The Mendoza Line - Fantastic Four

Image via VintageSeattle

Take a look at that guy?

Mario Mendoza was a player back in the late 70's, early 80's.  Defensively, he was serviceable at shortstop.  Offensively, not so much.  His career average was .215 with zero pop (only 4 HR).  All too often today, the "Mendoza Line" is a barometer for the ineptitude of a hitter. Although he only had more than 100 at-bats in 4 of his 9 seasons, Mendoza managed to hit over his own line in three of those four years.  The only other time batting over .200 was when he his .218 in 1978 with the Pirates, in just 55 at-bats.  He peaked with the Mariners in 1980 and 1981, putting together back-to-back seasons where he batted .245 and .231, respectively.

With those numbers in mind, there are currently four players in the majors (who are qualified to be among the league leaders in batting average) hitting below the Mendoza Line.

Carlos Pena, TB - .194 average - 330 AB - 11 2B - 14 HR - 39 RBI - 121 K
Pena is a career .236 hitter with 272 career HR in 12 seasons.  Tolerable.

Rickie Weeks, MIL - .197 average - 319 AB - 17 2B - 9 HR - 33 RBI - 108 K
Weeks is a career .250 hitter with 118 career HR and 106 career SB in 9 seasons.  Not too bad.

Justin Smoak, SEA - .198 average - 324 AB - 6 2B - 13 HR - 38 RBI - 76 K
Smoak is a career .218 hitter with 41 HR and 272 K, in just his 3rd year in the league.  Ehh.

Cliff Pennington, OAK - .199 average - 281 AB - 13 2B - 3 HR - 16 RBI - 59 K
Pennington is a career .249 hitter in 5 seasons with a .968 fielding percentage.  So what?

Who'd you rather have on your team?  Smoak has the smallest sample size while Pennington might pick it a little on defense, he's a bottom of the order bat, at best.  That leaves Weeks and Pena, two guys with an inordinate amount of strikeouts but both with a little pop.  Pena draws a lot of walks, makes the plays in the field, and stays healthy.  I think Weeks can bring a little more to the table as far as being a dynamic player.  He gets on base, scores runs, creates a little something on the basepaths.  His issue has always been his healthy, however.  But when he's right, the dude's a freak.

Image via Zimbio

The motliest of crews, indeed.  But if you had to twist my arm into taking one, I'm going with Southern University's finest, Rickie Darnell Weeks.

Fernando Rodney - "Best" Closer in 2012

The final was set and decided just now - Rays pitcher Fernando Rodney is the "best" closer in baseball this season.

Due to the fact that the Braves have hit the skids a little bit of late, Craig Kimbrel's run came to an end.

Chris Perez of the Indians has come on like a ball of fire lately and is currently tied for the Major League lead in saves with 16, but he was eliminated in the Round of Eight, by Rodney.

Here's a look at the final bracket.  Rodney has lowered his ERA 0.11 and his WHIP by 0.10 since the Tournament began and has allowed only two baserunners in that span (4 games).

Time to think of something else to chart about. 

CONGRATULATIONS FERNANDO RODNEY!!!

MLB: By the #'s; Nolan: By the #'s

MLB
It's been a pretty wild and unpredictable beginning to the 2012 MLB season.  I'm going to go through some numbers that might surprise you a little bit, or maybe not at all.

• 14 - teams over the .500 mark.  Those who are not in this group - Phillies, Red Sox, Tigers, Giants, Angels
• 8 - teams over the .500 mark that are from either the AL East or NL East, so don't give me your East Coast bias talk
• .397, .380 - Derek Jeter's and David Ortiz' batting average, respectively - aging rather well it seems
• .196 - Albert Pujols' batting average - can he be a bust?
• 2 - teams from the DC/Baltimore area that are in 1st place - the Orioles and Nationals
• 45 - strikeouts by Adam Dunn (in 106 AB's), which is actually on pace for less K's than last year
• .406/12 - batting average and home run total for Matt Kemp, the early favorite for NL MVP
• 11/10 - HR's allowed by Ervin Santana and Clay Buchholz in 38.2 and 32.2 IP, respectively
• 13.50 - ERA of Philip Humber in his three starts since his Perfect Game against the Mariners
• 3 of 7 - starts in which Jered Weaver has actually let up a run, twice against the Twins, the worst team in baseball
• .156 - BAA for two lefties, both at different stages of their careers - Ted Lilly and Gio Gonzalez
• 0 - teams that have reached the 20 win plateau - the Indians were the first to do it in 2011 (20-8) - although four three teams can get there today/tonight (Tampa Bay, Baltimore or Texas, San Francisco)

NOLAN
We're trying a new sleep method for when we put the little guy down to sleep.  We used to rock him until he was asleep then transfer him to the crib but he's getting a little big to rock for thirty minutes.

We put him in the crib awake, lay him down, and sit beside the crib until he falls asleep.  Gradually, we're going to (I hope) get to the point where we can put him in and leave the room immediately.  I think he's going through a little separation anxiety phase so he gets scared when he can't see us putting him to sleep.

It's only been a year and two weeks but it's time for him to grow up a little bit.

I lied in the header, there are no numbers related to Nolan in this post.

Have a good Tuesday.  It's a dreary but dry day so far here in CT.

Day Games

Because I'm a stay at home dad, there are some perks, namely getting to spend all day every day with Nolan.  There is also baseball.

Surprisingly, baseball on television captures Nolan's attention for periods of time.  He'll look at the TV and then back at me as if to say, "What's going on here?" - and it's kind of funny.

Early in the season, there have been plenty of day games for me us to watch.

We watched the Reds walk off on the Cardinals the other day.
The Nationals walked off on the Mets yesterday.

Today I'm flipping between the Angels/Yankees game and the Rays/Red Sox game.  My loyalty to the Yankees runs deep however, and coupled with the fact that I can only take listening to the Red Sox announcers for 60 seconds at most, the Yankees game has remained on 99% of the time - even for commercials.  The Red Sox guys call the players by their first name like they are best buddies.  And their accents I haven't quite warmed up to yet.

I wish MLB Network would put on the Tigers/White Sox game on - through four innings Max Scherzer has 8 K's and through 5 Jake Peavy has 7 K's.  Three hits, 1 HBP, and one caught stealing combined.

Oddities

• Tigers closer Jose Valverde was perfect in save chances last season - 49 for 49.  He blew one this year in his first chance, against the Red Sox.  He did pick up the win, however.
• The Mets are 4-0?  Really?
• The Rays and Padres are the only two teams with a grand slam
• The Padres are hitting .266 in day games compared to .109 in night games
• The Phillies have only 4 extra base hits - Hunter Pence has a 2B and HR, John Mayberry and Freddy Galvis have a 2B each
• The New York Yankees pitching staff has the 2nd worst WHIP at 1.74 (Atlanta is 1.78)
• The Red Sox have the worst ERA in the majors at 6.75
• The Rays are the only team with a BB:K ratio instead of a K:BB ratio
• The Braves and Twins remain the only two teams without a win

Have a great Tuesday, freaks.

Instagram Feature; MLB Opening Weekend

Instagram Feature
If you've been thinking to yourself, "there sure are a lot of pictures on the top of this page" when you check out WRT, you're right, there are.  My Instagram feed is fed right to the blog.

Thanks to the people at Instagram for bringing their platform over to Android.  I can finally snap and shoot photos with my phone and share them with the world.  There's plenty of filter options to make it look like I'm a really good photographer.  I promise not to take pictures of the sky - those are severely played out and have become boring to look at - unless it's a kick ass shot.  And I am not a hipster.

MLB Opening Weekend Storylines
Baseball season is here and so are the premature headlines that are shaping the baseball world.

Here's some shocking stories and some that aren't so shocking.

• SHOCKER - The New York Mets and Baltimore Orioles are both 3-0.  They swept the Braves at Citi Field, holding them to just seven runs while scoring twelve of their own.  Johan Santana was the only starter not to get a W (Niese and Dickey both got W's).  Lucas Duda has two homeruns and David Wright is hitting .667.  For the O's, the pitching has been the story - 5 runs allowed in their three-game sweep in Minnesota.
• NO SHOCK - The World Series champion St. Louis Cardinals are picking up right where they left off and are 3-1.  They beat the Marlins in the first game stateside and then took 2 of 3 from the Prince-less Brewers.  They did all this on the road.  Carlos Beltran looks rejuvenated and Lance Lynn threw an absolute gem, striking out eight Brewers in 6.2 innings on Easter Sunday.
• SHOCKER - Yankees and Red Sox are both 0-3.  The good news for the Bombers is that the last time they started 0-3, they won 114 games and the World Series in 1998.  They got dominated by the Rays, who many experts believe will win the AL East.  Bobby Valentine was hoping to have a better start, but his Red Sox were swept by the Tigers.  They coughed up a ninth-inning lead and an eleventh-inning lead yesterday - you think they miss Papelbon?
• NO SHOCK - The Twins lack of offense.  Justin Morneau, Denard Span, and Josh Willingham are the only three with more than one hit.  Joe Mauer is hitting .100.  Mauer and Morneau are really the only two Twins who can do some damage.  It's going to be a long season in Minnesota.

Some "By The Numbers" stuff.

•  4 - Players with 3 HR's - Yoenis Cespedes, Jay Bruce, Miguel Cabrera, and Corey Hart
• 10 - # of hits for Rafael Furcal, the only player in the majors with double digit hits
• 1 - Duane Below of the Tigers is the only pitcher with 2 wins - both in relief.
• 3 - Saves (2) + Wins (1) for Rays reliever Fernando Rodney, in 1.2 innings pitched
• 2 - Losses by Red Sox reliever Mark Melancon in his 1 inning pitched this season
• .500 - Fielding percentage of Angels 3B Mark Trumbo (3 errors in 6 total chances, in 2 games)
• #8 - Kurt Suzuki has thrown out 3 of 8 runners - the 5 SBA in four games is alarming for the pitchers
• 5 - # of teams sitting at 3-0 as well as teams stuck at 0-3

Let's remember, it's only three games (four for some).  I am not hitting the panic button with the Yankees nor am I anointing the Orioles the favorite in the AL East.  It is what it is, one weekend.  There are still 158/159 games to - buckle up.

Awesome-ness

-- Buffalo Bills WR Steve Johnson - the guy who dropped the pass against the Steelers when he was wide open and said he'd never forget the drop - celebrated his birthday party with a classic cake - of his wife's ass.  Cl-ASS-y cake Steve:

-- Evan Longoria is going for the GOOOOOOOOAAAAAAALLLLLLLLL!  Alex Morgan and he have been tweeting - and it may lead to something more than that.  Two good looking people, nationally recognized (after this WWC thing), both athletes - why not:

-- Wipeout is now on.  Oh Big Balls, have some mercy on these poor bastards:

A New Setup Man in Town

The Yankees got some much needed help today when they added All-Star closer Rafael Soriano to act as setup man for Mariano.

The deal is for three seasons - Soriano is 31 years-old.  Might he be the closer-in-waiting for the Bombers?  If his 2010 season is any indication of what this guy's capable of, things look good in the 9th inning for the future.

Over the past two seasons (2009 in Atlanta, 2010 in Tampa), he's racked up 72 saves, 4 wins, 159 K (only 41 BB) in 138 innings (only 89 hits).  His ERA is low, as you could have guessed - 1.76 to be exact.

They didn't add the ace of the staff, but they have one of those in CC.  Burnett (if he can ever get his shit together) has the stuff to be an ace.  He's as streaky as he is inked up.

About to turn in for the night.  Later troops.

Numbers Game - #12

The only #12 to be inducted into the HOF (as a Devil Ray, no less) - Wade Boggs (SI.com)

Future HOF QB and All-Hair Team QB Tom Brady

Playoff Baseball is Here!!!

  As an appetizer, an ex-Phillie dominated the Tampa Bay Rays in St. Pete.  For an intermezzo, Doc Halladay no-hit the Reds.  NO-HIT.  Understand something - it's only been done once in MLB Playoff history - by NYY great Don Larson.  The Yankees trail the Twins 2-0 in the third inning now, after a leadoff hit by pitch was followed by a 2-R bomb to center field.  Leadoff freebies always come back to bite you in the ass - ask CC.

  A-Rod is still not great.  Clutch he is not.  Yanks get the first two guys on - BB and 1B - and proceed to hit two fly balls and a K from Mr. Rodriguez.  That was the chance to get right back in it, get some of the momentum back.  Instead, a goose egg.  Swisher had the right idea bunting - he gets it down and the next fly ball scores a run.

  Good thing they told him not to bunt - SIKE!

  C.C. needs to settle in here and act like the big donkey he is - be a horse and get some 0's up there to give them a chance.  They've been playing like crap coming down the stretch, and it cost them the division. 

  I am home with Nathan watching the ballgame, missing the Mrs.

  Time to get ready to take Nathan for a stroll in the park - may make a night-time trip to the dog park out back.  Dog loves it over there.

  Sofa, chair-and-a-half, and ottoman are scheduled for delivery tomorrow - it only took Bob's over two weeks to do what I asked them to do.  Never order from them, and if you do, pick it up yourself.  Maybe it's just their customer service department that blows.  You walk in there and get bombarded by 40 sales people looking for a sale - it's like a feeding frenzy.  I'm just happy it's finally going to get delivered, start making this place look like something.  It gets old sitting on the damn floor.

  Time for October baseball.  Let's make it a game Yanks.  Joe Mauer is a good hitter.  A pro.  Damn the Twins are a scrappy team.  Good play Teixeira made, but Hudson's a sneaky little bastard.

  Big AB.  Posada sucks defensively.  I'm out.

  A split on the road is good for me.  Then they gotta continue their domination of the Twins.

moving time; time to move; yanks on the move

  for once, i am at a loss for words and topics.  i am physically drained from all the moving i've done this past week.  boxing up stuff, boxing up more stuff, and carrying some stuff to the garbage.  it seemed to never end, and then today, when it was supposed to pour all day, it didn't really rain so i finished the move relatively easy - with the help of rene ruiz - my trusty assistant.

  now all that's left to do is unpack everything.  and believe me, i plan on getting rid of a fair amount of stuff.  it's a mess in there right now and poor nathan probably feels like he's trapped in a cave, but soon enough it'll start to look like something.

  bob's discount furniture screwed us.  they were supposed to send a certificate of insurance to the new building and never did.  yada yada yada.  i called, complained (to put it lightly) and they give me $75 store credit.  i wanted nothing to do with a store credit, so i had them take the money off my order.  jackasses.

  time for bullpen city.  game this saturday at njit.  let's see how this one goes.  last weekend wasn't all rainbows and lollipops.  we beat pace 8-7 in 17 innings thanks to a 5 run burst in the 17th when we put the starters back in.  time for some of these newcomers to make a move and step up.  some hustle in practice often leads to hustle in games.  that's the sad part, a lot of these guys don't hustle.  it's the easiest thing to do.  drives me nuts.

  yankees clinched a postseason birth for i think the 15th time in 16 years.  they still trail the rays by half a game in the east so hopefully they can finish off the job and take home another pennant.  the rays finish with two games at the lowly royals while the yankees take the trip up the mass pike for a showdown with the hated red sox.  c.c. isn't scheduled to pitch so hopefully the offense (if they all aren't resting) can make up for what they lack on the mound.  it's sad to see how bad the starting pitching drops off after c.c.

  anyway, one-way ticket to bullpen city.

Jays-Yanks; Hold off Earl

  Headed over to the Stadium at around noon or so to catch a matinee between the Blue Jays and the Yankees.  Upstart Ivan Nova takes the hill for the Yanks while Brandon Morrow gets the nod for the Jays.

  Nova is making his third start since being called up from AAA (against TOR and CWS).  He's 1-0 with a 1.93 ERA. 

  Morrow has some electric stuff, 174 K's in 143.1 IP.  He's struck out 21 Yankees  in his two August starts against the Bombers (12 in a ND and 9 in a W).  This is a guy who struck out 17 in a one-hitter vs. Tampa on August 8th.  Surprisingly enough, his double-digit K games versus the Yankees and Rays are his only two of the year (he's had 11 other games on 8+ K). 

  They've seen Morrow before.  Just gotta figure him out and put the ball in play and anything can happen.  Toronto is 8th in the MLB  in fielding percentage (NYY are 4th).  Toronto is looking to play spoiler.

  Nova can't let MLB HR-leader Jose Bautista beat him.  He pitches well, the Yankees can open up a 2 game lead over 2nd-place TB (who visits the lowly Orioles tonight). 

  Hurricane Earl should hold off a little bit today, I'm hopeful.  It's a hell of a lot cooler outside, still muggy as shit, but you can't always get what you want.  Stay away Earl!!

  11pm Friday it should hit the NYC area.  That's tonight, for all you meteorologists.  We're the 2nd to last stop on the Earl Train.  From what I hear, they're preparing for a natural disaster off the Massachusetts coast.  Hope it's an over-reaction.  Earl needs to cool it.

  OK, time to get some stuff done.  Breakfast is the first order of business.

No TV

  Day 10 of no program television is now upon us.  Things are going well, besides not being able to check out some high quality prime-time shows (all of Lindsay's shows, plus MLB baseball, SportsCenter, American Pickers, Pawn Stars to name a few).

  Netflix has come in handy as of late, movies come and go on about a three day schedule.  We watched Step Brothers the other night, hilarious freaking movie.  Lindsay's first viewing, my second.  Still entertaining.  Will Ferrell has to be one of the funniest actors alive.  Hands down.  Then we sent away for Up In The Air.  George Clooney is awesome in that one, and I'm not generally a huge fan.  But the premise was great, it was funny, and it had won awards out the ass.  I say those awards were well deserved.  Two nights ago, Jesse came over for dinner with me, Linds, and Nathan because Julia was in St. Maarten with her sister.  We ate, and watched JUNO.  Same director (Jason Reitman) as Up In The Air, and just as funny if not funnier.  The language is hilarious, the words they use.  If you haven't seen JUNO, go see it.  It also won plenty of awards from the press and media.  Well deserved.  Just because DirecTV sucks the big one doesn't mean they can damper my television viewing experience.  I still got DVD's sucker!!

  On the baseball, the Yankees are once again tied with the Rays for first place in the AL East.  Both teams share the best record in baseball (78-48) but the Red Sox are still hovering, only six games back.

  Lindsay kicked my ass at Scrabble last night, 296-216.  What an absolute drubbing it was.  I was out of it from my third turn.  I had seven consecutive turns where I had at least 5 vowels on my rack.  Needless to say, 1-point letters when your down 50 points are useless.

  It's getting muggy in the office, per usual.  I share my office with the entire student-athlete population, so the traffic is high and some of the odors are pretty horrific.  Gonna take a stroll and take care of some things on campus.  Meeting with broker today - hope things work out for this new place.

  Fingers crossed. 

Break Time

   First of all, LeBron James is a bag of expletives.  Go after a title on a team where you're the man, not one head of a three headed monster.  Way to wimp out.

   Now that the MLB season has reached the All-Star break, I want to take a look at some of the top stories, as far as I'm concerned, in the first half.

   1.  Friar Power.  The San Diego Padres are 14 games over .500 (they were 75-87 last year) and up by two games in the much-improved NL West.  I mean this is a pitchers dominated team - with the best ERA (3.25) and WHIP (1.23) in the MLB.  They're hitting a paltry .250 but are in first place - pitching wins.  Look at the pathetic KC Royals - they lead the majors in hitting (.282) and are 10 games under .500 and 10.5 GB of the 1st place White Sox.  Watch out for the hooded clergy, they're here for real, and I don't think their pitching will go out of style.  They have no pressure to succeed and their best pitcher has only 27 starts under his belt for his career (Mat Latos) and a journeyman John Garland is reverting back to old form (when he won 18 games back-to-back years with the White Sox).  The Padres are good man, but so is everyone else in the West.  It's gonna be exciting.

   2.  Abe Vigoda (aka Jamie Moyer).  How in the hell is this guy 9-8?  I watched him dominate the Yankees (8 IP, 3 H, 2 R) and get shellacked by the Red Sox the very next start (1 IP, 9 H, 9 R).  He's got a 4.51 ERA in over 107 innings pitched - better than A.J. Burnett (4.75), John Lackey (4.78), and Brandon Morrow (4.86) - all guys with far superior stuff.  I watch him pitch and it actually infuriates me.  How can this guy do this at the highest level?  He throws 83 mph!  Are you kidding me?  I have to move on, it's pissing me off even thinking about it.  Good for you Jamie, you old bastard.

   3.  Vuvuzelas at a baseball game?  Really Marlins?  Fire the PR guy instead of letting Fredi Gonzalez get the axe.  This was something that people bitched about at the World Cup 2010, and once the USA was eliminated, everyone bitched about everything related to the World Cup.  And the Marlins decide it's a good idea to hand out half-assed vuvuzelas to fans for a game versus in-state rival Tampa Bay?  Give it a rest.  That goes against everything a traditional baseball fan stands for.  At least give out cowbells or something like that, everyone needs to have more cowbell.  Vuvuzela Night?  Never going to a Marlins game, on principle alone.

   4.  Marco...Polo...Teixeira?  He's hitting an eye-popping .254, but surprisingly has 17 HR and 60 RBI.  He seems to be AL version of Adam Dunn - HR's and right around a .250 BA (Dunn is at 22 HR and .288 in 2010).  He went into the break on fire, hitting .419 in July.  I mean he did virtually nothing in April (.136, 2 HR, 9 RBI) and the Yankees still managed to go 15-7.  They have a two game lead over the Rays and a five game lead over the Red Sox and they haven't even had the best record in the AL East in any given month (TB - Apr., TOR - May, BOS - June, TB - July).  Not to mention the heading to this paragraph - Mark Teixeira is having a mediocre season at best.  If they played the White Sox, Twins, and Mariners every series, he'd be hitting .450 for the year (.545 vs. CWS, .400 vs. MIN, .448 vs. SEA).  If he can stay hot after the break, watch out baseball!  Good time to be a Yankee fan.

   That's all I have time for.  Gotta go work on a few things.  We just got a new GTee in, may go take a few hacks off that, get some frustration out.

   HR Derby tonight at 8 pm Eastern (5 pm Pacific) - Swisher looking to bring the trophy back to the Bronx with him.

   Be well people.

We're talkin' NY baseball

Yankees Win.  The-e-e-e-e-e-e Yankees Win!

OK so it wasn't a huge win, but seeing how Boston and Tampa Bay both lost, it gave the Yankees another day to be alone at the top of the AL Beast.

Andy Pettitte was an absolute monster last night, going seven strong innings while scattering seven hits in the Yanks 9-3 win over Arizona.  The ageless one improved to 9-2 on the season and is looking forward to an impending All-Star nod.  His ERA dropped to 2.48, he struck out seven batters, and threw 73 of 113 pitches for strikes.  Unlike previous nights starter AJ Burnett, Pettitte limited the damage with 2-out - allowing only a fluky 2-run single to P Dan Haren in the second inning. (Haren is hitting .452 this  season with 6 RBI.)

The Mets bounced back from their Subway Series loss, pounding out 18 hits in a demolition of the Tigers, 14-6.  Both starters were equally terrible - Justin Verlander (2 IP, 5 R) and Jonathan Niese (4.2 IP, 6 R). (Niese, for whatever reason, went back out after a 90 minute rain delay.  That's no way to treat a young arm Jerry Manuel.)  Verlander's relief was just as bad as he was - Jay Sborz had an MLB-debut to forget - .2 IP, 3 H, 5 R - and left with 67.50 ERA.  It'll get better Jay.  Angel Pagan was huge for Los Mets (4-6, 3 R, 2B, 3B, 4 RBI) and David Wright had a solid game for the Mets (3-3, 3 R, 2B, 2 BB, 2 RBI).

I don't get to watch many Mets games - but from what I remember, they have some lollygaggers.  Maybe I just think they loaf around, or maybe it's from my disdain for the way Carlos Beltran plays the game.  I am not so sure the Mets miss him - Pagan is hitting .304 with 34 RBI and 41 R to go along with 14 SB.  Pretty good production for a guy with a $1,500,000 salary. (Beltran makes $11,000,000 and hasn't stepped on the field.)

Crap, it's late, gotta get ready for work.  T$H's new album Weight of the World is awesome.  I'll discuss later.

Baseball and Birthdays

Well, the Yankees almost pulled it off last night against the Phillies.  Brad Lidge's ERA went up from a 1.12 to a 2.00 and he made the game pretty interesting.  He's been pretty automatic since he's been healthy this season, so it was good that the Yanks showed a little fight.  I was on the flight back from Dallas, so I missed it.  We flew AirTran but I wish I would have gone JetBlue.  AirTran has some of the most cramped seating of any airline I've ever been on.  K, K, BB, 2B, 1B, K.  He struck out the side, but all the drama started with a two-out walk to Mark Teixeira and could have ended with a walk-off. 

The Rays are reeling (7-6 in June), the Yankees have been fairly steady (10-4 in June), as are the Sox (10-5 in June).  The Blue Jays have fallen back down to Earth and the O's are still looking for an answer.  Shaping up to be a three horse race again, for like the fifth straight season. 

I am going to the Yankees game tonight - and am just counting my blessings I don't have to suffer through a Jamie Moyer start.  Kyle Kendrick vs. Andy Pettitte.  Andy is going for win #201 as a Yankee and #238 overall.  He is putting up incredible numbers thus far, with his only real bad outing being against the Rays on May 20th (5 IP, 9 H, 7 R) in am 8-6 loss.  Looking forward to the game - it's always nice seeing a game at the Stadium, freaking thing is awesome.  It's really a sight to be seen.

The Rays are on the docket too, as Big Game James Shields takes on Tim Hudson in Atlanta.  The Yanks could take over first place tonight.  Hudson has been nothing short of dominant this year (6-2, 2.43 ERA).  He's had some command issues (30 BB in 85.1 IP) but has pitched out of the jams for the most part.  His last outing was a 2-1 CG loss to the Twins (8 IP, 7 H, 2 K).  When he's on, he's tough to hit.  Let's go Timmy.

Party at the "Copacabana", Barry Manilow turns 64 years old today.  He's still knocking them dead - I mean he should be, he's probably had a lot of $$ pumped in and out of his face.  He's made quite the transformation - I mean normally, you go from left to right, he went the opposite direction.  Wrinkles be gone, poof!!  I am kind of glad he chose Barry Manilow, seeing how he was born Barry Alan Pincus.  He was raised in Williamsburg Brooklyn.  He started off writing jingles, and his most famous being State Farm Insurance ("Like a good neighbor, State Farm is there...") and Band-Aid's (I am stuck on Band-Aid, 'cause Band-Aid's stuck on me!").  Happy Birthday Barry, and thanks for taking on your mother's last name.

Back at work, gotta do some work.  Going to purchase some chain and lock it down at Gaelic.

Lock it up!

Hello, Newman.

Sorry for the lack of material this weekend - it's been pretty hectic - Saturday I was recruiting all day, Sunday was spent traveling.  Now it's Monday and I'm raring to go.  Got a lot of material to cover so let's hope you're ready to listen.

Saturday started with an 8:13am alarm clock, NIN's "Discipline" was the song of choice, as it is most days.  Some days, it's The Gaslight Anthem's "Boomboxes and Dictionaries", both solid choices to ease me into my day.

Let's start with the backbone of this blog - sports.

1.  Strasburg was dominant again, although he did walk as many guys (5) as he had in his previous 5 starts (1 MLB, 4 AAA).  He improved to 2-0 (Pirates and Indians) but let up his 2nd HR in as many starts, both to lefties, and both on a change up.  Either way, he's got 22 K in 12.1 IP.  The Nationals may make some noise after all.

2.  The Yankees completed a sweep of the Astros and in the process, moved into a tie atop the AL Beast with the Rays.  There's a World Series rematch series, beginning tonight in the Bronx, as CC Sabathia takes on Roy Halladay.  The Phillies are looking to regain their mo-jo (4-6 in their last 10 games) and crawl back into the NL Least race (3.5 behind 1st place Atlanta) while the Yanks look to distance themselves from the rest of baseball.  I hope I get a good pitching match up Thursday when I go with Lindsay and our fathers - I think it's looking like Moyer vs. Pettitte.

3.  Ted Lilly had a no-hit bid into the 9th against the White Sox, but settled for a 1-hitter and a 1-0 Cubs win.  We were in a bar here in Dallas, and there were a few Chicago fans - one guy, who everyone else refused to give pounds to regardless of how many times he tried - was the epitome of what a White Sox fan is (as told to me by another patron from Chicago).  Obnoxious.  A total jackass.  He was whining when they pinch-hit Juan Pierre to lead off the ninth, then after he broke up the no-no, he said he knew he was going to get a hit - douche.  This guy was shouting all night, almost fell off his stool several times, and was almost forcing his girlfriend (so it seemed) into making out with him - sloppy.

On Saturday, I was up at Blind Brook HS for a game after a showcase at Pace.  BBHS has quite possibly the nicest facilities for a high school I've ever seen.  Field turf abounds - football field, baseball field, soccer field, softball field - they might even have field turf in the hallways.  Almost like VCP.  Anyway, the thing that stuck out was a parent who was chirping the whole game.  Similar to a major league game, every pop up was a HR (or so he reacted), every ground ball was "just missed", and every strikeout looking was outside.  Anyway, same game, same guy - the 7 hitter snuck a dribbler between the first- and second-baseman, to which Super-Dad blurted out, "He squecked that one through there!"  Now, I'm no English major, but "squeaked" is a word.  Squecked, not a word.  #1 Dad.

Sunday was filled with air travel and ground transportation.  LaGuardia to Charlotte, Charlotte to Dallas-Ft. Worth.  The tail end of the trip was turbulent, to put it lightly.  I started getting sick from bouncing around in my seat.  Once we got below the clouds (all 3 minutes of it) and landed, it was great.  The landing was the smoothest part of the flights.  Got off the plane, went to find some "Shared Transportation" and got in.  There were 5 others in there, all going to right near where we were going.  The van was full, but the driver was convinced he may be able to pick up another passenger, so he drove around the airport (to every terminal) trying to find someone else to cram in.  Once he realized he had wasted over 25 minutes worth of gas, he decided to take to the roads, and eventually dropped us off at the hotel.  It was like riding on a wooden roller coaster with no seat belt - pretty scary.  Not quite sure if he was legal.

We strolled around Downtown Dallas a little, I of course snapped some photos, and then we went into CVS - the biggest CVS I have ever seen (I guess everything really is bigger in Texas).  While meandering through the aisles, Lindsay saw a guy and said "He looks like the guy from Jurassic Park" so I looked.  Wasn't sure who she meant, I mean it has been over ten years since I've seen the movie.  We were looking through the "Trial Size" stuff, and I saw the man again - NEWMAN!!  I wanted to be sure, so creepily stared at him for a few seconds.  Then I went up and asked if he was Wayne Knight, and that I was a huge fan (which is an exaggeration) but he is freakin' NEWMAN.  If you've never seen Seinfeld and are reading this, welcome to Earth.  Turns out he's in town shooting a show for FOX, The Good Guys.  I got him to take a picture with me - CVS was empty, so I didn't care.  Had it been full of patrons, I probably would have just taken a sneaky photo of him.  I will publish the photo when I get back to the BX.  How cool is that?

FACT:  Dallas's Downtown shuts down on Sunday.  We found a neat little Mexican restaurant for lunch - Sol Irlandes - we didn't stay for the karaoke at night though.

Passed out several times after getting back from lunch, but managed to stay awake long enough to grab a bite at Press Box Grill.  That's where we were blessed with the Chicago fans.  Ate, had a drink, left as soon as Lilly let up the lone hit in the game, and came back to the hotel to pass out.

Today I will venture out and try to find a place to eat some breakfast.  Lindsay is at the conference so I will explore, maybe I'll bump into another celeb.  Probably not, but I can care less.  NEWMAN!

Hello Big D!

Covering all bases

Despite the best efforts of DirecTV to prevent me from access to the happenings in the sports world, I still am able to access the internet. HAH! They're sending a technician over on Thursday morning to try to fix the problem, even though the lady on the phone told me that "97% of the time, what I'm walking you through now works to fix this issue." Yeah right lady, SIKE! I won't lay into this guy too much, it isn't his fault after all. I just hope he can meander his way through the brush in the yard - it's a jungle back there.

The internet has provided me some information, however: Stephen Strasburg put up a pretty dominant line against the Pittsburgh Pirates tonight: 7 IP, 4 H, 2 R, 0 BB, 14 K. He struck out the side in the 2nd, 6th, and 7th innings, and allowed three of his four hits in the fourth inning (single, single, 6-4-3, HR, P4). 94 pitches, 65 for strikes. Lastings Milledge was his first strikeout victim, to end the first inning - Andy LaRoche was his last, to end the seventh inning. Every Pirates starter struck out at least once. He even handled the bat OK, at least from the box score - two ground outs to SS.

I'm guessing this kid had pretty good stuff tonight.

In other baseball news, Mike McCoy singled in the 6th inning, after the Rays had scored 7 runs, to break up a no-hit bid by TB starter Jeff Niemann. 48 career at-bats coming in to tonights game - hitting 9th. Poor Jeff Niemann.

Yankees are doubling up the O's right now, 6-3 heading into the bottom of the 6th. Swisher and Granderson have hit HR's for the Bombers - Swisher a 2R shot in the first, Grand(slam)erson a deli-job in the third. That's all their runs right there.

Lindsay is out with her friends catching "Sex and the City 2" at a theater somewhere in NYC and Nathan keeps looking out the window waiting for her to come home (right now he's eating, but he's strolling back over to the window sill).

What's the top search trend on Yahoo! you ask? Why it's everyones favorite, Uncle Jesse (John Stamos), who will apparently be joining the cast of Glee next season for an undisclosed amount of episodes. Top search topics on Google, is "lakers celtics" - the #1 annoyance of mine - a lack of proper punctuation. Bing's top search is the 2010 MLB Draft. No Manhattan College player has been taken, and our only hope really is OF Kevin Nieto, but that'll be late if at all. Dogpile fans searched Tom Cruise MTV Awards as their #1, I am not sure if I recall what he did. And finally, the users of Ask.com want to know, "What are the components of blood?" Sounds a little too in depth for me.

NBA news, Lakers were up 26-17 after one quarter and lead by 15 now. LAL 10-12 from the stripe, BOS is 1-4. Pierce and Allen were a combined 0-10 from the floor in the first half. Garnett has 10, Rondo 6. Lakers led by Kobe (10), Odom (6), and Gasol (4). I hope the Lakers roll by 30.

Nathan just fell off the couch, I have to go tend to him. Later world.

Bad showing

Where have all the clutch performers gone?  We needed guys to step up today, and no one seemed to deliver.  We didn't help ourselves - 8 walks and a hit by pitch - 2 scored.  Can you guess the final score?  7-5 bad guys.  Did our freshman SS make an error, yeah - but even still, we had two outs with only one run allowed and it ballooned into a 6-run fourth inning.  Pitcher's need to be able to get an out - one single, solitary out, in a row.  They've gotten one out in a row thousands of times in their baseball lives.  We threw up 0's all day (except for a solo HR in the B6), and had a chance at the end.  It just wasn't meant to be today.

Got a big one tomorrow at 3pm.  Big is actually an understatement.  Lose, and the season is over.  Win, and live to play another day.  Whoever is tougher tomorrow will prevail.  Backs to the wall, fight your way out.  We need to deliver the first punch, right in the mouth, early on.


Yankees won both - 1-0 in the suspended game from yesterday (Jeter hit a HR 399' to left center).  The bullpen patched together the shutout.  In today's scheduled game, they won 3-2, behind a Nick Swisher HR to right field.  Mariano closed out both games, earning saves in both, his 9th and 10th of the year.

Boston finished off a surprising sweep at The Trop, beating the Rays 11-3 behind Adrián Béltre's 6 RBI. 

The Magic are up 13 on the Celtics with 8:59 left in the game.  Celts lead the series 3-1.  Maybe Dwight Howard read my blog and decided to grow a pair and play like a man - he's got 17 points, 7 boards, 5 blocks, and only 1 foul.  Go Dwight Go!

Big one tomorrow.  Act as if.

Err's-day

We made some big errors in some big spots today.  Second inning - pick off at second base, runner made a move towards third on a pick off play, pitcher throws to second, we dropped the ball.  Safe at third; next guy hit a sacrifice fly, 1-0 deficit.  Ultimately, I'm not sure if that's what cost us game two, but it sure didn't help any.  Now, our season comes down to one game.  Win and we're in the conference tournament, lose and summer starts early.  Unreal, I'm speechless that some of our leaders (read: upperclassmen) had some of the worst at-bats of anyone in our lineup.  They play with their heads up their asses sometimes.  It's not always cookies and milk, but when it gets tough, you gotta get tougher.  We'll see what tomorrow brings.

Moving on - the Yankees just went down in order in the first inning - on 7 pitches - after Andy Pettitte struggled through the first and threw around 25, 27 pitches.  Way to give him a breather.  Ben Zobrist is .429 (6-14) with 3 R, 3 BB, and 4 RBI against the Yankees this year - through the second inning of today's game.  This guy is killing them.  Big Game James is on the mound for the Rays - the Yanks aren't going to have it wasy tonight - Shields is 4-1 with a 3.00 ERA and 59 K/11 BB coming into this one - pretty solid numbers - more than a hit an inning allowed, but low walks negate that. 

There's two things that can happen with a pitcher's control - you can walk a lot of guys and not let up many hits, or you can let up a lot of hits and not walk many - do both, and you won't get out of the 5th inning.  Either that, or you better have a ton of strikeouts.

Below are some statistics from the American League only, seeing how their numbers indicate effectiveness better than the National League - the DH is way better than the P hitting.

Here's a list of the top 3 WHIP with their H/BB and ERA and K:
#1 Doug Fister SEA 0.91 (40 H/10 BB in 50 IP) - ERA 1.96 - 25 K
#2 Shaun Marcum TOR 0.97 (46 H/14 BB in 62 IP) - ERA 2.61 - 45 K
#3 Jason Vargas SEA 0.98 (32 H/13 BB in 46 IP) - ERA 2.93 - 33 K

Here's a list of the top 3 BB with their H/ERA/WHIP and K:
#1 Rich Harden TEX 32 BB - 41 H/4.74 ERA/1.67 WHIP - 43 K
#2 Gil Meche KC 31 BB - 51 H/6.75 ERA/1.92 WHIP - 25 K
#3 Brandon Morrow TOR 27 BB - 42 H/6.15 ERA/1.68 WHIP - 54 K

Here's a lost of the top 3 in H and their BB/ERA/WHIP and K:
#1 Scott Baker MIN 64 H - 12 BB/4.88 ERA/1.37 WHIP - 47 K
#2 Kevin Millwood BAL 63 H - 15 BB/3.65 ERA/1.26 WHIP - 48 K
#3 A.J. Burnett NYY 61 H - 22 BB/3.86 ERA/1.42 WHIP - 40 K

The guys with the lowest WHIP don't necessarily need to strike a lot of hitters out because they're rarely in too many jams.  Pitchers with high BB and a lot of H allowed rely on strikeouts more, helping them out of jams.  The pitchers with the highest BB totals have terrible ERA's because they are always allowing free baserunners - even allowing only a hit an inning, as Harden and Morrow do, BB's before those hits will kill the ERA.  And finally, the guys with a lot of H allowed have decent ERA's because they don't walk a lot of guys and have pretty good K numbers.

Yankees tied it up at 3 - scored on a HR by Juan Miranda and an error by Shields on a bunt from Gardner.  Damn, Upton just homered - that's also been our Achilles’ heel this year - we score and instead of throwing up a 0 and keeping a little momentum on  our side, we go out and let up a run, or 2, or 4.  The inning after your team scores is a huge inning - throw up a goose egg and get your guys back hitting again.

I have to shower, I'm disgusting.  Our shower sucks, it's like a 3' x 3' square - tight quarters.  Clean time.