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| Ryan Drese | Andy Pettitte |
| 0 - 0, 0.00 | 0 - 1, 13.50 |
Cool, so it's Ryan Drese today in the rubber match. That's good for us, 'cause we absolutely destroyed the poor guy in 2005. Drese was 0 - 2 with a 7.71 in his two starts against Houston in 2005. On July 22nd, Drese gave up six runs in 6-1/3 as the Astros went on to score 14 runs and snag a rare win for Roger Clemens.
He had to be scratching his head after that one: "They NEVER score for Clemens," I can hear him muttering on his way back to the showers.
And on August 11, he gave up another six in 5-1/3 , as Pettitte got his tenth victory, and Wheeler not Lidge the save.
The batter vs. pitcher statistics do not break down very prettily from there for Drese, as you might expect. Jason Lane is 5 for 6 with a double against Drese. Biggio and Berkman both carry OPS's above 1.000 against him. Morgan's only 3 for 12, but with a homer a double and 3 RBI.
Taveras is 3 for 7 against the guy, and poor Adam Everett is 0 for 9.
Pettitte has had significant trouble with no-one he'll likely be facing, but Soriano is 2 for 7 with a double and a homer, and he's smoking the ball currently, been kinda hard to miss.
Clayton is 5 for 16 with a double against And, Guillen 2 for 12.
As StrosDux very sagely pointed out at the tail end of last night's thread, before last night, it'd been five years since the Astros blew a lead of five runs or more. But those 2001 Astros were able to come back and win their next game by 9 runs; that's some historical precedent I wouldn't mind seeing borne out today.
If Berkman and Wilson each homer today, I guarantee they will mention it on SportsCenter. They might even bring it up in passing if only one of them does.