New York Nine

Baseball the way it was meant to be, down and dirty with brutally honest analysis

Thursday, April 30, 2009

A Royal Gets His Due


I don't profess to be a Royals fan, but you've got to feel bad for Royals fans. The days of George Brett and Brett Saberhagen seem like a long long time ago and since those guys have left the Royals have sucked, sucked hard at that. Indeed, with all the losing for the last decade plus there hasn't been much to write home about in Kansas City, but it seems they finally found something, their diamond in the rough and I couldn't be happier for them and this guy right here, Zach Grienke.
I'm going to to attempt to try to rival the profilic Joe Posanksi who very skillfully profiles the cerebral pitcher, but in a nutshell Grienke has seen it all in his 25 years of life. He had been a phenom, dominating high school pitchers and the minor leagues effortlessly, coming up to the majors at the tender age of 20 and all of a sudden not interested in pitching, not interested in even throwing hard. When it was said earlier he seemed like he didn't care Zach left the game sough help and found he had social anxiety and depression. And yet he did not let it beat him but instead came back to the game more determined than ever, finishing fifth in the league in strikeouts with 183 and 10th in ERA and now he's been better than ever, starting the season tossing 43 consecutive scoreless innings via a couple shutouts, including one at the bambox in Alrington, Texas a game that I watched and could not help but be wowed by this guy, 25 years old, after all the shit he's been through to get there he looks confident, poised and utterly dominating.
I'm doing Grienke's story no justice so you should really pick up the newest copy of Sports Illustrated to really appreciate what Greinke's all about. Time will tell whether he can dominate something like this for the rest of the year or even a few years, but it never gets old hearing about someone so talented coming back from the edge of the abyss to emerge stronger than ever.

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Bill James' gives us yet another gem


If you're a baseball fan and you haven't read anything by Mr. James or at least heard of him, shame, shame on you. Indeed, more than any other writer or any student of the game, Bill James has truly revolutionized how we view and analyze this great game, seeking to find new ways to find value in players by relying hard statisics instead of small subjective sample sizes. Although he has not been universally accepted or praised, many old schoolers (narrow-minded, crusty bastards) deride his unique brand of baseball analysis, for the most part his approach has been widely embraced by the baseball community, to the point that he is currently employed by the Boston Red Sox to help on personel decisions. Yet he still has managed to find time to continue writing, whether that be on his website billjamesonline.com (subscription only) or his annual book, now in the form of the Goldmine. Surveying the 2008 season for all 30 teams, James gives you the kind of insight and progressive thinking about baseball that you can't get anywhere else, looking at things people never looked at before giving the reader a fresh take on this great game.
No matter what team you're a fan of, Bill has something for every team and everybody can appreciate, chock full of all kinds of essays and stats that you'd never think of. Here's a few gems from the book that gives you an idea of how in depth Bill goes.
BillFact: Nobody got busted inside in 2008 more than Alex Rodriguez. Gold Mine stats show that pitchers threw off the plate and inside on A-Rod 353 times — that’s about 15.4% of the time or one every 6 1/2 pitches or so. That’s about normal. In 2007, pitchers busted A-Rod inside 337 times, and in 2006 they busted him 327 times. My suspicion is that thinking is two-fold. (1) As baseball announcers like to say, you don’t want to let A-Rod “get his arms extended.” (2) A-Rod is just the sort of guy you kind of feel like you need to bust inside.
BillFact: When you see Evan Longoria pull a fly ball to left field … that’s is usually a really good thing. Longoria has hit 52 fly balls to left field in his career — 26 of those went over the fence for home runs. Pitchers might want to avoid pitching inside to Longoria.*
*And, in fact, pitchers HAVE tried to avoid throwing inside to Longoria — they have thrown only 11 pitches to him inside and off the plate so far this year. Longoria is like the anti-A-Rod.
indeed, where else are you going to find such a fine touch of analysis like this? This kind of research and insight is pretty much unique to Bill, everyone else out there is basically just trying to copy his style.
But even more than his adept research it is his prose that makes his works so memorable. With an easy to read casual style with a healthy dose of humor and irony, Bill presents his work in a way that is just simply enjoyable to read. Sure he's a guy who's taking the studying of the game to a new level, but at his heart he's a guy who loves baseball, who can never get enough and who is constantly trying to better understand its beauty and grace.
Its not a terribly long book and you can pretty much pick it up at any point and in only a few pages come to appreciate why this man has become so influential and so revered in the game of baseball. I highly reccommend this or any other book he has out, my favorite is tome the Historial Abstract, but anything you can get your hands on by Bill James will enrich your baseball viewing experience and give you greater insight than ever before.

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This is Why National League Baseball is Awesome


I know there are a lot of people out there, myself who used to be one of them who have said that American League play is the superior league. Better hitting, better pitching, better teams, and most importantly they don't have pitchers being an automatic out at the bottom of their lineups, but does that really make it better? Indeed, as time as gone on and specialization has become a greater part of the game the concept of all around excellence seems to be lost. So often the leagues are littered wiht players who lack this quality, a guy who can steal bases well but can't hit a lick, a guy who hits home runs, but who wouldn't know what to do with a glove on his hand and so on and so forth. But it seems that this trend of specialization is a little less, managers have to manage a little more, strategy is slightly more in play. In short, the more I watch baseball national league baseball seems more of a game and watching some of the pirates-brewers game last night reminded me of this, in perticular the performance of Yovani Gallardo.
If you haven't seen the boxscore of this 1-0 thriller, I'll give you the all you need to know, Gallardo, the starting pitcher that night was the star the evening, tossing eight shutout innings giving up only two hits and striking out eleven. But as if this wasn't enough of a performance in between that he provided all the offense for the entire game, smacking a solo shot into the left field stands for the only run of the game. I mean talk about a performance huh? I point this game out because it seems so rare in today's sports world that you see such excellence, perticularly all-around excellence in sports anywhere. Gone are the days of two way starters in football, slugging pitchers and many other stars that seem to have vanished from the modern sports landscape altogether. Now I'm not saying Gallardo is destined for greatness or anything like that, although last night's game is clearly an indication of his immense talents, but we should recognize is greatness for at least this one moment in time. On this night, Gallardo dominated the game in every possible way, displaying equal prowess with his bat as his arm and shone above all the rest, at least for this one night. Of course its just a moment and not necessarily a true indication of his talents, all you need to do is see that the last pitcher to achieve this feat was the less than spectacular Odalis Perez for the Dodgers in 1998, but it is a wonderous moment nevertheless.
It's a moment that could never happen in the American League, and I for one am happy that at least one of the leauges is still holding on this part of the past of baseball.

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Thursday, April 23, 2009

David Ortiz gets things started in Yanks-Red Sox


On an aside, after seeing this picture of Joba on deadspin I'm ecstatic that there's a no facial hair rule for the yankees because the dude grows some stupid looking beard, it looks like he's channeling his inner Kyle Orton, horrible just horrible. I digress, if you haven't heard the Red Sox "slugger" batting a crisp .220/.294/.322 called out Joba Chamberlain today, warning him to not thing about throwing at his team.

"None of that, man — just play the game the way it's supposed to be, and that's about it," Ortiz said, referring to Chamberlain. "This is a guy, as good as he is, the next step for him will be to earn respect from everybody in the league. He's not a bad guy, but when things like that happen, people get the wrong idea."

He is referring to Joba's very liberal throwing inside at Kevin Youkilis over the last few years, evidently he doesn't think its very cool. Well David I'm sorry but that's the game and frankly your own teammates, perticularly Josh Beckett love throwing at guys, especially at Yankees like Jeter and A-Rod. And while during the Torre tenure he didn't do it becuase they were "better than that"Girardi is finally taking the gloves off with Joba and other guys saying you know what if you're gong to throw at our guys well we're going to put some of your guys on their asses too and what's wrong with that? I'm not advocating hitting guys but throwing inside giving guys some chin music is part of the game, especially when you're talking about guys like Youkilis who are pratically standing on the fucking plate. Pitchers have always known you can't let a guy get comfortable up there and sometimes the situation calls for it. So "Papi" I say first off start hitting like you're supposed and deal with it, its part of the game, your guys are head hunters, as the situation with Beckett in Aneheim showed, so shut the hell up. Jeter and the rest of them don't run their mouths about because they know it comes in the territory. If you don't like it, find another game because this is how it goes.

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Tuesday, April 21, 2009

The Great Yankee Stadium Crisis



In case you haven't heard the world is coming to an end, the New Stadium needs to be torn down, Derek Jeter will hit a 100 home runs and the season is lost. God I love all this knee-jerk reaction crap to small sample sizes its really astounding how dumb the sports media can be. Yes its true, this weekend the opening of the New Yankee Stadium was one to remember, or perhaps one to forget as the Yankees were shellacked in two of the four games including a record breaking 14 run inning (yes 14 runs) where an astonishing 20 home runs were hit. Of course, such an asuspicious opening was not exactly anticipated by Yankee management, but it has caused a shockwave in sports media everyhwere. Indeed, the pundits like Buster Olney Mike Francesa and a host of others are having a field day with this one, and of course everyone has their theories. Well perhaps its the wind tunnel effect, or maybe its the tiers of seats, or maybe its the old stadium messing up the wind patters or maybe this or that, but its all bullshit. Sure, its not exactly a good thing for the park to be playing the way it is, and you'd certainly like to see a little better on the first weekend, but its early, its a ridiclously small sample size, and when you look at the games objectively, all the runs scored isn't that obscene.
First and foremost one of the things that seems to be overlook is that such a high level of production is not unprecedented, even at the old yankee stadium. Sure, its never happened on an opening series for a stadium, but its not like this hasn't happened. Indeed, according to Elias Sports Bureau, there were eight four-game spans of 20 or more homers at the original Yankee Stadium, some of them overlapping: one in 2000, two in 2003, one in 2004 and four in 2007. The high of 26 was from July 31-Aug. 2, 2007. Two in one year! Did pundits start freaking out in 2003 screaming "oh my god this old stadium is falling apart its creating a wind tunnel, balls are flying out of here!" No, it didn't happen, you know why? Because its baseball, crazy shit happens sometimes, you get a few bad starts from your starting pitching, a reliever is overused that week or not feeling "it" and you throw them in there against a good lineup sometimes they can be absolutely awful. Just because it happened at the beginning of a season with a new stadium doesn't make it any more astounding.
The case that this was just one of those weekends is further cemeted when you look at the guys who were giving up the home runs. I went back and looked at all the guys giving up home runs and when see who did the damage its really not that hard to believe that they gave up a few dingers. For one Anthony Reyes, the leader in the clubhouse with 3 is a perticularly awful pticher who while in the National League, an inferior hitting league gave up at least 17 home runs with ERAs of at least 5.50ERA. Now you put that guy in a superior hitting league and against a very stacked lineup isn't it at least plausible he gives up three home runs in pretty much any park? As for the rest, Anthony Claggett, a guy who's never been been in the major league gave up two home runs and eight earned in his only outing, is not that suprising and I doubt we'll see him anytime soon. Jensen Lewis, while a good reliver, has given up 16 home runs in 83 innings career, with such an astoundingly high rate isn't it plausible he coughs up two over the course of a series? I could go on about pretty much every guy, including Edwar Ramirez, AJ Burnett, Fausto Carmona and the rest of them and when you look at their track records of giving up their share of bombs, and in fact at a irregularly high rate, isn't 20 home runs in a series pretty easy to see?
Who knows, maybe after a season or a half season it will be evident that there is a problem and something needs to be done about it, but right now consider me among the skeptics of this "crisis." Sure, it was a weekend of a lot of offense, and some of the home runs did look like they were a bit wind-aided, but this is hardly the first time a guy hit a home run that would've been a pop out anyother day. The bottom line is, you put two teams together who have very deep and power-laiden lineups, some iffy starting pitching at times and atrocious bullpens you're going to have a LOT of runs scored, its inevitable. Get back to me at the all-star break and we'll see how bad things are then, until then this was just one of those weekends.

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Monday, April 20, 2009

What's Wrong With Wang?


Aliteration, you know you love it. Chien-Ming Wang, at least for me has always been sort of a guy hard to figure out. When he came up you noticed right away how awesome that sinker of his is, how it made guys just look ridiclous, forcing grounder after grounder, but most people were not convinced. Indeed, as most self-respecting sabermatricians (guys who study baseball stats) will tell you, pitchers need to be able to strike out at least at a league average of 5 or so per nine innings to hope to be effective over a long period of time. Sure a guy can get away with it for awhile, but it eventually catches up to you. But despite this commonly held view, Wang just kept doing his thing, getting ground balls, eating up innings and most importantly, winning. Indeed, even after missing most of last year from 2005-2008 he ranked 15th overall in wins in the majors and 20th in ERA with a 3.78ERA, becoming a bulwark of the rotation for the yankees. As time went on and he became more effective he emerged as the "Ace" but the role never seemed to fit, at times looking very bad when matched up against the Josh Becketts and CC Sabbathia's of the AL, most notably absolutely imploding in the 2006 ALDS in his two starts against the Indians. But now its 2009, and instead of having to face CC Sabbathia they're teammates, moving Wang into the more comfortable number 2 starter, and what a 2 he is? For sure, how many teams have number 2 starts who are two 19 game winners? And yet somehow its not gone all to plan, the new guys have stepped up, but Wang flounders alone, posting some staggeringly bad numbers in three starts only lasting three innings and an obscene 34.50 ERA, what happened? What went wrong?


I wish I could say I know what's going on or see what's the problem with Wang, but he's been too painful to watch. Instead of forcing guys to hit what some guys call 'a bowling ball' sinker, he's become a mess, tossing belt high sinkers that aren't sinking and guys are absolutely crushing him at historic levels. Of the 18 pitchers since 1954, to give up seven or more earned runs in three consecutive starts, Chien-Ming Wang’s totals are by far the worst of the lot and no one knows why. Dave Eiland the Yankees pitching coach seems to think that his mechanics are ot of wack but Wang doesn't think so. Girardi wonders if Wang is hurt, but again Wang insists that he feels fine. I for one think that it has something to do with his foot that he injured last year on the basepaths, possibly he is still unsure about pushing off on his foot so he's not getting the good sink on his pitches, but whatever the reason I am worried. Perhaps this is the law of averages finally compensating for Wang's lack of other pitches or something mental, but whatever the reason its causing a great deal of problems for the yankees. Wang is out of options to be sent to the minors so he can't go back down and work on stuff like say Brett Myers did last year or Cliff Lee the year before and he's not really "injured" although I guess they could just make something up. Something must be done about Chien-Ming Wang because trotting him out there every five days is clearly not a good idea.


All of this said, it could be a whole lot worse for the Yankees right now. Consider the fact that they've been absolutely embarassed four times this season already and yet they're still one game over .500 and in second place and that's with one of their starters absolutely shitting the bed everytime he's in there, giving them less than two innings per start and absolutely killing a bullpen without a long man. Add in the fact their best player is out, well second place isn't too shabby.

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Some Thoughts on Citi Field


Well the suspense is over for Mets fans, their dump Shea Stadium has finally been closed and in its place they have this wonder of a baseball park, Citi Field, and what a stadium it is. I attended the Saturday pitchers duel, a game that went way too fast for my liking because I left the park wishing I had more time to explore and investigate all over this place, its truly a wonder. That said, I think it is flawed in some regards in that the makers succeed in making seeing a game at Citi Field a memorable experience with lots to do and see, but not as much emphasis on the game.


Sorry I didn't get pictures of it because its really a sight, perticularly the entrance of Citi Field above when you walk into the Jackie Robinson Rotunda. Now when I first heard of this, the baseball historian in me kind of wanted to vomit. I mean come on, last time I checked Jackie Robinson was never a Met guys, he was a Dodger, and he played in Brooklyn, not Queens. What about the Mets own history, is that not good enough? Indeed I had a problem with the whole idea of Citi Field when I heard of it taking its architectural cues from Ebbets Field because I thought it was kind of cheap that they were borrowing Dodger history and claiming it as their own. But when I got there I felt very differently about the whole design. Sure, Jackie's playing days were long over when the Mets started, but the Mets have embraced their mantle as the Protectors of the history of New York Baseball. The Dodgers and Giants are gone long ago, but they represent an important part of New York history and with Jackie Robinson cultural history, and the Mets and their designers are ensuring that this history is not forgotten by honoring it in a tasteful and memorable way. As most new york baseball fans will tell you new york city is a National League town, always has been, and the mets have stepped up to be the standard-bearer to that history. Adorned with pictures and quotes on the walls of Jackie and Branch Rickey the vistor is surrounded by this momentous event in American History while not being overwhelmed. Indeed, the vistor can appreciate the design and the homage, but it is not too in your face or preachy, its there, but you can easily just take the escaltor up to your seats without even noticing. In this regard I give the Mets high marks.


From here you make your way to your seat and on the way its hard to not be impressed by all the conessions readily available at every turn. For sure, for someone who loves eating like me this was fantastic, with plenty of areas to get your standard ball park food quickly and easily. The prices were about on par with what you'd expect with every park, overpriced, but nothing that you wouldn't expect. This was pretty good by itself, but that evidently was only the beginning. I asked one of the guys walking around who worked there (everyone who I spoke to was very helpful and friendly) and I made my way to the main attraction, the big attraction of a food court in center field. I've been to my share of baseball parks, but I had never seen a spread like this place. Fresh seafood, oven baked pizzas, barbeque joints, mexican food, a Shake Shack, this was like a mall food court on steroids. I made my way to Blue Smoke, a place that I had never heard of, but my friends who know the City better than me assured me this was an awesome barbeque place in New York and they weren't kidding. I got the pulled pork sandwich fries and a beer and this stuff was restuarant quality, and not so surprisingly with the restuaruant price of over 20 bucks, that hurt, but it was worth every penny. Overall, I thought the food was easily the best I've ever had a ballpark, but I had a big problem with the lines. Sure it was still one of the first games there, but it was a fucking disaster there, Blue Smoke had the shortest line there and I still spend a solid inning or so waiting in line, places like Shake Shack were twice as long. As much as I love good food, I'm there to watch a game, so if you're going to improve the quality you can't sacrifice speed, I'm paying a lot of money to sit there and watch the game, not stand in line.


Finally the park and actual watching of the game was excellent. I hear the seats in the top deck aren't quite as nice, but I had seats in the right field section in the lower bowl and it was enjoyable. The seats weren't exactly like sitting on my couch, sitting next to my friends who nearly as tall as me made it kind of hard to eat my 21 dollar meal, but I've been in a lot worse and the seats were comfortable enough. The sight lines were great making it very easy to see whats going on, and even if i couldn't there were flat screen TVs everywhere making it easy to what's going on or the stats. Probably the only thing I could really complain about, which I saw Peter King of SI had the same complaint, is the stadium is like one big ad, everywhere you look is another billboard, but when stadiums cost so much its the nature of the beast.


Overall, I really loved what they did with Citi Field, a dramatic improvement from Shea Stadium, but I wonder if it just too much. Of course, you're spending a lot of money and I felt like I got my money's worth more here as opposed to the Old Yankee Stadium or Shea because there was so many ammenities and whatnot, but at what point do the ammenities overshadow what you're really there for, baseball? Sure those places sucked, but it was all the more reason to sit my ass down and watch the game, they were places engineered for one reason, to watch a game. Citi Field, and I'm sure the New Yankee Stadium will be even worse, feel like a mall or something that happens to have a baseball field in the middle, in case you're interested in that stuff. Sure it wasn't the most interesting game, a complete pitchers duel, and its probably the first time going there for most people like me, but people were hardly sitting down, it was a constant wave of people getting up and sitting down, walking around doing whatever as if the game was hardly going on. Even I fell victim to that, spending most of the first five innings walking around or standing in lines, I looked up at the scoreboard and just was floored how much time had gone by, the game was pratically an afterthought. Of course it is the first week and people are interested in seeing what all the fuss is about, and probably as time goes on it won't be quite as chaotic, but I found it troubling. Regardless, I give the field high marks all around, the designers did a wonderful job and even though I can't say I'm a huge met fan I can defintely see myself going to a few more met games in the coming years with the spread they got there.

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Thursday, April 16, 2009

Jerry, Why the Hell Are You Starting this Guy?


Okay, full disclosure, I don't really like Sheffield, when he was a Yankee I thought he was an asshole and sure enough after we trade him he starts running his mouth about how he hates the yankees and torre and everyone else because he's such a classy guy. Regardless, the guy could hit, with 499 home runs he's been one of the more dangerous hitters for a long time and he's probably a hall of famer. But at this point in his career, now 40 years old and years removed from being a great player, there's no way he should be starting for the mets last night or any night for that matter, he's just garbage now.
Now I think I'm alone on this becuase from what mets fans whom I've spoke to they're all generally happy about him being there because hey its Gary Sheffield! Sheff is awesome and we got him for nothing! While this is true that he was a great player, he's a shell of a guy he once was and all you need to do is see him last night. His bat was slow he doesn't run as well, he's hacking at bad pitches, a combination of all of the signs of serious decline for a slugger. And yet against a righty pitcher Kevin Correia, who's garbage by the way, playing at Citi Field, a vast outfield with some serious quirks and weird angles, why? You've got Ryan Church, coming back from a lost season thanks to concussions, a lefty swinging a hot bat hitting over .400, while he's not a great fielder he's not 40, why take him out? He's a bright spot, why take him out and put an automatic out? I mean in the first two at bats alone Sheffield left SEVEN on base, and it wasn't like he even looked good in those at-bats he was an atrocity!
Who knows, perhaps in a limited role Sheffield as a pinch hitter giving them some pop off the bench he can be a useful player, but judging by his steady decline and the way he just looks so old and finsihed I feel like the less Mets fans see of Sheff, the better.
Also, as sort of a preview, I'm going to the Mets-Brewers game, the first day game at Citi Field, I'll give a comprehensive review of my thoughts of the stadium, as well as some thoughts on the game.

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Wait, The Mariners are Good Now?


Although I'm sure many of us east coasters probably haven't really cared to know what's going on over there in the AL west, but from what I've seen so far, its a very intriuging division. Indeed, with the Angels pitching a mess and not looking like the 100 win team from a year ago, the Athletics, with their pitching being so young and unexperienced are full of question marks, all of a sudden the Mariners are sitting atop the standings at 7-2, 7-2? This is the same team that lost 100 games last year, right? Well it's a new year and after getting Ichiro back last night, having a healthy Erik Bedard and a new closer, the Mariners are starting to turn some heads.
Of course its still very early and its hard to make a substative claim about the team from such a small sample size, but I didn't see them being any good. Sure as a baseball fan I was happy to see Ken Griffey Jr. back with the team, but you'd be crazy to think that he was going to make a 100 loss team with a whole lot of holes that much better. After getting rid of closer Putz they picked up light hitting Franklin Guiterrez and Endy Chavez to go along with the rest of their lousy hitters like Kenji Joijima, Betancourt and the rest of them, there wasn't much to like. However with their front two, you could argue they have the best starting pitchers right now by virtue of Bedard and King Felix alone each striking out guys at a very impressive rate of 10 per nine innings. For sure, early on there's a lot to like from even the front three with Jarrod Washburn, who's sporting a 1.29ERA after two starts with a very tidy .71WHIP. Throw in a not absolutely horrible start by Silva and all of a sudden there's a lot to like on this team.
The numbers alone are pretty good, but even watching them yesterday it feels very much like a different team. With a packed stadium there to see the Kid, who hit his 400th homer as a Mariner, a healthy Ichiro back hitting a grand slam his first game back behind another stellar performance by Washburn, at least in the time I watched them, this is a confident team, a team that more importantly isn't afraid of the Angels. I still don't love this team, Washburn I think is pretty medicore, but pitching and defense win championships and they have a fair amount of both. It's early, but there's a lot to be happy if you're a mariner fan these days.

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Monday, April 13, 2009

Weekend Baseball Thoughts


I'm not sure if I'm going to do this often, but a weekend away where I had my brother's laptop and full access to just screwing around on MLB.TV for several hours so I got to watch a whole lot of different games, but not necessarily in its entirety. As a result, here are some quick blurbs about the teams I saw from the relatively short time I watched. Really this signing for up MLB.TV might be the death of my attention span, why wait for the commerical for the game to come on, just put another on right now! Ah god our society is really going to hell; I digress.
The Marlins, like I feared, look very good- Now its early and half of the games were against the absolutely horrible Nationals, but at 5-1 the Marlins are looking like the deep and talented team they seemed on paper. Josh Johnson (in case you don't know that's him right there, you'll know who he is soon enough, like October) is absolutely filthy throwing a complete game five hitter against the Mets and looking dominant throughout with a great fastball he can locate and great breaking stuff. Add this to their already potent offense with Hanley Ramirez, Uggla, Jorge Cantu, and now Emilio Bonifiacio and Cameron Maybin, this team is very scary. Especially with the Phillies looking very pedestrian, the Marlins I think are looking like a very smart pick for the wild card.
The Phillies aren't looking so hot yet - Again, its a long season, and in truth the phillies started slow last year and the year before and I'm sure probably before that too, but I really don't like their pitching right now. Between Hamels being injured and coming back and getting shelled, the dramatic increase of innings last year for him from the year before, and Myers and his rocky season last year and his not so smooth start to the year, and question marks for the rest of the staff they don't instill a lot of faith. Then again, you look at the dramatic comeback against the braves in the 7th inning, this is a dangerous offensive team with a penchant for the clutch. It's hard to say if its a real concern, but a lot of their success rests of Hamels, and I'm not liking what I see.
The Braves Look Solid - thanks to acquisitions of Lowe and Vazquez in the rotation, the emerging play of Jordan Schafer and a host of other players the Braves look damn good so far, embarassing the Phillies on opening night and looking solid throughout, with the lone exception of the third game. Their hitting looks good so far as well, but I wonder how long that will last with no real mashers aside from McCann and Jones and a bullpen that as it showed on friday can be pretty shitty.
The Dodgers look a lot like last year, a .500 team - after their metoric rise at the end of the season thanks to the acquisition of Manny, they've become a darling of baseball critics everywhere. However after 8 games they're .500, which is exactly where they were last year. Sure Manny hasn't really gotten hot yet, but he's only one guy and that rotation just isn't that impressive with after Kiroda and Billingsley, and neither of them are exactly Koufax and Drysdale.
The Rockies Offense is very good - while the pitching is a question, that lineup hits top to bottom. Tulowitski is having a bounceback start to the season, Atkins is looking good, Spillboroghs is having a hot start, Ianetta is solid, this team is just filled with guys who are dangerous with the stick. I question whether their pitching is up to snuff but I think that offfense is the best in the division.
Maybe the Orioles are good.. they've done this in the past, but I watched them play the yankees and the Rays and they looked dominating thus far. Their lineup with Adam Jones really clicking and starting to realize his talent, Markakis and Roberts doing their thing and contributions by Mora, Pie, Scott and pretty much everyone else hitting and hitting timely they're looking pretty impressive thus far. Add in some surpising pitching by Guthrie, but also the rest of the staff like Simon, the Japanese import Uehara, and Hendrickson they've shocked the class of the AL early and often. I'm very skeptical that they can keep it up, but perhaps they can become the new AL East team to don the "pesky" monkier and give the big three some headaches between now and September.
The Demise of the Yankees was greatly exaggerated - of course as a sometimes irrational yankee fan I take losses kind of hard, especially to teams like the Orioles who I think are garbage, but as this last series against Kansas City showed, its a long season. Sure they're not a great team either and after these two series you'd like to see them more than .500, but it was reassuring after two really lousy starts to have four pretty good ones in a row by the staff, including one very impressive Sabbathia start going 7 2/3 walking none and striking out 8 I believe. Sunday's game Girardi very poorly mismanaged the bullpen to avoid sweeping them which pissed me off, especially because it ruined Joba's debut this year, but its one game.
The Indians look like garbage - Don't want to say I called it because I like Cliff Lee, but he's been horrible so far this year allowing 11 runs in 10 innings and the rest of the rotation looking like shit too. My favorite former yankee and number three starter on a supposed playoff team Carl Pavano has a muscular 81.00 ERA after his first start and the rest of the rotation like Carmona have been shitty as well. It's early and their offense looks very good but I don't buy this team at all.

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Thursday, April 9, 2009

Life can be fleeting


As I learned myself this past July with the passing of my father suddenly, life is something to be cherished everyday because it can be here today and gone tommorrow. Such is the case for the young Nick Adenhart, 22, who passed this morning after being involved in hit and run accident as a passenger on his way home from the stadium. Pitching earlier that night and having his sterling pitching performance of six scoreless innings, only to have it blown by the bullpen, it seemed that Adenhart's luck was only beginning to unravel as a friend of his drove him home when suddenly he was struck by another driver Anthony Thomas Gallo, driving with a suspended lisence for drunken driving and was found to be drunk at the time, who fled the scene. Half an hour later he was found and arrested, but unfortunately the damage had been done, and early this morning the young Adenhart, at the time the youngest pitcher in baseball was gone.
Death is always tragic but it seems moreso when it happens to someone so young, so full of life and promise, on the brink of becoming a major league starter with the big club full time. Although I'm not an Angels fan, I've heard a great deal about the young man since he was drafted, how immensely talented he was and how he seemed destined to follow in the long line of great Angels pitchers in recent years. Unfortunately, it was not to be thanks to a guy who had no business being behind the wheel. I have heard that he will be charged with murder for the deaths of Adenhart and two others and I hope for the ffamiles of the respective people that he be brough to justice swiftly.
None of it will bring the lives of these poor people back, but hopefully the families of these people will get some solace from knowing justice is served. There is not much else one can say other than what a tragedy it is to the baseball community and everyone to have a young man's life end in a flash, he deserved better.

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Tommorrow is another day, but today sucks


The rational person in me is saying "hey its two games, it could be in April, could be in August, pitchers are going to have a clunker of a game here and then, it just happened to be that our top two guys had them to start the season" but that doesn't make my gut feel any less bit sick as I watched my Yankees absolutely shit the bed again last night against the goddamn Baltimore Orioles, losing 7-5 (it wasn't reallly that close) and start the season by falling flat on their face.
As someone who considers himself a student of the game and looking at things objectively, I hate the knee jerk reaction of fans and media alike who take too much of a small sample size in baseball and try to say something quantiative about a team. Indeed, as you hear so often, its a long season, on any given night in a 162 game season a guy can have a flat out lousy night, a whole team just looking off, does that make them a bad team? Does that make a player a bad player? Hardly, but for a fan like me who watches them so faithfully, attempting to rationalize two horrible, awful defeats to one of the worst teams in the league is a hard pill to swallow. Sure, it is just two games, and these two pithers, CC Sabbathia and Wang have extensive bodies of work in this league that show that they are effective and in fact above average pitchers in this league, but I just want to scream at them "can't you wait until May or something for that one really bad game? Can't we start this season on the right foot?" Unfortuately for me, or fortunately for yankee haters everywhere, this was not to be this first week.
Of course, there's always tommorrow, they can just turn it on with Burnett on the mound, rebound and look great and steamroll the rest of the season. Hell, the Phillies looked godawful for two and a half games, only to make a comeback late in the game. Believe me I watched it, and it was a thing of beauty how a team seemingly just looked lost for so long just seemed to click all at once and put it together for a dramatic victory, and that's baseball. On a given day even world champions can look like a bunch of bush leaguers, but these are professionals and if given even a small window of opportunity they can take advantage like the Phis did and sometimes there's no rhyme or reason why it happens.
Today is a new day for everyone, including the yankees and every other team out there. Anything can happen in this great game of baseball and it can even erase a great deal of bad in one fell swoop with a few magic moments, but until then all I'm left with is this pain from the proverbial stomach punch Nick Markakis and the Lowly Orioles gave me last night. I hope they make the best of it.

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Wednesday, April 8, 2009

If this guy is your second starter, things aren't looking so great



Well I've been mulling it over the last few days and when I turned on my TV and there was no baseball on last night, I had to give in and get MLB.TV again to fill the void. I'll probably write a more complete review of it after a few weeks of using it, but at least for one night I got the pleasure of watching this Dodgers-Padres game with the play by play of the incomprable Vin Scully. Honestly, this guy has been doing this for over fifty years and he doesn't even have a color guy, its just him and the mic, incredible, what an amazing broadcaster. I digress, I watched most of this game last night that ended in a Padres win I couldn't help but feel even more strongly that my initial thoughts on the Dodgers, that they don't have enough pitching, were indeed quite real as I saw this character, Randy Wolf step on the mound as LA's second starter.
I don't mean to deride Wolf as a starter, he's a lefty with decent stuff who has proven to be effective from time to time, but if the Dodgers seriously think they can depend on him to be their second or third starter they're in for a rude awakening. Indeed, if you look at his numbers one of the most troubling is the fact he hasn't pitched 200 innings in six years! Okay he pitched 190 last year but that was the first since 2003 that he even had 150 innings, that's not a good track record, perticularly when you consider he's taking Derek Lowe's spot in the rotation, one of the most durable pitchers in baseball who's tossed at least 200 innings the last five years. What's even more troubling though is that even when he's in there he's really not that impressive. If we use ERA+, a more accurate indication of a pitcher's effectiveness that includes park effects Wolf has actually been below replacement level player in performance posting ERA+ of 100, 84, 97, and 93 the last four years (100 is considered the league average). Compare that with Lowe's 114, 124, 118, and 131 ERA+ I really question the Dodgers' ability to pitch effectively all season long when they depend of the epitome of mediocrity that is Randy Wolf.
Not suprisingly at all, Wolf gave a decidedly mediocre performance against a truly awful offensive team, lasting 5 1/3 innings and giving up 4 earned runs on six hits, walking and striking out three. I mean this team is really awful up and down the lineup and Wolf just looked listless, his stuff underwhelming and his performance likewise. Now of course you can accuse me of having a double standard here, as I sort of dismissed CC's atrocious outing while I'm indicting Wolf after one similarly shitty start, but the comparison does not really hold. Indeed, unlike Wolf, CC has a track record of starting slow, but has shown the ability to overcome those early troubles and end the season as one of the league's best. Randy Wolf in comparison has a track record of being kind of shitty, and this performance is right in step with his whole career, so dodgers fans can expect a whole lot more of this.
What's more, you combine this significantly inferior pitching staff with a still medicore offense (sorry manny is still only one guy) who not surprisingly only mustered 2 runs against Chris Young's 86MPH fastball, I still don't see a championship team here. It's only one game, and the night before their offense looked real good against Jake Peavy, but on paper this team doesn't have the stuff of champioins. Too many question marks in the rotation after Kiroda, not enough of a track record of performance at the plate from most of the lineup signals to me a team that just isn't going to cut it.

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Tuesday, April 7, 2009

Yeah, like Tex was going to Your Shitty Team




On an aside about the Yankee-Orioles game, I found it perticularly classless how Baltimore fans assaulted Mark Texiera during the game with hate signs and the incessent booing. I'm not saying you shouldn't be able to boo guys or anything like that, that's part of the game and these guys are highly paid atheltes/entertainers, they have to deal with it. No, that didn't bother me but the reason for their being indignant I think is totally ridiclous. Okay he's from Maryland, awesome that's great, but does that mean he HAS to fucking sign with your shitty Orioles? I mean hey I'm a yankee fan but if I was a pro baseball player and the Angels offered me more money and a better opportunity to win than the yankees, I'd be an Angel, and why not? (if it was the Red Sox, the answer might not have been as easy, but money talks) You're a ballplayer and its your job, you have to do what's in your best interest, and going to Baltimore is not for Tex. Cal Ripken on ESPN radio who was also similiarly pissed at the fans said it best, if Texiera was really only about the money he would have signed with the Orioles, because if you're going to Baltimore and their decade plus long commitment to sucking you're sure as shit not going there to win! The only reason you'd go there is the dollar signs. Yeah okay, they've got some nice pieces that I like, but they're not anywhere near contention yet, so why would Texiera sign there and get beat by the rest of the AL when he has a chance to win and make more money elsewhere? Seriously Baltimore fans, grow up, if you want something to get mad about, how about the fact that your team has put a shitty product on the field year in and year out since 1996? THAT'S something to get mad about, not about a guy who happened to grow up in Maryland choosing to go somewhere else and be successful.
My sentiment isn't this strong just beacuse he's a yankee, its because its stupidity running amuck. You can hate a guy on another team and boo him and make fun of him like how A-Rod pretty deservingly gets it in Fenway, but this sort of hatred of Texiera is just plain stupid. Hate him for a good reason, like the fact he's a good player on a rival team.

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Cubs picking up where they left off, dominating the NL Central


Well at least for one day the Big Z Carlos Zambrano's arm did not fall off and the Cubs look exactly what they were last year, the class of the National League. Of course that comes with the caveat that its against the Houston Astros, a team that I believe is probably the worst in baseball, but nevertheless despite their rude booting from the playoffs against the Dodgers last year the Cubs look as strong as ever.
As I said earlier, I have a bad feeling for Cubs fans that Z is on the decline quickly. Indeed in the last two years Zambrano has seen a pretty serious decline in several peripherals, perticularly strikeouts, from 210 in 2006 to 170 in 07 and 130 last year. Granted his walks are also down fairly considerably, from 115 2006 to 70 last year, but its still a bad trend. Further, he's giving up more hits, last year at a clip of 8.2 from 6.8 in 2006. These are all signs of a pitcher getting worse, not better as he enters his eighth full season in the majors. That said, he looked very solid last night, tossing six innings with 6ks 3 walks and only giving up a run. My only concern watching him was him leaving in the seventh inning clearly wincing in pain. He later said it wasn't a big deal, but for a pitcher who as I said has shown a drop in numbers its got to worry the cubs considering how vital he is to their success.
The rest of the staff looked very good as well against the lowly Astros. The vilified Heilman came in the seventh in a two runners on and allowed a runner to score on a infield single but i thought he looked impressive with no one getting any good hacks at him. Add him into the mix of an already solid bullpen of Marmol, Jeff Samardzija, Cotts, and Kevin Gregg, who looked bad but good enough to keep Marmol in his valuable relief ace role, you have to like what you see there, even if Kerry Wood is gone.
The offense similarly looked good early and often with Soriano leading off with a home run and the rest of the lineup seemed to be clicking against the tough Oswalt, with Ramirez going deep and even backup Micah Hoffpauir, a player whom I thiink will be a vital cog for the cubs this year off the bench, got into the action.
Despite some questionable moves that this team made this off-season that may or may not pay of this year, the core of this team is still very good and very dangerous. Whether they coast to another NL Central title remains to be seen, but they certainly have the tools to do it. Time will tell.

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The Phillies are offiically on notice, This Mets team has their shit together



It's still April, and in Cincinnati its still pratically snowing so you can't get carried away, but this is clearly a different team than last year judging by the performance they put on yesterday afternoon, and its a change for the better. Indeed, although doing nothing perticularly flashy or looking really dominant, the pitching staff headed by Santana looked methodical and purposeful, dominating the Reds lineup and showed a lot of promise for the year to come.



Santana as he is prone to do, looked dominant early and often, giving up only three hits and one run in 5 2/3 innings striking out seven. However lasting not even six full innings usually would spell disaster for the mets, but not this year with the way their bullpen looks these days. For certain, the much ballyhooed back end of the bullpen lived up their billing, with Sean Green, Putz and K-Rod giving up no hits and allowing only one baserunner the rest of the way. Now that's what I call shortening a game with a bullpen.
On the other side, the hitting was nothing great, but effective and timely. The only offense really came from the un-hearlded second year outfielder Daniel Murphy, compiling a solo homer and an RBI groundout. For certain, it was nothing to write home about, as their big name stars did very little, but they did enough, they hit when it mattered and get enough to seal the win.
It was not a perticularly exciting or memorable game, with little offense on either side, but it showed a great deal of effiency in the Mets' approach this year. It remains to be seen whether the rest of the rotation can perform at a high level as Santana did and does every fifth day, but there was a lot to like and be happy about for Mets fans yesterday. I'd be lying if I didn't say I was a tad envious of it.

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CC Stinks Up the Joint


This was not exactly how Brian Cashman imagined things would start when he signed CC Sabbathia to his $161million dollar deal this off-season, nor did pratically anyone else, but as in life, things don't always work out as planned in baseball (at least so far). Indeed, resembling nothing like the guy that single-handedly carried the Milaukee Brewers to the playoffs for the first time since 1982, CC looked fucking terrible yesterday, walking five and striking out none, yes that's right nobody on the freaking Baltimore Orioles. That said, its April, the first game of April, and CC's been down this road before.
It can be easy to forget, but around this time last year the talking heads of sports media were already writing off this hefty lefty following his Cy Young season the year before. They clamored that his innings including the playoffs would prove to be his downfall the next year and his weight was going to get the best of him. Indeed, early on it seemed that might be a strong possibility, after four starts accumliating a putrid 13.50 ERA and striking out less than 3 per nine innings in that time. But subsequent that horrible start he went on a ridiclous tear for the rest of the year, in Cleveland and even greater in Milaukee posting an insane 2.70ERA and a ridiclous 162ERA+. So after one pretty awful start, I can't say I'm terribly worried quite yet.
Aside from CC, I thought the team looked pretty decent, all things considered, Posada looked comfortable behind the plate and at it, absolutely crushing a Guthrie fastball into centerfield, Cano showed some semblence of patience walking twice, Gardner looked at least passable with a bat in his hands, and the bench looked strong, with the big bat of Nick Swisher and the speed and defensive acumen of the young Ramiro Pena.
It was a horrible way to start the season and at times they were horrible, perticularly with runners on base and the bullpen while looking good at times ultimately made it a laugher for Baltimore. Tommorrow's another day, so who knows, its far too early to say anything of substance yet about them.

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Monday, April 6, 2009

The New York Nine Predictions

Well my attempt to make my own 30 clubs in 30 days kind of fell flat on its face, so I figure I'll just throw out my predictions for each division and why, here it goes.

NL West
1. Diamondbacks
2. Dodgers
3. Rockies
4. Giants
5. Padres

Sorry, even with Manny, losing your two best starters and your closer, and I'm supposed to believe that they're better? No thanks. Diamondbacks are young but maturing and a staff that added Jon Garland as a fourth starter is a solid move, watch out for them come October.


NL Central
1. Cubs
2. Reds
3. Cardinals
4. Brewers
5. Pirates
6. Astros


You can never count the Cardinals out and I could easily see me eating my words and them making in as a wild card, but the Reds' young pitching to go along with veterans Harang and Arroyo are too good to not be second, albeit a relatively distant second from a dominant Cubs team.


NL East
1. Mets
2. Marlins (WC)
3. Phillies
4. Braves
5. Nationals


Sports Illustrated picks the Amazins to win it all and its hard to not like the Mets, they had one glaring hole, the bullpen, and they've made that it a strength. It's not a rock solid team, but unlike most teams this year there's no aspect of the team thats truly awful. The Phillies are good, but too much good luck went their way last year for it to be sustainable, can they really expect such an amazing performance from their pen again? Not likely. Besides, that Marlins pitching staff is crazy talented and their lineup has serious power, watch out.


AL West

1. A's
2. Angels
3. Mariners
4. Rangers


I don't like this division at all really, while picking a team to win a division with a staff as inexperienced as these guys is really dicey, that Angels team is just very underwhelming. Between Lackey hurt, Santana possibly going for Tommy John, question marks with Escobar and how much he can contribute, and Saunder's inevitable let down year (he doesnt strike out anyone, that will catch up to him very soon) and their even shittier lineup than last year I can't take them. Then again judging by the rest of the division's pitching, they could sleepwalk to the division.


AL Central
1. Twins
2. White Sox
3. Indians
4. Royals
5. Tigers

I really don't get people's take on this division, pretty much everyone is picking the Indians and I don't get it. Cliff Lee's season last year is an abberation, Fausto Carmona doesn't strike enough guys out to be effective and their third starter is Carl Fucking Pavano, can you REALLY expect anything from him? That's not a playoff rotation there, sorry. The Twins are not a sexy pick but they've got solid starting pitching, with Liriano coming back to full strength to mow down guys again and a lineup that has vastly improved with the presence of Joe Crede. The White Sox I don't love but Kenny Williams is a fantastic GM and he's made his team younger and cheaper with a solid front three of the rotation of Buerle, Danks and Floyd and the emergence of Alexi Ramirez at short.


AL East

1. Red Sox
2. Yankees (WC)
3. Rays
4. Blue Jays
5. Baltimore


I'll probably devote an article to this to explain it more fully, but even as a Yankee fan I'm hard pressed to say right now that the Yankees are better than the Sox. While the lineup is probably better and the Yankees rotation has gotten better, the Sox still have a far superior bullpen and depth in their rotation that is unrivaled, I mean John Smoltz is their 6th starter! That said, I think the Yankees will keep it close, with Tampa slightly behind. While I love the Rays, they're a great story and I love to watch them, a lot of things had to go right for them to burst out for 97 wins last year, perticularly their stellar bullpen performance. I don't see that being duplicated, especially with Troy Percival as their closer and that should keep them out of the playoffs, at least for this year, after that all bets are off.


I'm not making postseason predictions beacuse as the last few years have shown the playoffs are a fucking crapshoot, with teams getting hot at the right time anyone can win, although if I had to pick the teams that I think are the best from either league, my money would be on the Diamondbacks and the Red Sox. More on all of this as the season progresses.

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Our Long National Nightmare is Over, Opening Day is Here!



Yes its true, the snow has melted (around here it at least), the sun is still out when I get out of work, and most importantly baseball is back, and not that laid-back spring traning stuff, or that World Baseball classic nonsense, no this is real baseball, baseball that matters at the highest level of competition and I'd be lying if I said I wasn't pumped for this.


Although the magic of Opening day has been taken away a little bit, ESPN has decided it should start Sunday night for some godforsaken reason there is something really great about the beginning of a new season. A day of excitement and optimisim, its a day that brings out the kid in everyone, some smart ones skipping work to indulge in our national pastime, forget about worries and cares for three hours.

Although it doesn't really look like it in New Jersey and most of the east coast, its the true beginning of spring, college basketball is thankfully over after today and America's game starts a new. I can't wait

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Friday, April 3, 2009

Mets hoping Sheff can boost an punchless outfield



There has been a lot of buzz around the mets in recent weeks, after boosthing their bullpen with two premier closers they've become a sort of sexy pick for the World Series, with Sports Illustrated even picking them to win it all, and with the new addition of Gary Sheffield, it seems expectations will rise even higher, although not rightly so.



The Mets outfield as it stands is arguably one of the weakest points on their roster. Indeed, outside of the Carlos Beltran, one of the most well rounded players of his generation, the corner outfield positions, traditionally reserved for players who can hit are filled with marginal guys right now. Featuring a combination of Daniel Murphy, Ryan Church, Fernando Tatis and Nick Evans, you can't expect to get much in the power department from any of these guys. So in Sheffield the hope is he can fill in that hole, bringing some power to a relatively unproven group of guys, but can he still really bring it? Last year in a deep lineup Sheffleld hit a pretty awful .225/.326/.400 with only 19 home runs, those are not numbers that a DH should be posting.



In addition Sheffield at the tender age of 39 is a pretty lousy fielder at this point, having lost a step or two and his once cannon of an arm is hardly that anymore. Indeed, one has to wonder, will Sheffield at this point even be an asset to this team, or will he be a dead weight like he was to the Detroit last year?
Stranger things have indeed happened, after all this is Gary Sheffield we're talking about here, with 499 home runs and counting Sheff has been one of the game's most feared hitters with quick writsts and a powerful swing that can make any pitcher sweat. Who knows, perhaps in the weaker NL he can have a successful season, but I worry that it will be too difficult to get him appropriate playing time to make him happy and more importantly effective. We'll see what happens, but consider me skeptical.

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