Far From Purrfect But Close Enough

Three pressing questions still seem to be nagging me after the weekend series against the Detroit Tigers in which the Snakes took 2 out of 3 from the Cats.

What's going on with Orlando Hudson?

The mental mistakes he's made so far this season seem to be out of character for him: Not running out bunts, being called out for stepping out of the batter's box and not realizing when the infield fly rule is in effect have been some of the mental lapses that have plagued him. So far this season he has 6 errors. That is second on the team behind Mark reynolds who has 8. He has never had more than 13 errors in a season (in 2006, his first in the NL with the Diamondbacks). Last year he had 10 for the entire year. Add to that the unsolicited tongue lashing he gave fans on TV for booing Eric Byrnes, and I have to wonder if there isn't something going on that we don't know about. Is he bothered by the hamstring injury more than he's letting on? Is the talk that he probably won't be back with the D-Backs next year getting under his skin? I wouldn't hold either one against him, but something just doesn't seem right with O-Dawg so far this year.

What's going on at second?

Or maybe I should ask, "What's going on at third?" In the first game, Stephen Drew stopped at second base on a hit through the first base hole which should have easily gotten him to third. He held out his hands and looked at third base coach Chip Hale as if asking what he was supposed to do. Mark Grace soundly criticized Drew (over and over) for not turning around to look at the ball.

During the third game, Justin Upton was on first when Conor Jackson sent a bullet down the right field line. This looked like a ball the speedy Upton could score on easily, but he stopped at 2nd base as well. The announcers then criticized the youngster for turning around to watch the flight of the ball instead of keeping his head down and rounding second. He did end up on third as Jackson cruised into second with a double.

Am I out of line for wondering what the third base coach was doing through all this? Doesn't he have some responsibility to help runners know what to do when a ball is hit behind them? Especially younger players?

Why aren't we running more?

This team has speed. Lots of speed yet we have only 20 stolen bases and are led in that category by - Mark Reynolds with 5? Chris Young has 3. The speedy Upton has none. Even Conor Jackson has 3. Speed kills. Let's use it.