Astros Have Another Injury

First, my apologies for being so quiet lately.  I have been swamped at work.

Let’s jump right into last night’s game.  The Astros lost 4-2 to the Brewers, but that wasn’t the important news of the game.

Russ Ortiz hit a homerun, but that wasn’t the important news either.  (Though it was pretty cool.)

The important news was that Mike Hampton came out of the game early with an injury.

Luckily, it is nothing serious as it was a small cut on his thumb, but Mike thought he should be safe rather than sorry.

“I glued the wound shut, but it opened up after the first and it never got any better and I never got a feel for any of my pitches, and we thought it would be safe to get me out of there sooner than later,” Hampton said.

It was one of those weird little “injuries” that is going to go down in baseball lore like Moises Alou’s treadmill injury or when Sammy Sosa injured himself sneezing.  Hampton cut himself in Chicago getting soap out of the dispenser at Wrigley.

“It just happened in the shower,” Hampton said. “I was pumping the soap out, taking a shower and it slipped off. Cut my finger. Of course, it couldn’t be the right hand. That wouldn’t serve anybody any justice if it was the right hand. It had to be the left.”

The good news is that nobody expects Hampy to miss his next start on Sunday vs. the Texas Rangers.

Backe Update

Brandon Backe had another good start for Corpus Christi this week further solidifying his return to the Astros when he comes off the DL.  During his time with the Hooks, Brandon is 3-0 with a 1.38 ER, 17 strikeouts and a 0.96 WHIP.  He has one more start in Round Rock before Houston decides what to do with him.  He could go to the bullpen or replace Paulino in the starting rotation.  Cecil Cooper says that no decision has been made yet.

“We haven’t even talked about that,” Cooper said. “It’s kind of a good problem to have. I’m sure we’ll have some discussions this week about that.”