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This doesn't look like a good match up for the Astros.  Brandon Backe takes the hill against one of the best pitchers in the game in Scott Kazmir.  Kazmir's numbers are very good with just over a 3/1 K/BB ratio and allowing just over 1 base runner per inning on average.  Backe on the other hand is struggling this year and has lost twice as many games as he has won.  Backe looks great some games, but then terrible in others.  He needs to become consistent if he wants to stay in a big league rotation.

So the bullpen blew another win chance for the Astros last night... that seems to be kind of a running similarity in many of the recent games.  But, the games can't be blamed solely on the bullpen.  The Astros just aren't scoring enough runs.  We knew when we came into this season that in order to win games, we  were going to need to score runs... lots of them.  That's just not happening.  In the last 8 games, the Astros have scored 5 runs twice.  Not once have the scored more than 5.  The only way you can win ball games by scoring just 5 runs a game is if your pitching staff is very good... ours isn't... so go score some runs!