The third time was not a charm, as John Wetteland blew another save, giving up two home runs in the ninth inning letting another game get by us. We did take the series against the Diamondbacks 2-1, but we should have swept – it felt that way all day.
We almost pulled it out in the bottom of the 10th, as Matt Mantei came in and had almost the same situation as the other day when we won after Randy Johnson came out of the game. This time, Matei did his job, and shut down the Rangers in the bottom of the 10th, but we did make a threat. John Wetteland gave up the two homers in the top of the 9th to let the game get tied at 6 (after Juan had put us up with a 3 run home run to make it at the time 6-3). The two home runs that Wetteland gave up were his 7th & 8th of the year – he gave up just 6 all of 1998.
Unfortunately, the strange start time of 3PM played a big factor, as Rusty Greer had a ball hit to him, but given the fact he was in blinding sunlight, he couldn’t see the ball till it was on the ground, allowing two runs to score. You really can’t blame him, I suppose, but the loss was hard to take. This was our first extra inning loss of the season, we’re now 4-1 in such games.
John Burkett pitched well again, if not as dominating as a few other recent appearances, but given how horrible he was at the start of the season, this is a big improvement. Mike Munoz is starting to look like one of the best off season pickups we’ve had in awhile. Unlike Mark Clark who also came in this year – I read something where if he doesn’t show improvement soon, he may need “Tommy John” surgery, and could be out all of 2000 in addition to this year!