I went to the Braves game last night and wanted to share some thoughts about the first matchup between Huddy and Mark. Unfortunately the game didn't live up to the hype, but it was still nice to be able to see both guys pitch.

First of all, driving into Atlanta, my friend Tim and I were listening to Buck and Kincaid on 680, when to my pleasant surprise Mychael Urban came on to talk about Aces and the Big 3. He mostly related stories from the book, but also made a few comments that stuck out to me:

• When asked who Zito misses more between Hudson and Mulder, Urban said he thought it was Hudson since Zito used to talk to him about the art of pitching and now he doesn't have anyone like that on the current team.
• When talking about how Zito and his outside interests are percieved by a lot of people, he made the comparison with Shaq, saying that people who think Shaq would shoot better free throws if he wasn't making rap albums were just being silly. I'd never thought of it like that, but I think it's an apt comparison.
• On a side note, Buck and Kincaid were both very positive when talking about the Oakland organization. It's nice to hear our guys get some respect from other parts of the nation.

From the game:

Hudson had a rough time in the first inning, but a few of the hits should have been played better by the defense, IMO. On Edmond's single, Mondesi threw home instead of to the cut off man.  While Mondesi has a good arm, he didn't have a shot at getting the runner going home and he could have gotten Edmonds in a run down if he had gone to the cut off man, or at least kept him at first base and it might have kept Walker at second.  The inning ended on a high note though, Huddy made an outstanding catch on a bunt attempt that was popped up, then caught the runner off of third.

Mulder had a slightly easier time in his first inning, but the defense still let him down to. The single that Andruw Jones hit should have been fielded by Eckstein, and any real shortstop would have had that ball and ended the inning, instead 2 runners scored.

Both of them picked a runner off base, Hudson got Cedeno and Mulder got Jones. The moves were pretty good and they had both guys fooled.  I personally took great pleasure in watching both getting picked off.

All in all it was an okay game, I wish they would pitched a little better, but I don't think they were as bad as their final lines indicate.