dude i confess i have no idea what happened last night but weren't the nats down going into the 9th anyways?? are you assuming werth would have hit a home run or whatever had it been 1-0 because that is not what you want to do... players hit differently depending on the pressure etc..
like i said i don't know what happened
i'm not happy about davey johnson at this point either man.. who is happy with the record? nobody...
i'll outline last nights implosion.
issue #1: sac bunting with suzuki. first off - why suzuki? second off, why sac bunt when you have scott hairston on deck? hairston strikes out looking like a fool, as he did all night by liriano.
stras pitched incredible through 8. davey marched out Drew Storen for the 9th with the heart of the Pirates order coming up.
issue #2: rafael soriano, who hasn't pitched since 7/20, is the shutdown pitcher you need in this situation. you need to keep that score 1-0, and play to tie or win it in the 9th. davey gambled, trying to get confidence back in Storen. Clippard pitched the day before, but was available. he would have been a good option as well.
storen imploded. he can't hold runners, so once someone is on, they are guaranteed scoring position. storen gives up 3 runs, and can't finish his inning.
bottom of the 9th, heart of the order up. zimmerman gets a base hit, and red-hot werth homers. the game is now 2-4. pirates grab an out with laroche, but then ramos gets on.
issue #3: span is up. he's fast, but susceptible to the grounding into double plays. he has 7, which is pretty high for someone hitting lead off most of the year. he also has no home runs on the year. i either sub ramos on the base paths, or pinch hit with harper or tracy and go for the tie.
issue #4: ump makes a bad call and calls ramos out by tag. there was no tag. davey "didn't see it", according to him during the press conference. he should have thrown a fit, the game was over and his team got fucked over.
