anyone know why pettite came out? wasn't watching the game but following thru sportline and I thought he was doing pretty good , but yanked after 5 innings?
Pitch count reached 90... which was about the limit where they wanted to extend him today. If everything feels alright tommorow, that should be the end of the pitch count limits for him.
lol doesn't seem to be a good inning for us ahh.... yeah makes sense about limiting pettites pitch count what a game though thru 5 by andy though
Oh my god what was that?! Did you see how that ball bounced off the edge of the grass? Should easily have been the 2nd out. Routine grounder bounces awkwardly off the edge of the grass. EDIT: Well there is the 2nd out, should have been the 3rd. Oh well. Castillo up to bat, one more batter left.
Just when I was about to say how "boring" ninth innings are since we don't have Wagner... Great way to end it... good comeback by Lidge from yesterday (show's that he's mentally tough). We now have THREE guys who are solid 6th-7th inning pitchers (Harville, Backe, Miceli)... and that's one of the most important things to have on a winning ballclub.
I think the Bullpen is stronger this year than last. Does anyone else think that Lidge has better stuff than Wagner? DD
Biggio just passed Bobby Bonds for 4th place in lead off HR. Great win by the Astros. I got a little scared in the 8th inning. BUT WHAM! they slammed the doors shut. 8K's for Pettitte in 5 innings. Not bad, not bad at all. The Astros are 26-6 now against the Pirates at MMP.
Better stuff... probably. But that's balanced out by the fact that Wags is a lefty. If Wags was a righty, his stuff gets a little bit more neutralized. Lidge is awesome though... and I love all the other guys in this bullpen as well. Only dead-weight right now... Duckworth, and that's for when the game is REALLY out of hand.
Just got tickets to Wednesday's game. Look for a huge group of Little Leaguers in section 409. I'll be in there somewhere.
. ... Former President Bush and his wife, Barbara, were shown on the Jumbotron during a lively segment that encourages couples to kiss. They obliged, drawing wild applause. http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/recap?gameId=240504118 how cute Guess what, I'm going to the Clemens game, so my jinx is on maybe someone will consider paying me NOT to go ?
What do you think about Jimy's decision to let Lidge get the last 5 outs for the save? I thought it would be automatic that Dotel would come in, but I think it's great the Jimy went against the conventional bullpen strategy. There's no reason to waste Dotel's arm when you have a guy capable of closing it out already in the game. Lidge was more worthy of the save than Dotel would have been since he got out of the trouble in the 8th. That's a true fireman does: puts out fires. Good to see Brad rewarded for his good job in the 8th. And Miceli has been great. Tonight was the first outing I can think of where he hasn't been very sharp, but everybody is due one of those outings every now and then. The Astros bullpen is strong enough to keep thing under control, though. And as for Lidge and Dotel both giving up dingers the night before, I bet we don't see that occurance more once or twice this season.
The paper today said Dotel has pitched in 3 of the last 5 games, and warmed up in the bullpen for all five. Williams gave him the night off.
Ahh, I see. The CBS Sportsline Game Center showed Dotel warming up in the bullpen, though. I don't know how accurate that is.
Roger going for the 6-0 start! How sweet is that! 6 more strike outs and he moves into 2nd place in the all time strike outs behind Nolan.
