While this game didn’t have the thrill of a grand slam or the ludicrous athleticism of a Major Leaguesque play at the plate, a shut out has its’ own type of charm.
Ty Wigginton homered in the 2nd, putting forth the question, “why ain’t I starting?”. It was the only run the Astros pitching onslaught would need.
Wolf pitched his first home game. Right off, in the first, he faced Delgado with 2 on and 2 outs. A swing at a slider away got the strike out. He recorded all his outs on 7 ks or heart stopping fly balls, he got zero outs on groundballs. In the 4th , a walk, a solid single and an hbp loaded the bases with but one out. Wolf’s wily arsenal of bp fastballs and slippery offspeed stuff got him out of the jam striking out the bottom of the Mets’ order. He escaped another bases loaded situation in the 5th, inducing Tatis to fly out to the biggest part of the ballpark. It is not as easy as it looked.
Sampson came on for the 6th and promptly got groundballs, in succession to 3rd, short, and 2nd, putting the infielders on notice that they were back in the game. The relievers, Sampson (2 innings), Wright, Brocail and Valverde put a cap on 13 shut out innings from the relievers for the series.
The Astros put up 3 extraneous runs in the 4th. Doubles by Wigginton, Pence and Quintero produced the scoring. Potential scoring opportunities were lost in the 2nd, Pence smacked a fly off the left field wall and went into a premature homerun trot. He tried to pick it back up and was thrown out trying for the double. If any of the vets called him on the skylarking play, they also had to call Carlos on the exact same play to start the 6th. I doubt they did.