Astros 6 Blue Jays 4
WP Fields (2-0)
LP Loup (1-2)
S Qualls (4)
contributed by Mr. Happy
Buttressed by a 3-4 night from Preston Tucker and another 2.2 frames of scoreless relief from the bully, the Good Guys bested Toronto 6-4 before 15,777 last night at MMPUS. While the home nine didn’t reach the seats last night, they doubled their pleasure all night with two-baggers. Indeed, five of the eight Astro hits were doubles. Eight and nine in the order was 4-7 with three doubles and three ribbies. Loup was pretty bad last night, not only blowing a save but getting hung with the big L. He didn’t retire any of the four hitters he faced in the seventh inning.
How long will the Hinchman continue to stick with K’ing Chris Carter? He’s so lost that he doesn’t know where he is lost from. Will the Astros continue to play batting average limbo with Carter? He’s at .150 now. How low can it go?
Carmonandez pitched about as well as he can last night (six hits and four earnies). He got off to a rough start in the top of the first frame when both Joey Bats and Edwin Encarnacion took him way out of the yard. About the best you can say about his pitching performance last night was that he ate up 6.1 innings. If, and this is a big if, the Astros can indeed contend in 2015, I don’t think that it will be Carmonandez who pitches in that four all year. I know that young phenom Lance McCullers, Jr. was just moved up to Fresno. I’ll be watching his starts there with great interest, because he could be in the equation in August or September.
Despite scoring six runs, which has been difficult lately, the hitters really didn’t have a very good night. Collectively, the Astros were only 8-31. The only two players who had multi-hit games were the Piranha (big surprise-who also had two stolen bags) and Tucker. Strikeouts continue to plague the Good Guys, as they collected 13 more last night. Marisnick, who’s been very cold lately, earned a golden sombrero in the leadoff spot. However, for all of their shortcomings at the dish, the Astros continue to shine in the field. The club again had no errors, and the infield notched three twin killings. The pitcher’s best friend indeed.
All in all, it’s another W, but I really like it because it was another come-from-behind win. I just don’t think that the ball club would have won this type of game even a year ago. Let’s hope that they keep winning.