bobcatfan Posted August 24, 2008 Report Posted August 24, 2008 Here is some interesting info i found on Roy Oswalt on Buster Olney's blog. It is encouraging news to astros fans... This is the hidden content, please Sign In or Sign Up "Roy Oswalt looks like he's back to his old self, working fast and launching himself off the mound at hitters. On Friday night, he pitched eight strong innings in a 3-0 loss to the Mets. Over his last five starts, Oswalt is 3-1 with an ERA of 2.75, managing to fight his way back from midseason physical trouble, something that a lot of pitchers struggle to do. Oswalt had some back trouble earlier this year and received an epidural, and he added some back exercises to his workout routine to strengthen that part of his body -- something that he expects to do for the rest of his career, he said earlier this week. "When I was having problems with my back, I had a few games where I couldn't go all out," he said. "But probably the last two starts, I felt as good as I did at the beginning of the season." Oswalt, an organized soul who likes to plan, already has part of his offseason mapped out. He and Padres pitcher Jake Peavy plan to do some hunting in Michigan, in a place near where David Wells and Kirk Gibson do their hunting, and then he and Peavy will hunt on a plot in Illinois." Oswalt lost his first 3 starts of the season to go 0-3 and balloon his era for this season which is currently a career worst 4.23 right now. But if you throw out his first 3 starts of the season, Oswalts era would be a 3.67, which is pretty good. Oswalt is 11-9 right now, with 6 of his losses when he gave up 3 runs or less. I expect Oswalt to win at least 15 games and have an era under 4 at the rate hes pitching, which would end up a pretty good season. When they give out grades for the Astros at the end of the season, i'm sure Oswalt's grade wont be very good, but i think some of these things i mentioned should be taken into account.
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