Record: 37-29. Change on last season: +2. Pace: 91-71
Quote of the Day: "Seven runs in four innings is ridiculous. It happens sometimes." -- Livan Hernandez
Aargh. There aren't many things worse than yesterday's game, where we didn't compete at all. That it came against my most-hated team in baseball only made things worse. Our bullpen was about the only bright spot with Edgar Gonzalez and new stud Jailen Peguero (three innings of scoreless, walkless, one-hit ball in his career to date) combining for four innings over which the Yankees managed only one hit. Of course, they were 7-1 up at the time, so they can be forgiven for not perhaps trying too had.
Livan Hernandez, to be honest, sucked. And that's a lot kinder than the words Mrs. SnakePit said about him: I had to gently remind her to be more loyal and supportive of the man whose number she wears. But really, seven runs in four innings? And that probably counts as fortunate, given he allowed fourteen base-runners in four innings of work, on nine hits and five walks. Not pretty. His lead in the Purple Row challenge will be hurt significantly by that.
Our lack of clutchiness continues, with another ohfer. That's now 0-for-11 in this series and including the Mets games as well, Arizona is 4-for-33 with runners in scoring position when visiting the Big Apple. Orlando Hudson had two hits and our only walk, while Conor Jackson had a sixth-inning solo homer. It's the fourteenth consecutive game where we had more strikeouts than walks, with a K:BB ratio since then of worse than 3.5:1. At the moment, we are a charitable gift to pitchers who are having poor seasons.
Carlos Quentin is coming in for some criticism - and understandably so. After a spell where it looked like he was turning things around, he's 6-for-40, and was dropped to ninth in the order for yesterday's game. Says Melvin, "The league knows if you're a first-pitch swinger, they are going to give you a tougher pitch to hit. When you put it in play, a lot of times it is not going to be good... Obviously we expect the numbers to be better." In an ominous note, Melvin added he "would like to think" Jeff DaVanon will be back before the All-Star break.
I'll keep this short, because I also have to get a GameDay thread posted. These weekday, East-coast afternoon games are a real killer - and due to "network issues", my early arrival on the phones has been requested. :-( AZDarkKnight, oklahomasooners, johngordonma, singaporedbacksfan and Goose represented the attendees at this one, and I can't say I can argue with the limited degree of participation. I only kept half an eye on the game after we went six runs down, and with the Dodgers and Padres both winning comfortably, we're back to third in the division, albeit only one game back.
Gameday Graph
[Click graph to enlarge, in new window]
Master of his domain: Mark Reynolds, +2.0% (!! - I wonder if we can get our entire team below zero one of these days?)
God-emperor of suck: Livan Hernandez, -34.2%
Since I see the diary has just fallen off the front-page, I'll mention again that the winner of the 'Ask Bill Murphy a question' contest has been picked. I've managed to squeeze one from each in - though I skipped leemellon's "sideburns vs. ERA" question for some reason...probably connected to perhaps wanting to get another interview ever again! :-) After calling in Mrs. SnakePit as a tie-breaker, andrewinnewyork is declared the winner. Email me your snail-mail address, andrew [my email is to be found on the sidebar], and I'll get your package on its way.