I’m in full blog, baseball, writing, putting off my homework mode. I keep flipping through the games on mlb.tv and watching guys hit/throw anything. Came away with some stuff.
James Shields: 9.0 IP, 4 hits, 1 ER, 9 K’s and a walk. I watched the 9th and he looked really good: had the curveball breaking exactly where he wanted it, had the fastball up to 94 mph, and had his really good changeup as always.
Roy Halladay: 6.2 IP, 10 hits, 6 ER, 3 K’s and 2 walks. Halladay did not have his best stuff (I watched some of his 7th inning) but did not pitch as poorly as his line would indicate. Halladay left the game in the 7th with two guys on and both wound up scoring. Not his best performance but, the line could have looked a ton prettier.
Wilson Betemit has an 11 game hit streak and a career high 3 SB. Is this finally his year? He’s never had a full time role: his most AB’s in a season was his 2006 campaign with Atlanta when he had 416. Given an everyday job, Betemit can hit over 20 HR.
Mark Trumbo hit a ball really far in Texas.
A.J. Burnett was left out there too long by manager Joe Girardi. In his sixth inning it was painfully obvious he was tired. He walked two, gave up two hard hits, and threw a wild pitch. The only reason the game did not get out of hand at this point is because David Robertson has really good stuff out of the pen. Hindsight is 20/20 but foresight wins games.
Bruce Chen pitched 20.1 consecutive scoreless innings before a couple of hard hit balls in the 7th last night. I feel like Chen does that a lot. He goes on these scoreless streaks and then streaks where he’s really bad.
Dan Uggla’s uniform in Atlanta looks tighter every time I see it. Other note: Uggla means owl in Sweedish. Seriously.
Matt Kemp was intentionally walked in the first inning. R-e-s-p-e-c-t. The guy has been the best player in the game through the first 16ish games (1.5 WAR). Who knows if that continues?
Total US Debt: $14,309,159,097,877.65. Hey, didn’t say all observations would be baseball.
Cole Hamels real name: Colbert Michael Hamels. Is he related to Colbert, Stephen?
Stat of the Day: Shaquille O’neil’s rap album Shaq Diesel, sold 1,000,000 copies in the 4 months after its release. Gotta love this country.
-Sean Morash
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