Chris Johnson hit a grand slam, first of his ML career and

oops, wrong team.

Where was I?

Oh yeah. Bud Norris was nails for 4 innings. Had trouble in the 5th – had to work around a 12 pitch walk to Nyjer Morgan for a grand total of 29 pitches, had a brief time out, came back for the 6th, got a flyout, a HBP, a FC leaving a man on second, eighty zillion pickoff throws to second, finally a flyout, then a blessed K. He looked exhausted and Bud hardly ever looks exhausted.

He hit for himself, bottom of the 6th, leading 3-0, which surprised me, then, to my shock, he was back out for the 7th. I guess I can’t really throw stones at Millsie-poo seeing as how our bullpen is not only awful, but really abused with his leftyrighty matchup obsession thingy.He walks Lucroy on a 3-2. Takes him like 5 minutes for the entire AB. But Millsie-poo leavies him in and Nyjer Eff Morgan hits a hanging slider into the RF bullpen. You give up a homer to Nyjer Morgan, honey it is time to GO.

I see Coco Cordero is the only one warming up. I feel sick. I don’t know whether or not Mills WANTS to use him or whether he was ORDERED to use him. But Bud is left in, gives up a double to the RF bullpen and then is yanked.

Cordero comes in. FB barely reaches 91 and he can’t control it well. He gets lucky with a bunt pop. Then a chop single that Scott Moore can’t get, then run comes in and Bud Norris doesn’t win again. BS number 3 for Cordero in 5 games. Another single. Another single. Then a double steal. Millsie-poo out. Then an IBB. Then a blessed GIDP – just as well because it’s Rhiner Cruz in the pen.

Crew 4 Stros 3

Only good thing is that the Crew bullpen is as bad as ours and for some reason, Jonathan Axford has fallen to pieces somehow.

8th inning is a giant fustercluck. Livan Hernandez, who the Braves DFAd a few weeks back, is out. I had heard that since Frankie Rodriguez was sucking as badly as Loe and Axford, that he’s in line to close. Oh man, how the mighty have fallen. Altuve singles, Marwin sac-bunts him over. Way to go, give up the out. Pearce, hitting third (no I am not kidding) doubles him in. Brett Wallace Ks, Julio Daniel walks and Scott Moore flies out.

Tie game Stros 4 Crew 4

Coco back out. OH NOOOOOOOOOO. Sure enough, Lucroy immediately doubles. Millsie-poo pulls Coco to send in Xavier Cedeno, the lefty to face Nyjer Morgan. Who sac bunts right back to Xavier who throws it to third and Lucroy has LONG since beaten the throw. Oh no. Next batter hits one of those infield rollers, Cedeno gets it but not in tim to get Lucroy at home or anyone else. Oh jeez. Next batter is ex-Stro Cody Ransom and Cedeno throws him a FB right down the middle and there’s a 3 run upper deck 450′ homer.

Crew 8 Stros 4

Yeah, it woulda been 7-4 if Cedeno had gotten the out at first.

Stros get back 3 in the 9th, but with men on first and third, 2 out, Julio Daniel hits a ball into the 5.5 hole and SS Cesar Izturis makes the web gem of the week to get it and get Julio Daniel out by a hair at first. He really was out – watched the replay. Too bad he runs so slow.

This team is so BAD.

Tomorrow, Dallas Keuchel tries to pitch a complete game to beat Yovani Gallardo, who is haveing a very un-Yo like year. But I’m sure he’s really looking forward to facing us because he always kills the Astros.

The Brewers are leading the NL in homers, so Dallas better watch out.

I see that the Cubs have ditched Maholm and Reed – sent them to the Braves – wonder if they got a better haul from them than we did for Michael Bourn. Best I can tell, they’re getting rid of anyone on the team they can except for Anthony Rizzo and Jeff Samardizjia. Big market Cubs are going bargain basement?

Speaking of Ex-Stros, Roy Oswalt got absolutely KILLT today by Albert Pujols and the Angels. Roy’s career ERA is taking a serious beating this year. His back must be really bad.

Things are getting interesting. The Nolan Ryans are really short on pitchers because Colby Lewis is out for the year, Feliz and Ogando are out and Roy-O appears to be on his last legs – so to speak. They haven’t gone after any of the pitchers who have been traded and they don’t appear to have anyone anywheres near ready in the minors. Wonder if they are gonna try for Josh Johnson, seeing as how the Marlins, unsurprisingly, are quite openly reducing payroll already.

Crane supposedly said that the payroll next year will be 50+ million. 11 mill of that, of course, will be for Wandy. Next year, we will have exactly 3 players who are arb eligible – Lowrie, who won’t get much seeing as how he was out most of the season, Wesley Wright, who is a LOOGY, and Wilton Lopez. That’s IT. One of the reasons they got rid of CJ is that he’s arb eligible and probably would cost them a cool mill and a half next year. EVERY player will be getting ML minimum or slightly more. That’s not much more than 20 mill. Say 25 mill. Crane will be pocketing the rest or maybe pretending to pay off debt like billionaires do. The other 30 mill is gonna be spent on who? Free agents? You mean like some retread reliever who might cost a couple mill? Nobody who is any good is coming to Houston, that’s fer SHER.

Ah well, not that there will be all these fans protesting…

 

Tags: Houston Astros, Milwaukee Brewers

This entry was posted on Monday, July 30th, 2012 at 11:32 pm and is filed under Bud Norris. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.