2010 MLB Season

[Dan Gould]

God help us if Tony LaRussa ever decides to go into broadcasting.

[Matthew]

God help us if Tony LaRussa ever decides to go into broadcasting.

That just can't happen, the God I worship is one of mercy, not vengeance!

[Dan Gould]

God help us if Tony LaRussa ever decides to go into broadcasting.

That just can't happen, the God I worship is one of mercy, not vengeance!

Yeah but what if He decides to go back to being an Old Testament-Wrath-of-God deity?

Human sacrifice, dogs and cats living together... mass hysteria!*

* and Tony LaRussa in the broadcast booth.

[Dan Gould]

Well it took two near-miracles, but we've got status quo ante. I can't believe I stayed up so late to end up with the Rays hanging on by the skin of their teeth. Talk about a gift win. Hopefully Jason Johnson shuts them down and they leave Miami with a series loss and a serious headache from those vuvuzelas.

[papsrus]

Well it took two near-miracles, but we've got status quo ante. I can't believe I stayed up so late to end up with the Rays hanging on by the skin of their teeth. Talk about a gift win. Hopefully Jason Johnson shuts them down and they leave Miami with a series loss and a serious headache from those vuvuzelas.

I was forced to watch it at work. The most commonly heard observation: "I can't believe a professional pitcher is incapable of throwing a strike!"

Maddon called Johnson the best pitcher in the game nobody talks about. (Present company excluded, of course.)

[ghost of miles]

Interesting nuggets from the NY Times rundown of the Yanks' 4-0 victory over the Mets today:

>>Although he won his the fourth consecutive game, Sabathia’s earned run average in his previous seven starts was 5.00. But he was dominant against the Mets, shutting them out over eight innings, allowing only four hits and two walks while striking out six.<<

>>Even though it was not a save opportunity, Mariano Rivera pitched a 1-2-3 the ninth inning. He has retired 22 straight batters, breaking his personal record.

Santana (5-4) did not have his best game, but he certainly did not pitch poorly. With his father watching from the stands on Father’s Day, Santana gave up Teixeira’s slam and four other hits, two of which never left the infield.

The turning point of the game was obviously Teixeira’s slam, and the three Yankee hits before were by no means sizzling line drives. Brett Gardner reached on a bloop single. Derek Jeter, who sat out Saturday’s game with a bruised right heel, was back in the lineup and he beat out an infield single, and Nick Swisher reached on a bunt to load the bases.

With nobody out Teixeira then took a pitch down and over the plate and pulled it into the left-field stands.<<

>>In an uneven week the Yankees were beaten by Jamie Moyer, Kyle Kendrick and Hisanori Takahashi, but they have defeated the top pitchers Roy Halladay, Mike Pelfrey and Santana.<<

Great bunt by Swisher--I think it caught the Mets completely off-guard and helped set up Tex's grandslam. First time NY's been in sole possession of AL East first place since April 21, given the Rays' loss today. With Boston rolling down the tracks, it's looking to be a long, hot summer!

Edited June 21, 2010 by ghost of miles

[Dan Gould]

And of all a sudden the final 3 games at Fenway seem a little more likely to be crucial to one team or the other or both.

[ghost of miles]

Yeah, somehow I think they're going to end up being a very big deal indeed. This week we should by all rights pounce on the Diamondbacks, but A.J.'s set to pitch tonight, and he's been awful on the road so far (and lately, just plain awful), so I don't have high hopes for this evening's game.

On another note, Mo Rivera sure had a shaky stretch (by his standards) several weeks ago, but he's now retired the last 21 batters he's faced, setting a new personal record. Good to know he's still got some gas left in the tank, given how unreliable the rest of the bullpen has been.

[Dan Gould]

Well there's lots of ways to look at it. For AJ, an NL team ought to be just the ticket. OTOH, the D-Backs have had a long stretch of road futility, they are probably not quite as bad as they've been so maybe they're due for some wins. I think the Yanks win at least two of three. Then again, apparently A-Rod and Posada are "day-to-day" for the week, so the offense might be a bit short if they only play four games a piece at Arizona and LA.

Edited June 21, 2010 by Dan Gould

[ghost of miles]

Just noticed the game's on ESPN, but with a 10:10 start time since it's out west. Could make for a bleary-eyed start to the morning tomorrow at work...

Dan, what's the latest conjecture on when Ellsbury will be back this year? Boston's offense is pretty impressive even without him--aren't you guys leading the majors in runs scored? NY's not far behind, but last time I checked Boston led in that category.

Edited June 22, 2010 by ghost of miles

[Dan Gould]

Since they discovered the new broken rib the presumption has been at the all-star break at the earliest. And yes, last I heard the Red Sox lead in runs scored (but they've played two more games so the margin is very small). They are also tops (or second) in a bunch of offensive categories, and are on a pace to score 25 runs more than last year.

Otoh, they've allowed about 50 runs more than the Yankees have, and 60 more than the Rays have. They really need Beckett to pitch like an ace when he gets back.

[ghost of miles]

Wow. Haven't turned on the game yet, just went to check the Yahoo box-score--Bad A.J. and then some. That's gotta be the worst start by a Yankee pitcher in a long, long time.

EDIT--great comment over at Pinstripe Alley:

Apparently AJ didn't get the note that this is the year of the pitcher

EDIT 2--and once again a less-then-stellar pitcher is handcuffing the NY batting order. Isn't Arizona the worst team in the league when it comes to runs given up per game? Lopez sure isn't having any problems with the Yankees tonight.

Edited June 22, 2010 by ghost of miles

[Dan Gould]

I turned the game on in the bottom of the first with two out and nobody on and thought "I hope this doesn't mean good AJ showed up" and then it went homer, base hit, base hit, homer, homer, double and I laughed, and I laughed.

AJ really personifies the "million-dollar arm, ten-cent head" cliche. I don't think he has a freaking clue what he's doing and when things go bad he doesn't have a clue how to change it. And when his fastball slows down, whatcha gonna do? Beckett can get stubborn and stupid and try to throw his fastball through a brick wall, but it seems like Burnett just gets sloppier and sloppier, his delivery falls apart and baseballs go all over the place. If they aren't outside of the strike zone, they end up hammered.

As for Rodrigo Lopez, he pitched a pretty good game against Boston last week. He's got some good pitches, like the backdoor cutter he throws to lefties. He might not be good enough to pitch in the A.L. (career ERA at Baltimore 4.75) but I think he's good enough to be a very decent NL pitcher.

[Brad]

Burnett seems to prove the adage that when he's good, he's very good but when he's bad, he's very bad

[BERIGAN]

Ghost, I see trying to come out ahead of time and say Burnett was likely to be bad...didn't work. Better luck next time!

Diamondbacks have a truly, horrible, horrible bullpen. Starters are just so-so. In fact, when the braves played the Diamondbacks, it was pissing some of us off to see them not score against their bullpen. You just expect it. They are why they are in last place. Check out how many guys have ERA's above 6.00

http://espn.go.com/mlb/team/stats/pitching/_/name/ari/arizona-diamondbacks

And I know the AL is better(though I'd love to see the DH in the NL-no purist when it comes to watching guys hitting .130 leave the bases loaded in the 4th) but there are guys like Edwin Jackson, who in theory should dominate, who has a 5.05 ERA, Dan Haren, after a great year last year, has a 4.71 ERA. Barry Zito has finally turned it around, but you look at his ERA for the first 2 years in the NL,(4.53, 5.15) and it makes the 2 years previous, in the AL (3.83, 3.86) look like they should be reversed. I was going to mention some hitters that have sucked coming over to the NL, but can't think of them right now!

[ghost of miles]

Ghost, I see trying to come out ahead of time and say Burnett was likely to be bad...didn't work. Better luck next time!

It was no attempt at the ol' reverse jinx--just a grim, straightahead prognosis based on recent starts and his prevailing tendency to pitch worse on the road (with even more of a disparity this year than last).

Maybe too early to say this, but so far I don't think this year's edition of the Yankees has the same spark as last year's. True, they started very slowly last year (partly because they were without A-Rod) and really poured it on in the second half, particularly after the All-Star break. Maybe that will come to pass as well this year--if Tex can at least jack his BA up to the .270 range and hit for a little more power (which also applies to A-Rod), if the bullpen can produce a more stable 7th-inning reliever (David Robertson, perhaps? who finally seems to be pitching well again), and if Javy can stay consistent, who knows? Cano's having a banner year, Andy Pettitte is going out in a blaze of glory (if this is his last year), and Mo is once again Mo. But I have my doubts--I just don't sense the kind of fire that we seemed to have last year. It's imperative that A.J. get back on track, since we're already starting to skip starts by Phil Hughes (although his innings limit may be a bit higher than previously reported--180-190 is the latest I've read, but still, he's not going to be going every single turn from here on out).

[Dan Gould]

Phil Hughes’ first six starts of the season: 39 IP & an ERA of 1.38

Phil Hughes’ last seven starts this season: 43.1 IP & an ERA of 4.78

He also has the highest run support in the majors, which is why he has the same number of wins coming out of those two chunks of his season. He's not going to be skipped again before the All-Star break, and then they will probably use the time off to reshuffle the starters so that he is the fourth or fifth starter out of the chute for the second half. That will be a smart way of reducing his starts without actually having Gaudin or someone from Scranton take his place, and at least they are being smart and not planning on giving him 3-4 inning starts in August. But I really think that he needs to return to the form he showed in his first six starts, or else we aren't going to be talking about the emergence of an ace anymore. He'll just be another guy with an ERA between 4 and 4.5.

Here's another interesting stat I saw from the same Yankee blog as the one that provided the one about Hughes:

So I took a look at the numbers, and while Teixeira may be having a subpar season so far, there is still a chance he can turn it around. If Tex goes on to hit at the exact pace he did last year from June 19, 2009 – the end of the 2009 season, his numbers don’t look as bad :

94 Games from 2009 + 67 games from 2010

729 PA

628 AB

168 H

38 2B

3 3B

29 HR

105 RBI

86 BB

.268/.348/.476/.824

Basically, even if Teixeira hits as well as he did last season from this point on (when he finished tied for the lead in homers), he ends up with a decidedly mediocre stat line - especially for a guy with such a huge contract. Teixeira has been bad enough that improving to last year's level doesn't begin to save his season.

And the other stat that I think Yankee fans have to worry about is A-Rod's lack of power. Only 8 homers, and only 2 since his groin/hip acted up. And since he is still not 100%, that means still more time where he doesn't have that base that's needed to drive the ball. I think its possible that A-Rod also has a poor (by his standards) season.

And let's not forget Jeter. Early in the year he was going great but that's really ended. Since 2002 when they started calculating these things, Fangraphs has never had Jeter with a lower line drive rate or a higher groundball rate. For May and June, his OPS+ is under 100. In June he's authored a .216/.310/.392 line. He turns 36 on Saturday. I wasn't sure what would be worse - a big season for Jeter making him demand A-Rod money and years or a bad season for Jeter where his ego demands A-Rod money and years anyway and Cashman has to ponder the possibility that he's already declining.

[papsrus]

Interesting highlight just now on espn. Minor league outfielder catches a fly ball at the (very short) fence, and then goes over the fence with the ball in his glove.

Home run? It must be, right?

[papsrus]

Rays owner Stu Sternberg is exploring moving the team to new stadium in Tampa. Seems like an obvious move, but curious given that just a few years ago before the economy really went in the tank he was exploring the idea of a new stadium on the waterfront in St. Pete.

[Quincy]

Interesting highlight just now on espn. Minor league outfielder catches a fly ball at the (very short) fence, and then goes over the fence with the ball in his glove.

Home run? It must be, right?

I think the batter is out, and this applies:

Rule 7.04© Comment: If a fielder, after having made a legal catch, should fall into a stand or among spectators or into the dugout or any other out-of-play area while in possession of the ball after making a legal catch, or fall while in the dugout after making a legal catch, the ball is dead and each runner shall advance one base, without liability to be put out, from his last legally touched base at the time the fielder fell into, or in, such out-of-play area.

[papsrus]

Interesting highlight just now on espn. Minor league outfielder catches a fly ball at the (very short) fence, and then goes over the fence with the ball in his glove.

Home run? It must be, right?

I think the batter is out, and this applies:

Rule 7.04© Comment: If a fielder, after having made a legal catch, should fall into a stand or among spectators or into the dugout or any other out-of-play area while in possession of the ball after making a legal catch, or fall while in the dugout after making a legal catch, the ball is dead and each runner shall advance one base, without liability to be put out, from his last legally touched base at the time the fielder fell into, or in, such out-of-play area.

Huh. Thanks Quincy. The espn anchors didn't seem sure when they showed the highlight. They called it a great catch, then wondered aloud about whether or not it was really a home run.

[ghost of miles]

Tonight's Yanks-Diamondbacks game is much more like it.

Of course, Joba may be pitching the bottom of the 8th.

Edited June 23, 2010 by ghost of miles

[Dan Gould]

I know I need to accept the occasional aggravating defeat but this one was pretty damn annoying, especially with the best pitcher in baseball going tonight, and who knows what happens with Dice-K tomorrow? They could very easily be relying on him to avoid a sweep, which would be an ignominious end to the 8-0-3 series run they've been on. But to be held to a single run, and that in the ninth inning by a guy with an ERA of 4 who walked 5 batters that just sucks. Add in the fact that the second run scored on a fluke bad hop of a double play ball in the eighth and its even more annoying. By all rights it should have been a bullpen game, and the Rockies don't win too many of those.

OTOH, Jimenez did leave the park early yesterday with some illness, so maybe we'll catch a break and he'll be skipped tonight. Germs, go to work!

Looking ahead, the Sox get a lot of games against the Rays before the break, and the Yanks get a lot of games against Seattle. Hopefully they catch Cliff Lee the maximum number of games but that's still not exactly helpful for the teams that are chasing. OTOH again, I do see that the Red Sox have two series against Seattle in September. Is it too much to hope that Lee will be long gone by then? Would definitely be an advantage ... so long as he doesn't end up in the Bronx.

[ghost of miles]

Dan oh Dan, what on earth are your Bosox doing to Ubaldo Jimenez's spirit-o-'68 ERA?

Edited June 24, 2010 by ghost of miles

[Dan Gould]

I can't believe it myself and its been kind of flukish anyway. Two out double by folk hero Daniel Nava scored the first two runs, then Nava knocked in Beltre with another double, followed by a Darnell McDonald homer, a Lackey double and a Scutaro single that chased Jiminez.

Its certainly taking the sting out of the College World Series, where my Seminoles turned a 7-3 lead in the eighth into an 11-7 deficit. Horrific. At least they eliminated the Gators but this will be 21 appearances without a win, adding to a record no one wants.