Sick Haren, sicker pitching
Dan Haren felt the touch of a stomach virus before taking the mound against the Dodgers last night. Unfortunately, it was only his opponents left nauseous while he worked, Haren's performance a key reason for the Dodgers coming up just short in a 3-2 loss. June's NL pitcher of the month remained in a groove like Stella, holding the Dodgers to a bunch of zeros over seven frames. An ace-like performance similar to what the Blue have oft counted on from Chad Billingsley, but didn't receive this time around.
Lot of scuffling, lot of tosses (114 in just under six innings). Once Haren was back on the bench, however, the Blue attempted a late minute charge.
Kicked off by a Jeff Kent long ball, the ninth frame then saw Delwyn Young make up for an earlier costly error by socking home James Loney with a long double. Brand new ball game in the works, a potentially satisfying box score lurking in the wings. But with a chance tie up the dance (and prevent the Snakes from taking back the NL West), Matt Kemp sent the first toss he saw into right for a game-ending out. Frustrating, to be sure, and nothing we haven't seen before from the talented and inconsistent player. But oddly enough, Kemp is drawing praise from a source who often loathes handing it out. (Dodger Thoughts' Jon Weisman has an interesting take on a quote from Andre Ethier in Simer's article)
Blake DeWitt may not be tearing it up with the bat anymore, but his glove will always keep him a sound option for Joe Torre at third. If the rook really wants to please his Skip, he'll learn to play short, because that's where the real void remains.
Most baseball front office types always insist that you can never have enough quality pitching. Judging by the way the Blue hurlers have kept their often anemic bats from dropping the team out of contention, it's hard to disagree. Unfortunately, one of the key assets, Takashi Saito, won't be available for a while, putting a huge responsibility on Jonathon Broxton's huger shoulders. Big man says he's up to the challenge.
Rubber match (and NL West-tying attempt) alert!!! Today's afternoon delight against the D-backs pits Derek Lowe and Brandon Webb mano y' mano, with the Dodger stakes being potential co-ownership of their division. But even if they come up short today, Tim Brown of Yahoo! still thinks the Ravine Soldiers will eventually represent their division as the top dogs.
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The D'backs will keep 1st place, unfortunately.
Having heard many of the announcers of the opposing teams on MLB extra innings, I have to say the D'backs have the absolute worst. Darren Sutton is no better than the knucklehead he replaced. And Joe G. next to him seems senile. I have never heard such play by play dictated by emotion and subjective judgements. Half the talk has nothing to do with the game. Does the D'backs front office really think this is what the fans want to hear?
Everyone seems to admire Vin Scully. Don't they ever listen to him?
Posted by: Andy B | July 20, 2008 at 12:25 PM
Broxton throw hard.
Broxton learn from Saito.
Broxton cook Sushi.
Posted by: benzojones | July 20, 2008 at 12:41 PM
MLB Extra Innings Subscribers:
are you all seeing what I'm seeing, which is that EVERY late game today is blacked out? WTF!?!?! The only explanation I can come up with is that ESPN's sunday night game is moved up to 6 (due to their masturbatory idiot-fest called the espy's, which I have never once watched or cared about, nor known any other single sports fan to give a rat's arse about), and that got their blackout list moved up to 4pm EST. But that is absolute bullplop!! Webb v. Lowe is happening, and I can't watch it because of the as$heads at ESPN. I am so livid right now. I have always held a special hatred of espn, and at this moment I loathe MLB's assinine blackout rules even more than I already did.
Posted by: VA Blueblood | July 20, 2008 at 01:28 PM
Three straight games that we can't get past the first inning.
David
Posted by: DavidS | July 20, 2008 at 02:09 PM
Va Blueblood
I also get MLB Extra Innings and yes it is BS that we cannot watch anything except what ESPN wants to show like Boston or New York. I hope some kind of a change is forthcoming.
Package
Posted by: Package | July 20, 2008 at 03:30 PM
Matt Hemp learned how to wait overnight... told ya he had a date yesterday.
Posted by: benzojones | July 20, 2008 at 04:00 PM
I taped the replay version so I could at least see the comeback
Andy,
after the 2nd inning of the 1st game i muted the tv and listened to the radio broadcast from the LA station....it didn't sync up but it was still better than listening to the reptiles announcers
Posted by: K T | July 20, 2008 at 11:04 PM
glad I wasn't the only one frustrated. there's consolation in mutual frustration. I've heard talk of MLB scrapping their archaic balckout rules, but I won't believe it until I see it. Things move slow when you're a phenomenally profitable monopoly with the only exemption to the Sherman anti-trust act Congress has ever issued.
And K T: you are right. I think the reptile barkers are the worst homer-announcers in the game. Well, maybe 2nd to the ChiSox blabberheads (man, do I hate those guys). We are all spoiled from having it so good with Vinny.
Posted by: VA Blueblood | July 21, 2008 at 12:50 PM