Yet Another OOTP6 Dynasty, Year 2: One Flew Over the Pale Hose

[orin2]

Let him hit.

[cknox0723]

Originally Posted by orin2

Let him hit.

And so I did. Dotel let his first fastball fly and Thomas swung, even though he really shouldn't do that at his age. He's a little late on it, but that's OK with me -- I've taken how long to complete this season (series, game, etc)?

Hard ground ball to the right side, in between first and second. Big Adam Dunn makes a less than graceful stop and tosses it over to second. With Eric Munson sliding towards him, shortstop Aurilia fires the ball back across the right side of the infield to first base, knowing that even though speedy second baseman Castillo wasn't there yet, he would be. The ball arrives at the first base bag and sure enough, even though he's not a first baseman, Castillo is there to catch it.

And Thomas is there as well, having beaten the throw. Magglio Ordonez scores and the Pale Hose take the lead, 3-2. All this happens in the span of about four-and-a-half seconds, an eyelash's length in the seventeen-plus year career of our 39 year old, .163 hitting first baseman.

But what an eyelash it was. Bases loaded, none out, and that run was the only one we got - side-arming right-hander Mike Koplove relieved after the fielder's choice, and walked Miguel Olivo but retired Ramon Vazquez on a long fly ball to center field for the third and final out of the inning.

Joe Roa comes on for the bottom of the ninth to close. The incomparable Ichiro! leads off with a single to right, but Rich Aurilia strikes out, his seventh out in eight tries in the series. Backup catcher Ben Davis pinch-hits for Fernando Tatis, who had entered an inning and a half ago for defensive purposes. The thirty year old is not a bad reserve backstop, but he is a .244 career hitter and that is about as good as he gets, so I'm feeling as confident as ever. Roa gives me good reason to be; he keeps the sinker down, gets ahead of Davis, and forces him into a defensive 1-2 count that ends with a defensive swing and bouncing ball to short like so many others. Wilson to Kennedy to Thomas, just like no one never drew up. With that, the game is over. Frank Thomas has the game-winning RBI and at the age of 39, in his last season, he is the hero and has put us one win from the ALCS.

I live with my head in the clouds, living for those moments not only with the Pale Hose but throughout my life, and even I am sitting here, blinking my eyes, not really sure of it all. But maybe it's time to believe.



CHW 3 SEA 2

WP: PJ Bevis - the overlooked hero -- remember, he entered in the eighth with first and third, no one out, and got out of it -- but should be used to that role considering he was pitching AAA before his rule 5 selection two years ago
LP: O. Dotel - so now we know why he was not meant to sign with us that first offseason, two years ago. now it makes sense.
S: J. Roa - two for two in postseason saves, 2007 season.

If I told you that I made all this up and the Pale Hose actually went 67-95 and finished fifth again, would that make more sense?

[Astros33Resurrected]

yayyyy

[Jestor]

I <3 Frank Thomas.

I <3 the Pale Hose winning even more.

[Y0DA55]

Originally Posted by cknox0723

I live with my head in the clouds, living for those moments not only with the Pale Hose but throughout my life, and even I am sitting here, blinking my eyes, not really sure of it all. But maybe it's time to believe.

Beautiful!

[orin2]

I am glad you let him hit. Sometimes people are just DUE. Thomas was due. I knew he would get you a run. Keep your head out of the clouds... finish strong.

[Vris]

Wow.

[ifspuds]

Hold on a second. The Pale Hose are up 2-0 in the series?

Pardon me while I look outside for the apocalyptic meteor about to plow into the Earth...

[Astros33Resurrected]

Originally Posted by ifspuds

Hold on a second. The Pale Hose are up 2-0 in the series?

Pardon me while I look outside for the apocalyptic meteor about to plow into the Earth...

lol

[cknox0723]

Originally Posted by ifspuds

Hold on a second. The Pale Hose are up 2-0 in the series?

Pardon me while I look outside for the apocalyptic meteor about to plow into the Earth...

Nah, everything is not so topsy-turvy. The Empire has a pair of 4-3 wins over our division rivals Cleveland to stake the same lead in their series. Cleanup hitting 3 b-man Alex Rodriguez hit a four-bagger in the first game and a three-run round-tripper in the first inning of the next one. Somewhat ironically, his counterpart on the other side has four hits (two doubles) in eight at-bats. Maybe all Joe Crede ever needed was a winning team; we laugh because it becomes a cliche to us dorky OOTP players, but just maybe.

The Mets are also up two-oh, despite a regular-season record one game inferior to their opponents, San Francisco. I guess it is a lesson that the playoffs favor a top-heavy talent base rather than twenty-five guys who win about 90 games even when they all simultaneously play their best. Surely the losing side could have used Yorvit!, their one-time reserve catcher, as AJ Pierzynski has gone one-for-eight at the plate, allowed four of five opposing basestealers to come away unrepentent, and presumably did a fiery but half-assed job calling the last game, a seven-to-four defeat.

Possibly the biggest surprise of two games is that the other Chicago side is losing their series, and badly as it is 2-0 Colorado in the best-of-five. The Western wild-card winners got seven-plus shutout innings from 25-year old ace right-hander Dustin McGowan in the first game; center fielder Cory Sullivan doubled home professional first baseman Todd Helton for a quick second-inning run and 5'8" .247 hitting second baseman Aaron Miles accounted for the other two. The latter-day mountainous Brian Doyle singled to right with two outs in the sixth; that would be Northsider ace Barry Zito's last batter. Miles would steal second off of unsuspecting reliever Travis Driskill, who then surrendered a base hit to .226 hitting 3 b-man Pedro Feliz. The lilliputian second sacker would "get miles" on Joe Borowski's first fastball of the ninth, increasing his ballclub's lead to an insurmountable three.

Like most of his teammates, Miles would go oh-fer against fireballer Kerry Wood the next day, but they did ever make those few knocks count. Three of Colorado's four hits came in a furious charge with two out in the third inning; right fielder Jayson Werth's mammoth two-run triple into his corner was the biggest blow. Wood fanned eleven in his Herculean 7.2 inning, 113-pitch performance, "just" the tenth time he'd racked up double-digit K's in what's been a brilliant season marred by injuries, but Russ Ortiz's ten was quite likely more important - that was his number of ground ball outs, one less than McGowan recorded a day earlier. After his unconscionable six-inning, eighty-four pitch performance, the baton was passed off perfectly, as it had so often this season. Ortiz to Proven Closer (TM) Wagner (4.96 ERA this season at age 36 and, um, 33 saves) to Lopez (erm, 4.78 ERA) to, uh, Luther Hackman for his second save of the series, the same number he had all season. Ed.'s note: I would love to say that is the AI being unorthodox and quirky, but in the right way: Hackman was brilliant in eleven regular-season innings against the Cubs, save for one outing in a nothing game in May, and Proven Closer (TM) Wagner had a 5.79 ERA in five outings (4.2 IP) against the Northsiders. However, he did not blow any saves or get charged with the loss, so I can't reconcile that. Especially since I know that the real reason is the infamous OOTP "oh ****, this guy is age 36 - TOO OLD!!!" internal panic button. But we can pretend.

The playoffs are only magnified because there are less games, you know, but up close there is something so wonderfully surreal about it all that you forget all its flaws.

[Astros33Resurrected]

We need updates!

[Astros33Resurrected]

:*(

[cknox0723]

Originally Posted by Astros33Resurrected

We need updates!

I know, I know...but if we're going to do this playoff thing, may as well do it right. Apparently we are here now, fair or not, like it or leave it.

"Here" for this here third game is the south side of Chicago. We have a home playoff game and amazingly enough a near-capacity crowd to watch it. There's a little rain, but that can't put a damper on things. We've come a long way to come back home.

A win and we go to the ALCS.

Pitchers are right-handers Jon Garland (15-11, 3.95) and Tomo Ohka (9-11, 3.87). Lineup for the visitors is the same as it's been, with young Dan Gottlieb getting his second consecutive in left field and the eighth spot. "****" Podsednik is riding the pine today, since he can't hit, giving my pet Raul Gonzalez the start in left.

[cknox0723]

"Jon Moo" starts off the game inauspiciously enough by walking centerfielder Juan Pierre on four pitches. Allowing the speedster to weigh too heavily on his mind, he loses second baseman Castillo to a base on balls as well, giving Seattle perhaps their best run scoring chance so far this series with Dunn, Suzuki, and Aurilia coming up.

But the big first baseman bounces into a 3-6 force and Suzuki hits a pop into shallow left-center that my boy Raul Gonzalez makes a nice snag on. Aurilia, who has looked very uncomfortable at the plate in the two games of this series, takes a called strike one and fouls off strike two to put himself in another deep hole. One misplaced pitch would throw him the rope he'd need to climb out, but instead Garland hangs him on the fifth pitch of the A.B., firing in a biting fastball in on the hands. Aurilia takes a defensive half-swing and hits the ball all of five feet in front of the plate. Yorvit guns one into the first-base orbit, and despite the fact that most of Garland's 21 pitches were mere minutes from Brussels, this first inning was really no different than the two previous brilliant ones this series.

Our side of the frame is a little lackluster, though. "Pokey" Vazquez hits in an infield pop-up on Tomo Ohka's first pitch; "Gumby" Kennedy hits one much further on the second offering, but Ichiro! has plenty of room in the Cell's right field caverns to stretch back and haul it in among the stalagmites. 100-RBI man "Buddha" Ordonez takes a few less than meaty offerings out of the zone to give himself a nice 2-0 count, but he swings over a spinning curveball and hits a harmless bouncer to short. Aurilia fires to Dunn and that's a five-pitch inning for you.

[cknox0723]

Garland has one of those five-pitch innings in the second, if you set aside everything that happened after he ran the count full to 3B Doug Mientkiewicz. How I wish we could set all that aside, too, 'cause Mientkie's three-base hit on that 3-2 pitch was just an ominous sign of things to come. Catcher Rob Hammock would follow with a hard-hit two-bagger to the right-center field gap, only his third hit in about thirty thousand at-bats against us this season. Young outfielder Dan Gottlieb, the eight hitter, worked out a walk, so I guess I should be grateful that Garland settled down after that, stringing together three outs on a sacrifice and two fly outs to right, allowing just one more run to score. But it's hard to be grateful when you're down two-oh. I guess Seattle would know about that.

Ohka pitches a painless one-two-three second inning and even though I know logically that the odds are heavily in our favor with a two-oh lead in the series, that's the first time the thought crosses my mind that we are on the way to blowing this thing. Mark it down.

[Astros33Resurrected]

Originally Posted by cknox0723

Garland has one of those five-pitch innings in the second, if you set aside everything that happened after he ran the count full to 3B Doug Mientkiewicz. How I wish we could set all that aside, too, 'cause Mientkie's three-base hit on that 3-2 pitch was just an ominous sign of things to come. Catcher Rob Hammock would follow with a hard-hit two-bagger to the right-center field gap, only his third hit in about thirty thousand at-bats against us this season. Young outfielder Dan Gottlieb, the eight hitter, worked out a walk, so I guess I should be grateful that Garland settled down after that, stringing together three outs on a sacrifice and two fly outs to right, allowing just one more run to score. But it's hard to be grateful when you're down two-oh. I guess Seattle would know about that.

Ohka pitches a painless one-two-three second inning and even though I know logically that the odds are heavily in our favor with a two-oh lead in the series, that's the first time the thought crosses my mind that we are on the way to blowing this thing. Mark it down.

Go Pale hose!

[cknox0723]

Garland surrenders Adam Dunn's leadoff single in the top of the third but responds with a crescendo of sorts, striking out Ichiro Suzuki after a tense, brilliant 16-pitch at-bat. He follows that up with a punch out of Rich Aurilia, the world's worst number five hitter, but then Dunn steals second on the first pitch to Doug Mientkietriple. I argue the call, trying to spare myself the misery of watching us blow the entire series in one game, but no luck. Garland throws another lousy pitch to "Zwieback", who hits another hard bouncer that cuts up the infield dirt, but this time it is up the middle and Adam Kennedy is able to keep it in the first line. Because he is eXtreme, he even converts the out over at first with a gladiatorial strike.

The bottom of our order goes down without a peep in the third, putting Ohka at twenty-seven pitches through nine outs, with Garland at a count roughly two-hundred twenty-five percent higher. Then the rains fall too heavily for baseball for about an hour, making pitch counts sort of irrelevant and allowing at least one senseless idealist to see a little bit of sunshine even as the downpour subsides only to a drizzle.

Jon Moo puts a damper on that by immediately surrendering a home run to Rob Hammock to start the fourth, a titanic blast to left-center that a hydrogen-and-oxygen soaked Raul "The Element" Gonzalez doesn't even bother to look at. Only saving grace is that when the ball lands, it sends up a little spray, giving us a little bit of Kauffman Stadium at home; comforting, considering how the visitors usually fare there.

Mike "" Nannini gets up in the bullpen at that point, but there is no joy in Mudville, Chicago, even when a muddy Garland muddles his way through the rest of the inning without mucking things up more. We're knee-deep in a three-nothing puddle.

Ohka's perfect game finally ends with the start of his second trip around the order, as Ramon Vazquez cracks a hard grounder to the left side of the infield that Rich Aurilia can't do anything but stop. Adam Kennedy improbably follows with a single through the middle and Vazquez pushes himself toward third and, with a grand slide into the mud, makes good on it, giving us runners at the corners with no one out and the heart of the order up.

[ifspuds]

Three-nothing? Oh ye of little faith. A puddle it may be, but a shallow one for the mighty Pale Hose!

[cknox0723]

100-RBI man Magglio Ordonez pops up to shallow left-center on the first pitch. Vernon Wells takes one ball and then another and then takes a grand, mistimed swing at a yellow hammer, hitting a massive foul pop that eventually goes plop into the glove of massive first baseman Dunn. Third baseman Eric Munson hits a harmless ground ball to the big first sacker for out number three and the cherry on top, it's still raining. No sunshine today, at least not through four.

[Astros33Resurrected]

Originally Posted by cknox0723

100-RBI man Magglio Ordonez pops up to shallow left-center on the first pitch. Vernon Wells takes one ball and then another and then takes a grand, mistimed swing at a yellow hammer, hitting a massive foul pop that eventually goes plop into the glove of massive first baseman Dunn. Third baseman Eric Munson hits a harmless ground ball to the big first sacker for out number three and the cherry on top, it's still raining. No sunshine today, at least not through four.

Why do you torture us with these tidbits ?