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Baseball Primer Newsblog— The Best News Links from the Baseball Newsstand
Monday, December 26, 2011
The postseason edition of trivia and oddbits that Jayson Stark excels at collecting and presenting…
Here’s one I didn’t know: All four teams that advanced to the LCS—the Cardinals, Brewers, Rangers and Tigers—got outscored by the teams they played in the Division Series … and won.
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1. ERROR---Jolly Old St. NickNot according to Pythagoras, they didn't!
So what?
When did this happen? 'Der_K' seemed like one of the more reasonable voices around here.
I find him amusing.
I vote that we replace " -- you guessed it -- Frank Stallone." with " -- who else? -- Octavio Dotel.".
Not f###### strange at all.
Yeah, that one was bizarre. It may not be common, but it's hardly surprising. It's probably only slightly rarer than having two teams face each other in the first series of the season and the first series of the post season. If Arizona had opened the season at Milwaukee, it likely would have been Kennedy vs Gallardo just like in game one of the LDS.
Get back to me when a team advances to the LCS without winning the LDS. :-)
Not f###### strange at all.
Yeah, you're probably better off following your own advice there Bob.
In a related story, I do not read Jayson Stark's pieces.
I mean not every nugget of information has to be useful/analytical. Some of it is just fun tidbits.
I'll bite: which of them are fun tidbits?
This one:
Oh..and Hidecki Okajima gave up a HR on his first pitch and his last pitchs of 2007.
Every one. Some are more fun than others, some might be trying to hard etc. But yes there were a lot of fun tidbits for those people who actually enjoy watching a baseball game, and carrying on a conversation with their neighbor, without making it all about roids, or Ichiro or how little everyone else knows about the game.
I really liked the one about Chris Carpenter has gone 174 consecutive starts(most in the live ball era) without allowing three runs in the first inning, and then of course he did.
I always enjoy a Jayson Stark tidbit column, I think you have to be a real 'grinch' to not enjoy them, assuming you are a baseball fan.
Or like the news stories about the babies that are born on Christmas or New Years. Well, there are a finite number of days in a year; did people expect that no babies would be born on these days?
no, but the purpose of many of those stories is to bring a particular plight to light by starting with a hook.
I find it oddly interesting that one of the people killed in Arizona, was a girl born on 9-11-01, who is the grandaughter of Dallas Green. It's a bunch of coincendances that creates a unique hook on a tragedy.
During the season a team wins a game and another team loses a game. Who really cares about that? it happens as often as 15 times a day?
Oh, I've been grumpy w/ my being kind of a lousy reader and poster here over the last month or two - nothing a lot more sleep won't cure - and tweaked my screen name a few days back to remind me to shut up more often.
Anyway, I like you too; thanks for the kind words.
****
I'd defend Stark here, but there's no need. This isn't an attempt at analysis - it's a pile of coincidences and trivia. Some of it's interesting, some of it less so. As suggested in the intro, I think he's better at this sort of thing than most other people who do it regularly.
(I also like Jaffe/Dag Nabbit's THT stuff d'jour columns (among others), which are a slightly different animal.)
**George Washington and Benedict Arnold, of course. Knowing Stern, it may have had to do with an argument they had over which of them had invented baseball.
Each one of those murders was senseless and tragic. That "unique" hook is a mere set of events without any causal connection that does not add to the significance, for me.
To Ray's point about birthdays, it takes a group of only 23 people for the chance of two people in a group sharing a birthday (month & day only) to be greater than 50%. There's a fun tidbit to consider when looking at a baseball team's 25-man roster in your scorecard.
EDIT: On the 40-man roster, it's a 90% chance that two players share a birthday (month & day only).
(Age is presumably B-R age, i.e., as of midnight of June 30.)
There were between 36 and 47 players per team, plus 92 players who had played for more than one team and which I did not take the time to investigate. If I did not make a mistake in sorting and re-sorting the data, here are the birthday pairs by team for 2011:
Player Month Day Year Age Tm
David Hernandez 5 13 2011 26 ARI
Robby Hammock 5 13 2011 34 ARI
J.C. Boscan 12 26 2011 31 ATL
Mike Minor 12 26 2011 23 ATL
Blake Davis 12 22 2011 27 BAL
Chris Jakubauskas 12 22 2011 32 BAL
Zach Britton 12 22 2011 23 BAL
Felix Doubront 10 23 2011 23 BOS
John Lackey 10 23 2011 32 BOS
Marlon Byrd 8 30 2011 33 CHC
Sean Marshall 8 30 2011 28 CHC
------------------------------
Jeff Stevens 9 5 2011 27 CHC
Tyler Colvin 9 5 2011 25 CHC
Miguel Cairo 5 4 2011 37 CIN
Sam LeCure 5 4 2011 27 CIN
Joe Smith 3 22 2011 27 CLE
Justin Masterson 3 22 2011 26 CLE
---------------------------------
Michael Brantley 5 15 2011 24 CLE
Rafael Perez 5 15 2011 29 CLE
Edgar Gonzalez 2 23 2011 28 COL
Wilin Rosario 2 23 2011 22 COL
------------------------------
Ian Stewart 4 5 2011 26 COL
Jorge De La Rosa 4 5 2011 30 COL
Carlos Guillen 9 30 2011 35 DET
Danny Worth 9 30 2011 25 DET
Chris Coghlan 6 18 2011 26 FLA
Steve Cishek 6 18 2011 25 FLA
Jason Michaels 5 4 2011 35 HOU
Robinson Cancel 5 4 2011 35 HOU
----------------------------------
Fernando Rodriguez 6 18 2011 27 HOU
J.B. Shuck 6 18 2011 24 HOU
----------------------------------
Brett Wallace 8 26 2011 24 HOU
Xavier Cedeno 8 26 2011 24 HOU
----------------------------------
J.A. Happ 10 19 2011 28 HOU
Jordan Lyles 10 19 2011 20 HOU
Jeff Francis 1 8 2011 30 KCR
Jeff Francoeur 1 8 2011 27 KCR
----------------------------------
Jesse Chavez 8 21 2011 27 KCR
Tim Collins 8 21 2011 21 KCR
Jeff Mathis 3 31 2011 28 LAA
Peter Bourjos 3 31 2011 24 LAA
Jon Garland 9 27 2011 31 LAD
Vicente Padilla 9 27 2011 33 LAD
----------------------------------
Hector Gimenez 9 28 2011 28 LAD
Jerry Sands 9 28 2011 23 LAD
Jeremy Reed 6 15 2011 30 MIL
Michael Fiers 6 15 2011 26 MIL
----------------------------------
Mark DiFelice 8 23 2011 34 MIL
Zach Braddock 8 23 2011 23 MIL
----------------------------------
Logan Schafer 9 8 2011 24 MIL
Mike Rivera 9 8 2011 34 MIL
Chris Parmelee 2 24 2011 23 MIN
Nick Blackburn 2 24 2011 29 MIN
----------------------------------
Kevin Slowey 5 4 2011 27 MIN
Matt Tolbert 5 4 2011 29 MIN
----------------------------------
Danny Valencia 9 19 2011 26 MIN
Scott Baker 9 19 2011 29 MIN
Chris Young 5 25 2011 32 NYM
Scott Hairston 5 25 2011 31 NYM
----------------------------------
Jonathon Niese 10 27 2011 24 NYM
Pedro Beato 10 27 2011 24 NYM
Ruben Tejada 10 27 2011 21 NYM
Ivan Nova 1 12 2011 24 NYY
Luis Ayala 1 12 2011 33 NYY
Brian Fuentes 8 9 2011 35 OAK
Graham Godfrey 8 9 2011 26 OAK
----------------------------------
Gio Gonzalez 9 19 2011 25 OAK
Joey Devine 9 19 2011 27 OAK
Domonic Brown 9 3 2011 23 PHI
Juan Perez 9 3 2011 32 PHI
----------------------------------
David Herndon 9 4 2011 25 PHI
Michael Stutes 9 4 2011 24 PHI
----------------------------------
Brandon Moss 9 16 2011 27 PHI
Michael Martinez 9 16 2011 28 PHI
Kyle Phillips 4 3 2011 27 SDP
Luis Martinez 4 3 2011 26 SDP
----------------------------------
Aaron Harang 5 9 2011 33 SDP
Chase Headley 5 9 2011 27 SDP
----------------------------------
Ernesto Frieri 7 19 2011 25 SDP
Evan Scribner 7 19 2011 25 SDP
Aaron Laffey 4 15 2011 26 SEA
Milton Bradley 4 15 2011 33 SEA
----------------------------------
Josh Lueke 12 5 2011 26 SEA
Justin Smoak 12 5 2011 24 SEA
Darren Ford 10 1 2011 25 SFG
Matt Cain 10 1 2011 26 SFG
Adam Russell 4 14 2011 28 TBR
Kyle Farnsworth 4 14 2011 35 TBR
----------------------------------
Alex Cobb 10 7 2011 23 TBR
Evan Longoria 10 7 2011 25 TBR
Endy Chavez 2 7 2011 33 TEX
Scott Feldman 2 7 2011 28 TEX
----------------------------------
Adrian Beltre 4 7 2011 32 TEX
Brett Tomko 4 7 2011 38 TEX
Darin Mastroianni 8 26 2011 25 TOR
Jayson Nix 8 26 2011 28 TOR
----------------------------------
Jose Bautista 10 19 2011 30 TOR
Rajai Davis 10 19 2011 30 TOR
Ian Desmond 9 20 2011 25 WSN
Steve Lombardozzi 9 20 2011 22 WSN
----------------------------------
Adam LaRoche 11 6 2011 31 WSN
Atahualpa Severino 11 6 2011 26 WSN
None of this stuff is significant, it's all just fun. You seem offended by that. Not everything needs meaning, sometimes times just a little meaningless fun is enjoyable.
Including Isaac Newton, Pud Galvin, and Humphrey Bogart.
And to be vaugely baseball related ... the troubador and beer maker for whom the Marlins former stadium was briefly named.
Actually, it makes for a great bar bet -- I've won a round of drinks several times with it and only once got skunked. I forget the numbers and percentages - but as I recall, you don't have to bump the number of people up all that much (35 people, I think?) to get the chances in the 90s.
And BTW -- 11/11/11 was the anniversary of my birth...
So what?
And it's not always terrifically written either. The line, "...the winning pitcher in both of those losses was -- who else? -- Octavio Dotel..." is sort of nonsense. It's not like Dotel is Anthony Young, where you'd be particularly shocked to hear that he was the one who won those 2 games. He could have discussed the incident in question, then mentioned that the win went to Dotel, then talked about the only other time it happened. Then he could have said, "And the winning pitcher in that game--who else?--Octavio Dotel!"
Or he could have just written it the same way he did and ended with, ""...those 2 events happened XXX years apart, against two different teams, but had the same winning pitcher: Octavio Dotel!"
(Exclamation points are very important to good writing, apparently.)
That's perfectly reasonable. There seems to be a bitterness coming from a couple of people that is in excess of what the column is meant to be. Being upset that this piece doesn't have meaning is like being upset that American Idol is not as good as Hamlet. It's not trying to be genius, it's just "stuff some people find interesting."
I would agree with this, though I would add that "these" in that sentence can refer to just about anything (historical, statheady, business, etc.).
Not f###### strange at all.
Out of curiousity, when is the last time it happened? Scanning back I don't see it happening since 2000.
God, it must have been miserable to be a Rangers fan that day.
Actually, the people who seem offended are those who like the Stark columns.
And Ron Washington, the man who made it all possible, will be back in 2012.
So why would you imagine that your opinion of these columns would interest anyone else?
He's posting it in an online forum, basically completely based on the idea that posting your opinions and reading other peoples is fun? Just a guess, I mean I could be wrong ... the site could be for posting facts and becomming enraged by them.
Happy New Year everyone.
That's why it was no surprise to see Beato close out Niese's Game 7 win this year with a K to Thole's mitt on the 25th anniversary.... wait, what?
*The schedule makers used to schedule opponents for opening series fairly strictly within divisions IIRC.
*The WC playoff rule used to be that no two teams in the same division could play each other in an LDS.
So, as I understand it, the scheduling rules themselves minimized the odds of such an occurence.
I don't understand why none of Jayson Stark's factual tidbits are fun to read, but Ray's content-free opinions are fun to read.
Of course, that's just my opinion. I don't expect any of you to have fun reading it.
I don't think schedule-making has changed much since the introduction of three-division play, or at least since the rapid adoption thereafter of the unbalanced schedule. Teams tend to open against division opponents, though at least one team from the ALs East and Central and NL's East and West must play outside the division to open the season, and often more than that do.
It still is (at least until the two WC system).
The odds that two teams would open both the regular season and the postseason in the same stadium and each using the exact same starting pitcher have to be somewhat slim (for a variety of reasons, the team's opening day starter probably isn't its Game 1 playoff starter more than half the time). It's not amazing by any stretch, but the observation of it isn't worthy of hostility either, by my reckoning.
Put another way; it IS ####### strange.
Baseball threads...
... and political threads.
Nice job of summing up BTF, Mouse.
I didn 't say Ray WAS fun to read, I just answered why he would think they might be, on a site designed for just such.
For the life of me I will never understand people who complain about other's postings, complain about articles linked to, and so on when no one is forcing them to read either and skipping articles and ignoring (either old fashioned ignoring or high tech Ignoring) other posters is so easy.
I of course never ignore posters, because, well I read the post generally without reading who it is from (a fair amount of the time I can tell though, and Ray is one of those I can guess with depressing frequency) and I find even posters I agree with nearly 100% of the time (The Good Face, SBB, and others) surprise me especially on the oddball topics - and I enjoy being surprised by life.
Mostly though I was just lightly tweaking the person who posted their question, and I am not trying to annoy you, and as such am not aiming this post at you, but into the BBTF aether as it were.
Happy New Year.
#### Ray, how many visits from the Ghost of Christmas Future do you need before you get the point?
I would rather read Ray's grocery list than a Jayson Stark piece. Hell, I'd rather read your posts than a Jayson Stark piece.
I'd rather read the Jayson Stark piece.
can someone give this a shot?
Not only do those people share the distinction of having been born on Christmas, but they have also never been in my kitchen.
So Rickey Henderson didn't make the first list because he has been in your kitchen?
Ack. Even posters I do not agree with. Sigh. Stupid multi-tasking while typing in English. Oh well. It still kind of makes sense.
But about Ray's grocery list, ummm, no.
Or maybe it's just the way the internet works that makes us all seem autistic.
For example he is convinced he has no friends. He has his brother and people he goes to school with and children of my friends, but no one he considers a friend. He is also the nicest person I know, always looking out for his brother and others. He also never lies - though he has figured out lies exist, he just doesn't do it well and so never does.
I'm am not answering your question (not that I could, or that it was addressed to me) but I suspect it is impossible to diagnose anything like Autism via internet postings. But hey, Ray, if you are, you are in very good company.
was you ever bit by a dead bee?
I take a similar approach to history. I enjoy the colourful coincidences of history that don't carry much significance, but I would never include them in an academic piece. They're just fun little tid bits that make up the tapestry that is baseball. Sure, if someone assigns some analytical meaning to them, they'd be wrong, but that doesn't mean they're not interesting to know. Personal mileage may vary, but I don't quite get anyone who feels the need to shoot them down. Seems like the definition of a wet blanket.
EDITED due to all the drinking.
Me neither.
DB
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