The only person who might be happy about Brian Moehler’s performance in the rubber game of the series is Brandon Backe, who might need some combination of injury and miracle to pitch for Houston this year. If you missed it, Brian Moehler gave up seven earned runs in just a hair less than two innings, opening the season with a robust 37.80 earned-run average. He wasn’t necessarily rocked around the park, giving up single, single, double, walk, single, single, single in the first, and single, HBP, single before getting an early shower. Before you could make it down to the good seats with a Star Dog, the good guys were down 8 to nothing. Combined with an anemic performance in the opener, Houston opens 1-2, and the Talkzone notwithstanding, isn’t exactly inspiring sonnets.

But, it’s vitally important that no one overreacts to the results of the first series of the season, even if it’s against the Cubs. Okay, nothing about baseball is actually vital or important, and you fans can overreact all you want (unless you’re talking to Drayton, please), but I’m talking specifically about Cecil Cooper and the Astros. Regardless of the results against the Cubs, nothing has changed from a week ago. Moehler, Mike Hampton and Russ Ortiz are still question marks in the rotation. Wandy Rodriquez is still a good to great pitcher at home. Lance Berkman still gets on base a lot. Hunter Pence still has no clue at the plate, although when he makes contact, it can go a long way fast. The good news is that no one was injured, not even Kaz Matsui or Mike Hampton (He could have fallen down the steps. And you wouldn’t have been surprised.) If you were paying attention, you might have noticed the Astros were very capable of winning the series.

How do they get better? First, picking a real lineup would be a good first step. Bourn, Matsui, Berkman, Lee, Tejada, Pence, Blum/Keppinger, Rodriguez, pitcher makes a hell of a lot of baseball sense. Someone might want to stick with that for a couple of weeks. Unless the Astros are counting on 5 home runs a night. And they might be. They probably should note that they still lost. Secondly, Russ Ortiz is a career starter, and isn’t going to be great coming out of the bullpen. He shouldn’t be put in situations like cleaning up Moehler’s mess, if Cooper is terribly worried about the results. It’s also understandable that Russ Ortiz is coming out of the bullpen for the first two weeks, but Roy Oswalt’s personal comfort isn’t a great reason for that, especially at the beginning of the season. Third,

The results aren’t want anyone wanted, but they could have been a hell of a lot worse. So on to Saint Louise, fried ravioli, and the battlin’ Birds. There’ll be a lot for Cooper to overreact about there as well. Like getting outmanaged by Billy Jean King.

Milo Way? – Wednesday afternoon, a stretch of Hamilton Street was rededicated “Milo Way”. And by rededicated I mean that under the actual street sign a legally insignificant sign was hung. It was the kind of sign you could buy from Spenser’s to be able to signify that the bar in your rumpus room is for “Red Sox Parking Only”, vainly hoping that actual Red Sox will “park” there, instead of your mother-in-law’s new husband.

Beyond being silly, it’s not really accurate. Hamilton Street is a well-paved, direct, one-way street, heading southwest between State Highway 59 and the George R. Brown Convention Center. A more accurate Milo Way would start off smoothly, run over Gene Elston’s grave, and proceed to deteriorate rapidly, meandering for miles and miles, not necessarily getting you anywhere. Along the way, there would be street signs promising you that you had almost reached the end, even though you can never actually get there.

Managing Through The Media, by Cecil Cooper – Quote of the Week: “I talked to (Pudge) last night about moving Keppinger into the No. 2 hole simply because Keppinger, in my estimation is a REAL two-hole hitter.”

Ivan “Pudge” Rodriguez was the two-hole hitter Monday and Tuesday. Although evidently not a REAL one. I get the impression that Cecil Cooper imagines himself to be the baseball equivalent of Benjamin Linus…always saying something or doing something to push the psychological buttons of his players to move them into doing things they aren’t normally willing to do or capable of. Mr. Cooper, Lost, while a quality television show, isn’t real life. In, real life, you just get shit-canned for losing the clubhouse. Again.

Weak Ponderance of the Off-Day: If you were a famous female athlete, would you marry a man with the last name Dyke?