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Sunday, August 15, 2004

Angels 3, Tigers 2

AnaheimIPHRERBBSOHRERA
Sele 6.06102204.47
We had guests over, and as the entertainment moved to Farscape, I wandered out to the garage to play with woodworking toys. Ergo, I didn't pay attention to this game until well into it, when -- surprise! --
  1. Sele had managed to hold the Tigers to the tune of one run
  2. The Tigers, in fact, scored two runs overall
Translated, it was Sele's best performance in ages, and so when, in the eighth, the club got a gift out from the pitcher and converted it to the winning run, well, hallelujah. For those calling for Percival's head at this point, well, remember the following point: as Terry Smith put it after the game, Percy has 23 in 28 opportunities; Frankie has closed out 9 of 15. So, yeah. He blew it for us on Friday, but this isn't a reason to throw him out just yet.

The most excellent news is that the Angels are now only a half game out of the division, thanks to a loss by Oakland against the fargin' Royals. That's two consecutive series the A's have dropped against sub-.500 teams. When you start reading Athletics Nation and see things like this --

Barry Zito with an 8-8 and a 4.79 ERA versus Zack Greinke with a 4-9 and a 4.94 ERA.
-- and this --
Rich Harden has been the A's best starting pitcher since the All-Star break. His ERA since the break is 2.66. Redman's ERA is second with a 3.86.

The Big Three? Hudson, Mulder and Zito=5.06 ERA, 5.16 ERA and a 5.30 ERA respectively. Granted, Hudson is making his way back from injury, but Mulder has suddenly become hittable and Zito's year-long struggles have continued.

-- why, their fearsome starting rotation starts to sound positively Ortiz-esque. Surprisingly -- and nobody's more surprised than I am -- the Angels have a shot at the postseason. Really.

Recap


Comments:
You know, I saw those save stats for Rodriguez a couple of days ago, and wrote them off as being a consequence of the way he's used vs. the way Percival's used. I figured that those blown saves probably happened because he was put into some pretty hairy situations - not at the start of an inning, with nobody on, like Percival.

Turns out, though, that's not true. Rodriguez has six blown saves. Five of them occured after he was put in to start the 8th inning, the other when he came in for a bases loaded, one out situation.

However, I think you also have to consider his hold stats. He has 21, so his effectiveness/ineffectiveness ratio is more like 30:6 instead of 9:6. Percival is 22:5.

What worries me most about Rodriguez right now is the time he spent playing winter ball in Venezuela. So far, I've seen no sign at all that he's fatigued, but the guy hasn't had an extended break for a long, long time. Let's hope his relatively young arm doesn't start to show the strain.
 

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