Baseball and Poker Highlights...

GAME 94: Red Sox 8, Astros 3
GAME 95: Astros 3, Red Sox 2
GAME 96: Red Sox 11, Astros 0

After the fun of the sweep in Dallas, the Astros came back home to Houston just in time to go into a bit of a slump against last years' World Series champs, the Red Sox. Let's just say that the good news is that the Astros got their one win to keep them ahead of last year's record. In today's close of the first "half" of the season, the Astros looked just like the team of kids that they actually are. The starting pitcher lasted 1/3 of an inning. The defense committed 3 errors. The batters only managed three hits, all singles, while striking out 12 times. Everyone in the starting line up struck out at least once except (ironically, last year's strikeout king) Carter. All around miserable game. But while some fans are booing and calling for Porter's ouster, I say, just take it in stride. This is who we are this season - sometimes high energy winners, sometimes can't-do-anything-right losers. Growing pains...

So let's talk about a couple of pretty cool things instead of series losses. First of all, one can't go too far wrong talking about Altuve, who's going to the All Star game with 130 hits and 41 stolen bases. That, sports fans, is a Major League record for the hits/SB combination going into the All Star Break. Altuve is also carrying .335 batting average (just barely edged out of leading the league by Adrian Beltre after today's 0 for 4 game), which positions him well for one of the four season goals I set back in May - winning the AL Batting Title. Hey, this could really happen! I just hope that Altuve's lack of stature  (and I don't mean that physically) with baseball fans outside of Houston doesn't result in his getting slighted in the All Star Game. Who doesn't remember Hunter Pence in 2009?

In other cool sports news, my to-be son-in-law, Aaron Kaiser (Tweeting as ManchildDC) is playing in Day 6 of the World Series of Poker Hold'em Main Event. Out of 6683 players who entered the tournament last week, as of this writing Aaron is still in the remaining 4 dozen. I'm not personally a big fan of poker or of gambling in general, but I'm a huge fan of Aaron! Very exciting for him!!! Will update this post later...

UPDATE: Aaron came in 36th place!!!