Thoughts on an odd game

I knew Freddy Garcia had been struggling, but I knew that Scott Elarton had been struggling even more. I went to tonight’s game, pretty much because it’s the only night I’ll have off in a period of three weeks, not because I thought the Royals would win.

Well Elarton did struggle—allowing four runs in five innings—and is the textbook case why wins and losses are practically useless when comparing pitchers: with tonight’s win, Elarton is 2-2 with a 7.34 ERA. But Garcia didn’t even make it out of the second inning, giving up six runs over five outs.

Anywho, I had various thoughts that cropped up in the old skull during the game, so I figure I might as well put them down here so I can remove all doubt that I’m dumb.

---Buddy Bell is actually a pretty good manager, but he has a great sense of humor. Don’t believe me? Why did Jason LaRue start again tonight? Bell knows he’s going to get fired, so he’s having a ton of fun making subtle but devastating mistakes game in and game out. Why did Tony Pena—who was tied with David DeJesus with the second-best batting average in tonight’s lineup, if we consider Joey Gathright’s .500+ average non-legit—hit eighth? (You’ve got some offense with Pena, a moderately dead spot in Gathright, back to some offense with DeJesus.) Mike Sweeney hitting fourth, Alex Gordon hitting fifth, Ryan Shealy hitting sixth has to be the worst 4-5-6 combo in the majors. Tony Pena, Esteban German, (John Buck,) even Shane Costa or Joey Gathright would all be better options to try at the five- or six-hole. What about Pena hitting second, Grudzielanek hitting fifth?

---Aaron Rowand is having a great year.

---Jimmy Rollins swing looks pretty.

---I’m okay with Joel Peralta coming in with a two-run lead. But it’s odd that David Riske, Jimmy Gobble, Joakim Soria, and Octavio Dotel, all better relievers who were used tonight, couldn’t combine to cover Peralta’s inning.

---The Royals had a ton of cheap hits tonight. Between all the broken bat singles, the whoopsy-blooper singles, the reach-out-and-poke-it singles, all of which were usually followed by a home run, I feel like the Royals didn’t really outhit the Phillies. I can’t think of one solid hit from a Royal that wasn’t a home run, with the exception of LaRue’s double, but that should have been a home run so I’m not going to fawn over it. Regardless, when you’re the Royals, you take the hits, even if they’re more a product of luck than a product of talent.

Okay, I didn’t have as many thoughts as I thought I would when I started this, plus I’m kinda tired. So… I’ll just leave it there and walk away.