Baseball Today

I spent the evening with Charissa and baseball as the Redhawks took on the Tucson Sidewinders (Diamondbacks).

On paper, the games looked like a pitching duel. Micah Owings went six innings for the Sidewinders allowing only one run on ten hits. He walked two and fanned two. Derek Lee gave the Redhawks six innings, allowing two runs on six hits. A better way to describe this game, though, would be a failure to avoid base running mistakes. Baldiris was tagged out at home plate when he tried to go home on a fielder's choice to the short stop (who chose to through out the lead runner and avoid a run). Freddy Guzman (a guy known for hustle) tried to stretch a base hit to the center fielder into a double and got himself thrown out by a mile.

On the Sidewinders side, Brito made it to second on an E6 when Arias failed to catch a pick off but was instantly tagged out when he thought the ball had gotten away far enough to make it to third only to realize that the runner on third wasn't moving. 6-4 on the put out.

In the end, neither starting pitcher would get a decision, as Adrian Brown would score in the seventh on a sac fly by former Red Sox Adam Hyzdu(the run was un-earned. Brown stole second and the catcher committed a throwing error on the pickoff attempt, allowing him to take third.)

Then Kameron Loe, on a so far shaky rehab stint from Texas, pitched the eighth and ninth allowing two harmless hits, hitting a batter and striking another out. He would earn the win in the bottom of the ninth when Freddy Guzman hit a liner over the head of the right field and stretched the hit into a triple. Joaquin Arias then hit a sac fly for the RBI and the win. The Redhawks crawl back over .500, improving to 59-58.

The Glass is Either Half Empty or Three Quarters Empty:

The Red Sox lost their third straight tonight (two to the Devil Rays and one to the Royals). Because of that sad fact, we were left to sweat the outcome of the Yankees/White Sox game. In a classic case of damned if you do damned if you don't, the White Sox beat the Yanks to keep the Red Sox 2 games back in the East. For that I thank them. The fly in the ointment is, the win pushed the White Sox into the lead in the Wild Card Race.