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Saturday - April 25, 2009

Game 39: Kansas State at Texas

Good morning! Sorry I didn't get this posted last night but I was dog tired. On advice of counsel, I went to bed when I got home. Heh. Alas, the news is not good. Texas lost to Kansas State 2-4. What happened? The Horns faced a buzz saw named A.J. Morris. With the win, he went to 10-0 on the season. Going into the game, he'd made 10 appearances, winning 9 of them. ERA going in? 1.31. Opponent batting average? .184. He'd walked 18 and struck out 69 in 68.2 innings pitched on the year. Last night was his second complete game of the season. Amazingly, he threw 149 pitches by my count. He did a great job. So sad.

Starting line-ups:

Kansas State	Texas
1 Adam Muenster, dh 2 Carter Jurica, 2b 3 Nick Martini, lf 4 Justin Bloxom, 1b 5 Jason King, 3b 6 Drew Biery, ss 7 Jordan Cruz, rf 8 Rob Vaughn, c 9 Dane Yelovich, cf - A.J. Morris, p	1 Travis Tucker, 2b 2 Michael Torres, 3b 3 Brandon Belt, 1b 4 Tant Shepherd, lf 5 Kevin Keyes, rf 6 Cameron Rupp, c 7 Kevin Lusson, dh 8 Brandon Loy, ss 9 Kyle Lusson, cf - Chance Ruffin, p

Note that Kyle Lusson got his 10th start of the year. And, little brother Kevin Lusson got his 3rd.

Chance Ruffin got the nod for the Horns and struggled a bit. He left with the game tied 2-2 in the 7th. Austin Dicharry faced 2, getting one out and walking one. Austin Wood finished off the 7th, striking out the final batter of the inning. He gave up a run in each of the final two innings, though, to take the loss and dropped his record to 4-1.

And, the game went like so:

• 1st inning, KSU
• Chance Ruffin on the mound for Texas.
• Muenster doubled to right-center.
• Jurica grounded out to ss.
• Martini singled to 1b, moving Muenster to 3b. Belt made a great dive and stop to keep the ball in the infield. If Ruffin had moved to cover 1b immediately, Martini would've probably grounded out. But, it looked like Ruffin (along with most of us in the stands) thought the ball was going to get through (it was very well hit and Belt really did make a fantastic grab). By the time he realized it wouldn't, it was too late. When Belt saw that Ruffin was too far away, he started racing for the bag but had no chance. Ruffin did beat Belt to the bag and Belt tried to throw to him. But, the batter was there too. And, the throw was late...not to mention dropped. Mental lapse. No error on the board, though.
• Ruffin buckled down and struck out Bloxom and King. Both went down looking.
• 1st inning, Texas
• A.J. Morris on the mound for KSU.
• Tucker reached on an error by ss (who misplayed a grounder behind 2b) and moved to 2b on a wild pitch with Torres at the plate.
• Torres reached on a bunt single down the 1b line, moving Tucker to 3b. On the play, the first baseman fielded while 2b covered the bag. I think KSU actually had a play but the first baseman hesitated as he threw the ball to first. It looked like he had a tough time getting the ball out of his glove (stuck in his glove's webbing?) and Torres beat the toss easily.
• Belt up. Suicide squeeze! He bunted down the 1b line. The pitcher fielded and thought about going home but then turned and threw to 1b. I think he might've had a play. Whew. Torres moved to 2b on the play, Tucker scored.
• Shepherd flew out to deep rf. Torres tagged up and moved to 3b.
• Keyes drew a full-count walk.
• Rupp went down swinging.
• Texas up 1-0.
• 2nd inning, KSU
• Biery drew a full-count walk.
• Cruz flew out to cf.
• Vaughn singled threw the left side, moving Biery to 2b.
• Yelovich reached on a 4-ball walk. Skip Johnson made a trip to the mound after the 2nd ball. After the walk, the bullpen got busy.
• Muenster lined into a 4-6 double play. Nice. The pitchers in the bullpen sat back down.
• 2nd inning, Texas
• Sadly, 1-2-3: Kevin Lusson grounded out to 3b, Loy grounded out to 2b, and Kyle Lusson grounded out to ss.
• 3rd inning, KSU
• Jurica grounded out to 1b (pitcher covered the bag). The ball was headed to Belt's left, hit the ground with a lot of counter-clockwise spin and darted back to Belt's right. He made a very nice play to grab the ball. That was more spin on a such a sharply-hit ball than I'd seen in a long time.
• Martini hit a ground-rule double down the lf line that was just fair before bouncing onto the berm down the line.
• Bloxom flew out to lf.
• King struck out swinging.
• 3rd inning, Texas
• Tucker grounded out to 3b.
• Torres singled off the mound up the middle.
• Belt flew out to lf right at the wall. The KSU outfield was playing quite shallow all game. And, it looked like this ball would get over the left fielder but he got back just in time.
• Which reminds me that I never mentioned the weather. It was 77 °F at the start of the game and dropped a few degrees over the course of the game. The wind was blowing hard from the rf corner to the lf corner at the start of the game but died down to almost nothing by the end of the game.
• Shepherd grounded out to 3b. The third baseman (King) made a really nice grab and throw. Sigh.
• 4th inning, KSU
• 3-up/3-down: Biery went down swinging, Cruz grounded out to 1b (unassisted), and Vaughn grounded out to 2b.
• 4th inning, Texas
• Keyes reached on a hard single that hit the KSU pitcher on the leg and ricocheted into rf. The trainer and coach went out to check on Morris. He stepped a bit gingerly but then threw a couple of test pitches and stayed in the game. That turned out to be our best shot and getting Morris off the field, folks. Alas...
• Rupp moved Keyes to 2b with a 1-3 sac bunt down the 1b line.
• Kevin Lusson singled to the cf/rf gap, scoring Keyes.
• Loy flew out to rf.
• With Kyle Lusson at the plate, Kevin Lusson stole 2b (his first sb as a Longhorn).
• Kyle Lusson went on to fly out to rf, though.
• Texas up 2-0.
• 5th inning, KSU
• 3-up/3-down again! Yelovich struck out swinging (full count), Muenster grounded out to ss, and Jurica flew out to rf.
• 5th inning, Texas
• Tucker drew a full-count 4-pitch walk. Sadly, he was then caught stealing (2-6) on the first pitch to Torres.
• Torres doubled down the rf line.
• Torres stole 3b on the first pitch to Belt.
• With the infield pulled in, Belt grounded out to 1b (unassisted). No chance for Torres to score.
• Shepherd struck out swinging.
• 6th inning, KSU
• Martini flew out to cf.
• Bloxom homered over the fence in the cf/rf gap...just right of the 405 sign.
• King homered into the KSU bullpen.
• Which prompted a visit to the mound by Skip Johnson.
• Biery flew out to rf.
• Cruz flew out to lf (foul). Shepherd made a nice play to catch the ball just over the wall at the berm.
• Game tied 2-2.
• 6th inning, Texas
• 1-2-3: Keyes grounded out to 3b, Rupp flew out to cf, and Kevin Lusson grounded out to 2b. Damn.
• 7th inning, KSU
• Vaughn singled up the middle.
• Yelovich bunted a couple of balls foul. He squared to bunt again (!) and watched a called strike. You don't see that sort of thing often, eh?
• Texas changed pitchers, sending Austin Dicharry in for Ruffin.
• Muenster struck out swinging (full-count).
• Vaughn stole 2b on the 5th pitch to Jurica.
• Jurica ended up fouling off a 6th pitch before drawing a full-count walk.
• Texas sent Austin Wood to the mound, replacing Dicharry.
• Martini struck out looking.
• 7th inning, Texas
• Loy lined out to rf.
• Kyle Lusson went down swinging (full count).
• Tucker reached on a bloop single to rf.
• Torres grounded out to 2b.
• 8th inning, KSU
• Bloxom flew out to lf.
• King singled to rf and stole 2b on the first pitch to Biery.
• Biery singled through the right side, scoring King. On the throw home, Biery moved up to 2b.
• Cruz singled through the left side, moving Biery to 3b.
• Vaughn struck out swinging. His back swing hit Rupp hard on the helmet. Rupp went down and stayed down (on his knees holding his head on the ground) for about a minute or so. He ended up getting up and staying in the game. Wow.
• KSU decided to test Rupp on the next pitch. Cruz stole 2b. Rupp looked to the runner at 3b and made no throw.
• Yelovich grounded out to 3b. Nice play by Torres.
• Texas down 2-3.
• 8th inning, Texas
• 1-2-3.
• Belt lined out to lf.
• Shepherd struck out looking (full count).
• Keyes struck out swinging. He appeared to disagree with the ump on the first pitch (called strike). So, Coach Garrido took an offensive time-out to talk to him. He watched another called strike, then a ball, then fouled one off, before striking out swinging.
• 9th inning, KSU
• Muenster struck out looking.
• Jurica did likewise.
• Martini singled up the middle and then stole 2b (on the 4th pitch to Bloxom).
• Bloxom hit a triple to the gap in right-center, scoring Martini.
• King struck out swinging.
• Texas down 2-4.
• 9th inning, Texas
• Rupp flew out to rf.
• Kevin Lusson singled to lf and was replaced by pinch-runner Morgan Mickan.
• It was about this time that Bob asked me if our right-handed batters had any hits on the night. Answer? Two. Keyes hit that single off the pitcher's leg in the 4th and Tucker hit a blooper in the 7th. Otherwise, it was all on the lefties last night.
• Loy reached on a 6-5 fielder's choice.
• Moldenhauer (lefty) pinch-hit for Kyle Lusson and singled to rf, moving Loy to 2b. Tim Maitland went in to run for Moldenhauer.
• Tucker, sadly, lined out to ss. 6 more inches and it would've been a run scoring single. Bah.
• Texas loses 2-4.

I repeat: great game for Morris. Texas had some chances but just couldn't get past Morris.

Here's the line (from GameTracker):

Hopefully, the Horns will do better this afternoon. They'll be retiring Burt Hooton's jersey number (20) before the game. I'll take my camera and be back with a game report later this evening. Hook 'em!

Posted by Joanna at 8:42 AM