My Opening Day

It was opening day for me today, as I finally made it out to my first game at Telephone Park. Noah Lowry faced one of Mr. Leaguer’s surprising starting pitchers, Kip Wells.

Wells was certainly one of the stars of the game. He scored both of the Cardinals’ runs, including a solo homer into the left field bleachers. He pitched well, too, but was foiled by three ugly errors in catching the ball at first base, though he made the most disasterous error himself. The Cards could have used the 7 year old boy to our left who smoothly gloved a ball tossed into the stands by Yaddy Molina. The Giants followed the miscues with some timely hitting, particularly by Ryan Klesko, who is looking like a man who needs to start every game against every right handed pitcher.

Noah kept the score down and the few baserunners stranded. He was certainly effective, but the kid doesn’t have a fastball. You can just tell that he’s going to give up some big scores along the way. He’s starting to look like he’ll have a decent career as a #5 starter. Woody Reuter with a better stick.

Meanwhile, what is wrong with the Cardinals? Swept by the Giants, their starting rotation includes only one pitcher who was in the rotation at the start of the 2006 season (Carpenter) and he’s on the DL.

And meanwhile, what is wrong with Big Al Pujols? He’s batting an anemic .190, down there with, er…. me? He’s never really had a slump in his career, so it will be interesting to see how he deals with it. By the way, Big Al is bald. He has supposedly just turned 27, but this is not about shaving his head, the man is Kojak. Is it possible he’s a little older than we think?

Brad Hennessey threw two nice innings at the end for the save. As Big Mike, sitting next to me said, “It was a well earned save. He saved us from Benitez.” Blownitez was warming up in the bottom of the eighth, but Klesko’s opposite field double drove in the run that made the lead 4, and he sat down.

Last night Jonathan Sanchez pitched the last three innings of 12 to earn the win. Is the bullpen finally pulling together after that meltdown against the Rockies? Both Hennessey and Sanchez have something that Noah Lowry does not: a 93 mph pitch with some movement. Maybe Sabean is right that the young bullpen just needs a little time.

Have you all seen Scott Speizio’s red goatee? Big Mike wants to know: does the carpet match the drapes? If you know, please get back to us on that.