Baseball Musings
Baseball Musings
April 21, 2007
Wild Ninth

The Houston Astros and Milwaukee Brewers entered the ninth inning tied at two, and nearly doubled their run output for that game in the final frame. The Brewers failed to go for the sure out on a sacrifice bunt, and that loaded the bases. Biggio delivered a grand slam to put the Astros up 6-2. Craig is now 55 hits short of 3000.

And in what appeared to be a confidence building move, Brad Lidge starts the ninth. He walks the first two batters then Fielder takes him deep.

"It wasn't good enough, put it that way, obviously," Lidge said of his 1-2 slider to Fielder. "It should have been down more. He's a good hitter.

"I would classify it this way -- I got ahead of him, so for me to put it anywhere in the strike zone I think is a mistake. I should have thrown it lower. I probably tried to throw it too hard, overthrew it a little bit and left it up in the zone."

It wasn't enough, however, as Qualls closed out the game.

Lidge is older than I thought, mostly because he hasn't bee around that long. He's 30 years old, an age when pitchers go through a transition as they lose something off their fastballs. If that's the case, Brad isn't adjusting to it well. Of course, since he came up late in his career, maybe his peak was just very short. Looking at his minor league numbers, it's surprising he didn't reach the majors sooner.


Posted by David Pinto at 08:48 AM | Games | TrackBack (0)
Comments

Brad Lidge spent a lot of time in the minors because he was plagued by injuries almost every year. He was a starting pitcher in the minors, and perhaps he became less injury prone when used as a reliever in the majors.
Lidge is perplexing. His stuff hasn't dramatically changed, but his command is bad, particularly in critical situations. He was pitching well in non-pressure relief situations over the last two weeks.

Roger Clemens made an off-the-cuff suggestion recently that Lidge should be moved to a starting role. Maybe that would change Lidge's mental approach. However, Garner has pointed out that Lidge's injury history in the minors is one reason that he is unlikely to be moved to a starting role.

Posted by: CL Johnson at April 21, 2007 02:09 PM

lidge hasn't lost velocity. at ALL.

it is just that he used to be able to catch the upper inside and loser outside corner with the FB and he almost never can any more. NO idea why.

lidge spent 4 YEARS hurt with arm/shoulder trouble in the minors.

also, he never could develop any pitch except for the FB and the slider.

he used to be effectively wild, but not any more. he's just wild. period.

Posted by: lisa gray at April 21, 2007 03:01 PM

Brad Lidge may be duplicating 1960s Dick "The Monster" Radatz, who was absolutely lights out for almost 3 seasons for the Red Sox until Johnny Callison hit a game winning HR off Radatz in the 1964 All Star game. He was never the same reliever after that.

Posted by: BoB S at April 21, 2007 10:34 PM
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