Some love for Teddy and Geo

I'm surprised to see I haven't said much about Ted Lilly here.  As I've mentioned to several of you, I believe Ted is basically the visible embodiment of my soul.  He always looks so anxious and distressed, no matter how he's pitching, and he says things in his postgame press conferences that make you want to cry and then hug him.  Here are some words from Ted on today's game against the Pirates, which we won 5-1:

"I still feel like I put myself in a lot of bad situations," Lilly said. "Fortunately, I was able to get out of it. I think you can only get away with that so many times. I've done that quite a bit throughout the course of the year and found a way out of it, and there have been some times I've had some big innings and put us behind."

Fortunately, Geovany Soto, awesome on every level, knows how to handle Ted.  Observe:

After that, Lilly faced no more than four batters in any one inning. Credit catcher Geovany Soto for helping to settle his starter down.

"He knew that I was scuffling with my curveball," Lilly said. "He helped me have a little more confidence and made me throw my changeup a little bit more and made me use my slider. Sometimes I get stubborn out there, and there will be times when something's not working and I want to force it to work. He was good with me today in that regard."

"Early in the game, we [weren't] really [on] the same page," Soto said. "After the fourth [and] fifth inning rolled around, I think we stepped it up a little bit. We were doing a better job being on the same page, getting ground balls and getting first-pitch outs. He got rolling after that."

Have I mentioned that I love them both?  Very, very much?  Well, now I have.