Saturday, April 18, 2009

Greinke perfect


Zack Greinke pitched the first complete game shutout of his career against the Texas Rangers, Saturday.

At the Rangers Ballpark in Arlington Zack Greinke pitched his first complete game shutout of his career beating the Rangers 2-0. Greinke allowed seven hits, gave up no walks and struck out 10. Four of his strikeouts came against Ian Kinsler and Josh Hamilton (2 each), two of the Rangers top hitters. Chris Davis completed the hat trick by striking out against Greinke three times.

Greinke ran into trouble in the second and third innings but did not seem to be phased. In the second he gave up a lead-off triple to Hank Blalock. Zack then got Marlon Byrd to ground out and then struck out Nelson Cruz and Chris Davis. The third inning was started with a double by Jarrod Saltalamacchia. He was sacrificed to third by Elvis Andrus. Greinke proceded to strike out Ian Kinsler and ground out Michael Young to end the inning.

It was not until the sixth inning that Greinke got run support. The first run of the game was scored by Coco Crisp. He led off with a walk, advanced to third on two groundballs and scored on a double by Billy Butler.

Miguel Olivo gave Greinke an insurance run in the top of the seventh. Olivo hit his first home run of the year off of Kevin Millwood. Millwood pitched the entire game as well.

Greinke threw 111 pitches. In his last start against Cleveland he needed 104 pitches to get through 5 innings. Saturday night Greinke was extremely efficient.

Greinke is 3-0, winning every start he has had this year. He has an earned run average of 0.00. For Greinke the icing on the cake is his streak of 34 scoreless innings dating back to last year. This year, so far, Greinke has thrown 20 innings without giving up a run.

The Royals should be jumping for joy, since they signed this guy to a four-year extension lasting until 2012.

Congragulations Zack!

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