Thursday, May 22, 2008

Nats get blown out by the Phillies, 12-2


Well that just happened.

We let Matt Chico pitch again and it came back to bite us in the butt, big time. As soon as Victorino ripped that double down the line passed a diving Zimmerman I put my dinner away and prepared myself to be sick. At no point in the game did Chico look especially effective, he let up line drives to a slumping line up and bombs to people who have no right hitting them (Victorino, not Howard). The outs he recorded were for the most part loud outs, and the hits were even louder. It’s starting to feel like JV baseball all over again when I see Chico start, he’s like the kid no one has the heart to tell he can’t pitch, on a staff that doesn’t have the recourses to bench him.

Bad things about Matt Chico:
-His fastball is fatter then Dmitri Young
-He doesn’t locate his fastball
-He doesn’t locate his off speed pitches
-His name is one letter off from meaning “Girl”
-He doesn’t get righties out
-He doesn’t get lefties out

Jesus Colume that 6th inning sucked! When you’re already down 4-0 an eight run inning won’t just take you out of the game, it will embarrass anyone wearing the curly w on their heads. I don’t think it’s possible for Colume to have pitched any worse then he did Wednesday night. He allowed 5 hits, walked a 45 year old starting pitcher, didn’t back up home plate, and was responsible to 6 runs, EARNED. The inning was of course capped off by Ryan Howards second homer of the game.

All by themselves

The Nats line up actually did a pretty solid job today, they just stranded their many base runners. Lastings Milledge went 2-4 even with a two strike hit after The Nats Blog attacked his two strike approach, but he stranded 4 runners tonight. This was the theme for the whole team sadly, the Nats had 12 hits and only scored 2 runs. It was a rare night to see all of our starting line up succeed, even Wily Mo and Dukes had a hit, we just couldn’t get it done when it counted. Sadly though this isn’t as much of a matter of bad luck as some may think, situational hitting is a skill you learn. The knowledge of which pitches to look for in what counts in different situations is instilled in great teams by their hitting coach. We really need a new one of those.

Keeping the big 3 quiet.

Howard, Utley, and Rollins combined for:

7/15, 3 2B’s, 2 Hr’s, 6 RBI’s, 4 R.

So no…the Nats didn’t keep them quiet tonight. It’s a shame the Nationals had to go out and give up such a big night to all three of these guys, they had done such a great job in the first part of the series of keeping all the Phillies off balance. We can look at this as an anomaly, Ryan Howard was more then due, Rollins was in a two game slump, and lets face it these hitters are just damn good.

Bad News:

This is the second series in a row the Nationals have lost two out of three. This isn’t a trend we can continue. Next up: The brew crew.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

chica is terrible, I'd rather have ray king in the bullpen then him

Lucky Jarmes said...

Ray King was in ESPN yesterday, talking about what it's like to be both really fat, and a pitcher. Hell yes!

He should still be on the team.

Unknown said...

You left out that the Nats walked 98 year old Jamie Moyer.

They couldn't hit him either. But walking him?