Another sponsored post for the Motorola Razr Maxx, and since I killed my old Blackberry yesterday, I really could use one, if they are reading. I am really lost without my cell phone. The Razr looks a lot more fun than my Blackberry. The focus of the post is 'something positive from the past week'. Hmmmm, well we are one week closer to the end of this depressing season.
Actually, the positive we can take from this past week is how good our bullpen has been. Early in the season we couldn't hold onto a win because our bullpen was so bad. Now, we have a good bullpen and no leads to hold.
Let's look at how the guys in the pen have been doing:
- Casey Janssen: 3 games, 3 innings, 0 earned, 8 batters faced, 0 hits, 1 walk, 3 k.
- Darren Oliver: 2 games, 1.2 innings, 0 earned, 6 batters faced, 1 hit, 0 walks, 1 k.
- Aaron Loup: 2 games, 2.2 innings, 1 earned, 11 batters faced, 2 hits, 1 walk, 3 k.
- Brandon Lyon: 3 games, 3.2 innings, 1 earned, 13 batters faced, 3 hits, 0 walks, 7 k.
- Brad Lincoln: 2 games, 4.1 innings. 0 earned, 17 batters faced, 2 hits, 2 walks, 4 k.
- Steve Delabar: 4 games, 3.2 innings, 0 earned, 13 batters faced, 0 hits, 2 walks, 7 k.
- J.A. Happ: 1 relief appearance (a start too but we aren't talking about that), 2.0 innings, 1 earned, 11 batters faced, 1 earned, 3 hits, 2 walks, 2k.
- Jesse Chavez: 1 game, 1 inning, 0 earned, 6 batters faced, 1 hits, 2 walks, 1 k.
- Chad Jenkins: 1 game, 3 innings, 0 earned, 11 batters faced, 2 hits, 0 walks, 2 k.
In total 25 innings with 3 earned runs, a 1.08 ERA, 14 hits, 10 walks, 30 strikeouts. Pretty amazing.
The revamp of the bullpen looks like it is working out, small sample size and all. It would be nice if we could score some runs and give them some leads to hold. I suppose I wouldn't be against trading some of that relief for some runs but maybe the offense will be ok when Jose Bautista, Brett Lawrie and some of the others return.
It's funny, losing didn't seem so bad when we were scoring runs. It is depressing to watch when we are so impotent at the plate. But perhaps we are closer to a winner than we were a month or so ago. Before the injuries to Bautista, Lawrie, J.P. Arencibia, and Adam Lind (yeah, Lind wasn't a big help), we were scoring as many runs as anyone in baseball. Those guys will all be back at some point, and we should start scoring again. If we do, maybe having a great bullpen will help us get to the contender level. Not this year, but next year could e good.
So, as hard as it might seem to believe, there was something positive about the past week.