Something happened on the field: Astros win first game in nine days.

One way you can tell that the Astros finally won last night is that Cubs Fan, who is under most circumstances serene about the Cubs/Astros rivalry and frequently upbraids me for being so unpleasant when our teams are playing each other, got a little exercised on the subject of Roy Oswalt and smirking and Lance Berkman and fake head injuries and even indulged in some creative visualization about a Michael Barrett line drive and the bones of Oswalt's hand.

You get the idea that Oswalt is just a teeny bit embarrassed by the Barrett beaning last August 22, when he got tossed before putting in three full innings, but completely unwilling to admit responsibility for his actions. In today's Chronicle, our philosopher-king observes:

"I forgot about it last year with me, I guess ... It's part of the game, I guess. Something happened on the field. If you're going to let it linger on for a year, it's pretty long."

There you have it.

...

Ron Santo is the good kind of homer, a man with a simple heart who just wants his beloved team to win. This homer-ism expresses itself in grumbling about the fans in other towns, the ballparks in other towns, the weather in other towns. He takes pleasure in the other team's pain. When Craig Biggio (hello, Craig Biggio! No comment!) let a Neifi Perez groundball roll through his legs, Santo hooted, "Man, that was a soft-hit ball, too!" And when Jason Dubois hit a pinch-hit home run in the fourth, Santo failed to mention that it barely fell into our comically short Crawford Boxes. We are talking first row.

I don't like Ron Santo nearly as much as I did a week ago -- Cubs Fan observes that it must hurt my feelings to hear how much this man I've grown fond of dislikes me, as an Astros fan -- and so when he got sullen and quiet during Houston's three-run seventh inning, I will confess: I was glad.

Milo Hamilton is the bad kind of homer, a man who goes out of his way to express his pleasure in Houston's management team, its commercial sponsors, its promotional schedule and its roster decisions. Every Houston pitch that gets called a ball is debatable, every questionable strike is clearly within the zone. Every slow-moving pop fly almost makes it out of the park (to be fair, when your left field is 315 feet from home plate and your right field 326, every slow-moving pop fly probably does almost make it out). Milo Hamilton would point out that actually, those are the Landry's Seafood Crawford Boxes where Dubois's shot landed last night. But he likes every town he visits and every out-of-town restaurant he dines at, and he goes out of his way to speak admiringly about the unspectacular careers of every third-base coach or manager in the league, and you can tell he doesn't take any of it too personally.

There are unexpected pleasures in listening to the opposing team's broadcast, or watching a game from the opposing team's ballpark. I was delighted in the second inning of yesterday's game when Kerry Wood came to the plate and struck out, and a huge cheer erupted in the background that Ron and Pat ignored. One of these days, listening to the Pirates, I'm going to crack the code of how to cheer happily and sincerely for a team that is destined for ignominy. That is my project for this first diaspora season of mine. But today, there's too much potential for bad feelings on both sides. I'll be listening to the home team.

...

I experienced my first real fantasy/reality conflict of interest when Wrathful Little Darling Kerry Wood took the mound last night. I had fallen to last place in my fantasy league, a situation that had become all too similar to my reality, and so I really wanted to get some points from Wood. At the same time, however, I wanted him to lose lose lose. Wood managed to put together three innings which were the best of both worlds -- he quickly gave up three runs to the Astros, then proceeded to strike out five batters in a row.

I was sorry to see him leave the game. When Wood is not playing the Astros, he is one of my personal favorites, and I keep waiting for the pieces to come back together for him. The report last night was shoulder tendinitis, and I'm thinking that perhaps he has rotator cuff problems similar to Wade Miller's from the last few seasons. After half of 2004 on the DL and a couple of months of inaction this season, Miller is poised to make his big-league comeback after a couple of impressive rehab starts. I hope that Wood is also able to pull it together, even if it takes some time on the DL.

After all, with the suspensions handed down from last week's Red Sox/Devil Rays fracas, I've got a lot of new Darlings to choose from.

...

Meanwhile, Brad Lidge has pneumonia, Adam Everrett is too sick to play (he says he is available in an emergency situation, but with his .239 batting average, I can't quite imagine the sort of emergency that would require his services -- "Okay, Adam, we really need someone to ground into a double play right here. This game is taking way too long"), and Viz is batting in the fifth spot. This is not a recipe for Astros victory, I am afraid.

Comments

[highandinside]

Oh, no, I'm in last place. The question now: do I bench Mark Prior today, because he is facing The Only Astro I Will Ever Love, or do I play him, and try to get some fucking points back?

It's a tough decision to make.

[Hirsch]

You play them both, obviously. Just because you stand to benefit from a rough outing for the Only Astro et cetera is no reason not to reap the benefits of having ole Calves o' Thunder on your team.

[Hirsch]

Wait a second. I forgot that Oswalt was a Darling. But so long as you are hoping for a Wood-like outing -- lots of strikeouts except when the Astros are knocking the ball all over the park -- it is okay with me.

[highandinside]

HOLY SHIT. MIKE LAMB! HOLY SHIT.

[rbs]

To quote my niece... OMG, OMG.

AND ADAM EVERETT! GOOD LORD.

That is what I get for starting Prior today, after all.

[Cubdom Byron]

Ron Santo is the good kind of homer, a man with a simple heart who just wants his beloved team to win. This homer-ism expresses itself in grumbling about the fans in other towns, the ballparks in other towns, the weather in other towns.

There is nothing more enjoyable than hearing Ron Santo on the one road trip he makes each year to New York. To hear him tell it, Shea is made completely of steaming dog crap... anybody who ever put a Mets uniform is scum... its good stuff.

[Robb]

Having lived in the Chicago 'burbs between 1995 and 2004 (and being a Cardinal fan) I truly understand how horrible Ron Santo actually is as an announcer.

My favorite Ron Santo moment - other than Brant Brown's dropped fly ball in 1998 - was last year, Cubs vs. White Sox. Timo Perez hit a home run, and Santo started going on and on (for 3 innings at least) about Timo's on-field antics, how he was a hot dog, etc. When I see the re-play, what had Timo done? An impersonation of Sammy Sosa's after HR ritual. Gee, Ron, way to call it both ways....

Unfortunately, he's probably a nice guy. But man - can he rub one the wrong way!

[Cubdom Byron]

I don't think there is a person in this world that could tell you he is (still) a good color-man with a straight face.

I thought he used to be pretty good in the mid-90's, but he has since stopped doing any kind of research before the games...

But people love him because he's Ron Santo, because he's got a great story, and because people identify with him. We're all Ron Santo's inside. Forget the objective stuff, forget knowledge of the game, you only need to know one thing: If its good for your team, then thats the way it happened, and its right. If its not good for your team, then it didn't happen that way, and the call was wrong.