Ok, so they weren’t the WHOLE story. But hey, they ALL need a little stroking.
From the very beginning of the game, Wandy didn’t look very good. The ump had a strike zone the size of a postage stamp (except for Mo Ensberg’s K in the 7th) and Wandy had to fight like heck. The only called strikes he got were in the middle of the plate.

He had a little bit of bad luck – 2 doubles immediately down the lines – one down the LF line that Mo missed and one down the RF line that Lance missed and both of those caused trouble. He walked 2, struck out 3 and the only really well hit ball was Griffey’s homer in the 5th. Wandy can’t win when he pitches great, and at least he got a ND for this lousy performance – 5 ER in 5 IP.

As for the bats – gotta give props to Hunter Pence for some VERY heads up baserunning – he noticed that it was taking Adam Dunn a LONGGG time to come up with the ball he hit into the LF corner and Pence didn’t stop running until he was on third. Then, when Encarnacion forgot to check him back to third before throwing out Everett on his grounder, and Pence ran for home the second the ball left Encarnacion’s hand. I haven’t been real too particularly impressed with Pence so far, but I sure was today.

Biggio went 1/4 and now has 2962 hits, 28th all time. Now only Sam Crawford – 2987 – stands between Biggio and 3000.

- Lance, walked, hit a single and hit an opposite field 2 run homer in the 7th.
- Carlos Lee suddenly remembered that he is supposed to hit for power and hit a 2 run homer in the first.
- Jason Lane went 2/4 and drove in a run and made 2 EXCELLENT diving catches. His fielding is incredibly better than it was the last 2 years – at least to my eyes.
- Mo Ensberg got totally screwed getting called out on ball 4 in the 7th even though he†struck out fair and square in the first, hit 2 balls squarely for 2 outs and hit the game winning RBI in the 8th. HEH!!!
- And lets not forget that Luke Scott was able to score that game winning run because he stole a base – got a great jump and even Yadi Molina wouldn’t have thrown him out.

Funny, I didn’t hear him tell the reporters – gee, I know I hit the game winner, but I am just soooooooo upset about missing that walk in the 7th.

Brad Lidge pitched to Ryan Freel in the 6th, striking him out and earning the W. I was pretty surprised that he didn’t come back out for the 7th, but Borkowski, who was very shaky pitched†0.2 inning, giving up a hit and a walk – AND had his butt saved by Lane’s Web Gem catch, and then Miller struck out Dunn to end the inning.

Qualls pitched a 1,2,3 8th.

Dan Wheeler gave up a homer AGAIN tonight, but fortunately it was a solo job. He’s been looking a little shaky, but has managed to gived up one less run than the opposition, so he’s saving games. So far so good – I’m not complaining, not at ALL.

Woody is pitching tomorrow – like Wandy, he’s winless. I sure hope the guys keep hitting as well as they did today and get him a W.

Tags: Cincinnati Reds, Houston Astros

This entry was posted on Tuesday, May 8th, 2007 at 8:33 pm and is filed under Adam Everett, Hunter Pence, Morgan Ensberg, Wandy Rodriguez. 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.