6-4-2 — an Angels/Dodgers double play blog: Lunch Boxed: Angels 2, A's 1

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Saturday, April 07, 2007

Lunch Boxed: Angels 2, A's 1

"Just another Halo victory", as the radio call goes, and indeed this one reminded me of so many of the A's-Angels series I've been to see over the last few. For one thing, pitching duels are almost always in store, and because a one-run game is a high probability, the game's exciting, even in a loss. These things often come down to who makes more mistakes, the Angels or the A's.

In today's game, it was the A's who misfired, the critical screwup being Nick Swisher's throwaway of Kotchman's near-certain double play ball in the sixth. Anderson scored from second while Nick Swisher chased the ball down in fair territory, but then Casey Kotchman, hitting fifth against right-hander Haren, gave the A's a gift by oversliding second and got himself called out. Danny Haren didn't help the A's cause by uncharacteristically walking three, including Gary Matthews Jr. in the top of the third to lead off the inning; he eventually scored the winning run on a Vlad Guerrero sac fly.

The A's scored their lone run in the third, when Travis Buck reached on a 5-4 fielder's choice. Advancing to second on Marco Scutaro's 5-4 fielder's choice, an RBI single by Jason Kendall plated him, but Lackey got Stewart on yet another 5-4 groundout on to end the inning. Lackey got in some trouble in the seventh by giving up a leadoff double to Eric Chavez, but he then erased himself in the game's most spectacular play, a 2-5-6-2 caught stealing putout that had Mike Napoli run up to third to back up Izturis and Cabrera, and make the final out. It somewhat atoned for his fifth inning botched overthrow to second while Mark Ellis was on the bag, allowing him to take third uncontested (he did not score). It doesn't help that his defense is uneven at a time when he's stone cold at the plate; perhaps we can chalk it up to residual effects of the virus that laid him low earlier in the week.

With K-Rod unavailable, the Angels' pen once again got the job done by handing the ball to Hector Carrasco, who managed a 1-2-3 inning in the eighth, and Scot Shields, who gave up a leadoff single but managed a 4-6-3 double play and a strikeout on Swisher to end the game.

Recap • ESPN Box

A couple of footnotes ancilliary to tonight's game, and generally...

Reverting to the ESPN box score because they actually have play-by-play again. Bizarre.
Seeing grown men carry a kid's lunchbox with Vlad's picture on the side is ... disconcerting.
We got to the park spectacularly early on Friday night, and so ate at the El Torito Grill on the corner of Katella and State College. I have always liked this chain-within-a-chain, and I would like to recommend their (chipotle?) New York steak special; Helen had the carne asada and shrimp special, which was also delicious. (I know she truly loves me because she gave me two of her shrip. No greater love, &c.) Great food, and entirely reasonable for a sit-down meal for two; we got out of there for a little more than $40.
I earlier shouted hosannas for the View level Beefery's Caesar salad, giving me something to eat at the park. I found something else now: the barbecued half chicken at the field level stand on the third base side can be ordered sans barbecue sauce. 100% protein, and gimme some of that. That's two, count 'em, two things I can order at the park and stay on my diet. Yay!
Ever since losing all this crazy weight (over 50 lbs now), my hands get cold at the slightest provocation. Six innings at 62 degrees now feels like an eternity inside an ice chest, so I went to Sports Chalet and bought ten pairs of Heat Factory hand warmers for about $1.30 a pair; you stuff 'em in your pockets, and with your hands in there during at-bats, you don't have to worry about frigid fingers again. I can't believe I had forgotten that trick from my (brief) days skiing.

Labels: angels, athletics, recaps