Well, we won in the bottom of the ninth. That was exciting and all, but it doens’t feel as good to me because Coco Cordero blew another lead in the ninth. It’s odd on my fantasy teams where I have him, as I’m not getting saves, but I’m getting stupid high ERA’s and wins from him. Not the way I wanted my closer to behave.
We seemed to have this game pretty well in hand all along. We got out early on an uncharacteristically (sp?) wild Barry Zito (75 pitches through first three innings). Zito gave up 6 hits and 5 runs overall in his 5 innings pitched. He also walked 4 and struck out five, a bunch of numbers that just don’t say Zito. Even his trademark curveball wasn’t as good as it was – one of them Hank Blalock nailed off the right field foul pole for a home run.
Speaking of home runs, Kevin Mench tied the Ranger record with five straight games with a home run. The second was right after Blalock’s home run. Phil Nevin had a shot later in the game, too. It was all feeling good, as Vicente Padilla was going well, allowing just one run through five. He did give up a couple in the sixth, but still had good numbers, going 5.2IP, allowing 3 runs (only 2 earned). He did walk four which isn’t good. But we blew getting him the win, which he probably deserved.
Cordero stunk up the joint again, and when he came off the field after blowing the lead, he got booed, which is a new experience for him, I’d imagine. The TV coverage showed Akinori Otsuka a bit in the pen when Cordero was knee deep in it. I wonder how long it would take before that switch was made?