Monday night, the offense broke out in a big away against the Reds. We did it in a compressed amount of innings, as we scored all our runs in the second (5), third (3), and fourth (4). Didn’t score anything else after the fourth inning. Oddly enough, eleven of the twelve runs all game against the starter, Jeff Francis, who certainly didn’t help himself with an outing like THAT this late in the spring. It was a pretty horrible line for him..
Three innings pitched, eleven hits, eleven earned runs, one walk, four strikeouts. Despite giving up eight runs in innings 2 & 3, he was sent back out there for the fourth inning, pitched to three guys, and was gone. Makes me wonder how much more horrific the line would have been if he wasn’t yanked when he was. Ugh. Just in this game, his ERA went from 2.77 to 8.44.
The flip side of that is that Scott Feldman was in outstanding form. He pitched like he was pitching when he won 17 games a couple of years ago. Six innings, just three hits, and no runs or walks. Struck out NINE. Spectacular outing. He looks like he’s figured it out again, which is good. He’ll be a bit of an overpaid long man, but it’s nice to have a long man that good.
Joe Nathan had a rare scoreless inning this spring. He usually gives up a few (his ERA is now at 12.00). Mike Adams also did well, scoreless inning. Mark Lowe, however, gave up the two runs the Reds got. Feldman/Nathan/Adams held the Reds down, only Lowe allowed them any offense.
The good thing about the opponent having such a godawful outing like he did is that it means our offense had some nice numbers. Here’s some bullet points from all that offense:
- 18 hits. Five doubles, one home run, twelve singles.
- Ian Kinsler was 2-4 with 2RBI & 2R. The two RBI came on a two run home run.
- Adrian Beltre was 2-4 with 2R. One of the hits was a double.
- Michael Young was 3-3 with 3R
- Nelson Cruz was 2-3 with three RBI, and 1R. One of the hits was a double.
- Ben Synder was 2-2.
- Mitch Moreland was 1-2 with 3RBI.
Nice to see a breakout like that. Now I’d love to see a breakout like that on April 6th. :)