Derek Holland’s line will show he had a quality start. Six innings, three earned runs. His outing wasn’t like Matt Harrison’s the other night, but he was still decent enough. The first three innings Holland was out there, I thought he was going to have the same kind of performance that Matt did. Then for the innings after that, he was more pedestrian. Few too many pitches (105 over 7, not too outrageous) in places. He battled, and did pretty good. Not Cliff Lee like, but still, a great start to the season for him. Hopefully he can build from that.
Darren O’Day pitched, and was like the real O’Day. Not that guy who was in spring training. Given how awful he was in the spring, we’ll need quite a few more performances like this one before I ignore what happened in Arizona this year.
Arthur Rhodes gave up a run, but was OK. Nothing spectacular, though.
Neftali Feliz pitched again, only this time with his first save opportunity. Converted itw with a perfect inning. Gotta love that. As much as I love scoring a ton of runs, I also want him to get some save opportunities!
Offensively, we were quite efficient with our hits, as we didn’t have a ton of them. Total of seven hits and four walks. Of the hits, we had two doubles (Hamilton, Young), a triple (Borbon), and two home runs (Andrus, Cruz). Both home runs were notable for different reasons. Elvis’ was the first regular season home run since the 2009 season, spanning something like 700+ at bats or so. Cruz’s tied a record that only two other players have done. The other two players were Mark McGwire and Willie Mays. Cruz is the first player ever to do it in the AL. “That” is the fact that he’s had a home run in each of the team’s first four games of the season. What’s amusing is the times of the other guys. Saw on TV where the year that McGwire did it, he ended up with 70 home runs that year. The year that Mays did it, he ended up with just 16. :)
Anyway, we’re 4-0 to start the season, our best start since 1996. Feels good. I wonder how long it will last. Hopefully quite awhile.