The Gil Meche Cy Young Watch continues

From the great land of the evergreens, the Gil Meche Cy Young Watch rolls on:

• Fifth quality start in six appearances. [KC Star]
  
• Three earned runs in his last 27 innings.
• Money earned in the Meche Meter last night: $400,000 (out of $500,000).
• Money earned for the season: $2.1 million (out of $11 million).
• Season ERA: 2.18, second best in league behind Dan Haren.
• 29 strikeouts, 8th best in league.
  
• And, for all the criticism the Royals got for Meche's contract, at least they didn't pay $8.325 million for Jeff Weaver. [Seattle Post-Intelligencer]
  

Opponents are batting .283 off Meche, which is high but only means he's been gritty. (His performance yesterday, according to manager Buddy Bell in the above-linked PI article, was "probably his best grittiness all year." Can't disagree with the spirit of that.) In his homecoming, he was helped by a six-run first inning. Jered Weaver's big brother got through the Kansas City lineup exactly once, and here's what transpired:

1. David DeJesus single to left-center.
2. Mark Grudzielanek single to left.
3. Mark Teahen single to left, 1-0.
   
4. Mike Sweeney single to left.
5. Ross Gload double to right, 3-0.
6. Emil Brown ground-out to short, 4-0.
7. Alex Gordon single to left.
8. John Buck walk.
9. Tony Pena Jr. (who made yet another great defensive play... more on this in a future post) single to right, 6-0.
   

Six runs and a sigh of relief. Brandon Duckworth came in from the bullpen and picked up his first career save, pitching three innings of stress-free ball.

Now let's go cut down some trees!