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Saturday, July 22, 2006

Nostradamus Still Works Here. And He's Pi$$ed Off.

After Special K connected in the first inning for only his ninth dinger of the year--wow, he sure was a productive slugging free-agent, wasn't he?--the score stood Astros 3, Mets 0. I'm not exactly sure why, but I knew at the time that we probably wouldn't score again. The question becomes one of whether the lead could hold up.

Of course... it didn't. As soon as Xavier Nady launched Brandon Backe's slider into orbit, the lead (and the game) were both gone. Sure enough, we couldn't muster any more runs, despite the bullpen's five effective (if more exciting than necessary) shutout innings.

My favorite inning had to have been the fourth. With two men on and no outs, everybody's favorite whipping boy Ausmus grounded into a double play to kill the potential rally. Never-Hit--not wanting to get left out of the fun--made darn sure that the rally was good and dead by swinging wildly at the ever-elusive rally with his bat following up with a swinging strikeout.

(By the way, Tim McCarver impliedly blamed the Nady game-losing homer on Ausmus, who had called for a slider while setting up on the inside part of the plate. "That pitch isn't designed to have the catcher set up inside.") Ausmus tried to redeem himself by "throwing out" Reyes at second, although replays showed that Reyes was--in fact--safe.

As bad as Ausmus was--and I'm inclined not to give him credit for his ninth-inning "hit" inasmuch as Wagner probably should have snagged it--he wasn't the low point. Nope, that dubious distinction belongs to the announcing duo of Buck & McCarver. While an improvement over that complete embarassment Josh Lewin, Joe & Tim made the regrettable decision to have Meat Loaf (WTF?) up in the booth for an inning. As if that weren't a poor enough decision, Joe then decided to try and "sing" along with him. That was awful, and it caused me to stab my eardrums with a pencil until they bled and I lost my hearing. WOULD SOMEBODY PLEASE ANSWER THAT DAMN PHONE?

This team blows chunks.

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