Game #105 Preview: 8/4, Arizona Diamondbacks @ Washington Nationals

Patrick Corbin LHP, 2-3, 3.21

Max Scherzer RHP, 11-8, 2.22

Ender Inciarte - RF	Yunel Escobar - 3B
A.J. Pollock - CF	Anthony Rendon - 2B
Paul Goldschmidt - 1B	Bryce Harper - RF
David Peralta - LF	Ryan Zimmerman - 1B
Jake Lamb - 3B	Jayson Werth - LF
Jarrod Saltalamacchia - C	Ian Desmond - SS
Chris Owings - 2B	Wilson Ramos - C
Nick Ahmed - SS	Michael Taylor - CF
Patrick Corbin - LHP	Max Scherzer - RHP

Hard to feel over optimistic about today's game, going as we are up against a three-time All-Star, who currently owns a 2.21 ERA, especially with our hottest hitter of the past five weeks, in Welington Castillo, riding the pine. We'll see how it works out, but this is the kind of game which, from previous experience, typically has scheduled recapper imstillhungry95 plunging his hands into boiling oil to escape. Buy, hey: we've already dismantled Felix Hernandez on this trip, and we did score off Scherzer when we faced him at Chase Field back in May. Admittedly it was only a run, but how much run support does Patrick Corbin need? Sheesh.

Went to see Mission Impossible: Rogue Nation this morning. Interesting to see it preceded by a trailer for the upcoming Bong film, SPECTRE, as MI seems to have moved over to occupy the spot in the action market which used to be occupied by Bond. I think it started with the third entry, when J.J. Abrams took over, and this one is pretty much a relentless gallop through seventies-style 007isms, globehopping around with a infinite supply of tricky gadgetry by its side, clobbering villains with implausibly byzantine schemes for world domination, in between highly-destructive car-chases.

Less bed-hopping here though: Ethan Hawke is serious IMF agent. Or maybe Scientology frowns on that kind of thing. Or his wife? Is Cruise still married? Or even a Scientologist? I dunno; need my mother-in-law here to advise me on all this, since she keeps up with the celebrity rags, though her specialist subject - bizarrely for someone born in Cuba - is the British royal family. [I feign polite interest]. Anyway. I thoroughly enjoyed this, even if, a bit like Mad Max: Fury Road, the hero is largely upstaged by a more interesting and deeper-faceted heroine, who rescues his ass on more than one occasion. This, I should stress, is absolutely not a criticism. 007 now has a lot to live up to.