An all-in-all frustrating and upsetting Game 1 experience.

Two things.

1) The ghost of Jordesi rears its ugly head. At this point, the term "Brian Jordan" to me is synonymous with crap. I don't give a damn if crap is right-handed and Andy Pettitte is left-handed. Crap shouldn't be starting in a freakin playoff game ahead of Ryan Langerhans, who is a superior hitter, a superior defensive player, and doggone it, a superior human being. (OK, ignore the last part.)

We were rallying against Pettitte in the bottom of the 4th. Marcus led the inning off with a double, and after Chipper grounded out, Andruw hit a 2-run homer to bring us to within 4-3. After a Franco walk and a Francoeur bunt single, up came Jordan -- with his Matheny-esque .247/.295/.338 line this season -- who promptly extinguished our best rally of the day by grounding into a 6-4-3 double play. He finished the game 0 for 3.

Maybe even worse than Jordan's non-existent bat, though, was his defensive gaffe in the top of the 7th, when he let Pettitte rip a flyball over his head and drop in for a ground-rule double. Pettitte eventually scored to make the score 5-3. Judging by the route Jordan took, as well as the fact that Jordan runs like Ike Austin, I honestly feel Langerhans could’ve caught this ball. And no, I'm not just saying this because I'm pissed off that Brian Jordan was in left field.

I'm not pissed off.

(You should've seen me when this happened. I was already steaming after Jordan's 6-4-3. After he let a pitcher hit one over his head, I almost defenestrated my copy chief.)

2) Bobby Cox has never been the best at managing his bullpen, and he made a couple of crucial mistakes today.

--In the top of the 7th, with two outs and Pettitte on third, Bobby left a shaky Tim Hudson in to face both Lance Berkman and Morgan Ensberg, the only two threats in the Astros offense. This was a mistake for two reasons. First, Hudson was off all night and really shouldn't have been left in to face either Berkman or Ensberg. Secondly, Bobby elected to intentionally walk Berkman to face Ensberg, who was only killing us the whole day. After the walk, Ensberg singled to left to drive in Pettitte.

This might sound like an example of “hindsight is 20/20,” but I really thought we should have brought in one of our lefty relievers, preferably Macay McBride, to pitch to Berkman instead of giving him a free pass. Besides the possibility of avoiding Ensberg with runners on base, this would've made Berkman bat right-handed, where he’s a less potent hitter, at least in terms of power. In his last three seasons, Berkman's slugging percentage as a left-handed batter is .567. As a right-handed batter, it's .435. In a situation like this, it would've been worth it to reduce his effectiveness and pitch to him.

So the two options here: Bring in a lefty to pitch to a right-handed Berkman, or walk Berkman to face Ensberg, who was only killing us the whole day. I didn't see the advantage of avoiding Berkman to face a more dangerous hitter.

--In the top of the 8th, Bobby brought John Foster, a lefty, in to face Berkman with the bases loaded -- not a horrible move. Berkman struck out looking. Problem was, Bobby left Foster in to face Ensberg, who (altogether now) was only killing us the whole day. Ensberg walked, bringing one run in, and then another run scored when Foster threw a wild pitch.

The obvious question here is, "Where was Kyle Farnsworth?" When Foster was brought into the game, the score was 6-3, bases loaded, 8th inning. We were still in the game – why mess around here? Why leave our best reliever on the bench, when the game's on the line and the Astros’ best hitters are due up?

I don't mean at all that we would have won today if Langerhans had started or if we had made better bullpen decisions vs. Berkman and Ensberg, or that Jordan was the only reason we lost today. Hudson was bad enough that we would have lost regardless.

But to me the principle matters -- Bobby Cox didn't put his best team on the field today. He didn't give us the best chance to win by starting Jordan over Langerhans, and for that matter, Johnny Estrada over Brian McCann, which honestly might have been an even worse decision. OK, McCann's a left-handed hitter and Estrada can switch hit. But does it really matter that Estrada can hit from both sides if he sucks from both sides?

McCann's line against lefties this season, albeit in 33 at-bats, was .333/.385/.556. Estrada's line against lefties: .214/.257/.291.

Ugh.

Two times.

Ugh.

In other words, it's not just that Jordan and Estrada suck. It's that we have better guys who can play instead of them. For the team's sake, I hope that this suddenly became apparent to Bobby during today's game.