Random Fandom

You know, it's hard to feel too bad about last night's game. Starting pitching and relief pitching did OK; only the offense looked anemic. This was one of those games where a few lucky bounces changed matters -- the first inning home run bounced off the foul poul; Bonds' fifth inning home run bounced off the glove of a fan -- a fan that could have (should have?) been ruled for interference. Gonzo hit a ball caught at the wall in the top of the first. Change those things around, and we could easily be looking at a D-Backs win this morning.

I'm not saying the Giants were lucky to win the game. Schmidt had his "A" game going, and every team gets breaks over the course of a season. I'm just saying that was one of those games that could have gone the other way. (Unlike, say, the Marlins series.)

Speaking of luck, there's been a lot of post-mortems conducted on the Sexson-Brewers trade on the Republic, its forum, and in this column from the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel (mentioned in both today's Republic and the D-Backs forum. I need more time to discuss the trade, but the column headline, "Brewers Pull Wool Over Diamondbacks' Eyes," is one of the bigger buckets of hooey I've read in some time. (Luckily the column is a little more well-considered.)

Look, clearly at this point in the season, the Brewers got the better of the deal. But that's because Sexson, a man who played all 162 games last year, got injured and is likely out for the season. If Sexson doesn't get injured and has an average season for him, the trade is win-win for both sides -- the Brewers got a lot of cheap replacements and the Diamondbacks have a very good cleanup hitter in the prime of his career.