FUCK THA MOTHAFUCKIN’ CUBS

Posted on August 13, 2012 by Dark Star in Featured, News, Series Previews

Houston Astros (38-78) vs Chicago Cubs (44-69)

August 13-15, 2012
Wrigley Field

CHICAGO (SnS) – Just another road series for the 2012 Houston Astros, in their season-long day’s journey into night. The only notable thing about this one is that it is in Chicago, specifically on the north side.

I hate to say I’ll miss the FTCubs after this year; but I will, in a way. The Astros have other spirited and even bitter rivalries, but the FTCubs were always reserved a special place in hell by some of us, I think because of the unique combination of a mostly bullshit, lackluster franchise, and a spectacularly offensive and dumbass fan base.

SCHEDULE
Monday – 7:05 CDT (FSH)
Tuesday – 7:05 CDT (FSH)
Wednesday – 1:20 CDT (FSH, WGN)

One of the greatest eruptions ever of SnS anti-Cub bile came from Rebel Jew (nee Joey Trum) several seasons ago. It was beautiful and very intricate. Me describing it would not do justice, so here’s an excerpt:

… loveable losers loveable losers loveable losers. there’s a certain personality flaw in certain people that just happens to be manifested in the concept of cub fan. it’s analogous to a recent article in the SF weekly about how retarted people are drawn to Huey Lewis and the News. there’s just something comforting about the cubs to certain personality-challenged individuals across our great nation. it’s not unlike the congregation of a joel osteen or that weird lady with the big hair, the cubs give the weak-willed among us a sense of empowerment. the cubs offer an excuse for the helpless idiocy demonstrated in the dumbfuck daily lives of so many. the cubs give an identity (even an outfit) to these people, a way of life through which they can feel special. the cubs offer an endlessly comforting message to its followers, “it’s okay if you’re an idiot. it’s alright if you’re a poser. we’re here to help you celebrate your meaninglessness. you may be a loser, but you’re loveable too.”

Go do a tour of the 2006 TZ Hall of Fame to read the rest of this masterpiece.

PROBABLE PITCHERS
Monday – Armondo Galarraga (0-2, 4.70) vs. Jeff “The Mullet” Samardzija (7-10, 4.21)
Tuesday – Lucas Harrell (9-8, 3.97) vs. Chris Volstad (0-8, 6.94)
Wednesday – Bud Norris (5-9, 4.93) vs. Justin Germano (1-2, 4.26)

Cubs series previews are always great place to find anti-Cubs venom, just about anytime. Here are a few several selected poisonous posts:

Ron Brand (May 21, 2012)

I hate the Cubs.

I should clarify that. I hate what the Cubs represent, the personification of the culture that celebrates losing. You can see the result anytime you scan the stands of a Cub home game – the men, bald, flabby, weak, most of them drunk and boorishly stupid; their women are ugly, demihuman breeding stock for a legion of ineffectual fools whose purpose in life is to throw all their available money at a towering god who eternally mewls and coughs for more sacrifice with no hope of reward.

I hate the Cubs, and their insipid fans. The people who aren’t strong enough to want to win, who have abandoned all hope and entered the domain of Suck for Suck’s sake. Those who applaud at the barest hint of mediocrity, who celebrate the nearness of victory but would spit out its sweetness at first taste for the familiar bitterness of Loss and the comforting blanket of darkness it provides.

Craig

(September 16, 2011) But these guys are still the Astros and I’ll still root for them to bitch-slap the stupid fucking Cubs. Because no matter where you are in the pecking order, there are some constant truths. Number One being … Fuck the Cubs.

(June 4, 2010) Which brings me to my main point, which is fuck the Cubs. They’re five games under .500 and won’t be going anywhere this year.

(September 14, 2008) Of all the idiotic bullshit moves dreamed up by Bud Selig, this one takes the urinal cake. The fucking pussified Cubs, who were so stoically brave during a tornado and lightning storm when they were behind in a game, wouldn’t get on a goddamn plane to Houston. So Selig tells Drayton McLane, “Hey I know, let’s you and him fight. At my house. I’ll sell tickets.”

Now Cecil Cooper and the Astros, many of whom are still without electricity at their own homes, where, you know, they might be needed, have to travel to Bud’s shitty suburb of Chicago and play a crucial “home” series in front of two fanbases that have a huge interest in seeing the Astros lose.

Jane Doe (April 11, 2011)

What is the difference between Wrigley Field and a cactus?
With a cactus, all the pricks are on the outside.

GreatBagwellsBeard (July 27, 2009)

I haven’t been this torn about a subject since realizing the Scarlett isn’t a good actress as much as she is a good whisperer. I love the city of Chicago almost as much as I hate the Cubs. The fucking Cubs. If they resided in a city that I despised (like Jacksonville), my hate would multiply and increase in power like motherfucking Voltron. As is, I’ve spent plenty of time in Chicago (even visiting Wrigley once), and I find the people to be friendly, the weather pleasantly brisk, the restaurants fantastic, and it tops the list of cities to which I’d move if Harris County is finally swept out to sea by a God angry at us for tolerating Joel Osteen’s pseudo-Christian pap. Still, I haven’t come to praise Chicago, but to bury the Cubs.

MRaup (June 8, 2009)

The Astros are starting to play some decent baseball. They’ve won a few series in a row, things are starting to look up as a few of the important bullpen parts are close to returning fairly soon, and there might just be a small light at the end of this early season tunnel… Or that light might just be the oncoming train full of drunken, shirtless cocksucker Cub fans on their way to Minute Maid to out-cheer, out-drunk, out-obnoxious, and out-asshole the Houston fans. It could be either one.

(July 18, 2008) … Hordes of Goddamn Cub fans all over Minute Maid Park, and me doing battle with every single one of the pasty faced douchebags that I hear chanting “Lets Go Cubbies” while slopping smuggled Old Style in a flask all over themselves …

(April 3, 2008) The Astros and Cubs are both slopping around at the bottom of the Central standings. Hopefully not a sign of things to come… Well, at least for the Astros. I hope the Cubs lose the rest of their games this year.

(September 11, 2007) The moral of this preview is… Fuck the Cubs.

Dark Star (May 18, 2008)

The Shit-head Cubbies – the favorite team of such luminaries as Warren Buffet, Bill Murray, Jim Belushi, Pat Sajak (I must say), and John Cusack, as well as George Will, Hillary Clinton, Dick Cheney, and many, many other similar nitwits, drunks, deluded freaks, and just plain losers …

(April 8, 2007) On Tuesday, the Puppies of North Chicago are giving away their version of a magnet schedule to the Wrigley faithful. I’m not sure why. The hard core Cub fans – which is to say the drunkest louts of all the drunken louts in the stands – don’t need a schedule. They are pulled to the park, rain or shine, win or lose, by a force they cannot understand or explain; a primal force, the same sort of thing that sends salmon backwards up a spillway, brings the swallows back to Capistrano each spring, and compels the lemmings to go ahead and jump headfirst off the cliff, en masse. All CubFan really needs is a big, square magnet he can stick on the ice box that says, “Every Fuckin’ Day!!”

Or, to quote the gifted soliloquist (and former Cub manager) Lee Elia, “Fuck those fuckin’ fans who come out here and say they’re Cub fans that are supposed to be behind you rippin’ every fuckin’ thing you do. . . The motherfuckers don’t even work. That’s why they’re out at the fuckin’ game. They oughta go out and get a fuckin’ job and find out what it’s like to go out and earn a fuckin’ living. Eighty-five percent of the fuckin’ world is working. The other fifteen percent come out here. A fuckin’ playground for the cocksuckers. . . ”

:sigh: Greatness like that just doesn’t come along every day, folks.

Taras Bulba (August 31, 2007)

Chicago is a mediocre 5-5 over their last ten games but appear to be feeling their oats and spouting off a lot of cocky drivel about being in a pennant race, etc. Perfect timing for the annual summer rite whereby the hopes and dreams of pathetic Cubs fans everywhere are brutally eviscerated by that mean ass son of a bitch, the God of Baseball, in the guise in the next three days of your Houston Astros. It’s coming a little late in the season, but nevertheless, it’s here. Allah, akhbar!

INJURIES
Houston
Chicago

One of my proudest achievements ever at AC/OWA/SnS was inspired by the FTCubs, back when the whole Fuck The Cubs thing was in its fullest flower. I wrote a take off of T.S. Eliot’s Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock, sometime late in the 2004 season. I called it the The Love Song of John Q. Cubfan and, though it is highly topical, I still have a fondness for it.

This was the season after the Cubs (and Steve Bartman) folded up against the Marlins in the NLCS. In 2004, the Cards had taken over 1^st place in the Central in early June, and led the rest of the way. The Astros and Cubs battled neck and neck for 2^nd place and what would be the Wild Card slot. Then there was an infamous 4-game series in late August at Wrigley. By that time, the FTCubs were still in 2^nd, but fading (and panicking), while the Astros, among others, were making a charge at them. The Cubs won the first game of the series without incident, but the Astros came back and stomped the Cubs 15-7 the next day. The Astros hit 5 HRs that game, and Lance Berkman and Roy Oswalt were hit by pitches, in retalition. The Astros won a close one on Saturday (Clemens beating Zambrano), more or less without incident. They won again on Sunday, 10-3 … by then the Cubs’ and manager Dusty Baker’s frustrations were showing, and a beanball war of sorts ensued. The highlights were Astros rookie reliever Dan Wheeler dotting the Cubs Derek Lee, and Cub reliever Mike Remlinger throwing at Berkman’s head, which emptied the benches. And so on. The Astros eventually left the Cubs in the dust that year, and won the Wild Card.

Anyway, it was against this backdrop that I composed the poem/parody.

The Love Song of John Q. Cubfan

Vous pouvez connerie le boulanger
Et obtenir les brioches
Que vous pouvez soutenir de chaque affaire
Excepté une

Let us go then, you and I,
When the evening is spread out against the sky
Like a Cub fan drunk and passed out in his seat;
Let us go, through certain Wrigleyville streets,
The muttering retreats
Of idiots who believe they’re cursed by goats
Who drink old fashioned beer that tastes like oats:
Streets that follow like a tedious interview
Of a whiny manager with a fucked-up world-view
That leads to an overwhelming question. . .
Oh, do not ask, “What the hell?”
Let us head for Wrigley on the El.

In the stands the vendors come and go
Selling their swill for six bucks a go.

The yellow journalists who just can’t rant enough
The yellow piss that makes the hands so tough
Get mixed together on some lost afternoon
When Sammy the rightfielder, who is a buffoon
Hops around like a bunny at the sight of a long, lazy drive
And gets gunned down at second by four feet or five,
And sensing another sign of the gods’ disdain
We order up another nasty brew to drain.

And indeed there will be time
For the wild card lead to disappear,
Onrushing giants and spacemen getting near;
There will be time, there will be time
To prepare to face the nagging fear;
There will be time to whine and moan,
For the umpires to conspire, the announcers to berate
As after another loss we head for home;
Time for beanballs and ejections,
Time for the sunshine to wear out the whiteys,
And time for Steve Stone to call us un-mighty,
As pointless as a lonely, Viagra-fueled erection.

In the stands the vendors come and go
They sell that shit for six bucks, you know?

And indeed there will be time
To wonder, “What the fuck?” and “What the fuck?”
Is it The Curse? Is it lousy luck?
Or just that our bullpen really sucks?
[They will say, “Your bullpen blows.”]
Borowski’s hurt, so the one we chose
LaTroy, to come in late and close
[They will say, “You cut off your face to spite your nose!”]
Do we dare
Take the Almighty’s name in vain?
In a minute there is time
To curse a blue streak, and go down in flames.

For we have known them all, already, known them all: —
Have known the games pissed away by errors, wind-borne flies, blown saves,
We have measured out our lives by the games we gave away;
We have lost must-win games to chumps, and have been appalled.
From the second deck falls a chunk of concrete, about half a ton
Should I try and run under one?

And we have known the indignities, already, know them all —
Beat out by a team in McDonald’s uniforms back in ’84,
Or ’89 Will Clark went all Babe Ruth on us (“It’s gone! It’s gone!”)
And how could we forget Brant Brown (Brant Brown?!) dropping that fly ball?
What the hell is going on?
Cincinnati (Cincinnati?!) beats us three of four
Should I go and get a gun?

And we know how this ends, already; we must remember –
Confident in a solid lead held almost up to the end,
[“Oh, don’t be silly!” they say, as the inevitable descends]
How will it be this time? Like the ’69 Mets?
Another incredible mind-fuck we will never forget?
Our hopes as dead as the ivy in November.
Could I sneak a knife in, nice and neat
Commit Harry Caray right in my seat?
. . . . .

When Ruth stood pointing out to Waveland Ave., was he really calling his shot?
Or just showing us the way to the exits, saying,
“This thing’s all over, boys; why’n’t you just head on home?”

I should have been a ragged old glove
Scuttling across the floors of silent dugouts
. . . . .

And the afternoon, the evening, sleeps so peacefully!
As smoothed by several rounds
Asleep…tired…slowing down,
Stretched out on the bar next to my ratty blue cap with the “C”.
Should I, after another shot ‘n’ a beer
Have the strength to walk on out of here?
But though I have wept and fasted, blown up balls and genuflected,
Though I have longed to see Dusty’s head [the stupid toothpick in its mouth] brought in upon a platter,
Truth is, I can’t do shit—and here’s no great matter;
I have seen the moment of our greatness flicker,
And I have seen the Base Ball Gods shake their heads, and snicker,
And in short, I’ve seen my own impotence reflected.

And was it all worth it, after all,
After elimination, the acrimony, the accusations,
Bitter doubt entering our conversations?
Was it worth raising the payroll to $100 million
Just to bring the types of players with the skills in
When one skill is not holding onto the fucking ball?
The skill to wear sunglasses and still not see,
The can of corn come wafting out,
While our pitcher grins on the mound with glee,
Saying, “I know you’ll catch that ball.”
“I know you’ll catch that fucking ball!”

And was it all worth it, after all,
Worth all the money, care, and time spent,
Putting together a team which only wasted all its promise?
Which would rather initiate, and then retaliate, than win the game –
Rather kick a wall and get a knee sprain –
And get 15 days on the DL,
While the whole season goes to hell.
Was it worth it, all the discontent?
When, with our backs up against the wall,
Against the lowly Redlegs and the Braves,
They say, “You lost them all.”
“You lost them all!”
. . . . .

No, we are not championship material, nor were meant to be,
We are lovable losers, lots of fun,
Someone to get well against, if you’ve been on a bad run,
Come to the ballpark, the ‘Taj Mahal’, and get drunk out in the sun.
We’ve got great starters, but our bullpen sucks,
Our offense has its moments, but is full of holes,
And just when you think they give a fuck,
They blow a lead and lose control,
And the whole damn season comes undone.

We can’t take it. . . we can’t take it. . .
When our Sammy starts to jake it,

Shall we keep our hopes alive? Shall we go into the breech?
We shall play the Reds at home, and watch their offense be unleashed.
I have heard the fat ladies singing, each to each.

I do not think they will sing for me.

We have seen them at night wearing too-tight slacks
Stumbling out of the bars in Lincoln Park
Looking for their SUV’s double-parked.

We have lingered in the dream world of fantasy
Sustained by our collective hysteria, and a whole lot of booze
‘Til reality sets in, and we lose and lose

<><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><>

Astros lose the series, 0-3.

Follow the action in the Game Zone

Hell, It’s Midnight Somewhere

Posted on August 12, 2012 by Ron Brand in Featured, Game Recaps

Brewers 5, Astros 3

W:Gallardo (11-8)
L:Lyles (2-9)

That shiny new ride your team has been seen in around town, the one that has everybody excited? Well, it’s back to reality boys and girls because the clock has struck midnight and that’s a pumpkin they’re back on top of.

Still, it was pretty cool while it lasted. Two in a row! Two wins in a week! Three in the last eight days! That’s 60% of their second half wins! That’s already as many games as they won in the whole month of July!

Yes sir, happy times are back!

Ok, happy times were back, but the mojo of waiver wire pickups and retro jerseys can only last so long. In this case, two games. It was Jordan Lyles’ tough luck to pitch on the third day, and against Certified Astro Killa Yovani Gallardo.

What the hell kind of name is Yovani, anyway? Where is this guy from? Don’t they have guys named Roy, or Mike or James Rodney where he comes from?

I digress, because it’s the thing to do. Today’s tilt was actually reasonably entertaining, and not just because of the Threat of Continued Mojo. Young Master Lyles pitched a good game and didn’t fall victim to his usual battering the third time through the lineup. This was due in part to changing his approach later in the game and flashing a nice change that he’s held under wraps successfully so far. Lyles went seven, giving up eight hits and four runs, including a solo crank by everybody’s favorite 80s one-hit wonder, Corey Hart. Lyles struck out five and didn’t issue a walk, doing a great job of being around the plate but not too much over it all day long. In particular he was surprisingly successful in getting groundouts, especially from The Peen, and that’s half the battle of keeping it close against the Brew Crew.

The other part of the battle wasn’t held up quite as well, since Astrokilla Gallardo was on the hill. Yovani showed the nice lady nine spots on the doll and that didn’t include the two walks he gave up, but it only resulted in three runs. Greene continues to acclimate well, as he had two hits including a double. Gonzalez and Snyder had two hits each as well, leaving four overall to spread amongst the rest of the team and that’s the reason only three runs were tallied. The Astros were an uncharacteristic 3 for 11 with runners in scoring position. I’m sure this is a trend, not an anomaly.

Marwin had a tough day in the field, maybe loosening up a little too much with the milk and cookies after the big celebratory sleepover last night. Maxwell had a real nice play late in the game to track down a deep fly to right-center by Segura. Otherwise, the ticky-tacky little things pretty much balanced out the way they usually do, 40% for and 60% against and that’ll make it hard on you every time.

Tomorrow they’ll take on the incestual scat-eating gang-felchers from Chi. The Aristocrats! Maybe that place’ll catch on fire before the Astros show up, or maybe the FTC will finally succumb to that vile infected Old Style Piss and it’ll be like an episode of Walking Dead. Tune in to the GZ tomorrow to find out.

Double Your RetroUni Walkoff Pleasure!!!

Posted on August 11, 2012 by Ron Brand in Featured, Game Recaps

Astros 6, Brewers 5 (10 innings)
By Mr. (very) Happy

This game started off on a high note as the Astros scored twice in the first inning off of Marco Estrada, who was not very sharp tonight, tossing four frames and surrendering seven hits and four earnies. Tyler Greene made the most of his batting debut with the Astros, clubbing a game lead off double in the first inning, scoring on one of three hits for three RBIs for Steve Pearce on the night, and Greene had a key solo home run off of Agent Livan Hernandez in the fifth inning. Unfortunately, the Brewers knotted the game at two with two unearned runs in the second inning, taking advantage of a very shaky overall third base effort from Brett Wallace, who, in my opinion, simply can’t play down there. Third base is a place where you can either do it or you can’t. In my opinion, Wallace is in the latter category like the rest of us. In tonight’s GameZone, a denizen even expressed a yearning for days gone by with CJ at the hot corner.

In the bottom of the third, the Astros again took advantage of Estrada, plating two runs on three hits, including a triple from Pearce, who took full advantage of some wretched outfield play from Milwaukee in that inning. However, the Brewers again tied the game at four in the top of the fifth inning on a clutch two out double by Aoki. However, the Astros answered in the bottom of that frame on the Greene solo shot to put the Good Guys back up 5-4. Keuchel pitched very well tonight, striking out six in six innings and not walking a single hitter, thereby finishing in the “over” on my prediction of innings likely pitched (3.1), under on long balls surrendered (zippo) and way under on the free passes (nil). In fact, Keuchel also finished with some flair in his last inning, the sixth, starting an inning ending 1-4-3 twin killing.

The bully tonight was nothing short of fantastic, allowing one run on six hits in four innings with eight (count ’em eight!) strikeouts, including catching the Peen looking twice. The bully foursome (Fick, Wright, Storey and Lopez) held the lead until the top of the ninth, when Wilton Lopez, who, in my opinion, needs to throw a few more off-speed pitches to take away the rampant cheating on his fast stuff that was going on tonight, surrendered the tying run to send the game into extras, which hasn’t been the Astros’ strongsuit so far this season. In fact, the Astros hadn’t scored a single run in extra innings this season.

However, that would change in the tenth. The Astros loaded the sacks with nobody out for Scott Moore, who singled to left, taking full advantage of the Peen having been brought in as a sixth infielder (including the pitcher), scoring Altuve, who had three hits in five trips and scored three runs, with the game winner. This made a vulture winner out of Wilton Lopez, who now has won on two consecutive nights. The Astros have now won their first home series since sweeping the FTC way back in May.

Should the ballclub once again don the 90’s unis tomorrow and go for the broom against the Brewers? Absofuckinglutely!!! Don’t change a fucking thing!!! Don’t even wash those unis!!! The club is now once again within striking distance of .333 ball at 38-77. I realize that isn’t much solace, but look on the bright side: it could be a helluva lot worse.

Fairy Tale

Posted on August 11, 2012 by Ron Brand in Featured, Game Recaps

Astros 4
Brewers 3

by NeilT

I watched a lot of Astros baseball last week. I watched most of the games on Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday at home. On Thursday I went to the game. Thursday’s game was so exhausting. They couldn’t hit. The Nats could. It was just dreary. We left in the 9th inning to beat the traffic and there wasn’t any. I’ve never been so exhausted with baseball.

Last night I turned on the game. I was playing the guitar, working on Recuerdos de Alhambra, which is as melancholy as it gets, right up there with Pavane for a Dead Princess and Yesterday. It shouldn’t be played while watching this year’s Astros. I wasn’t paying much attention to the game and Kris wanted me to put onn a movie, so during the fifth we turned on Mirror, Mirror at our daughter’s suggestion. It wasn’t completely awful, maybe even kinda ok. It’s a twist on the Snow White tale, with the dwarves as highwaymen, the prince as pompous but likable, and Snow White as innocent but capable. Nathan Lane is the Queen’s assistant, not the queen, and Julia Roberts is the Queen.

But guess what? When I went to bed and checked the score, the Snow Whites had won, with a walk off, in the 9th. Never happened, you say, that’s a fairy tale, you say. Trust me though, it’s true.

In the first Nyjer Morgan got to first on lost ball on a strike out. Oh no, I say. The Brewers scored Morgan in the 1st on a Ryan (I did not have sex with that woman) Braun double, and Weeks scored on a wild pitch in the third. After I turned off the game Scott Moore scored the Astros’ first run on a Corporan single in the bottom of the fifth. Rickie Weeks scored the Brewers’ final run in the seventh on a Juan Segura single.

Pitching lines were good. Norris pitched 7, with 8 hits, 3 R, 7 strikeouts, and no walks. F. Rodriguez pitched the 8th, Lopez the 9th, both with no hits, no walks, 2 strikeouts.

Corporan homered on the first at bat in the 8th, and in the bottom of the 9th the princess kissed the frog and it turned into a prince. Wallace led off with a walk, Tyler Greene pinch ran. Greene stole second and advanced to third on the same play on a wild pitch. Pearce singled in Greene, and reached second on an error. Bogusevic singled in Pearce.

If you haven’t seen the game ending scrum, go here.

You’ll think it’s a fairy tale until you see it. The Astros will wear their Snow Whites again tonight, because, well, they won, so I think I’ll watch this. I don’t remember much about the movie, except there’s a nice version of Gaspar Sanz’s Canarios in the Gypsy scene.

Another Day; Another Shutout Loss, But Who’s Counting Besides Me?

Posted on August 10, 2012 by Ron Brand in Featured, Game Recaps

Washington 5, Astros 0

by Mr. Happy

Given that tonight’s 5-0 whitewashing of the Home Nine by the Nationals was the eleventh time that the ball club has been shutout, it still doesn’t get any easier to take. Tonight’s winning pitcher, Jordan Zimmermann, served notice very early on that he was going to be virtually impossible to beat once staked to a two run lead, being able to thread the tiny needle that HPU Ed Hickox constructed for a strike zone.

As well as tonight’s losing pitcher, Lucas Harrell, pitched for his five frames and 100 pitches, the walk that he surrendered on at least one stingy bullshit call to Ryan Zimmerman came back to haunt him in the fourth inning, where the Nats scored all the runs that they’d need tonight in order to dispatch the Astros. Zimmermann scattered three hits, two of which were for extra sacks, and struck out 11 in his six innings of work, while the Astros could manage but two hits the rest of the way en route to the white washing. A sore lack of clutch hitting, 0-6 with runners in scoring position, again plagued the Astros, who stranded six runners tonight. Additionally, none of the Astros baserunners could advance past 2B tonight, despite two lead off base hits.

Nevertheless, Michael Morse added two long balls to his season’s total of ten in the sixth and eighth innings, respectively. Ryan Zimmerman drove home a last run with a sacrifice fly in the top of the ninth inning in order to cement the win and a series sweep for the Nationals, who now have the best road record in the major leagues.

Tonight’s result was as predictable as the results have been lately, with no surprises from the Home Nine, so the sparse number of GameZone denizens turned their focus on the goings on at Red Rocks, which, frankly, was more interesting than tonight’s ball game. The Astros, losers now of five in a row and now one for August, strive to increase their stranglehold on next year’s No. 1 pick while entertaining the Brewers. I can’t wait!

Astros Don’t Get Blown Away

Posted on August 9, 2012 by Ron Brand in Featured, Game Recaps

Nationals 4, Astros 3

W: Gonzales (14-6 3.32)
L: Galarraga (0-2 5.38)

BOX

by Sphinx Drummond

Once again the Astros had to face a team with a better win-loss ratio (this cycle will continue until it doesn‘t…maybe next year or the year after) and once again they proved why every team they face has a better win-loss ratio. The numbers don’t lie. It’s the ninth of August, and there is only one team with under 40 wins. One would hope a young team would get better as the season progresses but the Astros are making an exception.

If the Astros had their own show on TLC it would be of the Extreme Makeover variety. If it was about the 143 or so fans that still follow this team it would be one of the Strange Obsessions or Crazy Addictions variety.

Against the team with the best record in all of the MLB, the Astros actually did pretty good. They’ve lost three of the first four in this series but each game has been close, with arguably a chance to win in the 9th. After falling behind early last night, Galarraga pitched well enough to keep it close and Cedeno, Fick, and Cruz pitched well enough in relief that the Astros were only down 2 runs going into the home half of the night.

Corporan grounded out to start the frame and Brandon Barnes followed with his first major league hit. Marwin grounded out for the 2nd out but Barnes advanced to second base. Ben Francisco singled to drive in Barnes and make it a one run game with two outs. Jose Altuve followed with another single, Bogey, running for Francisco, made it to third and Altuve advanced to second on the throw.

So Mills, who must hate to be second guessed and always goes by the book when it comes to lefty-righty match-ups, leaves the ice-cold Downs in to bat for himself instead of maybe going to someone like Wallace (who has hit lefties better than Downs this year, FWIW). Anyway, Gonzales struck out Downs on four pitches, the last one–a curve ball in the dirt, and the Nationals harvested another win with Gio Gonzales earning a complete game victory.

Anyway, like Reuben, even if they ripped us off on the Rusty Staub deal, I miss those pesky Expos. I loved some of the great names they had like Coco Laboy, John Boccabella, or Pepe Mangual. I might have warmed up to the Washington DC team if they would have reused the Senators or any name that relates to the area but there’s a degree of arrogance in assuming the National namesake. It irks me in the same way the DFW team does in Arlington calling themselves the “Texas” Rangers.

Later tonight, it’s Zimmermann against Harrell. The overachieving Lucas Harrell gives the Astros their best chance to not get swept but Zimmermann is good and the Nationals are so fucking great the have the best record in all of major league baseball, so it’s a fat chance.

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