Umpire Jordan Baker gaining notice for gum-throwing habit

Jerry Meals just threw up his…lunch.

As if Yasiel Puig, or any other major league outfielder, doesn’t have enough to worry about, add one thing to the list. Umpire Jordan Baker is quickly gaining fame for a pretty gross habit: After each half inning, he turns and throws his chewing gum into the outfield.

The gum-throwing, first reported by Lobshots.com, means that at the end of each game Baker leaves 18 wads of chewing gum in the outfield. Who has to clean this up? You have to bet if an ...

OMNICHATTER for 06/07/2013

For continued Draft Omnichattering, go here.

As super-regionals have begun, you can Omnichatter up the D1 NCAAs over here.

Anyway, full slate of games today. Yeah!

OT: NBA Finals and June thread

Not sure why no one has put up a new thread yet, then I remember that only 10-12 guys here care about the NBA.

we won’t detract from what this site is really about: the IRS and Biogenesis.

Megdal: Jeff Wilpon and the myth of a free-spending Mets winter to come

Megdal’s latest…

So now consider the real winter ahead for the New York Mets owners. They have less than a year to either find a way to pay J.P. Morgan Chase $320 million, or convince the bank to give them more time. And they’ll have to do so with more than just a Fred Wilpon press conference sunnily declaring his money problems a thing of the past. If the bank believes, unlike Standard and Poor’s, that the Mets are on the cusp of profitability, or that a forced sale now will produce less ...

Judge John Hodgman Podcast: Uniform Code of Podcast Justice

Sports! Paul brings the case against his friend Jeremy. Paul loves to wear his favorite baseball team’s gear to games, even when that team isn’t playing the game.

At issue: is it okay to wear a Phillies hat, jersey, t-shirt, and (possibly) pair of crocs to a Dodgers-Reds tilt in Dodger Stadium?

Zuckerman - Harper to see Dr. Andrews for knee

“Everybody says it’s bursitis,” Johnson said. “I thought if he took some anti-inflammatory it would calm it down, but it’s kind of been lingering. When he runs it swells up. He was jogging in the pool it swelled up from that. We’re concerned so we’ll get another opinion on it.”

One possibility Johnson acknowledged was Harper getting the bursa sac removed. His bursitis is due to swelling in the bursa sac in his left knee.

MLB draft was much different when Detroit Tigers’ Jim Leyland was a player

Shiit, when Jim Leyland was a player…Old Gold’s were new.

Leyland received quite a bit less as a catcher in the Tigers’ system in 1963.

“I signed for nothing,” he said. “No bonus, $400 a month. I thought I was the richest son of a ##### you ever saw in your life.

“Don’t get me wrong. It was a big day. But I wouldn’t have been a headline in USA Today.”

...Leyland’s meager bonus and his early paychecks didn’t allow him to splurge on luxuries. Well, except maybe one.

“I think my ...

Author shares tales of DiMaggio brothers

Including the tale of Dom DiMaggio being a HOF.

Dominic DiMaggio, four years younger than Joe, was a top-tier star in his own right, a seven-time American League All-Star centerfielder with the Red Sox (1940-42, 1946-53) and a lifetime .298 hitter. After World War II ended, he surpassed Joe DiMaggio as the league’s outstanding defensive centerfielder.

“I make the case in the book,” Clavin said. “If his name wasn’t DiMaggio, he’d be in the Hall of Fame.”

...But in some respects, ...

Alex Rodriguez issues statement

Just as Jason Keidel issued his! “Have Any Dignity Left, A-Rod? Retire Today And Don’t Come Back”

Alex Rodriguez said Thursday he is not ready to talk about the alleged connection between him and the founder of a Miami-area clinic at the heart of an ongoing performance-enhancing drug scandal in Major League Baseball.

“Myself and others are being mentioned in a media report before the process is even concluded,” Rodriguez said in a statement. “I would hope this thing would follow the ...

CBS: Catching Up With Bobby Valentine

“I think we’ve shot ourselves in the foot”...Hey, stop lifting my R. Budd Selig material!

TA: This scandal, involving Biogenesis in Miami.  How damaging is this to the game overall?

BV: I think our entire posture on this situation has damaged the game.  I think it’s been handled poorly from the start, whenever the start was.  I don’t know when guys starting using performance-enhancing drugs in baseball, but I would think that it was about the same time that they were being used in other ...

Schultz: Strasburg injury reaffirms Nats blew it last year

The Big Train to The Karma Train…Washington has it all!

We’re barely into June and the Braves already hold an eight-game lead over the Washington Nationals, the team that had been given the most likely chance to win the National League East and the pennant. This doesn’t guarantee that the Braves are going to win the East. But it does somewhat reaffirm how dumb the Nationals were to all but drop kick a potential World Series season last year.

...The Strasburg effect? Nothing is certain, but ...

Angels order fan to take paper bag off his head

Nice try, El Hombre.

Henry Bouldin could not bear to watch the Angels, not after the team was swept by the lowly Houston Astros.

So, as he sat behind home plate for Tuesday’s game against the Chicago Cubs, the Angels fan wore a paper bag over his head.

Until the seventh inning, that is, when the Angels ordered him to take it off.

“Security just showed up out of nowhere,” Bouldin said Wednesday. “They said you can’t wear anything over your head.”

That indeed is the Angels’ policy, team ...

MLB: Ichiro embraces magnitude of 4,000 hits

Ichiro Suzuki is about to join the pantheon of the baseball gods on a statistical plateau only two other players have passed: 4,000 hits.

Including his infield single in the Yankees’ 6-4 victory over the Indians on Wednesday at Yankee Stadium, Ichiro needs only 67 to match that lofty level.

Considering his legendary durability, it will happen sometime during the months ahead, certainly before the end of the season. True, Ichiro gets there by combining the hits he accumulated playing for ...

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

Pittsburgh Gazette Times, June 6, 1913:

Pitcher Hopper, the New England right-hander, who has pitched two no-hit games and who is sought by the Cardinals…is probably the only pitcher in baseball who has the reputation of having been sold for a dog.

[Roger Bresnahan] decided that Hopper wasn’t worthy of a trial, and…[Dick Kinsella], who was then owner of the Springfield Three-I League team needed pitchers, [so] Bresnahan offered Hopper to him. They could not agree on a price until Kinsella ...

Anthony Bosch asked A-Rod for money before turning to MLB

Bosch needed funds to mount a defense against MLB’s once-pending lawsuit against him, but Rodriguez turned him down.

At that point, the Daily News reports, Bosch and MLB agreed to collaborate.

“They (MLB) were afraid someone else would pay him,” a source told the Daily News. “Bosch is the only guy that can provide them with what they need.”

In exchange for his cooperation, MLB will reportedly be “dropping the lawsuit MLB filed against him earlier this year and paying his legal bills, ...

Strauss: Cards’ offense taking a different route

How is St. Louis fending off the Reds and Pirates? Grinding, says hitting coach John F. Mabry.

Mabry uses terms like “process” and “grinding” almost interchangeably. Mind-set is as important to success as technique.

Mabry knows that style carries lots of weight in a market that loves to reminisce about Whitey-ball, which was played on a rug with lots of fast guys, two elements this club no longer boasts. (Nobody in the NL has attempted fewer steals than the Cardinals’ 17.) The new ...

Mets pound Nationals behind Byrd’s 2 HR, Gee impresses again

For the second straight night, a Mets pitcher fighting for his job made a strong case, but this time the struggling offense delivered for him.

Dillon Gee made a strong case to keep his spot in the rotation and the Mets jumped on some shaky pitching as they beat the Nationals 10-1 Wednesday night.

OMNICHATTER for 06/06/13

You can find the Draft OMNICHATTER here, although I don’t think anybody would complain if you threw in any major news or selections from it- just try to keep it primarily in that thread.

Anyway, 11 games today, with the first game (Rays at Tigers) at 1:08 PM.

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 ...