Downey: Baseball, this time throw the book at users of performance-enhancing drugs

Downey Clean Breeze…Sheeet.

Throw the bums out, some will scream. I am totally OK with this.

Who’s legitimate and who ain’t? That’s all we want to know anymore.

We have spent much of this century wondering which individuals in the national pastime are squeaky clean and which are as stained as a dugout floor.

...All I do know is, we’re sick of it, man.

Baseball’s zero-tolerance policy is an absolute must. Oh, the players’ union reps will surely react and be appalled and appeal. But if ...

SF Giants Fans are not hypocrites for booing Melky

Absent any real news this morning, I want to touch on something that has always bugged me: the notion that Giants fans have no right to boo other steroid users because they cheered Barry Bonds.

I started to hear that creep into the conversation after the fans booed Melky Cabrera last night. Tim Brown, a national baseball writer for Yahoo whom I greatly respect, gave San Francisco fans a slight jab by noting the “incongruity” of booing Melky when they cheered Bonds.

In my opinion he’s ...

Nationals’ Strasburg placed on DL with lat strain

The Washington Nationals have placed Stephen Strasburg on the 15-day disabled list because of a strained muscle in his back.

The Nationals made the move Wednesday after Strasburg skipped a scheduled bullpen session. The session was supposed to determine whether he could make a start on Saturday

ESPN’s Franchise Player Draft - ESPN

Click the link to see the list.

If you were starting a franchise and you could pick any player in professional baseball, who would be your franchise player? That’s the question we asked 30 of our resident baseball “experts,” who participated in ESPN’s third annual Franchise Player Draft.

Baseball scout Epy Guerrero, the Blue Jays man in Latin America - The Globe and Mail

Known for his work ethic and dedication, the scout was not above calling upon subterfuge and legerdemain when needed.

He hiked up mountainsides and rode donkeys to check out athletes, and is said to have once dressed as a soldier to slip a prospect out of Nicaragua.

One of his more famous capers involved a beanpole boy who showed soft hands in the field and a lashing stroke at the plate. The youth was so poor he could not afford a glove, so had fashioned a cardboard milk carton around his ...

Sandalow: CSN’s Chris Kamka Crowned Chicago’s Undisputed Stats King

Even Seymour Siwoff laughs at Chris Kamka.

People who love sports are dime-a-dozen. Face it, in that way, Kamka and I aren’t unique. But what makes him original is the ability to not just love sports, but have the capacity and the patience to dive deep and find narratives in numbers. Finding out the ERA of all position players who have pitched since the 1980s, after all, isn’t the kind of stat the average fan can reel off.

“It’s an ability, but I’ll tell you it’s a real lot of ...

Chris Perez being investigated in connection with drug-related incident

At a noon news conference today, Rocky River Police Chief Kelly Stillman said police, U.S. postal inspectors and the West Shore Enforcement Bureau searched the home that [Chris] Perez and his wife are renting on Parklane Drive after a package was delivered there on Tuesday.

He said they found what he called “a controlled substance” — which is what police often call drugs. Stillman said he would not speculate on what was confiscated.

Hey Tribe fans, don’t forget to call 216-420-HITS to buy ...

The Murky Waters of MLB’s Latest Steroid Case - The Triangle Blog - Grantland

This is a great article about the rumored Bosch-related suspensions.

THT: Freedman: Does MLB have a case this time?

Eugene Freedman has the answer…

Just cause doesn’t mean just ‘cause. You’re probably thinking about your non-unionized workplace. Your employer can discipline or fire you for a good reason, a bad reason, or no reason at all. In a workplace represented by a union, like Major League Baseball’s, it doesn’t work that way.

...But, beyond that, there’s something that MLB has to go up against in this case: its own testing regime. MLB has called its testing the best in sports or at least ...

Keith Olbermann will lead TBS’ studio coverage of the MLB postseason

After a messy public breakup with his last employer resulted in a $50 million lawsuit, Keith Olbermann will return to television in October as a studio host for Turner’s coverage of the Major League Baseball postseason.

The deal will have Olbermann leading TBS’ Atlanta-based studio show with Dennis Eckersley and possibly a second analyst. TBS this season has both Wild Card Playoff games, 18 of the 20 League Division Series games and exclusive rights to the National League Championship ...

Al Leiter, ex-Yankees and Mets pitcher, ‘interested’ in Lautenberg’s senate seat

Good, out with the righty lefty…and in with the lefty righty David Cone!

Could Al Leiter be a potential name on the long list of possible replacements for the late Sen. Frank Lautenberg? The ex-pitcher said he’d be interested.

Leiter was listed by Philadelphia Inquirer’s Matt Katz as an “outside the box wildcard” earlier this week. When the former hurler was asked by ESPNNewYork’s Andrew Marchand yesterday about it, he responded, “Who wouldn’t be interested if the governor of your state for ...

Primer Dugout (and link of the day) 6-5-2013

New York Tribune, June 5, 1913:

Montreal, June 4.—Physicians feared to-day that Miles Main, the Buffalo pitcher hurt by being hit on the head by a batted ball in yesterday’s game with the Montreal club, will be temporarily blind and probably permanently deaf.

An X-ray examination of Main’s skull made at the Western Hospital showed that both ihs ear drums were seriously injured, while the optic nerve also was affected. At the best he will be out of the game for weeks.

I can’t find any evidence ...

Ryan Braun addresses “Outside the Lines” report

Braun Series ____

The media had gathered in the wake of an “Outside the Lines” report that indicated Braun, injured Yankees slugger Alex Rodriguez and nearly 20 other players could be suspended as a result of Major League Baseball’s ongoing investigation into Anthony Bosch and his Biogenesis clinic in Miami, which is believed to have provided performance-enhancing drugs for major-league players.

There were plenty of questions, but Braun did not want to entertain them.

“I’ve already ...

Jeff Pearlman: Q&A: Steve Trachsel

“In order to master changes, we have to recover slowness, reflection and togetherness. There we will find real renewal.”

J.P.: In the lord’s year of 1998, you surrendered Mark McGwire’s 62nd home run, to break Roger Maris’ record. You’ve since stated that you knew he was using; that it was beyond obvious. So I’d like to ask you this: A. Did that make giving up the homer worse—knowing the man was cheating? And can you, having played nearly two decades in the Majors, understand why ...

Hardy HR HR: Puig conquers the heavens

Viva Puig!  (Even ringtones are available.)

If Matt Kemp came on as the Bison, what is Puig? Beast of the Cuban Wild? If I’m Hushpuppy, this is what he looks like to me.

I don’t think I’m alone. Puig’s exploits brought youthful thrills from Vin Scully, who shouted “Que viva Cuba, viva Puig!” as each moment topped the last.

“If you joined us late,” said Scully, “I’m sorry.”  And that was before Puig’s second homer, an opposite-field laser over the right-field wall.

...Read More...

Jim Furtado Posted: June 05, 2013 at 05:19 AM | 16 comment(s)
  Beats: dodgers, vin scully, yasiel puig

OMNICHATTER FOR 06-05-2013

The OMNICHATTER is not on the Biogenesis list, although it has tested positive for unusually high levels of awesome in the past.

Anyway, 15 games, with the first at 12:10 PM in Atlanta.

Condition of fan hurt at Orioles game worsens

A University of Maryland Medical Center official says the condition of a man injured in a fight and fall at an Orioles game has worsened.

MLB seeks to suspend A-Rod, Braun

This’ll go over as well as a Frey Family wedding.

Major League Baseball will seek to suspend about 20 players connected to the Miami-area clinic at the heart of an ongoing performance-enhancing drug scandal, including Alex Rodriguez and Ryan Braun, possibly within the next few weeks, “Outside the Lines” has learned. If the suspensions are upheld, the performance-enhancing drug scandal would be the largest in American sports history.

Tony Bosch, founder of the now-shuttered Biogenesis of ...

Hamilton | Bryce Harper: When it comes to sound medical decisions, he’s not a natural

Time will tell whetherBryce Harper is Roy Hobbs or Bump Bailey, but the Washington Nationals have a chance to shape his legacy more toward “the greatest there ever was” status and less toward running through a wall and killing himself.

Grantland: Keri: Ranking the Best Ballpark Experiences

Ranking them, No. 21-36.  (I guess the rest will come in a future article).  Nine of these are gone, including the entire bottom seven.

Billy Crystal Developing Another Baseball Movie Project!

How do you follow up the comedic blockbuster “Parental Guidance”?

This weekend I was at Pixar for the MONSTERS UNIVERSITY junket, and had a good sit down with Billy Crystal about his work as Mike Wazowski and his film directing.  When I asked him if he wanted to tell another baseball story if he directed again, Crystal replied,

“We’re developing one now of a book that I found in the mid 50’s… it was written in the mid 50s that is a really wonderful unusual baseball novel that ...

Megdal: Carlos Gomez Finds His Groove

Groove Mil Groove/Swing Mil Swing

So what, then, to make of Carlos Gomez, a 6’3”, 215 center fielder, the best in the National League? He’s a power/speed threat on par with anyone in baseball, whose average and home run totals have skyrocketed. And it happened when he stopped listening to years of coaches insisting he hit the ball on the ground, and became the 30-plus home run hitter he says he always thought he could be.

“In 2011, I realized what I wanted to do, to make a change in my ...

Las Vegas: The Mets’ Minor Disaster

“They’re undesirable,” said Dave Rosenfield, a longtime Norfolk (Va.) Tides executive. “Nobody wants them.”

Rosenfield was Norfolk’s general manager when it became the Mets’ Triple-A affiliate in 1969 (it was named Tidewater then) and was still on the job when the Mets left in late 2006. Only a one-hour flight from New York, Norfolk was perfectly suitable for the Mets. And for decades, the two got along well enough.

But Rosenfield said the relationship soured after Jeff Wilpon ...

$weep! Astros ($24 million) Take Four From Angels ($127 million)

It’s obvious that $100 million just doesn’t buy what it used to. That’s the approximate gap in respective payrolls for the 2013 season between the Los Angeles Angels and the Houston Astros, with the ‘Stros bringing up the rear in the major leagues…They’re not getting their money’s worth.

The Astros outscored the Angels 15-8 in the series and won their sixth straight game on the road for the first time since 2005, when they went to the World Series.

Milton Bradley convicted of abusing wife

LOS ANGELES—A jury on Monday convicted former Los Angeles Dodgers outfielder Milton Bradley of abusing his estranged wife.

Bradley, 35, was convicted after a four-week trial of nine misdemeanor counts, including four counts of spousal battery, one count of assault with a deadly weapon and one count of making criminal threats, Los Angeles city attorney’s spokesman Frank Mateljan said. He faces up to 7½ years in jail at his sentencing, which is scheduled for July 2.

Prosecutors said ...

Betzold: Tigers’ defense is letting them down late in games

And a dread of some strange Impemba doom…

For weeks, the Fox Sports Detroit TV announcers kept crowing that the Tigers had the fewest errors in the league, and that proved they must be a great defensive team, as if fielding percentage were a meaningful measure of defensive prowess. It hasn’t been, at least not for the past 30 years, since Bill James arrived on the scene.

It’s really quite simple: in order to be charged with an error, you have to reach a batted ball. And if you have poor ...

Primer Dugout (and link of the day) 6-4-2013

Milwaukee Sentinel, June 4, 1913:

LA CROSSE, Wis., June 3.—Roy Lueth’s fondness for baseball, which caused him to miss a “date” with his sweetheart Saturday night, has caused the police department a great deal of trouble the last two days.
...
Hearing a rumor that Lueth had gone up the Mississippi river in a canoe, the river was dragged on Sunday and Monday for his body. Tuesday morning Lueth showed up and said that Saturday night he had felt an irresistible impulse to go to Chicago and see a ...

Tigers GM Dave Dombrowski eager to help MLB be more diverse

The On-Field Diversity Task Force? This sounds like something Chuck Goggin should be heading up.

Bud Selig has made past efforts to analyze and attack baseball’s problem in drawing African-American players.

A new strategy, unveiled last month by the commissioner, was to name Dave Dombrowski, president and general manager of the Tigers, as chairman of a 17-person committee designed to remedy a growing racial gap in the number of athletes playing baseball and evolving as big-leaguers.

...

Madden: Putting Overbay in right field shows just how desperate struggling Yankees have gotten

But right now what troubles the Yankees and their high command has nothing to do with A-Rod. Rather, it is everything that was troublesome for them back in March when they faced the season with an aging team that was seemingly breaking down everywhere. The loss of Curtis Granderson for the second time, combined with Vernon Wells’ prolonged May slump has opened up the new hole in right field that, against the Indians’ right-handed ace, Justin Masterson, Joe Girardi elected to fill with ...

Yasiel Puig makes throw from warning track to end game with double play

So sick, it makes you wanna…uhh, Yasiel.

Yasiel Puig left his mark on the game in his MLB debut on Monday night. The Cuban prospect went 2-for-4 with two hits batting in the leadoff spot for the Los Angeles Dodgers. He also made a sick throw for a game-ending double play in the ninth.

San Diego Padres outfielder Kyle Blanks was up with Chris Denorfia on first, one out, and the Dodgers leading 2-1. Blanks hit a fly ball to deep right, and Puig made the catch at the warning track. Then, despite ...