[Highlander]

After the 1-0 loss on Opening Day, things didn't get much better for the Expos. Game 2 against the Pirates saw Rick Rhoden hold the Expos to 1 run in a 5-1 win.

A trip across the state was on tap next with a 3 game series against the Phillies. The bats finally woke up in game 1 of this series, with 6 runs behind a 4-5 game by Rodney Scott in his first game and 3 runs for Tim Raines. The problem is that after 9 innings, the Phillies also had 6 runs so the game went to extra innings. A walk by Reardon led the inning off, but a couple of groundouts got him within reach of extending the game. A throwing error by Tim Wallach ruined that, though as the winning run scored on the error and the Expos found themselves starting the season 0-3.

Game 2 of the Philly series had some pressure....we really didn't want to start out 0-4. On the mound, it was Scott Sanderson against the newly signed Rick Reuschel. We were down 7-5 in the 9th inning, but a pinch hit 2-out, 2-run double by John Milner sent the game to extra inning again. This time it was a Phillies error that gave us the game, as Gary Matthews (who for some reason is playing 1B) booted one to let Warren Cromartie score the winning run. Jeff Reardon got the win.

Game 3 saw a great pitching matchup by the two "Steves"....Rogers for us and Carlton for them. It seemed like we were in for a low scoring game, but the bottom of our order really got to Carlton. Chris Smith got a start at 1st and went 4-4, Speier went 3-4 with 2 RBI and Frank Taveras also drove in 2 runs to lead us to a 6-3 win. Rogers got the win and Reardon got the save. We tried Bob James since Jeff had pitched 2 games in a row, but he was on the brink of getting really beat up so Jeff came in to rescue him.

On the subject of James, he has gotten off to a horrible start. He's only pitched 1.2 innings but has already walked 4 batters and given up 2 hits and 3 ER. Not someone I feel like we can trust until his control shows some improvement. With that in mind, we made a trade for a bullpen arm. We sent minor league OF Roy Johnson to the Astros for P Bert Roberge. Bert was an Expo in 1985-86 in real life, so he is an eligible player for us to acquire. We don't have a lot of great assets to trade right now, so hopefully Roberge can just be a stabilizing force in the pen to help bridge the gap to Jeff Reardon. Our scout sees him as an average reliever with 3 solid pitches. He still has some control issues, but nothing like James.

Up next, we face the Pirates again, this time 2 games at home, and then travel to NY for 3 against the Mets.