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.