FINAL 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 R H E
Indians (26-14) 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 3 0
White Sox (20-21) 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 X 1 5 0
W: Peavy (1-0) L: Masterson (5-2)
Two hours and one minute, and no Mark Buehrle involved!
Indians (26-14) 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 3 0
White Sox (20-21) 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 X 1 5 0
W: Peavy (1-0) L: Masterson (5-2)
Two hours and one minute, and no Mark Buehrle involved!
1) Straightening the wobble
No outing can be considered an unqualified success when it starts by giving up a double to Juan Pierre, but truthfully, the first three innings for Justin Masterson were somewhat shaky. The White Sox went 1-for-8 with runners in scoring position last night, and 5 of those came in the first two innings. (There were actually two more plate appearances that aren’t “counted” there: the sac fly from Adam Dunn and a walk from Brett Lillibridge.)
The run Masterson allowed was pretty mundane: Pierre blorted one down the opposite field line and is still relatively fast (and aggressive: his SB:CS ratio this year is atrocious). Omar Vizquel may be old, but he’s hitting .348 right now. And Adam Dunn hit a fly ball that wasn’t even very deep: had it been to right instead of center, Pierre would not have scored.
However, Masterson still didn’t have his best command early in the game: A.J. Pierzynski singled on a 2-1 pitch, Lillibridge walked on five pitches, three of Masterson’s first six outs were outfield flies, and he started the 3rd inning with 7 straight balls, walking Vizquel and going 3-0 to Dunn. At that point, Masterson had pitched 2+ innings (the plus stands for extra wandering around!), giving up 3 hits, 2 BB, and 1 R against 1 K.