Marlins at Astros, 4/16/07
Score: Astros 4, Sushi 3
W: Chad Qualls (2-1) L: K. Gregg (0-1)
Homeruns: No, but Hanley Ramirez was SURE he’d get one
March to 3000: 2,942 (2×4, 2 2b, SAC)
Read Alyson’s Report Here: Footer
Or the AP recap here: Yahoo!
It did not take long to figure out that this would not be a pristine game. Two pitches in, Ramirez smacks one off the BMC software sign, but just below the yellow line. Burke, displaying the innate fielding instincts we’ve come so quickly to know and love, goes all the way to the wall, while El Caballo just sort of stands there snorting at it. The ball caroms back towards RCF, with Burke giving chase. At this point, Ramirez is getting greedy, to the point he runs the stop sign at third. And I don’t mean your run of the mill, Houston driver, “it’s not really red until 5 seconds in”, type of run the stop sign; his own 3b coach damn near tackled him to stop him. Burke managed to hit the cutoff man, and Ausmus applied the “ole” tag for the game’s first out.
From there, it was like watching two tightrope walkers that you knew had done a couple of tequila shots; the only question was who would fall first. Wandy got some good double-play help; Anibal was able to dance around just about every leadoff man reaching, until the 4th, when Ausmus was able to plate Ensberg on a SF to center. Florida quickly matched with a run in the top of the frame on… well, I don’t know quite how to do justice to the double that Burke dove at. A sampling from GZ’s link below will give you the general flavor, including pravata’s summary that he has “seen tropical fish that play a better centerfield than Burke.”
Loretta, getting the start at SS on this night to freshen his bat, plated 2 on a 2-out single in the 6th. Let the record reflect that Biggio had a “productive out” prior to this, moving the runners over on a grounder to first that had no chance at a DP.
Then things got weird.
The Captain announced that Ty Webb was celebrating a birthday at the evening’s game, which to no one’s surprise, was quickly relayed into the GZ (credit to Bench on this one, beating out LonghornCDR). Rick White was gettin’ busy, giving up the tying runs while Caddyshack quotes rolled out like it was a Sports Guy column. Unbelievably, this entire episode passed without one demand to have the entire TZ “scrubbed, sterilized and disinfected!”
Houston’s bats stayed silent in the 7th and 8th, with Qualls showing more effective work on 5 straight outs. The rally in the bottom frame featured back-to-back walks by Loretta and Berkman, and a Lee single that was misplayed by Borchard (in a nice piece of foreshadowing) after Loretta already had the stop sign. Ensberg strode to the plate, confident that his customary walk would do the job. After a pop foul down the right side was dropped on a Borchard-Jacobs collision, Mo slapped one past the shortstop for the winner.
Astros go for the 2-game sweep tonight with Roy pitching on short rest. I can’t guarantee this, but I have a pretty good feeling that the first person who drops a Caddyshack 2 quote in the GZ will be forced by Spack to watch that affront to Western civilization, Clockwork Orange-style.
Read the annotated script to Caddyshack in the GameZone: [url”>http://www.orangewhoopass.com/forums/index.php?topic=101660.0
Discuss in the TalkZone: [url”>http://www.orangewhoopass.com/forums/index.php?board=1.0