Finally. He had gone 120 at bats or so without a homerun. What a way to do it to. Hitting a homerun at Fenway over the green monster had to be a childhood dream of his. Congrats Bags!
Someone needs to explain to Merced that in order to not get struck out, you have to take the bat off your shoulder. Dude just saw six pitches and didn't swing at one.
Defense has been hurting us lately. We have given up some devastating unearned runs and close to unearned runs (ie not turning double play). This was a great place for Bags to break out of his slump. Come on Miller let's salvage a tough East coast trip.
That error wasn't Bagwell's fault. I don't know why shading the ball is legal. For those that didn't see the game, an easy grounder was hit to Bagwell that should have ended the inning. Garciaparra, who was on first did the base running trick where you start running and then stop for a second between the ball and the defensive player. Bagwell lost the ball and it ended up bouncing off his throwing hand. Ended up costing us the four runs we lost by. Why it's legal to do that completely baffles me. Pitchers can't trick the base runners, hence the balk rule, so why can runners trick the position players? I've never understood that.
I thought the plethora of bad pitching after the error cost the 'stros four runs. Bags has picked up his pitchers - and infielders - for years. The pitchers should have picked him up right there. Then, maybe the 'stros win. Maybe.
Man, our batters are doing all they can on the offensive end, but they are losing it on the defensive side. Saarloose only gave up 2 earned runs yesterday, but had 6 runs on the score board for the Sox because of defensive mistakes again, and so he got a loss for a good showing.
Redding got the loss, giving up 6 runs, but only 2 earned. What in the hell does Ensburg have to do to get in the lineup?
Once again, Bagwell proves that I'd rather have my 7 year-old niece at bat in a pressure situation this year than him. Ugh.
OK, top of the ninth, runner at 2nd, 2 outs, tie game, Bagwell up. Is there any doubt on what will happen? I say we pinch hit Ensberg.
Octavio Dotel is a magician. 2nd and 3rd, 1 out. He walks Todd Walker, gets Nomah to pop up, and Manny to ground out. Bagwell just looks bad at the plate...he's hurting us hitting like his in the heart of our lineup. Edit: Bagwell gets hit, and Kent promptly gets the GIDP. Lance flies out. Why can we never get Bagwell, Kent, Berkman, and Hidago all hitting decently?
Despite Bagwell's best efforts to lose the game for us, Dotel sacks up and gets Nomah and Manny out with the bases loaded.
Rm95- double play ball by Kent. Bags might as well have been picked off. Man, we need some starting pitching to take this load off of our bullpen. Our bullpen can match anyone's, but we can't expect them to be dominant all the time. Imagine if we had some starters going 7 innings consistently. More Lidge, Dotel, and Wagner. Less of anything else. I'd still like Weaver. Even if he's up and down, guy eats innings like no other. Nice play by Bidge, and rock solid pitching from Bland.
