Friar Watch

Jake Peavy: Jake had a rough time in the first, giving up a run but more importantly throwing 30 pitches. The high pitch count limited Jake to 6 innings. I like that Bud Black took Peavy out after 98 pitches, it would have been real easy to leave him in for another inning but this will help keep him fresh.

Umpire Laz Diaz seemed inconsistent tonight, it seemed like Jake was getting squeezed but a look at the calls doesn’t seem so bad:

Green = called balls
Red = called strikes

According to the Gameday data, Jake only threw two pitches in the strike zone that were called balls: The first pitch to Soriano in the 5th (in the lower right corner) and, most egregiously, the 2-1 pitch to Theriot that same inning (the high pitch on the outer half).

What about Cubs starter Rich Hill:

Looks like Hill has a lot to complain about. I see 12 pitches that could have reasonably been called strikes.

Heath Bell: Heath didn’t look terrible but he did load the bases on a walk and two singles. Fortunately he was able to wriggle off the hook with two strikeouts.

Cla Meredith: The Claw started the 8th and did a good job of getting out of trouble as well. A Marcus Giles error followed by a single, a strikeout, a near double play (Cla couldn’t keep his foot on the bag), another grounder and it’s another scoreless inning for Cla.

One last graph, because I love looking at Cla’s pitches.
Green = swinging strike
Yellow = called strike
White = Ramirez single
Red = everything else

Look at that group of four misses (the fifth in the middle is a foul ball). Those must look like hittable pitches before the bottom drops out. The two called strikes are perfect, and the single was on a pretty good pitch too.

Doug Brocail: Once again Black goes to Brocail when it’s not a save situation but this time Brocail faltered a little, giving up a single, a fly ball and a walk. Now all of a sudden it’s a save situation and that means a rare appearance in the middle of an inning for Trevor.

Trevor Hoffman: Two batters, two outs, one more save for Trevor. The last sequence to Derek Lee was another masterpiece. With the count 2-1 Trevor threw an 85 mph fastball on the inner half past Lee. Lee was really late, he looked like he was trying to hit a 100 mph heater. Off speed kills.