At the same time St. Louis first baseman Mark McGwire was launching pitch after pitch into the stratosphere during batting practice Monday afternoon at Busch Stadium, the Milwaukee Brewers were lying on the turf and going through their pre-game stretching routine just a few yards away from the batting cage. At one point, after McGwire had hit two consecutive pitches over the wall in left field, Milwaukee's Sean Berry gazed up at a group of slack-jawed reporters standing nearby. Moments later, McGwire launched another rocket into the second deck. Berry is, of course, the Brewers' first baseman. The only person in the visitors' clubhouse who was not impressed by his heroics was Berry himself, who is now 10 for 18 in his career against Osborne and 3 for 6 with two homers against Acevedo.
Tomorrow is another day.
After nearly seven full seasons in the big leagues with Kansas City, Montreal and most recently Houston, Berry has learned not to get too depressed about a slump or too excited about a hot streak. Since the end of spring training, Berry has been on a major hot streak. He finished with a team-leading .416 batting average. We've got a few guys that finished camp strong. That was important.