Hooray for John Thomson, who pitched seven innings of five-hit shutout ball, desperately needed after recent days. Thomson did walk three, but struck out five, and generally avoided trouble. He only got in trouble a couple of times. After the second short delay, in the third (apparently it had something to do with the umpires?) when he walked two and the Mets had runners on second and third, two out, but he struck out Cliff Floyd. He got lucky in the fourth when a long ball with a runner on first bounced over the wall for a double, keeping a run from scoring, and he was able to walk the next guy to face the pitcher. In the seventh, the Mets got the first two on, but Thomson got a strikeout and two fly balls to get out of it.
He needed to, because after a bizarre first inning (where the Braves scored two runs when Jason Phillips twice couldn’t manage to successfully block the plate or get a tag down) the Braves did basically diddly. The Braves were limited to four hits, three by Marcus, two of those doubles. The only other hit was Drew’s single in the first; he later scored on an error. They walked three times, but struck out thirteen. Andruw turned in three of those, though he worked the count to 3-2 all three times so I’m not too upset.
The Marlins lost, and the Braves’ lead is 8 1/2 and magic number ten… Well, I’m out of here. It looks like the storm will probably pass a little further east than previously thought and things won’t be as bad as feared. I’ll try to pop in, but Jeff will be with you tomorrow and probably Friday.
Good luck, Mac. I’ll try to do you proud. Hopefully the magic number will be down to six by the time of your return.
Looks like Marcus might be getting his power stroke back; after only 4 extra bases in August, he now has 6 extra base hits in half as many PA in September.
The downside is that he’s been swinging at everything, only 2 BB, But that should pick up pretty soon.
Mac, I don’t want to make light of the hurricane, but I think the real reason you are opting out is that you don’t want to watch a Trachsel-pitched game.
Seriously, take care of yourself. My thoughts are with all of you in the South who have been in harm’s way far too often these last couple of months.