the end of an era

i have cried several times in the last few days. i will never again see my boyfriend play baseball professionally. i really didn't think i'd be this choked up about it, but after watching him play for 20 years (and enjoying every bit of it), i guess it's inevitable.

i actually had a conversation with a man on friday night (who lives in houston but is from philly) who told me he didn't think biggio was that good. i'll let that sink in a minute. not that good? has he been in a coma for 20 years?

i was at a work function, so screaming that he was obviously the most ignorant man in the city of houston was not an option. instead i chose to excuse myself from the table. when i came back, he had wisely moved to the other end of the table.

biggio's had an amazing career, and he's done it with grace and dignity. he will be missed by many...especially me.

Growing Excitement

I am excited about a few things in baseball right now. My Astros are playing much better and are coming back home this weekend. In addition, my "boyfriend" keeps hitting the ball; 3000 is coming up.

And the other thing I am happy about is our team's reaction to Clemens' decision to go "back home" to the yankees; there is an article about it on the Astros' website. It sounds like the majority of them (excluding Ausmus) feel like I do: we have our team, and our pitching staff is doing well. Who cares about Clemens...let's move on.

I LOVE this! And it makes me want to go have drinks with Berkman and Oswalt! They seem to be as annoyed with Clemens as I am (unless they're just annoyed with the press for making a big deal out of it...but let a girl dream). My favorite quote from the article:

"There are two kinds of people," Lance Berkman said. "Those people who aren't surprised, and morons."

Seriously, please come have a beer with me, Berkman!

Clemens

So I just heard that Clemens re-signed with the Yanks, and I have one word: GOOD! I'm so sick of the way he plays (screws) with everyone, and it tells me a lot that he signed with the club with the worst chance (as of right now) of getting to the playoffs. Is it because they need him more than everyone else, and he can be their shining star? Is it because his buddy Pettitte is playing there? I don't think there's been any word on how much he's getting paid yet, but that may have something to do with it. Honestly, I don't even care. Good luck and good riddance...

Hunter Hype...and other things

(written Wed.) I went to the game tonight, and we won...finally! That means that we have won every game I've been to (although it doesn't hurt that Oswalt has pitched several of those).

The first thing about the game tonight of note was Oswalt's pitch count. While I can't find an official count, the last thing I remember was like 92 total pitches with only 19 balls. Can someone say amazing? That's about all I have on that...the guy is just a great pitcher, and he will always be fun to watch, as long as we (and I mean the entire city of Houston) don't expect and depend on him to carry the team.

I began this post last Wednesday after the game, and I am just now getting back to it. I was going to write about all the Hunter Pence hype, and how I thought it was almost scary that there was so much riding on this kid. There are a lot of fans here in Houston who like to jump on the bandwagon when a team is doing well, and then those same people talk smack about the team when they are not winning. We do the same thing with our players (example: Brad Lidge; and I'm not talking about those of us who think he just lost it and may benefit from a change of scenery. I'm talking about those people who boo him when he comes out and talk smack about him). I don't like those "fans".

Okay, back to Hunter: I know that he is young, and I was really worried that he would cave under the pressure (although so far, no sign of that...and his first dinger in the majors today, which just so happened to be a grand slam, is evidence of that). It is entertaining to watch this young thing play ball. He is all over the place. There was one time on Wednesday night when I honestly thought Luke Scott might drop a ball he had caught. There was a hit to shallow right field, an easy catch for Scott, but Pence ran full speed into right field and didn't stop until he was on top of Scott. They laughed about it after the catch, but it scared me a little. Then last night (I think it was last night) a routine fly was hit to deep left, and Lee was waiting pretty much under the ball. Pence booked it over from center, called Lee off, and made the catch. Um, okay. While part of me is glad we have someone who will hustle and is aggressive, there's another part of me wondering when he's going to screw something up. He reminds me of the character (I think his name was Kelly) in the Bad News Bears who runs around the entire field making every play because the rest of the team sucks.

I will enjoy watching Pence play, and I am a fan, but I refuse to jump on the bandwagon. I'll leave that to the rest of the city.

One of the effects of Pence's presence is revitalized bats (or so it seems). Today they scored 13 runs, and Albers pitched a shutout against the Cards (awesome!). I only wish we could save some of these hits for later games. It seems like our bats get fired up in one game, and then we go cold again for the next few (or more); examples: April 13, Astros v. Phillies (9-6) and April 28, Astros v. Brewers (10-1).

Go 'stros! ...and Hunter, you too: keep it up; you're doing great!

My "boyfriend" Biggio

So I was just reading some of my posts from last season. Hmmm, funny, I could just copy and paste some of them to today's blog! Lately there's not been much to get excited about with my Astros. I still love them, but they have been less than fun to watch recently (especially on television...the announcers are KILLING me, which is a whole separate post for another time). Thankfully we've won both games I've been to, and I'm going again Wed. night, so we'll see. I have not complained too much about the team's performance of late for two reasons:

1. Lidge has been removed from the position of closer, and Dan Wheeler, the guy I've been saying for 2 years should be our closer, is now such. It's just too bad we don't have need for him lately. Sorry, I digress; back to Biggio...

2. Biggio's run to his 3000th hit. This is huge. Seriously, it's HUGE. I think because I've grown up watching him (and loving him, both as a player and as a "boyfriend"), when the season started, I wasn't thinking about what a big deal this is. As of today, he has 2,953 hits. Um, that means there are only 28 people (as of right now) in the history of baseball who have more career hits than he does. And as I was checking my numbers on that stat, I ran across a few other categories where little Pigpen, as I used to call him, has made his mark:

hit by pitch - he is 2nd (all time), with only 5 more plunks needed to break the all-time record (set in like 1902 or something)

doubles - as of today, the count is 643, which means he ranks 8th all time, just ahead of Honus Wagner and ahead of other greats like Hank Aaron and Cal Ripken, Jr.

games played - he ranks 24th all time (with today's count being 2,732). If he plays only 100 more games this season, he'll rank 16th, and he's only had 2 seasons in which he played fewer than 130 games, one of which was the year they went on strike. Last year he played 145 games (which would mean 122 more this season), so if he matched that, he would rank 15th. I'm not counting on him playing many complete games after he reaches 3000 hits though.

plate appearances - he ranks 14th all time with 12,049

at bats - he ranks 15th with 10,451

bases on balls - he ranks 58th, which may seem low, but if you think about it, he's a lead-off hitter, and most of the players who are frequently walked are power hitters, of which he is not. He is, however, very good at fouling off pitches until he gets a pitch he likes (or is walked). I once saw an at-bat that lasted 21 pitches (or something insane like that); he just kept fouling them off.

total bases - he ranks 33rd with 4,556

I wish I knew how many players had played in MLB games in the history of the game. I do know there are over 200 players in the Baseball Hall of Fame. Imagine being in the top 20 on several lists when there are that many hall-of-famers. How amazing!

All in all, I am looking at this season differently. While I want my Astros to do well and to win, I have something else to look forward to: Biggio. I think it's safe to say this is his last season. Lately I've regretted not paying more attention to the game and the players when I was so close to the team. There are players I wish I had gotten to know better (and some whose careers I wish I had gotten to know better).

But I was just a teenage girl who happened to be friends with the coach's daughter and got to spend every summer home game night at the Dome...and I had a crush on a new player named Biggio.

I hadn't quite fallen in love with the game of baseball just yet. Oh the irony...

another car commercial?

naturally, since we are back to baseball season, i have spent an uncharacteristic amount of time watching tv lately, mainly my astros. what i have recently realized (and whether it's worse this year or it's always been this bad and i've just never noticed before, i'll never know) is that there are an inordinate amount of car/truck/dealership commercials at breaks (buffered by the occasional minute maid commercial). what is the deal with this? do sports fans buy more cars and trucks than the average person watching another show? seriously, these commercials are not only way too frequent, but they are REALLY bad, especially the local dealerships. it's almost worth getting a DVR and starting the game a half hour later just to fast forward through these things. you'd think in the days of DVR's and tivo that commercials would be getting better, but apparently not.

why is this such an issue this year? lately it seems the commercials are all i have to look forward to. fox, make it stop! bring back your fun commercials. i miss seeing people running into other people and running into walls. bring back the "we're all astros" commercials!

Don't give up...

Sadly, it's been almost a month since my last post, and much has happened with my boys.

Update:

• We're still not playing .500 ball
• We still can't win a game for Clemens (even when we're up by 4 runs when he leaves the game)
• Lidge almost got traded
• There were rumors that Oswalt almost got traded (still trying to figure this one out)
• My new (second) favorite player Luke Scott is hitting .400
• Lidge managed to save a one-run game last night
• My boyfriend Biggio hit 2 homeruns tonight
• Backe looked good tonight, and Pettitte looked good last night
• They're 2-0 against the Padres at San Diego

I am still not convinced that Phil Garner is a good manager. He is a very nice man (one of my students wrote him last year, and he responded with a handwritten letter to her), and I've heard that he's a "good guy" (whatever that means), but I do not trust his judgment. He has made way too many bad decisions (or indecisions) this year that have cost us heavily. He bunts in situations that he shouldn't (like when his 4, 5, and 6 hitters are coming up...that's just giving away an out), and he doesn't seem to be doing a good job of judging his pitchers' abilities in tight game situations.

Watching the game tonight made me wonder something: how must Clemens feel when his team can win a one-run game that Pettitte pitches and then the next night score 7 runs to give Backe a win? I'm pretty sure I'd be pissed on the inside at least. I just have to believe that he's torn between being happy that his team is winning and irritated that they can't do it when he's on the hill. Oh well, at least I saw him smiling tonight.

And on that note, I love the way these guys act with each other; they're just fun. Mike Lamb has been interviewed a few times, and he is hilarious. He and Chris Burke get along great, and they're funny together. Multiple times I have seen Lamb randomly go up and hug Burke in the dugout...it's just good to know that even though they're below .500, they can still have a good time. That's ultimately going to play a big part in whether or not they stay alive in the race to the end of the season.

Things to look forward to:

• Pettitte always catches fire in the second half of the season
• Backe is back and looks good
• Ensberg is back and looks good
• Scott just rocks
• Lamb is hitting .300
• Everett always rocks defensively
• Only 3 of our starters are hitting below .250 (and Ensberg is one of them with .245)

Go 'stros!