He will quit on the White Sox just the way he quit on the Red Sox and the Dodgers. Sooner or later. Bank on it.
Manny Ramirez returns to Fenway Park tonight and he’ll get booed with gusto—which he deserves. It’s nice to know that folks in Los Angeles now understand what we were trying to tell them when Manny first got to L.A. in 2008 and everybody out there talked about mean Boston and how Manny was just “misunderstood.’‘
Now they understand. Manny is all about Manny. And greed. Oh, and he’s also a steroid cheat, who’s been caught twice.
Manny the con man spoke through an interpreter (White Sox bench coach Joey Cora) when he joined the White Sox in Cleveland Tuesday. What a fraud. Ramirez went to high school in New York City. He’s been speaking fluent English for decades. He understands everything he hears in English and has never spoken through an interpreter until this week.
Good luck, Ozzie Guillen. You’ve managed some beauties before, but you’ve never had a guy like Manny.
Stan “who may be the only reporter who covered that game for a New York paper who’s still alive” Isaacs remembers…
And then there was the laughable promotion by MasterCard in 2002 to select the greatest moments in baseball history. MasterCard was more interested in numbers than in fashioning an authentic list. So it was that most of the events people voted on were not moments; they occurred mostly in the post-television age; and were events likely to draw votes in certain quarters, i.e. listing Ichiro Suzuki’s outstanding 2001 rookie season as a way of attracting votes from Japan. Yes, Japanese citizens were eligible to vote.
The Thomson-Branca moment did not make the final top ten. Cal Ripken’s feat of playing in the most consecutive games (that’s a lot of “moments”) was voted No. 1. Baseball was made to look ridiculous anew for selling out to a commercial entity.
As the contest drew to an end, the MasterCard people sent Thomson and Branca on a round of radio talks to promote the contest. That night they were at Shea Stadium to appear on a Mets’ pre-game show. I was in the Mets clubhouse and watched Branca, a regular visitor to the Mets because manager Bobby Valentine was his son-in-law, leading Thomson around, introducing him to players.
I was in Valentine’s office where the talk got around to the MasterCard promotion. Branca vented his anger. “It’s ridiculous that our moment is not high in the running.” he said. “Was Suzuki a moment? Was Ripken a moment?”
I could hardly suppress a smile. Here was Branca—the victim of a day that has lived in infamy for him, for the Dodgers and their fans—angry that his “moment” was not being awarded with the votes of the fans. Ah, baseball.
Or as Lack-O-Staats said the other day…“It’s amazing how someone can hit for power one year during his walk-year and then turn around and hit for average the next walk-year!”
Right now, the game of figuring out whether the Sox might re-sign Beltre is an act of pure speculation, aside from suggesting that, barring some highly unforeseen circumstance, he will decline his $5 million player option, even if it increases to $10 million should he reach the now-attainable mark of 640 plate appearances.
Beltre, a Scott Boras client, is also all-but-certain to test the free-agent waters before discussing a return to Boston. As the elite third baseman on the market, he will be coveted.
Will there be alternatives should Beltre head for greener pastures (and dollar figures) this coming offseason? Of course.
While Beltre would clearly be the standout third baseman on the market, Kevin Youkilis could afford the Sox the opportunity to pursue either a first or third baseman. That would give the team fallback options in the form of players like Adam Dunn, Adam LaRoche, Carlos Pena and (though unlikely to leave Chicago) Paul Konerko.
Mr. Madden, your BrainSeepuStar multi-media virtual video glasses should arrive in time for the Moneyball opening.
When you read stuff like this from the Daily News’ Bill Madden, you have to ask yourself two questions: (1) At what point will columnists stop using a now seven year-old book as a hook to write about the A’s? and (2) would Billy Beane have been better off if he had never provided Michael Lewis the access to write “Moneyball” in the first place?
Bud Selig and the major league poobahs ought to be ashamed to be charging major league prices of $100 and stiffly upward for what amounted to be the $200 million world champions vs. Sacramento. What’s especially wrong with this picture, however, is that these are the same Oakland A’s that, in Michael Lewis’ 2003 best-selling book “Moneyball” - now being made into a major motion picture starring Brad Pitt as A’s GM Billy Beane - were depicted as the model franchise for all of baseball because of their ability to make the most out of spending the least.
Given the time that has passed—one of the main subjects of the book has retired already for cryin’ out loud—I can’t help but wonder if it’s really all that enlightening to critique the 2010 Oakland Athletics by referencing the book. And really, given that teams like the Yankees owe a lot of their recent success to co-opting and improving upon many of Beane’s ideas, it’s rather amusing to see “Moneyball” slammed over and over again like it is.
Ford Motor Co. on Thursday settled a Mississippi lawsuit over a 2001 accident in which a New York Mets prospect was killed when his SUV crashed in the Florida Panhandle, a lawyer for the player’s family said.
The settlement came shortly after the jury in Jasper County had awarded $131 million in actual damages to Cole’s family and before it was to consider possible punitive damages, Tab Turner, an attorney for the family of Brian Cole, told The Associated Press.
Turner, from Little Rock, Ark., said the settlement amount and terms were confidential.
“The family is glad this is finally over. I thought the verdict was an appropriate response to the evidence. They put zero percent of the fault on Brian Cole and 100 percent of the fault on Ford Motor Co. for a defective and unreasonably dangerous vehicle,” Turner said.
Ford spokeswoman Marcey Evans said the accident was a tragedy and the company offered its sympathy to the Cole family for their loss.
However, Evans said in a statement that the Mississippi court “denied Ford a fair trial by excluding evidence that the jury should have heard and considered about Brian’s driving and the speculative nature of plaintiffs’ claims.”
He’s the master of after-the-fact analysis. If the result of the play was good, it was Niiiiiiiice. If the result of the play was bad, it was bad. Good things never happened on bad plays, nor vice versa.
He was the fan in the booth. The loud, obnoxious guy sitting one row behind and two seats over whose comments are entertaining for the first two innings, but by the sixth inning and his sixth beer, you just wanna strangle. The team did well, he cheered or grunted. They did poorly, he ripped those bums.
For some people watching at home, that had a real strong appeal. He’s one of us!
For others? Ugh. Cretinous meatheadism? Pass.
So today was a very, very, very, very good day, and plenty of Nats fans grunted in celebration.
But I feel somewhat conflicted. Dibble stinks, but isn’t what the team did to him kind of, well, cheap?
Human Bomb: Bet-A-Million Butler or Betemit? (No comment until the time limit is up)
Betemit was signed as a minor-league free agent last fall and since the trade of third baseman Alberto Callaspo, Betemit has suddenly become the Royals’ most dangerous hitter.
Betemit is hitting .321 with 10 homers and 29 RBIs in just 184 at bats.
Projecting those numbers over a full season certainly should make any Royals fan pause to wonder what exactly the Royals have stumbled upon.
“He’s been just terrific,” general manager Dayton Moore told me. “The guy gives you professional at bats.”
But are Betemit’s numbers for real?
“You got to believe what you’re seeing,” Moore said. “That’s the way I’ve always operated. You have to believe what you’re seeing.”
Sadaharu Oh smashed the 756th home run of his 19-year pro baseball career before 50,000 roaring fans here Saturday night…breaking the American record held by Hank Aaron.
...
Some baseball experts in the United States and elsewhere challenge Oh’s mark, arguing that American major league ball is of higher caliber and that fields are smaller in Japan.
There’s more to me than you’ll ever know and I’ve got more hits than Sadaharu Oh.
“Some of the worst trades I’ve ever made were with Walt,” [Kevin] Towers said. “He’s the one guy, every time we made a trade I’d end up saying: ‘You know what? This is not going to be good.’ I always tell him, ‘The only one I ever won on you was Fernando Valenzuela for Danny Jackson, and the only reason I won that deal was because Jackson retired and Fernando didn’t.’ ”
At 59, Jocketty has been around long enough to have traded icons of the 1980s like Valenzuela. He is upbeat by nature, and players call him approachable and calm. But only one general manager is older — Jack Zduriencik of the Seattle Mariners, by a month — and Jocketty came to baseball through some of the game’s most colorful characters.
...
Fan support is still tepid; the Reds averaged fewer than 17,000 fans in their most recent home series, and they rank 12th of 16 N.L. teams in attendance per game. The hope is that the Reds’ performance will increase the season-ticket base and help add to a payroll that ranked 19th in the majors on opening day.
...
“This is the oldest franchise in baseball,” Jocketty said. “There is a history of winning here. People still remember the Big Red Machine, and that’s huge. But other than 1990, there hasn’t been a whole lot in between. It’s now important to get people believing that this can be similar to that era, and that it’s going to be a lot of fun to be a Reds fan.”
The Twins sure could have used the extra bodies as they wrapped up their series against the Tigers with a 10-9 loss in a 13-inning contest that lasted four hours, 47 minutes at Target Field.
Gerald Laird blasted a solo home run off right-hander Nick Blackburn, who had been scheduled to start on Friday against the Rangers, with one out in the 13th to give Detroit the victory.
Tell the truth, Poz and Michael Schur…tell the truth.
Which brings us to the main character of our blog saga … Derek Jeter. I have been thinking a lot about Jeter the last couple of days because (name drop alert) I went to have drinks with Michael Schur — brilliant creator of “Parks and Rec,” and Ken Tremendous of Fire Joe Morgan — and the entire conversation was more or less about Derek Jeter. Michael admits that he spends most of his leisure minutes these days thinking about Derek Jeter. Well, what else is there to think about? His Red Sox are toast. Tiger Woods’ story has gotten repetitive (He’s back! Oh, wait, no he’s not back! Excuse me, yes, he IS back. Oh, no, wrong, he’s not back). The NFL preseason might be bizarrely popular (the NBC preseason games have been the No. 1 shows on television for the week) but they aren’t much to think about. That leaves Jeter and what promises to be the most fascinating ending in the history of professional sports.
...But now he’s back to the player he looked to be two years ago. As Schur points out, not without some glee, Jeter’s sub-par numbers this year — let the record show that on Sept. 2, 2010 Yuniesky Betancourt (95 OPS+) had a higher OPS+ than Derek Jeter (94 OPS+) — don’t even tell the whole story. Jeter’s stunning numbers (.266/.331/.374) are really pumped up by the energy and hitting atmosphere of Yankee Stadium. On the road he’s hitting .230/.294/.307.
We can argue about how much Jeter has left … but when you have a 36 year old shortstop with a .314 lifetime average suddenly hitting .266 in September — it sure smells of serious and irreversible decline.
Plagued by a lack of hustle and an Omar Infante throwing error, [Tim] Hudson surrendered four hits during the two-run first inning that gave Santana enough support to help the Mets claim a 4-2 win over the Braves on Thursday night at Turner Field.
With both the Phillies and Rockies coming from the West Coast for a single makeup game, the Phillies victimized the Rockies with a nine-run rally in the seventh to take the lead en route to a 12-11 victory that was packed with all the drama of a three-game set.
Because I’m tired of “sabermetriflinging” this out to a number of friends…
AL Cy Young
If there has ever been an award race that loomed as a referendum on where we stand on New Age versus Old Time award values, this is it. We’re about to find out exactly how sabermetrified our trusty Cy Young electorate has become.
If this were 1963, or even 2003, there’s no doubt who would win this Cy Young. That would be Sabathia, a big-time ace who is 18-5, has gone 14-2 since the beginning of June, just ripped off a streak of 16 straight quality starts and has a shot to become the AL’s first 24-game winner in two decades.
So for voters fixated on the old win column, Sabathia currently owns eight more wins than King Felix. And it wouldn’t shock anyone, given the state of their two teams, if that gap inflated to nine, or 10 or 11 wins by the end of the season.
It’s one thing for the voters to hand a Cy Young to 15- and 16-game winners over a 19-game winner, the way they did last year for Tim Lincecum and Zack Greinke. It’s another thing to deliver a Cy Young to a 13-game winner over, say, a 22-game winner.
But remember, this is a performance award, period. And King Felix leads the league in every meaningful sabermetric pitching stat on Earth except adjusted ERA+ (where Buchholz is No. 1—and Sabathia ranks ninth).
Even if you compare more traditional numbers, though, Hernandez has an ERA that’s three-quarters of a run lower than Sabathia’s, an opponent OPS that’s 74 points lower, more innings pitched, a better strikeout rate and a better WHIP.
So if you truly analyze the big picture, Buchholz (your ERA leader) and Wilson (whose team is 15-2 in his past 17 starts) should rank ahead of Sabathia in this race. But are voters really ready to ignore that win column completely? We’ll find out. Won’t we?
CC Sabathia continued his regular-season unbeaten streak at Yankee Stadium, turning in a dominant performance as the Yankees completed a four-game sweep of the Athletics, 5-0, on Thursday.
Curtis Granderson, who replaced an injured Nick Swisher in the second inning, provided the bulk of the offense with a pair of home runs in New York’s sixth consecutive win
NYY 84-50 [2-0 in SEPT]
TBR 82-51 [1-0 in SEPT] (1.5 GB)
Alex Rodriguez is no longer represented by Scott Boras, the power agent who negotiated for him the two highest-paid contracts in baseball history, USA Today reports.
The Yankee slugger now is working with Pittsburgh sports attorney Jay Reisinger and Washington lawyer Jim Sharp, who have been handling his legal and government affairs since February 2009. The USA Today report says Reisinger confirmed the relationship.
Cardinals President Bill DeWitt III said, “Fan sentiment and feedback” were important factors in the decision to go back to KMOX.
He added that the business climate has changed considerably in the half-decade since the club bought a 50 percent interest in KTRS and moved the broadcasts there.
“I don’t think there are any regrets,” DeWitt said about the original decision to leave KMOX.
He said the team will be open to offers about buying its portion of KTRS, which it purchased for $2 million, according to numerous sources.
Now they’re stuck with KTRS, with no sports teams associated with that station. Good luck on that!
I come back from a one-way ticket to Polizzi-ville to find this sitting on my mesc?!
I had the chance to see both Bonds and Clemens play the game. For Bonds, he broke in with the Pirates in 1986. He was a skinny kid, but had more talent in his little finger than most players in the majors. He was hitting homeruns then, and continued to hit them (762) until he retired in 2007. He was something to watch, and he could play the game. If the accusation of him using performance enhancing drugs is true, do I believe he belongs in the Hall of Fame? No! Period! Using performance enhancing drugs does just what it says it suppose to do. Enhance your performance. For me, that’s cheating, and you should never be rewarded for cheating. That’s the chance you take when you cheat. If you don’t get caught, you prosper, if you do, you lose. Simple as that.
...Baseball’s Hall of Fame is a special place. It is a place for those who were the best in this great game of baseball. It’s a place for such greats like Babe Ruth, Ty Cobb, Ted Williams and others. Is it a place for Barry Bonds, Roger Clemens, or Pete Rose? Time will tell, but for me Pete Rose is the real deal. Nothing enhanced about that!!
“The Mariners knew all about Josh Lueke’s 96-mph fastball when they acquired him from the Texas Rangers in the Cliff Lee deal.
But Mariners executives insisted they knew nothing before the July 9 trade about the 25-year-old minor-leaguer facing felony charges in a rape and sodomy case in which he later pleaded no contest to a lesser charge.
However, new information appears to contradict the Mariners’ original version of events. Former Mariners pitching coach Rick Adair said he told general manager Jack Zduriencik about Lueke’s troubles well before the deal.”
This is the most Jason Kendall thing I have ever read:
“He got to the point where he couldn’t even raise his arm,” Yost said. “He got to the point where he had to take his glove and push his arm back into a throwing position — and he was still throwing runners out.”
When Latin-American and Asian players sign professional contracts, they are typically immersed in English-language classes and, in some cases, assigned translators. Max St. Pierre wasn’t so fortunate. Taken by Detroit in the 26th round of the 1997 draft out of French-speaking Quebec City, the now 30-year-old catcher came into pro ball with neither a support system nor teammates who spoke the same language. What followed was a tumultuous ride through the minor leagues, one which featured not only loneliness but also a battle with alcohol abuse.
Not a new article, but an interesting Q&A with Maxime St.Pierre, who was called up yesterday by the Tigers after 14 years in the minors.
A night after bowling over the catcher, Nyjer Morgan gets a pitch behind him. Morgan goes after the pitcher, when — BAM! — Gaby Sanchez out of nowhere.
The (Marlins?) announcers tend to blame the whole thing on Morgan. While he is obviously not without some blame, Volstad is the guy throwing behind him. I didn’t see the game live, but apparently after they hit Morgan earlier in the game he stole a couple of bases? The Nats were down a lot, so I don’t see the logic in saying that’s why he deserved to get thrown behind again.
One thing ownership won’t do, Ricketts said, is favor a managerial candidate for marketing and fan-draw value, such as Ryne Sandberg.
‘‘The fact is, it’s Jim’s job to decide which manager to bring in,’’ said Ricketts, who expects to get involved as part of the interview process once Hendry has a short list of finalists. ‘‘But it’s about winning, not about marketing.
‘‘I don’t think we need a marquee name to sell tickets. What we need is a team that produces on the field. That’s really what’s most important to us.’‘
What’s the over/under on how many secons before Vazquez gets booed?
For all the tumult that has engulfed the Yankees’ rotation during Andy Pettitte’s absence, it will probably not look much different when he returns.
For one thing, Javier Vazquez will be back. And A. J. Burnett’s spot is safe, regardless of how he pitched Wednesday night against Oakland. Manager Joe Girardi announced these moves about 30 minutes before Pettitte continued making progress in his recovery from a left groin injury, throwing 55 pitches at a high intensity.
Among the promises Frank McCourt made on the day he took over the Dodgers in 2004: He would maintain the Dodgers’ player payroll within the top one-quarter of major league teams, and he had no plans to consider selling naming rights to Dodger Stadium.
The business plan he filed with Major League Baseball tells a different story on both counts. In two largely similar versions of the plan, the document explains how he plans to reverse the Dodgers’ financial losses in part by slashing payroll—from $100 million in 2004 to $85 million in 2006—and limiting annual growth to about 4%.
The Arizona Fall League will feature 30 former first-round Draft picks this year, including 2009 No. 2 overall pick Dustin Ackley and No. 4 selection Tony Sanchez.
Nationals’ 2010 No. 1 overall pick Bryce Harper, rumored to debut in the AFL this fall, was not included among the league’s preliminary rosters.
(5 - 2:16pm, Sep 03)
Last: SoSH U at work