The New Killer B(urke) Strikes Again

There is nothing like going 3-4 in the playoffs with your last two at bats resulting in home runs, including a walk off home run to end a series, to get you in the starting lineup. So Chris Burke didn’t quite hit a home run in his first at bat against the Cardinals last night, but a triple would suffice. But thing did really look good with two outs the Cards intentionally walk Ausmus to get to the pitcher Oswalt. So manager, Phil Garner did something that no one expected, he sent the catcher on a steal attempt against one of the best pick-off combination of Mark Mulder and Yadier Molina. And it worked as it caught Molina so off guard that Molina forgot to catch the ball allowing Burke to score on the pass ball. Brilliant. All of the attention has been on Oswalt’s pitching, but if (I mean when) the Astros win the series; this is the play to look back on as the defining play of the series.

And Burke didn’t stop there. With the game still in reach and Berkman on third, the newest Killer B made the very first hit of the series for the Astros with runners in scoring position (they were 0-14) giving the team a cushion and then padded it a little more when he scored on an Adam Everett triple. So for those keeping track at home, Burke’s line in the playoffs so for reads as:

4-R
2-HR
4-RBI
.667-OBP
1.750-SLG
.625-AVG

Who needs Carlos Beltran? Hopefully Phil Garner keeps this kid in the lineup for the rest of the series because he has been money so far this postseason, well aside from his little mistake in what should have been a routine fly ball last night. But that misstep didn’t hurt the team in the end. And with the series tied up, it now becomes a best of five with the Astros with home field advantage. And in those five games you have potentially have Clemens going twice and Pettitte and Oswalt getting a start each. Oh and the other starter just happened to Brandon Backe who blanked the Cards in the postseason last year. And you also have Brad Lidge who can come in as early as the seventh and the Cards are currently 5-101 against Lidge for the last two years and has never given up a run in the playoffs. I really like the ‘Stros to make their first World Series ever.

As for the other series the big new is the umpire’s call in game 2. I fully support the umpire on “the call” and if Angel fan need someone to blame they need to look at the catcher. Every time I watch the game and there is a swinging third strike below the knees, the catcher always tags the batter even if it came nowhere near the ground as it was second nature and when the Angel’s catcher didn’t do this it just shows why he’s the third string catcher on the team.

As for the umpire’s mechanics, as an athlete I was always told to play until you hear a whistle and this is exactly why A.J. Pierzynski’s team won, he didn’t hear out so he kept playing, the catcher assumed the play was over so he stop playing and he team ended up losing. And there I no way the umpire is going to change his mind after the play. As a former umpire myself (granted I did beer league softball games where every ball is in the dirt) we had two rules 1) you are never wrong even when you know you are. Whenever I knew I was wrong after a play, I would never admit it, instead I would get a second opinion from other ump and hope he would reverse the call. 2) Try to make the game end early as possible. As an ump, we tend to get paid by the game no matter how long it goes so I sure that was in the back of the ump’s mind knowing an out call makes it go to extra inning and with an 18 inning marathon in recent memory, I doubt Blue wanted that to happen again.

Now with the controversy, there was been talk of instant replay. This is the worst idea to end all bad ideas. The great thing about sports is the human error. It was drive male conversation the next day, case in point, the latest controversy. Look how much debate that play has brought. Now if there was instant replay in baseball that is much like that in football, the play would have ended up standing due to inconclusive results. Then no one would be talking about the game at all the next day.

Even worse is when these machines screw up. I remember a couple years ago, late in the game, the Browns were driving down the field needing a touchdown to beat the Titans ion a must win foe the Browns to keep their playoff hopes alive. On fourth down, Northcutt made a catch inside the ten afterwards the Browns hurried to the line to spike the ball and stop the clock because there were out of time outs. After the Brown spiked the ball, the refs announced that they were going back and reviewing the previous catch by Northcutt even though in the rules state a play cannot be reviewed after the next play has been ran. But the ref blamed a mistake by the computer and overturned the Northcutt play and since that play was on fourth down the Titans got the ball and the game essentially was over and so were the Browns playoff hopes. And in true Browns fashion, beer bottles were thrown onto the field and the incident is the reason the NFL no longer sell beer bottles at the game. So to all the pro-instant replay fanatics out there, the computers can be wrong too and if something goes wrong, I would much rather blame human error than a computer one.