One Edwin Nunez to Go

A poor call ruined an imperfectly perfect afternoon in Pittsburgh and August went out like a lion. The Brewers are apparently trying to rectify the situation, but it's very rare that a scoring decision such as this gets reversed especially in the context of the entire game.

I watched that swinging bunt and Sabathia bobble in real time and I was amazed that it was ruled a hit prior to LaRoche making it to first base. It clearly was a tough call, but I wish the official scorer put a little more thought into it. Perhaps one replay viewing and a slight memory recall of the excessive amount of tough fielding opportunities by Sabathia would have made it an error, but I guess it wasn't to be. The common theme for the Brewers since PNC opened is "the place where dreams go to die," so I'll take what I can get in this instance.

Of course, the "hit" (and the corresponding focus-to-blurry images of that number through the rest of the game) could elicit an interesting behavior analysis by a psychologist: was it because of the hit that relaxed the team that caused the Pirates to go hitless the rest of the game, or was it in spite of it? I didn't perform so well in my psych classes in college for me to do an analysis, but my mood ring tells me that the pressure would have gotten to Sabathia later in the game and he would have given up a hit in any case. It proves so many things have to go right for a no-hitter to happen.

As often is brought up by announcers with hitless games going into the fourth or fifth inning, a hit has to be beyond a reasonable doubt to be scored as such. That's one of the many unwritten rules of the game, and as much as I like to see these rule of thumb instances pushed out of the game, I think it is a worthwhile non-rule. It's much more acceptable to be changed from an error to a hit than the other way around. Even Uecker, who often is reserved in his criticism, was calling out the official scorer. Oh well, a win is a win and I hope this scorer's error doesn't fester.

Each time a pitcher bends over to field a bunt or squibber I think of Edwin Nunez who always seemed to throw ten feet above the first baseman on those plays. I'm happy to say I have not seen any play like that on the Brewers this season.

In other news…

The Brewers now have 80 wins after a record-setting 20-7 August. The total wins ties the 2008 Brewers with the 1996 team for 13^th most wins in franchise history (better than 25 other incarnations).

I do not know of this "Matt LaPorta" you speak of.