Monday, August 1, 2011

Dickities 3
Astros 4

W: Melancon | L: Ondrusek

Having jettisoned two of the tenured stars of the last few years for a parade of prospects, the Astros had some holes to fill to field a team when they met the pimply, misshapen asses at Minute Maid Monday. The two recent call-ups combined with another young gun to create some large excitement in a 10-inning walk-off win. Who are these guys?

JD suggested “Hello! My name is…” stickers for the youth movement but fans who didn’t know them found out pretty quickly who they were. Facing Arroyo in the 2nd after a Carlos Lee walk, recent AAer J.D. Martinez blooped a high pop-fly to shallow center that landed between 3 converging Reds. In possibly the most ridiculous baserunning boner on record, when the ball was scooped up by Stubbs, Lee was inexplicably rounding 2nd. An average throw to 3rd caught Lee by 8 feet for the 1st out. After Barmes singled, AA call-up Jimmy Paredes stood in for his 1st major league at-bat. With a 2-2 count, he patiently found Arroyo’s K pitch and sent it deep to the RCF gap for a 2-run triple. Q added a double to roughly the same spot in RCF to score Paredes to put the Astros up 3-0

Bud got banged around throughout his 5 innings but held off the damage to 3 runs before leaving with a blister issue. The bullpen did an uncharacteristically good job holding of the Reds to 1 hit for 5 more innings as this one stayed locked at 3 until the bottom of the 10th.

Q started the festivities off with a single off of Ondrusek. PH and the man that is Angel Sanchez followed with another base hit and the “crowd” started to stir. With Bogusevic up, the Dickities decided to load the bases and draw the infield in a bit to take their chances on a play at the plate. Young Jose Altuve slapped a liner past Ondrusek that appeared to be headed into CF but Brandon Phillips made a diving play on the infield grass and gunned it in to Hanigan at the plate. The throw looked to beat Q to the plate but the ball bobbled out of Hanigan’s glove and Q was called safe. Game over!

As the team crowded around Q and Altuve jumping around like they just won the division, I thought to myself how much I enjoyed this game. I pretty much turned off the last one I watched. Despite the moves that were made and the gnashing of teeth that accompanied them, I still love the Astros and if these are the Astros now, I love ’em, too. Thanks for the excitement, kids!

Brewers 5, Astros 4

W: Rodriguez (4-2)
L: Rodriguez (2-1)

And so it has come to this. Staggering around, rolling steel balls between their fingers, the Astros brain trust has become Captain Queeg. Paralyzed by the need for decision and unable to prepare and carry out a plan, they lash out blindly because inaction would be mistaken for cowardice and weakness. Unfortunately, action for the sake of action rarely produces the results hoped for.

The brightest spot in today’s game was the first home run by Jason Bourgeois, a 3-run spot that gave the Astros a lead they held for half an inning. Myers’ line on the day, against a good hitting club, looks ok at first – six innings, four runs, six strikeouts, no walks – but Milwaukee never played with a sense of urgency. Rather, the Brewers knew when they took the field that they were going to win, it was only a matter of getting through the nine innings to finish the job.

In the end, it was Fielder driving in The Peen to no one’s surprise, just like the script said it would be. Another day at the office when the Astros come to town, another fly swatted off the arm.

The mixed messages of the weekend centered around the question of accountability. Surprising trades were made that took the best the team had to offer in a sacrifice to the future. Conveniently, the true outcomes of these moves will only be a little clearer in a couple of years and if they’re successful, will share many fathers.

The other side of this question came with the demotion of Wallace and CJ, and the promotion of Bogusevic and Paredes, both of whom are clearly not ready for The Big Time. Bearing a sizable chunk of responsibility for this year’s futility has worn heavily on our two demoted Stars Of The Future.

“We knew we were making moves and getting younger guys out here, but I guess they didn’t have that in store for me and Wally and the organization is going in a different direction,” CJ said. “I guess they don’t really want us to be too much a part of that right now.”

Wallace was only slightly more upbeat. “It’s definitely surprising. We’ll go down there and take care of business.”

It would appear that this is a temporary development, an eye-opener for CJ and Wallace that will last until Lee gets moved and Paredes makes us all long for CJ’s brand of stone handed ball. As with all things Astro though, only time will tell…and he ain’t sayin’ shit right now.