2012 was a dismal season for the Houston Astros, neatly sandwiched between the equally dismal 2011 and 2013 seasons.
The 2012 squad fought its way to a 22-23 record through 45 games, but went just 33-84 in its next 117, including an 8-46 spurt through July and August. Smack in the middle of that funereal slog, there was a flash of joy. If you blinked you probably missed it.
It was August 10, 2012, a week before my 17th birthday. The Astros trailed their then-division opponent Milwaukee Brewers 3-2 in the bottom of the 9th. Losers of 19 of their last 21, the ‘Stros seemed impossibly far away from that ever-elusive first walk-off win of the season.
Single, stolen base, wild pitch, double, deep fly ball. A tie game with a runner on third and just 1 out. I remember sitting up and clasping my hands together. “Please let this end well,” I pled uselessly to an otherwise-empty living room, my dog sleeping on the couch beside me and the cool, artificial breeze floating gently through the house.
You can watch what happened next here, because MLB won’t let me embed this extremely valuable footage on my blog.
Yes, this team, at this time, was built to lose. But there’s just somethin’ about a walk-off! It fills the soul.
The Astros players were, I kid you not, so fired up about this that they decided to wear their 1990s throwback jerseys one additional night, to hell with what the promotional calendar said.
And I’ll be damned, they walked those boys off again!
Expertly, the team ran out wearing these same jerseys for the 3rd and final game against the Brewers the following afternoon. They kept it close, but their fortune fizzled out in a 5-3 loss. The Astros would win just 2 more games that month.
On April 7, the Northwestern baseball team hosted the Illinois Fighting Illini in their home conference opener. Scores of visiting fans huddled together under blue and orange blankets, bracing themselves for descending frigid afternoon shadows in the ominous sunlight of a 3 p.m. Rocky Miller Park first pitch.
The Illini led off the game with a base hit to left. The runner made a break for second base early in the next at-bat. Catcher Cooper Foard popped up from his crouch and fired a seed across the infield, nabbing the runner with ease. The fans with purple blankets cheered heartily. This was not the expected outcome of that play, and it set an unfamiliar tone in the ballpark.
A few tense hours later, down 3-1 in the 9th, a spirited, super duper small ball NU rally forced a mid-inning pitching change and made the score 3-2. The trouble with small ball is that it usually involves outs. There were 2 of them when Foard stepped to the plate with runners on second and third.
If you’ve been following this blog with any regularity, you know it has been a really rough year to start covering Northwestern baseball. After 6 games (all losses, of course) there was a mass coaching/staff exodus that head coach Jim Foster only recently recouped with new hires (both former big leaguers).
So you can understand how, while last Friday’s win felt amazing, it jogged an 11-year-old memory of two magical nights in Houston that made no impact on a horrible baseball season.
Saturday’s 7-2 loss, a tight, 4-2 game that got out of hand with extremely sloppy play by the Wildcats in the top of the 9th, seemed to confirm this line of thinking….for 24 hours.
Owen McElfatrick’s go-ahead 3-run bomb was his 3rd as a college baseball player, something he just started doing in February. He’s gone through growing pains this year just like the rest of his team, but he’s got a huge hit under his belt now. And a series win!
The Wildcats are 5-22 on the season, and, hilariously, now 3-3 in the Big Ten. If the season ended today, that would earn them a spot in the conference tournament. 8 of the 13 Big Ten teams get in, and, frankly, it’s the most attainable goal for this program at the moment. It’s the first goal for every team.
There is a lot of baseball to be played to determine if these two magical afternoons in Evanston will be anything but a blip in a disappointing year. But unlike the 2012 Astros, who were beyond hopeless by August, Foster and the ‘Cats have earned themselves some hope.
Let me rephrase: they have earned themselves the opportunity to have hope. The schedule does them no favors. This weekend’s road set against Nebraska will be very hard, and there are no breaks with Rutgers and Michigan State in the subsequent conference weekends. If I were a betting man on such things, I would probably hold on to my money.
It doesn’t really matter, though. The team is playing with a noticeable gusto it absolutely lacked during the first 20 or so games of the season. The starting pitching is night-and-day better, the bullpen can hold things in place now, the defense is mostly improving and the hitters are attacking at-bats with confidence. Stephen Hrustich is hitting over .300 and has a 12-game hitting streak.
There’s some good stuff here!
(On weekends, that is. The team is essentially punting on weekday games to save its more reliable pitchers for weekends. It’s pure chaos. The ‘Cats lost 24-20 to UIC at home on Tuesday. Don’t worry about it!)
What matters is, Northwestern has 18 conference games left, and as of now, they all matter. It’s a deserving opportunity for the players who have undoubtedly worked their tails off during a very tough time for the program.
Maybe it doesn’t go well from here. Maybe it really is just two moments of variance culminating at just the right time in an otherwise bleak campaign. Either way, it’s a breath of fresh air to say, accurately: they’ve got to play the rest of the games to find out.
To borrow a phrase from former Astros color commentator Jim Deshaies, “in a year of frustration, what a feel good night.”
The Other Guys
…get the major Other Guys treatment from me this week because I want this to publish before the Northwestern-Nebraska series starts and I am super lazy.
Rest assured, because I know you’re restless for some Missouri Valley Conference analysis, over the next few weeks, I plan to give those dusty corners of the college baseball world more attention.
For now:
Eastern Illinois Panthers (17-12, 1-5 OVC)
Next 6 conference games vs. Cupcake State, Southern College Prep Academy
Illinois State Redbirds (10-17, 2-7 MVC)
Next 6 conference games vs. Murray State, Bradley
Milwaukee Panthers (14-15, 5-6 Horizon)
Next 6 conference games vs. Purdue-Fort Wayne, Northern Kentucky
Northern Illinois Huskies (6-24, 3-9 MAC)
Brother, do you really want to know
UIC Flames (14-14, 3-6 MVC)
Next 6 conference games vs. Missouri Valley, Valpo
Valparaiso Beacons (11-14, 2-7 MVC)
Next 6 conference games vs. Bradley, UIC 👀 - watch this space