Sunday, July 10, 2005

The Pirates and Pedro

I have to admit, I've always been a big Pedro Martinez fan. I've always loved his fierce competitive streak. Maybe I identified with him because back in '97 when he was a fireballer that was known for beaning one too many people, I had a similar reputation (in Little League nonetheless, but there's a reason kids pick people like Pedro to idolize instead of Jon Lieber, Steve Cooke, Esteban Loaiza, Jason Schmidt circa '97, or Francisco Cordova). Anyways, of course Pedro's first start against the Pirates since that 1997 season when he was an Expo has to come on a Sunday, the one day of the week that it's toughest for me to make it to the ballpark. Since I disagree with the crap that tends to be fed to us by our broadcasting team (you know, the "there's no such thing as momentum, you're only as good as your next starter" stuff) I think this is a gigantic game for the Bucs today. We're coming off of two great wins against the Mets, and I think if we can pull into the break coming off a sweep and a win over Pedro Martinez and Craig Wilson back in the lineup we'll be in good shape once the break ends. Remember the Tampa series, we had two big wins against them, dropped a heartbreaker on Sunday, and suddenly things were in the tank. That means that the tast once again falls to Kip Wells. Kip flat out choked in his last two big starts against the Sox and Yankees, but he's coming off the best start of his career against the Phils. Pedro's been good this year, but he's still not the Pedro Martinez from 1997-2003. We can beat him, but only if Kip Wells can keep us close.

UPDATE (3 minutes later): Thanks Kip, serve up a dinger to Carlos "I only hit homers with Pedro on the mound" Beltran. Way to get us off to a good start. 2-0 Mets.