Its weird that so many guys are chasing obscure records this season. Chipper is trying to hit .400 over the season, Josh Hamilton has a chance to eclipse Manny Ramirez's modern day leading RBI total, while Lance Berkman also has a chance to beat Bagwell's modern day runs total. Ramirez had 165 RBI in 1999, while Bagwell had 152 runs in 2000. Berkman has 61 runs so far, but I don't see him keeping it up. Hamilton has 70 RBI, a whopping total already.
Hopefully after yesterday we will not be seeing .500 any more. The Astros had a closed meeting after BP yesterday in which Ed Wade spoke to players for ten minutes. Certainly yesterday's win against the Brewers was encouraging, seeing the return to vintage form of Roy Oswalt. Berkman drove in 5 with a 2 run home run and a bases clearing triple on a laser over Mike Cameron's head. It is a good start to this series, but this needs to continue. Forget for now what the Cubs are doing, I've always felt that the Cubs would win the NL Central. We've just got to get to 90 odd wins and see if we can pick up that wildcard slot.
However, the offense still did not produce much without the help of Berkman, which is the worrying thing. Getting a vintage Oswalt back is a first good step in the right direction for the 33-32 Astros, and Brian Moehler has pitched well his last few starts, although Backe and Chacon have had a couple of bad starts on the bounce. In two starts in June Chacon is 0-2 with a 16.50 ERA. We have Rodriguez back, and he pitched very well in Pittsburgh last week.
A few pieces of info I missed last week. Reggie Abercrombie was recalled from AAA, while Jose Cruz Jr. was placed on waivers. Cruz just wasn't suited to the pinch hitting role, and hopefully he can get some more ABs with a different team.
Cecil Cooper has stated that Darin Erstad and Geoff Blum could see more playing time at the expense of Michael Bourn and Ty Wiggington. Bourn has been dropped down in the order and replaced at the top of the lineup with Hunter Pence. We'll see if the shakeup causes the offense to wake up.
