Baseball Musings
Baseball Musings
May 04, 2008
Games of the Day

Greg Maddux makes his fourth attempt at 350 wins. His first attempt he took one for the team after a marathon 22 inning game. His last two attempts, he pitched well enough to win but first his offense, then his bullpen let him down. He'll face a Florida Marlins team that's starting to slide. They've lost four of their last five games, allowing 36 runs. Maddux faces former Tiger Andrew Miller. Miller looked like he made some progress in his penultimate start, but he still gave up nine hits in five innings. He hasn't struck out a batter in his last two appearances.

Roy Halladay tries to break a rare three game losing streak against the White Sox this afternoon. Rare in that he completed all three games:

Their losing pitcher in the 19th straight loss was Mickey Lolich. It marked his seventh straight start in which he did both of these things: He threw a complete game, and he lost.

That is the longest such streak of complete-game losses in at least the last half-century, according to baseball-reference.com.

Toronto's Roy Halladay has pitched a complete-game loss in each of his last three starts. If he does so again today against the White Sox, he'll become the first pitcher in 28 years to have a complete-game loss in four straight starts.

The last pitcher to incur this fate was Oakland's Rick Langford, who had six straight complete-game losses in 1980. They came early in a streak in which manager Billy Martin abused Langford by having him throw 22 straight complete games (by far the longest such streak in the last half-century). Langford's career faded soon thereafter.

As you can see, Halladay pitched very well over the three games, not allowing a home run and only one walk a game. Jose Contreras takes the hill for Chicago. He's doing a better job of keeping the ball in the park, allowing just two home runs so far. That's tough when half the games are at the White Sox home park.

Scott Kazmir makes his 2008 debut as he tries to prevent a Red Sox sweep of the Rays. He'll face fellow lefty Jon Lester. Lester has walked more than he struck out this season, but he's coming off a great start in which he shutout the Blue Jays for eight innings. The Rays managed a 4.04 team ERA, good for sixth in the AL without Kazmir in the rotation. I suspect it will get even better now.

The matchup of the day takes place in Philadelphia where Cole Hamels hosts the Giants Tim Lincecum. Hamels pitches at his best at home this season, posting a 2.15 ERA and allowing just two home runs in 29 1/3 innings. Lincecum allowed just one round tripper all season. Tim's overall batting against numbers aren't that impressive (.265 BA, .345 OBA), but he's allowed a mere .111 BA with men in scoring position. It's the bend, don't break strategy.

Two former AL aces battle in the desert later today as Johan Santana faces Dan Haren. Dan faced the Mets twice in interleague play and posted very good numbers in a small sample size. This is Santana's first crack at the snakes.

Finally, the Cubs and Cardinals play the rubber game of their series with first place in the NL Central on the line. Jason Marquis and Todd Wellemeyer do battle. Last season, the former Cardinal Marquis showed St. Louis they were wrong to let him go, compiling a 3-1 record and a 3.60 ERA against them. Welllemeyer's strikeouts and walks indicate he should be better than a 4.14 ERA, but his six home runs allowed negate that somewhat.

Enjoy!

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Posted by David Pinto at 11:06 AM | Matchups | TrackBack (0)
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