Thursday, April 17, 2008

Banged Around

Both Clay Buchholtz and Chien-Ming Wang lasted less than five innings last night just one week after hooking up for a pitchers duel. If the Sox or Yanks see a pitcher twice in such a short period of time they will take advantage. Their line ups are too smart and too patient. Tonight we get another rematch in Beckett vs. Mussina, and I wouldn't be surprised to see a lot of runs again. Although, I think the Sox have a distinct advantage in this game concerning starting pitching.

I can't figure out why David Ortiz has become such a hacker. He has some hits lately, and I hope that is a sign that he is coming out of his slump. However, he is failing at a lot of first pitches and therefore producing weak ground ball outs. This was the case a couple of times last night. If he shows more patience and can poke the ball the other way against those ridiculous shifts, he will be more successful and get back into a groove. I just hope the knee isn't a serious problem. If it is, he should just sit until it is 100%. The rest of the line up can hold up until he gets back.

2 comments:

Dennis said...

Although I think Ortiz will snap out of it, the fat, out of shape guys are always the ones most likely to fall off a cliff. The knee is bad, we all know it, but it can't be helping to carry around 300 pounds on it.

Dan said...

That's true Den. It had crossed my mind. Think of others such as Cecil Fielder and Mo Vaughn who each had a great half a dozen years or so then fell off the cliff as you put it.