The eight year olds I coach scored 12 runs in one inning last week: Since I made the mistake of bragging about this, we barely scored half of that total for today's game. So much for being the only undefeated team.
Tony Gwynn has died. Just 54. Salivary gland cancer from chewing tobacco. He's the reason I have any fondness for the Padres.
I was always a big Tony Gwynn fan, and make that one more reason why MLB needs to mandate gum and sunflower seeds.
Last day of the season for the youth league my kids play in. Here's me and the team I coached (7 and 8 year olds). We came in second place! And here's my older boy trying out for the league's city-wide Summer tournament team (11 and 12 year olds):
I'm a big Brett Gardner fan. He's highly underrated. Great fielder, great base-runner, very good lead-off batter, and a guy who just plays the game hard and well. But when Brett Gardner has the second highest slugging percentage in your starting line-up, your team has problems.
"Your team has problems," that pretty much covers any AL East fan. The one redeeming thing about this season is that I'm getting to see a lot of young talent learn the ropes. The Redsox have had as many as five rookies start a single game. They are good kids, with a ton of promise. But it's hard to win many games when half the team was playing double A within the past year. Doesn't matter how good the Sox pitching is, rookies are not going to supply a strong enough line-up to produce. Not until they've seen a lot more major league pitches. So that's what this season is about, and I'm okay with that. Tremendous fun watching guys like Bogarts, Bradley, and Holt grow in to their potential.
@markb: Since you were interested in the stuff I wrote about coaching youth baseball, here's a pic from tonight's game. That's my boy behind the plate.
Im in the Diamond Challenge at CDM Sports again this year. Doing pretty good, may end up with a check at the end of the season.
@Eightball : your boy Zach Duke is tearing it up out of the bullpen for the Brewers this year. ERA: 1.11 WHIP: 0.934 K/9: 12
Hmm . . . Never saw a team win because their grounds crew couldn't get a tarp on the field before. Bottom of the fifth, one out, there was a sudden torrential downpour at Yankee Stadium, with the winds really kicking it up a notch. The tarp was so weighed down by water 2/3 of the way through unrolling that it couldn't be unrolled any more, and when they walked it back to dump the water in the outfield, the tarp went flying more-or-less. It didn't rain hard all that long and ordinarily they'd have been able to finish the game, but the field was declared unplayable for the night. Yankees win 2-1 in a tarp-snafu shortened game.
Zach Duke got me a 4th place finish in 2004. This years rookie pitchers for me are Garrett Richards and Chris Archer. Glad to see hes doing good this season.
Well, it's official as of tonight: Brett Gardner leads the Yankees in slugging percentage. I never thought I'd see the day. He's having a really good season, but still, come on, that's a bit ridiculous. Of course at 15 home runs on the season so far he's probably juicing.
There's always that guy -- the usually mediocre player who has a career year when the rest of the team is beset by injuries or incompetence.. Good for Gardner, but I wish he had slumped this weekend.
Just to be clear, there's nothing usually mediocre about Brett Gardner. By the Baseball Reference measure he has a comparable WAR/Plate appearance for his career to Andrew McCutchen's, and better than most players considered stars (on a side note, I really wish B-R had a WAR rate stat you could sort by). He really is highly underrated. He just does not have much power, even this year when his power is up a bit.
So gul, how do you feel about the Red Sox fire sale? I think they did well in their trade with the Cards. Joe Kelly is a very versatile young pitcher, and if he can learn to go a little deeper in games, he's be a fine #3 or #4 rotation guy for the Sox. Allen Craig could be a steal for them if he finds his batting stroke again, but he was clearly the odd man out in the Cardinals outfield, with Oscar Taveras needing an everyday position. Ultimately here in STL, I think that trade will be judged in a couple years on how deep the Cardinals go in the playoffs this year and next, vs how Kelly matures as a starting pitcher. I think Craig vs Taveras is a wash.
I think the trades mostly made sense for all teams involved. The Sox arguably upgraded their outfield, and they've had so much pitching depth, they can afford to take some of their prospects for a spin over the final 50 games. That said, I'm worried about pitching for next year. I don't mind losing Lester and Miller, their contracts were up, but giving up Lackey is a bit harder to swallow. Upshot is, they traded short timers for longer term contracts, may have fixed their outfield, and dumped a shit load of payroll. But despite the young arms, I want them to get a couple of top tier pitchers in the off season, which they should be able to afford.
Whoops! ---------------- Mets give fan Phillies truck Mere seconds after New York Mets fan Steven Mitzmacher walked through the gate and got his truck that he realized that the promotional giveaway had the logo of the team's hated division rival, the Philadelphia Phillies. "I looked down and I said to my brother-in-law, 'What's this?'" Mitzmacher said. Courtesy Steven MitzmacherLook closely: That is, in fact, a truck with a Phillies logo, despite the Mets packaging. The truck that was given away at the Aug. 3 game against the San Francisco Giants, also featured the logos of W.B. Mason, the office supplies company that sponsors both the Mets and the Phillies. "At first I thought that maybe the trucks had different logos on them, but when I looked around, everyone else had a Mets logo on the door of the truck," said Mitzmacher, 28, who works in online marketing. "So I posted the picture on Twitter and Reddit to see how far it could go." News of the gaffe traveled slowly for days, but picked up steam on Tuesday as more and more outlets picked it up. A Mets spokesperson said the trucks were made by a vendor called Hit Promotional Products. "Unfortunately, this turned out to be a case of human error during the packaging stage of production and we apologize that a few manufactured units of the incorrectly branded truck were placed in the wrong team packaging," the company said in a statement given to ESPN.com. "We believe this is a very isolated issue that hadn't occurred in the past, but will address to make sure mistakes like this don't occur in the future." W.B. Mason has to be more careful than other companies. They not only sponsor the rival Mets and Phillies, they also sponsor both the New York Yankees and the Boston Red Sox. Mitzmacher said he is going to keep the truck, but he's going to have to tell his soon-to-be born child why he can't take it out of the box in three years. Said Mitzmacher: "When I'm 70, maybe I'll take it to the Antique Roadshow." ---------------- That is just such a Mets thing to happen.
Not a whole lot of interest in a Sox-Yankees game this season, but the Redsox just executed a 4-6-3-5-3 double play, which was kind of tough to follow, but fairly exciting just the same.
seldom see such a perfect case tudy http://www.bluebirdbanter.com/2014/9/3/6097723/the-orioles-the-blue-jays-and-the-value-of-defence
Earl Weaver put it best with his line about pitching, fundamentals, and three run homers. A lot of teams in the upper tier will have the first and third elements (see Detroit), but lack the fundamentals, which I've always taken to mean fielding, throwing, and base running. Sloppy play in those areas will separate a good team on paper from a truly elite team. Thing is, Baltimore stands up well compared to the rest of the AL East, but I think they remain deficient. The Angels or A's are almost certain to win the AL pennant this year.
Okay, I messed up the participants, also forgetting to mention the catcher! It was a 2-6-3-4-5-3! http://atmlb.com/1pqBXmH
Things are winding down. The Angels have clinched at least a wild card slot, and both the Orioles and Nationals can win their divisions tonight. The Angels should win their division this week, and then the other divisions should go down to the wire. Here's my post-season prediction: AL Division Winners: Baltimore Detroit Los Angeles Al Wild Cards: Oakland Seattle NL Division Winners: Washington St. Louis Los Angeles NL Wild Cards: San Francisco Pittsburgh Division Series Results: Baltimore beats Detroit Los Angeles (AL) beats Oakland San Francisco beats Washington Los Angeles (NL) beats St. Louis Pennant Winners: Baltimore Los Angeles And the Dodgers are going to win their 7th World Series.
Ah the Reds sucked ass the 2nd half of the year, Bruce is a bust, Votto was out most of the year. Oh well the Bengals are kicking ASS..
The Giants are really a streaky team this year. Since they had such a hard time the last couple of weeks maybe they'll have a good few weeks when it counts in playoff time. They have only two dependable starters right now -- Bumgarner and Peavy. Vogelsong has pitched well, but sometimes he has a horrendous outing. I pretty much agree with Gul's prediction, but if the Dodgers make the series I'll be rooting for the AL team.
Nats-O's for a different sort of local-rival series? I like the narrative better than yet another cross-town rivalry gimmick
Funny my sister lives in Baltimore, and really doesn't care much for the Orioles, or the Nationals. But she loves the Ravens.
