Oregon @ Washington State (Cougars win series 2-1)

[UOducksTK1]

How many games can we lose in the last inning? Incredible.

[BillM]

Our guys battled back all day again, but our pitchers absolutely let us down again. Unbelievable 9th inning performance by Boer. So much for that bullpen experiment!

[greenyellow]

I think that it's starting to show that losing so many top pitching recruits to the MLB Draft has really hurt the pitching staff depth.

[BillM]

Our veteran pitchers let us down big time in this series . . . Anderson then Moen in the first game and then Boer today. The young guys did their jobs and battled. For so much on the line (even though it was a HUGE longshot for postseason play), WSU is the team who played like they had a shot at the postseason.

Very disappointing!

[oregontrack]

This is why I was hesitant about moving a top-notch starter into the closer's role. It's not a 'McGough thing' or a 'Moen thing', it's an 'Oregon bullpen thing'. It swallows up everyone it touches. Mariano Rivera could be at the back end of our 'pen and we'd still blow save after save after save.

Well, finish over .500 and try to spoil Oregon State's Pac-10 title chances next week.

[BillM]

I worried about taking Boer out of the starting rotation too, but I guess the coaches thought putting him in the bullpen gave us something we were lacking. At midseason, Coach Horton said that he believed that our bullpen would be our strength. Unfortunately, our bullpen is still struggling. I worried too that starting Keudell after 3 days rest and his third game in a week, would backfire on us. I know Keudell wanted to start, but it doesn't look like we left ourselves with any other options. We have literally GIVEN away 9 or 10 games this year (and those are just the ones I can think of).

Anyway, 20-31 UP is up next, but we're 2-2 against them. OS lost their first series of the year so I would imagine they're going to be out for blood this weekend. Hopefully our veteran pitchers will want to go out as winners (may be the last time we see Anderson and Boer, Moen for sure, Keudell maybe) in what may be their last games as Ducks. We need 1 more win to reach 30 wins which would give us a winning season.

A winning season and a chance to knock OS out of 1st place would make up for much of the disappointment this season. Hopefully our guys can put it all together in our next four games. When our pitching has been good, our hitting has not been good; when our hitting is good, our pitching has not been good.

[oregontrack]

It'll be interesting to see what we do with the staff this week. I don't blame Kuedell at all for today's performance, he started 3 games in an 8 day span. That's rough. Jones has been really good lately, and smoked the Beavs in Corvallis a couple weeks ago. I'd imagine Horton would want to give him another shot. Boer certainly deserves to start, especially since (as mentioned above) it might be his last appearance as a Duck.

If anything, recent athletic precedents dictate that OSU doesn't do well against us when they're playing for a Pac-10 title.

[BillM]

If our pitching and hitting finally come together this upcoming weekend and we are able to steal a couple games from the beavs, I would love to not only knock them out of the Pac-10 Championship (ASU would have to sweep UCLA), but knock them out of a national seed/super regional too. They'll no doubt get their regional. Last years OS games were brutal for us . . . one walk-off win after another for OS. I'm not sure our guys quite got the rivalry.

I just want to see our guys finish well. They haven't shown any signs of giving up on the season and to their credit keep battling in games. It would at least give them something to build on in the postseason.