GAME 8 - Wishes and Dishes

April 15: Astros 4, Pirates 1

I got my wish - that the Astros would do something good while I was offline for the end of Passover. They won both of the games I missed. That meant that I had the pleasure of watching a winning game from last night as I packed up all of the Passover dishes for another year. Now I'm sitting in a very clean kitchen, having just finished watching yesterday's game, and trying to decide if after midnight's too late to watch the game from today. (It is.)

Excellent game all around, starting with the Astros getting on the board right away with a pair of runs in the first inning. Bourn, leading off, took a four-pitch walk. Tejada, batting second, hit an infield single - the first of his three hits of the game. Berkman followed with a single to load the bases with no outs. After shutouts in the two previous games, it would have been a travesty if the Astros could not convert a full house with no outs into something on the scoreboard. No worry: Back-to-back sac flies by Lee and Pence plated the first two runs.

The Astros scored two more runs in the third inning. Tejada led off with a single and Berkman doubled to put two runners in scoring position with no outs. Lee then doubled to drive them both in, bumping his RBIs for the game to 3. (A nice improvement on the 1 RBI he had logged in the 7 previous games together.) Pence singled to put runners on the corners, still with no outs, making it look like it could be a big inning. But unfortunately they were stranded. After this early inning action, the Astros didn't manage to score any other runs in the game.

Scoring any runs at all was newsworthy, but it wouldn't have counted for much without good pitching. The Astros got excellent help from the mound, as Hampton threw 6 innings of shutout ball, allowing only 4 hits and 1 walk, and striking out 8. A very nice performance, one that set him up for his first regular-season win in an Astros uniform since 1999. Hampton was followed by Geary, who worked his way in and out of trouble, but did not allow a run. Hawkins pitched a scoreless eighth. The Pirates did not score until the bottom of the ninth, when Valverde allowed a lead-off homer to LaRoche. But that was it for Pirate runs. Game over. The losing stread ends at 5 games as the Astros win 4-1.

In addition to a handful (almost) of runs and great pitching, the Astros looked good out on the field. In particular, Berkman made a nice leap to spear a line drive for an out. And Pudge nailed an attempted theft with a perfect throw to Tejada. Keppinger started at second in this game, while Matsui is sidelined with back stiffness. Meanwhile, Kepp hit a double to extend his hitting streak to 6 games.

Only one complaint: I don't know if it was my computer or network or ISP, or if it was mlb.tv, but the streaming of the archived game was extremely choppy. Every few seconds I'd get a freeze of both video and audio. Made the game frustrating to watch - and much longer than it actually was.

Fashion Statement: All the players on both teams wore #42, to honor the 62nd anniversary of Jackie Robinson's breaking the color barrier in baseball.

Moves: Moehler's knee sprain put him on the DL, and the Astros have brought up Arias to fill his roster spot. Not clear who's going to start in Moehler's stead. Fulchino, up to fill in for the injured Brocail, can start but Cooper apparently talked about using him out of the pen. In other news, the Astros sent Drew Sutton to the Reds, to complete the trade for Keppinger.