8) 14 innings of great baseball down the drain on an Albert Pujols HR off intestinally challenged Odalis Perez... Dodgers went up 2-0 in Nomar Garciaparra's HR that extended his current hitting streak to 22 straight games... Cards got even late in the game when Jimmy Edmonds burned Operaman, who went brain muerto on his catcher. Russ Martin kept calling for fastballs and sliders away, away, away, away... Edmonds kept fouling them off, but Martin wouldn't give in. He didn't want Edmonds to get something inside that he could pull with a man on base and up 2-0... But Giovanni shook him off four times and finally Martin gave in and set up inside and...kaboom...the game was tied. Next time, he will listen when the kid catcher says not to do something... Both teams ran out of players in this marathon. The Cards even used Jeff Weaver as a PINCH HITTER! Finally, in the 14th inning, with no other options, the skipper put in Odalis Perez to pitch to Albert Pujols... Pujols lifetime record against our gutless wonder was 9 hits, including 4 HRs in only 14 at-bats. The French Army has a better record against the Germans. I was thinking "great leaping cheetos don't throw the damn thing over the plate!" "Just walk him!" But nooooooo... He tossed a belt-high fastball on the inside corner. Pujols turned on it, then stood there watching as the ball left the city limits on a trajectory that should place it somewhere in Illinois if it ever comes down... After the game, with his record against Pujols now 10 hits, with 5 HRs in 15 at-bats, Perez stood before his locker, with big tears coming down his face, talking to the only people who still listen to him: the reporters. His teammates stopped talking to him years ago and the management has been trying unsuccessfully to trade him since last April and Grady Little keeps him out in the bullpen where the real players don't have to look at him.. He blamed his teammates. He blamed the owners. He blamed the coaches. He said that he's being "treated like trash" and claims that he's never done anything wrong, ignoring the obvious fact that he had just blown another game and blamed it on his teammates...again. In recent days, the Yankees signed drunken Sidney Ponson and the Cards signed scatter-arm Jeff Weaver and NOBODY wants Odalis Perez who was suppossed to be better than either of them. His teammates have told him the reason why he's treated this way. He just doesn't want to believe it. The reason is: he's a loser. ...........DD :x
Great.... <t>Rundown on the marathon JO'Co. I am beat today after watching it. AP is one of a kind. I cannot believe how good Nomar looks at the plate except when Wainright got him on the slider late in the game.<br/> <br/> Question? What do you hear out there about JD Drew staying with the Dodgers? You think they can get him signed again?<br/> <br/> I was hoping my feed last night on the game would be Vin but we got the Cards announcers. Nothing like listening to VS do a game.</t>
424 pitches...yikes is right...talk about wearing out your staff. If either teams starter falters early today it could turn into a slugfest with those bullpens worn out.
re: JD Drew I would be surprised if the Dodgers offer JD Drew a new contract. I don't believe they will make any serious attempt to sign him. He's a good guy and a good player, but he comes with a $10-12 million dollar price tag and he's a fragile player who misses a lot of games and must be substituted out on a regular basis to protect him. That's a lot of risk and money for a .290 hitter with warning track power... The Dodgers are loaded with kid outfielders who hit as well or better than Drew, with more on the way and who're paid the MLB minimum of $330k per year. Check out leftfielder Andre Eithier. He's 23 years-old, with a current BA of .345 and 6HR, 32 RBIs in 171 at-bats. He's also a superior defensive outfielder and he hits lefties better than righties. Matt Kemp is only 21 years-old and has the most potential of any of the Dodger rookies and he hit 7 HRs in his first 45 at-bats! In two weeks, they get back Jason Repko, who is 25 years-old and who was batting .302 with 3 HRs and 12 RBIs in only 69 at-bats when he sprained his ankle. Down in the minors, they have more on the way... I just don't think that Drew is in their long-term plans. They have better and cheaper players in the dugout right now...
Well...it sure wasn't much of a game tonight... Cardinals 5 Dodgers 0 The game was basically over when the Cards scored in the first inning. Carpenter was magnificent. The Dodgers didn't get their second hit until the 7th inning and had only two hard hit balls all night. I don't think he threw 100 total pitches in tossing a complete game shutout and he stopped Nomar's 22 game hitting streak. Except for that, he didn't do much... For the Dodgers, it was the same old story and we're not going to be able to compete with the best teams until we get those problems corrected. The first area of need is pitching. We don't have anything like Carpenter. What we do have is barely adequate. Derek Lowe got knocked around for the fourth start in-a-row and he's our #2 pitcher. The rest of the staff goes downhill from there. That's not good enough. Our other area of concern is too many rookies. A good example of how rookies can hurt you was Andre Either's first at-bat. Now if you have never seen a pitcher before, isn't it aways a good idea to watch the first pitch instead of swinging at it? Isn't that what they tell you in Little League? How about if the pitcher you've never seen before won the Cy Young Award last season when you were in the minor leagues? So of course, Eithier swung at the first pitch and was back in the dugout before Carpenter even broke a sweat... Unhappy backup catcher, unhappy pitcher in the bullpen, clueless rookies, not enough pitching, natives getting restless in the City of Angels... :x :x :x
Yep... <t>Carpenter was the game story last night. The Duncan kid for the Cards has a chance to be a pretty good hitter. Nice power.</t>
8) Egads! Another extra-inning loss. At least we had a little pitching in this one, but we really do have to stop throwing to Pujols. There's only two rules for pitchers: 1. If you can't throw strikes, you're not a pitcher. 2. If you can't figure a way to get the batter out: put him on. Rule #2 is the baseball version of, "Three people can keep a secret, if two are dead." Why pitch to the people who can beat you? Who gives a rats arse who the best player is? If he's that good, put him on. If he doesn't like it, put him on with one pitch. Whatever you do...you don't just serve up the ball over the plate and tempt fait. To hell with that. Managers don't relieve pitchers for walking Superman, but they do relieve them for being stupid enough to forget Rule #2...
There are two Red Sox pitchers, Rudy Seanez and Julian Tavarez, who apparently don't know those rules.
8) I remember Seanez. He came up with the Dodgers and we don't want him back. He's a hard thrower but...how should I delicately put this...uh... does the phrase "million dollar arm and .10 cent head" ring a bell? Tavarez is actually a pretty good pitcher. Unfortunately, he has the pyschological makeup of a juvenile, schizophrenic, raving, lunatic. This tends to make him problematic in pressure situations...
8) Doh! Dodgers swept in St. Louis. This series looked like the series with the Twins. The Dodgers just don't match up with the better teams. We're about 3 players short: 2 pitchers and a power hitter...
JO'Co.. <t>As a Cards fan happy for the sweep and the way they played Sunday but did not expect to take all four. <br/> <br/> I've run out of things to say about AP.</t>
Well Albert is a MANIMAL as I like to refer to him as. Half man, half animal. He swings the bat with ease and the ball just gets propelled into mach 3 as it goes over the fence. Despite the bad month of june, I think we got things turned around pretty good. All I have to say is I'll see you in OCT!!