The Edifice of Greed Turner Field
After taking 2 out of 3 from the goddamn Reds, the Good Guys are off to WhiteTrashville (population 3,000,000 toothless inbred yokels, and that just covers the Chipper Jones Fan Club).
I hate a lot of teams, but there’s a special place in my cold black heart just for the Braves. I can’t see that stupid logo without thinking of “strikes” 3 inches off the outside corner, The Mongoliod Hitting Machine (Seriously, what grown man wants to be called Chipper?!), or years and years of playoff domination before the Astros finally broke through.* Fuck, I hate the Braves.
Friday, May 1, 6:30 p.m. CDT – FSN
Saturday, May 2, 2:30 p.m. CDT – FOX
Sunday, May 3, 12:30 p.m. CDT – My20
Projected Matchups from Astros.com
Friday
Mike Hampton (1-1, 3.86) v Derek Lowe (2-1, 3.10)
Hampton checked in with a pretty blah outing against the Brew Crew his last time through the rotation, giving up 4 earnies through six innings. He struck out 4, walked 3, and was cruising in the 6th when he gave up a big fly to Bill Hall that tied the game. The bullpen went on to completely shit the bed, as Valverde inexplicably threw Prince Fielder an 0-2 fastball up that Big Tubby promptly deposited in right field. Fast Forward a few innings, and the Good Guys lost. Thanks Gerry.
Hampton has only seen a few of the Braves at all. Chipper Jones (19-50, 18 singles and one home run) and Garrett Anderson (3-4, all singles) are the only guys that have had any success against him. David Ross (1-6) and Omar Infante (0-3) are the only other people that have ever faced Hampy, and clearly they suck.
Lowe is off to a pretty good start this year. He’s had one bad outing, giving up 4 runs over 5 innings against the Fish. Other than that, he’s been business as usual, getting more groundouts than flyouts (49/37) and keeping his team in the game. His last start was a doozy, 8 innings and only gave up 2 hits.
The Good Guys knock Derek around pretty good, posting a team batting average of .302 against him. Miggy (10-33) and Kabong (30-11) both have taken him deep twice, Erstad (9-24) has hit 4 doubles off him, Geoff (8-25) and Twinkie (6-20) both have taken him deep as well, and Kaz (5-11) sports a gaudy .455 average. Jason Smith (0-8) sucks against him and Pudge (5-22) has scuffled some. Everyone else has miniscule numbers of at bats against him (see Bourn and Pence, both 1 for 3).
Saturday
Roy Oswalt (0-2, 3.94) v. Jair Jurrjens (2-2, 1.72)
Roy continues to make Astros fans throw shit at their TVs, Oswalt Inninging away any lead that the offense stakes him to. He had a great outing against the Reds, giving up one run in seven innings of work. He only struck out 2, but the dominant Oswalt at least peeked his head out of the hole he’s been hiding in.
Apparently the Braves roster has mostly cycled over, as only 3 of their guys have ever faced RoyO. Chipper Jones (3-13, 3 K), David Ross (1-4), and Greg Norton (0-1) all have faced him, and all have sucked.
Jair Jurrjens parents must have hated him. What a horrible name. He sounds like something a teenage boy’s mother wouldn’t be thrilled to find on her son’s bedstand next to a wadded up Kleenex. And, judging by this picture, Jair is that teenage boy. What, too much? Anyway, Jair has somehow managed to lose two of his starts despite giving up less than 2 runs a game, a 3-0 shutout at the hands of the Pirates and a 3-2 thriller against the Redbirds in his last start.
Current Astros are a whopping 1 for 2 against him. Jason Smith has the only hit. We’re doomed. DOOOOOOOOOOOOOMED!
Sunday
Wandy Rodriguez (2-2, 1.69) v. Jo-Jo Reyes (0-1, 4.26)
Wandy has been nothing short of awesome so far this year. When his curve is on, he’s a strikeout machine. When his curve isn’t sharp, he’s still finding ways to get outs. Against the Reds in his last start, Wandy was nothing short of brilliant, giving up just 1 earned run over 7 innings of work while striking 5 and walking only 2.
And now the bad news… Current Braves (21-64 for a .328 average with a .983 OPS)rip Wandy like the Talk Zone rips Bizidy and his extended pinky. I won’t get in to the details because this needs to be done before the game starts, and writing out 3/4 of the Braves roster will take for-damn-ever. Slacker Jones (4-7, 2 dongs), Yunel Escobar (3-6), and Brian Barton (2-3) are the ones that I’d be watching out for the most though.
Fuck Jo-Jo Reyes. A grown man named Jo-Jo gets NO love from me. Attention Jo-Jo, Joseph and Albert are BOTH acceptable names for adults. Jo-Jo is your kid sister’s name, not yours.
Current Astros crush Joseph Albert in small samplings. Carlos Lee (3-7), Miguel Tejada (1-2), and Jeff Keppinger (4-7) all knock him around good, again in small sample size. Fat Elvis (1-8), PENCE!!! (1-5), and Towles (0-2) all suck against him, say it with me now, in a small sample size.
Notable giveaways this series…
Sunday is “Bark in the Park” day, whatever the fuck that means. Kids run the bases too. Yee-fuckin-haw. That’s it. Nothing at all being given away this weekend. And people think Drayton is cheap…
Injury Report
So, in case you didn’t notice, MLB.com went to a new format for their injury report. The injury link takes you to a page with every team’s report on it. Pretty snazzy, until one notices that it says “Fantasy Baseball” at the top of it. Fuckers. (repeated from last week because, hey, its true.
HOU –
Aaron Boone is still on the DL with a broken heart, and probably won’t be playing at any point this season/ever again.
Brandon Backe is rehabbing in AAA right now with the Express.
Brian Moehler got shelled in Midland starting for the Hooks the other night in a rehab start.
Q is on the 15 day DL after an intense makeout session with Mike Cameron near home plate ended in disaster when he developed a sore shoulder.
El Papa Grande is on the DL with an exploded calf muscle. He can come off the DL on May 12th, but I’m not holding my breath on that after hearing they drained 15 gallons of fluid from his calf the other day. Gross.
ATL –
Garrett Anderson is on the 15 day DL with a strained quad following a ballroom dancing incident gone horribly wrong. He is scheduled to be back around May 5th.
Jorge Campillo is on the 15 day DL with tendonitis in his right shoulder, and… wait. Who the fuck is Jorge Campillo?
Tom “Snivelling Woman #2” Glavine is on the 15 day DL with an inflamed rotator cuff after throwing his arms up in frustration after not getting a strike-call on a pitch 2 feet off the outside corner.
Tim Hudson is on the 60 day DL after not using enough Jair Jurrjens while flogging the dolphin and tearing a ligament in his elbow. He’s not due back any time soon.
Brian McCann is on the 15 day DL after being too close to Hudson during the above described incident and being hit by the “splashback” in his left eye. They expect the infection to heal up in the next week or two, and Brian has said repeatedly that he’ll always wear protection from here on out while “catching” for Glavine.
Our Interesting Things To Look For
All this and more on this weekend’s… SERIES PREVIEW!
Discuss today’s game in the GameZone.
*You thought I was going to talk about Walt Weiss, didn’t you? Well, I won’t. Except for right now… Fuck.