Dallas Cowboys (24-32, .429, 5th AL West) @ Los Angeles Lakers (35-21, .625, 1st NL West)
Everything is bigger in Texas. Hail the size of Geo Metro’s, hats that hold 10-gallons of suds, the hair held strong and tall with equal parts mousse and regret. Everything. Well, everything except the number in the Win column for the Dallas Cowboys - which, as it turns out, is smaller than that of 18 of the 24 major league clubs. They are, not unlike Golden State, a team built on bullpen proficiency and a lack thereof everywhere else - 9th in Runs, 7th in OBP, 8th in SP ERA, and 10th in D-Eff. Not a single starter on their staff has a sub-4.50 ERA - not one. Their “Ace” is 1-8. Their top-rated offensive player is named Timmy - who at 28 is a full-grown man who allows people to refer to him as Timmy. This is a problem. A big, big problem for a club with a good but rapidly declining fan loyalty, an owner known to meddle despite his low baseball IQ, and a pitching coach whose focus is neutral. They are a badly listing ship, lost at sea, with too few life jackets to save even the women and children, who, after three straight years of sneaking into the playoffs look unlikely to ever do that again. Not this year. Not the next. Never again. That is, of course, unless they do something so grandiose, so uniquely Texan, something that makes the baseball world stand at attention and acknowledge that everything is truly bigger in Texas. Like buying some high-priced free agents and riding those studs from 8 seconds to eternity. That’d do it - anything less would be uncivilized.
57 of 162: Steve Allen (5-5, 4.94) @ Merl Crawford (5-3, 3.64)
We won’t be sweeping the Cowboys – they finished with the bigger of the two run totals today in their 10-3 win on our turf. Guess who led the way? Timmy Simpson… doh! 2 for 3 with 2 RBI, a HR, and a triple. Dallas tagged us for 14 hits, 2 doubles, a triple (TIMMY), and a HR (TIMMY). Allen earned his 6th win and Merl got destroyed, laid to waste, merc’d. And our pen was no better – Matty (if Timmy can do it, he can too) Olston gave up 4 runs in 3 innings and both of the Dallas HR’s come off of the meatballs he was throwing. Do you know what we have here? A buncha lollygaggers, that’s what.
Elsewhere: Chicago Fire 2B Matthew White had himself a day against the Montreal Impact… 3 for 4, 2 triples, a homer, 4 RBI and 3 runs. Easily the best game of his life.
58 of 162: Sal Matthews (1-5, 6.31) @ Case Tunnell (3-2, 4.23)
Timmy does it again – 3 for 5, two doubles and two RBI – but it’s not enough. Dom Cooke, in a PH situation, puts out a moon-shot solo home run to walk off the Cowboys in the bottom of the 9th – Lakers win 6-5 and balance is restored in the universe. Case is OK – 7 innings, 10 hits, 3 earned, and we get 5 doubles, a triple, and two home runs and still only manage to put 6 runs on the board. The result is what you would expect – a win – just not nearly as big a W as it should’ve been. Baseball is weird.
Break time… The draft is tomorrow (unfortunately the Ivory Coast's favorite son is not eligible for the draft until next year)… we have the 8th & 9th picks of the 1st round - I have an outside chance of getting LF Shawn Sullivan out of Pepperdine there, but I wouldn't bet the house on it…. So, I’ll write that up tomorrow and get back to breaking the hearts of Texans everywhere after that…