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"A plague on both your houses." -- Shakespeare, Romeo and Juliet
With locusts - ok, grasshoppers - infesting much of the valley, including Chase Field, it appears we have held off on the rivers of blood, frogs, etc. and gone straight for plague #8 here in Phoenix. Darkness and the death of the first-born to follow later in the week, I imagine. So, welcome to the Giants: I hope you are ready for boils and hail, the kind of tourist attraction that won us the right to stage the 2011 All-Star game. I just hope the insects stick around for the Cubs series, because nothing shuts up a "Let's go, Cubbies!" chant faster than a mouthful of carapace. [What's the difference between a swarm of locusts and the Cubs fans at Chase? One is an irritating, noisy infestation that serves no purpose but, fortunately, only shows up infrequently...while the other is a swarm of locusts. Thank you. I'll be here all week.]
So, Doug Davis finds himself facing the reigning Cy Young winner for his second start in a row. Still, the last one ended up okay, Davis pitching eight shutout innings and getting the win, as we squeezed our only runs of the weekend in the top of the ninth. The key to Davis's effectiveness in his past couple of outings has been his control: he has walked only one batter each time, giving him a K:BB ratio of 11:2 in sixteen innings. Hitters' impatience helped him stick around too, with Doug only needing an average of 12.4 pitches per inning. The other number that jumps out to me is that he's seen 0-2 counts on 27% of batters this season, compared to only 18% in 2008, so he seems to be pitching more aggressively so far.
Should be about for most of this one, albeit probably also packing up more stuff in SnakePit Towers: it seems, no matter how many boxes we fill, the house doesn't seem actually to get any emptier! Maybe we should just burn the place down and start afresh. That would be cleansing.
Lineup
- Lopez 2B
- Drew SS
- Jackson LF
- Tracy 1B
- Reynolds 3B
- Young CF
- Upton RF
- Snyder C
- Davis P