Change is hard

May 11, 2008

[Photoset] And apparently so are changeups! So if Barry Svrluga thought Friday night’s game was the most boring, I wonder what he’d say about last night’s 11-0 pounding by the Marlins? Oops, I forgot he’s not writing about Nats anymore! Today’s gamer, brought to you by the new Post beat writer, Chico Harlan, focuses on pitching pitching pitching. I’m a Mike O’Connor supporter and was surprised by such an ineffective outing, starting out with a first pitch meatball to Cody Ross for a homer into the left field stands. I don’t understand what happened? O’Connor had a 1.96 ERA in the minors and appeared to be well on his way to a comeback. I excused his outings out of the bullpen, figuring the routine was just something he wasn’t accustomed to. I don’t have any explanation for last night’s performance. The Marlins scored every which way on their way to 11 runs, including one on a wild pitch on the night O’Connor and Jesus Flores returned to the team. The “Duck and Cover!” slide was a bit much, though.

The most interesting event of the night, occurring coincidentally immediately after I pointed out Jeff Passan’s article on maple bats, was a Marlins runner nearly getting speared by the spear of a bat and doing a little dance on his way to second to avoid it. The facial expressions in the early shots are priceless, although I was pretty far out in the outfield to capture them.

‘Stache Watch: Looks like Nick Johnson shaved off his mustache.

Good Arm! In the late innings, a fan threw the ball from yet another home run back onto the field. It rolled all the way past an unsuspecting Cristian Guzman on the infield before being picked up by an ump and drew huge cheers from the crowd! Then a loud chorus of boos erupted and I couldn’t tell what was going on from across the park. What happened? Was the fan removed?

Posted in Gameday, MLB, Washington Nationals