Is Kent hurt??? Two off-days in a row (even with the day off tommorow), and we've faced lefty's both days... in Coors Field. Looked like an ideal opp. for Kent to do some damagae...???
Thats what I was wondering. If hes not, there is no way Jimi should be sitting him today, especially with the day off tomorrow. This Kennedy guy has a big ol looping curve. Bags got good wood and still couldnt hit it out. HOpefully our guys fall into a trap where they are trying to jack all his pitches out. Just stay back and single them to death.
They just said that Kent had a strained quad.... in fact, now I remember him looking kinda funny after he slid home in Friday night's game... but I'm pretty sure he stayed in afterwards, so its probably just precationary. If we can bang out the hits today, with a lineup that includes Lane and Viz... this will do wonders for our bench confidence.
Once again, our offense is feast or famine. 12 runs one day and 1 run the next. Against another powder puff pitcher.
Against another powder puff pitcher. To be fair, their pitcher has been great all year long so far... and 3 of his starts now have been at Coors. His performance today was pretty much in line with his other games this season.
How much are we paying Viz to absolutely not produce in his spot starts and pinch-hitting?? He's pretty worthless in the lineup otherwise, and I would have rather saved the $$$ by just playing Bruntlett. At least Ausmus can justify the $$$ by handling the pitching staff... but even then, that's a marginal exception. You can't have two exceptions on the team... and the Astros have that with the light-hitting Viz and Ausmus getting major playing time.
I'm just glad we won the CO series. I like the 2-1 or 3-1 series wins. Maybe even steal a few sweeps. But lets not get sweeped like the last SL series! Let see how we do vs Pitt.
Oh well, still won the series. At least Lidge messed up in a game that we were already losing against a non-divisional opponent instead of a game where we needed him to do good.
Its a combination of thin atmosphere and HUGE dimensions. The ball flies out of there, so the outfielders have to play back. But, the gaps are 390!!!, so inevitably, you'll see plenty of bloop singles, doubles, triples, and the eventual cheap HR. Since the balls are flying out of there anyways (no matter what the dimensions), they should have just built an average-normal sized park so that outfielders can at least cut-off the extra base hits. As it is now, its impossible. Bottom line... the reason why you see so many high scoring games is NOT because of the HR, IMO, its because of the way the outfield is configured.
Nick -- i totally agree. and the game just "feels" different there. you can literally see the ball jump off the bat there. it's different than anything else i've ever seen.
Since the balls are flying out of there anyways (no matter what the dimensions), they should have just built an average-normal sized park so that outfielders can at least cut-off the extra base hits. Except then even MORE balls fly would fly out of there. It's not like balls are either going to fly out or not. You make the park smaller and you'll just get tons more homeruns. Coors is fine as a ballpark. It puts a premium on having speedy outfielders, but there's nothing wrong with that. The problem is how the atmopshere affects the pitching - breaking balls don't break as well. That results in more balls being solidly hit, which is where the problem comes in. Once they are hit, though, I don't think there's anything wrong with the ballpark's dimensions.
agreed..you can see the lack of movement on pitches...and you can see how they hang up there. again...i just have never seen balls jump off wood bats like that before. i say this every year we play there...but it just seems like something other than baseball sometimes.
Why can't they just use balls with a little bit more weight/density??? That would solve all the problems... and would simulate baseball in a ballpark played closer to sea level. Its quite obvious that even the best of pitchers are still going to struggle there... why not give it a shot??
Why can't they just use balls with a little bit more weight/density??? That would solve all the problems... and would simulate baseball in a ballpark played closer to sea level. They do store baseballs differently there to keep in moisture or something - and it has dramatically decreased the level of scoring in that park from about 4 years ago (they started this 2 or 3 years ago). However, you create a heavier ball and its going to affect the pitcher's feel & delivery, etc. There's no way to purely simulate sea-level conditions unless you domed the stadium and pumped it with higher-density air.
