Hampton: 7IP, 3H/1ER, 3K:1BB
Sampson: 1IP, 1K
LaHawk: 1IP, 1H, 2K
It looked like Same Old Not-Hurt Mike Hampton at the beginning, didn't it? Nate McLouth leads off with a homer on a 2-0 pitch. Andy LaRoche grounds out, and Freddy Sanchez walks. Then he gets Craig Monroe to hit into a double play. After one inning, Hampton's pitch count is 24.
But then. Then! Hampton allowed two more hits after McLouth's home run. Both of them were singles. He got 19 of the next 21 batters, and closed out with 10 in a row.
| Pitcher | Pit/Str | Strike% | BF/Outs | Efficiency% | GB/FB/K |
| Hampton | 90/64 | 71.1% | 24/21 | 87.5% | 17/1/3 |
| Sampson | 9/8 | 88.9% | 3/3 | 100% | 2/0/1 |
| LaHawk | 13/9 | 69.2% | 4/3 | 75% | 1/0/2 |
| Total | 112/81 | 72.3% | 31/27 | 87.1% | 20/1/6 |
Can I point out that 17 of Hampton's 18 contact outs were groundballs? That's how you win a game. Or at least that's how the Astros almost lose a game, because they weren't exactly knocking the cover off the ball. Let's give it to Quintero for an RBI single to tie the game up, and for joining Maysonet and Tejada with multi-hit games. Tejada's hit streak is now 14 games. It took Mike Hampton scoring the go-ahead run in the 7th on a Tejada single for him to factor in the decision
We did see some lineup changes. Bourn got the day off, so Maysonet was in the #1 spot. Pence/Lee/Berkman made up your 3/4/5 spot (it didn't help Berkman - 0x3 with a BB). In fact, 3-7 were a combined 1x18.
Man of the Match:
Mike Hampton. Great game, hopefully kicks off a good streak.
Goat of the Game:
We'll give this one to Jason Michaels. 0x4 (all flyouts, so there was some luck involved), batting average is now .179.
