Bill McCurdy and Jimmy Wynn
~ From the deepest row of Keuchel’s Corner. – Lapping up the 2017 fun from Opening Day One!
Some Sunday Night Game Smoke
No Real Smoking Please
Just to set the record straight. My “Sunday Night Game Smoke” these days is all mental fodder for the mind. As one of the rare fortunates who got away from inhaled nicotine addiction several years ago, so far, I’m a survivor with great empathy for anyone else out there still living in my generation with a biochemical craving worse than that of heroin. My “Sunday Night Game Smoke” enjoyment today is simply modeled upon how my growing addiction to the idea that our Astros are the best team in baseball – and that we may be headed deeper into s season in which that old Tony Bennett number, “The Best is Yet To Come”, simply grows louder and lasts longer as the 2017 Houston Astros theme song.
Out of – the Tree – of Life
Jose – stuck out his thumb!
Banged out – a 3-run bomb,
And things started – to hum!
Stros on the way – to win
The Best Was Here – To Come!
Question: What’s the Answer to a 3-Man Dead Spot at the bottom of a batting order?
Answer: Don’t have one. – How? See Brian McCann, Nori Aoki, and a few others who fit well as hole-in-the-boat hitters that will keep that old bottom-feeder spot as alive and productive as the rest of the lineup.
The Fiers Home Run Curse
Of course, if any of us really had the bottom line answer to that one, we might have been invited to LA this passing weekend to spend some time with Astros starter Mike Fiers. The worst thing that can happen to a pitcher on any pitch (other than being struck in the face by the pitch that could not survive its ride through “the arc of force” that potentially awaits almost all pitches to the plate) is the crushing home run.
Sometimes an outbreak of home runs off one pitcher are like a strange case of diarrhea. You know the guy throwing the bombs, at least, has a bug of some kind, and that, even though it may be hard to diagnose, the hope remains that it will go away in time. Or maybe it is something mechanical that can be spotted by an expert and corrected.
But sometimes. – Just when you think it’s now gone. – WHOOPS! – It happens again.
Once the normal viral period expires – now the work turns earnest in the search for mechanical corrections. If found, hope for the problem being solved now soars. If not, the weight shifts to the risk-reward question that is never too far away. Is this guy going to be of any help to us at the rate he now gives up the long ball?
If not, over time – and sometimes over not too much time – it will become time to say goodbye to any pitcher with a serious, mysterious ongoing WHOOPS problem.
Astros Have Answer to “Play ’em Were They hit” defenses.
The “Play ’em Were They Hit” defense has become the 2017 answer to many club offenses, but that doesn’t seem to work well on most players in the Houston offense. Brian McCann jumps immediately to mind, but he is not alone among the guys who can “hit ’em where they ain’t” to every field. I would love to see a player-by-player hitting chart on where the hits are falling for all of our Astros regulars in support of this notion. My perception isn’t graphed. It’s just how it feels of late.
The Future of Jose Altuve
Two related questions:
(1) How hard is it going to be to sign Jose Altuve to a contract extension with Scott Boros as his agent?
(2) How hard is it going to be o sign Jose Altuve to a contract extension if we wait until he wins a 3rd AL batting title?
Who knows?
Who knows, we may be simply getting lost in our own Sunday Night Astros Baseball Smoke! All I really know tonight is – that 21-11 and 1st place feels pretty good when it also comes with a 5.5 lead game over the 2nd place Angels in the AL West.
___________________
Bill McCurdy
Publisher, Editor, Writer
The Pecan Park Eagle
The Pecan Park Eagle 
Leave a Reply