With the season Curtis Granderson is having and all the attention it has brought him as a major candidate for the American League Most Valuable Player Award, it can get easy bypassing the contributions Robinson Cano has made for the Yankees this year.
Cano was an MVP contender a year ago and finished third in the balloting behind winner ...
The Pirates are dealing with a couple other factors: advanced scouting reports and inexperience.
Early on, the relative obscurity of the Pirates’ lineup was an asset. But now the secret is out on many of their batters.
Hurdle and Ritchie said veteran hitters handle at-bats better.
“With experience, you can have a little more courage, a little more patience at the plate, show a little more discipline,” Hurdle said. “That comes in time.”
The upper-echelon major league teams typically have ...
I’m not leaving you Mr Christensen, not ever! AL MVP Votes (so far) Jose Bautista - 2
My ears were wide open as these guys explained their arguments. I’m one of 28 writers with an AL MVP vote this year.
...Personally, I have no problem voting for a pitcher. There are 10 spots on the MVP ballot, and if the season ended today, Verlander would be my second choice, behind Toronto’s Jose Bautista.
For me, Bautista’s numbers are too impressive to ignore. Entering Friday, he led the AL in on-base ...
With the lockout continuing, I estimate that fewer than 10-12 Primates now care about the NBA, but with our own thread, we won’t detract from what this site is really about: Andy’s collection of pirated movies, how many batteries one should buy to prepare for a hurricane that may or may not hit Manhattan, and Vera Farmiga.
...Snowball: Never Forget Where You Get Them Dollars From
Here’s why you should care now – because without a serious presence in the ownership suites Reyes could be gone, Wright could follow and it’s hard to imagine the team doing better than searching for free agent bargains like they did last winter. The payroll already is going to plummet, a fact management has admitted. A plan is in place with Sandy Alderson and his staff trying to stock the farm system. But counting on Matt ...
There is an ironclad rule in journalism that you never get too close to someone you write about.
I broke the rule once a long time ago, and I paid the price for it last week, when a famous friend – the baseball player Miguel Tejada – was cut by the San Francisco Giants and then trashed on every media platform around.
As a member of the media, I could have joined the chorus, but I didn’t. I felt too closely what Tejada felt while being on the receiving end of public scorn.
...[The] Red Sox scored eight runs off Lewis, Tateyama and Merkin Valdez in the fourth inning and went on to a 12-7 victory over the Rangers in a three-hour, 44-minute affair at Fenway Park on Saturday.
The Nationals built an early 5-0 lead behind starting pitcher Tom Milone, who made his major league debut after his contract was purchased from Triple-A Syracuse on Saturday.
With runners on second and third and one out in the second inning, Washington third base coach Bo Porter beckoned Milone over for a chat. With the Mets’ infield in expecting a bunt, Milone swung away and hit the first pitch from Dillon Gee into the Nationals bullpen for a three-run homer.
...
According to STATS LLC and ...
Saturday’s game-tying two-run homer from Ryan Raburn and walk-off shot from Miguel Cabrera two batters later traveled an estimated 824 feet. The resulting 9-8 Tigers win over the White Sox opened up a 7 1/2-game cushion between them in the American League Central standings, and pushed Detroit 6 1/2 games ahead of second-place Cleveland, who lost to the Royals.
...
Detroit faced a seven-run deficit and had a defense withering in 93-degree weather at the game’s midway point. Eight runs, a ...
George Kottaras became the first major league player to hit for the cycle this season and the Milwaukee Brewers beat the Houston Astros 8-2 on Saturday night.
Kottaras hit a solo homer in the fourth inning off Bud Norris (6-9) to give Milwaukee a 2-0 lead and tripled in the sixth ahead of a two-run shot by Craig Counsell, his first of the year.
...
Colorado slugger Carlos Gonzalez was the last major leaguer to hit for the cycle, on July 31 last season against the Chicago Cubs.
Wait, slow down…Michael Kay just said “defensive metrics” today. I’m still dizzy.
Beane is an innovator. He was able to understand the value of information in a game that resists change at all costs. He focused on player development, market inefficiencies, and building a team, not a collection of free agent superstars. His model is what we see in Boston and New York today, but they are able to complement with elite talent and buy away mistakes. The Yankees had to change their internal ...
Bah, book a room at The Holmes World’s Fair Hotel and settle this!
The frustration stemming from the shortage of production from Adam Dunn, Alex Rios and Gordon Beckham recently reached a boiling point between general manager Ken Williams and hitting coach Greg Walker.
Walker took issue with Williams’ comments about Beckham’s swing, and after he and Williams exchanged heated words in the tunnel leading to the Sox clubhouse at U.S. Cellular Field, Williams told Walker to clean out his ...
Or as my Met buddy, Dennis Ribanter sez…“Meh, just another Aaron Small Sample”.
If you’re not in yet, you should be.
Enough pooh-poohing Ivan Nova. He’s not a blip, an unknown commodity. Let’s face it: He’s a force, the New York Yankees’ No. 2 starter if the playoffs opened today.
Yeah, yeah. Nova’s a rookie and doesn’t have any postseason experience.
Who cares? He can pitch. Even better—he simply wins.
...But Nova isn’t just lucky, a fraud. Nova—who upped his record to 15-4 and lowered ...
Hindsight has the baseball world looking back at the “steroid era.” Knowing that so many players gained enhancement over their natural abilities, do you feel that the accomplishments of pitchers like Maddux, Glavine, Pedro Martinez and yourself should be given more recognition for what you did on the mound in what was essentially a less-than level playing field?
Once again, you’re asking a lot of questions where there might be a biased opinion, because my opinion, based on I was just ...
It is only about a 45-minute ride from Brian Roberts’ house in Sarasota to Tropicana Field, but the trip represented yet another difficult hurdle in the veteran second baseman’s return from a concussion.
“It was a huge step for me to get in the car,” said Roberts, whose voice cracked several times Friday as he talked with reporters while seated next to Orioles manager Buck Showalter. The 33-year-old was around some of his teammates for one of the first times since he last played May 16.
Who is the girl in the picket line, with the long hair? What’s going on here? You have got to be kidding me!
Angel Stadium workers in two separate unions, both frustrated by slow contract negotiations and threatening to walk off the job, took their fight directly to Angels fans on Friday night before the game.
Members and supporters of the two unions – SEIU, which represents ticket takers, ticket sellers, ushers and janitors, and Unite Here Local 11, which represents food vendors – ...
With 326 career homers, Lee brings much-needed power to the lineup. A 15-year veteran who won a World Series ring in 2003 with the Florida Marlins, Lee also adds experience to the roster.
“Have you seen many teams that have won a lot without having at least one five-year guy in their lineup? I haven’t,” Hurdle said. “You need somebody who’s been tested by fire, who can lend some quiet confidence and a voice of reason to the clubhouse when times ...
That was Jeff Francoeur’s response when I asked him what kind of stuff Indians starter Justin Masterson had. “The bowling ball from hell.” We were talking in the dugout before the game and Frenchy called it: if Masterson could run that heavy two-seamer in on his hands, Jeff would have a tough night. If Masterson left something down, Jeff could drop the bat head and golf it.
Twice Masterson got the pitch where he wanted it (Frenchy’s two strike outs) and once Frenchy got the pitch where ...
The Rangers’ pitching staff tied a club record with its 17th shutout on Friday night, and Derek Holland is headed toward his own record that any pitcher would love to have.
The Rangers continue to score runs for Holland at a record-setting pace. They scored six in the first two innings against Red Sox starter Andrew Miller and went on to a 10-0 victory.
Playing their first game of the month Friday, [the Giants] performed with urgency and efficiency rarely seen during their woeful August as Carlos Beltran homered during a 4-for-4 night and Cody Ross also homered to back Matt Cain’s eight-inning effort in a critical 6-2 victory over the Arizona Diamondbacks.
Auditions month with the Marlins got under way Friday at Sun Life Stadium.
The review by manager Jack McKeon following a 5-3 loss to the Phillies was scathing.
“I’m getting tired of looking at this stuff. We’re better than that. It’s time to wake up,” said an exasperated McKeon. “Maybe they can’t play. Maybe they’re not good enough. It’s up to them. They have another 25 games to show us they can play.”
...“Sooner or later these guys have got to wake up. We’re ...
On July 6, Bruce Bennett analyzed a letter from a Los Angeles Dodgers fan about the team’s stunning bankruptcy filing. For his time — one-tenth of a legal hour, or six minutes — Bennett earned $97.50, exactly what he billed for a more standard task, such as examining the day’s docket.
That’s a fine wage for Bennett, who makes $975 an hour as the Dodgers’ lead bankruptcy lawyer. For 34 days of legal toil that ended July 31, Bennett’s firm, Dewey & LeBoeuf, rolled up fees of $1.7 ...
It’s the best rivalry in media softball: the notorious potsmokers vs. the financial power brokers. High Times swept the season series with Wall St. Journal Thursday, eking out victory in the 11th inning and making themselves favorites in the upcoming NYMSL playoffs.
For most of his life, my brother believed that there was a direct correlation between the Montreal Expos’ fortunes and his own. (Given my brother’s occasional happiness and success, the theory was dubious from the start, and it would finally be disproved in 2004 when the Expos were given a name-change and moved to Washington and he was not.) In 1981, the Expos made the playoffs for the first and only time in franchise history, but were defeated by ...
All of a sudden, the talk about the greatness of Derek Jeter has intensified, and this is misguided.
He’s actually greater than that.
It’s a bunch of little-big things with Jeter. Unlike New York Yankees teammate Alex Rodriguez, for instance, Jeter isn’t spectacular at fielding, throwing, hitting, slugging or just existing away from the ballpark, but he is good at everything.
...I’ll put it this way: One of these centuries, when Jeter retires, ...
And, as usual,...I couldn’t make it all the way through.
Q: When can we look past all of these ######## saber metrics and admit that traditional stats are pretty damn useful? Just because Verlander’s WAR is a bit worse than Halladay’s, Halladay is not immediately the more dominant pitcher. There’s something to be said for 20 wins by late August regardless of what a computer and some dude at Caltech say. In 20 years Brad Pitt will star in a movie called Poorball about a revolutionary GM who ...
A U.S. district court judge granted federal prosecutors a new trial for former Major League pitcher Roger Clemens on Friday, setting a start date of April 17.
Clemens is accused of lying to Congress when lawmakers investigated the illicit use of steroids in professional baseball.
...U.S. District Court Judge Reggie Walton blasted prosecutors Friday, declaring, “I would hate to believe they just blatantly disregarded rulings that I made, but it’s hard for me to reach any other conclusion.”
While most of the early winter speculation involves the possible new homes for Albert Pujols and Prince Fielder, they could be joined by another superstar, CC Sabathia.
The Yankees ace, signed to a seven-year, $161 million contract, has the right to opt out this winter after the first three seasons of his deal. While the attrition rate for pitchers often results in buyer’s remorse for teams that sign hurlers to big contracts, the Yankees have had nothing to complain about in Sabathia’s ...
