Sunday, August 2, 2009
Astros 2
Godless, mother-humping Cardinals 0
W: David S. “Bud” Norris (1-0, 0.90)
L: Adam Wainwright (12-7, 2.79)
S: Jose Valverde (12 saves, 2.70)
A: 45,227
Astros.com Recap
Bud Norris won hisself a game, and the Astros got back on the airplane after losing an assload of road games, 3 games in the standings, and most of their manhood.
It would be remarkably lazy to go with the whole “This Bud’s for you” angle on Bud Norris’ first major league start during which he gathered his first major league win (not to mention his first major league hit). I will leave that to ESPN. If Norris is as good as he was in his first start going forward, you can expect a lot of beer references.
The only thing that should be said is that the south doesn’t have the market cornered on rednecks. “Bud” is proof that there are plenty of Dukes of Hazzard fans in Cali, as well.
Norris was great, taking advantage of the Cardinals lack of familarity, limiting the heathens to 2 hits over 7 innings. I’m going to go ahead and say that was mostly him, because he no-hit the Cards into the 6th inning of Sunday’s game. But I’ll be damned if the LaRussa’s charges didn’t look just like the Astros usually do when facing a new pitcher. Either way, he came up big in key spots (the key spots existed because Norris walked 4 Turdinals) and the bullpen held up, despite Cooper’s use of 38 pitchers to get the final 6 outs. Guess what? Wes Wright? He can pitch to right handed hitters, too.
The offense continued to show just how inept they can be without Lance Berkman in the lineup. Houston collected 8 hits and managed to leave 7 men on base. They also took exactly zero (0) walks, showing little patience or understanding of what exactly a strike zone is. Curiously, the Cooper moved the slumping Hunter Pence into the 3rd spot in the order. Pence whose average had dropped to .290 (his lowest since April 17th) responded with 2 hits. Great job, Cecil.
Michael Bourn and Miguel Tejada collected the two RBI that made the difference for Norris.
And because this is better than anything I could ever write…even if I was Jack Sutherford…
Jackastros has mad MS Paint skilz.