D'Backs 4 Pirates 3

Umm... I don't know where to start on this one. We'll start with the positives, Oliver Perez actually looked fairly sharp tonight, only allowing 4 hits and 3 walks through 6 innings with 4 Ks. He kept his fastball pretty consistently in the 93-94 range, which isn't quite where he was in '04 but still seems to be high enough for him to be effective. He threw 61 of 97 pitches for strikes, which won't get him confused for Greg Maddux but certainly is not bad, especially for him. He was definitely better today than he was in his last start, so I'd say progress is being made. Also on the side of the positives, Jason Bay crushed a hanging curve from El Duque so far that he actually took a second to admire it, which is rare. Also, with runners on first and second with no outs in a close game in the ninth inning Craig Wilson was allowed to bat and drew a walk. Sure, it wasn't a game tying three run homer, but his walk lead to Castillo's two run single. This is what happens when you let your starters play. And that's it. That means it's time to move on to the negatives. The length of that list more than makes up for the short "positive" list tonight.

In fact, let's make a list. We'll start with the least egregious errors and move on.

• We scored one freaking run off of El Duque. I would make so joke about how he's been El Suck-ay this year, but I'm a bigger man than that. I think. Still, he came in with the same ERA as Ollie, one run off of him is not pretty.
• Jose Hernandez struck out with one out and the tying run on second and the go ahead run at first. He was, of course, pinch hitting. This wasn't quite as bad as it seems, as only Cota, Edwards, and DeCaster were left on the bench at this point. Still, Valverde looked VERY hittable tonight and I think Cota probably could've at least gotten his bat on the ball, which is more than we can say for the man named Jose K. Did you all catch that? Hernandez is so bad I'd rather see HUMBERTO COTA at the plate.
• Tracy brought Marte out for a second inning. Marte has been shaky in his appearences that tend to go far shorter than one inning (we're talking one batter here). I don't know what possessed Tracy to trust him to hold down a second inning after he had trouble with his first.
• Freddy Sanchez muffed Luiz Gonzalez bunt with the tying run on third and two outs. Granted, he was playing well back, it was a great bunt, and it would've been a tough play, but it's one I kind of expected Freddy to make otherwise. Still, the last two spots are reserved for...
• The one and only Jeromy Burnitz. With runners on second and third and one out in a tie game he dropped Orlando Hudson's can of corn pop-up to right. It's not likely that he would've thrown Sean Green out at the plate, so this error had the potential to not be that harmful, except for...
• The worst play of the season. In the same inning with two outs (meaning that in a perfect- read:Burnitzless- world the inning would be over) and D'Backs on first and third, Craig Counsell hit a tweener on the third base side of the mound. Marte grabbed the ball and in an attempt to make an incredibly difficult, but run saving play, overthrew Craig Wilson by infinity-billion feet. Burnitz tried to back up the play, but fell on his ass in the process of doing so. The final result was not only the D'Backs third run scoring from third base, but Hudson also scoring from first and Counsell ending up on third. If you're keeping track at home.

If you're keeping track at home, Burnitz both extended the 8th inning with his error, but in his inability to back a play up allowed his own extra runner to score from first on a ball that barely made it back to the pitcher. And of course, it all happened in a game that we only lost by 1 run. Seriously, Burnitz can't embarass himself any more. The only person he's embarassing at this point is Jim Tracy. Judging by the dugout shots of Tracy in the 8th inning, I think he may have finally figured it out.