OK, the Bucs were destroyed again yesterday as Mark Mulder took Kip Wells to pitching school. Mulder used less than 100 pitches to go eight innings. Wells threw 113 in four and a third. He walked two, which is not good for four innings' work, and gave up eleven hits and two home runs. From the box score, I can't tell if he was nibbling again or just throwing the ball where the A's could hit it hard. He must have faced about 25 batters. Either way, he's now up to 19.1 pitches per three outs. This, for those of you keeping score at home, sucks. If the Bucs are fortunate enough to get 3300 pitches out of Wells this year, at this pace he'll give them 172 season-destroying innings. When you think of "present and future ace," hopefully your expectations are a little higher than Brett Tomko. The Pirates had one error and what might be their best infield defense (with Stynes-Wilson-Castillo) on the field. Unless the outfield defense was clumsy or porous, Wells probably can't hang any responsibility for that outing on his defense. I'll go out on a limb now and predict that Kip Wells is not getting another one-year, $2.5M contract from the Pirates, not when Tomko will be available for $1.5M. I'm not saying the Pirates should give up on Wells. Hell no, just the opposite. And I'm not endorsing any kind of punishment for Wells. That's stupid and would make the situation worse. The coaches have to work with him and see if they can help him to pitch better. The fans should back off and give him time and space to find himself again. Meanwhile, everyone should know that he's not pitching like an ace and the Bucs obviously are not getting much ROI on the deal they gave him at the beginning of the year.
Other observations: No one got hit by a pitch. Maybe that nonsense will stop before someone gets their forearm fractured. Rotowire tells me Mackowiak left with a bruised shoulder. Hopefully he can relax today, listen to eight solid hours of Ray Charles, and feel well enough to play some tomorrow.
The A's put 34,000 fans in the seats. No doubt every one of them left thinking, "How soon can I get back to the ballpark?"
Can't say I look forward to catching up on the beat writing.
Three months from yesterday the Steelers host the Raiders in the NFL season opener. Mmm, Steelers.
More later on the fact that the Bucs are 5-14 over the last three weeks.
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