Baseball Musings
Baseball Musings
September 15, 2006
Games of the Day

It's a big night for the Mets as Pedro Martinez returns to the mound and a win will clinch the NL East. Martinez last pitched on August 14th and allowed six runs in one inning. While the Mets are winning just fine without him (19-9 in his absence), a healthy Pedro enhances their chances of winning the World Series. He'll face the Pirates, who are a respectable 12-9 over the last three weeks.

Johan Santana goes for win number 19 as the Twins try to continue their comeback in the AL Central. He faces the Indians and Fausto Carmona. Santana is 7-2 vs. the Tribe in his career, striking out 116 in108 1/3 innings. In other words, typical Johan.

The Yankees magic number to clinch the East is six, and they open a four game series with the Red Sox tonight. If New York and win three out of four, the division is theirs. Beckett takes on Wang. Chien goes for win 18. He was held out of last night's game due to the weather. Beckett pitched a good game vs. the Yankees back in May, but overall his ERA against New York this season is 12.21.

The Astros are teetering on the brink of falling out of the wild card race as they send Roger Clemens against Brett Myers of the Phillies. Clemens earned his money for the Astros. Unfortunately, the rest of the team didn't give him enough support. Despite posting a 2.27 ERA, the Astros are 7-8 in Roger's starts. If the team had gone 11-4, they're in the thick of things. Six times Houston scored two runs or less in a Clemens start.

The Giants hope to gain on both San Diego and Los Angeles this weekend, but they have to do it against the St. Louis Cardinals. Jason Schmidt and Jeff Suppan get the series started tonight. Schmidt's been consistent home and road, but his support hasn't as his record goes from 7-1 in San Francisco to 4-7 away. Suppan is pitching well down the stretch and emerged as the Cardinals #2 starter.

The Oakland Athletics face an AL Wild Card contender for the second series in a row as they work to put away the Angels in the west before next weekend. Two hot second half pitchers face each other as Jon Garland takes on Esteban Loaiza. Since the start of August, Garland is 6-1, Loaiza 5-1.

The most important game of the day is the one scheduled to start last, San Diego at Los Angeles. The walkers and wheelchairs will be ready as old men David Wells and Greg Maddux battle each other. It's a classic fight between pitchers who throw strikes and get hitters to swing at bad pitches. We might be looking at an 1:45 game here.

Enjoy!


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Posted by David Pinto at 08:50 AM | Matchups | TrackBack (0)
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