Astros versus Braves

Well doesn't that sound familiar to Astro fans, somewhat painfully so. This time around though most experts seem to be picking the Astros to finally win a playoff series and defeat the Braves, to whom they have lost three out of their last four playoff series.

Does this Astro fan have the same confidence as the pundits do? Not exactly, but cautiously optimistic.
Game one was on Wednesday. Scheduled to be on at 2pm MST right when I am at work. I had the game update page on ESPN open. Of course I was hoping for a win but more than that I was hoping that the Astro bats would do well win or loose. I felt that they had to hit well to not let the past creep into their minds. To my delightment they did produce. Most everyone contributed in some fashion, even Brad Ausmus had a solo home run. Every refresh of the page showed more Astro offense and I could not contain my smile. Four home runs and a 9-3 final score later Roger Clemens had his first game one win. Maybe things are different this year, ahhh but don't celebrate yet.

Game two was on Thursday. So was our client party at the Albuquerque International Balloon Fiesta. Duty calls. Before I left for the event at 2:30pm MST I saw a 1-0 Astro lead in the second inning. That was the last update I got until a few hours later. I was working behind the bar and our program director and host of the afternoon show on "610 the Sports Animal" here in Albuquerque, one mister Ian Martin asked me if I knew the score. I told him about the 1-0 and he said when he left the station it was 2-0 but Atlanta was threatening. My first thought was that it sounded about right. Its tough to go against playoff pitching and have your offense explode in consecutive games. I knew this series, no matter how hot the Astros were coming into it, would be tough. It was 11:00 pm MST before I was able to get home and hop online to find that the final was 4-2 Braves in 11. Rats! How sweet it would have been to go up 2-0 and head back to Houston. If that happened I would have felt real confident that the Astros would not drop 3 in a row. Now they go home tied 1-1 and hope to keep the series from going back to Atlanta for game five, when anything can happen.

Later today is game three. Good ol' Minute Maid Park. 18 straight wins coming in. My question though is that a good thing or a bad thing. I think it only gets its answer if the Astros win or loose. If they win everyone will say that they just can not loose there. If they loose then they will say that the streak had to come to an end sometime. That is just the way things are, aren't they. Will we ever really know if it was truely helpful? I do think it helps in two ways. First I think the crowd will be that little bit more into it, without them even knowning it. Just that one or two decibels more. Secondly I think it might just give that little bit of confidence the Astros might need to keep positive if the ball doesnt bounce their way sometime in the game. Instead of chalking it up to that "we just can win in the playoffs" type thing it can be a "we will get it back" type of thing. That is just how I see it.

Today's game is at 11:00am MST. I should be able to watch it since today's prior engagement is not till 2:00ish. I do have some things that have to get done though so I will not see every pitch, unfortunately. That will have to wait till tomorrow when I give up some good NFL time to sit and watch game 4 pitch for pitch and hope that it is the game that Houston finally clinches their first playoff series win.

Cross your fingers... I will.