Bernie is coming back for the FINAL GAME(TM) and Andy is pitching it. The pregame ceremony should be awesome and there is nobody I would rather have pitching it on this team than Andy but it would break my heart if Good Andy doesn’t show up for the game.

I really desperately want him to do well for obvious reasons, but between the atrocious defense he’s had behind him (check out his BABIP!) and his breaking pitches starting to wane as he’s getting tired (apparently he didn’t get his normal workout in this year, which makes sense when you consider he was seriously contemplating retirement) it just makes me very nervous. At the end of the day, I still believe in him but it’s getting hard. His k/9 is actually up this year so he must be doing something right.

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In farm system news, Scranton are kings of the International League. They absolutely murdered Pawtucket 20-2. Some kid named Phil Hughes pitched 5 innings, allowed 4 hits, walked 4 and had one earned run. He also struck out 12. The four walks is pretty terrible on the one hand, on the other hand that is still a 3:1 ratio so I’ll forgive it for one night. The kid is getting his stuff together and hopefully next year he’ll be able to bring it to the next level and not come down with any horrible freak injuries.