Category: General MLB

I was watching the end of the Cincinnati/Arizona game last night on the MLB package, only on DirectTV. Brennaman & Brantley were doing the game for the Reds, the game was in the bottom of the 9th, two on, nobody out, Diamondbacks up two, with Edwin Encarnacion at the plate facing closer Brandon Lyon.

The announcers are debating whether the runners should be advanced with a bunt. Brennaman is saying EE has never successfully sacrificed in his career and his stats show him to be a clutch performer. Brantley counters that according to the book you’ve got to bunt and if Encarnacion can’t bunt then they should send somebody up there who can. And besides that states Brantley, Edwin is not clutch.

In the meantime Dusty “Play it by the Book” Baker wants the batter to bunt. I’m SCREAMING at Baker through my TV set, “He can’t bunt! Use your friggin brains!” But alas Dusty can’t hear me or he’s paying no attention to what I’m saying.

No matter, as Encarnacion is now in the hole 1-2 after two futile bunt attempts, then there’s a breaking pitch in the dirt. As Lyon comes home with the pitch, Brennaman & Brantley continue the debate. Brennaman says Edwin is clutch, Brantley yells as the sphere is headed plateward, He is not clutch!

Of course the batter connects sending a screamer into the leftfield stands for a game winning home run, Brennaman asks will it be deep enough? Is he clutch? Brantley comments that he has never been so wrong. Brennaman mutters something about, well according to the book, probably thinking to himself he has to work with this goofball all season long.

Classic: Brennaman signs off with, “That’s all from Cincinnati. Final score Arizona 6, Reds 5”.

Pinch hitter Delwyn (everyone calls me “PeeWee”) Young delivered in the bottom of the 9th with a two out infield hit. Rafael Furcal scored from secondbase as Giants secondbaseman frantically tried to throw out the blur that was Young streaking toward firstbase. Durham’s throw was late and by the time firstbaseman Rich Aurilia threw home, a hustling Furcal was under Benji Molina’s swipe tag with the winning run.

San Fran had taken the lead in the top of the 7th, but beleagured reliever Brad Hennesey spit it right back out when Furcal got him with two RBI’s in the bottom of the frame.

Two Japenese imports figured in the decision, Saito got the win and Yabu picked up the loss.

It was interesting earlier in the game when Bruce Bochy removed pitch count challenged SF starter Matt Cain in the bottom of the 6th, in a nothing-nothing game, Cain had thrown 114 pitches. Wisconsin native lefthanded reliever Jack Taschner was brought on to face Juan Pierre with the bases loaded and two outs. Joe Torre went with the book, sending Matt Kemp up to pinch hit, even though Taschner was much more effective against righties than lefties last season. Of course, Matt Kemp struckout, where are you Bill James?

There is something fundamentally wrong with America’s Pastime opening in Japan. You’d be hard pressed finding somebody who loves baseball more than I do. Since last year’s World Series I’ve already seen six games in the Arizona Fall League, five Grapefruit League games, and seven Cactus League games. In off seasons gone by I can remember watching Winter League games in Spanish via a very fuzzy UHF signal.

The excitement surrounding Opening Day was unreal! Trying to get a radio signal from Cincinnati in Chicago to catch the first pitch was a yearly challenge. Somehow opening MLB in Japan seems surreal to me, especially while 28 teams are still playing exhibition games. It doesn’t seem right that I should have to wake up at 5:00 AM, and frankly it doesn’t seem worth it. There used to be something special about Opening Day when all teams started off equal. And don’t even get me started about advertisement on the uniforms, likening MLB to NASCAR is very disturbing.

A note to MLB, bring back our national pastime, bring back Opening Day, to America, to Cincinnati, where it belongs!

These are my predictions for the 2008 season. 

-TB

American League

AL WEST	AL CENTRAL	AL EAST
Angels Mariners Rangers A’s	Indians Tigers White Sox Royals Twins	Yankees Red Sox Blue Jays Rays Orioles

 

National League

NL WEST	NL CENTRAL	NL EAST
Dodgers Diamondbacks Padres Rockies Giants	Reds Cubs Astros Brewers Cardinals Pirates	Phillies Mets Braves Nats Marlins

Leo Mazzone has been fired as pitching coach of the Baltimore Orioles.  He had one year left of his contract which the Orioles are responsible. 

Mazzone, who it seemed, could do wrong with the Atlanta Braves, had mixed success with the Orioles.  No one can argue with what he accomplished with Erik Bedard.  Yet the Baltimore staff finished with a 5.17 ERA in 2007. 

Did they give Leo enough time?  With young hurlers like Adam Loewen, Jeremy Guthrie, it’s hard to tell.  He had quick success when he came on with the Braves and maybe the Orioles expected the same.

 

 

…nice and yummy.

Former bigs SS Jose Offerman goes Marichal on an opposing pitcher in a minor league game and gets charged with second degree assault – AP News

Your Taco Bell cup may be worth a trip to the World Series – Media Post

First the Cubs have a contest for a fan to sing TMOTTB… now you can throw out the first pitch.  Will Ohman need not apply. – MLB.com

Everybody loves a list… Today, MLB’s least durable starters. – Covers.com

Put it in the books… Cox has been ejected 132 times. – USA Today

Putting fan allegiance aside, HERE’S a storybook homer. 

Reader Gary emails:

…do you happen to know when the practice of lining up to congratulate the other team was eliminated from major league baseball? I’d like to write an article about this and have searched the internet to no avail. I know this used to be the practice in MLB as it still is, say, in Little League and in the softball league that I currently coach and play in. Any ideas on how I might find out when and why it stopped?

That’s an interesting question. I assured Gary that at least in the Big Ten, the practice is still intact. After a game, the Illini will congratulate each other then will line up and trade the glad hand with the opposing team.

Illinois and MSU shake on it

But it certainly doesn’t happen in the MLB.

In a second email, Gary forwarded a link to a Boston Globe article from 2005 about a group of fifth and sixth graders who petitioned the Yankees and Red Sox to shake hands before their game. One thing about this group of kids… they set their sights high.

”The Merriam School Handshake Project” was launched last fall, after the Red Sox rallied from three games behind to beat the Yankees in the American League Championship Series. Tensions between the school’s opposing Sox and Yankees fans boiled over in the schoolyard and in the classroom. ”Kids were intimidated; they were afraid to wear their Yankees hats,” said Ed Kaufman, a fifth-grade teacher and Yankees fan who helped to organize the campaign. ”Things were just crossing the line from respectful and fun.”

So after school assemblies addressing sportsmanship, students put together the PowerPoint show and mailed and e-mailed it with letters urging team owners, managers, and captains to support the Opening Day shake.

Kids try to get the Yanks and Bosox to shake (Globe Staff Photo / Joanne Rathe)

George Steinbrenner was behind the idea. Terry Francona liked the idea but wouldn’t force his players to do it.

Depending on how you read it, some say MLB Rule 3.09 is a rule which prohibits handshakes between opposing teams. Rule 3.09 states:

Players in uniform shall not address or mingle with spectators, nor sit in the stands before, during, or after a game. No manager, coach or player shall address any spectator before or during a game. Players of opposing teams shall not fraternize at any time while in uniform.

In my opinion, that doesn’t hold water. During a game, I see many baserunners talking to fielders (even in a friendly way).

My feeling? Some players are fiercely competitive and I don’t see them participating in anything like this. But I honestly think the post-game congratulatory handshake wouldn’t kill anyone.

In 2005 he had 21 errors in 95 games and in 2006 he had 22 miscues in 92 games, but this year he has made only one error in 30 games. Last night I was watching the Brewers on TV, flipping back and forth between watching the Pistons humiliate my Bulls once again, and saw Rickie Weeks backhand a ball up the middle & fire a strike to first to get the out. Then I heard the announcers say, Rickie has really improved in the field, and only has one error on the year. I had to check it out and sure
enough, just one error. Then the announcers said something that would have been considered a joke not long ago, the DP combo of Hardy & Weeks reminded them of Trammell & Whitaker.

Is there hope for B.J. Upton? Finally the Devil Rays have found a place for Upton, secondbase. He’s leading the league in batting .371 & strikeouts 37, that’s never happened before. But my question is whether Upton can find the same magic fielding dust that Weeks found and sprinkle some on his glove. B.J. made 13 errors at thirdbase in 2005 in 50 games. Thus far Upton’s committed nine errors in 27 games this year at secondbase.

Yesterday I checked in to see the owner of Uptown
Pizza. Uptown Pizza is the best pizza you can get in
Waupaca, WI. Waupaca was celebrating its 150th
birthday. Brad, Uptown’s owner, is a big Brewer fan,
even before this year. Brad checks out the Zealot
from time to time and he says, “I scrolled and
scrolled and scrolled and scrolled, looking for
something about his beloved Brewers and was
disappointed to find nothing”. So here goes…

A friend of mine asked whether he should keep JJ Hardy
on his fantasy baseball team. I told him JJ was a
.260 hitter, at best, and would end up hitting 12
homers. Since giving my advice, Hardy has had two 4
for 5 games and has hit his 9th home run of the
season. I’m afraid to see whether my friend took my
bad advice, well it could have been worse, I could’ve
cut him from my fantasy team.

I’m not going to lie and say I saw this coming. But
it is nice to see, the Milwaukee Brewers in 1st place
in the NL Central Division. I picked the Cardinals to
win the Central, but with Chris Carpenter out for
three months, even the magicians of LaRussa & Duncan
look to be overmatched.

But the Brewers success has much more to do with
Milwaukee taking care of business rather than the
misfortune of the Redbirds. The Brew Crew has won two
thirds of the games they’ve played thus far. Granted
it’s very early in the season, only 30 games played.

And living in Chicago I know firsthand a good start
doesn’t always translate to a successful season, the
Cubs have won many a April Championships, only to
falter as the year wore on.

But I don’t think that will happen to this year’s
Brewer squad. First off they have a steady manager in
Ned Yost who seems to roll with the punches, he
doesn’t get too up and he doesn’t get too down. The
Brewers have a good lineup 1-8, with a good mix of
young guys and veterans. But pitching is where it’s
at, and this is where Milwaukee really has it all
together. The starting staff is made up of Ben
Sheets, Chris Capuano, Jeff Suppan, Dave Bush, and
Claudio Vargas. You’d be hard pressed finding a
better starting five in baseball. And Coco (could
there be a better nickname?) Cordero has been closing
the door everytime out and Derrick Turnbow seems to
have found his game as the setup man.

Now everybody, ROLL OUT THE BARRELS & WE’LL HAVE A
BARREL OF FUN… Can I get a bratwurst with
sauerkraut & a brewski?