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Sunday - April 1, 2007

Game 34: Oklahoma at Texas

Hey, folks. Sorry for not posting earlier. I came home, made a pot of soup, and took some of it to some friends. And, we chatted the evening away. And, now I'm back home and have time to post about the second miserable Sunday in a row. For Texas Baseball fans. How happy can we all be that the Horns will not be playing this coming Sunday? They will have the third of a 3-game series...but it'll be played on a Saturday. Whew.

Texas lost to the Sooners today 2-5. They didn't play a very good game. They had their moments. But, they couldn't put enough of those moments together to make a difference. They actually started off well. Travis Tucker reached on an Astroturf single that bounced over the short stop's head. Chance Wheeless then reached on a bunt toward the pitcher. On the play, the pitcher stumbled, fell, and was unable to field the ball. The OU catcher picked Travis off at 2b on the first pitch to Jordan Danks. Jordan then reached on a single that glanced off the second baseman's glove. So, that was three singles to start off the game. But, all three of them were flukes of one sort or another. Bradley Suttle then hit a ball that seemed destined for the cf/rf gap. It was the best-hit ball of the inning. Alas, the right fielder caught up to the ball. Chance, thinking the ball would fall in, was about two-thirds of the way to 3b. The OU right fielder threw Chance out at 2b for an easy double play. The Horns went down in order in the 2nd and threatened in the 3rd when Chais Fuller led off with a walk and moved to 2b on a sac bunt by Nick Peoples. Alas, he was stranded there. In the 4th, Jordan reached on a double to rf. (I would've scored it a single with an error by the right fielder...but I wasn't the official scorer so I'm going with what he/she decided.) Jordan moved to 3b on a ground out to 2b by Bradley. He then scored on a sac fly by Kyle Russell to rf. Preston Clark followed the sac fly with a monster home run over the new Texas bullpen in lf. There was no doubt about that ball the second it left Preston's bat. And, that was it. Chais reached on a triple to start off the 5th. It was yet another fluke of a hit. The ball was a high fly ball to no-man's land near the rf line. It fell between the first baseman, the second baseman, and the right fielder. It bounced high over the right fielder's head and Chais reached 3b rather easily. Nick hit a grounder to ss. Chais broke for home and was thrown out easily. Nick stole 2b and moved to 3b on a throwing error during Travis' at-bat. Alas, Travis popped out to ss and Chance flew out to rf. Two runners at 3b in the inning and neither managed to score. The OU closer went into the game after that and that was pretty much it for the Horns.

On the other side of things, Joseph Krebs got the start and went 4+ innings. He got into a bit of trouble in the 3rd and gave up a run on 3 hits. He got into trouble again in the 4th and just squeaked his way out of it without giving up any runs. Sadly, he started off the 4th by giving up back-to-back singles. The first batter hit a ball up the middle to reach. The next batter bunted down the 1b line. Chance fielded the ball and looked to 2b, realized he couldn't make the play, and ended up too late to make the play at 1b. So, Keith Shinaberry went in at the plate. He struck out the first batter he faced but gave up a single (rbi) to the next. Pat McCrory then went in. He walked the first batter he faced, allowed the runners to advance on a wild pitch, and then gave up a 2-run single. Preston Clark caught that runner stealing a few pitches later. Oddly, Keith ended up with the loss. He threw 8 pitches and was saddled with the loss. He gave up a single, though, and that runner ended up scoring the 3rd run of the game. You don't often see someone throw 8 pitches and end up losing a game. Not very often at all. Austin Wood pitched the 6th, 7th, and 8th. For the most part, he looked pretty good. He did give up a solo shot in the 8th. Randy Boone threw a very efficient 3-up/3-down 9th. The Texas pitchers gave up 11 hits, walked 3, and struck out 6.

Frankly, I kept expecting the Horns would come back today and win the game. But, they just couldn't get things going. They had a terrible 5th and that proved to be more than enough to give the Sooners their first win at Disch-Falk since 1997. Yep, 1997. Ah well.

Posted by Joanna at 11:19 PM