OT: The Soccer Thread, December 2013

Some December highlights:

December 2nd: Lazio v Napoli
December 3rd: Upstart Lille v Marseille and Palace v West Ham
December 4th: Man U v Everton
December 6th: World Cup Draw, Bologna v Juventus
December 7th: MLS CHAMPIONSHIP, SKC v RSL, Man U v Newcastle, FA Cup second round proper matches, Napoli v Udinese, Dortmund v Leverkusen
December 8th: Arsenal v Everton, Roma v Fiorentina
December 9th: Swansea v Hull
December 10th: Man U v Shakhtar Donetsk, Galatasaray v Juventus, FC Hollywood v Man ...

Father Gabe Costa: Who Will Be Elected To The Baseball Hall Of Fame In 2014?

Father Gabe Costa doesn’t have a HOF vote…and the father away the better!

I have listed a number “interesting” eligible candidates on this year’s lists. I have included the number of years for which they have been under consideration (just for the BBWAA), a bullet comment or two and listed a “Prediction Grade for Election in 2014” which is calibrated as follows:

A = Definite Election…if not this year, then in the very near future

B = Possible Election…if not this year, then ...

Curt Schilling and Howard Eskin Got into a Vicious Twitter War Over the Weekend

Curt Schilling and Howard Eskin love pissing on each other. In January, Eskin attacked Schilling’s HOF credentials and Schilling called Eskin a jackass.

This weekend, their ongoing disagreement bubbled over into new territory. A confusing Twitter war commenced when Eskin again took aim at Schilling’s credentials. Schill responded. And many followers chimed in, sending the argument into strange territories.

I’ve done my best to curate the conversation into a coherent exchange. Do enjoy

...Read More...

Repoz Posted: December 02, 2013 at 10:18 AM | 63 comment(s)
  Beats: hof, phillies

Gregg Zaun: World Series Champion, Analyst, and helping families in need

Okay…so the analyst bit was a reach.

GZ: I think the game has deteriorated fundamentally. High-level players are rushed to the bigs too soon. They don’t get enough reps in the minors anymore. Just look at the bunting and the inability to command the fastball. Pitchers who throw 95 are out there trying to trick guys and end up with Tommy John surgery from throwing too many sliders, etc. Players focus on the areas of their games which get them paid.

...GZ: Don’t assume that a veteran is ...

Primer Dugout (and link of the day) 12-2-2013

Washington Herald, December 2, 1913:

Eli Cates, pitcher of the Indianapolis Federal League team, had his right hand torn off in a corn shredder. The accident happened on the farm of Cates’ uncle near [Greenfork, Indiana]. Cates, who pitched with his right hand, was one of the mainstays of the Indianapolis club last season.

Yowch.

U.S.S. Mariner: The Nelson Cruz Inevitability

Nelson rules…where a greater variation of teams would be expected.

Offers being equal, the Mariners wouldn’t be the pick of many players. But there’s reason to believe that, with Cruz, the offers won’t be equal, and if the Mariners blow away the competition, Cruz would have to take a significant hit to go somewhere else. Before Byrd, maybe the Phillies would’ve been the team most likely to save the Mariners from themselves, but now they’ve already acquired an alternative and the ...

NY Post: Ca-no money left for Robbie?

Here is a question Robinson Cano and his advisors have to at least take into consideration as they attempt to find common ground with the Yankees:

What happens if the Yankees spend their dollars elsewhere and they are no longer in the market for the five-time All Star? [...]

Seattle is thought to be a dark horse-team for Cano, but the Mariners don’t figure to contend in the AL West with or without Cano. Since Cano left Scott Boras for Jay Z because he believed the mega entertainment star ...

OT: NBA Monthly Thread - December 2013

The Starters:

let me just tell you that I’ve found the best possible gift for any basketball fan: basketball-printed and basketball net-printed leggings... Even better, both the ball and net leggings have matching t-shirts to go along with them. Personally, I’d pair the basketball shirt with the hoop leggings, since it’d give you the appearance of being a gigantic human basketball going in to an elongated human rim, but that’s just me. At just $150 per pair of leggings — and $175 ...

Rockies owner provides detailed look at team’s budget

[Monfort] also explained why he isn’t about to spend all that new TV money next year. He said he is planning to receive $8 million less, or $19 million, believing a chunk will be kept for baseball’s central fund to compensate for last season

...The $18 million is additionally siphoned, Monfort explained, to pay $5.5 million to the MLB credit line for past loans, $5 million for player raises and $3.5 million to cover projected revenue loss from not having the Yankees and the Red Sox play at ...

[OTP-Dec 2013] Toronto Sun: Politics, baseball and Star Trek 2

When I read Aristotle’s ethics in undergrad it initially struck me as odd that one of the later chapters was on friendship. Why include such a frivolous topic in a book of such gravitas?

But it soon became clear to me the reason we debate, for example, roads and public transit isn’t because there is some inherent value in it. But because it gets us to work, or to the baseball game. Politics has no inherent value. Enjoying baseball and beer with friends on a weekend afternoon does.

This is ...

Tangotiger: Jack Morris will make the Hall of Fame

And probably Lee Smith will as well.

The player with the highest share of ballots to not (eventually) make the Hall of Fame was Gil Hodges, at 63% of votes at his peak.  Jack Morris received 68% last year.  He’d be the new leader.  But he won’t be for long, because the Veteran’s Committee will vote him in eventually.

After Hodges (*), second place is Tony Oliva at 47%.  Do you know what this means?  It means it’s completely ridiculous to make a player need 75% of the votes.  As soon ...

Murray Chass On Baseball: VOTE DELAYED IS STILL A VOTE

Bacne-of-the-envelope miscalculation.

The packet of information for the writers’ vote for the Hall of Fame arrived in the mail, and if it had included an actual ballot, I would have immediately marked an X next to Jack Morris, whose name appears for the last time of his 15-year eligibility.

(Omission of the ballot was to be rectified this week.)

The 254-game winner received 67.7 percent of the vote a year ago, the highest of his 14 years, but he was 42 votes short of the number he needed ...

Gammons: The new generation of shortstops

Now, as we (hopefully) ease out of the so-called Steroid Era into what Bud Selig hopes is simply the return to real baseball era, there are six young shortstops we will likely see arrive this season that could soon make this a golden era at the position.

–One, the Rangers’ Jurickson Profar, will probably play second base and team with Elvis Andrus, who in case you missed it, had the fourth best Wins Above Replacement of any shortstop in 2013. “His instincts and hitting skills should make ...

Balasis: Wilpon’s Brick and Mortar Failure

And here I thought Baseball Bill Denehy had a lot of rage…

In Fred Wilpon’s almost quaint and tragic desire to restore an Ebbets Field to the N.Y. landscape, his dream of building a new stadium resulted in the debt riddled quagmire he’s still mired in. He assumed property would always appreciate, he believed cash would always be at the ready, he predicted everything would work as it had during his real estate heyday, but not only did he assume wrong on every one of those counts, he lost ...

Twins sign Phil Hughes for $24 million over three years

Phil Hughes will join Ricky Nolasco in a rebuilt Twins rotation, according to La Velle E. Neal III of the Minneapolis Star-Tribune, agreeing to a three-year, $24 million contract on Saturday.

Hughes, the winter’s youngest free agent at age 27, is coming off a rough season in which he went 4-14 with a 5.19 ERA in 29 starts and one relief appearance for the Yankees. Getting out of Yankee Stadium and it’s shallow right field porch should do him a whole lot of good, though it’s not like ...

BtBS: Replacing setup men with “openers”

Starting pitchers aren’t as effective a couple of times through the order, bullpens are getting bigger, and outings are getting a little bit shorter. It’s all part of the continuing shift in baseball away from the rotation, and toward the bullpen.

So let’s stop burying the lede and get it out of the way: I think it couldn’t hurt for teams to experiment with a new bullpen role. We’ve got closers ... I think there’s a good reason at this point to add in the role of the “opener.” ...Read More...

bobm Posted: November 30, 2013 at 05:23 PM | 31 comment(s)
  Beats: bullpen, pitching, rotation

Hall of Stats: The Interactive 2014 Hall of Fame Ballot

This is my fourth year creating the Interactive Hall of Fame ballot—a ballot with “bullseye” visualizations of every player on the ballot. You can drag the visuals around to compare players to each other.

The outer ring represents Wins Above Replacement (WAR, or an approximate measure of the player’s career value) while the inner ring represents Wins Above Average (WAA, or an approximate measure of the player’s peak value).

Mitchell: Jhonny Peralta and PED Inconsistency From Major League Baseball

Or as Hochman rabbled…“There are a lot more Aardsmas than Peraltas.” Gee, not according to my census book.

Peralta’s signing also indicates that the Cardinals believe that Peralta not only has served his time, so to speak, but that he is capable of performing at a high level even without the steroids. After all, Peralta will face a 100 game suspension if he tests positive again. If Peralta can perform as he has in his better years, this will be a good signing for the Cardinals, but if he ...

Newhan: The 2014 Hall Ballot: Another Blessing

Even old hand Newhan is having trouble with his HOF ballot.

Eligible Hall voters can select 10 players from a ballot of 36.

            I have never reached 10, but 2014 could prove an exception.

            Without being totally definitive at this point, there’s Maddux, Glavine, Thomas, Kent, Mussina, Biggio and my ongoing support of Mike Piazza, in his second year of eligibility, and Jack Morris, needing to jump from 67.7% in his 15th and last year of eligibility.

          ...

Rodriguez: Hechavarria wrong when it comes to going right

HECH!...“According to Baseball Info Solutions, part of the reason the athletically-gifted Adeiny Hechavarria grades out poorly in some defensive metrics is he doesn’t cheat to the hole enough.”

If numbers don’t lie, anyone who hasn’t seen Adeiny Hechavarria play shortstop might think he uses a milk carton for a glove. The eyes say Hechavarria was worthy of Gold Glove consideration. His defensive metrics suggest otherwise.

“I know zone rating,” President of Baseball Operations Michael Hill ...

MLB, MLBPA joint drug report shows Adderall use rising in baseball

Adderall!

Major League Baseball and the Major League Baseball Players’ Association released a joint drug report on Friday, covering the 2012-13 season. Here is the text, courtesy of Nick Cafardo of the Boston Globe:

  The report covers from the 2012 offseason to the end of the 2013 Major League Baseball post-season. The report is specific to Players who compose forty-man rosters for Major League Baseball Clubs.

  1) The total number of drug tests that were conducted for the presence of ...

Royals, GM Dayton Moore Agree to Two Year Contract Extension

Imaginary World Series- completed. Real World Series…?

Since taking over KC, the Royals have had a total record of 552-685 and have yet to make the playoffs or place higher than third in the AL Central.

Gammons: Marlins looking for third, second and catching help

The Marlins have a wealth of young pitchers, starting with Jose Fernandez and 2012 first pick Andrew Heaney, and are presently looking for third base, second base and catching help, as well as some veterans to fill some leadership voids. They have discussed former Dodger second baseman Mark Ellis, who has also been the radar of the Tigers. Despite the fact they drafted former North Carolina third baseman Colin Moran with the sixth pick in the 2013 draft, they approached the Red Sox about their ...

TSL: MLB’s 2014 Hall Of Fame Ballot Was Announced

You know…the one where Jayson Stark is a “funny style cats who need to get a life”.

Lee Smith : Characters of the game have always been embraced by baseball culture. Smith was that and then some. When Smith retired, he was also the leader in career saves with 478. He since has been passed by Trevor Hoffman and Mariano Rivera but still ranks third. Smith reached that number by flexing supreme durability. His 12 straight seasons with at least 60 appearances is still the longest streak in MLB ...

Connolly: Will Rafael Palmeiro fall off the Hall of Fame ballot?

Rafael: La disputa.

The reason is pretty obvious. His failed drug test in 2005 made him a poster boy for cheaters, though he’ll always contend that a tainted vial of liquid vitamin B-12 was responsible for the steroid stanozolol ending up in his system.

Hall of Fame voters didn’t buy that excuse, or they didn’t care. In his first year of eligibility, Palmeiro received 64 votes and was named on 11 percent of all submitted ballots. In 2012, he got a slight bump, to 72 votes and 12.6 ...

Chass: A DIFFERENT LABOR CHIEF

The children “adored” Michael Weiner, the retired rabbi related. That would be Mr. Weiner the Sunday school teacher. He was also the fellow who headed the baseball players’ union until his death from brain cancer Nov. 21, but it’s highly unlikely that many of his union members knew him as the teacher of fourth and fifth graders at the Jewish Center of Northwest Jersey in Washington, N.J.michael-weiner-225

Rabbi Ellen Lewis, who recently retired after 19 years at the temple, told me ...

Ted Lilly To Retire

Theodore Roosevelt will no longer be the man in the arena.

Also, another Expo down…

Left-hander Ted Lilly’s comeback attempt has stalled due to persistent shoulder and back pain, and the 15-year veteran is set to announce his retirement from professional baseball, he told Andreina Salas Guzman Venezuelan news outlet El Universal (Spanish link)...

Lilly, 37, recently had nerve endings in the right side of his neck cauterized in an attempt to alleviate neck pain that had been hampering his ...

Murray Chass: MISERABLE METS THREATEN CLUBS’ SCHEME

The New York Mets think they are so smart, but they are really so dumb. The Mets, playing a late-season version of the major league service time manipulation game, cheated shortstop Ruben Tejada out of a day on the major league roster when they recalled him from the minors in September.

While other minor leaguers they called up at the same time joined the Mets immediately, the Mets told Tejada to stay in his New York apartment and they would let him know when they wanted him at Citi Field. ...

Ed Sherman: Will scumbag who sold Hall of Fame vote to Deadspin actually reveal identity?

Dunno about that…but Jack O’Connell probably just rushed out and bought a load of Church & Dwight Co. stock!

Oh really? A person actually is going to step forward and explain why he/she took on this noble crusade?

I’d be surprised if that occurs. The criticism already is fairly intense. Labeling this voter a “scumbag” actually is fairly tame considering what is being said elsewhere.

Also, if this voter was so intent on exposing the process, why did he/she have to sell the vote to ...

Baseball free agents interested in Mets inquiring about big Citi Field dimensions, reps say

Curse of dimensionality strikes again!

The Mets may have changed the dimensions of Citi Field, but they have yet to change its reputation. The cavernous park was altered after the 2011 season, the outfield walls brought in closer to home plate, but the perception that it is a park where power hitters go to die at the warning track is seemingly still out there.

Two agents representing players the Mets have talked to this offseason admitted privately that the ballpark’s reputation is ...