Brandon Backe pitched the best six innings of his life and the Stros plated five runs with two outs as they pulled to within one game of advancing to the National League Championship Series with an 8-5 win over the Braves on Saturday afternoon in front of a deafening sellout Juice Box crowd. The win was the Stros 19th straight at the Juice Box, and the club’s 38th win in their last 49 games.
Based on the outcome of the other two division series games on Saturday, the Stros and Braves will play on Sunday at either noon or 6:30 p.m. The Rocket will pitch for the Stros on three day’s against the Braves Russ Ortiz.
Backe continued to show the same extraordinary poise that he displayed when he stepped in for the ailing Clemens last Sunday to lead the Stros to their Wild Card playoff clinching win in the regular-season finale. In Saturday’s game, Backe worked his way out of a bases-loaded jam in the second by getting the third out with a 94-mph heater, and retired the final seven batters he faced. Backe’s final numbers were solid — two runs, five hits, five strikeouts and two walks in six innings.
Carlos Beltran‘s two run yak got the Stros started in the third inning, and then the rest of the Stros put it away with five runs in the fifth and sixth innings as Jeff Kent, Lance Berkman, and Morgan Ensberg all had key hits in the rallies. But for a couple of baserunning errors, the Stros would likely have had a couple of more runs, and the final score was closer than the game really was. The Braves’ Andruw Jones cranked a three run tater off of hard luck Russ Springer in the eighth to bring the Braves within three runs after the Stros gave the Braves an extra out in that inning by failing to catch J.D. Drew‘s popup that hit one of the Juice Box roof supports. Brad Lidge pitched a dominating ninth to nail down the victory.
Finally, the Juice Box crowd was tuned into every pitch, and almost blew the roof off the place when Lidge struck out the final hitter. The Juice Box should be totally juiced when Clemens takes the mound on Sunday to try and bring Houston its first win in a Major League Baseball playoff series. Tune in and hang on for a wild ride!
Houston's Clear Thinkers
Longtime Houston attorney Tom Kirkendall's observations on developments in law, business, medicine, culture, sports, and other matters of general interest to the Houston business, professional, and academic communities.
“hard luck” Russ Springer served Jones a fat fastball right over the plate. He had an 0-2 count, but he was probably so juiced by the crowd (get it?) that he wanted to blow it past him. Whoops.
Well, certainly the pitch was a bit too good, but I can’t be too hard on Springer. First, as noted earlier, he would have been out of the inning before Jones batted if one of the Stros infielders had caught Drew’s popup. Also, the first two strikes to Jones were fastballs and he was so far behind each of them that Springer could have reasonably believed that Jones was not going to be able to catch up with his heater. I guess Jones was setting him up. ;^)
Yeah, you’re right, and springer certainly pitched better than Qualls today!