Long-time Astros closer and fan favorite, Billy Wagner, who was traded to the Phillies during this past offseason, was placed on the 15 day disabled list yesterday (retroactive to May 7) with a pulled groin.
Wags is easily the best Astros closer of all-time. He has a 2.50 career ERA, compared to a league average of 4.31 during his career, and he has saved 104 runs more than an average pitcher would have saved in 477 games over his career. After a great season with the Stros last season, Wags is off to a good start this season with a 1.20 ERA/5 RSAA (runs saved against average) in his first 13 games.

The Stros dropped their third straight game on Friday night as the Mets smoked them, 8-3. Roy O gave up his first career grand salami to the Mets’ Cliff Floyd, and that’s about all she wrote on this one. The Stros continue to slump at the plate, and now have averaged just three runs a game over their last six. The Stros try to get back on track in the Saturday evening game against the Mets behind Andy Pettitte, as the Rocket prepares for a Sunday afternoon matinee.

Baseball fans can now print Houston Astros tickets directly from their own office or home computer, under a new system that the club just launched.
The newly announced delivery option — called TicketFast — allows fans to print tickets that are purchased on www.astros.com. Such tickets can be printed using home or office computers, then they can be used to attend Astros games at the Juice Box. TicketFast works by printing a unique bar code that is used in conjunction with the latest Minute Maid Park entry system.

The Marlins beat the Stros on Thursday for the second straight time, 3-2, behind a top of the ninth rally that included one of the strangest plays you will see this season.
The situation was this. Dotel had already blown the save opportunity by giving up a lead off walk and then a triple to Juan Pierre that plated the tying run with no outs. The Stros walked the next two batters to set up the force at any base and pulled the infield in. Dotel got Miguel Cabrera to hit a hard chopper to third, Viz leaped to stab the ball, came down on the bag and threw home. Ausmus — acting instinctively and not comprehending that Viz’s touching the bag at third had removed the force play at the plate — simply tagged the plate (the plate ump made the out call), and threw to first to attempt to complete an inning-ending triple play (the throw was just a tad late). After an umpire crew discussion, Pierre was ruled safe at home (the correct call), the Marlins took the lead, and Ausmus tried to find a place to hide.
All three of the games in this series were close, but the Marlins proved that their starting pitching is better than the Stros’ strong set of starters. Carl Pavano dominated the Stros in this game, just like Willis and Penny did in the prior two games. Although each team’s best pitcher — the Marlins’ Josh Beckett (from Spring High School on the northside of Houston) and the Stros’ Roy O — did not pitch in this series, my sense is that the Marlins set of starting pitchers is the best in baseball.
The Stros try to get back on the winning track tonight at the Juice Box by sending Andy Pettitte to the hill against the Mets. Roy O follows him in the Saturday game of the series, and the Rocket takes on the Mets’ Al Leiter in what should be an entertaining Sunday game.

The Stros’ string of good luck ended on Wednesday evening as they not only lost to the Fish 5-2, but also may have lost Wade Miller. Miller battled gamely through five and two thirds innings (4 hits, 3 walks, 3 runs, 5 K’s), then left with soreness in the same area of his neck where he had a pinched nerve during the 2002 season that put him on the shelf for two months. He will be MRI’ed today.
Dontrelle Willis pitched a rare Juice Box complete game for the Marlins, as this game really came down to a key play in the bottom of the sixth. With two out, the Stros had closed to 3-2 and had runners at second and third. Ensberg blistered a ground ball up the middle that looked like it would plate the two runs and give the ‘Stros the lead, but Willis gloved it with a “look what I found” expression and threw Ensberg out. That was all she wrote as Willis proceeded to put the ‘Stros down in order in the last three innings to secure his fourth win.
The rubber game of the series tonight looks like a mismatch as the ‘Stros inconsistent Tim Redding goes up against the Marlins’ sturdy Carl Pavano. The Mets come in to the Juice Box on Friday for a weekend series.

Roger Clemens continued his dreamlike hometown season as he hurled the Stros to their 10th victory in their last 12 games, 6-1 over the Marlins. The Rocket won his 7th straight game of the season, giving up only 3 hits, a walk and one run while striking out 11 in seven innings. For the first two thirds of the game, this was an old-fashioned late 1960’s-early 70’s pitching duel between Clemens and the Marlins’ Brad Penny, who dominated the Stros. However, Lance Berkman tied the game with a double to deep center off of Penny in the bottom of the seventh, and then Morgan Ensberg plated Berkman for the lead to secure the win for Clemens and send Penny to the showers. Bidg and the crew then put this one away with a four spot in the bottom of eighth.
Wade Miller takes the hill in an interesting matchup with the Marlins’ colorful Dontrelle Willis tonight at the Juice Box in the second game of this three game series.

After last night’s bizarre game, the Stros came back this afternoon to beat the Braves in a pitching dual, 2-1. Andy Pettitte was sharp, pitching six innings and strinking out five, giving up three hits, four walks, and one run. The Braves’ Russ Ortiz was just as good, going six and two thirds, striking out nine, and giving up only two hits and two runs. Miceli and Dotel were money again in relief.
Manager Jimy Williams, still irritated from last night’s debacle with the umpiring crew, got in a few choice words with the plate ump this afternoon after Pettitte expressed frustration at the arbitrary nature of the ump’s pitch calls. At least Jimy did not go nuclear and get thrown out again, although he is facing a suspension for bumping the plate ump from last night’s game.
The Stros (20-11) get an off day on Monday to play in Bidg’s charity golf tournament at Wildcat Golf Club, and then the Rocket opens up a six game homestand at the Juice Box on Tuesday against the World Champion Fish (18-13) and the Mets (14-17).

Occasionally, umpires cost a team a game, and tonight was one of those nights for the Stros as they lost in 10 innings to the Braves, 5-4. Andruw Jones hit a two-out homer off Ricky Stone that barely cleared the right-field wall to win the game for the Braves.
However, the Stros had the game in hand until the bottom of the eighth, when the Braves’ Jesse Garcia convinced umpires he had been grazed on the helmet with a pitch, sparking a two-run eighth that tied the game 3-3. The disputed call led to the ejection of Astros manager Jimy Williams. Before the inning was over, bench coach John Tamargo and starter Roy O also were tossed.
The controversy began when Garcia claimed a pitch from Oswalt nicked the top of his helmet and began trotting toward first. Plate umpire Gary Darling didn’t make a call but consulted with second-base umpire Rob Drake, who ruled that Garcia had been hit. Astros’ manager Williams went nuclear, and tried to run around Darling several times to go after Drake.
Oswalt gave up a bases-loaded single that pulled the Braves to 3-2, then threw up his arms after a low fastball to Chipper Jones was ruled a ball. Darling, who by this time wasn’t calling a strike for Oswalt unless it was right down the middle, bounced out from behind the plate and yelled at Oswalt, who promptly walked Jones and forced in the tying run.
Tamargo, now running the team, came out to make a pitching change and wound up getting ejected when he began jawing with Darling. About that time, Oswalt tossed a blue case — filled with bubble gum — from the Houston dugout, and its contents sprayed along the third-base line. Several batboys had to come out, scurrying around on their knees to clean up the mess.
Oswalt’s reaction is reflective of the absurdity of the umpires’ calls and behavior. Roy O is normally as calm and well-mannered as any player in baseball. Frankly, this game might have turned into a mob scene had Roger Clemens been pitching.
The Stros came back to take the lead in the top of ninth, but Brad Lidge, filling in for Octavio Dotel — who had pitched in three straight games — couldn’t hold that lead. That set the stage for Jones’ heroics in the bottom of the tenth.
Andy Pettitte goes for his second win after coming off the DL in the series finale against the Braves. I guess pitching coach Burt Hooten will take the lineup card to the meeting at home plate with the umpires before the game.

If you hadn’t noticed, Barry Bonds has just completed one of the best months of hitting in the history of Major League Baseball.
In April, Bonds’ had an incredible .472 batting average, an equally impressive .696 on base average, an astronomical 1.132 slugging percentage, and an historic 1828 OPS (on base average + slugging percentage).
Joe Sheehan and Keith Woolner over at Baseball Prospectus did some research and determined that Bonds’ April was the best month of hitting in the past 30 years (see chart below). In fact, Bonds’ 1848 OPS during April dwarfs Todd Helton’s May of 2000, which had been the best month by a player in the past 32 seasons. Moreover, Helton played 15 of his 23 games that month in the hitting haven of Coors Field, and Bonds’ April OPS still beats him by over 300 points!
The first chart is interesting also because each player listed is a great player with the exception of Ron Cey (good, but not great) and Richard Hidalgo (good, but not great at this point in his career). Given the large number of games played in baseball, this reflects that it is risky to draw dispositive conclusions based on a player’s anecdotal performance in a limited sample of games. This is the most common error that casual fans of baseball make in evaluating players.
The second chart below reflects the research of the Wall Street Journal’s ($) Allen St. John in this piece in which he suggests that Bonds’ hitting has been helped significantly by playing in the new National League ballparks that have been built over the past decade. As Mr. St. John notes:

SBC isn’t the only retrostyle new park that suits Mr. Bonds. From 2000 through 2003, he played 105 games at the NL parks built since 1995: Coors Field in Colorado, Bank One Ballpark in Arizona, Houston’s Minute Maid Park (previously Enron Field), PNC Park in Pittsburgh, Alanta’s Turner Field, Miller Park in Milwaukee, and Cincinnati’s Great American Ball Park. In those games he hit .372 and slugged .868. Plus, he hit 46 homers, for an average of 75.6 round trippers per 162 games, above his single-season record pace of 2001.

Hitter-friendly ballparks and steroids aside, Bonds is providing us with a once in a lifetime performance over the past decade. Bonds is simply the best hitter in Major League Baseball since Ted Williams and one of the three or four best of all-time. Sit back and enjoy it, because we are unlikely to see it again in our lives.

Tim Redding finally pitched a game this season similar to the way he pitched last season as he led the Stros to a 5-3 victory over the Braves in Atlanta. Redding pitched six innings, gave up four hits, a walk and a run, which came on a J.D. Drew dinger. Relievers Backe and Miceli were a bit shaky in the seventh, but Lidge bailed them out again with an inning and a third of strong relief. Dotel closed it with another strong ninth as he appears to catching his stride. Jeff Kent was the hitting star again with three hits and three RBI’s, including his sixth jack of the season.
The Stros have now won four in a row and eight out of their last nine. Hard luck Roy O goes for his third win tomorrow evening in the second game of the weekend series with the Braves.