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Tucson still playing in the AAA shoot-out; leading 2-1 against Toledo in the eighth, but first pitch for the big boys is approaching rapidly. So figure I'll get this up: currently looks like the AAA game will finish almost spot on 7pm, just in time for the D'backs to take over. No rest for the blogger tonight... :-)
We may be out of the NL West race, but we can still certainly have an impact, with ten out of our last thirteen games against the Dodgers + Padres, who are fighting it out for the NL West. And, thanks to the Phillies, the loser may not even get the Wild Card spot. On the whole, I'd probably prefer the Padres to win it, but my main concern is really now Brandon Webb's quest for the Cy Young. Still, we might learn some things from the other matchups, such as whether Hernandez 2.0 is the legitimate pitcher he has seemed to be in the past couple of outings. Fifteen innings, eight hits, three earned runs and a 2-0 record? We'll take that from our #3 starter, any day. Of particular note, he didn't walk a batter in eight innings last time, his first walkless start since July.
It'll be interesting to see if there any post-traumatic shock for the Padres, since they lost in amazing fashion last night. San Diego went into the ninth with a one-run lead, then scored three times to make it 9-5. However, in the bottom, the Dodgers went deep, back-to-back-to-back-to-back - yes, four consecutive homers, for the first time since 1964 - tying it. The Padres scored in the tenth, but then Nomar hit another homer, a two-run shot, to win the game for LA. Teams might be excused for going to the locker-room and blowing their brains out after losing that one.
Finally, today is, of course, "Talk like a Pirate" day. So, I've been going around complaining about not having had a winning team since 1992, how the franchise has been run into the ground and moaning about why no free agents want to come to Pittsburgh. I blame that Kevin McClatchy, myself... Oh, you mean that's not the kind of Pirate I'm supposed to talk like? Ah, I get it. In which case, anyone want to buy a bootleg copy of Madonna's last CD? ;-)