The New Killer B(urke)

I was planning on ripping Ashlee Simpson’s latest poor outing on Saturday Night Live, but I was sidetracked today by the six hour, eighteen inning playoff game between the Houston Astros and Atlanta Braves. After being down 6-1 in the bottom of the eighth, one of longtime killer B, Lance Berkman hit a grand slam into the Crawford Boxes to get within a run. Then in the bottom of the 9th, down to their last out, Brad Ausmus tied up the game with a home run that was so close to the yellow line, ever time they replayed it at regular speed, I couldn’t see it hit above it. Major props to the umpire that had the great eye to see it. Then after that score, there was essentially a second game play as the game went another nine innings after that. There were some close plays on both sides with Luke Scott coming within inches of a walk off homerun in the 10th and the Braves left them loaded in the 14th. In the end, the box score ended up looking like that of an all-star game with all the switches to the roster with all but one position player not getting into the game. The Astros even had four different players at first base and Eric Bruntlett coming in the eighth as a short shop only to move to center field the back to short only to end the game at center.

The ending finally came after Rodger Clemens coming in to pinch hit in the 15th and follow that up with three scoreless innings. Then in the bottom of the 18th, after Clemens struck out, the newest killer B, Chris Burke hit a ball into the Craford Boxes, almost exactly in the same place Berkman, who Burke pinch ran for way back in the 10th, ten innings earlier for the walk off home run. And just like that, the longest playoff game ever was over.

Now the Astros will travel to St. Louis to start that series on Wednesday. So much for Lost and Veronica Mars (hopefully it will be an early start and won’t go 18 innings). With Pettitte starting game one with Clemens and Oswalt to follow and in a possible seven game series, having those guys on the mound for most likely six of the games, I am very confident that the Astros can make it to the World Series this year. I really hope Carlos Beltran is having fun watching this from his multimillion dollar couch.