A golden sombrero is awarded to a player who manages to strike out four times in a single game (real golden sombrero not included). It's quite the feat unless you're Ryan Howard or Mark Reynolds. Unfortunately, no-hitters and Brian Wilson's beard are all the rage nowadays. Not for me, though. I will pour over the box scores to bring you the finest at swinging and missing.MTD continues to work on his novel
Where Are My Shoes?, so I'm back to handle some people striking out a lot. Wednesday, in Seattle's 10-1 win over Detroit, it was Jack Cust, who was like my old little league teammate Scott Gerard. We'd win 17-5 and Scott would strike out three times, ground into a double play and make four errors in left field. Jack Cust is Scott Gerard.
Justin Verlander strikes out a lot of people, so it's not a surprise when he K's eight Mariners in six innings. Only problem for Cust was, he was half of the strike outs. Let's take a look at the carnage.
1st inning - Right after Justin Smoak ripped a three-run home run to give Seattle the lead, Cust ran the count full before taking a look at strike 3.
4th - Cust led off the inning with a swinging strike out. Seattle ownership beginning to re-think late-July's Jack Cust Bobblehead Day.
5th - The M's got a run on Miguel Olivo's sacrifice fly (Olivo!), then Smoak walked to put runners at first and third. Cust followed with his third whiff as he watched a Verlander pitch go by for the third out of the inning.
8th - Ladies and gentleman, Al Alburquerque! The man with one of the greatest names in baseball history, struck out the side and Cust was the last of the three, his third backwards K of the night.
There are quite a few ways to show up the opposing team. You can hot dog down the first base line after hitting wall scraping home run. You can do the Jose Valverde dance. Brandon Phillips is possibly the best defensive shower upper (pretty sure that's not a term) with his inability to make a routine play, well, routine.
