Great Stategy, Felipe

Someone told me once that if, as a team, you do not allow the opposition to score at all, then chances were good that you could pull off a victory.

Yesterday, in my mind, I was thinking Jason Schmidt would allow just a few runs. Andy Pettitte would allow a run or two less. Well, if you flip-flopped those...I'd still be wrong.

Schmidt allow the very round, very low number of "0" runs through eight innings yesterday, and outdueled the still-very-good Pettitte in the Giants 4-0 shutout of the Houston Astros yesterday.

Two things:

1) I don't really want to jump the gun, but folks, Jason Schmidt is back. Since his ERA hit a season high of 6.12 back on June 11th vs. the Indians, Schmidt has only had one bonafide bad start -- the rest have been anywhere from decent to dominant. His k/9 (strikeouts per nine innings) is almost at one batter per inning, and his velocity...well, it isn't the raw numbers he's hitting on the gun that I'm looking at, it was the fact that in the 7th inning at about 100 pitches, Schmidt was still hitting 94 mph.

2) Some credit to Randy Winn, who has thus far done everything Brian Sabean could have hoped for, plus more. He's gotten a hit in every game (five in his last two games), and he seems to be settling into centerfield. The Giants offense still sucks right now, but Winn is doing everything within his power to turn things around.

(still think the trade was silly, by the way, but I give credit where it's due -- Winn has contributed more than his share over his first four games with the team)

Sidenote: My absolutely horrible luck and timing continues in other parts of my life. After rushing home to catch the remainder of the Royals/A's game on television, I turned on the tube to find the Royals up 4-1. Did I see any of the Royals scoring? No.

And if you saw the game or saw the highlights, does anyone care to guess at which point in the game I turned on the t.v.?

If you guessed right as Dan Johnson was driving a 3-2 pitch over the fence into the Royals bullpen, you guessed correctly. The 2nd pitch I saw in the game was the one that Johnson hit to put the A's back in the game. And, of course, I saw the agonizing 8th inning which saw the Royals give up the lead by allowing two Oakland runs on...one hit. Yep, one hit, and it was...a single. Three walks and a wild pitch did the rest.

So, a 5-4 loss, and a look skyward towards the heavens with one question: can you take the stake out of my heart, now, oh Lord?