Tuesday, April 27, 2004
SAVING SANITY
Q: If Meche is totally off, throws 40 pitches in the first, and gets yanked early, how do the Mariners win?
A: The other starting pitcher sucks too!
For all of the struggles Gil Meche had tonight, he somehow only gave up two runs. Matt Riley was less-than-spectacular as well, though two of his runs scored with Rodrigo Lopez on the mound in the Mariners 4-run 4th, which got them a 5-2 lead.
I was at the Tav here in Ellensburg watching this all happen over a Super Mother burger with fries. In the time I was in there, the Mariners managed to build themselves a 5-2 lead, and then blow said lead as Julio Mateo got lit up some.
Try as they might to lose this game (and boy did they ever in the Oriole 8th), the Mariners pulled this game out. It looked bad in the 8th when Ron Villone let the first two runners aboard (including walking the 9 hitter) with the Mora/Tejada/Palmeiro coming to the plate. But the Mariners just had their bit of luck tonight. Hasegawa and Myers aren't going to slice through these three hitters every time out (I think Tejada is 7-for-13 against Hasegawa and now Palmeiro is 4-for-11 against Myers), but they did tonight. Well, Guardado had to get that final out because Tejada wasn't really sliced through as much as nailed by Hasegawa (what was up with Tejada getting plunked twice tonight?).
I wasn't into this game quite as much as the others, and hell, I probably needed a break from the all-outitude of the crazy-long recaps. But I still don't know what the hell the roles are in the bullpen, though I think Mateo might be a righty long man, and Ron Villone may or may not be the lefty long man. This might change in a week, though.
Gameball: John Olerud. 3-for-5 on a night when every Mariner who stepped to the plate got a hit. He raised his average to .254.
Goat: Gil Meche. I usually don't try to pick an easy or obvious goat or gameball, but I wasn't fully into the game tonight. What I do know is that though Meche kept it close in the early innings somehow and in a sense gave the Mariners a chance to win, this bullpen may be jacked for the rest of this series. Matt Thornton is the only arm in the pen that wasn't used tonight, and that doesn't bode well when Freddy Garcia is the only one in the rotation right now that won't surprise anyone if he goes seven innings. With the other four, it's hit or miss so far this season, and Moyer's had one good outing this year (the rest being crap). Moyer goes tomorrow. I'll keep bringing this up until/if Moyer comes back around again: is he getting burned by QuesTec???????
Before I end this horribly disjointed recap, did anyone catch Francisco Cordero and the Rangers getting out of that bases-juiced-with-nobody-out situation in the bottom of the 9th? Al Soriano made two nice plays, going home on a grounder for the first out, then starting a 4-3 double play to end it. Wow.
Moyer. Ainsworth. Tomorrow.
[Edit Wed ~5:15a -- it occurred to me this morning that my method of usage for the word "jacked" probably isn't very universal. Some people may have had trouble associating the use of the word with the context of the rest of the paragraph. My usage of "jacked" is meant to mean "messed up" rather than "amped up" or "hyped up" or "more than ready for what's coming next." Yes, with the twisted and weird street lingo that I grew up around (I'm a scrappy boy from the Bremerton "ghetto"), "jacked" can mean something bad. To anyone that couldn't match "jacked" with the rest of that paragraph, I can see how you did, as the inspiration to right the wrong hit me early this Wednesday morning.]
A: The other starting pitcher sucks too!
For all of the struggles Gil Meche had tonight, he somehow only gave up two runs. Matt Riley was less-than-spectacular as well, though two of his runs scored with Rodrigo Lopez on the mound in the Mariners 4-run 4th, which got them a 5-2 lead.
I was at the Tav here in Ellensburg watching this all happen over a Super Mother burger with fries. In the time I was in there, the Mariners managed to build themselves a 5-2 lead, and then blow said lead as Julio Mateo got lit up some.
Try as they might to lose this game (and boy did they ever in the Oriole 8th), the Mariners pulled this game out. It looked bad in the 8th when Ron Villone let the first two runners aboard (including walking the 9 hitter) with the Mora/Tejada/Palmeiro coming to the plate. But the Mariners just had their bit of luck tonight. Hasegawa and Myers aren't going to slice through these three hitters every time out (I think Tejada is 7-for-13 against Hasegawa and now Palmeiro is 4-for-11 against Myers), but they did tonight. Well, Guardado had to get that final out because Tejada wasn't really sliced through as much as nailed by Hasegawa (what was up with Tejada getting plunked twice tonight?).
I wasn't into this game quite as much as the others, and hell, I probably needed a break from the all-outitude of the crazy-long recaps. But I still don't know what the hell the roles are in the bullpen, though I think Mateo might be a righty long man, and Ron Villone may or may not be the lefty long man. This might change in a week, though.
Gameball: John Olerud. 3-for-5 on a night when every Mariner who stepped to the plate got a hit. He raised his average to .254.
Goat: Gil Meche. I usually don't try to pick an easy or obvious goat or gameball, but I wasn't fully into the game tonight. What I do know is that though Meche kept it close in the early innings somehow and in a sense gave the Mariners a chance to win, this bullpen may be jacked for the rest of this series. Matt Thornton is the only arm in the pen that wasn't used tonight, and that doesn't bode well when Freddy Garcia is the only one in the rotation right now that won't surprise anyone if he goes seven innings. With the other four, it's hit or miss so far this season, and Moyer's had one good outing this year (the rest being crap). Moyer goes tomorrow. I'll keep bringing this up until/if Moyer comes back around again: is he getting burned by QuesTec???????
Before I end this horribly disjointed recap, did anyone catch Francisco Cordero and the Rangers getting out of that bases-juiced-with-nobody-out situation in the bottom of the 9th? Al Soriano made two nice plays, going home on a grounder for the first out, then starting a 4-3 double play to end it. Wow.
Moyer. Ainsworth. Tomorrow.
[Edit Wed ~5:15a -- it occurred to me this morning that my method of usage for the word "jacked" probably isn't very universal. Some people may have had trouble associating the use of the word with the context of the rest of the paragraph. My usage of "jacked" is meant to mean "messed up" rather than "amped up" or "hyped up" or "more than ready for what's coming next." Yes, with the twisted and weird street lingo that I grew up around (I'm a scrappy boy from the Bremerton "ghetto"), "jacked" can mean something bad. To anyone that couldn't match "jacked" with the rest of that paragraph, I can see how you did, as the inspiration to right the wrong hit me early this Wednesday morning.]
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