Wednesday, April 23, 2008
Astros 9
Dickities 3
W: Sampson (1-2) | L: Arroyo (0-3)
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The hometown nine kept the scoring machine humming right along, putting a deep hurt on the Redlegs for their 4th straight win.
The scoring opened in the bottom of the 1st when the Red Messiah pirouetted one out to deep right for a 1-0 lead. It could have been more, but Hairston‘s single had already been erased by the first of Keppinger‘s GIDPs. Sampson got the swinging K on Phillips to end the inning, officially making tonight more successful than his previous outing, by a factor of roughly infinity. Everything else was gravy from there.
The top of the 2nd got off to a rollicking start, as Flapjack and Beaker opened with back-to-back doubles, tying it up at 1 each. Loretta – in for Blum because he rakes Arroyo – followed with a single to plate Pence for the lead, and moved to second on another single by Towles. But after Sampson moved both up on a sac bunt, the rally died off with a pair of ponches from Kaz and Erstad.
The next inning and a half went quickly, with the lone highlight being a sparkling 5-4-3 DP started by a charging Loretta, and turned lightning-quick by Kaz at the pivot. It was Keppinger’s 2nd GIDP in as many at-bats, and kept the tying run from crossing the dish in the form of Ross, who was on 3rd.
Gunther led off the 4th with a walk, and Loretta just missed a smokey off the top of the wall in left, putting them 2nd and 3rd with no one out. The rally found itself on life support quickly, though, as Towles and Sampson earned a pair of K’s, bring Matsui up with 2 down.
Then, the wheels came flying off the Bronson Arroyo Crapwagon in spectacular fashion. Kaz knocked the first pitch into right for a 2-run single, putting the Good Guys ahead, 4-1. Erstad pushed him to third with a single up the middle, before the Torpedo Boat plated him with a solid line single to left to make it 5-1, runners at 1st and 3rd, still 2 outs.
After working into a 3-1 count, Twinkie hammered a single in front of Junior to make it 6-1, and smoke started rising from the carousel. Dusty had finally seen enough, and turned to Lincoln to mop up the mess, while Arroyo left to a rain of boos that had been steadily building for the 3 batters prior. They’ve never forgiven him for the cornrows, I guess.
El Kabong greeted Lincoln with a double, scoring Tejada (7-1), and moving Berkman to third. Having now batted around, Thunderpants stepped in and dribbled a swinging bunt back to the mound for an infield hit to score Maybelline. Lincoln, rushing the throw, fired it off into no man’s land, allowing Tejada to score, too, bringing the damage to 9-1. Mercifully, Loretta finally ended the 2-out rally with a flyout to right that Junior barely snagged on the run, and the Redlegs got busy mailing it in the rest of the way. Friends, when it takes 4 paragraphs to describe a half inning, things are going well.
Sampson was efficient and solid the rest of the way, stretching it to 7 full innings, giving up just 1 more run as he started to tire in his last frame. Wesley Wright worked a scoreless 8th, and the Dickities picked up one last garbage-time run in the 9th from an Encarnacion pat off of Geary.
The whole thing starts again at some ungodly hour of the morning tomorrow, so put on a pot of coffee and get excited that you’re at work instead of staring at the crime against humanity they call a centerfield berm at the Tammy Faye Baker Great American Paddle Wheel And Smokestack Extravaganza. See you in the GZ, where the views always nice, or at least better than cartoonish riverboat bullshit silhouetted against a backdrop of Kentucky.