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Matchup/Game Thread at Rangers 7:35 CDT

Woody Williams Kevin Millwood
3 - 9, 5.50 3 - 6, 7.62

Hell no, I haven't forgiven this c***s*****. Been almost eight years, and I ain't over it, shit no.

And I'll never be over it, most likely, either.

I can see it now. I'll be in the old folks home, gumming my hot cereal one morning, mumbling incoherently about my hearing aid, and I'll turn to the obituaries as the old folks do, and through coke bottle glasses, I'll see that Kevin Millwood has passed. And I guarantee you, what I'll say on that far off morning in Twenty-Forty-whatever is that 'the sonofabitch who one-hit us in the '99 NLCS has finally kicked the bucket.'

It's history, I know. The team couldn't win in the postseason under Dierker, I know. Who knows why, it was just one of those things. The intervening years have provided us some perspective. Dierker resigned, and we've won in the postseason since, we've beaten the Braves, and beaten 'em good, in fact.

Doesn't matter. It still burns a hole in my stomach, how we had the momentum, goddamnit, behind Shaner's beautiful six innings in Game One, what I had naively called afterwards, "the biggest game ever pitched in Astros history," 'cause we'd never ever before taken a playoff series lead by winning on the road.

We had the momentum, and then Kevin Fucking Millwood took it all away from us, he one-hit us, damn near threw a perfect game, and it was all gone.

Gone, all gone. Nothing left but the quickly cooling ash of our dreams. Forget Pujols, my young friends, this was pain.

Thank God for Don Larsen and Jim Lonborg, or else I'd have to despise Kevin Millwood even more than I already do. At least he didn't pitch the greatest game in playoff history against us. It was only close to that.

I know that Walt Weiss hurt us and hurt us bad with the play deep behind second on Eusebio's grounder in Game Three. But without Millwood, it never even gets to that point. Without Millwood, we could have watched Game Three expecting to win, instead of bracing for more pain.

The man ruined our karma, and just to rub it in, hje came back and saved Game Three with another perfect inning!

I don't care if we've beaten the Braves, I don't care if we've been champions of the entire freaking National League, I will never ever forget it, and I will always always hate him.

I see that 7.62 ERA of his, and I am truly psyched about the pain the hot Houston Astro bats may very well inflict upon Millwood tonight. It won't be enough, it will never be enough, but it's something.

Every hit off him a victory, every earned run off his ass a freaking celebration.

Pile it on, Astros, make it hurt, even if no-one but Biggio really knows why.