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Today must be opposite day.
- White Sox starter, Gavin Floyd threw six innings and gave up only four hits, only two walks, and grabbed nine strikeouts.
- Astros starter Wandy Rodriguez threw 5-1/2 innings, gave up nine hits and only struck out two batters.
- White Sox hitters earned twelve total hits and only struck out six times
- Astros hitters earned only eight hits and struck out a whopping 13 times
Offense
The Astros had a good night on offense despite their Designated Hitter going 0-4 with two strikeouts. Brett Wallace crushed a first-pitch home run to deeeeeeeeep right field in the second inning, Jed Lowrie hit his eleventh in the fifth, and Brian Bogusevic broke a 0-3 night with a three-run jack in the ninth to right center. The Astros had three walks, two of which led to runs, and Jose Altuve added two more doubles to his collection of multi-games and multi-base hits. Altuve did get caught stealing (picked off, actually), but his run-down allowed Maxwell to score from third.
Pitching
Rodriguez started out strongly, only facing seven batters in the first two innings before laboring through the third and fourth. Despite this, he did not give up his second and third runs until back-to-back doubles by Alex Rios and A.J. Pierzynski in the sixth. From the bullpen, Wilton Lopez, Wesley Wright, Fernando Rodriguez, and Brett Myers held the White Sox to zeroes the rest of the way, finishing off a much-needed Win for Wandy.
Defense
Justin Maxwell provided a couple scary moments in the sixth inning, first by leaping to catch a misjudged fly ball, then by falling down after corralling a soft line drive. Defensive gems were provided by Chris Johnson (spectacular bare hand grab/throw to nail a runner at first after dodging a another baserunner on his way to third), Altuve (diving catch in shallow Right Field), and a sliding catch by Maxwell to end the game. The Astros employed an interesting shift against Adam Dunn. Lowrie slid over to third, and Johnson (later Brian Bixler when Johnson left the game with sore hamstrings) played shallow right, positioned laterally between the first and second basemen and vertically between the second baseman and right-fielder. This proved effective on Altuve's diving stop, though it didn't prevent an earlier Dunn single from dropping into Right Field between Johnson and Bogusevic.
Why tell you more? I'll just show you! Scorecards after the jump.
Random Game Notes:
- Ridiculous strikeout call on Bogusevic in the third inning. Fox Trax and Pitch F/X both had that pitch in a different area code from the strike zone.
- A.J. Pierzynski diving for pitches would drive me crazy if I were his pitcher. He didn't sell the pitches very well when catching. Also, I'm not sure if the first of Floyd's two Wild Pitches shouldn't have been called a Passed Ball.
- Jordan Schafer had a rough night statistcally, but he had a very good 10-pitch AB in the seventh.
- The White Sox had three "Alex'es" in the lineup tonight. Alejandro De Aza, Alex Rios, and Alexei Ramirez!
- Jordan Danks got his first MLB hit tonight, against Wright. He could have been an Astro, but I'm not complaining that we got Marwin Gonzalez and Rhiner Cruz in the Rule 5 draft instead. They've been solid.
- Just for fun, I did scorecards tonight. Uploaded below.
Scorecards:
