Upbeat Mussina Finds Signs Of Encouragement

The numbers may look fairly bad, but to Baltimore Orioles pitcher Mike Mussina, all that mattered Saturday was how he felt - good and strong.

Mussina pitched six innings, his longest stretch of the spring, in his next to last start before opening day. He allowed nine hits and five runs, walked two and struck out two.

“I thought I threw the ball fine,” he said after the Orioles rallied to defeat St. Louis 8-7. “Sometimes you don’t get the breaks. That’s the way it goes.”

He couldn’t catch a break from the plate umpire, who squeezed him so tightly in the first inning that Mussina and catcher Chris Hoiles took turns questioning the strike zone. Mussina threw 27 pitches in the first inning, compared with six in the fourth.