Mike exceptional Friday Night

David Price faces the Red Sox tonight at 6:10 PM ET/5:10 CT in what will be a playoff-like atmosphere at Fenway. This game is a makeup for a rained out game last Thursday. The Rays have already taken two of three from Boston, and can get back into first with a victory tonight. Rays a 1/2 game back of Sox. Rays took two of three from the Yankees in the Bronx over the weekend, but lost a tough one yesterday in the bottom of the ninth, 6-5. Yanks scored a run in the bottom of the ninth to win it and threw cold water and a stellar performance from rookie Wil Myers who hit a three-run shot to put us ahead earlier in the game 5-4. Wil is a player! Joe Maddon is loyal to the point of stupidity some times. I love Joe’s personality and I think he does a great job for the most part with the club, but yesterday he stuck with the erratic Jake McGee in the ninth and it cost his team the game. The Rays have some guys in the bullpen who are not trustable. McGee is one of them. I’d say Fernando Rodney is another, but Maddon should have gone to him yesterday when McGee got in trouble. Rodney is not the dominant pitcher he was a year ago, not even close, but he still would have given us a better shot against Soriano than McGee did. Any way, can’t get the game back, so we’ve got to look at today’s game in what will be an October-like atmosphere at Fenway. And Dave will be right in the middle of it.

Dave (5-5, 3.75 ERA, 15 walks, 76 K’s) will once again face Felix Doubradt, whom he defeated last Wednesday, 5-1. Doubrant is good though, He allowed six hits and three runs to us last Wednesday with two walks and five K’s. He’s 7-4 on the year with a 3.78 ERA with 48 walks and 103 K’s. And Dave will be facing those tough Red Sox’ bats. They lost the first game Friday at Baltimore, but came back to win the next two over a tough Orioles team. Will be a major challenge, but I love the way Dave is pitching. In nine starts at Fenway, Dave is 5-1 with 1.96 ERA. Should be a classic. Will have wrap tomorrow.

Mike Minor had an awesome outing last Friday Night in a 4-1 Braves’ victory over the Cards. Mike pitched seven, gave up four hits, one run, a homer by Yadier Molin, with no walks and five K’s. It was a big time performance. Mike now 9-5 on the year with a 2.98 ERA. He has walked 28 and struck out 123. Incredible numbers. Braves are 60-45, 8.5 up on the Nationals. Braves went on to sweep Cards in Atlanta. That’s a huge deal.

Pirates now 1.5 back of Cards after losing two of three to the Marlins. Just unbelievable. The Marlins are now 40-63. The Pirates’ problem is the strikeouts. The Pirates strike out the third most in the majors. They have 887 K’s The Braves are second at 897 and the Astros lead at 975. It’s amazing the Braves and Pirates are doing so well, but it’s starting to catch up with the Bucs. They struck out 11 times Friday in a loss, q20 times on Saturday in a win and 13 times yesterday in a loss. They struck out 15 times to the Nationals Thursday in a 9-7 loss. Starling Marte has struck out 107 times this year in 98 games and Pedro has K’d 122 times in 95 games. Marte seems like lately it’s two strikeouts per game. That’s gotta change. I know the strikeouts in the major leagues are much higher now, and I’m not sure why that is. I don’t think the pitching is that much better than it used to be. Some players never used steroids so you can’t blame it on that. It’s hard to figure out. Maybe it’s just a confidence thing with these guys. One thing I’ve noticed is a lot of guys, Marte and Pedro included, swing too hard when they’re at the plate and invariably miss the ball. They’ve just got to think contact. They just want to hit it out, when they need to just think about putting the ball in play. Pedro has gotten better at it; Marte has digressed. Luckily, the Bucs get their shot tonight  and this week as the Cards are visiting PNC Park for five. Golden opportunity for the Bucs.

Sonny now back with  the triple A Sacramento River Cats. Not sure why that happened. Looked for any explanation I could get and didn’t see any. he hadn’t allowed a run in two appearances, had walked one and struck out six. I guess they wanted him to get more starting appearances and maybe they’re getting him ready for September-October when he can either come out of the pen or start. Hopefully that is what they’re thinking.

No commitment news right now, football or basketball. Could have some football commits in the next couple of weeks. Fall practice starts Thursday as we start preparing for a monumental tilt with Ole Miss.

Need some good news in basketball. We’ll just have to be more versatile at the power forward-small forward position this year. Rod, Shelby, Dai-Jon and maybe freshman Luke Kornet will have to be small forwards, which is probably outside their respective comfort zones, but it’s just the way it is. Anyway, we have god players returning and we can have a good season.

Will have Dave and some of our guys in the minor leagues write ups tomorrow. By the way, I saw a fantastic movie Saturday Night with my wife, Trouble with the Curve. It’s with Clint Eastwood, Amy Adams and Justin Timberlake. Wasn’t familiar with Amy until this movie but really liked her. As you can surmise by the title, it is a baseball movie but with such an exceptional human interest story. I highly recommend it.