Archives › 2009 › May

With the Dodgers and Cubs less than an hour away from first pitch, here are a few things to consider: – Eric Milton (1-0. 3.00) makes his third start of the year for the Dodgers. Milton won his first game in nearly three years his last time out, limiting the Rockies to a single run…

I made the trek up the East Coast this weekend to see the Mets’ road spring training lineup take on Josh Johnson and the Marlins. With the exception of Fernando Martinez’s first hit, double and RBI, there wasn’t much to crow about as the Marlins won the game handily 7-3. However, Saturday marked my first…

One of the favorite go-to lines for certain baseball people is to gush about team chemistry. Whenever a team is going well, we hear from managers and writers and players about the great character guys are on the team and this and that. And if a team isn’t playing up to the potential that has…

So Matt Wieters made his debut last night. It was a rather uneventful one: 0-for-4 (fly out to right, grounder back to the box, weak grounder to 3rd, and a backwards K), and the poor Orioles fans couldn’t even watch him take BP because of rain. Surely there will be some highlights to come for…

Before moving on to the top 50 pitchers for 2010-14, here’s a look at the pitchers who missed the cut: The prospects: Trevor Cahill, Neftali Feliz, Brett Anderson, Chris Tillman, Jarrod Parker, Brett Cecil Cahill was the very last cut from the list. That he’s fanned just 19 in 48 2/3 innings as a major…

- After nine straight losses on the road, the Blue Jays finally return home tonight. Unfortunately, they’ll be facing the Red Sox, who started off Toronto’s losing streak with a three-game sweep at Fenway last week. The winning pitcher in the first game of that series, Tim Wakefield, will be back on the mound for…

As if things weren’t bad enough in Colorado, the Rockies have gone and replaced the mediocre Clint Hurdle with the incompetent Jim Tracy. Tracy’s resume includes a 562-572 record, which is exactly the kind of near-.500 record the Rockies have aspired to achieve in most of their years in existence. He got that record by…

The White Sox were able to get Carlos Quentin at a discount from the Diamondbacks last offseason because he was coming off shoulder surgery, but he’s had different injury problems since arriving in Chicago. Gambling on Quentin’s health paid huge dividends for the White Sox last season, as he hit .288/.394/.571 with 36 homers and…

* Gordon Beckham played primarily shortstop at Double-A, but moved to third base for his final game there and stayed at the hot corner last night in his Triple-A debut. I’ve been assuming that the White Sox view Beckham as the long-term answer at second base and they’ve gotten the AL’s third-worst production from the…

According to the Dallas Morning News, earlier this week a female Rangers fan wearing a “Yankees Suck” t-shirt was asked to either turn it inside out or leave the ballpark … in Texas. But wait, it gets better. Kristen Knapp-Webb was at the Rangers-Yankees game celebrating her 19th wedding anniversary and her husband Walter had…

Astros owner Drayton McLane, on speculation that manager Cecil Cooper is on the verge of being fired: Firing the manager is not in the cards. He’s only been the manager for a year and a half. I think that’s somewhat premature. When you’re real good that doesn’t last forever. When you’re playing real bad that…

Diamondbacks ace Brandon Webb has been sidelined with a strained shoulder muscle since struggling in his Opening Day start, but played catch from 120 feet earlier this week and said yesterday that he’s still hoping to return before the All-Star break. Before he can think about rejoining Arizona’s rotation Webb will have to stretch his…

Matt Wieters’ debut in Baltimore tonight is getting all of the attention, but let us not lose sight of the fact that the man whose job he is taking — Gregg Zaun — is himself a megastar. Don’t believe me? Just check out his website, which is not the sort of thing you’d expect for…

Lar at Wezen-Ball takes a look back at an article from 1997 that, in turn, takes a look back at Carl Yastrzemski’s 1967 Triple Crown. This quote from Yaz floored me: “. . . being in the pennant race, I was so focused that I didn’t know I had won it until the next day.…

Jayson Stark has a column up over at ESPN gong in depth with Terry Francona and Charlie Manuel about how they’re dealing with struggling veterans David Ortiz and Jamie Moyer. There’s an extended bit lauding Francona for his diplomacy and tenderness and whatever when it came to dropping Papi in the order: So what does…

People complained that the reviews of the Gary Sheffield and Daniel Murphy home runs this week took too long, with the former taking more than six minutes and the latter almost four minutes. I can understand the frustration, but you have to laud Major League Baseball for having its priorities in order: “In the case…

The other day Yahoo!’s Gordon Edes was reporting that the Red Sox were scouting Jeff Francoeur. I kind of doubt it actually, given that Francoeur is pretty much the polar opposite of what Theo Epstein, Bill James and the rest of that gang in Boston looks for in a player. My guess: if Red Sox…

Red Sox 3, Twins 1: Varitek homers twice and gets run for getting up in the ump’s face arguing balls and strikes. I can’t criticize him; I like to go home early on days on which I get a lot done too. Mike Redmond, Terry Francona and Ron Gardenhire were also ejected, and I picture…

Brett Myers underwent an MRI exam on his hip Thursday and received bad news as it showed fraying and a possible tear in the labrum. He hasn’t been placed on the disabled list as of this writing, but that seems inevitable after Myers revealed that “it sounds like surgery is almost 100 percent from the…

1. Travis Wood (Reds) – 1.382. Chuck Lofgren (Indians) – 1.483. Troy Patton (Orioles) – 1.624. Cristhian Martinez (Marlins) – 1.845. Zach McAllister (Yankees) – 1.916. Brad Lincoln (Pirates) – 2.057. Hector Rondon (Indians) – 2.088. Brooks Brown (Tigers) – 2.219. Casey Lambert (Cubs) – 2.3210. Trevor Bell (Angels) – 2.3411. Henry Sosa (Giants) –…

* It wasn’t quite as eventful as Carlos Zambrano’s implosion yesterday, but this afternoon’s Twins-Red Sox game just saw home-plate umpire Todd Tichenor eject both starting catchers and both managers in the same inning, about five minutes apart. Mike Redmond and Ron Gardenire were tossed in the top of the seventh after a borderline call…

The “candlesticks scene” from Bull Durham has forever taken most of the mystique out of players holding conferences on the mound, but the “exchange” that A.J. Burnett and Kevin Cash had yesterday was still pretty amusing. Mark Feinsand of the New York Daily News explains: At one point in the fifth inning, Burnett threw a…

Last week Milton Bradley complained that his various run-ins with umpires have caused the men in blue to widen their strike zone when he’s at the plate: Unfortunately, I just think it’s a lot of “Oh, you did this to my colleague,” or “We’re going to get him any time we can. As soon as…

It took 2,060 games, but Chipper Jones finally had the first Golden Sombrero of his 16-year career last night, striking out four times against Randy Johnson and the Giants. Prior to last night there had been a total of 1,279 instances of a player striking out at least four times in a game since Jones…