Game 138: Pirates 8 Cardinals 2

You know, as much as I thought we'd help Mark Mulder make a triumphant return to the mound tonight, it would've been really disappointing to lose a game to a guy that hasn't pitched in a year, then had to sit through a rain delay before the game started. And apparently the rain delay made Tony Armas better (which is only because it couldn't have conceivably made him worse). Tonight's game sparked a ten minute conversation between me and my dad about David Eckstein's throwing motion. I'm not sure the man has a rotator cuff. Either that, or he's got a really small one. Good thing he's so damn gritty. Also, Jack Wilson is batting .282. WTF? His OPS+ is nearing "average" territory. LaRoche is on fire and hit another home run. But please, before you announce that his line is near where we expected it to be, please remember that his slugging percentage is still 100 points lower than it was last year. What he's done is damn impressive in light of his awful start, but his stat line isn't going to completely recover from that April. We can only hope that it doesn't happen again.