The [Nearly] Impossible Sweep

On the same infamous day that holds George Brett's pinetar-bat incident, and Barry Bonds' birthday, behold, something positive:

S.F. has a sweep at home. Yes, it's against the Nats; we've gone over this. This is still crazy, because we had by far the worst record from home until this series. OK, we still do. But at least now we're tied with Seattle and Washington on that, and it's no reason to take this 1-0 victory as anything but positive.

Steve Holm was great. I like Bengie, and even have him on my fantasy squad, but Steve Holm came in one day out from Fresno, and caught Matt's CG shutout. Excellent calling, that's all there is to it. He also went 2-3. Hello? First game back since June, catching Cain; goes 2-3. Cain admitted readily that he and Holm were on-page from the beginning.

Matt was likewise fantastic. It was his first CG of the year, and therefore by-default his first CG shutout. But it was also the first CG shutout for the entire starting staff. Way to go, Matthew. We love you. Hope they save you your own bobblehead on Saturday. Honestly, I'm starting to get a little upset that we don't score any runs for him, and I may even suspect personal dugout issues that other players have with him, because last year was the same. The guy pitched this way today, and he almost lost because, horror of horrors, an error (that's obviously not his fault) and one double almost lost the win for him.

Dave Roberts was another first-game(-back) star. 2-4; an amazing catch early on where he collapsed against the wall and saved runner-advancement.

Randy Winn, God bless him, though I knock him I do primarily like the guy. And his defense is why. It's true that he went 0-3 with 2 Ks. It's true that the game looked out of hand with runners on second and third with one out in the bottom of the 9th. It's also true that the ball he caught for the second out was shallow RF. But the wind was a little wild, and when he caught it he still had no running start to beat the speedy guy on third. He was so on target to Holm that the runner had to stop midway and go back.

We have a sweep. We have a bit of hope. Once again, I'm shocked to a tizzy. That's good.

-MSH