No Singing That Day in Mudville

Nothing like coming off a heartbreaking loss by playing the hottest team in baseball in their own park. Milwaukee has the best record in the Majors while the Yankees are struggling to get back above .500. When did April become Upside Down Month?

Regardless, the Nats are in Miller Park tonight to try and squeeze out at least one win in the series. Hoping for anything more would be greedy, but hey, I’ll take what I can get. Now to some specifics.

If you’re reading this blog, you undoubtedly know about the disaster that was the final 30 minutes of the game yesterday against the Cubs. Before getting to the disaster of the 9th and 10th innings, let me list some positives I got from the game:

Ryan Zimmerman may be slowly emerging from his slump. While he went just 1-3 with a walk and 2 K’s, I take heart from any hit. A fact that was played out this evening as Z-man went 2-4, raising his BA to .256. OK, so it’s not Tony Gwynn, but it’s a start.

Matt Chico pitched better than expected. He kept to his game plan for the entire outing. Only Geoff Jenkins’s 3-run homer in the second inning detracts from a good 7 inning outing tonight.

Ryan Langerhans had two hits, which will hopefully turn into more, but that’s debatable as Nook Logan returned to the outfield tonight. Luckily for Langerhans, Nook didn’t really do much tonight so all is not lost.

Shawn Hill had a good outing overall, despite some control problems that were probably more the result of some nagging arm soreness rather than a long term problem. Let’s hope the rest helps that soreness.

OK, so that’s about all I got out of the game. There was still the paltry offense led by Dmitri Young’s fluke 2-RBI pinch hit in the 7th. Luckily, it was helped by Shawn Hill’s solid pitching and some decent defense (I’m looking at you, Z-man, and your ninja-like reflexes).

Chief, you’ve GOT to get going here! Four blown saves already and this one the worst yet. Look, I’m a Chief fan. He’s not my favorite player, but I like him. He comes in to each game to win it. I never doubt his commitment to winning. And obviously, he’s got off the field family issues weighing on him right now. (http://washington.nationals.mlb.com/news/article.jsp?ymd=20070507&content_id=1951413&vkey=news_was&fext=.jsp&c_id=was) However, the closer has one job: come in for one half inning and get three outs to get the win. When you throw 7 straight balls, you’re not going to get that job done. Especially against the Cubs. So while the Nats could have done a lot to make the score a little better (Kory Casto stranding like 15 runners comes to mind), Chief’s gotta get the job done no matter if the lead is one run or 10.

Some quick notes:

John Patterson has been placed on the 15 day DL with soreness in his right bicep. The only ailment left for Patterson is getting struck by lightning and bird flu at this point. The guy has rotten health luck. I guess we can take solace that Jason Simontacchi is returning tomorrow. Then again, he’s returning against the Brewers.

I’ve been living under a rock because I had no idea that the Brewers were under new ownership as of 2005. That partially explains why they’re playing so well. Yeah, they played a lot of teams with sub .500 records thus far, but not having the Seligs running your organization automatically adds 15 wins to your record. I think someone measured that and if they haven’t, they should because it’s true.

I’m going to the Orioles-Devil Rays game tomorrow night using some company tickets that one of our executives was giving away. While I’m no O’s or Devil Rays fan, a free major league baseball ticket sitting 10 rows back from the field is something I won’t turn down without a very good reason.