I’ve long been critical of ARod for his obvious missteps. I even likened him to a Seinfeld-eque character. Well, FOTB and fellow blogger/writer Lisa Swan finally had enough of the biased ESPN bashing and the lack of basis behind many of the anti-ARod arguements. So she did what any good writer would do… get the facts. Here are a few (you have to click thru to her article to get ‘em all):
* A-Rod has nine walkoff homers in his career, with six of them as a Yankee.
* Contrary to that “he only hits them when they don’t count” reputation, 42% (241 homers) of Rodriguez’s 573 home runs either tied the game or gave his team the lead.
* And of his 20 home runs this year, 12 of them either tied the game or gave the Yankees the lead.
He’s still not a lovable character and he makes you want to keep him at arms length. You might not want to trust anything he says. But after that home run Friday night, he’s a bit more loved in Yankeeland.
Everything does indeed end poorly, or else it wouldn’t end:
The Red Sox have designated John Smoltz for assignment. Smoltz was 2-5 with an 8.32 ERA in eight starts for the Sox after signing a one-year, $5.5 million contract.
As a fan of the team that struck the final death blow, I feel bad. But clearly “Schmolz” can’t do it any longer.
I hope to see him on the Senior PGA Tour in 8 years.
A waiver claim has been placed on Toronto Blue Jays right fielder Alex Rios, according to Major League Baseball sources.
At a time when most teams have very little financial flexibility, it could be within the realm of possibility that the Blue Jays will consider a trade of Rios, who still has six years remaining on a seven-year, $69.35 million contract he agreed to in April 2008, or simply waive him to the team that claimed him.
For a team that’s cash-strapped, they should not get greedy and just be thrilled to rid themselves of the burden of this contract.
Praying: Please don’t be the Yanks who claimed him! Please don’t be the Yanks…
You’ve been warned. Click thru at your own risk (yes, totally SFW). But if you do, I have a game for you:
I looked at it for about 6 seconds before clicking the “back” button. How long can you stare at it before changing the page?
Be honest. Report results in the comments.
Forget Swine Flu! It’s Pavano-fever!
The Twins deepened their rotation today, acquiring Carl Pavano from the Indians for a player to be named later. Pavano, 33, has allowed 150 hits in 125.2 innings, posting a respectable 88K/23BB ratio.
His base salary is just $1.5MM, but in addition to the $500k remaining on his contract, Pavano stands to earn a lot through incentives. If he makes 10 more starts and averages 6.0 IP per outing, he’ll make another $1.75 in bonuses.
Enjoy, good people of Minnesota.
After Melky Cabrera’s cycle against Chicago the other day, it’s practically inevitable that somebody will advocate that he remain the starter over Brett Gardner when the latter returns from the disabled list. It would be easy to understand the sentiment: Cabrera was always a much higher regarded prospect, he has more power, and he does have that nifty game a few days ago. Before any of that gets started I’d like to break the two players down a little bit.
Offensively, the two players achieve similar results through different means. Cabrera has eleven home runs this year and is slugging .451. Gardner has virtually no power, having gone deep only three times and is posting slugging % right at .400. Gardner has much better pitch recognition skills (he swings at only 16% of the pitches out of the strike zone, compared to 26% for Melky) and a better on base percentage. Despite the difference in skills, both have posted wOBA’s of .345. Throw in Gardner’s 20 stolen bases and 80% success rate, and I would have to lean towards Gardner as the better hitter.
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IIATMS contributing writer Will Moller did an excellent job showing the missed calls that plagued Joba’s start, resulting in 7 walks in just 5 innings. But this was not limited to just Joba.
How about 18 walks in a 9 inning game? PAINFUL. Any wonder why a) the game took 4 hours to complete, b) pitchers didn’t last, c) offense was humming?
Blame it all on Derryl Cousins’ ridiculous strike zone. Have a gander at the chart below. Look at all that green IN the strikezone! (And the red outside it, for that matter.)
Select View Full Post to view the strikezone plot analysis of the bad calls that had Angels yelling.
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Peering in from the bleachers this evening, I was only able to see the outcome of the at bats, lacking the detail delivered by my HDTV. Luckily, brooksbaseball.net managed to avoid the Twitterbomb from earlier in the day, and upon my arrival home, I was able to check out what actually went down after a quick look through, I’m no longer nearly as concerned about Joba’s performance tonight.
Look at the bottom right hand quadrant of the strike zone, and you’ll notice a group of green squares, signifying pitches that were in the strikezone and called balls. On Joba’s watch, Cousins gifted the Bosox with 8 balls that ought to have gone into the strike column, as well as two which sat on the actual border (and were called balls as well). On the other side of the ledger, two balls that were barely outside were called strikes, and one that was on the border was a called strike.
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Everyone can breath a deep sigh of relief, the Yankees winless streak against the Red Sox is officially over. It wasn’t pretty, in fact at times it was downright ugly, but the Bronx Bombers gave Smoltz and Boston a sound thumping, winning 13-6.
Despite both pitchers lacking their best stuff, Joba and Smoltz both kept the game scoreless through the first two innings. Posada was partly to blame, as he failed to slide home in the second and got tagged out by Boston’s new catcher, Victor Martinez. Dustin Pedroia was the first to score, sending a cheapie into the right field stands. Damon would do the same, putting the score at 1-1 after 3. A single by Lowell, followed by a homerun by Kotchman put the Sox up 3-1 before Joba sat down Lowrie, Ellsbury and Pedroia in order.
The bottom of the fourth saw John Smoltz, who does not resemble his former self at all, implode yet again. Posada started the inning with a double and scored on Cano’s single. Swisher walked and Melky hit a three-run bomb to give the Pinstripes the lead. Jeter flied out, but Damon kept the inning going with a single. Teixeira followed with a double and Smoltz intentionally walked A-Rod to load the bases, before being replaced by Billy Traber. Damon scored on Matsui’s ground out, sending Posada up for the second time in the inning. He sent the ball deep for the second three-run shot of the inning. The Yankees eight runs that inning would give them a 9-3 lead. Despite a large lead, Joba walked Martinez, Youkilis and Drew; however, he minimized the damage, allowing just one run on a single by Lowell. The bullpen would keep the Red Sox quiet during the sixth, seventh and eighth, while the Yankees would build their lead to 13-4. In the ninth, Claggett made things exciting, walking Drew and Kotchman before giving up RBI singles to Ellsbury and Pedroia. He eventually got Martinez to ground out to Posada to end the game and give the Yankees the victory.
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So it wasn’t Joba, it was Melancon. And Pedroia was pretty peeved as it hit him high on the shoulder. I can’t say it was intentional, but Pedroia sure thought it was.
Exactly what I was hoping not to see, especially with a 13-4 lead. Now, the Sox have a reason to drill Jeter or Teix or ARod tomorrow. Better wear some extra plastic, boys.
Picture lifted from FackYouk, fine purveyors of black and white goodness.
Another career baseball writer has gotten his pink slip. I don’t follow the Reds carefully, but I know of Hal McCoy’s reputation. You don’t put 37 years in any business (and get elected to the Hall of Fame) without being good at it. And it’s sad to read, almost as if he’s writing his own obituary:
The hammer fell today and it hurts like hell.
They’re putting the ol’ baseball scribe out to pasture and if there are teardrops on your screen, well, that’s from me, just an old softie.
My run is over – 37 years of bliss, doing a job that wasn’t a job. It was pure joy and pure fun.
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Gotta have some lunchtime laughs: Fantasy Camp with J-Roll and Ryan Howard
h/t: SI.com’s HotClicks
