Baseball 2004 Archives

Theo strikes again, signing Wade Miller.

Mac Thomason rips Baseball America a new one over its preference for toolsy high-upside prospects over guys who have less upside but more likelihood of developing into useful contributors. I'm woefuly deficient in following the minor leagues myself, so I can't judge who's right on the particular prospects in question, but Mac's point is worth considering.

Perhaps the most striking feature of this baseball offseason, coming during an era when effective starting pitching would seem to be in short supply, is the large number of starting pitchers with substantial track records - many of them quite successful in recent years - who have gone on the market. I'm probably missing someone here, but I count 30 starters - 20% of the starting jobs in the big leagues, and more than that as a proportion of guys with any kind of major league track record - who have either been traded or been free agents this off season (this is counting free agents who re-signed or, like Roger Clemens, are now committed to one team, as well as guys in the Randy Johnson deal who were publicly traded before the deal fell through). Of course, with so many pitchers available, it behooves buyers in this market not to overpay out of a concern for scarcity. To make sense of the available options, it's therefore useful to look at them as a group.

In the past, I've found "established performance levels" to be a useful way to organize information about a player's record, including my continuing "Established Win Shares Levels" studies. In that spirit, here are the established performance levels, Win Shares included, for those 30 pitchers, ranked by ERA+ (which I computed as a weighted average); I listed "U" next to the team for guys who are still unclaimed:

Age	Pitcher	Team	W	L	ERA	G	GS	IP	H/9	HR/9	BB/9	K/9	ERA+	EWSL
41	RJohnson	AZ	14	11	2.85	29	29	204	7.19	0.82	1.89	10.69	164	19
33	PMartinez	NYM	16	7	3.12	31	31	203.2	7.49	0.77	2.33	9.81	163	18
29	THudson	ATL	14	7	3.12	31	31	213.2	8.51	0.51	2.22	5.51	147	20
42	RClemens	HOU	17	6	3.50	32	32	207.1	7.79	0.80	3.01	8.86	127	17
32	BRadke	MIN	12	8	3.97	32	32	200	9.71	1.09	1.16	5.48	120	15
39	ALeiter	FLA	12	9	3.53	31	31	180.2	7.97	0.84	4.55	6.65	120	11
27	MMulder	STL	17	8	3.89	30	30	209.1	8.68	0.90	2.75	5.99	120	16
28	WMiller	U	11	9	3.71	23	23	133.2	8.01	0.91	3.90	7.71	119	9
28	JVazquez	NYY	13	11	4.13	33	33	214	8.58	1.28	2.40	7.78	117	16
29	CPavano	NYY	14	10	3.68	33	30	200.2	9.10	0.78	2.17	5.79	116	14
29	JaWright	NYY	9	6	4.29	34	17	114.2	9.10	0.71	3.80	7.70	116	7
28	OdPerez	U	10	9	3.61	31	31	196.2	8.42	1.18	2.00	6.26	115	11
30	MClement	BOS	11	12	3.82	31	31	191.2	7.55	1.02	3.71	8.82	114	11
27	BPenny	LA	11	10	3.76	27	27	158.1	8.79	0.91	2.81	6.65	111	9
32	DLowe	U	16	10	4.57	33	33	195.1	9.75	0.70	3.11	5.08	110	11
42	DWells	BOS	14	8	3.88	31	31	203	9.63	1.02	1.07	4.75	109	12
38	WWilliams	SD	13	8	3.91	30	29	185.1	8.93	0.89	2.50	6.28	108	10
31	RuOrtiz	AZ	17	9	3.94	34	34	208.1	8.17	0.85	4.56	6.22	106	13
34	EDessens	LA	5	7	4.42	41	20	140.2	10.31	1.21	2.73	5.74	105	7
35	JLieber	PHI	8	5	4.21	17	17	111.2	10.77	1.01	0.89	5.28	105	7
31	MRedman	PIT	12	12	4.26	31	31	192.2	9.41	1.02	2.93	5.58	103	10
30	GRusch	CHC	5	8	4.65	32	20	140.2	10.13	0.87	2.83	6.36	101	6
30	MMorris	STL	14	9	4.20	30	30	193.1	8.94	1.25	2.40	6.24	100	9
32	RaOrtiz	CIN	10	9	4.57	33	23	160.1	9.58	1.40	2.88	5.58	98	8
29	EMilton	U	10	5	4.68	23	23	134.2	8.81	1.75	2.86	6.88	95	6
30	KBenson	NYM	9	10	4.52	26	26	156.2	9.69	0.87	2.92	5.90	94	6
31	KIshii	LA	12	8	4.38	29	29	160.2	8.03	1.07	5.62	6.72	93	6
32	PWilson	CIN	9	8	4.55	29	29	179.1	9.84	1.30	2.98	5.42	92	7
33	CLidle	PHI	11	13	5.01	33	32	201.2	9.63	1.09	2.54	5.30	89	7
31	IValdez	U	11	9	5.20	30	28	156	10.54	1.64	2.42	3.82	86	5

Of course, this chart is just past performance; it doesn't show the severe injury risks associated with a large number of these guys, most notably Pedro and Brad Penny . . . Just a few more quick thoughts for now:

*You can clearly see that the Mets overpayed for Kris Benson. While I'm not a fan of Benson, I wasn't opposed to re-signing him, which seemed like a necessary move to avoid opening a hole in the rotation. But it's now clear that there were many other available alternatives of comparable quality, and the Mets should have relied on that to avoid overpaying and, if necessary, sign or trade for someone else.

*The difficulty of sustaining a serious workload in this day and age is apparent from the fact that only Hudson and Vazquez have been able to establish a level of 210 or more innings over the last three-year period.

*Context matters: Carl Pavano's numbers look better than those of Vazquez because he was pitching in a friendlier evironment last year. Derek Lowe's ERAs are actually better than those of David Wells, when you adjust for Fenway.

*Matt Clement is indeed a useful pitcher, and his power would have made him especially valuable to the Mets, but the guy does have weaknesses (mainly walks) that will be exposed at Fenway.

*I continue to think that Billy Beane will be vindicated in his decision to deal Mark Mulder now rather than later as far as Mulder's declining performance and uncertain health/durability is concerned - but that doesn't justify the trade, because it doesn't look like Beane got enough value in return. Good strategy, bad tactics. The same applies to a lesser extent to the Hudson deal.

*Matt Morris' performance no longer lives up to his reputation.

*Somebody could still really make a quiet impact on their rotation by snagging both Odalis Perez and Wade Miller.

So, after all the speculation about Javier Vazquez not being able to pitch in New York, Vazquez apparently scuttles the Randy Johnson deal by refusing to report to the Dodgers for a physical. Of course, it could be that he or the Yankees have something to hide about his physical condition, and it could be that Vazquez is trying to squeeze some extra money out of the deal. But for now, he seems to have decided that he'd rather try to make it here, and prove he could make it a-ny-where . . .

Two of the Astros rotation slots remain up in the air: Wade Miller is leaving town, but Roger Clemens has accepted arbitration, meaning that if he comes back again it will be as an Astro.

Miller's a good pitcher who's been scarred by injuries and Minute Maid Field; if he's healthy, he'd be a great pickup for someone.

Clemens can certainly still pitch, so it's more a matter of motivation. If he does return, Clemens - the winningest righthander since Grover Alexander - could become only the second pitcher (after Warren Spahn) to break 330 career wins in the post-1920 lively ball era.

The Baseball Savant gets carried away with Eric Chavez, comparing his numbers through age 26 to Barry Bonds:

The only real difference between the two at this point is that Bonds was showing a greater degree of plate discipline at this early stage than is Chavez. On the other hand, Chavez is showing much more power than Bonds at this point.

Link via Pinto. Of course, Bonds through age 26 had won back-to-back MVP awards; Chavez has never placed in the top 10 in the balloting. That's because the offensive context Chavez plays in is radically different; for example, the rough measure of OPS+ shows Chavez at 131, 122, 132 and 132 the past four years, compared to 147, 125, 170 and 161 for Bonds.

Even if you ignore context, though, the comparison doesn't hold. Chavez missed 37 games to injury last season, something that didn't happen to Bonds until he was 34. And the comparison totally overlooks a factor of great significance in projecting player development: speed. Chavez has stolen 14 bases and grounded into 35 double plays the past two years, compared to 97 steals and 16 GIDP for Bonds at the same age. (As to the plate discipline, Chavez has drawn 90+ walks once; Bonds had done it three years running). Even with just the raw numbers, you could see several reasons why Chavez' future as a hitter - even ignoring the post-2000 Bonds surge, which is entirely without precedent - shouldn't be compared to Barry Bonds.

Some new developments in the D.C. stadium saga:

D.C. Mayor Anthony A. Williams and Council Chairman Linda W. Cropp have reached an agreement tonight on the terms of a baseball stadium financing package that they believe likely will satisfy Major League Baseball by guaranteeing construction of a future home for the Washington Nationals, aides said…

Details are still emerging about the new agreement between Cropp and Williams, but the full 13-member council will be asked to vote on an amended plan today…

Hopefully, they have better options on the table than just this.

Looks like Mike Cameron is going to be out for the start of next season. The Mets shouldn’t need an extra incentive to pursue Carlos Beltran, but this would seem to be it.

Aaron Gleeman on Luis Rivas:

The Official Twins Beat Writer of AG.com, La Velle E. Neal III, wrote an article in the Minneapolis Star Tribune over the weekend that carried the headline: "Team worries Rivas has become stale."

As you can imagine, I got a nice chuckle out of that one. I also wondered about someone like Luis Rivas becoming "stale." I mean, if you have a bucket of, say, feces, and you leave it out for a week, does it become something worse than a bucket of feces? Does it become "rancid feces" or something? And how big of a bucket would you need to fit Rivas into it, exactly?

Q of the Day: Of the 15 Harvard alums to play Major League Baseball, name the only one to make the Hall of Fame.

Answer in the extended entry:

Read More »

Well, you knew Steinbrenner had to do something to top Pedro coming to Shea, and there was only one pitcher out there (well, other than bringing back Clemens) who fit the bill. Just wait for the first time Pedro and Randy Johnson square off in the regular season . . . although Joe Torre traditionally tries to duck the head-to-head matchups of aces.

Short term - over the next two seasons, maybe three - this deal is a bonanza for the Yankees, who give up the struggling Javier Vazquez and bring in the dominating Johnson plus, apparently, as of the latest report, Kaz Ishii, who can also be potentially useful. I'll have to digest the broader pitcure for the Yankee pitching staff later, but the minimal changes to the everyday lineup, combined with the addition of Johnson, Ishii, Pavano, Wright, Stanton and Rodriguez leaves no doubt where the Yanks felt they needed to improve.

If Vazquez isn't nursing an undisclosed injury - a very real possibility- I envy the Dodgers getting him out of the Bronx, where Torre had lost confidence in him, and into Dodger Stadium, although the Daily News suggested this morning that he could be headed to the White Sox . . . of course, the deal is still cotngent on Brad Penny passing a physical with Arizona, among other things (think the D-Backs ever thought when they traded Penny for Matt Mantei that they'd need to part with the Big Unit to get him back?)

The rationale for dumping Johnson and bringing in Penny makes sense for Arizona, and Shawn Green is still young enough, but Green's injuries and high salary obviously make him a less than ideal return on Johnson.

More to follow on all this, as well as Tim Hudson to the Braves, Beltre to the Mariners, and Renteria and Clement to the Red Sox . . . the moves are just coming too fast to make sense of them all.

You can now buy the departed Redbird Nation blog, starring our old friend and fellow Crusader Brian Gunn, in handy book form here. I've already ordered my copy.

The D.C. Council has pretty much rewritten the city’s agreement with Major League Baseball, leaving the future of the former Montreal Expos once again in doubt.

I’m sympathetic to the argument that D.C. taxpayers shouldn’t get stuck with the whole tab for a new stadium, but the City Council should honor the city’s original agreement with MLB. Doing otherwise only gives baseball an excuse to look elsewhere for a less inept city government that won’t renege on its deals.

UPDATE: David Pinto has a different take, which I agree with in principle, except to say that, if D.C. wanted to draw a line about demanding private financing, the time to do that was when it first made a deal. With baseball already committed to moving and renaming the team and local baseball fans prepared to support it, I think it’s wrong to reverse course like this. Hopefully, an owner or investor will ride in to pony up the money, but the track record of D.C.’s local government can’t be much of an incentive.

SECOND UPDATE (from the Crank): I like the image of Bud Selig as Lando . . . Eric McErlain has been all over this story, and has links aplenty here.

ANOTHER UPDATE: Chris Lawrence makes a valid point.

A reader emailed me this question:

"Who is the only player to hit an Inside the Park Grand Slam pinch hit Home Run and have it be the only Home run of his career?"

Well, I didn't know the answer, and haven't yet been able to verify that it happened that way (maybe someone can confirm this in the comments). But assuming that there is, in fact, precisely one such player, I think I found the answer.

This link lists the 12 major leaguers to hit both a pinch hit grand slam and an inside the park grand slam in their careers:

Randy Winn is the 12th major-leaguer, third in the past 50 years, to hit an inside-the-park grand slam (Oct. 3, 1999) and a pinch-hit grand slam (April 4). The others, according to SABR home run analyst David Vincent: Mike O'Neill, Beals Becker, Cy Williams, Marty Kavanagh, Rogers Hornsby, Harvey Hendrick, Les Bell, Hack Wilson, Pete Milne, Tim McCarver and Cesar Cedeno.

(A purportedly complete list of inside the park grand slams is here).

Of the 12, precisely one player had just one career home run: Pete Milne of the 1949 New York Giants. Milne batted 29 times in 31 games for the Giants that year while making just one appearance in the field, so it stands to reason that he was used mostly as a pinch hitter. (The list above identifies the date of his grand slam as April 27, 1949, a game the Giants won 11-8 over the hated Dodgers, so it's not surprising that it won him a job as a pinch hitter). So that appears to be the answer.

As you can tell from my commentary the past few days, I have decidedly mixed feelings about the Mets' signing of Pedro Martinez to a four-year, $50 million contract. Some thoughts, some original, some not, in no particular order:

1. Four years is obviously too much guaranteed time for a guy with Pedro's injury history. On the other hand, the cost of the deal is money ($50 million), players (the draft picks the Mets give up) and opportunity cost (the innings Pedro takes away from other players). Given that Pedro seems unlikely to reach the point where he's pitching a lot of innings but pitching ineffectively, an extra year only costs the Mets one of those, the money. On the other hand, you can hardly blame the Red Sox for deciding that this was crazy money.

2. In the same vein: finding good young hitters is not that hard; finding good young pitchers these days - guys who can consistently take 30 turns in the rotation with a better-than-league ERA - is next to impossible. And Barry Bonds notwithstanding, in general, hitters decline much more predictably with age than do pitchers. And, a starting pitcher usually does much less to block the progress of good young arms, since few teams are so glutted with pitching that they can't quickly find room for a good youngster. All of which are a way of explaining why, as a general matter, I'm more willing to see even a rebuilding team take on an expensive starting pitcher in his 30s, as compared to a Sammy Sosa-type declining slugger.

3. Pedro is, as I discussed yesterday, a pitcher of historic levels of greatness. If you are going to gamble, better to gamble on a guy who's an inner-circle Hall of Famer than on . . . well, on Kris Benson and Victor Zambrano, for example. Given his track record, I view Pedro as much more of a proven commodity, and not a significantly greater injury risk, than Carl Pavano or Jaret Wright, both headed to the Bronx after precisely one year of being healthy and effective. (Of course, all pitchers are greater injury risks than almost all everyday players).

On the durability front, well, Pedro is replacing Al Leiter, who is six years older and was never an iron man himself. Leiter, working for an average salary the past 3-4 years of about $2 million per year less than Pedro will make, averaged 194 innings a year in his seven seasons at Shea, only once throwing more than 210 (Pedro threw 217 last year, but with diminished effectiveness compared to 2001-03). If we get about the same from Pedro, I'll be happy. I don't expect 230 innings.

4. Shea is a great place for a power pitcher, especially with Mike Cameron in center field, and facing a pitcher instead of some Frank Thomas/Edgar Martinez type DH every nine hitters is a great way to cut down the number of stressful pitches thrown. Both of which are a way of saying that Pedro may wind up being more valuable with the Mets than he would have been with the Red Sox. Bringing a power pitcher to Shea is like bringing a power hitter to Wrigley (see, Dawson, Andre; Alou, Moises).

5. Of course, none of this should be viewed as a substitute for the long-term strategy the Mets need to develop young talent. But frankly, I'm not about to hold my breath waiting for that to happen. Given the existing strategy of trying to half-rebuild while continuing to prop up the team with veterans, Pedro is a decent fit in that context.

6. I know the market has changed a lot, but $50 million really doesn't look like an extraordinary amount of money compared to past contracts given to Mike Hampton, Kevin Brown, Darren Dreifort, Kevin Appier, Mike Mussina, Tom Glavine, Chan Ho Park . . . yeah, there's a lot of bad decisions there, but this isn't a Mo Vaughn style 7-year $100-mil-plus millstone here; it's basically one Kris Benson plus one Kaz Matsui. If this deal deters the Mets from two more middle-market contracts like those, where's the harm?

7. Just for a little perspective, if you look at the most similar pitchers at the same age, Pedro is around the same age at which Tom Seaver went to the Reds, Roger Clemens to the Blue Jays, Mussina to the Yankees, and Lefty Grove to the Red Sox. Most of the guys on that list had their ups and downs in their mid-30s, but in general they had some real high points as well. Of course, physically, Martinez resembles Mussina, Grove, Greg Maddux, Whitey Ford or Juan Marichal much more than he does Seaver or Clemens. On a more sobering note, Pedro is also about the same age Frank Viola and Bret Saberhagen were when they left the Mets.

8. Can we finally have a no-hitter now, please?

9. Dan Lewis asks Five Questions:

1) Will this guy improve the team next year?
2) Does the move cost us too much in players?
3) What would our plan have been if we didn’t make this move, and is the gain signficant?
4) What is the effect of the deal if it goes badly?
5) If the deal goes awry, how will we fix it?

Go see his answers; I do think there's a missing factor here: the deal has upside. Although I don't regard it as the most likely possibility, it's certainly one of the plausible scenarios to get 800 innings, 800 strikeouts and an ERA below 3.00 from Pedro over the next four years. Given the scarcity of highly effective pitchers these days, that would be worth more than $12 million a year, in my view. (A return to something close to vintage Pedro, which is not going to happen, would be worth much more). That's one thing that distinguishes this from the contracts that a lot of mid-30s hitters get, where you are paying them a salary equal to the best value they are likely to give you. Hey, you win in baseball by taking risks. This deal is a big risk, but then Vladimir Guerrero last year was a big risk too. This is one that could pay off. Better that than give out more $25 million contracts to guys who are a safe bet to turn in a 4.25 ERA.

Long-time readers will recall my Translated Pitcher Records project from four years ago. Hopefully, I'll get back to that one some day. But a simpler way of comparing the very best pitchers over time is ERA+, baseballreference.com's comparison of a pitcher's career ERA to a park-context-adjusted league average. There are two problems, however, with the baseballreference.com leaderboard: it has a very low innings pitched threshold, and thus is loaded at the top with relief pitchers; and, unlike my Translated Records, it isn't translated back into a recognizable ERA benchmark.

So I thought I'd do both; I separated out the pitchers by groupings of innings pitched, and translated their ERAs back into a uniform context of a league ERA of 4.50, which is around midway between the NL and AL ERAs in 2004:

3000 Career Innings or More

#	Pitcher	ERA	IP
1	Lefty Grove	3.04	3940.2
2	Walter Johnson	3.08	5914.2
3	Randy Johnson	3.13	3368
4	Roger Clemens	3.19	4493
5	Greg Maddux	3.19	4181.1
6	Kid Nichols	3.24	5056.1
7	Three Finger Brown	3.26	3172.1
8	Cy Young	3.26	7354.2
9	Grover Alexander	3.33	5190
10	Christy Mathewson	3.33	4780.2
11	John Clarkson	3.36	4536.1
12	Whitey Ford	3.41	3170.1
13	Kevin Brown	3.46	3183
14	Carl Hubbell	3.46	3590.1
15	Amos Rusie	3.46	3769.2

You can see why I stick to the view that Walter Johnson was the greatest of all pitchers, as he stands second only to Lefty Grove here, and in 40% more innings. This list is dominated by pre-1920 and active pitchers, other than Grove and Ford. While I knew he was on the edge of making a Hall of Fame case, I was as surprised as anyone to see Kevin Brown on a list this elite. And this is also further confirmation of precisely how great Kid Nichols was, and why he really gets a raw deal when the great pitchers of old are being ranked.

2000-3000 Career Innings

This second list is guys who have had fairly substantial careers but not a full, 15-years-at-200-innings career:

#	Pitcher	ERA	IP
1	Pedro Martinez	2.69	2296
2	Hoyt Wilhelm	3.08	2254.1
3	Ed Walsh	3.10	2964.1
4	Addie Joss	3.17	2327
5	Al Spalding	3.17	2890.2
6	Rube Waddell	3.36	2961.1
7	Noodles Hahn	3.41	2029.1
8	Sandy Koufax	3.44	2324.1
9	Curt Schilling	3.44	2812.2
10	Hal Newhouser	3.46	2993

You can see here why, for all my mixed feelings about the warning signs and the Mets overpaying, I'm still excited about the possibility of Pedro coming to Shea: he's been head and shoulders above anybody else who's ever pitched, he's still just 33, and a guy that good is worth a gamble. . . Noodles Hahn? Yeah, I'm not too sure about that one either, but Hahn's the classic forgotten type of pitcher, a guy whose big years came with the turn-of-the-century Reds, a dismal franchise in a quiet period in the game's history. . . Curt Schilling is close to qualifying for the next list up, although he's also close to dropping off the bottom if he finishes with a few bad seasons.

The rest of the guys in the under-2000 IP bin fall into three groups: relievers, starting with Dan Quisenberry at 3.08 and including John Franco, Bruce Sutter, John Hiller, Lee Smith, Kent Tekulve, and Doug Jones; very-short-career starters, from Smoky Joe Wood at 3.08 down through Jim Devlin (who was banned from baseball for throwing the 1877 pennant race), Harry Brecheen, Spud Chandler, and Dizzy Dean; and one active starter, Tim Hudson at 3.26.

Well, this would put the Mets one Mike Mussina acquisition from ensuring that no active pitcher wins 300 games . . .The fourth year for Pedro strikes me as the one year too many. I'm more encouraged by the fact that they're pursuing Delgado and Sexson, especially now that they wouldn't need to surrender draft choices to get Delgado (I'd rather have Sexson, although he may be close to signing with Seattle).

UPDATE: At least the Mets aren't doing anything nearly as stupid as trading Carlos Lee for Scott Podsednik. The mind staggers at that one.

SECOND UPDATE: It certainly looks like this is happening, given Larry Lucchino's email referring to Pedro's Red Sox tenure in the past tense.

Another era is ending in Oakland, just as the first Beane Era ended with the departure of Matt Stairs, Ben Grieve, John Jaha, and Jason Giambi. It seems increasingly likely now that Tim Hudson will be traded in accordance with his demand for a new contract by March 1, bringing the era of the Big Three starters to a close.

Hudson, of course, is one of baseball's true elite pitchers, has been since he arrived in the majors in the last century. He's been durable - 2004 was the first time he missed significant time to injury - and unbeatable, 92-39 in his Oakland career.

Of course, I've long been a devotee of Bill James' belief that one thing you have to watch in evaluating pitchers is their strikeout rates; a dropping rate is both a signal (diminishing effectiveness) and has a direct effect on performance, increasing the number of balls in play that can potentially become hits. On the other hand, there are ways for a pitcher to compensate for a loss of strikeouts, at least temporarily, mostly by throwing strikes and keeping the ball in the park.

Tim Hudson in recent years has been one of the most extreme examples of those coping mechanisms you will ever see. Let's look at his season-by-season rates in a number of categories:

Year	K/9	BB/9	HR/9	GB/FB	GDP/9	SB/9	SB%
1999	8.71	4.09	0.53	2.27	0.92	0.92	73.7
2000	7.52	3.65	1.07	2.02	0.71	1.07	88.9
2001	6.93	2.72	0.77	2.26	0.69	0.92	77.4
2002	5.74	2.34	0.72	2.03	1.32	0.19	38.5
2003	6.08	2.29	0.56	2.26	0.86	0.26	53.8
2004	4.91	2.10	0.38	2.53	1.10	0.38	66.7

It's not an unbroken chain in every category, but the overall pattern is crystal clear: a broad-based improvement in every other aspect of Hudson's game but strikeouts since 1999. You have to admire Hudson's determined adaptability, relentlessly cutting walks and home runs, getting more ground balls, and revolutionizing his ability to set up the double play by eliminating his vulnerability to the stolen base almost overnight in 2002. He's even made just 3 errors the past three years compared to 10 the prior three.

That's the good news. The bad news is, his strikeout rate has been sinking like a stone, and Hudson has all but run out of room to squeeze further improvements out of the rest of his game to compensate. Lefthanders are particularly catching up to him, batting .298/.422/.352 against Hudson in 2004.

It's very possible that the smart, gifted and driven 29-year-old ace will come up with new ways to trick batters and reverse the downward trend in his strikeout rate, keeping him at the elite level to which he's grown accustomed. But any team forking over big bucks and top prospects to get him should understand that, if he doesn't, Hudson's days as one of the league's elite may be numbered.

UPDATE: I recognize, of course, that Hudson's alarmingly low 2004 K rate may have been a function of pitching through injuries. The downward trend is still worrisome.

One quick thought on the Yankees' acquisition of Tony Womack (no relation to Dooley). Yes, he's had a big hit or two, but for his career, the 35-year-old Womack has played in 38 of his teams' 39 games in the postseason; here's his postseason career record projected out to a full 162-game season:

G	AB	H	2B	3B	HR	R	RBI	BB	K	SB	CS	AVG	SLG	OBP
158	648	137	25	8	0	79	25	29	104	17	12	.212	.276	.250

Come to think of it, let's check out Jaret Wright's career postseason record; Wright has made 15 appearances in 27 postseason games played by his teams:

W	L	ERA	G	GS	IP	H	BB	K	H/9	BB/9	K/9
18	27	7.24	90	54	306	336	198	282	9.88	5.82	8.29

Well, OK, Wright's numbers - which include a 15.63 career postseason ERA against the Red Sox - are spread over almost two different careers in Cleveland and Atlanta, and the postseason does wacky things to pitcher workloads. Still, if you believe in the Yankee postseason magic, these guys haven't had it in the past.

I was looking over Curt Schilling's career, and two thoughts come to mind:

1. One of the great underrated terrible trades in recent baseball history is the Astros' decision, on April 2, 1992, to trade Schilling straight up for Jason Grimsley. Schilling and Grimsley were both young pitchers trying to establish themselves at this point - Grimsley was 24, Schilling 25 - and both had followed some success as rookies in 1990 (a 3.30 ERA in 57.1 IP as a starter for Grimsley, a 2.54 ERA in 46 IP as a reliever for Schilling) with struggles in 1991 (1-7 with a 4.87 ERA in 61 IP as a starter for Grimsley, a 3.81 ERA in 75.2 IP as a reliever for Schilling). But it should have been obvious at the time not only that Schilling threw harder but that he was closer to breaking through: 103 K and 58 walks for Schilling in 121.2 IP over the previous two years - including 71 K in 75.2 IP in 1991 - compared to an abysmal record of 83 K to 84 walks for Grimsley (and 16 wild pitches) in 118.1 IP. And the results were immediate and dramatic: Schilling posted a 2.35 ERA in 226.1 IP in 1992 for the Phillies - 4th best in the NL - and would pitch a shutout in the World Series by the end of 1993, while Grimsley never pitched a game in an Astros uniform and was released a year later.

It's not clear to me, years later, what Houston was thinking; with Pete Harnisch, Darryl Kile, and Butch Henry, Houston had no shortage of young starters, and Schilling had started in the minors. Perhaps Grimsley had options left and Schilling didn't (after all, the deal was April 2)? Either way, the Astros don't get nearly enough grief for this one in the annals of catastrophically bad trades.

2. If there's one guy whose career path Schilling's resembles, strangely enough, it's Tommy John, and not only because both of them were pioneers in bionic baseball. Through age 33, due to a variety of injuries and misfortunes (including lousy support from their teams) over the years, both Schilling and John had a lot of good baseball behind them and not much to show in the win column: Schilling had 110 lifetime wins at the end of 2000 (when he went 11-12), following his mid-season arrival in Arizona, despite a league-average-or-better ERA 9 times in 11 years; John had 134 wins after his first post-surgery season, in 1976, when he went 10-10, despite a league-average-or-better ERA 11 years in a row. Each had seemingly given his arm in the service of a dismal franchise - Schilling throwing 254.1 and 268.2 IP in 1997-98 with the Phillies, John 269.1 IP in 1970 with the White Sox.

Then, each suddenly reeled off three 20-win seasons in four years, and went to the postseason with two different teams, Schilling the D-Backs and Red Sox and John the Dodgers and Yankees.

Of course, the parallels aren't perfect. Schilling is most unlikely to match John's durability (pitching to age 46) or win total of 288 (John through age 37 was up to 214 wins, while Schilling now stands at 184). On the other hand, Schilling's teams haven't failed in the postseason as John's did in 1977, 1978, 1980, 1981 and 1982 - despite solid efforts from John (a 2.65 career postseason ERA), and Schilling had been the difference for both Arizona and Boston. And John couldn't quite match Schilling's level of dominance - from age 34 to 37, John went 80-35, Schilling 74-28, and John's career winning percentage through age 37 stood at .586 compared to .599 for Schilling (this before John went 23-20 over the next two years pitching mostly for division-winning teams). To say nothing of the fact that Schilling is an overpowering strikeout pitcher who alreadly has 500 more strikeouts than John did in nearly 2000 more career innings.

As you can see, though, the parallels are actually fairly strong, a factor to consider down the road in evaluating both pitchers' Hall of Fame cases.

SI.com writer Peter McEntegart repeats a slightly different variation of a stat I saw Peter Gammons citing the other day:

The most astounding number to come out of the Barry Bonds steroid controversy is not that 93 percent of the 40,000-plus voters on a SI.com poll don't believe Bonds' claim that he was unaware he took steroids. The more intriguing number comes from Stats Inc., which reports that Bonds had never hit a home run longer than 450 feet before the 2000 season, when he turned 36. Since then, he's hit at least 21 homers of 450 feet or farther.

Here is Gammons’ version:

WFAN's Christopher Russo interviewed a home run distance expert who claimed that prior to 2000, Bonds hit three homers longer than 450 feet; in the last five years, he has hit 26.

Either way…well…it seems like telling circumstantial evidence.

Poliblogger passes on this Barry Bonds quote:

Bonds said he never paid Anderson for drugs or supplements but did give the trainer $15,000 in cash in 2003 for weight training and a $20,000 bonus after his 73-homer season.

Bonds said that Anderson had so little money that he “lives in his car half the time.” Asked by a juror why he didn’t buy “a mansion” for his trainer, Bonds answered: “One, I’m black, and I’m keeping my money. And there’s not too many rich black people in this world. There’s more wealthy Asian people and Caucasian and white. And I ain’t giving my money up.”

and asks the relevant question:

Why in the world would a multi-million dollar athlete at the pinnacle of his career employ a trainer who was semi-homeless? I will grant that Bonds didn’t need to buy the guy a house, but you are letting a guy who “lives in his car half the time” to use unknown substances on your body?

So, Bonds now says he took what Anderson gave him but didn't ask what it was. Are you kidding me? Here you've got a guy walking around with the Scarlet "S" tattooed on his head, he knows he's taking a variety of supposedly unidentified substances . . . Absolutely everyone who followed baseball the past five years either (1) thought Bonds was using the stuff or at least (2) was aware of the charges. You thought Bonds was on steroids. I thought Bonds was on steroids. But it never even occurred to Barry Bonds himself that he should look into the stuff he was taking? If so, he was the only guy in the game who wasn't thinking it. He has to know it won't pass the smell test.

Jon Weisman reports the sad news of the death of Brian Traxler, a square-shaped line drive hitter who managed to make a big impression on a lot of fans for a guy who had only one major league hit.

Speaking of the media and ballplayers' personal lives, remember the story about Cecil Fielder's gambling problem? Well, now Fielder has sued the Detroit News for libel:

The libel suit, filed Nov. 23 in Wayne County Circuit Court, accuses the Detroit Newspaper Agency and reporter Fred Girard of defaming and slandering the three-time All Star by reporting that he was "in hiding," "not in contact with his family," not supporting his daughter financially, and had an "unstoppable gambling compulsion," according to the suit.

[snip]

Fielder's lawyers said the stories exaggerated the gambling and reported incorrect information.

In a follow up story Oct. 21, Fielder told the News he planned to repay his debts, saying: "I'm going to be a man about it. I'm going to take care of all my responsibilities."

From the story reported on ESPN, it doesn't sound as if Fielder is disputing many of the key allegations against him - that he gambled away millions of dollars and had lost his Florida mansion as a result of inability to pay gambling debts - and is instead attacking charges that are harder to pin down, like the extent to which he was "in hiding" or in contact with his family. Those are facts as to which it will be hard to show that the News recklessly disregarded the truth if they relied on what somebody told them or on the fact that they couldn't find him, and Fielder will have a tough time proving $25 million in damages if the thrust of the story - massive gambling debts, loss of his house - is true.

I thought what the NY Daily News did to Jason Giambi on Sunday was just reprehensible. Giambi has a lot of well-deserved grief coming over his use of illegal and against-the-rules steroids and his lies to cover up that use. But the Daily News splashed a huge story across the back page about Giambi's love of Vegas nightlife:

The release of his grand jury testimony, which labels him as both a steroid user and a liar, not only makes Giambi the worst kind of bum as far as New York is concerned. It makes his somewhat reckless personal life, until now something of an open secret in baseball circles, fair game for public consumption.

Um, why would that be? What does Vegas have to do with whether the guy cheated and - the question of the hour - how seriously we should take that cheating? And what do you mean, "reckless"? Drugs? Sex? Gambling? Something else entirely? The News never precisely says, burying us instead in innuendo and a bunch of truisms about Sin City:

Read More »

Well, one positive development from all this steroid business is that the Mets have apparently decided to pass on Sammy Sosa.

Jason Mastaitis has picked up on this too and has some other juicy…err…interesting Mets news.

In a post about Pete Rose and Barry Bonds, David Pinto has some provocative thoughts about steroid use and baseball, basically asking why is it wrong:

I want to throw out a hypothetical here. What if a surgeon invented a way to make you stronger with muscle implants? We already harvest hearts and lungs and corneas and livers for transplant. What if there was a way to graft more muscle onto your thighs? Is it different than laser surgery on your eyes so you see as well as Ted Williams? Is it different than getting a new arm through surgery to repair a blown tendon? Hypothetically, the effect would be the same as steroids; a stronger body hitting the ball farther. Would this be okay? Where do we draw the line and why do steroids seem to cross it?

We want to watch big guys hit home runs. That sells baseball. That helps our teams win. That's exciting. Why do we care so much about how they sculpt their bodies to become those hitters?

After all, we don't see to care so much about actors and actresses having plastic surgery. We go see them in movies because they look good, and when they stop being beautiful, we stop watching. Should there be a rule that only "natural" actors be allowed to make movies? Should Hollywood ban everyone who gets a face lift or tummy tuck?

Of course not. Becuase these people are hurting no one but themselves. And the same is true of baseball players.

It’s a very good question, the fundamental kind people too rarely ask. Like in international relations, why is it wrong for countries like Iraq and Iran to pursue nuclear weapons? Asking such questions doesn’t necessarily mean that you will come to a different conclusion, but it does help prevent you from blindly following conventional wisdom. In terms of steroids, there are several reasons why they should be banned and why their usage should be proscribed. Here are just a few…

Read More »

No time to blog this morning, but I'll point you to Jeff Quinton, who picks up the NY Daily News report on Jason Giambi admitting to the BALCO grand jury that he used steroids and human growth hormone. Of course, if this story gets confirmed in the public eye - not that anybody'd be all that surprised - it would reduce Giambi's vulnerability to blackmail by the Yankees.

Of course, the Yankees also have their hands full with not paying their taxes rent . . .

UPDATE: Fixed the reference above. Also, note that Jeremy Giambi also admitted using steroids, which is unsurprising in light of his brother's admission:

Jeremy Giambi's testimony mirrored his brother's -- right down to Anderson's notifying him that he had tested positive for the steroid Deca Durabolin. Jeremy Giambi described to the grand jury how he had injected human growth hormone and testosterone he received from the trainer before the start of the 2003 season, when he played for the Boston Red Sox.

The younger Giambi testified that he knew testosterone was a steroid but that Anderson had described "the clear" and "the cream" only as undetectable "alternatives to steroids."

"For all I knew, it could have been baby lotion," Jeremy Giambi told the grand jury.

Jeremy Giambi, 30, also told the grand jury that he had taken several different-colored pills provided by Anderson even though he didn't know what they were.

Nedrow asked Jeremy Giambi why he trusted Anderson.

"I don't know, I guess -- I mean, you're right," Jeremy Giambi testified. "I probably shouldn't have trusted the guy. But I just felt like, you know, what he had done for Barry [Bonds] and, you know, I didn't think the guy would send me something that was, you know, Drano or something, you know, I mean, I hope he wouldn't."

The Giants have to be planning on drifting gradually to a safe distance from the pennant race as the Marlins did this season if they are looking to entrust their closer job to Armando Benitez. As the AP item notes:

[W]hile Benitez has been one of the game's top closers in the regular season with 244 saves in 283 chances - the fourth best percentage all-time -- his postseason history is spotty. He has blown six of 10 postseason save opportunities -- a major league record . . .

Yeah, and that doesn't count meaningful regular season games in pennant races. Brian Sabean is falling back on the "everybody blows games" defense:

"He's 32-years old and has learned a lot from his experience," Sabean said, adding that in this postseason "people with greater reputations proved they're fallible."

Well, not quite, but the erstwhile Yankee radio man and SportsCenter anchor is off to Chavez Ravine, where he'll replace Ross Porter and share a booth with Rick Monday for Dodger broadcasts; they will alternate with Vin Scully, who works alone. From MLB's report:

Steiner, a New York native, said the first game he heard on a big Zenith radio at the age of 6 had Scully calling the Brooklyn Dodgers from Ebbets Field.

Link via Bookworm, who speculates that beat reporter Suzyn Waldman may take Steiner's place in the booth; I'm fairly certain she'd be the first woman to broadcast games on a regular basis for a New York baseball team.

The Daily News claims that the Mets have offered Pedro Martinez a three-year deal worth somewhere in the neighborhood of $37-39 million (about $12-13 million per year), and are contemplating a fourth year guaranteed. While I'm not a fan of the overall strategy of committing more money to expensive stars in their thirties, Pedro is at least a sufficiently high-quality starter - a rare enough thing these days - that it would not be a terrible move, although adding a fourth year guaranteed, with Pedro's health and durability concerns, would be a Very Bad Idea. That fourth year is only worth it if you are - unlike the Mets - willing to risk writing off an extra season of salary to get over the top in the short run.

Anyway, amidst all the gnashing of teeth about Pedro's decline, a little perspective is in order:

W	L	ERA	G	GS	CG	IP	H	HR	BB	K
13	10	3.70	33	33	4	216.2	189	19	70	222
19	7	2.89	33	33	2	233.2	188	26	67	251
16	9	3.90	33	33	1	217	193	26	61	227

That's Pedro in 1996, 1998, and 2004; as you can see, Pedro's performance this season wasn't greatly out of line with seasons he had in his mid-20s. Yes, we'll never see the Pedro of 1999-2000 again (in our lifetimes, we may never see any pitcher that dominating again), and yes, he's lost some gas off his fastball, but the numbers say there's still plenty of gas in Pedro's tank if he can stay healthy.

For reasons that are unclear to me, I got a free sample issue in the mail of "At The Yard," a magazine following the minor leagues. What caught my attention was an article on how Dwight Eisenhower apparently told reporters in 1945 that he had played minor league ball under an assumed name ("Wilson") in 1909 when he was 19. Grantland Rice reported that Ike played center field in the Central Kansas League (presumably a fairly low-level minor league), batting .288, scoring 43 runs and stealing 20 bases in a season of a little over 200 at bats. (Here's what little else I could find on this online).

(A side note: am I the only one who thinks Grover Alexander, a Nebraskan who was three years older than the Kansan Eisenhower also entered pro ball in 1909, bore a striking resemblance to Ike?)

Anyway, as the article (not available online, so far as I can tell) points out, Eisenhower abruptly stopped talking about his pro baseball career after that, and with good reason: he played football and baseball at West Point, which he entered in 1911, and to do so he would have had to sign an NCAA eligibility card stating that he had not played professional sports - and if he signed that card falsely, it would be a violation of West Point's honor code, something Ike would not want to admit to once he was embarked on a career in politics. In today's atmosphere, of course, it's unlikely he would have gotten away with this without someone digging this up.

But if there's some enterprising SABR type out there who would like to dig up the old minor league box scores, this sounds like a fun project to look into.

Wade Boggs leads the new nominees on the Hall of Fame ballot, but while a few of the other new candidates, like Darryl Strawberry, Chili Davis and Willie McGee put together pieces of a Hall of Fame case, nobody else new is a serious candidate, whereas Boggs should and will skate in with little or no debate. I think my favorite Wade Boggs fact is in 1987 when he somehow must have sensed that the ball was livelier, and he announced in spring training that he was going to try to his more home runs. As it turned out, homers were up around the league, and Boggs hit 24 of them (up from a career high of 8; he would hit double figures only once more, with 11 in 1994).

Anyway, there's the usual lively debate about who else goes in; you can go here for a link-filled roundup of my past writings on the returning candidates, and why the only ones I would support are Bert Blyleven, Goose Gossage and Ryne Sandberg (although I may return at some point for a closer look at Sandberg and Alan Trammell).

One of my major projects of late has been plugging the 2004 Win Shares data from the Hardball Times into a series of spreadsheets to (1) analyze the usefulness of my Established Win Shares Levels figures from earlier this year and (2) run similar EWSL numbers for 2005. EWSL is explained here; in a nutshell, it's an application to Win Shares of Established Performance Levels, which take a weighted measurement of a player's accomplishments in a given category over the prior three years. I ran an EWSL analysis of each team starting here, listing 23 players (13 non-pitchers and 10 pitchers).

As I've said before, EWSL is just a compilation of the past, not a projection of the future, although past performance is always a useful thing to have in projecting a ballplayer's future. Anyway, one issue with EWSL, especially on a team level, is that it tends to overrate older players and underrate younger ones by relying on established track records.

That, we already knew. But by how much? I had used a number of adjustments to deal with this issue, and I'll return to those later, but first I wanted to take a look at how the unadjusted EWSL fared as a predictor. So I broke down by age each of the 678 players I had listed to compare their unadjusted EWSL entering 2004 to their 2004 Win Shares, and grouped the results by age. The Average EWSL and Average 2004 Win Shares columns are rounded off; the % column shows the total 2004 Win Shares for that age group (un-rounded) divided by the total EWSL (also un-rounded), with 1.00 meaning the group matched its EWSL, numbers above 1.00 showing an increase and below 1.00 showing a decrease. I grouped the 20-21 and over-40 groups because they were so small (20 was just Edwin Jackson, who never did get a shot in 2004).

Age	#	Avg EWSL	Avg 2004 WS	+/-	%
20-21	6	3	7	+4	2.77
22	13	4	11	+7	3.15
23	11	6	10	+4	1.61
24	26	6	10	+4	1.76
25	39	6	10	+4	1.64
26	70	7	8	+1	1.22
27	60	8	9	+1	1.19
28	60	9	11	+2	1.26
29	49	9	8	-1	0.89
30	62	10	10	0	0.96
31	51	9	8	-1	0.89
32	53	10	9	-1	0.91
33	41	10	7	-3	0.71
34	34	8	7	-1	0.87
35	21	14	7	-7	0.52
36	26	10	9	-1	0.84
37	19	11	9	-2	0.81
38	17	9	8	-1	0.86
39	11	13	11	-2	0.84
40+	9	11	11	0	1.00

Although the overall aging pattern is hardly a surprise, I was struck by how vividly the pattern came out even over a relatively small sample size. (The breakdowns of numbers of players by age is interesting in its own right). The 40+ crowd, of course, was dominated by Clemens and Randy Johnson, which is what throws that off. Since Established Performance Levels acts as something of a multiplier of inexperience, it's not surprising to see the average player doubling or tripling his past track record at a very young age, when many in the group are rookies, and that time-lag may also contribute to why the break point for decline starts at 29 rather than 28. I was also struck by the overall stability of the numbers, as there was relatively little variance in the 2004 quality of production over age groups, although of course the mid-30s crowd did underperform the mid-20s crowd even though the mid-20s contingent included a much larger number of marginal players who won't last past 30.

The wipeout of the 35-year-olds was especially gruesome, and can be attributed partly to having a small sample and the highest starting point in the range. But there were more than just a few disasters in that group: Tim Salmon (down from 18 to 2), Bret Boone (29 to 9), Shigetoshi Hasegawa (10 to 3), John Olerud (20 to 10 - the Mariners had way too many of these guys), Mike Mussina (18 to 10), Paul Quantrill (10 to 6), Pat Hentgen (6 to 0), Fernando Vina (12 to 1), Sammy Sosa (27 to 14), and most egregiously of all, Hideo Nomo (15 to -6).

Anyway, there's more work still to be done, but clearly to be useful as a predictive tool EWSL needs to be adjusted for age in some fashion.

Baseball-Reference.com page sponsorships can get pretty rough on the sponsored player from time to time, but this is a new one: check out Wil Cordero's page:

Support Battered Women sponsor(s) this page.

According to a 2000 UNICEFstudy, 20-50% of females worldwide will be victimized by domestic violence.

What's interesting about the A's apparently acquiring Jason Kendall for Mark Redman and Arthur Rhodes is not the Pirates' end of the deal, which involves getting some face-saving pitching help while getting out from under Kendall's oversized contract, but rather the A's being willing to take on salary to get a catcher (replacing the departing Damian Miller) who gets on base. For all the notoriety of the A's OBP obsession, the team had in recent years been losing ground in that department. Kendall helps turn around that trend (which had gotten a bit better this season).

Good deal for Oakland, in spite of Kendall's cost, age and lack of power.

I wonder whether it would be worthwhile for the Mets to take a look at Brad Radke, although it sounds like his asking price is fairly steep. (Then again, I loved this line: "Radke has said he wants only a two-year deal, but Simon [his agent] said that wouldn't necessarily be the length he proposes." Yeah, the agent will have a lot of credibility on that score.)

On the plus side, Radke's an extreme fly ball pitcher who would profit from pitching at Shea in front of Mike Cameron. And I'm less concerned about signing a free agent pitcher in his 30s as opposed to hitters, given (1) that you need a lot of innings on a pitching staff, so there's less sense that old guys are blocking the development of youngsters, and (2) age is less of a straight-line predictor of career path for pitchers (pitchers in their 20s are a crapshoot anyway). On the other hand, the Mets do need to keep cash free to develop the everyday lineup, and Radke is a guy who gives up a lot of hits.

That’s the rumor:

Take it for what it's worth, but moments ago, during an interview on the Michael Kay Show, Jon Heyman of Newsday said that his sources have indicated that the Mets are likely sever ties with Al Leiter and have targeted Matt Clement to be his replacement.

(Via Jason Mastaitis).

I have to say the Angels got the better end of the deal that sent Jose Guillen to the Washington Nationals for Juan Rivera and prospect Macier Izturis (younger brother of Cesar Izturis). I don't know much about Izturis, but Guillen and Rivera are both the same general type of player - relatively free-swinging right-handed sluggers with a good arm - but Rivera is two years younger, makes a fraction of the money, and doesn't come with Guillen's clubhouse headaches. And Rivera finished with a flourish last year; in his first extended action as an everyday player, he batted .358/.526/418 after the All-Star Break. Given that Guillen himself has only been a productive regular for two seasons, I'd rather have Rivera even before you factor in the money, let alone when you toss in a 24-year-old shortstop who batted .338 in AAA last year.

Nobody doubts that Carl Pavano is a talented pitcher, but I've been hearing people talk about Pavano as if he was a potential substitute for Pedro Martinez in Boston or Javier Vazquez or Kevin Brown in New York. Hold on there, people. Pavano may be just coming into his own, or he may be just coming off a career year. Either way, I don't see a #1 starter.

First off, there's his lack of a track record; Pavano's thrown 100 innings in a season 5 times, and 2004 is the first time he's been better than a league-average pitcher. Then there's the core of the problem: strikeouts. 28-year-old pitchers who don't get a lot of strikeouts do not, in general, become stars. And look at Pavano's K per 9 innings the last four years: 7.59, 6.09, 5.96, 5.63. Certainly not forward progress.

This is not to say that Pavano is doomed as an effective pitcher, or even that it's impossible that he will follow the footsteps of Kevin Brown and Mike Scott and similar pitchers who bucked the trend of history by becoming big strikeout pitchers in their 30s. After all, he had a fine year in 2004 by slicing his walks to less than 2 per 9 innings and avoiding the home run ball, both critical skills. But the odds on the latter are not strong. Consider the ten men identified by Baseball-Reference.com as the most-similar pitchers to Pavano through age 28:

Oil Can Boyd (980)
Dustin Hermanson (973)
Charles Nagy (970)
Luis Leal (969)
Bill Wegman (969)
Art Mahaffey (969)
Todd Stottlemyre (966)
Jim Lonborg (966)
Aaron Sele (962)
Frank Castillo (960)

As you can see, the similarity scores are fairly high - and these guys averaged 41 career wins after age 28. Nagy and Wegman both had their best years at 29, and Stottlemyre had a big strikeout year at 30, but not one of these guys was really on his way up entering his thirties.

I'd put Pavano on the level with Jon Lieber and Brad Radke, both similar pitchers in some ways, although Radke in particular is homer-prone. But Pedro Martinez, who's four years older and with a lot of mileage on his arm, still struck out 9.41 men per 9 innings in 2004 with only a slightly higher walk rate than Pavano. There's no comparison.

I can't say I'm ecstatic about seeing Kris Benson in a Mets uniform for another three years, but re-signing him was clearly a necessity once the team let Al Leiter go. The real proof in the pudding on the acquisitions of Benson and Victor Zambrano will come next year (although the costs will take longer to weigh as we watch the development of Scott Kazmir and the other prospects in the deals). Benson should, if healthy, be at least about a league-average pitcher, which isn't nothing.

Of course, yet again, all of this is just window dressing if Mets management still thinks that the club's problems can be rectified by the elderly and expensive likes of Sammy Sosa.

*The Tigers sign Troy Percival for 2 years, $12 million. Yes, it's just a 2-year deal, but that's elite closer money, and Percival's just not worth it anymore.

*Thank you Mike Cameron? Baseball Prospectus' latest stab at team defensive stats (subscription only) lists the Mets as #4 in the majors for 2004.

*How did I miss this one when it happened? From September, Mike's Baseball Rants has some fun with John Kruk calling Chone Figgins - Chone Figgins - "the most valuable player in the game today."

If you look at the Win Shares numbers from the Hardball Times, you can see that the AL MVP race was, for all intents and purposes, a dead heat between the top five candidates, each of whom was worth approximately 10 wins to his team:

Player	Win Shares
Gary Sheffield	31
Alex Rodriguez	30
Hideki Matsui	30
Miguel Tejada	30
Vladimir Guerrero	29

In a race like that, the more intangible factors - that Guerrero's team was unusually dependent on him (unlike the big Yankee sluggers, who could feed off each other) and that he closed with a bang to push the Angels over the top in the AL West in September, are good reason to give Guerrero the benefit of the doubt. Specifically, in 12 September-October games against Oakland and Texas, Guerrero scored 13 runs, drove in 14, hit 8 home runs, and batted .478/1.087/.547. Interestingly, the "Win Shares Above Average" figures - comparing each player to an average player with similar playing time - give a slightly different picture:

Player	WSAA
Gary Sheffield	15
Johan Santana	15
Alex Rodriguez	12
Hideki Matsui	12
Miguel Tejada	12
Vladimir Guerrero	12
David Ortiz	12
Manny Ramirez	11
Travis Hafner	11
Erubiel Durazo	10

This would seem to support breaking Sheffield away from the pack a bit, especially since I'm not sure that WSAA is a valid basis for a straight-line comparison of a starting pitcher to an everyday player. It's still close enough that I'd give Guerrero the benefit of the doubt, though. I'm particularly suspicious that WSAA seems to favor players with little or no defensive value. For what it's worth, the Baseball Prospectus (subscription only) rates Guerrero #1 in the AL by a fairly decisive margin by its "VORP" (Value Over Replacement Level) rating for position players:

Player	VORP
Vladimir Guerrero	93.2
Melvin Mora	79.3
Ichiro Suzuki	79.2
Miguel Tejada	79.1
Travis Hafner	74.1
David Ortiz	73.1
Carlos Guillen	71.3
Manny Ramirez	70.0

I'm not sure I understand VORP, one of BP's famously intricate measurements, well enough to figure out (1) why Vlad takes such a leap forward by its calculations or (2) why all the Yankees take such a beating (the big three all clock in below 65, with Matsui down around 55). One thing Guerrero did very well this year was slash his usually high number of caught stealings (3 in 18 attempts, compared to an average of 13 in 37 attempts the prior four years); he also grounded into 19 DPs, down a bit on a per-at-bat level from prior years, by cutting his ground ball/fly ball ratio to a career low. These are little things, but the caught stealings in particular had been a quiet drag on Guerrero's production in the past, and Mike Scioscia should get some credit if he's the one who convinced Guerrero to run less.

Another random note: Guerrero's patience at the plate did not fall off as dramatically as it might have appeared; his intentional walks dropped to 14 from an average of 25 a year his last four years in Montreal, but his rate of unintentional walks/at bats was 6.2%, as compared to 7.5% those prior four years.

Sad but encouraging news yesterday, as the Mets let Al Leiter go after a desultory attempt to re-sign him on the cheap. Leiter will be remembered well by Mets fans not only for quality pitching but also for being an all-around gritty, emotional guy who took his job seriously, bonded with the fans and was always accessible to the media. No game he pitched was bigger or better than the utterly dominating 2-hit shutout he threw at the Reds in a 1-game playoff for the Wild Card in 1999.

On the other hand, the team needs a new direction, and tossing overboard a 39-year-old who's been known to meddle in the GM's business is a must. Leiter was still very effective this season, but his durability is questionable - he's thrown less than 190 innings three of the last four years - and he's playing an unsustainable game by nibbling around the corners, walking more batters and striking out fewer:

Year	BB/9	K/9	K/BB
2000	3.29	8.65	2.63
2001	2.21	6.82	3.09
2002	3.04	7.58	2.49
2003	4.68	6.92	1.48
2004	5.03	6.06	1.21

It's to Leiter's credit that he's managed the guile and guts to stay effective against such an evident pattern of declining ability, but he can't keep it up much longer. Let the Yankees have him back.

I can remember, back in the 1980s, when there used to be exciting and interesting arguments over the NL MVP Award - arguments about Gary Carter and Dale Murphy and Mike Schmidt and Pedro Guerrero and Andre Dawson and Ozzie Smith . . . these days, it's just the same old thing every year - Bonds, Bonds, Bonds. There really wasn't a way to deny him the award this season, not with an OBP over .600.

Jon Weisman has a great piece up on the longetivity and replaceability of baseball bloggers in light of the departures of Brian Gunn and Edward Cossette and the death of Doug Pappas. (Link via Pinto). Two thoughts:

1. At least bloggers go away when (and sometimes before) they run out of things to say; by contrast, professional sportswriting is chock full of people who repeat themselves endlessly and have lost the love of what they do, but keep going paycheck to paycheck.

2. My own focus on a variety of topics is what keeps me going here, in my fifth year doing this; I can always put down baseball for politics, politics for baseball, or go write about law or pop culture or just anything. It's liberating and helps alleviate the need to say something fresh about the same topic every day.

I haven't done a trip around the baseball blogosphere in a while; here we go:

*Brian Gunn hangs up his cleats at Redbird Nation. The Holy Cross sportswriting contingent loses one of its best, as Brian becomes yet another blogger to decide that blogging is just too all-consuming. It's a shame; the only problem with Brian's site was that, like Aaron Gleeman's writings, there were never enough hours in the day to read it all if you were reading other sites as well. Let's hope we see him back in print soon, but in the meantime, good luck.

*USS Mariner has a good rundown of dates to keep in mind this offseason, starting with today's opening of teams' ability to initiate formal talks with other teams' free agents.

*Mac Thomason on the Braves' free agents:

[J.D.] Drew was the Braves' best hitter this year, finding his health and having a career year in Atlanta. And it's his home state. Some players would take less to stay at home where they've found success. These players do not have Scott Boras as an agent. Drew will want an eight-figure salary and a long-term contract, one I find it unlikely that the Braves would give. . . . There's still the question of his health, which might drive the price down. But the market is thin in outfielders this year, and it seems likely to me that someone will indeed give Drew a long-term deal for more than $10 million a season. And that it won't be the Braves. . . .

*Speaking of Gleeman, lest I be accused again of ducking the issue, I send you to Aaron's explanation of why Derek Jeter - who was improved with the glove this year - did not deserve the Gold Glove.

*Jay Jaffe studies the Yankees' most recent cost-cutting moves, from declining options on Jon Lieber and Paul Quantrill to letting Fred Hickman (!) go, and concludes that the Yankees do, in fact, have limits to how much money they will spend. Me, I'll believe it when I see it. I think of the bumper sticker slogan used by supporters of New Jersey Senate candidate Bob Franks in 2000 against multi-millionaire Jon Corzine's self-financed campaign: "Make him spend it all, Bob." Make him spend it all, Omar and Theo and the rest. At the moment, however, it looks like a familiar process is starting whereby other teams are already getting scared off from bidding against the Yankees for Carlos Beltran while Yankee players woo him.

*Participate in Tangotiger's fan scouting survey of your home team!

*Jon Weisman discusses a Mike Piazza for Shawn Green rumor, which sounds like a really bad idea for the Mets; Green's not that young, plenty expensive, and appears to be damaged goods (he had a very disppointing 2004), and at that point you might as well just stick with the one who can get behind the plate. I can see why the Dodgers are desperate for catching help, though.

*I'm way late in linking to Wizbang, which sends you to the sad tale of how gambling wrecked Cecil Fielder. By the way, I've seen Fielder's house in Florida, and it is indeed gigantic; it's a sign of the guy's foolishness that he managed to lose the house, when part of the reason why rich people buy big mansions in Florida is because of legal protections against losing your house there if you file for bankruptcy.

*Finally, Will Carroll notes an irony for baseball-and-politics bloggers:

[Ever notice that] everyone says “get back to baseball” to me when we get “too” political, but that we get insanely long participative threads when we talk about anything except baseball?

Or is it just that everyone nods their head and says “Oh, dead on!” when I write about baseball?

Actually, the irony is this: most of the major baseball bloggers agree on the basic ideas they are promoting, there's a lot of agreement and civility among baseball bloggers, in contrast to the acrimony and the adversarial nature of political blogs. But one side effect of that is that it sometimes seems that baseball bloggers (other than David Pinto) don't link to each other enough precisely because we're not attacking each other. And I say that being as guilty of that as anybody.

The invaluable Hardball Times is launching sales of its first book today, the The Hardball Times 2004 Baseball Annual. You can read more about the book here and place an order here. Check it out.

Jason Mastaitis looks at the compensation available for Mets free agents:

Type A: Richard Hidalgo, Al Leiter

Type B: Mike DeJean

Type C: Kris Benson, Ricky Bottalico

For a Type A player, the compensation is the signing team's first-round pick plus a supplemental first-rounder. For a Type B, it's the signing team's first-round choice. For a Type C, it's a supplemental second-rounder. However, if the signing team picks in the upper half of the first round, that choice is protected and it loses its second-round selection instead.

I'd mostly agree with his suggested dispositions, although I think I'd offer arbitration to Bottalico as well. Clearly, the Mets should be looking to keep Benson and get compensation for Leiter, unless Benson's demands are too high or Leiter's very low. I'm more hesitant to offer arbitration to Hidalgo, although he could yet be useful.

The full list of free agents by type, with asterisks denoting the guys who may still have a team or player option to exercise:

Type A Moises Alou (ChC), Wilson Alvarez (LA), *Tony Batista (Mon), Carlos Beltran (Hou), Adrian Beltre (LA), Armando Benitez (Fla), Jeromy Burnitz (Col), Orlando Cabrera (Bos), Miguel Cairo (NYY), Vinny Castilla (Col), Royce Clayton (Col), *Roger Clemens (Hou), Rheal Cormier (Phi), Carlos Delgado (Tor), J.D. Drew (Atl), Cal Eldred (StL), Steve Finley (LA), Nomar Garciaparra (ChC), Mark Grudzielanek (ChC), Chris Hammond (Oak), Dustin Hermanson (SF), Richard Hidalgo (NYM), Jeff Kent (Hou), Steve Kline (StL), Corey Koskie (Min), *Al Leiter (NYM), Esteban Loaiza (NYY), Derek Lowe (Bos), Matt Mantei (Ari), Edgar Martinez (Sea), Pedro Martinez (Bos), Mike Matheny (StL), Kent Mercker (ChC), Dan Miceli (Hou), Damian Miller (Oak), Kevin Millwood (Phi), Matt Morris (StL), Jeff Nelson (Tex), Magglio Ordonez (CWS), Russ Ortiz (Atl), Carl Pavano (Fla), Troy Percival (Ana), Odalis Perez (LA), Placido Polanco (Phi), Brad Radke (Min), Joe Randa (KC), Edgar Renteria (StL), Richie Sexson (Ari), Paul Shuey (LA), *Ugueth Urbina (Det), Jason Varitek (Bos), Omar Vizquel (Cle), David Wells (SD), *Woody Williams (StL), Scott Williamson (Bos), Jaret Wright (Atl).

Type B
Terry Adams (Bos), Antonio Alfonseca (Atl), Roberto Alomar (CWS), Rich Aurilia (SD), Danny Bautista (Ari), Dave Burba (SF), Chris Carpenter (StL), Matt Clement (ChC), Craig Counsell (Mil), Deivi Cruz (SF), *Mike DeJean (NYM), Elmer Dessens (LA), Brook Fordyce (TB), Chad Fox (Fla), Alex Gonzalez (SD), Juan Gonzalez (KC), Cristian Guzman (Min), Jose Hernandez (LA), Orlando Hernandez (NYY), Todd Jones (Phi), Barry Larkin (Cin), Curtis Leskanic (Bos), Cory Lidle (Phi), *Jon Lieber (NYY), Jose Lima (LA), Tino Martinez (TB), Brent Mayne (LA), *Jose Mesa (Phi), Doug Mirabelli (Bos), Greg Myers (Tor), Hideo Nomo (LA), John Olerud (NYY), Antonio Osuna (SD), Todd Pratt (Phi), Steve Reed (Col), *B.J. Surhoff (Bal), Jose Valentin (CWS), Robin Ventura (LA), Ron Villone (Sea), Todd Walker (ChC), Gabe White (Cin), Dan Wilson (Sea), Paul Wilson (Cin), Esteban Yan (Det), Eric Young (Tex), Gregg Zaun (Tor).

Type C
Sandy Alomar Jr. (CWS), Carlos Baerga (Ari), Kris Benson (NYM), Henry Blanco (Min), Ricky Bottalico (NYM), Jermaine Dye (Oak), Shawn Estes (Col), Julio Franco (Atl), Troy Glaus (Ana), Todd Greene (Col), Ben Grieve (ChC), John Halama (TB), Roberto Hernandez (Phi), *Todd Hollandsworth (ChC), Travis Lee (NYY), Al Levine (Det), *John Mabry (StL), Ramon Martinez (ChC), Jim Mecir (Oak), Eric Milton (Phi), Mike Redmond (Fla), Desi Relaford (KC), Rudy Seanez (Fla), Aaron Sele (Ana), Ismael Valdez (Fla), Todd Van Poppel (Cin), Bob Wickman (CWS), Tony Womack (StL).

Beltran, of course, is the big prize among the everyday players, as well as Ordonez. Either one would be a good acquisition; Beltran would be better, but Ordonez could come cheaper. Richie Sexson - who like Ordonez is coming off an injury - would also be a nice fit. As much as I like John Olerud and think his glove would be a big help, I don't see him having enough gas in his tank at the plate to be useful. Carlos Delgado is still a monster, but he'll be 33 next year and showed the first signs of decline this season; I'd stay away if I were a team as in need of youth as the Mets. Another guy who looks interesting on that list is Matt Clement; power pitchers have always had good fortunes at Shea.

Well, I admit I was wrong to say the Mets should have hired Wally Backman to manage, after the Diamondbacks fire him after discovering past arrests for DUI and domestic violence. Lesson for fans: sometimes, the insiders do know things we don't. Lesson for Arizona: do your background checks first. It's a shame, because Backman had the hallmarks of a successful manager. A lot of great managers have had off-field issues, of course, but it's just not acceptable anymore to look the other way at them.

I thought I had deleted this old post, but it looks like I was ahead of the curve for once. DC’s major league team will reportedly be called the Washington Nationals:

Nationals was the primary name of Washington's first American League franchise from 1905 to 1957, a period that included a 1924 World Series title. At several points during that long stretch, however, Senators was used as an alternate nickname.

(Via The Corner).

I hadn't planned on getting back to baseball this week, but of course I can't ignore the Mets' hiring of Willie Randolph as manager.

Of course, first impressions of a first-time manager can be misleading or pointless. On the positive side, Randolph has been with a lot of winning teams and was a smart player himself; he seems like a level-headed, even-keeled guy; he's not the same old retread; and the Mets apparently are not paying him all that much money. On the negative side, he seems a bit too much like Art Howe, there's probably a reason why Randolph has been turned down for so many managerial jobs in the past (although it's true that the "you must interview a minority" rule means Randolph has been interviewed for a lot of jobs where the team already had someone else in mind), and he does continue the sense of the Mets as the second-class organization in town.

Time will tell. I would have preferred Wally Backman myself.

I've been on a break from baseball news about these parts; I'll be looking to refocus on my post-season wrapups after the election. One item of note: a medical examiner's report has attributed Ken Caminiti's death to a cocaine overdose. Of course, the contrubuting causes - "[c]oronary artery disease and an enlarged heart" - can't entirely be separated from Caminiti's other problems, including steroids, but it would seem that the major culprit here was drugs of a non-performance-enhancing nature.

I liked this comment from Shannen Coffin about the Red Sox:

My dad was one of those hundreds of thousands (millions?) of fans who died without ever seeing them win it all. He was way too young to go. As a kid, every year, weathered by years of disappointment, he would tell me, "It's not October yet; don't get too excited." Well, Dad, it's October now. We did it. Wish you had been there with me. Rest in glorious peace.

UPDATE: Also, leave poor Bill Buckner alone!

I'm going to offer a perhaps-unexpected (to new readers, at least) point here and say that now is not the time, and a puff-piece interview on Good Morning America was not the place, for Curt Schilling to stump for President Bush. The stakes in this election are indeed life and death, and of course I welcome Schilling's endorsement. But:

1. I've long been infuriated by entertainers who stick their politics into a venue (interviews, concerts, etc.) where I'm expecting to just be entertained, as opposed to presenting a political argument in a political context. That should go for conservatives in sports and entertainment just as much as liberals. There's a reason why, despite the baseball/politics mix on this site, I labor to keep the two types of content clearly marked.

2. Sox fans are celebrating right now, and, let's be frank, a lot of them are Democrats. Don't spoil that with politics, no matter the cause; just don't (more on that idea here).

Random links:

Commonwealth Conservative on why he loves baseball.

Tim Lambert on - for what it's worth now - home field advantages in the World Series.

The Red Sock of Courage.

Well, this is one Red Sox fans haven't heard before:

[Manny] Ramirez vowed last night that the Sox will be back in the playoffs next year, giving him a chance to take sole possession of the [postseason hitting streak] mark.

"Next year?'' he said in the champagne-soaked Red Sox clubhouse. "I guess we have to go and do it again.''

I have to admit it: try as I might, it's awfully difficult to find anything to add to the moment from last night, just the perfection of the moment of fans and a franchise who'd been denied and cruelly taunted - by fate and by Yankee fans - for eight decades - finally making it to the top of the mountain. Just a few thoughts:

*The Cards had to do the most staggering roll-over-play-dead in the World Series since the 1999 Braves or maybe the 1990 A's. It looks like Game One really was the turning point; after the Cards couldn't get over the hump, they just never got anything going. For a team that took the National League by storm, that was shocking, especially on the offensive side.

*Nice job by Jason Marquis to keep the Cards in the game last night; I'm skeptical of Marquis because he's a high-walk pitcher who doesn't compensate by overpowering people, but after getting on the ropes early he did manage to avoid the KO.

*More, much more on this (and other bigger-picture questions) later in November and December - after this morning, I will probably shift into politics-only here through next Wednesday or whenever it is that the election is resolved - but you have to figure Curt Schilling is suddenly, improbably closing in on a pretty solid Hall of Fame case. Of course, you would have said the same thing (and I know I did) about Jack Morris after Game Seven of the 1991 Series.

*Manny Ramirez matching Hank Bauer's record 17-game postseason hitting streak and winning the Series MVP just feels odd - Manny never did bust out with the big longball, and didn't even drive in a run against the Yankees. Yet again, as always, his overall postseason numbers were less impressive than his regular season stats. Yet, somehow, he just kept poking a hit here and a hit there, and it added up to good things.

*If you own stock in Dan Shaughnessy, sell. (Bruce Allen has the full Boston media roundup)

Never thought I'd live to write that. The dog finally caught the bus; Charlie Brown kicked the football; Gilligan got off the island. Not being a hockey fan - I remember the Rangers winning the Stanley Cup, but I wasn't really able to appreciate it - the closest thing I can compare this to is the fall of the Berlin Wall in terms of the "never thought I'd see the day" factor. Wow, just wow.

Technically, the 21st century began in 2001, not 2000. Which means, of course, that the Red Sox have won a World Series in this century. And the Yankees have not.

It depends what the definition of "choked" is.

Well, after what we saw last week, and in light of Red Sox history as well as the dire condition of Curt Schilling's ankle, it's hard to say that we should count the Cardinals out just yet. But things look pretty grim. I have to say, even though I'm pulling for the Red Sox, I feel awfully bad for Cardinal fans (which must be a sign that I'm finally over my bitterness from 1985 and 1987), who had a genuinely great team this year; that's a rare treat, and one that's spoiled if they don't go all the way, as fans of the 2001 Mariners could tell you.

Pedro may not have been the San Pedro de Fenway of old last night, but he did a tremendous job shutting down the murderous Cardinal lineup. I expect the Cards to come out and finally pond the stuffings out of Derek Lowe, but it will probably be too late.

One memory that came back watching Larry Walker get thrown out at the plate was back in Walker's rookie year, 1989, when the Expos dropped to two games back in the pennant race on August 23, in a game they lost 1-0 in 22 innings when Walker was called out in the bottom of the 16th for leaving third base early on a sacrifice fly. I have to wonder if he's been more tentative about breaking for home on a fly ball ever since.

Even though I know this site has a bunch of Red Sox fan readers, from the perspective of a neutral fan, mainly looking to watch entertaining, competitive baseball, I must confess to being pretty disappointed in this World Series. Thus far, it’s been one-sided, sloppy and anti-climactic.

Of course, I’m sure I would feel differently if my team was on the verge of its first championship in 86 years. Or maybe I’m just grumpy because I had such high hopes and because my prediction now appears to have been far off. But it is looking like it’s over – we all know teams can’t come back from down 3-0…right?

Sad news for baseball fans and music lovers: Robert Merrill, former national-anthem-singing institution at Yankee Stadium, has died at 85. What a great voice he had.

Yeah, Mike Lupica is just all class:

I've mentioned in the past, as a Boston College man, that if Notre Dame can't hold up its end of this football rivalry, we're going to have to drop them the way we did Holy Cross. But I was taught to be more generous than that at BC. So we'll keep playing them, just as long as they understand something: We're their daddy.

If you read the front end of the column, Lupica is laying the groundwork for his preferred storyline that blames everything on A-Rod, totally absolves Derek Jeter, and makes it out like the Yankees' ability to import an endless line of superstars is somehow a burden they have to carry. Well, of course.

A few days old, yet still worth reading: Drew over at Longhorn Mafia has a new #1 on his personal list of toughest sports losses.

Random Game Two thoughts:

*Speaking of Willis Reed (see below), during last night's start by Curt Schilling, I thought back to some of the great or memorable performances by injured players: Reed, Kareem in Game 6 of the 1980 NBA Finals, Nolan Ryan pitching on a fractured ankle in Game 5 of the 1986 NLCS, Kirk Gibson's home run in 1988. What most great performances like this have in common is, they're one-day-only things. Schilling has pressed his luck twice, and there are real questions about whether he can go a third time.

*Tim McCarver said last night that Manny Ramirez is an "outstanding two-strike hitter." Well, I don't generally accept things like this on faith if they can be checked, especially concerning the two-strike hitting of a guy who struck out 124 times this year, so I looked at Manny's numbers the last three years, from ESPN.com:

Count	Avg	Slg	OBP	OPS
0-2	.221	.372	.228	600
After 0-2	.217	.380	.250	630
1-2	.206	.381	.210	591
After 1-2	.221	.409	.283	692
2-2	.269	.469	.274	743
After 2-2	.261	.463	.375	838
3-2	.271	.508	.521	1029
2 Strikes	.245	.440	.338	778
All	.325	.613	.423	1036

The "Two Strikes" line adds up his 0-2, 1-2, 2-2 and 3-2 numbers. At first glance, Manny is a terrible two-strike hitter until he gets to 2-2, and only really good at 3-2. But nearly everyone is horrible on those counts; the fact that Manny slugs nearly .400 even on 0-2 and 1-2, .469 on 2-2 and over .500 on 3-2 is not bad at all, both absolutely and in comparison to his usual spectacular production. The average AL player batted .269/.431/.337 this season, but .195/.300/.266 with two strikes, a 26.3% dropoff in OPS; Manny falls off by 24.9% over a three year-period, which is visibly but not outstandingly better.

*Entering Game Three of the World Series, the Cardinals are 29-10 in postseason games at Busch Stadium since 1982, and 16-26 on the road; since 1996, the breakdown is 14-6 at home, 10-14 on the road.

*I wonder what Bill James thinks, being associated with a team that bats Orlando Cabrera second. Repeat: "I am just a consultant, I'm not the manager."

*Are the Green Monster seats now officially the cool seats now that Hollywood stars like Tom Hanks sit in them?

*I liked the way Cal Eldred went high and outside after Ortiz' foul homer; a lot of guys love to follow those up by jacking one out, and Eldred tried to get him to bite.

*Well, you get your bombs with Mark Bellhorn, and you get your boots. I still think he's worth the tradeoff as compared to Pokey Reese.

*Unless I heard wrong, Joe Buck described Jason Marquis as being "infestive" in this postseason, but then again that sounds about right.

*Buck was also doing a way-premature Sox-finally-win-the-championship victory lap in the 7th, before two wins were in the books. The announcers seem to have forgotten about the Cardinals, even after they posted the best record in baseball and dominated the National League. Coming from a crew of one guy whose dad was the Voice of the Cardinals and one who played in three World Serieses for the Cards, that has to grate on St. Louis' fans.

A doctor weighs in on what went wrong to cause a pepper spray projectile fired by Boston cops to kill a young woman celebrating the Red Sox' ALCS victory.

UPDATE: My bad; I really just skimmed this before I linked to it, since the writer appears to have some useful knowledge on the subject, but I don't necessarily endorse the implication some people have drawn from this that the Boston PD doesn't deserve a good bit of the blame for this. I absolutely don't think that the Boston PD should be let off the hook here, and I say that as a great believer in giving cops the benefit of the doubt in dealing with difficult situations. One of the first rules of policing is, either you shoot to kill or you don't shoot. Projectiles like this shouldn't be fired directly at people if there's no reason to use deadly force.

Nice article here on Iraq’s national baseball team. It is truly a shame, however, to hear that so many of the players enjoy playing the game, but fear its association with America. That fear is indicative of the climate of terror which some hope to permanently reinstate in Iraqi society and which is anathema to the spirit of the joyful pastime we often take for granted.

This game felt rather anticlimactic, as Game Ones often do after an exciting LCS, even as dramatic as the game was. I don't know, I just kept feeling like the Sox had this one, even when it was tied (and yes, I'm rooting for the Red Sox, not least for the effect a Sox championship will have on Yankee fans). Although the point when Manny - well, I was taking sporadic notes, which just say "Ack! Manny can't field!" That point was not a good feeling for Sox fans.

Speaking of Manny, breathes there a man alive who would not be mortified by that Stevie Wonder "That's What Friends Are For" montage FOX Sports did of slo-mo scenes of Manny with his Sox teammates?

Obviously, your moments of zen were the Bellhorn home run and Foulke freezing Jim Edmonds in the 8th with the bases loaded. And, of course, the relentless David Ortiz.

I spotted a guy in a "Cedeno" jersey on the Cardinals, and the announcers kept calling him "Roger Cedeno," and I even recall the Roger Cedeno being on the Cardinals this year. But then I saw him get a hit in an important situation, and concluded that it had to be a different guy.

Captain's log: it turned 10 p.m. in the bottom of the fourth inning. Way to reach out to young fans.

Kelly Clarkson, singing "God Bless America," looked like either somebody played a prank with lampblack around her eyes, or she got her nose broken in the last 24 hours.

You lives by the knuckleball, and sometimes it goes away. Wakefield has decent stuff early, but just stopped throwing strikes. Pirates and Sox fans will recall that sometimes this goes on for years. Hopefully, he'll find the zone again.

No, I'm not doing a prediction this series, because I'm not a doctor and can't predict the status of Schilling's ankle, on which all turns.

McCarver thought Varitek did a good job blocking the plate on Jason Marquis' Enos Slaughter imitation in the 8th inning, and McCarver does know a thing or two about how hard it is to block the plate. But it looked like a lousy job to me, or at best a valiant but highly ineffective effort.

As I've noted before, a good Game One sets the stage for a series. Sometimes in ironic fashion - like in 1986, when the Red Sox won a 1-run game on a ball that went through Tim Teufel's legs (and it looked like the Mets couldn't touch Bruce Hurst), or in the 1988 NLCS, when the Mets rallied in the ninth to break Orel Hershiser's scoreless streak. Tonight's dramas - Wakefield's control, Manny's fielding, Womack's collarbone, the Cardinal bullpen, the Fenway home cooking.

At this point, if you suggested to me that David Ortiz arrives at the games after a stroll across the Boston Harbor, I don't know that I could disbelieve it.

Poking my head around on the web site of the Saw Doctors, one of this site’s favorite bands, I had to laugh at this paragraph from a review of an August 12 performance by the band in Cape Cod:

With a tip of the hat to Massachusetts, [Leo] Moran introduced “To Win Just Once” off “Sing A Powerful Song” CD saying, “people keep telling me we should dedicate this song to the Red Sox. I don't know anything about baseball” [Link added]

If he did, he would see just how applicable are the song’s words (originally written for an Irish boxer who qualified for the 1996 Atlanta Summer Olympics). Submitted for your consideration, here are the lyrics:

Read More »

While we're doing the memory lane stuff, consider this: The Red Sox franchise still has a winning record all time in World Serieses, having won 5 in the 1903-1918 period and lost 4 between 1946 and 1986. What's interesting is when you look at it another way: the 1946 St. Louis Cardinals were the first team ever to beat the Red Sox in a World Series. And the 1967 Cards were the second.

Among the teams that have faced the Sox in the Series since 1918, those 1946 Cardinals are unique in another way: they didn't win 100 games. Since then, you have the 1967 Cards (101 wins), the 1975 Reds (108 wins), the 1986 Mets (108 wins), and the 2004 Cardinals (105 wins). The Sox sure know how to pick 'em.

You heard it here first (I think):

1. The Yankees now have an enormous incentive to convince Jason Giambi to retire so they can get out of his contract (have the insurance company pay it, maybe get relief on the luxury tax).

2. The Yankees are, presumably, in possession of Giambi's medical records, which may indicate things Giambi doesn't want publicized.

3. As you may remember from the Dave Winfield/Howard Spira saga, Steinbrenner is not above getting involved in some pretty seedy things, potentially including extortion and blackmail, when he has a grudge against one of his own players.

This is all speculation, of course; I don't know anything more than you do about any of this. But if I was with the Players' Union, I'd be watching very carefully to see that undue influences aren't brought on Giambi to retire.

This should be a great World Series. Brian Gunn over at Redbird Nation has a typically excellent recap of last night’s game, including this line:

Jeff Suppan outdueled Roger Clemens tonight. You know that, I know that, but I don't care -- I'm gonna say it again because I like the way it rolls off the tongue: Jeff. Suppan. Outdueled. Roger. Clemens.

And I liked these comments about the Astros:

[T]hey played some great ball against us. When one samurai warrior defeats another, he doesn't gloat over him; he thanks him for giving him a worthy competition, for bringing out his best. These Astros brought out the best in us. And even though I don't feel great about denying them the first World Series in their entire existence, I thank them all the same.

For the Sox side, you’ll probably want to read Bill Simmons if you haven’t already.

Finally, since you’re going to hear a lot about the 1967 Series in the next week or so, you might as well brush up on the facts of that one. As for predictions, I’m really on the fence about this series, but here goes: Cardinals in 7.

UPDATE (From the Crank, who's been very happy to see the Mad Hibernian at least temporarily back on the blog): You can get more on Bob Gibson, the hero of that 1967 series, in my extended comparison of Gibson to 1926 World Series hero Grover Alexander.

This is hardly news, but if you look at the standings after the July 31 trade deadline, the postseason runs of the Red Sox and Astros become a good deal less surprising. The best record in baseball after the deadline? The Sawx, at 42-18, a .700 clip. Second best? The Astros, 40-18 (.690). The Cardinals, who had wrapped up the NL Central already by late July, also actually picked up the pace, going 39-20 (.661), tied with the Braves for the third best record. The Yankees were sixth at 36-23 (.610). The Runs Scored and Allowed breakouts for the Sox and Yanks are even more dramatic. Runs Scored per game: Sox 6.27, Yankees 5.63. Runs Allowed per game: Sox 4.55, Yankees 5.15.

Of course, I didn't put any stock in rational analysis before this series; like a lot of people, I stuck with the idea that the Yankees would beat the Red Sox because they always do. No more.

(On a side note, until I looked at these standings, I hadn't grasped quite how complete was the late-season collapse of the Brewers, who had looked so promising in the early going. Folks, it's a long season).

I'd missed this - this time it was Newsday that jumped the gun, and Allan Wood nails them. Link via Armchair GM, where Dan Lewis and friends are back and blogging again.

It's gonna be a long, angry and expensive off-season for the Yankees. If George fires Cashman, the Mets should immediately sack the rest of their front office and hire him. But there will be plenty of time for recriminations. For now, it's just enough to savor a remarkable comeback. Check out my live blog of Game Seven below.

Congratulations to the Red Sox on their historic comeback. They sure earned this series victory, especially with epic wins in Games Four and Five that will be long remembered. Check out the Crank below for his definitive commentary.

Watching this game, two rather obvious things struck me about the Yankees:

1) Their pitching just wasn’t that good. On paper, it looked good, but it just wasn’t. In the playoffs, you win with pitching and the Yankees flat got out-pitched in the second half of this series. (Roger Clemens really would have helped.)

2) They miss the Jason Giambi they thought they were getting. In the 7th when it looked like they were coming back, up stepped John Olerud and Miguel Cairo. I like Olerud, but he is near the end. Giambi was supposed to be a pillar of the offense, but he’s been out for so long and was so weak earlier this year that it’s easy for people to forget what was expected from him.

Should be an interesting World Series. Do not count out the National League though – that’s been a truly excellent series in its own right. In fact, I hate to bring up 1986 - well, no I don’t - but the Red Sox had a mighty stirring win in that ALCS as well (remember Dave Henderson?).

We shall see, but these Red Sox have certainly earned their place in the sun.

LIVE-BLOGGING: THIS POST WILL BE UPDATED WHEN POSSIBLE

Peter Gammons is on the pregame show . . . he's trying to fudge, but you can hear it: he thinks this is finally the year.

These are the saddest of possible words, Matsui to Jeter to Posada.

Yes, Simmons is right. They will rename it Papichusetts. 2-0 Sox.

Most similar player to David Ortiz through age 28: Tony Clark. You know it's coming: At the end of his next contract, Ortiz will be signed by the Yankees.

Yankees had 61 come from behind wins - that means they were trailing in 122 games this year. That's a lot, isn't it?

John Sterling goes out on a limb: "I'd say Ortiz has been the toughest batter the Yankees have faced all year."

It just cracks me up that one of the Yankees' major radio ad sponsors is Johnnie Cochran.

Brown drills Cabrera to load the bases. Mister Brown is out of town. After 1.1 innings. Hide the walls!

Grand slam Johnny Damon. 6-0 Sox before the Yankees have a hit. Game Seven of the 1934 World Series comes to mind, when the home town Tigers got blown out 11-0 and the Detroit fans started pelting Cardinals left fielder Joe Medwick with bottles, rotten fruit, and auto parts (said Medwick: "I know why they threw it at me. I just don't know why they brought it to the park.").

Sterling: "The crowd, really, in stunned silence." Charlie Steiner compares Ortiz to Frank Lary. A work colleague emails: "I think we've seen Brown's last pitch in pinstripes."

20-20-24 outs to go, I wanna be sedated . . .

Reality check: 24 outs against these Yankees is a lot.

No hits for the Yanks in the first two innings. Game One comes to mind. The symmetries are hypnotic . . .

Jeter singles in Cairo. 6-1. Meyers and Leskanic are up in the Boston pen already. Get real: 5-run lead, exhausted bullpen. You gotta give Lowe some rope here if you want to win the game.

Lowe gets out of the inning. Pedro is getting ready to get warmed up anyway. All hands on deck.

We know this much: if the Sox win, the odds of Clemens beating the Cards tomorrow increase exponentially.

I guess Johnny Damon's slump is officially over. 8-1 Sox.

Javier Vazquez goes down like a tree struck by lightning!

When you are the Red Sox playing the Yankees, leaving the bases loaded with a 7-run lead feels like cause for genuine concern, rather than pure piggishness. It's not paranoia when they are really out to get you.

The Post is getting its editorial ready.

Dr. Manhattan emails: "Well, the first part of 1999 NLCS Game 6 is going according to schedule..."

Yankees still have only one hit. Maybe we won't see the Derek Lowe Face tonight.

Top of the 7th, Gordon and Heredia warming in the bullpen. Sterling and Steiner are thanking people - it seems to have just hit them that this may be their last broadcast of the season.

Pedro's coming in. Why? This could be a volatile situation. I'd rather bring in Mendoza while you have enough lead to have a margin for error.

Sterling is talking up 2005 season tickets. Lowe leaves after just 69 pitches, Matsui smacks a 2-0 double off Pedro. Cue "Jaws" music.

Bernie doubles, 8-2. Lofton singles, 8-3. Olerud hobbles up to the plate.

Olerud whiffs, Lofton on second, two outs. Crowd chanting "Who's Your Daddy" over and over and over.

Bellhorn homers, 9-3. People are starting, slowly, to realize why Bellhorn was one of the stars of the Red Sox this season. Homer is reminiscent of Strawberry's homer off Al Nipper in Game 7 in the 1986 World Series.

Al Leiter apparently said on TV that Pedro wanted in. Um, who is the manager?

I hear "Let's Go Red Sox" chants as Timlin sets them down in the 8th. Where are the Yankee fans?

Cabrera hits a sac fly off Gordon to make it 10-3; Gordon needs the winter to rest. Mariano's coming in, for the same reason Gagne was on the mound at the end of the Cards-Dodgers season; why not go down with your best guy, no matter how hopeless the odds?

This still seems like it can't be happening.

Well, it's over. The Yankees Lose! Theeeee Yankees Lose! The Sox have extracted revenge for last season; the Yankees, gigantic payroll, stacked roster and all, have choked in a way no baseball team has ever choked. The series starts Saturday at Fenway.

The story of the 2004 Yankees is a remarkably simple one. The Yankees' team ERA after the All-Star break was 4.95, putting stress on the team's top relievers to keep them in games. Rivera, Gordon and Quantrill combined to throw 111.2 innings in 107 appearances in 76 games after the break. None of the three were as effective in the ALCS as you'd like; Gordon and Quantrill were terrible, and Rivera mortal. And Brown and Vazquez, the Yankee starters who collapsed in the second half after looking like their 1-2 punch early on, were shelled in this series. That's all you need to know.

Astros have just tied Game 6 of the NLCS 4-4 in the ninth against Jason Isringhausen.

RUNNING UPDATES: Somehow, Izzy got out of the jam, and we go to the bottom of the ninth with Albert Pujols leading off against Brad Lidge. What will FOX do if this game goes extra innings and runs into the Sox-Yankees game?

You have to say Jeff Bagwell has redeemed himself in this postseason, the game-tying hit here being another example.

OK, I don't think I'll be updating this one - still got too much else to take care of before the AL game. Bottom of the 11th.

One more: Take that, Jeff Kent. Two-run walk-off homer by Jim Edmonds to send this to Game Seven, just minutes before the opening of the ALCS Game Seven. I'm wondering if any postseason series has seen walk-off homers by both teams - I'll probably think of one later if it's been done.

Fifth in a series of reflections on sports by "Andy Tollhaus," an Army officer currently serving in Iraq.

October 20, 2004, 3:45 AM
FOB Danger
Tikrit, Iraq

I just woke up for Round 14 of the Red Sox-Yankees title fight. I turned on the
TV to find a very comforting image: a close up of Curt Schilling peering in over
his glove with the score across the top showing 0-0 in the 2nd. With all the emotions just conjured up, it’s hard to remind yourself that the Sox are actually trailing in the series two games to three.

It’s been a long, painful, tiring ride, just to get to this point. Not only have the games started at the ludicrous hour of 3 AM here in the Fertile Crescent, but for a while it looked as if the Yankees were just going to steamroll my beloved Sox. This series has been highly anticipated for a year, now. For the first couple of days, though, it seemed as if it was all hype.

The Division Series against the Angels was easy enough -- both for the Red Sox and for me. It started with an early, 11 PM start time and an easy Game 1 win for the good guys. I asked the company I fly with to put me on the late night/early morning schedule, so I’d be able to watch the games when I’m not flying. It backfired for me during Pedro’s 5 AM start in Game 2, though, as I drew a mission with a 6 AM takeoff time. The game was on TV during our mission planning, but it was only the 2nd or 3rd inning when we walked out to the aircraft. Of course at the same time, the Twins had taken a lead in the top half of the 12th in a classic Yankees game. As I took off for the mission I thought that the Yankees were down two games to none with their backs against a wall. The Twins’ loss didn’t really matter all that much, though, since it really was inevitable that we’d have a classic rematch between the two bitter rivals. The Yankees did their usual comeback routine with very little attention from me. In fact, I was having a hard enough time watching the Sox. After missing Game 2 for a mission, David Ortiz hit his walk-off homerun in Game 3 against the Angels while I was walking back from the bathroom. Feeling that this one was in the bag, I took my toothbrush with me to the bathroom during the pitching change so I could go right to bed when the Sox won it. Ortiz wasted no time proving me right, hitting Francisco Rodriguez’s first pitch out of the park.

The sweep gave the Sox a couple of days to get their pitching rotation in order and me a couple of days to make sure I had my sleep schedule down. Still on “deep nights,” as we call it, I’d been going to bed around 8 AM and waking up around 4 or 5 in the evening. I’d maintained this schedule for about a week by the time Game 1 rolled around, so I was primed and ready to roll.

Looking back at what could become one of the greatest series of all time, I realize that I need to record my own personal view of this bit of baseball history. As I sit here and watch Game 6, I’ll create a daily log of personal events during this series. I’ve got to warn you, though, this reflection may be as long and as rambling as the series itself.

Read More »

There would indeed be a little bit of humor, in this election season, if we were to see an Astros-Red Sox World Series, Texas vs. Massachusetts. Here's a little quickie trivia (answers to follow later):

1. Who was the last team from a major party presidential candidate's home state to make the World Series in an election year?

2. Who was the last team from a successful major party presidential candidate's home state to win the World Series in an election year?

("Home state" here meaning the conventional view - the state where the candidate spent his adult life and won elective office, rather than, say, considering Bush from Connecticut and Kerry from Colorado, the states of their birth)

UPDATE: The first commenter gets it, so think of your answer before you check the comments.

As I suggested in an unsuccessful prediction back in September, the most reliable guide to predicting what would happen to the Red Sox is, "what would hurt the most?" My older brother suggests winning the ALCS, finally getting past the Yankees, and getting shut down by Roger Clemens in the World Series. That's certainly a possibility right now. Of course, staging a historic comeback - the first team down 3-0 ever to force a Game Seven - only to end with just another loss to the Hated Yankees would rank pretty high, especially since only three days ago Red Sox Nation was swearing it wouldn't believe again. Who knows? Maybe some new cruel symmetry will emerge, as in 1986 when the Sox won Game One of the World Series on a ground ball through Tim Tuefel's legs . . . karma they got back in spades a few days later (and on the subject of 1986, I did think it unfair to lay out the Sox' long string of Game Seven losses without noting the 1986 ALCS, when Jim Rice & Co. pounded John Candelaria as a visibly exhausted Clemens shut down the Angels 8-1 in Game Seven).

Turning to last night, I enjoyed the irony, after pregame predictions of rampant early bunting by the Yankees against the sore-ankled Curt Schilling, of Jason Varitek dropping a bunt single in the second that caught A-Rod napping at third. I'm sure the irony wasn't lost on Varitek.

The umps, led by Cowboy Joe West (best known for body-slamming Dennis Cook in an early-90s brawl between the Mets and Phillies) did a good, tough job last night, having the good judgment to reach collective decisions - even if it meant reversing themselves - in the face of a hostile crowd that wound up requiring cops in riot gear to line the field (the NYPD doesn't fool around these days). But, not being a rules afficionado, I'm still puzzled - on the play where A-Rod was called out for whacking Bronson Arroyo's wrist to knock the ball away at first base - why they sent Derek Jeter back to first instead of second after recalling his run. Had the play not been interfered with by Rodriguez, after all, Jeter would have been at second.

That play, by the way, reminded me of the horrific collision at first between Todd Hundley and Cliff Floyd (back when Floyd was a young first baseman for the Expos) that shattered Floyd's wrist, set his development back several years and almost wrecked his career. Rodriguez and Arroyo were very fortunate to get out of that collision unscathed. Yankee fans, meanwhile, did themselves no credit with their response to the play, although as Yankee booster Tim McCarver rushed to point out, Sox fans had had a similarly bad reaction to Jose Offerman being called out for running out of the baseline in the 1999 ALCS.

This was one of those classic examples of a game where you keep expecting another shoe to drop, and it never does. I just had a feeling early on that the Sox were never going to get that fifth run, and it was all going to come down to whether or not they could hold the lead and avoid a replay of Game Seven from last year (another one of those symmetries - I may be all in favor of rational analysis of the regular season, but there are more things in heaven, earth and postseason baseball than are dreamt of in our philosophies). Still, it may catch up to the Sox tonight that they had to use Foulke again - he seemed to be losing steam rapidly just in his one inning of work - while Rivera and Gordon got the night off (me, I would have left Schilling in - Al Leiter felt the same way - although Francona undoubtedly knew things I didn't about Schilling's ankle, and of course Francona wouldn't have been the first manager to get ripped for leaving Schilling in too long in a big game).

Anybody still upset that the Sox didn't have Pokey Reese's bat in the lineup last night?

If you're wondering, it's gray and damp but not raining yet here in New York, and WCBS has been saying the weather is "go" for tonight's game at Yankee Stadium.

Now, the Red Sox have really been pushing the limits of what they can expect from Tim Wakefield, and they've had some tense moments with Jason Varitek's problems trying to catch him. But does anyone doubt that they would be toast now if they didn't have a knuckleballer who's almost immune to the fatigue concerns that plague normal pitchers?

UPDATE: Aaron Gleeman has the must-read analysis of the day, a breakdown of the number of pitches thrown by the various Red Sox and Yankees pitchers the past three days.

Last night's action almost defies belief, let alone explanation - what unbelievable baseball. I mean, here we have two teams playing 26 innings in 27 hours, and as soon as the Sox-Yankees game ended, it was on to the 8th inning of a 0-0 tie in Houston. Dr. Manhattan emailed this morning to compare this to the 1999 NLCS - a comparison I'd been thinking of last night myself - when the Mets fell behind 3-0, rallied to finally beat John Rocker in Game Four, won the classic rain-soaked "grand slam single" game in 15 innings the next day at Shea, and then lost Game Six - after coming back from 5-0 and 7-3 deficits - in 11 innings two days later. That series involved the home team coming back from a deficit in extra innings twice in as many games, and ended with Kenny Rogers walking in the winning run. 1986 also comes to mind - especially with the parallel of two heart-stopping serieses running at the same time - with the Mets and Astros playing a 12-inning classic at Shea followed by a 16-inning topper in Houston the next day (again due to rain).

David Ortiz has been the anti-Manny, raising his game in the postseason as much as Manny's falls off; he's in George Brett territory right now. The two teams seem to have almost given up hope of stopping Ortiz and Matsui. It's Poppy vs. Godzilla!

The Red Sox can eschew the bunt all they want - the Yankee announcers said only 12 sacrifices all year, which sounded low to me but I'm in too much of a hurry right now to check - but if that's the strategy, they really need to use better judgment trying to steal bases. The caughts by Damon and Ortiz in the late innings last night were devastating.

Assuming no rainout tonight - and the day is certainly off to a rainy start here in NY - everything will turn on Curt Schilling. The Yankee bullpen is exhausted as well, but the Yankees are at home, they can still afford to lose one, and there's no reason Jon Lieber can't at least go 6 innings. If Schilling's ankle holds up, he may be able to give the pen a serious rest; if he goes down in the first three innings again, I have trouble imagining this one being close.

As for the NLCS, I hope you saw a happy Jeff Kent last night, a rare sight indeed.

Predictions for the rest of the serieses? You think I'm crazy? Well, maybe. I'll say this: I still, in my guts, expect the Yankees to face the Cardinals.

After Pedro gets lit up in the top of the 6th, the Sox find themselves down 2 with 8 outs left. The good news: Mark Bellhorn's on second, Tanyan Sturtze is in, and Mariano and Gordon will be tired when and if they get in. And that means hope.

RUNNING UPDATES: Sturtze walks Cabrera - not an easy thing to do, as we saw last night - and Gordon's coming in to face Manny with the tying runs on base. Gordon has thrown 3 innings the past two days, including two late last night.

Gordon gets Manny to hit into a double play. Rally over. Ugh.

Sox are probably 1-2 outs away from seeing Rivera again.

Cairo doubles off the ubiquitous Timlin. And remember, he's the weakest of the Yankee hitters.

Jeter bunts him to third. Timlin needs to whiff A-Rod here.

And he does!

Sheffield intentionally walked, Timlin's out, in comes Foulke. Game on the line here, the ace is in to face Matsui.

Foulke gets him to fly out weakly to Manny.

David Ortiz goes deep off Gordon to lead off the 8th. He could run for mayor right now and win in a walk.

Gordon walks Millar. Roberts in to run for him again. Enter night, exit light?

Nope, Mel leaves him in.

0-1 on Trot, 0 out, Roberts on 1st.

2-1.

3-1, crowd's on Gordon something fierce, Yankee announcers depressed.

Roberts running 3-1, Nixon singles him to third. Varitek will face Mariano. Kapler running for Trot, who I suppose still isn't 100%? He used to run well.

2-0. Is Rivera sharp? Yankees playing back for the DP, ceding a tie.

Sac fly ties it.

Mueller grounds out to first, Kapler to 2d, Bellhorn up.

1-2 to Bellhorn.

Bellhorn whiffs. 4-4 going to 9th, bullpen cupboards are pretty close to bare. Due up top 9: Bernie-Posada-Sierra. Bottom: Damon-Cabrera-Manny. Foulke and Rivera both tired, Foulke sounds sharper, Sox are at home. Odds favor the Red Sox here, but only slightly. Odds really favor a 10- or 11-inning game.

2-out walk to Sierra. 1-2 to Tony Clark.

Ground rule double to right for Clark, Sierra has to stop at third. Cairo up, 2d and 3d and two outs.

Cairo pops out. Progress, of a sort, that you wouldn't hit for him there, but aside from Lofton there's nobody left on the Yankee bench to hit. Foulke's thrown 22 pitches, he will likely be done now if this goes to a 10th. Can Rivera be beaten a third time in one postseason?

Infield hit for Damon on Rivera's 15th pitch. Winning run on first, nobody up in Yankee pen. Can Cabrera bunt here or at least take a pitch?

Damon caught stealing. We will probably go 10 now.

Groundout on a 2-0 pitch. Manny up with 2 outs and bases empty; he will probably swing for the fences and whiff.

Rivera can be tough to bunt on, but man does that decision to have Damon run look bad right now. 2-0 to Manny, Yankee announcers moaning about call of check swing.

Fly to center, we go 10. Bronson Arroyo is in, Jeter up.

Jeter pops out, A-Rod whiffs, 1-1 to Sheffield, Felix Heredia warming up.

Sheffield whiffs. David Ortiz will lead off the bottom of the tenth. Dare to dream again? If Ortiz hits one out here, they'll make him an honorary Kennedy.

Called strikeout on check swing. Calls are even now? Minky up, Quantrill warming in the pen.

3-0 to the Mighty Mink.

Minky doubles. Kapler up, 1 out, Quantrill coming in, his 266th appearance in the past three years.

Kapler grounds out, Varitek up with 2 out, man on 3d.

Varitek pops out. I've got to get in the car, so I'll wrap this later.

I can't be the only one dragging badly this morning from staying up to 1:30 to see the end of the Yankees-Sox game. I know they needed a later start to avoid conflicts with football and the Cards-Astros game, but this is ridiculous . . . what a thrilling finish, enough to suck back in all the Red Sox fans who had written off the series, enough to put the history 3-0 deficits out of mind until the end of tonight's game - at the end of which, if Boston wins, the series looks much more like a battle. And, of course, the most staggering fact of all - the vulnerability of Mariano Rivera, who's now blown as many saves in this postseason as in the prior nine years.

I was really amazed by the ingratitude of Sox fans towards Mark Bellhorn, who was taunted with the "Pokey, Pokey" chants when he bobbled a grounder in the 6th inning. Bellhorn has had such a great year, yet Boston fans only focus on the negative.

I feel like if I went out in my front yard last night and threw some pitches, Orlando Cabrera would swing at them.

Remember: after tonight, if he loses, the next time you see Pedro Martinez he may be in a Yankee uniform. Which only makes Yankee fans' taunting of Pedro - for showing the Yanks respect, no less - all the more inexplicable.

Over the weekend, John Heyman of Newsday analyzed the status of the Mets’ managerial quest:

Whether it be Omar Minaya's early influence or merely the odds of finally getting one right, the Mets appear to be on the verge of getting one right.

Minaya interviewed highly respected Rangers hitting coach Rudy Jaramillo on Friday and will interview beloved Yankee Willie Randolph when he returns from Boston. In between those two, Newsday has learned that Minaya will squeeze in a meeting with Bobby Valentine, the one encore candidate we'd enthusiastically endorse for his New York track record…

Valentine's candidacy is an intriguing plot twist, though one person with ties to the Mets said he believes it's still largely a "two-horse" race between Jaramillo and Randolph, with Valentine and former Angels and Astros manager Terry Collins under consideration but less likely.

I confess to knowing nothing about Jaramillo, have always admired Randolph and would actually be receptive to a comeback by Valentine. I don’t have strong feelings about Collins.

Anyway, if you’re looking for more Mets analysis, Jason Mastaitis has a two-part prescription here and here. His recommendations include a farewell to John Franco, Al Leiter, Cliff Floyd and Richard Hidalgo, signing Carlos Beltran and starting Victor Diaz in left field next season, among other things. Also, check out this picture for a trip down memory lane.

The evidence pointing to steroid use by Barry Bonds continues to build:

Barry Bonds was using an "undetectable" performance-enhancing drug during the 2003 baseball season, his weight trainer claimed in a conversation that was secretly recorded last year and provided to The Chronicle.

Trainer Greg Anderson, 38, who is Bonds' longtime friend and a defendant in the BALCO steroids conspiracy case, also said on the recording that he expected to receive advance warning before the San Francisco Giants superstar had to submit to a drug test under what was then baseball's new steroids-testing program.

The recording is the most direct evidence yet that Bonds used performance-enhancing drugs during his drive to break the storied record for career home runs. Major League Baseball banned the use of steroids beginning with the 2003 season. It has long been illegal to use them without a doctor's prescription.

"The whole thing is, everything that I've been doing at this point, it's all undetectable," Anderson said on the recording of the drug he was providing Bonds. "See the stuff I have, we created it, and you can't buy it anywhere else, can't get it anywhere else, but you can take it the day of (the test), pee, and it comes up perfect."

There was another reason the trainer was confident that Bonds' drug use would escape detection: Anderson said he would be tipped off a week or two before Bonds was subjected to steroid testing.

"It's going to be in either the end of May or beginning of June, right before the All-Star break, definitely," he was recorded saying. "So after the All-Star break, f -- , we're like f -- ing clear."

Now, if this tape is authentic, that would certainly strongly suggest wrongdoing on Anderson's part, and the high likelihood that Bonds was in on it (he certainly benefitted from it). Anderson's and Bonds' lawyers are denying the tape's authenticity, as you would expect. I regard this as the first sign that we have enough to move the debate about Bonds - which has thus far seemed to me to be based on speculation rather than evidence, even if it's speculation I tend to sympathize with - into the open.

Bonds is rapidly approaching one of baseball's most hallowed records. Hopefully, if the evidence surfaces to show that he has used illegal performance-enhancing drugs, MLB can stop him before he gets there, rather than have the record tainted. On the other hand, one wishes there was some way that, if Bonds is actually clean, he could be definitively cleared of all this. But we are rapidly reaching the point where the skeptical fan may start to believe the charges.

Utter humiliation for the Red Sox tonight, as the Yankees pour on 19 runs in their own house. After coming so close last season, Sox fans may now have to lament an offseason of having been destroyed by the Yankees. Horrendous. I'm not at the point where I can discuss this rationally, and I'm not even a Sox fan.

Holy Cross alum Brian at Redbird Nation has a fine writeup of last night's action in St. Louis, with bonus points for saying the weather was "Worcestering" out. I still haven't read enough about the game yet to find out who was shooting off the fireworks in the pouring rain in the middle of the 7th inning.

Oh, and: yes, I know I'm against big free agent signings, but I do want Carlos Beltran for Christmas (and yes, that's a baseball-reference.com link with 2004 stats, hooray!). He's the type of free agent worth pursuing - a top-of-the-market player, broad base of skills, showing rapid improvement in patience and power the past two years, runs well, plays great defense, and he's only 28 next season. And just imagine a defensive outfield with Beltran and Cameron.

Jeff Quinton wonders about reports that the Mets might be looking to deal Cliff Floyd for Sammy Sosa. Now, there are two possible ways for me to react to this. One would be to take a rational look at the two players, break down their age, productivity, injury histories and remaining contracts.

I choose the second way. No. The Mets simply need to break their addiction to bringing in expensive old guys. Even if they may be better or cheaper or younger than some other expensive old guys they are shipping out. The first step is recognizing you have a problem. If you can't dump Floyd's salary for younger talent, then eat the contract. And Glavine's, too, and the rest. (I'm OK with keeping Piazza, given the difficulty of replacing him, but Leiter has to go). A GM who can't stop the importation of old, expensive players simply has no business with this team.

As you can tell from my debate summary, I missed most of the ballgames last night. Of course, that's aside from the fact that Major League Baseball scheduled the two games to run against each other . . .

On the Yanks-Sox side, Pedro running out of gas has become a theme. You may have been surprised when it was John Olerud who delivered the knockout blow, given Olerud's struggles the past two seasons; even in his rejuvenated form with the Yankees, Olerud didn't hit for power. But the unflappable Olerud has long had a knack for big hits against top pitchers, especially when the rest of the team is hitting. On the NL side, any series with the Cardinals in it will be a long one for pitchers on both sides.

Mike Mussina's shot at perfection fell pretty far short last night. Here's a look back at the night in September 2001 when he came just one batter (Carl Everett) short of a perfect game at Fenway.

In the movies, or in a novel or a play, the ideal opening act is one that introduces all the major dramatic tensions without resolving any of them. In an action film, you want a gripping opening, but one that won't overshadow what comes later.

That's what we saw last night. We weren't treated to a historic comeback, or a perfect game, or a game-breaking ninth-inning rally, or vengeance for past defeats, or a beanball war. But we got a tantalizing taste of each. Dramatic themes have been introduced: Will Curt Schilling bounce back in his next start, or is he ailing? Can the Red Sox stop Hideki Matsui? Will Joe Torre ever be dumb enough to use Tanyan Sturtze again? How much gas is in Joe Frazier's car? (Well, maybe not that last one).

Stay tuned tonight - same bat time, same bat channel.

Before the season, I evaluated each of the teams around the majors based on Established Win Shares Levels (see here for a discussion of EWSL and here for the team method). Over the offseason, I'll be taking a look back at how teams matched up against those established levels, both to explain where things went right or wrong and to fine-tune EWSL's usefulness (within its natural limitations) as a predictive tool. For now, in advance of their playoff showdown, let's look at how the Yankees and Red Sox stacked up to their preseason predictions. You'll note some variance from the preseason numbers I ran because I did the Yankees before the A-Rod trade.

New York Yankees

Adjusted EWSL: 323.3 (108 wins)
Unadjusted EWSL: 310.3 (103 wins)
Weighted Age: 32.721
Actual Record: 101 wins

Pos	Player	EWSL	2004	Age
C	JPosada	25	20	32
1B	JGiambi	32	8	33
2B	MCairo	3	13	30
SS	DJeter	22	26	30
3B	ARodriguez	34	30	28
RF	GSheffield	31	31	35
CF	KLofton	18	7	37
LF	HMatsui*	19	29	30
DH	BWilliams	21	16	35
C2	JFlaherty	5	3	36
INF	EWilson	2	5	30
OF	RSierra	6	9	38
13	TClark	5	8	32
SP1	MMussina	18	10	35
SP2	JVazquez	18	10	27
SP3	KBrown	12	9	39
SP4	JContreras*	7	2	32
SP5	JLieber	4	11	34
CL	MRivera	15	16	34
R2	PQuantrill	10	6	35
R3	GWhite	5	-1	32
R4	TGordon	8	15	36
R5	FHeredia	6	0	29

Not a lot of things you didn't already know here: the Yankees actually underachieved this year, due to major fall-offs from Giambi, Mussina, Vazquez, and Kenny Lofton, while the main guys who stepped way up to pick up some of the slack were Matsui, Cairo, Gordon and Lieber. There's also the guys I hadn't listed in the preseason:

Pos	Player	EWSL	2004	Age
SP	OHernandez	4	9	38
1B	JOlerud	20	6	35
P	TSturtze	5	3	33

Five guys also contributed one Win Share each. You will note that Olerud's 6 Win Shares, like Contreras' total, is only for his time with the Yankees. . . and yes, I know 38 is an approximate age for El Duque, but I have to use something.

Boston Red Sox

Adjusted EWSL: 307.3 (102 wins)
Unadjusted EWSL: 307.3 (102 wins)
Weighted Age: 31.735
Actual record: 98 wins

Pos	Player	EWSL	2004	Age
C	JVaritek	14	18	32
1B	KMillar	16	17	32
2B	PReese	7	3	31
SS	NGarciaparra	22	6	30
3B	BMueller	17	12	33
RF	TNixon	19	4	30
CF	JDamon	19	26	30
LF	MRamirez	28	28	32
DH	DOrtiz	12	25	28
C2	DMirabelli	4	7	33
INF	MBellhorn	9	21	29
OF	GKapler	7	5	28
13	EBurks	12	0	39
SP1	PMartinez	19	16	32
SP2	CSchilling	20	22	37
SP3	DLowe	15	6	31
SP4	TWakefield	13	8	37
SP5	BKim	16	0	25
CL	KFoulke	17	15	31
R2	SWilliamson	7	4	28
R3	MTimlin	8	6	38
R4	AEmbree	5	4	34
R5	RMendoza	4	3	32

A real tribute to the Sox here for surviving the big dropoffs from the contributions of Nomar (even before he was traded), Nixon, Lowe and Kim. Ellis Burks, of course, never did get a role on the team, so his inclusion here is more a feature of February. The two guys who picked up the most slack were Ortiz (who had 15 win shares in 2003) and Bellhorn; the Sox went far this year by ignoring Bellhorn's 177 whiffs and cashing in on his cheap (less than $500,000 this year) production. But the team's additions, including one guy I totally overlooked in February (Bronson Arroyo) made a difference:

Pos	Player	EWSL	2004	Age
SP	BArroyo	2	10	27
3B	KYoukilis	0	8	25
SS	OCabrera	19	5	29
RP	CLeskanic	6	3	36
1B	DMcCarty	1	3	34

Plus, Dave Roberts and Brian Daubach with two Win Shares apiece, and six other guys with one Win Share apiece, including the disappointing Doug Mentkiewicz (19 EWSL entering the season). Cabrera, clearly, was a useful pickup, and the Greek God of Walks, with his .367 on base percentage, gave the Sox some valuable fill-in work.

After a 42-year wait and more heartbreaking playoff losses than you can count, the Astros are apparently, at long last, about to win a postseason series. Of course, nothing was more epic than their first two losses, the 1980 series (following their victory in the 1-game playoff with the Dodgers) that concluded a best of 5 series against the Phillies with four consecutive extra inning games, and the 1986 classic with the Mets, with a walk-off homer in Game Three, a 12-inning heart-stopper in Game Five (with Nolan Ryan matching Doc Gooden with a 2-hit 12-K performance despite breaking his ankle in the third inning) and the unforgettable 16-inning seesaw affair in Game Six. And, of course, I'm glad to see Bagwell and Biggio finally taste some success in October.

It's wierd to see Jose Vizcaino out there; it seems like a generation ago that he was with the Mets (I was still in law school then), and he was neither outstandingly good nor outstandingly young then. . . am I the only one who keeps expecting Lance Berkman to break into an ad for Little Chocolate Donuts?

One entertaining moment from last night's game was during the confrontation between Eric Gagne and Albert Pujols in the 9th; it was a fine illustration of the focus that has made Gagne such a lights-out closer. Pujols fouled a ball viciously off his foot, and was hopping around in agony - and while he's writhing in pain, Gagne calmly steps forward, takes the ball and talks to his catcher without paying Pujols the slightest notice. Then, maybe two pitches later, Gagne throws a curveball that sails up and in just above Pujols' head. An accident? Maybe; not too many people throw a curveball as a purpose pitch, especially one that was almost a wild pitch with a man on first. But for a guy who's still in enough pain that he's barely able to plant his feet, the curveball sealed the deal as far as making Pujols uncomfortable in the box, and he hit weakly into a double play shortly thereafter.

Other thoughts: Man, the Astros outmaneuvered themselves in using Brad Lidge for only 2/3 of an inning and leaving Russ Springer to take the loss; does someone at FOX Sports stay up at night thinking of annoying ways to distract from the game? The dirt-level "Diamond Cam" is silly enough, but that "Scooter" guy explaining things reminded me way too much of the paperclip guy from Microsoft Word; Game Two of the Yanks-Twins series was the first time Mariano Rivera blew a save in the postseason without costing the Yankees a series.

Ken Caminiti has died, at age 41, of a heart attack. Caminiti's death may well be a wake-up call to the major leagues about the hazards of steroids, which he admitted using during his career. Or not; he had apparently been battling a cocaine addiction recently, and cocaine, of course, is not exactly good for your heart either. In any event, a terrible tragedy for a guy who loved the game and gave it everything he had.

I first saw Caminiti when he debuted with the Astros; he drew comparisons to George Brett after a hot first week or two, then didn't hit like that again until the steroids. A lot of people will remember Caminiti as a heavily-muscled slugger, but the memory I'll always have is of him in his Houston days, endlessly diving over railings and into dugouts to catch errant foul popups.

Watching the playoffs, I must say, even as a sworn enemy of reality TV, I had to laugh at some of the promos for Fox’s “My Big Fat Obnoxious Boss.”

I'm not thrilled with the Mets repatriating Omar Minaya instead of finally bringing in someone with a fresh perspective and the authority to make decisions without much input from ownership. Minaya was previously marinated in the Mets' decisionmaking process, which is terribly broken.

A commenter named Wally, over at Avkash's place, rounds up a complete list of Minaya's moves in Montreal. Go check it out (scroll down).

Has Andruw Jones' home run come down yet?

Tremendous, tremendous performance tonight by Jose Lima, a guy who's been given up for dead many times in his career, and often for very good reasons. Of course, as is well known, Lima's usefulness is in direct proportion to the size of the ballpark he's pitching in. I was dubious about leaving him in to finish the game with Gagne ready to go, but he slammed the door quite efficiently. Reminded me a lot of Bobby Jones' performance against the Giants in the 2000 NLDS, a guy who's had a checkered career just putting together his best-pitched game at exactly the right moment. And you just have to love a guy like Lima, frankly; he's one of the game's true characters.

The invaluable Jim Baker has a column over at Baseball Prospectus (subscription only) carving up an assertion by Frank DeFord that there should be more teams in the baseball playoffs. As Baker points out, the current Divisional Series schedules have already forced most of us who work for a living to abandon hope of being able to see all the games, and he gives a little bit of hypothetical scheduling to demonstrate how awful a schedule might look if you doubled the size of the first round and still wanted to have no overlapping game times. (Baker also does a quick number-crunching exercise to show that Derek Jeter is a solid playoff performer, compared to a number of playoff veterans (notably Manny Ramirez) who have failed to perform to their regular-season level, but that Jeter can hardly be said to have raised the level of his game in October, unlike, say, Pete Rose or Reggie Jackson.

Well, someone forgot to tell David Ortiz and the Red Sox that they aren’t “living in a world of reality” if they think they can win it all.

David Pinto, in his pre-game comments, noted that this would be Boston’s first sweep of a post-season series since 1975 against Oakland. (He also had some interesting comments regarding Kelvim Escobar’s torso.) Anyway, Ortiz’s Todd Pratt-style walk-off home run over the Green Monster advances Boston to what is probably an inevitable showdown with the Evil Empire.

Should be fun, or as some might say, wicked awesome.

Color me unsurprised that (1) the Cardinals are crushing the overmatched Dodgers but (2) they will likely be without the services of perennially injury-prone Chris Carpenter for the rest of the postseason.

Following up on something I wrote about repeatedly in the regular season, the Cards' starting infield finished with 113 Win Shares, tied for fifth all time with the 1982 Brewers (Cooper, Gantner, Yount and Molitor) and 1913 A's (with Eddie Collins and Frank "Home Run" Baker) and behind the 1914 A's, 1908 Pirates (Honus Wagner and co.), 1912 A's and 1934 Tigers (who had four guys each drive in 100 runs), and ahead of the 1975 and 1976 Reds, the 1927 Giants, and the 1946 Cardinals.

If you aren't reading Redbird Nation on a regular basis, you are missing a lot. Brian Gunn has an interesting analysis of the importance of ace pitchers in the postseason - frankly, it's the sort of thing I used to write and hope to get back to again some day - as well as a fascinating analysis of marginal relative attendance figures that shows how St. Louis draws more fans compared to its market size than any other team. Brian only does a top 10, but I'd love to see the whole list.

I'm too late into the game to do LDS (gag) predictions, so let me offer a few totally unoriginal thoughts before we go further:

*Can the Red Sox go all the way? Only if they don't face the Yankees. No, there's no point in analyzing that rationally at this stage. It just will not happen.

*Can the Yankees go all the way? I just don't see it. I know I go back and forth on the Yankees every year, but let's be realistic - they don't have the pitching. The bullpen isn't deep, not since Quantrill's arm finally fell off in August, and the starting rotation, even with three #1 starters, lacks a single pitcher you can genuinely bank on at this point in the season. They may go far, but eventually that has to catch up with them. Alex Belth's pre-season comparison to the 1987 Mets looks a lot better now, although as I said at the time, the better analogy is the 1999 Indians.

*On the Yankee front, by the way, A-Rod fell four RBI short of 110, so his streak of consecutive seasons of 110 runs and 110 RBI ends at six, one short of tying Babe Ruth and Jimmie Foxx for the third longest such streak of all time.

*The Cards, although they have their own pitching issues, are just way, way too strong for the rest of the NL field. The only team I thought could have derailed them was the Cubs, given the possibility of a sudden hot streak by the Cub pitchers.

*Go read Simmons on the Red Sox if you haven't yet.

Last year, I thought the Twins' best postseason bet rode on Johan Santana dominating the Yankees in a short series. That didn't really work out. Obviously, it still does. But these Yankees are no longer vulnerable to lefthanded pitching; just look at new acquisitions Gary Sheffield (.314/.550/.423 against lefties this season) and Alex Rodriguez (.311/.659/.422). Combine those guys with a big year for Jeter against lefties (.314/.532/.378), and suddenly you have a team that looks more like lefty-mashers.

The Twins look, on paper, like a pretty solid team. But let's not forget that these guys were 46-30 this season against the weak AL Central. Against the AL East and AL West? 35-33, an 83-win clip. Not so impressive. Compare that to the Yankees, 71-41 against the same two divisions (albeit without playing themselves), a 103-win clip, or the Red Sox, 70-42, a 101-win pace.

So Ichiro finally broke George Sisler's long-standing hits record of 257, going 3-for-5 last night against the Rangers. But that's not all: if he manages two more 5 at bat games today and tomorrow, he'll also break Willie Wilson's single-season at bats record of 705. At a minimum, unless Ichiro takes both days off, he'll be just the third major leaguer to notch 700 at bats in a season. For a guy whose durability was questioned when he arrived here as an undersized outfielder from short-season Japan (where his career high in at bats was 546), that's impressive work.

So the season's longer. It's been longer for 42 years. Sisler had a longer schedule to work with than Jesse Burkett, who had 240 hits in a 135 game season in 1896 (288 per 162 games). (Ty Cobb broke Burkett's record in 1911). The original record of 138 hits was set by Ross Barnes, in the NL's inaugural 1876 season, in 66 games (339 per 162 games). Yes, that puts Ichiro in perspective, but don't cry for Sisler; it's the way the game's history has gone.

Mark Prior came up huge today, with 16 K and only 3 hits and a walk allowed in going 9 innings against the Reds, with the three main wild card contenders now tied in the loss column. Unfortunately for the Cubbies, one hit was an Austin Kearns homer that tied the game 1-1 in the 7th. Still tied in the 10th at last check, with Ryan Dempster in a 2-on 2-out jam.

UPDATE: Still tied after 11.

UPDATE: Bottom 12, 2-1 Reds after Valentin doubled in Dunn, man on first, Nomar up, 1 out.

UPDATE: Reds win.

UPDATE: A's win, Angels lose to Rangers; all tied up again in the AL West. Texas is 3 back with 3 to play, but with the A's and Angels facing off for the last three games there's no way for them to tie it up. Barring a big Dodger collapse against the Giants, the only races left are the AL West and the NL Wild Card.

I noted a few years ago the similarity between (1) the battles between conservatives, particularly bloggers, and the mainstream political media and (2) the battles between statistical analysts of baseball and the mainstream baseball media. Peter Gammons has given us yet another example of this attitude:

Teammate Dave Roberts says Orlando Cabrera is one of those players who is not particularly good playing on bad teams where the only things that count are sabermetrics, but is much better playing for a good team where little things can make the difference between winning and losing.

Cabrera is a dashing, 78 rpm defender who sometimes almost plays too fast. But he gives himself up when necessary, pounds high fastballs and clearly loves playing on a Red Sox team that is in contention and sold out every game all season. . . Roberts is right about Cabrera, and the same thing can be said about Derek Jeter -- who the stats Nazis will insist from their garages isn't an exceptional shortstop -- and Brian Roberts. On the other hand, there are some star-type players that are not as good on a pennant contender.

"Stats Nazis in their garages" does have about the same ring as "a guy sitting in his living room in his pajamas." (For the record, I blog in the basement, not the living room or the garage). Ironically, of course, this comes just a little over two weeks after Gammons wrote a warm endorsement of the very types of new statistical analysis of defensive stats that have long supported the case against Jeter's defense and that led the Red Sox to trade for Cabrera. In fact, in that column, Gammons cited Cabrera as a prime example of the value of such stats. As I've noted repeatedly, we have yet another example of how Gammons gives vent to the views of different sources with diametrically opposite world views.

Studes notes that the Yankees are likely to finish around ten games better than the record that would be projected, via Bill James' Pythagorean theory, from their runs scored and allowed. He notes the teams qualifying for postseason play since 1900 that have exceeded their projections by the most: 1970 Reds (11 games), 1961 Reds (10), 1997 Giants (10), 1931 Athletics (9), 1930 Athletics (8), 2002 Twins (8).

See a pattern? How about their postseason records? 1970 Reds (4-4), 1961 Reds (1-4), 1997 Giants (0-3), 1931 Athletics (3-4), 1930 Athletics (4-2), 2002 Twins (1-4). Total: 13-21, one World Championship (the 1930 A's, who played a Cardinals team with a nearly identical Pythagorean record).

Much as I dislike Barry Bonds and don't want him breaking the home run record, I'm constrained to agree with John Perricone and Bud Selig that we have long since passed the point where opposing managers aren't just being foolish in walking Bonds all the time, but downright unsportsmanlike. Let the man hit.

Stat of the day: the Cubs are batting .272/.480/.327 since the All-Star Break. Of course, a .480 team slugging percentage for a full season would be most impressive by historical standards. For the starting lineup, the numbers are even more impressive:

PLAYER	G	AB	H	2B	3B	HR	R	RBI	BB	AVG	SLG	OBP
Michael Barrett	53	177	56	16	3	6	25	21	12	.316	.542	.361
Derrek Lee	65	252	68	19	0	10	44	47	25	.270	.536	.338
Mark Grudzielanek	55	174	54	10	1	4	21	16	8	.310	.448	.342
Nomar Garciaparra	33	127	38	10	0	4	21	16	9	.299	.472	.353
Aramis Ramirez	56	201	62	9	0	19	35	44	18	.308	.637	.363
Sammy Sosa	61	238	56	7	0	17	33	37	18	.235	.479	.295
Corey Patterson	63	264	74	17	0	13	43	33	16	.280	.492	.329
Moises Alou	63	230	70	17	2	18	48	49	34	.304	.630	.388
Starting 8	65	1663	478	96	6	100	270	263	140	.287	.533	.343

Once again, the Cubs have a team that's long on home runs and short on patience. But when you've got this kind of wall-to-wall power, it hardly matters. While Mark Prior, Kerry Wood and Matt Clement have struggled, it's been the less-vaunted Cubbie offense - even adjusting for the fact that it's been a good hitters' year at Wrigley - that's carried the load as the Cubs stay in the wild-card hunt down the stretch run. And while Nomar and Sammy may be the biggest names here, they haven't been particularly close to the biggest bats, as Moises Alou, Aramis Ramirez and the long-awaited breakout of Michael Barrett have made a much bigger impact.

Eric McErlain has a couple of good posts, one lamenting how the Mets not only destroyed their credibility with their fans by trading Scott Kazmir but completely failed to anticipate or understand why people were so upset, the other discussing the development of a baseball stadium in Washington to house Les Expos (See here for a photo of the likely site).

ESPN and the Associated Press botched this one on Friday:

Ichiro Suzuki broke the major league single-season record with his 199th single in the seventh inning of the Seattle Mariners' game against the Oakland Athletics on Friday night.

With a hit in the seventh inning for his second single of the game, Suzuki bettered the mark of 198 singles set by Lloyd Waner of Pittsburgh in 1927.

Of course, as I noted in a column about Ichiro three years ago, the major league record at the time was 206 set by Wee Willie Keeler in 1898, and the AL record was 185 by Wade Boggs in 1985. Ichiro broke that AL record in 2001, extending it to 192, and has now broken Keeler's record as well, with 211 singles through last night. But a little halfway competent research would have indicated the right record.

In early 2002, I took a look at the pitchers who won 300 games and where they stood relative to Greg Maddux and Tom Glavine at the same age, finding that Maddux was ahead of every modern (post-1920) pitcher who had won 300, while Glavine was also well-situated. As the two near the end of their age-38 seasons, let's update the chart, and add Mike Mussina into the mix:

Pitcher	Thru 35	At 36-37	Thru 37	At 38	Thru 38	After
Maddux	257	32	289	*14	303	--
Carlton	249	36	285	15	300	29
Clemens	233	27	260	20	280	*48
Seaver	245	19	264	9	273	38
Grove	223	34	257	14	271	29
Spahn	203	43	246	21	267	96
Sutton	230	28	258	8	266	58
Glavine	224	27	251	*9	260	--
Wynn	201	34	235	14	249	51
Perry	198	33	231	15	246	68
Ryan	205	26	231	10	241	83
Mussina	*211	--	--	--	--	--
Niekro	131	32	163	16	179	139

* - And counting

First of all, ignore Phil Niekro, who's the outlier here. As you can see, a lot of these guys hit the wall right around 36-37, although the effect is exaggerated by the fact that several of the more recent pitchers were around that age in the 1981 strike season. Maddux remains well-situated to rack up a truly impressive number of career wins without having to have any more great seasons, although perhaps not as well situated as Clemens, who stands two wins from becoming only the second pitcher (Spahn was the last one) since the 1920s to win 330 games.

Glavine is still in the game, but frankly he needs to get out of Queens (which would probably help the Mets as well). As for Mussina, his struggles of late don't portend well, but he's ahead of Ryan, Spahn, Wynn, Perry and Niekro at the same age, and with the Yankee offense behind him he should have a few more years of smooth sailing if he gets straightened out.

For comparison, let's run the chart of the remaining 300-game winners from the 1890-1930 period (the 1880s guys are not even worth comparing):

Pitcher	Thru 35	At 36-37	Thru 37	At 38	Thru 38	After
Young	351	54	405	18	423	88
Johnson	354	43	397	15	412	5
Mathewson	373	0	373	0	373	0
Nichols	361	0	361	0	361	0
Alexander	266	34	300	15	315	58
Plank	224	44	288	15	303	23

Alexander, at least by this age (in the mid 1920s), is actually a decent comparison to Maddux. Mathewson retired at age 35, and at 37 was in Europe serving in World War I.

A new feature over at Baseball-Reference.com: the site has long had Similarity Scores so you could compare a player's most comparable players through the same age. Now, at least for batters, you can look over the list of the ten most comparable - and their stats after that age. Here's the numbers for Barry Bonds from age 36 (in 2001) to 2003, compared to the average from 36 on for his most comparable players through age 35:

PLAYER(S)	G	AB	HR	R	RBI	AVG	SLG	OBP	OPS+
Bonds	426	1269	164	357	337	.345	.808	.542	257
Average	393	1272	66	194	202	.255	.460	.360	125

The list of comparables includes three active players - Jeff Bagwell, Frank Thomas and Rafael Palmeiro - but the numbers are even lower if you remove them. The others' average numbers are not that bad for old guys, but they give you a sense of how truly unique what Bonds has done is. Lest you think this an unfair comparison, the other seven are all in the Hall of Fame, including Mickey Mantle, Willie Mays, Frank Robinson and Mel Ott.

All of whom were in increasingly steep decline at Bonds' age.

Somehow, I managed to miss this story.

Looks like my prediction isn't holding up too well, as the Yankee-Red Sox series reverted to form with the Yanks' mauling of Derek Lowe and Pedro Martinez, leaving the Sox to pick up a game and a half on the Yankees in their remaining 11 other games even if they sweep next weekend's series at Fenway. Of course, that's not impossible (the Sox play 8 games against Baltimore and three against Tampa Bay, while the Yankees have 1 against the Rays, three vs. the Twins and six against the woebegotten Blue Jays), but don't bet on it.

Well, this is the first time in my lifetime - or at least my memory - that anybody has cracked 700 homers. Savor the moment . . . even if, like me, you can't find much to like about Bonds. It's still a unique one.

The invaluable Jason Mastaitis reminds me of something I either hadn't known or had forgotten (unsurprising, given how poorly I follow the lower minor leagues): Jason Bay used to be a Mets farmhand until he was traded in the deal that brought in Steve Reed to throw 26 innings in the all-important 2002 stretch drive. Could the Mets use a 25-year-old outfielder who makes $305,000 and has career averages of .293/.563/.382?

Don't answer that.

I also agree with Mastaitis that Wally Backman sounds like he would be a fine choice to replace Art Howe.

Jonah Keri has an interesting look, over at BaseballProspectus.com (subscription only), at the sudden development the last two years of two over-30 utilitymen (Mark Loretta and Melvin Mora) into major star-caliber players. He includes a chart of players who took major leaps forward after age 30, from a database going back to 1972. (Side note: here's an example of BP's insistence on using its own proprietary stats, in this case VORP, hampering its studies - they could have used Win Shares without any substantial change in accuracy and been able to run the study back another 100 years).

Anyway, I found the distribution of these leaps forward by older players over time interesting:

1973-78: 5 in 6 years. OK, we can discount that some due to the
paucity of pre-1972 data. Note that 3 are in 1973, when the DH was
introduced.

1979-92: 13 in 14 years, two of which were in the high-offense 1987
season.

1993-2004: 30 in 11 years.

Logical inference? Well, could just be a small sample size. But it
could be either that (1) physical fitness and simlar issues have created
greater opportunity for late-career advancement in the post-1993
environment, or (2) players can be affected unequally by an upswing in
offense, leading some guys to blossom more than others (consistent with the
1973 & 1987 results).

To no one's surprise, the Mets have fired Art Howe, but will be asking him to manage out the balance of the season rather than hand the reins to a Moose Stubing-style caretaker. Which is pretty classless, but then, for the money they are paying Howe, he can suck it up.

More [please] later [not] on [Larry] possible [Bowa] replacements.

Mike Carminati will no longer be performing his relentless and often hilarious fiskings of Joe Morgan's chat sessions on ESPN, on account of ESPN deciding to move Morgan's chats behind the wall of "premium" content you have to pay to get. Of course, paying for the Morgan chats is like when PT Barnum got people to pay admission to see "the Fabulous Egress". While I have my theories, it's never been entirely clear how such a smart player can be so stupid about the game he mastered. If another Joe Morgan came up today, Morgan probably wouldn't think he was any good.

That horse was dead anyway; I gave up about a year or two ago arguing with people who think batting average and RBI are important but statistics aren't. But Carminti's posts were entertaining nonetheless.

Aaron Gleeman has some additional thoughts.

How do teams go about developing or acquiring the best players in baseball? Well, for a snapshot from the 2004 season, I thought I'd take a look at the top 20 players in each league, by Win Shares, and how they got where they are. Where players were acquired by trade, I tried to break out the factors that led them to be traded - i.e., trading veterans for prospects, trading a prospective free agent, just making a bad deal, etc.:

National League:

Player	Team	Acquired
Barry Bonds	SF	Free agent
Scott Rolen	STL	Trade (economic factors)
Albert Pujols	STL	Home-grown (draft)
Jim Edmonds	STL	Trade (other team's mistake)
Mark Loretta	SD	Free agent
Adrian Beltre	LA	Home-grown/foreign player
Bobby Abreu	PHI	Trade (other team's mistake)
Sean Casey	CIN	Trade (prospect acquired for veteran)
JD Drew	ATL	Trade (straight up deal)
Todd Helton	COL	Home-grown (draft)
Adam Dunn	CIN	Home-grown (draft)
Lance Berkman	HOU	Home-grown (draft)
Mike Lowell	FLA	Trade (other team's mistake)
Brian Giles	SD	Trade (economic factors)
Phil Nevin	SD	Trade (other team's mistake)
Jim Thome	PHI	Free agent
Jason Kendall	PIT	Home-grown (draft)
Jimmy Rollins	PHI	Home-grown (draft)
Randy Johnson	AZ	Free agent
Derrek Lee	CHC	Trade (economic factors)

Of course, I should note that the Pirates got a very good deal for Giles, economic factors and my own skepticism at the time notwithstanding. I'm also willing to call the Drew-Marquis deal a fair one for now, whereas the Derrek Lee-Hee Seop Choi deal was clearly motivated by economics even though Choi is a fine young player. And yes, I'm as amazed as you are to see Mark Loretta on that list. Also, I could be mistaken about whether economics were a big mover in the Jim Edmonds deal.

American League:

Player	Team	Acquired
Gary Sheffield	NYY	Free agent
Hideki Matsui	NYY	Free agent (foreign)
Alex Rodriguez	NYY	Trade (economic factors)
Manny Ramirez	BOS	Free agent
Carlos Guillen	DET	Trade (other team's mistake)
Miguel Tejada	BAL	Free agent
Johan Santana	MIN	Rule V draft
Vladimir Guerrero	ANA	Free agent
Ichiro Suzuki	SEA	Free agent (foreign)
Johnny Damon	BOS	Free agent
Hank Blalock	TEX	Home-grown (draft)
Jose Guillen	ANA	Free agent
Derek Jeter	NYY	Home-grown (draft)
Michael Young	TEX	Trade (other team's mistake)
Travis Hafner	CLE	Trade (other team's mistake)
David Ortiz	BOS	Free agent
Melvin Mora	BAL	Trade (young player acquired for veteran)
Lew Ford	MIN	Trade (prospect acquired for veteran)
Carlos Lee	CHW	Home-grown (draft)
Ivan Rodriguez	DET	Free agent

Yup, Carlos Guillen, Melvin Mora and Lew Ford are still hanging in there. And yes, the Yankees have the top three players in the league. Wonders never cease.

Let's group these, putting the foreign and domestic free agents in one category, as well as lumping together the various types of trades made principally for baseball reasons rather than financial ones.

Method	#
Free agency	14
Economic deals	4
Strategic trades	11
Rule V draft	1
Home-grown	10

Leaving aside the fact that big organizations like the Yankees and Cardinals have an advantage in being able to sign anyone they draft, you've got 45% of star players coming either through free agency or through deals where a big factor was the other team's need to either dump salary or avoid losing a prospective free agent (on the other hand, some free agents, like David Ortiz, were acquired without breaking the bank in a bidding war). For obvious (ahem, Yankees and Red Sox) reasons, the proportion is much higher among AL teams. But savvy trading and scavenging (the Twins stand alone here in stealing Santana off the Rule V draft, but I can't think of a more idiotic and unjustified deal than the Devil Rays trading the rights to Bobby Abreu, acquired in the expansion draft, for Kevin Stocker) is still a close second as a way of striking gold. Just a quarter of the Top 40 are truly home-grown products.

How to explain the Mets' second-half collapse in three easy lessons?

1. Here are the combined post-All-Star Break stats for Mike Piazza, Cliff Floyd, and Richard Hidalgo:

AB	H	2B	3B	HR	R	RBI	BB	K	SB	AVG	SLG	OBP	OPS
467	98	21	0	19	57	59	57	104	9	.210	.377	.296	673

Bear in mind that this is the middle of the Mets' batting order (Jason Phillips and Todd Zeile have been worse). Full second-half batting stats are here.

2. Here are the combined post-All-Star Break stats for Tom Glavine, Al Leiter and Steve Traschsel:

W	L	G	IP	ERA	H/9	HR/9	BB/9	K/9	WHIP
7	16	33	194	4.92	10.30	1.0	4.6	5.2	1.65

Bear in mind that these are the aces of the Mets' staff; Jae Seo and Kris Benson are worse. Full second-half pitching stats are here.

3. Games played by Todd Zeile after the break: 46. Games played by Jose Reyes and Kaz Matsui combined: 43. No, you don't want to see Zeile's numbers, or the Mets' defense without Reyes. You just want to see Zeile retired, and the season over.

Following up on an earlier post, a few diligent readers sent me links to this AP story observing that President Bush - unlike Senator Kerry - has raised a lot of money from baseball owners and, to a lesser extent, baseball players. Of course, given that a lot of these people know Bush personally from his days as owner of the Rangers, that's not all that surprising, nor is it surprising that the owners would, as a result, view Bush as being sympathetic to their interests.

Bill James - yes, Bill James, writing a guest column over at the Hardball Times - makes the obvious-when-you-really-think-about-it point, though to a surprising extent, that the 162 game schedule increases Ichiro's odds on breaking George Sisler's hits record by something like a factor of 9-to-1, whereas it less than doubled Roger Maris' odds of breaking Ruth's home run record (as a matter of probabilities; in practice, you either break the record by Game 154 or you do not).

Link via Pinto.

Peter Gammons can be very frustrating for sabermetrically-inclined readers; he clearly understands and enjoys sophisticated analyses of the game, but he's also prone to Luddite anti-stathead diatribes. As I've often noted, the reason for this is that Gammons will repeat basically anything his sources around the game's front offices tell him, and many of them remain contemptuous of statistical analysis on anything but the most rudimentary level. To give a political analogy, Gammons is David Broder and Bob Novak rolled into one, dispensing the insiders' views from both sides of a raging debate with equal vigor. In fact, given how closely Gammons' columns reflect conventional wisdom, you can measure the influence of sabermetric ideas within the game by how often they show up in Gammons' work as opposed to how often he bashes them.

So, it's welcome to see Gammons picking up on the Hot New Thing, the pursuit of sophisticated defensive statistics and their role in the reshaping of the Oakland and Boston rosters. And, of course, he throws us sabermetric types the ultimate bone at the end:

Statistical analysis, whose roots make Bill James an absolute must for the Hall of Fame . . .

Too true; read the whole thing.

Also, Jim Baker looks at the historical performance of wild card teams in the playoffs, with some surprising results - including the fact that baseball's wild card teams have won more playoff games than they have lost, with a record of 85-79 (or 78-72, if you exlude the 2002 World Series matchup of two wild card teams).

I think there's a simple reason why the Red Sox are going to pull down the Yanks from behind, even trailing by 3.5 games, and win the division:

False hope.

Think: finally slaying the Yankees in the regular season, and coming from behind to do it, is the only way to top last season for giving Sox fans false hope of finally winning it all.

Then they lose to the Wild Card Yankees in the ALCS.

You heard it here first.

Answering a question I asked in late July, the Mets radio announcers noted that tonight's save by Armando Benitez against the Mets, his 11th of the season, established a new record for saves by one pitcher against one team in the same season.

Shoot me now! I demand that you shoot me now!

The Mets have been absolutely unwatchable (or unlistenable, as the case may be) the past few weeks; with the exception of David Wright's at bats, each game seems to fade in my memory almost immediately into a blur of despair. This blog was necessarily going to be tilted more in a political direction than usual in the stretch run to the presidential election, but that's been exacerbated of late by the need to avert my eyes from the train wreck that has been the Mets of late.

It could be a coincidence that uber-groundball pitcher Derek Lowe turned his season around immediately upon the Red Sox ditching Nomar and bringing in glove wizards Orlando Cabrera and Doug Mientkiewicz. Could be, but not likely.

When the deal was made a month ago, I looked at the Hardball Times' Fielding Independent Pitching numbers, which seek to project a pitcher's ERA as if he had an average defense behind him (FIP) compared to the pitcher's actual Runs Allowed, and found significant underperformance by the major Sox pitchers, particularly those with high numbers of ground balls allowed and especially Derek Low:

Pitcher	IP	RA	FIP	+/-	GB/IP
Schilling	145.2	3.58	3.15	+0.43	1.26
Martinez	136.2	4.35	3.96	+0.39	1.19
Lowe	117	7.46	4.83	+2.63	2.31
Wakefield	116.2	5.01	4.63	+0.38	1.59
Arroyo	110.2	5.63	4.32	+1.31	1.27
Foulke	53.2	2.18	3.46	-1.28	1.06
Timlin	53.1	3.71	3.67	+0.04	1.59
Embree	37.2	5.26	4.54	+0.72	1.22
TOTAL	771.1	4.81	4.07	+0.74	1.46

So, how have things gone since the deal?

Pitcher	IP	RA	FIP	+/-
Schilling	43	3.14	4.19	-1.05
Martinez	44	2.45	2.45	0.00
Lowe*	49	4.78	3.67	+1.11
Wakefield	39.1	5.03	6.64	-1.61
Arroyo	33.2	4.81	3.21	+1.61
Foulke	17	1.59	2.12	-0.53
Timlin	11.2	7.71	3.86	+3.85
Embree	6.1	4.26	4.26	0.00
TOTAL	244	4.02	3.87	+0.15

Now, the individual numbers at such small sample sizes are bound to be flukey, although it's clear that Lowe is no longer getting completely murdered by his defense. But the overall conclusion is clear: since the deal, the Sox pitchers are pitching slightly better (as Peter Gammons and others have noted, Lowe's walk rate has dropped dramatically since the deal, perhaps due to greater confidence in his defense), but their defensive support has been dramatically better, as their FIP has dropped by 0.20 R/9IP while their Runs Allowed-FIP margin has dropped by 0.59. Maybe, just maybe, Theo and Bill James & co. know what they are doing.

* - There may be an error in the Hardball Times numbers for Lowe, but I can;t fix it without comparing apples to oranges.

Like many bloggers, I often get emails from people who have started new blogs. I have less and less free time these days to check these out and less and less room on my blogroll for new additions, and frankly - if you're thinking of doing this - while I'm sympathetic to new bloggers, I'm much more interested in getting an email with a link to an interesting post than just "look at my blog."

That said, here's a roundup of people who asked me to pass on a link, most of them baseball blogs; if you're in the mood to go exploring, check them out:

Baseball Addict

College Basketball Blog

The Senseless, Wacky, Crazy, Downright Twisted Dictionary to Major League Baseball

Bijan Bayne (the author of "Sky Kings: Black Pioneers of Professional Basketball")

Ump Is Blind (a humor site)

BaseballAvenue

The Torch (a political site)

Balls, Sticks, & Stuff (Comments on sports...and other stuff too)

I'll have more in part two of this tour in the next few days.

As I've noted before here and here, the Cardinals' infield is making a run at the all-time record for Win Shares amassed by one starting infield, which is 119 by the 1914 A's (Connie Mack's "$100,000 infield" of Stuffy McInnis, Eddie Collins, Jack Barry and Frank Baker; you can find the full list in the Ken Boyer comment of the New Historical Baseball Abstract). Through Thursday's action, Pujols, Womack, Renteria and Rolen were up to 33, 15, 16 and 35 Win Shares, respectively - 99 total, and a pace for 121 on the season if Tony LaRussa doesn't start sitting them more down the stretch run. (Of course, Mack's team had a shorter season to work with). In fact, 99 Win Shares already puts this crew even with the 1973 Big Red Machine (which would have scored higher if NL MVP Pete Rose had been playing third instead of .191-hitting Dennis Menke) and the 1990 Detroit Tigers (Cecil Fielder, Lou Whitaker, Alan Trammell and Tony Phillips) for 21st place all time, and just six more Win Shares between them will pull them into the top 10.

Chris Dial over at the Baseball Think Factory has an intriguing but ultimately inconclusive look at whether slow-working pitchers - which he mainly defines as "Steve Trachsel" - get poor defensive support. The study as conducted proves nothing, but it's a good analytical start down a road towards being able to measure two things (a pitcher's pace and the quality of his defensive support relative to his team's defensive abilities) and see if they correlate.

Marty Noble of Newsday notes the political tilt of baseball players in general and the Mets in particular towards the Republican party:

Players rarely wear their political allegiance on their sleeves.

"But I'd be surprised if it isn't 4 or 5 to 1 Republican in the game," Mets catcher Vance Wilson said last week. "Not everyone is involved or up to date on what's going on, but of the ones who are, I'm sure it's heavy Republican."

(Link via Baseball Primer). Of course, Noble can't resist this dig:

The Grand Old Party appeals to those in the grand old game, if only because of their affluence. The average salary of a major league player, $2,549,363, connects more with Republican ways and the have-lots of the world.

Would Noble say the same thing about the overwhelmingly Democratic tilt of, say, movie stars? I'm sure making big money and paying big taxes does have something to do with it, but professional athletes have always been a conservative lot, since long before they made a lot of money, and I suspect that's been doubly true in times (like the present) when the principal political issue was war and peace.

Since July 30:

Team	W	L	+/-
Braves	21	8	--
Marlins	15	12	-5
Expos	16	13	-5
Phillies	13	16	-8
Mets	11	18	-10

Smells like victory . . .

PLAYER	G	AB	H	2B	3B	HR	R	RBI	BB*	K	SB	AVG	SLG	OBP
David Wright	29	113	34	9	0	6	19	19	5	17	1	.301	.540	.331
Ty Wigginton	29	90	14	2	0	1	5	7	10	18	0	.156	.211	.240

* - Includes HBP

Well, this much is certain: the one decision the Mets made that has helped them win a few ballgames now was the one that involved giving an everyday job to a 21-year-old prospect.

PITCHER	W	L	G	IP	ERA	H/9	HR/9	BB/9	K/9
Kris Benson	2	3	6	35	6.43	10.54	1.32	3.09	5.14
Victor Zambrano	2	0	3	14	3.86	7.71	0.00	3.86	9.00
Scott Kazmir	1	0	2	8	5.63	14.63	0.00	4.50	6.75

But hey, at least Rick Peterson can say that Victor Zambrano hasn't walked anyone in two weeks . . .

Rany Jazayerli has a good point about the Royals' acquisition of Matt Kinney:

I don’t know why on earth the Brewers would waive Matt Kinney.

Start with the reasons why they did. He’s now on his fourth organization; the Red Sox traded him to Minnesota for Greg Swindell back in 1998, and the Twins dealt him to Milwaukee two years ago when they ran out of room on their 40-man roster. He’s got a 5.18 career ERA, which isn’t good. Like far too many Royals’ pitchers, he’s a little too prone to flyballs (0.83 G/F ratio, 55 HR in 361 career IP).

Now here are all the reasons why they shouldn’t have. He’s not that old (27). He’s cheap ($400,000), although I think he’ll be arbitration-eligible this winter. He can miss bats, and he’s getting better at it. His K/9 ratio is 6.80 for his career, and consider this progression: 5.10, 6.14, 7.18, 7.51. Last season, he struck out 152 batters in 190 innings. Do you know how long it’s been since a Royals pitcher struck out 152 batters? Try 1997, by a pre-injury Kevin Appier.

And most importantly, he appears to have taken a big leap forward this season. His strikeout rate is the best of his career…and so is his walk rate (3.32 per 9). His ERA this season is 5.78, but most of that damage was done in the season’s first six weeks. His ERA on May 15th was 8.61; since then, this is his line:

31.2 IP, 35 H, 4 HR, 7 BB, 30 K, 3.13 ERA.

Plus, it’s worth noting that he’s been awfully hit-unlucky this year, surrendering 8 hits more than expected, which is a pretty margin in just 62 innings.

And we’re not talking about a soft-tosser; Kinney throws in the mid-90s, and was considered a top prospect in the minor leagues.

So why did the Brewers flat-out release him? Damned if I know. He was definitely getting torched by lefties (.379/.443/.543). While his platoon splits have never been as dramatic as they were this year, that may always be a problem for him. And the turnaround to his season corresponds to the time he was demoted to the bullpen. He had a 9.72 ERA as a starter this season, and even though he’s been pitching well in relief, I suppose the Brewers may be disappointed by what Kinney hasn’t become, as opposed to what he has.

What he has become is a pretty damn good reliever, with the stuff and sudden breakout in his K/BB ratio to suggest continued upside. The Royals plan to use him in middle relief, and maybe that’s all he’ll ever be good for. But it’s sure as hell worth giving him the roster spot to find out.

Point, Allard Baird.

Red-hot man mountain Calvin Pickering - now batting .364/1.364/.417 in three games since his Sunday callup to replace the injured Mike Sweeney - hit a bases-clearing triple last night in Anaheim. Pickering looks like he may finally be living up to his long-ago promise, having had a huge year in AAA.

I just noticed a new feature at Baseball-Reference.com: lists of baseball players by the colleges they attended. My alma mater, Holy Cross, is well represented with 77 major league players, albeit the great bulk of them real old-timers, and the last guy (former Twins pitcher Mike Pazik) retiring in 1977. Notables include 19th century star Cubs outfielder Jimmy Ryan; Lou Sockalexis, the Native American supposed namesake of the Cleveland Indians (who was kicked out of HC for drinking - I guess the place was rather different then); Andy Coakley, a successful pitcher for Connie Mack's pennant-winning 1905 A's; Jack Barry, the shortstop in Mack's "$100,000 Infield," who later coached baseball at the Cross for decades; "Jumpin' Joe" Dugan, the third baseman for the 1927 Yankees; Rosy Ryan, a starting pitcher for the Giants when they won four pennants and two World Series between 1921 and 1924; and Mike Hegan, a journeyman catcher who played for the 1964 Yankees, 1969 Seattle Pilots, and 1972-73 A's.

Not a bad crew. Barry or Jimmy Ryan was probably the best player of the bunch.

Avkash has more on David Wright's patience at the plate, and why we shouldn't be too concerned at his lack of walks thus far.

David Wright hasn't missed a game yet since arriving at Shea; here are his numbers projected to a full season:

G	AB	H	2B	3B	HR	R	RBI	BB	K	SB-CS	AVG	SLG	OBP	HPB	GIDP
162	671	203	58	0	29	110	87	23	104	6-0	.303	.519	.331	6	23

Well, we Mets fans need something to dream on. Wright's flyball/groundball ratio of 0.78 bodes particularly well for him as a power hitter, although it hasn't stopped him from hitting into double plays. Ironically, Wright has been missing the two elements - steady defense and patience at the plate - that were his predecessor Ty Wigginton's two most conspicuous weaknesses. But Wright is 21 and showed both in the minors, so there's hope for the future.

Now, if we can ever get Jose Reyes healthy . . .

If the season ended today, the AL division winners would be the Yankees, Twins and A's, and the Red Sox would take the Wild Card. Ichiro is hitting .428 against those four teams (68/159). Wow. (The overall scalding hot streak continues: .394 since May 1 (163/414), .483 since the All-Star Break (70/145)).

How bad are the Diamondbacks? You probably know that they're on pace for more than 110 losses and that, entering last night's action, they'd lost 46 of their last 55 games. Mike's Baseball Rants has some historical perspective; even the 1962 Mets and last year's Tigers never lost more than 44 of 55 games (the 1916 A's, however managed a 4-56 slide).

How about this: before last night's victory over Pittsburgh, the D-Backs were 0-14 against the Tigers, Expos, Devil Rays and Pirates.

Opposing lefthanded batters are hitting .299/.486/.395 - against a team that sends Randy Johnson to the hill every fifth day. Take out Johnson (.171/.261/.244) and that goes to .309/.503/.405. With men on base, opposing teams are hitting .289/.495/.385 against Arizona.

The 1994 Montreal Expos are one of baseball's great "what-if" stories - what if they'd played out a full season? What if they'd won the World Series? Would they have been able to hold together such a talented team? Would they have saved baseball in Montreal?

Well, we can't answer those questions precisely . . . although we can approximate an answer to the first question, and without resort to "what-ifs." I was playing around with the Streak Reports on Baseball-Reference.com some time ago, and noticed that from August 19, 1993 through May 5, 1995 - a full 162-game schedule including the entire 1994 regular season - the Expos won 110 games and lost just 52. (The Expos finished the 1993 season on a 31-10 tear in a futile attempt to catch the Phillies, went 74-40 to post the best record in baseball in 1994, and opened 1995 with a 5-2 spurt before slumping to a last-place finish with a depleted lineup. For that stretch, they were, in plain sight, a great team for one full season's worth of games, similar to, say, the 1975 Reds (108 wins), the 1986 Mets (108 wins), or the 1984 Tigers (104 wins). And now, thanks to the magic of Retrosheet, we can not only see that 110-win record; we can flesh out the picture by reconstructing the individual stats of the players who made up a great team. Let's take a look:

Batting Stats

PLAYER	G	AB	H	2B	3B	HR	R	RBI	BB	K	SB-CS	Avg	Slg	OBP	DP	HB
Darrin Fletcher	132	419	110	27	2	15	46	79	31	35	0-0	.263	.444	.314	7	7
Cliff Floyd	117	387	105	19	4	5	47	44	27	79	12-3	.271	.380	.321	4	3
Mike Lansing	145	532	145	29	2	5	59	49	42	55	19-10	.273	.363	.334	15	8
Wil Cordero	149	555	161	40	4	20	83	90	50	79	17-5	.290	.485	.356	10	8
Sean Berry	139	427	121	27	3	18	69	60	51	72	19-1	.283	.487	.361	11	3
Larry Walker	140	524	160	50	4	26	101	112	73	91	23-8	.305	.565	.390	10	5
Marquis Grissom	151	648	198	30	4	18	130	72	54	82	60-7	.306	.448	.356	14	1
Moises Alou	129	497	166	37	6	26	93	90	46	75	7-7	.334	.590	.393	7	6
Lou Frazier	103	188	48	3	2	0	29	18	19	33	22-5	.255	.293	.325	1	1
Rondell White	69	185	50	14	2	6	28	30	17	36	2-3	.270	.465	.340	3	3
Lenny Webster	57	143	39	10	0	5	13	23	16	24	0-0	.273	.448	.370	7	6
Randy Ready	32	105	27	6	1	1	17	10	18	6	2-1	.257	.362	.371	4	1
Juan Bell	38	97	27	4	0	2	12	10	15	21	4-0	.278	.381	.372	1	0
Randy Milligan	47	82	19	2	0	2	10	12	14	21	0-0	.232	.329	.337	1	0
Freddie Benavides	47	85	16	5	1	0	8	6	3	15	0-0	.188	.271	.222	2	1
Oreste Marrero	27	66	15	4	1	1	9	3	14	12	1-3	.227	.364	.363	0	0
Tim Spehr	76	72	24	7	1	1	16	9	6	19	3-0	.333	.500	.385	0	0
Delino DeShields	17	61	15	2	1	0	9	4	13	10	9-0	.246	.311	.362	0	1
John Vander Wal	24	49	10	4	1	0	8	3	8	3	0-1	.204	.327	.316	1	0
Jeff Gardner	18	32	7	0	1	0	4	1	3	5	0-0	.219	.281	.286	1	0
Roberto Kelly	7	29	7	2	0	1	5	3	0	4	1-1	.241	.414	.241	3	0
Tony Tarasco	6	20	9	3	0	0	3	2	1	4	0-0	.450	.600	.476	0	0
Shane Andrews	6	16	5	2	0	2	3	5	2	5	0-0	.313	.813	.389	0	0

Team Totals

PLAYER	G	AB	H	2B	3B	HR	R	RBI	BB	K	SB-CS	Avg	Slg	OBP	GDP	HPB
NON-PITCHERS	162	5265	1497	330	41	155	808	746	523	798	203-57	.284	.451	.352	103	54
PITCHERS	162	343	46	5	2	0	18	16	21	134	0-0	.134	.160	.184	4	0
TOTAL	162	5608	1543	335	43	155	826	762	544	932	203-57	.275	.433	.342	107	54

One thing that really jumps out at you about the Expos' offense is its incredible balance. The team leader in homers hit 26, but they managed 209 155 home runs - an average of 26 19 per non-pitching lineup slot. [NOTE: Yes, my arithmetic goofed there somehow, as Travis Nelson has pointed out to me. I'll fix any other arithmetical errors as they come to my attention.] Nobody on this team walked a whole lot - besides Walker with 73, nobody drew more than 54 walks - but everybody drew at least a halfway respectable number of walks and hit for a good enough average to not have a horrid OBP, and nobody struck out 100 times. Everybody could steal a few bases. And everyone hit gobs of doubles. It doesn't look like a terrifying offense, but it was solid all the way through.

Walker and Alou, of course, were the offensive stars, and would go on to distinguished careers elsewhere. The hidden big year here was Grissom, who was dazzling - playing by far the best baseball of his long, erratic career - down the stretch in 1993, batting .353, scoring 34 runs and stealing 24 bases in 25 attempts in 41 games. And, of course, all the way down the depth chart (see more below) you see guys who have had long, productive major league careers.

As you can see, the Expos had an unusually poor-hitting pitching staff; if you break the numbers down (see below), the mainstays of the rotation were especially awful, while guys like Butch Henry, Denis Boucher and the relievers did OK in limited action.

Pitching Stats

Pitcher	W-L	SV	ERA	G	GS	CG	IP	H	HR	BB	K	R	ER
Jeff Fassero	15-8	0	3.00	32	31	2	207.1	176	17	58	189	79	69
Ken Hill	18-8	0	3.66	30	30	2	196.2	192	15	61	107	92	80
Pedro Martinez	13-5	1	3.20	26	25	1	157.1	121	12	50	156	59	56
Kirk Rueter	12-4	0	4.53	27	27	0	135	144	15	31	66	75	68
Butch Henry	9-5	1	2.82	34	17	0	127.2	120	12	24	78	42	40
Mel Rojas	4-3	22	3.09	79	0	0	110.2	96	13	27	103	46	38
Gil Heredia	9-3	1	3.28	48	7	0	107	117	10	20	89	45	39
Jeff Shaw	6-2	1	3.95	63	0	0	86.2	88	11	21	56	42	38
John Wetteland	5-6	42	2.31	72	0	0	85.2	55	5	25	101	24	22
Tim Scott	8-2	2	3.12	56	0	0	69.1	64	3	25	57	25	24
Dennis Martinez	5-1	0	2.53	8	8	0	57	46	5	16	43	21	16
Denis Boucher	3-2	0	3.83	15	7	0	47	48	7	10	31	23	20
Gabe White	1-1	1	6.08	7	5	0	23.2	24	4	11	17	16	16
Chris Nabholz	2-0	0	0.59	6	2	0	15.1	7	0	8	14	1	1
Brian Barnes	0-1	0	6.00	11	0	0	12	17	0	8	7	9	8
TOTAL	110-52	71	3.41	162	162	5	1466.1	1350	133	409	1133	623	556

What's striking here is that, even for a modern team, this staff never finished its starts. Felipe Alou had a great bullpen (and a deep roster to pinch hit for his helpless-hitting starters), and made extensive use of it. . . Ken Hill and Dennis Martinez went in opposite directions down the stretch in 1993, as Martinez salvaged what had been an awful year, while Hill had the swoon some were expecting again in 1994 when the strike hit . . . Wetteland was incredibly lights-out in 1993, and even moreso the end of the year.

More players:

Read More »

Dr. Manhattan has a rundown on the Yankees. Check it out.

Well, so much for optimism: Victor Zambrano walked off the mound in the second inning with an inflamed elbow, and is listed as day-to-day.

Now, I haven't seen Victor Zambrano pitch for the Mets yet. And I continue to believe that they way overpaid for him. And I continue to be skeptical of Rick Peterson's reported boast that he could turn Zambrano around "in 10 minutes."

That being said, I am optimistic about Zambrano's future with the Mets, and his performance in his first two starts (2.92 ERA, 12 K, 5 BB, 10 H, 0 HR and 0 HBP in 12 innings) does nothing to undermine that confidence. Hopefully, Mets fans won't hold against Zambrano the front office's foolishness in dealing for him. And, of coure, people should be patient if he gets shelled in his next start - in Colorado.

I was mildly surprised that nobody took a chance on Bret Boone at the trading deadine, given that it was only last season that Boone was third in the league with 117 RBI, scored 111 runs, won the Gold Glove and finished tenth in the MVP balloting, and given some of the weak-hitting second basemen fielded by contenders: the Twins' Luis Rivas (.247/.399/.274); the Yankees' Miguel Cairo (.286/.418/.332 being way over his career averages of .271/.367/.319); the Angels' Adam Kennedy (.257/.366/.327); the Phillies' Placido Polanco (.277/.385/.340); and the A's' Marco Scutaro (.280/.386/.306). Sure enough, Boone - who averaged .301/.526/.358 with 106 runs and 122 RBI the past three seasons, and who I ranked before the season as the 8th best player in baseball by Established Win Shares (with 29) - is batting .305/.467/.368 since the All-Star Break.

Not that I think Boone is a superstar at this juncture; he's 35, and he had a horrid first half, and frankly I haven't really seen him play this season. I suspect his defense may have deteriorated badly; the Hardball Times' Win Shares numbers (granting that in-season Win Shares are not the best way to evaluate defense) show him with 1.5 defensive Win Shares compared to 4.0 for Rivas, 2.6 for Cairo, 2.9 for Kennedy, 3.2 for Polanco, and 3.9 for Scutaro. Boone's Range Factor and Zone Rating this season are 4.32 and .755, career lows and down from 4.54 and .814 just last season. And frankly, while the other second basemen listed above are all offensive weak links, none but Rivas - possibly the best of the bunch with the glove - has really been horrendous. So maybe it's no surprise that the highly-paid Boone ($8 million salary this season) just couldn't be shopped despite pretty good odds that he'd provide an offensive upgrade for a contending team.

Doesn't the Rev. Moon perform ceremonies like this? (link via Bill Simmons)

Watching the Mets get completely dismantled by the Cardinals this weekend was not fun - let the record reflect that just 8 days after trading their best prospect and several other key blue chips to shore up theirn rotation for the 2004 stretch run, the Mets stand 11 games out of first place and 8 1/2 games back (in 9th place) in the wild card race. It's over.

The Cards, meanwhile, had a real strike of genius in acquiring Larry Walker to join Jim Edmonds and . . . well, Jim Edmonds in their outfield. Even for all his injuries and Coors and everything else, Walker is still a formidable offensive threat (.279/.494./.392 on the road the last three years, and .317/.780/.508 in 58 plate appearances on the road this year). For St. Louis, this is the time to go for the jugular, and that's exactly what the Walker acquisition represents.

I'm less clear, at this distance, why Ray Lankford (.258/.425/.353) got his walking papers rather than, say, Reggie Sanders (.252/.476/.297); Brian at Redbird Nation thinks other reserve outfielders, notably So Taguchi, should have been the odd men out.

This is just amazing: Ichiro is now batting .481 (51/106) since the All-Star Break, and is running a career-best .398 OBP. Perhaps equally interesting is the persistence of a huge home-road split, especially as far as hitting for power: .367/.473/.407 on the road, compared to .344/.394/389 at SafeCo.

Over at Aaron's Baseball Blog, where Joe Nathan is compared to Schupp's 1916 season (more here on the 1916 Giants).

Since 1911, 11 pitchers have won 25 or more games in a season (some of them more than once) while starting less than 35 games. Most of these are familiar names - seven are Hall of Famers, and three of the others played for multiple World Championship teams.

Click here for the answer.

Bonus question: Name the pitcher who holds the record for fewest starts in a season by a 20-game winner. Answer at the top of the page here. Hint: He's also the only man to win 20 games while throwing fewer than 200 innings. Another hint:

Read More »

You know, the Dodgers have gotten a lot of entirely undeserved grief for Paul DePodesta's imitation of the 1987 Giants, turning over a big chunk of the roster and dealing popular team leader Paul LoDuca. But even if you buy into the idea that "chemistry" is too fragile a thing to mess with, how can you possibly argue that the Marlins made a good deal by dumping Brad Penny and Hee Seop Choi for LoDuca, Juan Encarnacion and Guillermo Mota? I mean, LoDuca could win the Nobel Prize for Chemistry, and that still doesn't even the scales with Penny, who after all won two brilliantly pitched games against the Yankees in the World Series last year.

More seriously, what the heck were the Fish thinking? LoDuca is indeed having a fine year, batting .308/.460/.360, compared to career averages of .287/.430/.342, but he's notorious for wearing out in the second half (not a characteristic usually associated with team leaders on successful teams), and at 32 he's unlikely to change that pattern. Hee Seop Choi, by comparison, is just 25, already batting .270/.495/.388, and only likely to improve. (It's true he's had the advantage of platooning thus far this season). Encarnacion, of course, is likely to be no help at all with the bat (.235/.415/.290), while Penny was the team's second-best pitcher this season (3.15 ERA, 105/39 K/BB ratio), is only 26, and is still learning how to harness his Grade A fastball.

The only way to make sense of the deal is to look at Florida's desperate situation at catcher, where Mike Redmond and Josh Willingham have both been offensive and defensive busts. But that still makes this a panic trade; you don't give up young stars like Penny and Choi to fill a single hole with an unspectacular 32-year-old. Fools.

I finally got around to adding the marvelous Mets blog The Raindrops to my blogroll, and here's a good reason why (via Always Amazin) - Avkash, who follows the Mets minor league system much more closely than I do, tears into Mets management over the Benson and Zambrano deals.

Baseball Primer has the appropriate response.

Bob Murphy has died, at age 79, just about a year after announcing his retirement after 42 years as the voice of the Mets. Murphy had apparently been battling lung cancer. You can read my "happy recap" of Murphy's broadcasting career, on the occasion of his retirement, here. He was a fine man and a terrific broadcaster, and will be missed.

I don't have the quote handy, but Bill James has told interviewers in recent months that the Red Sox have their own, proprietary defensive statistics that show some pretty impressive things. I kept thinking of that, as the Sawx traded Nomaaahhh for two guys - Orlando Cabrera and Doug Mientkiewicz - who have made particularly large impressions with the glove. Do the Sox know something the rest of us don't about the size of the impact of these players? (The fact that the A's have similarly been stocking up on glove men the past few years suggests that there may be something up here as far as non-public evaluations of defensive value).

Second James quote that comes to mind is his defense of the Ted Simmons trade upon Whitey Herzog's arrival in St. Louis, on the grounds that (1) the team wasn't winning with Simmons anyway and (2) Whitey's willingness to deal Simmons after Simmons refused to play third base was necessary to establish who was in charge. Lesson: yes, sometimes the manager's need to motivate the players really is a legitimate factor in making a deal.

This brings us to the competing interpretations of the Nomar trade: is this a disastrous abandonment of a win-now Sox team? Is this, like the Cardinals trading Simmons, importing Darrel Porter, and dealing Garry Templeton for Ozzie Smith, part of a needed restructuring in which declining properties (who lack plate patience) are shipped out and more defensive-oriented players brought in?

Joe Sheehan argues, persuasively, that Mientkiewicz was basically available for free, having lost his job to Justin Morneau, so effectively the Sox traded Nomar for the inferior (.298 OBP this season ) Cabrera. Bill Simmons counters that every team in the league had scouts watching Nomar, and given his poor defensive play and attitude, the deal the Sox got was probably all they could get for a declining Nomar in his walk year. Bill is probably right: the real issue is, if this is the best deal you can get, and Nomar's hitting well and you're contending for the Wild Card, do you make a deal at all?

Simmons:

Boston needed to trade him, especially after that jarring game in Yankee Stadium when Jeter crashed into the stands as Nomar sulked on the bench across the field . . . You can't have someone that unhappy in the clubhouse. You just can't. And when he screwed them over in Minnesota this weekend -- according to multiple reports -- telling the Sox that his aching achilles needed more rest (and possibly another stint on the DL), then pulled a complete 180 and told the Cubs that he was fine ... I mean, he needed to go. At that point, you're talking about a fire sale. Which is exactly what happened. The Red Sox were so desperate to dump him, they ended up overpaying to send him out of town.

Sheehan: "Chemistry is a three-game winning streak."

Again: they're both right here, to some extent; I don't much believe in "chemistry," but then there really is such a thing as a guy who's so miserable and insubordinate that you need to ship him out and stick with people who actually want to win some ballgames. I'm afraid I'm not close enough to the Sox to judge.

Still, the deal-breaker is exactly how much the Sox stand to gain from Cabrera's and Minky's defense. Entering this year, owing in large part to Nomar's injuries but also their defense, my Established Win Shares system rated Nomar only slightly ahead, with 22 EWSL to Cabrera's and Minky's 19 apiece. Of course, that doesn't account for the fact that Win Shares is biased towards players who are close to replacement level but get a lot of playing time. This season, Nomar has 6 Win Shares (2 above an average player with his playing time), while Cabrera has 7 and Minky has 4, but 4 each below average - not a flattering picture. So it's hard to get a good feeling about this deal on the Win Shares ledger, though Cabrera gets 4.5 defensive WS to Nomar's 0.8 - even with the difference in playing time, that's something.

Step back, though: Sheehan contends that the Red Sox staff is so flyball- and strikeout-dominated that infield defense won't make much of a dent. The Hardball Times' Fielding Independent Pitching numbers - which seek to project a pitcher's ERA as if he had an average defense behind him - seem to bear that out: other than Derek Lowe, none of the Sox major pitchers has a significantly worse FIP than his actual ERA (San Pedro de Fenway is trailing a bit, 4.15 to 3.96, but it's not a large difference). However, the splits widen when you compare Runs Allowed as opposed to ERA:

Pitcher	IP	RA	FIP	+/-	GB/IP
Schilling	145.2	3.58	3.15	+0.43	1.26
Martinez	136.2	4.35	3.96	+0.39	1.19
Lowe	117	7.46	4.83	+2.63	2.31
Wakefield	116.2	5.01	4.63	+0.38	1.59
Arroyo	110.2	5.63	4.32	+1.31	1.27
Foulke	53.2	2.18	3.46	-1.28	1.06
Timlin	53.1	3.71	3.67	+0.04	1.59
Embree	37.2	5.26	4.54	+0.72	1.22
TOTAL	771.1	4.81	4.07	+0.74	1.46

I know FIP is supposed to approximate ERA, not RA, but 0.74 runs/game seems like a big deal for your top 8 pitchers . . . it comes to something like 63 runs. And while I don't have the numbers to compare here, 1.46 ground balls per inning pitched seems like plenty of opportunities for the infield defense to make a difference. If nothing else, the Red Sox have a lot invested in Derek Lowe - and might some day in the future want to have the option of adding other pitchers who get a lot of ground balls - and with their defense as it was, that was a lost cause.

I'm running low on time here, so I'll just say: no, I don't think this deal really helps the Sox, but given the financial realities, the fact that they're not going to catch the Yankees in the regular season and the fact that there's a good case that this team needed to upgrade its defense, I'm not going to rip the Sox for taking a bad situation, identifying a way in which their team needed to be upgraded, and executing a strategy that is aimed directly at the problem.

From Jayson Stark: Rick "Peterson reportedly told the Mets he could get [Victor] Zambrano straightened out 'in 10 minutes.'"

If he's wrong, that will sounds like George Tenet telling Bush that finding WMD in Iraq was "a slam dunk case."

Stark also thinks the Marlins got by far the better of the deal with the Dodgers . . . more on that later. The short answer is, "um, no."

I tuned in late to last night's Mets game hoping to give a fresh look to Kris Benson, only to discover that he'd already been driven from the game, allowing seven runs in five innings. I've got a feeling this won't be the last time.

The Mad Hibernian is horrified at the deals that exchanged Scott Kazmir and Justin Huber for Victor Zambrano and Ty Wigginton and Matt Peterson for Kris Benson.

On the first count, I have to agree. I'll admit I'm no expert on the minor leagues, and it's true that pitching prospects are a crapshoot, but Kazmir has consistently been projected as a potential ace, and Huber is also a highly-regarded catching prospect. This, for a 28-year-old pitcher who's walked 202 batters in 316.1 innings the past two years. Zambrano's not a star now - heck, I have him on one of my Rotisserie teams and have had him on the bench all season - and I don't see a great likelihood that he's going to become one. It's true that he's still relativley young and cheap, so the Mets haven't broken the bank for a guy who'll be gone soon, but the deal still seems all but impossible to justify other than as a panic move in support of a pennant race that's rapidly slipping away (unless, of course, it's part of a larger deal with some greater fool - which I doubt).

I'm a little less appalled at the Benson deal, in theory - I was all in favor of cashing in Wigginton while his stock was up, although I do like the guy and his competitive fire will be missed - but Benson's high upside from 1999-2000 has never returned, and he's ranged from mediocre to bad to injured the past three years since missing the 2001 season. He's basically a sore-armed has-been - while he appears to be healthier now and may yet reclaim a little more ground, the hope of improvement is just not what you cash in your chips for.

Bottom line: the Mets have suffered a major setback in their rebuilding program, they've sought immediate help in guys who won't be worth it unless they show significant mid-career improvement, they haven't fixed their biggest short-term problem (the bullpen), they're still highly unlikely to win the division and even less likely to go anywhere in October, and fan sentiment - the usual reason for deals like these - is likely to be almost unanimously against these deals.

Suddenly, Jim Duquette looks an awful lot like someone else he knows well.

The increasingly impressive (though not so young - he's 27) Eric Valent hit for the cycle in this afternoon's 10-1 thrashing of the lowly Expos; the finally red-hot Mike Cameron also chipped in a pair of home runs, giving him an impressive 20 homers to go with his pitiable .231 batting average. Cameron's not a high-average hitter, but he needs to hit at least .245 to be contributing with the bat, preferably around .260.

As any former Roger Clemens fans in Boston could attest, there's no frustration quite like having a guy who consistently chokes in big situations and then leaves the team, only to thrive in big situations. I'm not sure what the record is for saves by one pitcher against one team in a single season is - Ugueth Urbina saved seven games in the Expos' 12 matchups with the Mets in 1998, Dennis Eckersley had 8 saves against Seattle in 1992 - but Armando Benitez already has 6 saves against the Mets this season. Ugh.

The Mets are falling behind in a seesaw four-way race in which they are matched up against the division favorite Phillies, the defending division champion Braves, and the defending World Champion Marlins, so it's not a shock that they're the odd men out. But how it has happened has been intensely frustrating. With the current unbalanced schedule, head-to-head matchups are hugely important, and close games can be a big factor. Let's look at how the four contenders have fared against each other this season in games decided by one or two runs:

Team	1-Run	2-Run	Total
Marlins	8-3	7-0	15-3
Braves	3-5	4-1	7-6
Phillies	6-3	1-8	7-11
Mets	1-7	0-3	1-10

Ugh, ugh, ugh. You can see the bullpen's baleful influence right here, as well as why the Phillies haven't walked off with the division as they should.

I'm not enjoying the Scott Erickson era. Bear in mind, these are the Expos we are talking about.

Thoughts upon my return from vacationing in Lake George, NY:

*Saw a bunch of Bush/Cheney and W'04 bumper stickers. Saw tons of those yellow ribbon support-the-troops stickers. Did not see a Kerry or Kerry/Edwards sticker anywhere. Blue state, red country. Also on the sticker subject, I bought one of those magnetic Bush stickers advertised over at Smash's place; they're a great thing if (like my wife) you don't want permanent sticker residue on your car after the election (downside: the fear of the sticker getting swiped). I also saw a Bush TV ad, which seemed odd, given that the New York/Vermont TV market isn't exactly a swing state market.

*Ever have one of those stretches when you just keep having instant problems with stuff you buy? We had this - inedible/undercooked hot dog, corkscrew that won't open a bottle, overcharge for a food order, take-out entree that gets home without an essential element - and the solutions are always bad: I don't want to sit back and accept getting ripped off, but I also hate to be one of those people who goes back and complains about stuff all the time.

*Ricky Williams is retiring. Ricky Williams was born in 1977. Yes, I feel old.

*The Mets appear ready to decide that this team is worth making a few tinkers around the edges but otherwise be neither a buyer nor a seller in the summer deal market. Which is depressing, given how close they have come in so many games blown by the bullpen lately, but makes sense. Sometimes a pennant race just has to be enjoyed on its own terms, without high expectations.

*On Sandy Berger's pants-gate: man, Clinton scandals are just the gift that keeps on giving, aren't they?

The Mariners have designated John Olerud for assignment, which makes lots of sense given that he's having a lousy year and the team needs to blow up their aging roster and rebuild. I suspect they may still trade him, but if they can't, Olerud becomes a free agent - one with a good glove and a .354 on base percentage (.383 away from SafeCo). Surely, that's still a useful player for a team looking to plug a gaping hole at first.

Would the Mets be interested? He's still probably a better hitter than Jason Phillips, who's currently stuck at .214/.341/.290. But giving Olerud any significant playing time would shove Piazza back behind the plate (I'd like to see him catching half time or less at this stage), plus Olerud was terribly slow when he was with the Mets the first time. In short, there are probably other teams who could use his services more.

Few developments have been more surprising over the past month or so than the sudden movement of the Cardinals to put away the NL Central. Not that the division is done for, but some serious countermoves will be required to get the rest of the division back in the game.

With the exception of the Astros, however, the Cards' division rivals haven't played that badly; instead, the Cardinals have just outdone themselves, running their record to 54-33, a .621 clip and a 101-win pace.

Let's look back at my Established Win Shares estimates, compared to the 2004 Win Shares pace for each Cards player (I'll just double them for simplicity):

Adjusted EWSL: 257.0 (86 wins)
Unadjusted EWSL: 251.0 (84 wins)
Weighted Age: 30.409

Pos	Player	EWSL	2004 WS Pace	Age
C	MMatheny	11	8	33
1B	APujols	36	34	24
2B	TWomack	8	20	34
SS	ERenteria	23	18	28
3B	SRolen	27	48	29
RF	RSanders	16	16	36
CF	JEdmonds	26	26	34
LF	RLankford	4	8	37
UT	MAnderson	12	6	30
C2	CMcKay+	0	2	30
INF	JMabry	4	6	33
OF	RCedeno	10	2	29
13	STaguchi*	2	4	34
SP1	MMorris	12	10	29
SP2	WWilliams	12	8	37
SP3	JSuppan	12	12	29
SP4	CCarpenter	3	16	29
SP5	JMarquis	3	12	25
CL	JIsringhausen	10	12	31
R2	SKline	7	8	31
R3	RKing	5	8	30
R4	CEldred	3	0	36
R5	JTavarez	7	4	31

Top Win Shares paces for players I didn't list before the season: Kiko Calero (4), Yadier Molina (4), Hector Luna (4), and Mike Lincoln (2). In other words, the Cards are dancing with them that brung 'em.

What jumps out at you, of course, is Rolen, although frankly I'm quite not sure why his numbers (.339/.599/.415) add up to such a staggering total of 20.1 batting Win Shares. When you look up and down the list, most of the rest of the team is pretty much on target, with bench players down from their projections due to reduced playing time and Tony Womack enjoying an unexpected (and unlikely to continue) resurgence at .319/.427/.364. You will also note something I noticed in my earlier EWSL analysis of the NL Central: the Cards' infield is presently right around on pace for the all-time record for Win Shares by one starting infield, which is 119.

The bullpen has also been hot (Ray King has a 1.41 ERA and has been touched for just 22 hits, none of them homers, in 32 innings in 45 appearances, and Steve Kline has a similar line - 42 games, 32 IP, 25 Hits, 1 HR, 1.97 ERA), and the team's biggest preseason question mark (the back end of the rotation, with Chris Carpenter and Jason Marquis a combined 18-8 with ERAs of 3.87 and 3.88 and a combined K/BB ratio of 167/59.

Can they keep it up? That will be the big question for the second half (I remain skeptical of Carpenter, who's had great hot streaks before but shows no sign of being capable of throwing 200+ innings without some serious wear and tear).

UPDATE: I forgot to include the link to Brian Gunn at Redbird Nation, who ran a similar analysis with PECOTA projections.

Some good stuff over at ESPN.com, including Page 2's list of the ten most overpaid players and John Sickels' analysis of one of the most surprising and significant improvements this season, by Braves catcher Johnny Estrada, a .332-hitting doubles machine thus far this season (the Win Shares board over at The Hardball Times has Estrada ranked in the top 10 players in the NL this season):

In Estrada's case, he hit for average in the low minors, but showed poor strike zone judgment and not much power. He struggled at times in the upper levels, and was awful for the Phillies in 2002. But then he showed major improvement when he was 26 years old in Triple-A. Few hitters show real, genuine, sustained improvement in their numbers at that age. But it does happen sometimes, and in Estrada's case it looks like the optimists (the Braves and their fans) were right, and the pessimists (people like me who worried about his low walk rate and weird Triple-A performance spike) were wrong.

As to the Page 2 list, of course, I'd rate guys like Roger Cedeno, Higginson or Chan Ho Park above, say, Carlos Delgado or Bartolo Colon, who still seem like decent bets to be their old selves in the second half.

Dr. Manhattan sends along news of additional seductions.

David Pinto asks whether it's time for Rafael Palmeiro to hang it up. I wondered a month ago whether the sudden spike in Palmeiro's walk rate, combined with a drop in his power numbers, spelled trouble; since then, the bottom has dropped out, with Palmeiro batting .194/.347/.291 in June and July.

But a closer look at the numbers suggests the real problem: like a lot of older players, Palmeiro needs to be platooned. This season, he's batting .159/.261/.230 against lefthanded pitching, while keeping a healthy .279/.468/.402 clip against righthanders. Plus, Palmeiro has played nearly every game (80 out of 82) for the Orioles, a wearying grind for a 39-year-old player; sitting him against lefties would undoubtedly give him a needed breather. Granted, Palmeiro hasn't had big platoon splits in the past, but age does funny things to hitters. Platooning added years to the careers of guys like Harold Baines, Lou Whitaker and George Brett, and it could help the O's squeeze another productive season or so out of Palmeiro.

Suddenly, the Fourth of July is in the rear view mirror, the All-Star Break is just three games away, and guess what?

Team	W-L	GB
Phillies	44-39	--
Mets	43-40	1
Braves	43-41	1.5
Marlins	43-42	2

Between today and the trade deadline, the Mets play the Marlins 5 times, the Braves 5 times, the Phillies 4 times and the Expos (not visible with the naked eye from the rest of the standings) 6 times. (The Mets are also just 2.5 back in the wild card standings, but I don't regard that as a realistic possibility, whereas the unbalanced schedule gives the team a shot against a wobbly division).

The Mets just hit three home runs off Brett Myers in the second inning (Floyd, Wigginton and Cameron), giving them 24 round-trippers in the past 10 games.

*Aaron Gleeman is campaigning for Bobby Abreu for his first All-Star Team; you can vote online until tonight. Of course, you can vote in the AL as well, and I cast my ballot for Frank Thomas, who's had no shortage of honors in his career but clearly deserves to be on this year's team, as his .271/.563/.434 numbers are his best since 2000 and (on the Slg and OBP fronts) closely in line with his surefire Hall of Fame career averages.

*Really odd to see Barry Bonds pass Rickey Henderson's career walks record while Rickey's still out there playing ball.

*Through just past the midpoint of the season, Mike Piazza has appeared in all but one of the Mets' games and is on pace for career highs in games and at bats while batting .310/.531/.399, close to his career averages, while catching in only about half of his appearances. Obviously, the move to first base has been a success on that score, and his glove work has been visibly improving. You can still see the catching instincts; I've never seen a first baseman do so many splits and I've certainly never seen one block throws in the dirt with his legs.

*Richard Hidalgo's season slugging average is now .506. Just thought you should know that.

*Bret Boone has some unusually large splits this season: .246/.557/.361 vs. LHP, .237/.353/.286 vs. RHP, .284/.556/.348 in day games, .221/.333/.286 at night. What does that mean? Maybe nothing. But maybe it's a sign of declining reflexes and/or vision.

I'm still unconvinced that the Mets ought to be buyers in the trade market this year unless they can get more players as cheaply as they got Richard Hidalgo. On the other hand, it's July, and if they can rebound and play well against the Phillies and the Marlins over the next 12 games even without help, the race will be close enough that you have to start thinking in those terms, as long as you don't compromise your long-term plans.

Last week, Jason Mastaitis speculated on the available pitchers:

One high-level scout believes the modest list of available arms ultimately will include Atlanta's Russ Ortiz and Jaret Wright, Colorado's Jason Jennings and Shawn Estes, Milwaukee's Ben Sheets, Pittsburgh's Kip Wells and Toronto's Pat Hentgen, Miguel Batista and Ted Lilly. Anaheim's Ramon Ortiz also could pique the Mets' interest.

The only two names on that list that would pique my interest are Jennings, who may be worth a gamble taking him out of Coors (although he's has a great record at home, his stats are better on the road), and Sheets, whom the Brewers would be crazy to trade.

I'm not so sure about Jennings, who's been appalling even on the road this year. Most of those guys wouldn't even offer a short-term benefit, and I agree that I can't imagine the Brew Crew dealing Sheets. On the other hand, if Lilly didn't come too expensive, I could see being interested in him; Lilly pitched solidly for Oakland last season and is striking out nearly a batter per inning with a 4.01 ERA this year.

Extremely impressive victory by the Mets today to complete the sweep of the Hated Yankees. What particularly impressed me was this: the Mets took the first two and got our hopes up by grabbing the early 4-1 lead today through three innings, but the game had the feel of one of those clinics on why great teams put people away when they're on the ropes, and teams . . . well, teams like these Mets don't. They played sloppy defense in the field while the Yankees had some electrifying moments on the bases and in the field (Derek Jeter snagged one key ball up the middle in the spot where we've seen so many hits go by him in years past - is he cheating towards the middle more with a Gold Glove shortstop playing third?). Naturally, the Yankees came back to tie it up 4-4 and tie it up again 5-5. Yet, somehow, Ty Wigginton managed to hit his second homer of the game (it could easily have been his third), and they hung on. Of course, nobody's perfect, and as this series displayed, the way to beat this Yankee team is to go yard on them early and often against a longball-prone staff (it helps that Richard Hidalgo is now slugging .746 in a Mets uniform, and setting one awfully high bar for Carlos Beltran in the process, not that Beltran hasn't responded).

Meanwhile, this series showed yet again why Tony Clark continues to be a valuable bench player - yes, he's still not going to hit above .250, and the old Clark is gone, but what you want from a guy like that is that sometimes he'll come up with the big hit; yesterday he had plenty.

Anyway, a 3-game sweep against what is, let's face it, still the best team in baseball is a great building block to go into the next set with the NL East. The Mets still need work getting the top of the order on and getting the defense in order, but if they can keep the middle of the order healthy, they need no longer fear a power outage. They can slug.

Avkash over at the Raindrops has all sorts of bloggy goodness; check out his look at how some of the Mets' less well-known prospects are doing in the minors (including one teenager named Yusmeiro Petit who walked 10 and struck out 85 in 77.1 innings last year and has followed up this year by striking out 122 and walking 22 in 83 innings in the Sally League - 13.2 K/9 IP, if you're keeping score). He's also got some appropriate observations on Tom Glavine's consistency, as well as linking to "Farenheit 1918," which is one of the funniest things I've read in some time ("Mike:
Poor silly girl, of course. It's all about oil. Always has been. The Babe Ruth trade was about oil.")

So, are we seeing an unusual number and extent of teams showing sudden improvement or decline this season? Mike Carminati has the answer.

The Red Sox just brought in their closer, Keith Foulke, to start the bottom of the 8th of a tie game at Yankee Stadium. Charlie Steiner announced this as if the Red Sox were planning to use voodoo to beat the Yankees.

Kudos to the Bill James-influenced Sox for recognizing that sometimes you need to use your relief ace when the game is most in the balance.

UPDATE: Well, this has been a wild one. Foulke and Rivera each threw two scoreless. Right now, the Red Sox have Dave McCarty at second base, and the Yankee announcers are discussing whether the Yanks might have to use Posada at second at some point.

UPDATE: Sheffield winds up at third. Manny homers in the 13th.

UPDATE: Cairo doubles in Sierra to tie it again in the 14th. Red Sox had been one strike away . . .

UPDATE: Never bet against the house. John Flaherty drives one to the wall to drive in the winning run.

Baseball teams tend to be unfortunately half-hearted in cutting bait on hopes of contention at times - consider Arizona's decision to retain Randy Johnson and Luis Gonzalez and Steve Finley even after the departure of Curt Schilling set them firmly on the rebuilding track - so we can't read too much into the Mariners unloading free agent-to-be Freddy Garcia. Still, with the aging Mariners in last place 10.5 games behind their nearest competitor, it's interesting to look at what's left. Leaving aside the rather pointless catcher swap of Ben Davis for Miguel Olivo, the primary bounty from the deal was Jeremy Reed, a high-average hitting outfielder (the Mariners also got minor league SS Michael Morse). The logical next steps would be dealing Jamie Moyer, Eddie Guardado, Mike Myers, and John Olerud (although Olerud's fine .374 OBP isn't really enough to deserve a starting job on a contender for a 1B who's slow and has no power).

UPDATE: Derek Zumsteg and friends at the USS Mariner are pretty pumped about the deal, partly in light of having watched Garcia's struggles in recent years; start here and scroll down. Unsurprisingly, David Cameron doesn't think Jamie Moyer's going anywhere. More interesting is whether some contender with a hole to fill will take a flyer on Bret Boone. Gee, I wonder who has money to burn and Miguel Cairo playing second base?

Not much to say about the first game Sunday, as Yankee longballs gave Jose Contreras' storybook reunion with his family all the help he needed. The second game was much more frustrating, since the Mets did a number of good things, including some massive home runs (Richard Hidalgo going deep to dead center, Eric Valent blasting an upper-deck job to right), and good pitching (like John Franco striking out the side in the eighth). But the hole Matt Ginter got into with some first inning dribblers and a hit batsman (Jeter) leading up to Ruben Sierra's 2-run shot was just too much.

Leiter and Glavine may be able to handle the likes of the Yankee lineup, but I'm doubtful as to the rest of the staff.

Oh, and Mike Stanton still sucks.

Time to lower that level to yellow.

Sadly, I got rained out of my chance to see Friday night's game (I was there with people from work). Tomorrow's matchups - Traschsel/Contreras and Ginter/Mussina - look promising if you're pulling for a split.

Larry Mahnken at Hardball Times does a number on ESPN's bogus "Productive Outs" stat. A must-read.

Well, for all you fans of the Mets - or anybody else - hoping to land Carlos Beltran, the jig is up as Beltran goes to the Astros, in a three-way deal that explains a lot about Houston's willingness to donate Richard Hidalgo to the Mets for David Weathers. With a strong team, a tough division and heavy reliance on oldsters like Clemens and Bagwell, the Astros are definitely in go-for-broke mode, so acquiring Beltran is a worthwhile gamble.

What Houston gave up, though, will cost them: Octavio Dotel. This presumably makes Brad Lidge the closer, but leaves the team short in the pen (not that this is an unacceptable cost for a big star like Beltran). Dotel had some off days this year, mainly due to the longball, but he should greatly improve the closer-less bullpen in Oakland, which can now move Arthur Rhodes back to the setup role. Kudos to Billy Beane on weaseling his way into another three-way swap. He even managed to wheedle some cash out of the poor-mouthing Royals. Wanna bet Beane's not done yet?

As for KC, giving up on this season had come to make sense, even though this team looked before the season like a legit contender. They got three prospects from Houston and Oakland: third baseman Mark Teahen and right-hander Mike Wood from Oakland, and catcher Joe or John Buck (sources seem unclear on this; if it's Joe, he has a colorful history of broadcasting and prostitution behind him) from the Astros. I checked the Baseball Prospectus and they had unimpressive numbers for Buck and Wood and nothing on Teahan, but I'm sure we'll see commentary soon enough from some of the experts on minor leaguers.

Quite the classic battle going on in Texas - the Mariners and Rangers were tied 7-7 entering the bottom of the 15th at last check.

UPDATE: Rangers have loaded the bases against Jamie Moyer with one out in the bottom of the 15th.

UPDATE: Moyer gets Hank Blalock to ground into a 1-2-3 double play. On to the 16th.

LAST UPDATE: 9-7 Rangers on a walk-off homer in the 18th by Alfonso Soriano.

It's hard to avoid the conclusion that last night's Mets loss was Kaz Matsui's fault. First and third, one out in the bottom of the ninth - after a hustling Todd Zeile went first-to-third on a Jason Phillips single - and Matsui, after running the count to 3-1, strikes out diving at a pitch that was way low and outside. The Mets wouldn't get another chance as good to win the game.

As the Mets announcers were pointing out, the team was also in the unusual position where they regretted sending home today's starting pitcher (Tom Glavine) early - because they needed him as a pinch hitter in extra innings, and instead had to send up Steve Trachsel.

I'm not as down on Kaz Matsui as some people, but I can't help wondering: who scouted this guy and came back with the universally glowing reports about his defense? And was it the same guy who scouted Frederic Weis for the Knicks?

One quick Mets thought: not only are Tom Glavine (2.07), Al Leiter (2.14), Braden Looper (1.83), Matt Ginter (2.79), Orber Moreno (3.20) and Ricky Bottalico (2.01) all pitching thus far to career-best ERAs, but through 68 games, several Mets pitchers are on pace for career highs in innings pitched, including Glavine (249), Steve Trachsel (218), Looper (93), Ginter (92), and Mike Stanton (85). We'll see how they all hold up.

David Weathers, on being traded to Houston:

David Weathers said one of the toughest parts of getting dealt to Houston was telling his 4 1/2-year-old son Ryan, who is a fixture in the New York clubhouse.

"He was crushed," Weathers said. "He told me, 'you can be an Astro. I'm gonna be a Met.' And then he didn't come out of his room for almost an hour."

Richard Hidalgo, on rumors (prior to the deal being finalized) of his being traded to the Mets:

"I don't think about it," he said of the trade talks. "They're the ones thinking about it (in New York). I don't have anything to say about that, but New York doesn't scare me. I've played in Venezuela."

All trades involve a certain amount of risk; you just have to weigh the upside against the downside and the cost and compare that to doing nothing. And the Mets' trade of David Weathers and B-grade pitching prospect Jeremy Griffiths for Astros outfielder Richard Hidalgo looks like a great gamble:

1. Weathers is 34; Hidalgo is 28. So, you can't view this as compromising the future for a win-now posture.

2. Hidalgo has just one year left on his contract, which the Mets can buy out for $2 million:

As Duquette was quick to point out, if Hidalgo has any future with the Mets beyond 2004, it won't come with that hefty price tag. "It wouldn't preclude us from renegotiating if he played well here and liked it here," Duquette said. "We'll keep an open mind to it."

So, this isn't a deal that ties the Mets' hands much beyond this season.

3. Weathers has been terrible (see this analysis from Avkash at the Raindrops, which I linked to last week).

4. Even when you factor in that he's leaving Minute Maid Field, Hidalgo's a guy who can put up some serious power numbers. Hidalgo had a huge year last year, slugging .572 in more than 500 at bats, and started this season like a house afire before sliding into a slump at the end of April that he hasn't shaken yet. Here's his numbers for 2003-04:

Dates	G	AB	H	2B	3B	HR	R	RBI	BB	K	AVG	SLG	OBP	OPS
2003-4/24/04	158	580	184	52	3	32	104	107	62	119	.317	.583	.383	966
4/25-6/16/04	41	133	26	6	1	0	8	11	13	38	.195	.256	.267	523

Now, that is indeed one horrendous slump, and if you're Houston and paying Hidalgo $12 million, it looks twice as bad. But in a lot of ways, Houston's decision to drop Hidalgo after a bad six weeks looks suspiciously like the White Sox' abandonment of D'Angelo Jimenez this time last season in the midst of a similar slump; I questioned that move at the time here and showed how badly it worked out here. It's possible that something's seriously wrong with Hidalgo that was fine in April (he has been battling some shoulder problems lately), but if this is just a slump, the Astros could really regret dealing him. Recall that Baseball Prospectus had Hidalgo projected for this season at .278/.498/.358, and thought he would probably exceed that (the Established Win Shares method lists him as a 15 Win Shares player entering this year, which is quite solid).

I'll take this bet any day.

I'm really looking forward to the new Neyer/Bill James book on pitchers; ESPN had an excerpt the other day that's worth a few arguments on the best fastballs of all time (link via Baseball Primer).

Looking at Rob Neyer's overall list of the best fastballs, I might rate Robin Roberts - who was the best pitcher in baseball for several years throwing nearly nothing but fastballs - ahead of Clemens, even though Clemens in his early-90s prime was a better pitcher (he's not so shabby today, of course, but since 1996 or so the heater really hasn't been his strikeout pitch).

Personally, I'd say the two best fastballs I've ever seen in my lifetime - on their own merits, as opposed to how they set them up with other pitches - are Mariano Rivera's cut fastball and Dwight Gooden's heater in his prime. Gooden's high riser was a classic "oh, that's just not fair" pitch even when the hitter was looking for it, let alone when he set it up with the big arching curveball. (Of course, Nolan Ryan's fastball was plenty intimidating, but Ryan was also quite wild at his peak). Gossage isn't far behind, though.

Apropos of nothing: Walter O'Malley catching a game at Ebbets Field with King Faisal of Iraq in 1952.

OK, I've been on something of a Win Shares kick lately, playing around with the latest data. Here's something else I came up with from looking at The Hardball Times' tables of in-season 2004 Win Shares: the players who are contributing the greatest share of their teams' Win Shares (through Thursday's action). I broke the list between contending and non-contending teams (using .500, for now, as the break, since a team under .500 can't contend unless they improve), and, due to the DH, between AL and NL. I also used un-rounded Win Shares rather than the rounded-off numbers, since it's still early enough in the season that the rounding makes a significant impact. So, who's carrying the biggest load for their team?

NL Contenders:

#	Player	Win Shares	Team	Team Wins	%
1	Barry Bonds	20.1	SF	30	22.3
2	Sean Casey	19.6	CIN	34	19.2
3	Scott Rolen	18.1	STL	34	17.8
4	Bobby Abreu	15.8	PHI	30	17.6
5	Ken Griffey	15.3	CIN	34	15.3
6	Adam Dunn	14.6	CIN	34	14.6
7	Johnny Estrada	12.2	ATL	29	14.0
8	Lance Berkman	13.2	HOU	32	13.8
9	Mike Lowell	13.7	FLA	34	13.2
10	Albert Pujols	13.2	STL	34	12.9

Bonds, as always, dominates these lists . . . You can certainly see that the Reds are heavily dependent on three players for nearly half the team's value, two of whom have underachieved in recent years and the third of whom has been injury prone. Fingers crossed . . . Johnny Estrada? . . . .

AL Contenders:

#	Player	Win Shares	Team	Team Wins	%
1	Vladimir Guerrero	13.6	ANA	34	13.3
2	Michael Young	12.2	TEX	33	12.3
3	Manny Ramirez	12.0	BOS	35	11.4
4	Alex Rodriguez	12.7	NYY	38	11.1
5	Jose Guillen	10.5	ANA	34	10.3
6	Frank Thomas	9.1	CHW	31	9.8
7	Lew Ford	9.5	MIN	33	9.6
8	Curt Schilling	9.8	BOS	35	9.3
9T	Tim Hudson	9.3	OAK	34	9.1
9T	Scott Hatteberg	9.3	OAK	34	9.1

No surprise that Guerrero tops this list . . . As with the NL leaders, there are still some pretenders here (Lew Ford, Hatteberg). There are also fewer winning teams in the AL to pick from. In general, AL teams are less dependent on their stars at this stage, partly due to the concentration of stars on the Yankees.

NL Non-Contenders:

#	Player	Win Shares	Team	Team Wins	%
1	Craig Wilson	11.8	PIT	24	16.4
2	Todd Helton	8.8	COL	21	14.0
3	Randy Johnson	9.9	AZ	24	13.8
4	Luis Gonzalez	9.8	AZ	24	13.6
5	Jack Wilson	9.5	PIT	24	13.2

Like some of the NL leaders, a few of the bad teams are also top-heavy with a few decent contributors.

AL Non-Contenders:

#	Player	Win Shares	Team	Team Wins	%
1	Melvin Mora	13.1	BAL	26	16.8
2	Carlos Beltran	10.0	KC	21	15.9
3	Ivan Rodriguez	11.2	DET	27	13.8
4	Julio Lugo	8.8	TB	23	12.8
5	Carlos Guillen	10.3	DET	27	12.7

Interestingly, these are all up-the-middle defensive players.

So, Barry Bonds today hit his 500th home run as a Giant (I noted the approaching milestone a few weeks back). I guess that "who's the greatest free agent signing ever" debate is pretty much over, huh? There's no question that Bonds would be a Hall of Famer without his career with the Pirates.

When I started the Established Win Shares project, I ran a list of the top 25 players in baseball by EWSL. But there were no pitchers, and it was justifiably asked, who are the top-ranked pitchers? Well, having covered all the teams, I can now line them up (I broke ties by age rather than pore over the decimal places as I did with the original list):

Rank	Player	EWSL	Pos.	Team	Age
1	Tim Hudson	22	SP	OAK	28
2	Barry Zito	20	SP	OAK	26
2T	Roy Halladay	20	SP	TOR	27
2T	Eric Gagne	20	RP	LA	28
2T	Curt Schilling	20	SP	BOS	37
6	Pedro Martinez	19	SP	BOS	32
7T	Mark Mulder	18	SP	OAK	26
7T	Javier Vazquez	18	SP	NYY	27
7T	Bartolo Colon	18	SP	ANA	31
7T	Mike Mussina	18	SP	NYY	35
11T	Keith Foulke	17	RP	BOS	31
11T	Billy Wagner	17	RP	PHI	32
11T	Randy Johnson	17	SP	AZ	40
11T	Jamie Moyer	17	SP	SEA	41
15T	Byung-Hyun Kim	16	P	BOS	25
15T	Jason Schmidt	16	SP	SF	31
17T	Mark Buehrle	15	SP	CHA	25
17T	Kerry Wood	15	SP	CHN	27
17T	Russ Ortiz	15	SP	ATL	30
17T	Derek Lowe	15	SP	BOS	31
17T	Mariano Rivera	15	RP	NYY	34
17T	Hideo Nomo	15	SP	LA	35
17T	John Smoltz	15	RP	ATL	37
17T	Greg Maddux	15	SP	CHN	38

Hey, I was as surprised at some of these names as you are . . . you can really see the domination of a few teams (Red Sox, A's, Yankees) on this list.

Avkash Patel at The Raindrops has an outstanding analysis of the Mets bullpen (link via David Pinto). I think he perhaps gives short shrift to the fact that the Mets bullpen just doesn't have the talent to get the job done right no matter how they're used, but it's true that more Orber Moreno and less John Franco, for example, would be nice in key situations.

Finally, at long last, I've completed my division-by-division walk around the major leagues by Established Win Shares Levels with the biggest division, the NL Central. Some time in the next week or so, I'll have to go back and pull together an overall summary of the results for all six divisions. To review, you can go back over my previous efforts:

*The Top 25 Players in Baseball and explanation of EWSL method

*AL West EWSL Report & explanation of team method

*AL East EWSL Report & slight modification to team method

*AL Central EWSL Report

*NL West EWSL Report

*NL East EWSL Report

A few recurring notes on the method: Recall that the projected win totals below are probably a bit on the low side, in part because I only list 23 players, and that these aren't really projections at all, so much as estimates of how much established major league talent is on each roster. Also, as before, I've indicated the players who are ranked only on 2002-03 with a #, players ranked only on 2003 with a *, and rookies with a +. For rookie non-pitchers with everyday jobs, I've arbitrarily pencilled in 10 Win Shares , 5 WS for rookie pitchers with rotation slots, 3 for bench players and 2 for relievers.

Read More »

I thought I'd take a quick look at some of the 40th president's baseball connections:

*Straight out of college in 1932, Reagan got a job with radio station WOC in Des Moines, Iowa; within a year, following the station's merger with WHO, Reagan was installed as the station's broadcaster for Chicago Cubs games, a job he would hold for five seasons, until he landed his first Hollywood job in 1937. You have to recall that, in those days, the technology didn't exist to broadcast games live from the ballpark to a coast-to-coast or even a regional audience. So, Reagan wasn't the Cubs broadcaster - just the broadcaster for Des Moines and the surrounding area reached by WHO. But to people who lived there, he was the voice of the Cubs for those years.

What that meant was, Reagan would sit in front of a ticker reeling off the play-by-play and re-creating the game as it was happening. Imagine doing this by watching the play-by-play on the internet and you get the idea. I recall Bob Costas doing a demonstration on the pregame show for the NBC Game of the Week back in the 80s showing what this process was like; among other things, the broadcaster would click two sticks together to make a bat-hitting-ball sound, and play a tape of canned crowd noise. Once, the tape jammed and Reagan just improvised the batter fouling off pitch after pitch until they fixed the feed.

Reagan often said that his biggest baseball thrill was the last month of the 1935 pennant race. It's not hard to see why. Reagan was a 24-year-old broadcaster that season, and the Cubs were chasing the defending World Champion Cardinals of "Gashouse Gang" fame. On the morning of September 3, 1935, the Cubs stood in third place, 2.5 games behind the Cardinals (but 5 back in the loss column). The Cards would go on to have a fine stretch run, going 17-11. But what the Cubs did the rest of the way was remarkable, winning 21 straight, including three straight (culminating with a doubleheader sweep that kicked off by beating 28-game-winner Dizzy Dean) from the Cards to clinch the pennant before dropping the final two games to St. Louis.

*Reagan was born in 1911. Of course, this means that even without the Alzheimer's, at 93 he was too young to remember a Cubs world championship (they lost to the Tigers in the 1935 Series, including three 1-run games). What baseball players were born in 1911? You could look it up; the better-known names on the list:

Hank Greenberg
Joe "Ducky Wucky" Medwick
Frank McCormick
Walter Alston
Denny Galehouse
Van Lingle Mungo

What do these guys have in common? Well, among other things, other than Galehouse (who died in 1998), all of them were dead by the time Reagan left the White House in 1989.

*Last December, I panned Reagan's performance in the Grover Cleveland Alexander biopic The Winning Team:

You may remember that shortly after Alexander died, Hollywood rushed out a movie of his life called "The Winning Team," starring Reagan as Alexander and Doris Day as his wife. It was just awful. The movie had a few dramatic high points, but they made little enough attempt to capture the real Alexander. And Reagan – put aside your politics for a minute and just think acting – gave what had to be the worst performance of his acting career: adept at playing the genial Everyman and the B-movie hero, Reagan was completely out of his league trying to portray a morose, moody alcoholic. Only Reagan’s political career kept the movie from disappearing into complete obscurity, but the butchering of Alexander’s life story left him less well known today than Crash Davis and Moonlight Graham.

Twins Fan Dan at All-Baseball.com asks, reviewing the current crop of first basemen, "Has the position ever been this deficient in greatness?" The commenters note that we're nearing the end of a golden era, so the premise is a bit faulty. But there have certainly been darker times.

The 1900-1919 period was pretty slim for first basemen. Hall of Famers for that period are mostly guys ending their careers (Jake Beckley), starting out (Sisler), or touching first on the way out the door after they were already washed up (Wagner, Lajoie). My initial assumption was that the best first baseman of the period was probably Frank Chance (who had a short career), and if not him some nondescript type like Fred Merkle or Stuffy McInnis, or a crook like Hal Chase.

The Win Shares system rates the top first basemen for the 1900-09 decade as Chance (209 WS, 17th among all players for the decade); Harry Davis (189 WS, 23d) and Fred Tenney (165, 43d). For 1910-19, tops are Ed Konetchy (204 WS, 12th among all players for the decade); Jake Daubert (182 WS, 21st); and Merkle (176 WS, 28th). Konetchy, a guy I've barely heard of, seems to top out the group with 287 Win Shares between 1907 and 1921.

By contrast, my "Established Win Shares" list of the top players in baseball entering this season lists four first basemen in the top 10 (Giambi, Thome, Helton and Delgado; five if you count Pujols). And there are a couple of active first basemen, still productive players, who are well past Ed Konetchy in terms of career totals: Jeff Bagwell, Rafael Palmeiro, and Frank Thomas all cleared 300 WS years ago. (Even John Olerud's career stacks up fairly well with the Konetchys and Frank Chances).

So no, we are not at a historic low ebb for first basemen. Far from it.

Will Carroll (subscription only) notes the severity of the knee surgery Joe Mauer had and concludes, "I would be stunned if Mauer can stay at catcher for the next six years." As usual, I suggest you cough up the money to subscribe and read the whole thing - Carroll's injury analyses are worth the price of BP Premium by themselves.

(On the other hand, I was skimming his book "Saving the Pitcher" in Barnes & Noble last week, and it looks way too medical-detailed for me).

I agree completely with David Pinto that the teams that didn't bid on Vladimir Guerrero - or, in the Mets' case, teams that bid halfheartedly - are looking pretty dumb right now, as Guerrero is singlehandedly keeping an injury-riddled Angels team in the race. Baseball Prospectus rates him fourth in the major leagues in VORP (Value over Replacement Player), behind only Bonds, Sean Casey, and, er, Melvin Mora, and Hardball Times has him first in the AL with 14 Win Shares (behind only Bonds, Casey and Scott Rolen in the NL and tied with Mike Lowell). Guerrero, need we be reminded, is 28, the same age as Karim Garcia and four years younger than Shane Spencer. Who are not leading the league in anything.

Reports of Barry Zito's demise seem premature; with another spectacular outing last night, Zito's line since May 1 is a 3.21 ERA, 7.50 H/9 IP, 0.64 HR, 3.21 BB, and 7.07 K. In his last four starts, Zito has allowed just 1 home run and 19 hits in 29 innings of work.

Barry Bonds is closing in on another home run milestone: he's four homers from 500 as a Giant. Which is pretty impressive, seeing as he was already a two-time MVP when he got to San Francisco.

Rafael Palmeiro is also still plugging along, batting .280/.446/.403. A closer look at the numbers, though, reveals some possible danger signs. Palmeiro's walk rate has spiked sharply upward this season - he's on pace for 126 walks compared to 84 last year and a career high of 104 - while his power has dropped off very sharply. I recall a Bill James thesis that an old player who starts walking a lot more may be compensating for slower bat speed, and will usually be found out soon enough by the pitchers. Then again, it wasn't a systematic study, and Palmeiro's strikeouts are at their lowest rate since 1989, while players showing this pattern typically start striking out a lot more as well. We shall see.

I made it out to Shea last night for what turned out to be a remarkably fast-moving game, nosing the Mets above .500 with a victory over the defending champs. Jae Seo was in fine form, somehow surviving a brutal defensive infield with Piazza at first, Wigginton and second and Zeile at third. AJ Burnett was unimpressive in his return from surgery, getting cuffed around (with the help of Miguel Cabrera, who botched a key Ty Wigginton triple in the second inning, letting it roll past him to the wall).

Cliff Floyd attempted two stolen bases, which tells me two things: his legs are healthy again after last weekend's collision with Mike Cameron, and the Mets have very little respect for the Burnett/Mike Redmond battery.

I have to say, the Mets would really be in some deep trouble if they hadn't signed Kaz Matsui - not that he's been great, but with Jose Reyes shut down from rehabbing his hamstrings due to a bad back, it's a good thing the Mets weren't more reliant on Reyes. The team ought to just plug in Danny Garcia at second and see where it goes from there.

As numerous studies have told us, clutch hitting is a result, not a skill. But it sure is nice to get those results, as Todd Zeile followed Tuesday's game-winning hit in the 10th inning with a 2-run 10th inning homer that put last night's game out of reach. Of course, the Wagner-less Philadelphia bullpen had a bit to do with that, as Tim Worrell ran out of gas in his second inning of work Tuesday and Roberto Hernandez was serving up meatballs last night. Still, any time you can win consecutive extra inning games on the road against the strongest team in the division, you take what you can get.

It's a long season yet, and I'm still no believer in Zeile, but it's starting to look like a respectable ending to his 16-year major league odyssey since his arrival as a catcher with Whitey Herzog's Cardinals.

News reports are expressing surprise at Alfonso Soriano leading the AL All-Star balloting, but this should be no big surprise; he's probably got loyal backers both in NY and Texas, and there's precious little competition among AL 2B. (The Win Shares leaders at second right now are Juan Uribe, Ron Belliard and Mark Bellhorn, none of them household names).

The fun story: with Mike Piazza leading among NL catchers, the likely starting battery for the NL will be Piazza with either Randy Johnson . . . or Roger Clemens.

His first three years in the majors, Juan Uribe had a fairly large home-field advantage, batting .288/.468/.324 at home and .227/.345/.271 on the road. Which was to be expected; he was playing his home games at Coors Field. Uribe was nonetheless a disappointment, since he was expected to be better than a .227 hitter with minimal power, and was expected to take much greater advantage of Coors.

So, this season, Uribe goes to Comiskey Park, no bandbox. So what happens? His road numbers have, in fact, improved substantially across the board without the compression effect of playing on the road after having a homestand at high altitude: .277/.400/.347. But the really spectacular improvement is at home: a guy who was nothing really special at Coors is batting .371/.638/.416 in Chicago (oddly, he's also had nearly twice as many at bats at home, since the White Sox have played 27 home and 22 road games, and Uribe didn't have a firm grip on the everyday job until the end of the season-opening road trip).

The effects of Coors can be complex. For whatever reason, Uribe doesn't seem to have taken advantage. Contrast this with Vinny Castilla, up to his old tricks after three years away:

Park: Season	AVG	SLG	OBP
Home: 2001-03	.245	.399	.282
Road: 2001-03	.266	.448	.308
Home: 2004	.371	.773	.441
Road: 2004	.213	.447	.272

A high note yesterday to cap off an otherwise depressing weekend for the Mets, including Cliff Floyd's return to the lineup and a game-winning hit for Mike Cameron; Floyd really looked pretty severely injured after colliding with Cameron in the first inning on Saturday. The Mets seem to be matching up better with the Phillies than the Marlins this season, likely due to their inability to hit Florida's pitching.

Jason Mastaitis at Always Amazin' notes that the hype over Armando Benitez closing out the Mets last night ignores the man's history: "remember, the great Armando doesn't blow games in June. His mental breakdown comes during the stretch run."

He also floats a trade theory:

Ty Wigginton may be being set up as trade bait.

McEwing's trade value is virtually nil but Wigginton has value, especially if he's additionally shopped as a second baseman. While I love Wiggy, imagine if the Mets made this trade:

Ty Wigginton and either Heilman, Yates, or Ginter for Jason Schmidt and Edgardo Alfonzo.

The Giants are looking for someone to take Fonzie's salary off their hands and they would need a third baseman in return. While this certainly is not a trade to make them younger, Fonzie would only be a stopgap third baseman for the next four months (who is still tremendously popular in NY) and they'd get a bona fide #1 starter to stabilize the rotation. Seems like a fit to me.

Well, as to point #1, Wigginton's now a semi-established major league regular who is 100% certain to lose his job the minute David Wright is ready, so of course he's trade bait. But the trade proposal doesn't hold water. First of all, why would the Giants be looking to dump veterans? Yes, they've started slowly, but when there's a guy in your lineup who is hitting .361/ .825/.613 and will be 40 in July, the future is now.

Also, even if the Giants wanted to deal Alfonzo for Wigginton - a dubious proposition, given Wiggy's career .259/.417/.318 numbers and sometimes erratic glovework - why on earth would they deal their #1 starter, Jason Schmidt (who's 31 and as far as I know doesn't have any contract issues) for Yates (an unproven youngster who hasn't shown he can throw 6 innings on a consistent basis), Heilman (who was pounded by major league pitching in his debut last season), or Ginter (a retread the Mets got for Timo Perez)?

I've been thinking the team that might be desperate enough to spring for Wigginton could be the Angels after the Glaus injury, but Chone Figgins has hit awfully well filling in at third. I gather Figgins' glove work hasn't won raves, though. But I can't see Anaheim giving up much to "upgrade" from Figgy to Wiggy.

One reason I've never liked Olympic Stadium in Montreal is the quality of baseball that seems to be played there, or at least the way it comes through on TV. It always seems like games there are quiet, sedate affairs, with the innings sliding by until the game just stops. Florida, ever since the Marlins were founded, has been even worse: with the heavy South Florida air and the Mets' and Marlins' historic tendency towards strong pitching and weak offenses, the games are often quite low-scoring, and add in the scores of empty seats you often see in Miami and you've got a recipe for some seriously sleepy baseball. Tonight was a perfect example of this, with a few runs early and nothing off Dontrelle Willis or Tom Glavine to alter the end 2-1 result.

This is a followup post to the one immediately below; courtesy of the Hardball Times, we have the National League "Fielding Independent Pitching" leaders, the (slightly longer) list of NL pitchers with a FIP below 4.00 in 45 or more innings through last night (the stats have now been updated):

Pitcher	IP	FIP
Randy Johnson	70	2.67
Roger Clemens	57.1	2.80
Ben Sheets	73	2.89
Jake Peavy	53.2	2.99
Roy Oswalt	69.2	3.02
Oliver Perez	45.2	3.03
Carlos Zambrano	61.1	3.43
Matt Clement	60.1	3.55
Joe Kennedy	59.1	3.60
Tom Glavine	67.2	3.65
Josh Beckett	66	3.65
Livan Hernandez	80	3.74
Doug Davis	61.2	3.74
Brad Penny	68	3.76
Jeff Weaver	63.2	3.80
Jon Thomson	57.1	3.80
Jason Schmidt	55	3.87
Jaret Wright	49.2	3.88
Russ Ortiz	56	3.99

Yes, that's Johnson and Schilling atop their respective leagues, with Roger Clemens close behind; good time for the oldsters. And the youngsters too, like Jake Peavy and Oliver Perez. Yyou can see here why the Peavy injury will hurt the Padres badly, as none of their other starters are in his class (as I noted before the season) . . . Kerry Wood (3.50) missed the innings cut by a third of an inning . . . the three Braves on the list all would have missed the cut a week ago; Atlanta's pitching is just now rounding into shape.

Caution: some guys on this list, notably Weaver and Davis, have repeatedly underachieved what their K/BB and HR numbers say they should do.

Yes, Tom Glavine (tonight included) has been far better than I had any reason to expect (sell high!).

The Hardball Times has some great stat reports that, among other things, absolve me from trying to calculate Defense Independent Pitching Stats in-season as I did last year. I decided to take a stroll through the American League "Fielding Independent Pitching" leaders - Hardball Times' latest riff on a pitching metric based on HR, BB and K, yielding "an approximation of what the pitcher's ERA would be with an "average" defense behind him." Looking solely at guys who have thrown 40 or more innings this season (a pretty low cutoff, just below the qualifier for the ERA title, but high enough to keep the list to starting pitchers who have been in the rotation most of the year), here's the short list of AL pitchers with a FIP below 4.00 through the end of last week (the last time they updated):

Pitcher	IP	FIP
Curt Schilling	63.1	2.78
Brad Radke	55	3.43
Kenny Rogers	61.1	3.52
Cliff Lee	45.2	3.67
Tim Hudson	68.1	3.70
Rich Harden	43.1	3.72
Pedro Martinez	57.2	3.77
Freddy Garcia	56	3.78
Roy Halladay	69.1	3.94
Tim Wakefield	49	3.94
Jake Westbrook	40	3.97
Mark Buehrle	63.1	3.99

Yes, that's The Gambler in third place. The man gets no respect (albeit for good reasons). But he's definitely been a factor in the Rangers' resurgence. And one of the quiet stories of the season thus far has been the emergence of a competent pitching staff in Cleveland with Lee, Westbrook and CC Sabathia (4.33) all pitching OK. If you're wondering, the Yankees' Big Three all seem to fall off this list due to allowing too many home runs. For Mussina and Vazquez, at least, that's a perennial problem. Meanwhile, Rich Harden looks like he's ready to supplant Barry Zito in Oakland's own Big Three (Mulder is just shy of the list at 4.03).

Shea Hot Corner, with links to Jason Stark and others, broaches the subject of moving Kaz Matsui to second base when/if Jose Reyes comes back, in light of Reyes' youth and great range compared to Matsui's thus far deeply disappointing glove work. Like the Yankees with Jeter and A-Rod, the Mets may be stuck by the difficulty of getting the inferior player to move, in this case because they promised Matsui he could play short when they signed him. Of course, a manager worth what they're paying Art Howe could make it happen - but putting the fear of God into a veteran player is just not Howe's style.

I'm not ready to write about tonight's Mets game, which completely wasted a brilliant outing by Matt Ginter, who threw six shutout innings at the Phillies. Let's talk about something else we'll see with the Phillies.

There's been a lot of attention paid to Dontrelle Willis' batting this year (not that his pitching of late has lived up to his bat), but there's another NL pitcher hitting the tar out of the ball: Randy Wolf, who's batting a booming .294/.588/.333 this season, after driving in 11 runs last year in 33 starts. Then, of course, there's Roger Clemens (4 RBI in 9 starts) and Tom Glavine (.263 and 3 RBI). (Brooks Kieschnick doesn't count).

At the far end of the scale, I'm not sure who's the worst hitting pitcher in the business; Al Leiter is pretty helpless looking up there, and his career line is .087/.107/.147 with 255 strikeouts in 469 at bats. But even worse is Ben Sheets. Hitless in 17 tries this season, Sheets is now batting .073 for his career, with an .078 career slugging percentage and a .118 career OBP. No wonder the Milwaukee staff ace is five games under .500 for his career.

*An auspicious start for the Mets' string of games against NL East contenders, as Steve Trachsel shuts down the Phillies. You really could not ever have asked more from Traschsel than what he's given the Mets since recovering from a rocky start in the first months of 2001. Of course, I'll believe that this is a contending team when I see it; more on that to come.

*Through April 20, Bobby Abreu, one of the Phillies' stable of notorious slow starters, was batting .108 with just two extra base hits. His numbers over the 30 games since then, actual and projected to 162 games:

Stats	G	AB	H	2B	3B	HR	R	RBI	BB	SB	AVG	SLG	OBP
Actual	29	116	41	10	1	9	32	31	23	7	.353	.690	.460
Projected	157	626	221	54	5	49	173	167	124	38	.353	.690	.460

That's a month; in fact, that, my friends, is a ballplayer. Nobody gets less respect for being a great player than Abreu.

*Jimmy Gobble continues his experiment in not striking people out. Through last night's matchup with K-impaired Mike Maroth, Gobble has struck out just 13 batters in 54.2 IP, 2.14 per 9 innings. Gobble has showed good control and kept the ball in the park, but it's really, really hard to win with that strikeout rate.

*I forgot to link to this earlier, but if you have any way to help the son of the late Gonzalo Marquez find memorabilia from his father's career or the 1972 A's, Bruce Markusen tells you how you can help.

Aaron Gleeman, writing at The Hardball Times, has some astonishing numbers showing Melvin Mora's last five healthy months, amounting to a .367/.597/.466 line. He also explains why "there's a good chance that Esteban Loaiza's 2003 season will go down as one of the strangest, completely-out-of-nowhere seasons in baseball history."

Also, Brian Gunn takes on Chris Kahrl's endless negativity on the St. Louis bench. I do enjoy Karhl, but I agree with Brian that he does ride the same hobbyhorses endlessly, and he packs so many inside references into each sentence and clause that his columns can be like reading a statute.

Then again, a note to Brian and his commenters who hold out some hope for a Roger Cedeno revival: trust me, I spent the past two years watching the guy. It ain't happening. Although it wouldn't hurt to get in better shape and have his eyes checked.

I've lately been reading Allan Wood's marvelous book Babe Ruth and the 1918 Red Sox; more on that later. One point that fascinated me from Wood's book is his portrayal of Ruth, in his first season spending significant time as a position player, as a tempermentally impatient hitter, one who loved swinging at first pitches, something his teammates usually avoided and for which he was sometimes reprimanded.

Take a look at Ruth's batting numbers broken down in three parts: 1914-17, when he was a full-time pitcher who got extra at bats mostly by pinch hitting; 1918, when he was new to the lineup; and 1919 and 1920, his first two years as a regular; I'll run a projection to 600 at bats so you can really see the changes:

Actual Batting Stats

Years	AB	BB	K
1914-17	361	31	68
1918	317	58	58
1919	432	101	58
1920	458	150	80

Projected to 600 At Bats

Years	AB	BB	K
1914-17	600	52	113
1918	600	110	110
1919	600	140	81
1920	600	197	105

When you look at these numbers in light of the portrait painted by Wood, two things emerge: (1) the rapid rise in Ruth's walk rate is a compelling testimony to how quickly fear of the Babe's power caused pitchers to work around him; and (2) the very quick improvement in both Ruth's BB and K rates shows what a quick study Ruth was. This wasn't a guy who gloried in waiting out the pitcher; Ruth learned to wait. And he learned that lesson in just a few years, while lesser players can take their whole careers to get the point.

I haven't seen him enough to diagnose the problem, but there is something seriously wrong with Johan Santana (btw, didn't his first name used to have two "n"s?) - after his shellacking yesterday, the league is hitting .301 against Santana. His K/BB ratio (48/17 in 54.2 IP) is just fine, but he's been tagged for 10 home runs in 10 starts (1.6 per 9 IP) and averaging less than 6 innings a start.

As The Mad Hibernian notes below, yet another chance missed for a Mets no-hitter. (As you may recall, Tom Glavine also had another, more tenuous brush with a no-no for the Mets last August). It would have been ironic indeed to see the Mets' first no-hitter thrown by Glavine, who had a great career with the Braves but never threw a no-no there. After all, recall that Tom Seaver, Dwight Gooden and David Cone all had their best years at Shea but went on to throw no-hitters for other teams - Seaver and Gooden in their first years for a new team, Gooden and Cone for the Hated Yankees. Nolan Ryan, who spent four full seasons in Flushing and started 74 games for the Mets, threw four no-hitters in the four seasons after leaving the Mets. Here, as far as I can assemble it, is the full list - check here and correct me if I've missed someone:

Pitchers Who Threw No-Hitters After Leaving The Mets:
Nolan Ryan (seven times, including for every other franchise he pitched for)
Tom Seaver
Mike Scott
Dwight Gooden
David Cone
Hideo Nomo
*Octavio Dotel (1 inning in combined no-hitter)

Pitchers Who Threw No-Hitters Before Coming To The Mets:
Don Cardwell
Warren Spahn (twice, albeit long before he was a Met)
Dock Ellis
John Candelaria
*Alejandro Pena (1 inning in combined no-hitter)
Bret Saberhagen
Kenny Rogers
Al Leiter
Hideo Nomo (got 'em on both ends)
**Scott Erickson (not that he's pitched for the Mets in the regular season, or is likely to)

Jose Contreras yesterday had his second good outing in the last three: 6 IP, 3 H, 2 BB, 7 K, and 1 run on a solo homer. As bad as Contreras started the season, I wonder how many other teams would have pulled him from the rotation and sent him to the minors; the Yankees have particularly little tolerance for struggling pitchers, and always have. (Then again, the Mets have also used such early-season demotions to straighten out guys like Steve Trachsel and Bobby Jones). It's debatable which is the better approach, but Contreras does seem to be in the process of righting the ship.

Michele asks for greatest sports moments. I'll repost my thoughts here. I'll agree with some of the moments cited by her commenters - Jose Canseco getting hit in the head with a ball and turning it into a home run is still the funniest thing that's ever happened. Bill Mazeroski's homer - ten years to the day before I was born - is tough to top for sheer instant drama and finality, especially when you consider the aura of invincability of those Yankees and the back-and-forth nature of that game and that series. And yes, I once had a poster on my wall of the famous Starks dunk over Jordan.

My personal favorite, of course, is still the bottom of the tenth inning of Game Six, 1986 World Series, specifically Bob Stanley's game-tying wild pitch. Close behind are Robin Ventura's "grand slam single" in the rain in 1999 and virtually every minute of the 1991 Super Bowl.

Probably the most electric moment from a sport I don't follow or, ordinarily, even like that much was Sarah Hughes' gold medal winning figure skating performance, because she single-handedly did what I thought couldn't be done in figure skating: overcome the expectations and grab victory through the sheer brilliance of a single performance. In other words, for one night, she actually made figure skating a real sport.

The most memorable ones I've seen in person: (1) Game Six of the Knicks-Heat series in 1997, when half the team (including Patrick) was suspended and the MSG crowd just tried to will the skeleton roster to victory; (2) Brad Clontz' wild pitch in the last scheduled game of the regular season in 1999 to send the Mets to a 1-game playoff with the Reds.

Via David Pinto, some horrible news: Doug Pappas, the indefatigable business-of-baseball writer who tilted endlessly at the windmill of Major League Baseball's opaque finances, has died suddenly:

Doug Pappas, attorney and writer, died Thursday while hiking in Big Bend National Park, apparently due to heat prostration.

Doug died while taking part in one of his passions, traveling the country and taking pictures of it for his Roadside Photos web site.

That's scary; Pappas was only 43. Pappas did great work; I never met the man, but I enjoyed his writing, which often broke new ground. You can check out his Business of Baseball blog here (last entry was Tuesday), and his article archive at Baseball Prospectus (last article, part of a series on ticket prices, ran Monday) here.

Hopefully, someone will take up responsibility for preserving his writings on his blog; it's the least that can be done.

Yes, I'm aware that this blog has been (a) a bit too quiet lately and (b) in particular, quite short on baseball blogging of late. What can I say? I've been traveling the past two weekends and busy at work.

Tonight, i got to watch some actual baseball for the first time in a bit, specifically the Mets and Rockies. A few random thoughts:

*The Rockies pitching staff . . . not good. Not at all good. The Mets looked like they were taking batting practice out there.

*Is Royce Clayton auditioning for Milli Vanilli? (Well, Rob's dead, after all). Like the Vanillis, Clayton can't get a hit without a lot of help . . .

*How sad is this? The Mets radio announcers were waxing nostalgic for the one week last season when Jose Reyes, Cliff Floyd and Mike Piazza were all healthy at the same time.

*Matt Ginter is not terrible. Which is about all you could ask from him, but it's better than, oh say, giving a game ball to James Baldwin every fifth day (the Mets signed Baldwin because Scott Ruffcorn was unavailable).

*Tonight, we saw the Braden Looper we all remember from his Marlins days, wild and living on the edge. In fairness, two of the ninth inning baserunners got on on fluke bad bounce grounders that ate up Kaz Matsui and Ty Wigginton. But he did manage to get out of the jam.

Take a look at this box score and tell me what's wrong. Yes . . . that's right . . . that's Jose Offerman, batting cleanup.

A little glimpse of discarded extras from the new Bill James/Rob Neyer book (due in June) on pitchers and what they threw.

Randy Johnson is perfect through 7 innings, with Andruw Jones due up to start the 8th. Johnson's thrown 91 pitches through 7.

UPDATE: Jones flied out to center. Estrada whiffs. Every pitch thrown so far in the 8th is a strike. 1-2 pitch, Drew grounds out. Three outs to go.

Ninth inning, one down as DeRosa grounds out on a 1-2 pitch. Nick Green up, a pinch hitter for Hampton on deck.

Green whiffs on a 1-2 pitch.

1-1 to Eddie Perez. Mets rallying, by the way.

2-2.

Cliff Floyd wins the Mets game with a 9th inning hit.

Perez whiffs. RANDY JOHNSON HAS THROWN A PERFECT GAME. 117 pitches.

Floyd to Ed Coleman: "I just want to win so bad, man."

More random thoughts:

*Victor Martinez has arrived; 3 RBI tonight moves the Cleveland catcher into the top 10 in the AL.

*Troy Glaus being out for the season would be just a huge blow to the Angels.

*Heard on WFAN tonight: a Yankee fan speaking optimistically about Tanyon Sturtze. Yes, there is a God.

*Rich Harden: 37.1 IP, 2 HR, 17 BB, 40 K. Yes, he's allowed 39 hits, but Harden shows every sign of joining the elite of the Oakland rotation.

*The Greek God of Walks is in the house. And he could be here to stay.

Pennant contention? Don't be silly. Development of exciting young players? Hold off on that for now. Right now, all the Mets can hope to offer, with a mediocre and veteran-laden roster, is exciting baseball. But this last 7-game road trip to Arizona and Houston provided that in scads, topped off by yesterday's 13-inning thriller, in which Mike Piazza homered off Octavio Dotel, down 2-0 and down to his last strike, to take the win away from Roger Clemens (oh, boo hoo) and Jason Phillips was defrosted from his season-long slump long enough to hit the game-winning home run.

The Hardball Times carries a great look at what types of teams have prevailed in playoff serieses since 1995 (hat tip to Matt Welch). The answer (other than "teams with Mariano Rivera"), roughly: (1) pitching, (2) starting pitching, (3) pitching and defense, (4) speed and contact.

This partially gibes with Bill James' prior studies - I'm rushing this morning and don't have time to look it up, but I believe his various studies have found that what wins World Serieses, at least, is frontline starting pitching and home run power.

The advantage in the current study for steals is unusual, since historically, great stolen base teams (think of the 1985 Cardinals or 1911-13 Giants) get killed in the World Series. The relationship isn't strong enough to generalize, but I can take a guess: the stolen base is more of an advantage today precisely because it's rare. Thus, in the past, there were teams that reliead heavily on steals (Whiteyball!), and they didn't fare well, but nobody plays like that now. Whereas in today's game, a steals advantage is more likely to be negative - that is, one team can't run at all. And with the higher caliber of pitching in the postseason, a complete inability to manufacture runs may be a handicap more than the ability to do so is an advantage.

I noted over a month ago that Orlando Hudson seemed to be showing improved patience at the plate, and wondered if it would pay off with increased power. Checking back in now that the season's well underway, I've thus far been right on target; Hudson's still seeing 4.02 pitches per plate appearance compared to 3.65 and 3.76 his first two seasons entering last night's action, and the payoff (including last night) has been a .286/.518/.369 line, including a pace for 44 doubles and 25 home runs. Go Dog Go!

An alert reader points me to this charming New Yorker article on the knuckleball, focusing on Tim Wakefield and Red Sox prospect Charlie Zink (given the Bill James influence on the organization, it's unsurprising that there's a pro-knuckleball and pro-sidearm bias at work in Boston; I'm a big fan myself). I hadn't known that Toad Ramsey was considered the primeval knuckleballer.

This anecdote about Zink was amusing:

“My first double-A game, I was pitching in Binghamton against the Mets,” he said. “And the second hitter I faced pulled a rib-cage muscle from swinging so hard. He had to get taken out of the game. I mean, that was one of the funniest things I’ve seen.”

Give Kaz Matsui this much credit: the guy knows how to make a first impression. Tonight, Randy Johnson got the rude awakening about the wiry shortstop's power, as Matsui leads the game off with a homer on Johnson's second pitch of the game.

UPDATE (Thursday Morning): And 1-0 is how it ends. I have to admit that Braden Looper and Tom Glavine have both been far better than my preseason skepticism indicated (both have had improved control, Looper dramatically), although I still don't trust either one of them. There have been too few positive surprises this season, although Orber Moreno has looked good at times and Eric "Prince" Valent has shown an enticing combination of patience and power.

The real test comes if Glavine is still pitching well in July and contending teams start inquiring about taking him and maybe half his contract off the Mets' hands. Will they be able to pull the trigger even if it means writing off a multimilliondollar loss?

John Thorn has found evidence of baseball being played as early as 1791 in Pittsfield, Massachusetts. No word on how the Pittsfield team fared against teams from New York . . .

News flash: James Baldwin is still bad.

The overpaid and perenially underperforming Darin Erstad may really live to regret his latest injury, as the Angels have responded by bringing up top prospect Casey Kotchman from AA to take his place. Kotchman was batting .368 with power in Arkansas. At this point, Erstad's contract is really the only reason he still has a job anyway, but eventually the Angels may realize that the money is a sunk cost and send him somewhere where Erstad's decent batting averages, good glove in the outfield, speed and versatility can make him a useful bench player rather than a subpar everyday player.

Looks like Raul Mondesi is sitting out the rest of the season due to a legal dispute back home in the Dominican Republic; although one report says that "Mondesi believed his wife or four children may have been in jeopardy, and he returned home to insure their safety," perhaps the more telling quote is this one:

"I've played 20 straight years of baseball all year round," Mondesi said. "I deserve a rest even if it's only for a few months. Today I took my children to school for the first time in my life. It was an amazing feeling."

There have been questions for some time about how dedicated Mondesi really is; he's hardly the first ballplayer to decide he just isn't enjoying the game anymore. Hopefully, after some time away, he'll be ready to make the game a priority again.

While Michele is busy heaping slanders on Mr. Met (it gets worse), I think it is important to defend the honor of He of the Round Head by raising this important fact, from a 2002 report:

He’s serving in the U.S. Army now and has gone from wearing a baseball as a head to keeping the ball rolling at a prison camp for terrorists.

His name is Lee Reynolds and over the course of the last three years he has been a man behind the mask of New York Mets mascot Mr. Met.

Major Reynolds is currently stationed in the Army public affairs office at Camp X-Ray in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, according to Army officials.

Camp X-Ray is the name of the military compound where al Qaeda and Taliban detainees captured in Afghanistan are being held.

According to Mets officials, Reynolds’ role as the Mets mascot is one shared with a “couple of people.”

Mets officials said that they hope he is safe and that they are grateful for Reynolds’ service to his country.

According to published reports Reynolds, 38, will be stationed in Cuba for the next six months.

Reynolds told a reporter for the New York Post, “Reserve soldiers come from all walks of life, and right now I’m serving my country and serving my state after 9/11. I am very proud to be here, in spite of having to miss the entire baseball season and the Mets have always been 100 percent supportive. They’ve said the door is open for me.”

Of course, the Al Qaeda and Taliban detainees are sure to confess when he walks into the interrogation room in the Mr. Met head . . .

Don't shake hands with Moises Alou.

Mike Piazza's first-inning homer tonight breaks Carlton Fisk's career record for homers as a catcher. Good to see the record behind him, thus avoiding the Gary Carter-in-1988 problem, where Carter slumped horribly as months passed with him stuck on 299 career homers.

Adam Dunn certainly seems to have regained his lost power stroke without cutting his strikeouts - Dunn's 9 homers trail only Barry Bonds, yet his 32 walks and 29 whiffs put him, at present, on a pace for around 200 of each.

Another guy to watch in the early going: Oliver Perez, having what certainly looks like the kind of breakout year that will give Pirates fans hope of breaking even on the Brian Giles trade. With 29 whiffs and just 5 walks in 25.2 IP, Perez is starting to feel his oats - but then, he's thus far faced only the Reds (twice), Mets and Brewers. Something more needs to be proven yet.

Via Jason Mastaitis at Always Amazin', Baseball America takes a look at David Wright, who may be the Mets' third baseman in the very near future. Wright, who almost invariably draws comparisons to Scott Rolen, may well be the franchise's most valuable property; he doesn't have Jose Reyes' injury history and, unlike Scott Kazmir, he's not a pitcher (pitchers are always a risk - who would you rather bet on for the next three years, Albert Pujols or Mark Prior?).

In the grand tradition of half-finished serieses on this website, I am at long last returning to the next installment of my division-by-division walk around the major leagues by Established Win Shares Levels. It's still early enough that it feels worthwhile to cover the NL East, although we'll see how long the last division (NL Central) takes; I may resort to running one team at a time. (Now that I have the routine down pat, I'll try to get them all done before the season next year). Here's my previous efforts:

*The Top 25 Players in Baseball and explanation of EWSL method

*AL West EWSL Report & explanation of team method

*AL East EWSL Report & slight modification to team method

*AL Central EWSL Report

*NL West EWSL Report

A few recurring notes on the method: Recall that the projected win totals below are probably a bit on the low side, in part because I only list 23 players, and that these aren't really projections at all, so much as estimates of how much established major league talent is on each roster. Also, as before, I've indicated the players who are ranked only on 2002-03 with a #, players ranked only on 2003 with a *, and rookies with a +. For rookie non-pitchers with everyday jobs, I've arbitrarily pencilled in 10 Win Shares , 5 WS for rookie pitchers with rotation slots, 3 for bench players and 2 for relievers. So, with the defending champion Marlins off and running, how does the EWSL method stack up the division?

Read More »

Maybe I'm overreacting to last night's game, when he served up a 2-run moonshot to Brian Giles - I don't think so, since this sort of thing has become all too common this season - but I'm about ready to conclude that John Franco is, finally, finished. He's had a good run, but I just don't see him fooling anybody anymore.

You just have to see what happened in the sixth inning of game 2 of the Braves-Rockies doubleheader at Coors Field this evening - you won't believe it if you don't. Vinny Castilla, who's back with the Rox, went into the first row of the stands to catch a foul ball, and banged into a fan (presumably a Rockies fan) who was reaching for the ball. As Castilla is turning to try and convince the umpire that he caught the ball, the fan reaches in and takes the ball out of Castilla's glove, resulting in the ump (who didn't seem to see what happened) blowing the call and ruling no catch.

Unbelievable. Like I said, watch tonight's highlights for this one.

A reader, surveying worst-case scenarios, writes to ask:

Do you know what the best record for a team in April was, without then making the postseason? I am asking as a Red Sox fan, and looking at possibly finishing April at .727

Well, I don't have a definite answer, but I've got a pretty good guess. The 1987 Brewers went 18-3 in April, including the famous 13-0 getaway highlighted by Juan Nieves' no-hitter (they were 18-2 when Paul Molitor pulled his hamstring and missed a month), and stood at 20-3 on the morning of May 3, the day they started their 12-game losing streak. The Brew Crew finished third, albeit only 7 games back.

Buster Olney is back with another ode to "productive outs," yet again taking a simple notion - that there can be a benefit at times to sacrificing an out to improve your chances of scoring one run - and blowing it out of proportion as if it's the main reason for certain teams' successes and failures. Bizarrely, Olney's Exhibit A this time in support of his "Smallball vs. Moneyball" rant (ESPN's title, not mine) is a Yankees-Red Sox game last week in which the Red Sox won 2-0, with the only runs scoring on this sequence in the Boston fourth:

-Top of the 4th inning -M Bellhorn walked. -D Ortiz struck out looking. -M Ramirez homered to left, M Bellhorn scored. -K Millar lined out to shortstop. -J Varitek flied out to center.

Yup, the game turned on a walk (by Mark Bellhorn, the main target of Olney's scorn) and a home run, with the only intervening out being the least productive kind, with David Ortiz' strikeout being rendered moot by Manny's home run. Productive outs, indeed. See here for more on Olney's misguided attempt to pass off his pet theory as if it were a meaningful form of statistical analysis, notably the fact that his theory completely ignores the fact that teams that move a lot of baserunners are better than teams that don't because teams that have a lot of baserunners in the first place are better than teams that don't.

UPDATE: Well, this one certainly brought out the long knives. Check out Derek Zumsteg, David Pinto, and the Primates on Olney's folly. By the way, I also enjoyed how Olney quoted Paul O'Neill saying, in essence, how the Yankees were better when they had Paul O'Neill.

Things are looking up for the Detroit pitching staff. This is all relative; although they won't be mistaken for Maddux, Glavine and Smoltz in their primes, the early returns on three of Detroit's young starters show a few signs for cautious optimism:

Pitcher	IP	ERA	H/9	HR/9	BB/9	K/9
Mike Maroth	32.2	3.58	10.19	0.83	1.65	5.51
Nate Robertson	22.2	2.78	5.96	0.79	6.35	11.91
Jeremy Bonderman	21.2	6.65	8.72	2.08	4.57	9.55

Maroth's numbers are particularly encouraging, and show a guy who's maturing into a dependable starter with great control, although with his low strikeout rate he'll always get hit. Robertson's numbers are your basic Nolan Ryan stat line - don't expect that to keep up, and don't expect him to finish with a 2.78 ERA if he keeps walking 6 men per 9 innings. But the exceptionally high strikeout rate is a very good sign.

Bonderman is still a long way off, but his high K rate is also a sign that he's starting to fool some people, which he did precious little of last season.

Now, this is a bit much: the Alex Rodriguez quarter. (Link via the Primer Lounge)

If you're wondering why New York Giants fans are so excited about Eli Manning, well, let me offer some perspective here. Consider my somewhat-typical experience. I'm a Mets/Giants/Knicks fan, and I'm 32 years old. Manning gives me, potentially (if he lives up to billing), the opportunity to see my favorite team develop an offensive superstar. Now, if you're a Red Sox fan or a Lakers fan or, even, a Detroit Lions or Montreal Expos fan, that may not sound like anything terribly novel. But consider the top homegrown offensive stars of my three favorite teams over the past 30 years or so, at least based on their performance in NY:

1. Patrick Ewing
2. Darryl Strawberry
3. Phil Simms (yes, Simms contributed more than Strawberry, but except for a brief moment around 1984, he was never a carry-the-team kind of QB)
4. Edgardo Alfonzo
5. Rodney Hampton
6. Mark Jackson (yes, #2 all-time in assists, but Jackson's a slow guy who can't shoot and only once scored as many as 15 points per game)
7. Joe Morris
8. Todd Hundley (we're scraping here; Hundley spent more than half his Mets career as an offensive millstone, although he did set a home run record for catchers)
9. Ray Williams
10. Amani Toomer
11. Mark Bavaro (an icon, but only briefly a light-up-the-scoreboard player)
12. Tiki Barber
13. Michael Ray Richardson
14. Lee Mazzilli
15. John Starks (I count Starks and Mason as homegrown players, since the Knicks developed them as regulars)

That's a top-of-the head list (feel free to quibble - this one's a natural argument-starter), and after Ewing, it's pretty weak; plenty of individual franchises could do better. And neither of the corresponding lists will knock your socks off, either - the top guys who were brought along in NY but bloomed elsewhere (Rod Strickland, Ed McCaffrey, Lenny Dykstra, Kevin Mitchell, Gregg Jefferies), and the top guys who arrived from elsewhere (a list that starts to fall off after Mike Piazza, Bernard King and Bob McAdoo - meaning no disrespect to Gary Carter and Keith Hernandez - and on which the top Giants are creaky old guys like Ottis Anderson and Fran Terkenton).

Looking at the list above, it's no surprise that the Mets have never had an MVP or a batting champ, the Knicks haven't had an MVP or scoring champ in the past 35 years, and I couldn't find the last time the Giants had a league leader in passing, rushing or receiving yards. My New York, at least, is a defensive town. That's why people went crazy for Stephon Marbury, who seems no more likely to bring home playoff glory than King or McAdoo, and why Mets fans are so hopeful about Jose Reyes if he can ever put together a healthy season.

I have little to add about the death of Pat Tillman that hasn't been better said elsewhere, although a quote from General George S. Patton I'd seen used elsewhere lately seemed a fitting tribute: "It is foolish and wrong to mourn the men who died. Rather we should thank God that such men lived."

It is worthwhile, at such a time, to remember that Tillman is not the first professional athlete to put his athletic career aside and put his life on the line for his country. The sacrifices of the World War II generation, like Ted Williams, is also a tale that's been better told elsewhere, including the contributions of Williams, Bob Feller, Joe DiMaggio, Hank Greenberg, Johnny Mize, Warren Spahn, Yogi Berra, Ralph Houk, Phil Rizzuto, Cecil Travis, Mickey Vernon, Dom DiMaggio, Stan Musial, Johnny Pesky, Dick Wakefield, Joe Gordon, Tommy Henrich, Charlie Keller, Alvin Dark, Sam Chapman, Buddy Lewis, Hank Sauer, Sid Gordon, Virgil Trucks, Hank Bauer, Barney McCosky, Ferris Fain, Eddie Robinson, Jackie Robinson, Wally Judnich, Enos Slaughter, Pete Reiser, Elbie Fletcher, Terry Moore, Al Rosen, Ralph Kiner, Pee Wee Reese, and others.

But baseball's sacrifices in the First World War need remembering, too, including:

*"Harvard Eddie" Grant, formerly an everyday third baseman for the Phillies and Reds, killed in action October 5, 1918 in the Argonne Forest.

*German-born Robert Gustave "Bun" Troy, who made a brief appearance with the Tigers in 1912, killed in action October 7, 1918 in Petit Maujouym, in France.

*Christy Mathewson, who suffered severe health problems from which he never recovered - possibly contributing to his death in 1925 at age 45 from tuberculosis - after inhaling poison gas in a training accident. (Ty Cobb also served in the same unit).

*Grover Cleveland Alexander, who as I explained here, would probably have made it to 400 wins or close to it if he hadn't lost a year at his peak to World War I, and who suffered lasting trauma from seeing combat with an artillery outfit.

*Sam Rice, who as I explained here, missed a year following his first big season after being drafted into the Army in World War I; Rice also got a late start in the majors because he’d joined the Navy at age 23 after his parents, wife and two children were killed by a tornado (Rice saw combat in the Navy, landing at Vera Cruz in 1914). Without those interruptions, Rice could easily have had 3500-3700 hits in the major leagues.

*Hall of Famer Rabbit Maranville also missed a year to the Great War, as did several others I've overlooked here.

Perhaps not quite on the same level as a guy like Tillman, who volunteered for some of the Army's most hazardous duty, but in the long run those are just details. Heroes all.

There are baseball heroes, and then there are just plain heroes. And then there are guys who were both. More on that subject later. For now, it seems an appropriate moment to tell a story I've been meaning to get to for some time: the day I met Ted Williams.

Now, for a variety of reasons, I've been fortunate to meet a number of famous ballplayers and political figures, and even managed to get my picture taken with some of them. But there's nothing quite like meeting the Splendid Splinter in person.

This was back in the fall of 1992, my senior year of college, and I was an officer in the College Republicans at Holy Cross. We were in Boston for a Bush/Quayle '92 event, filled with the sort of enthusiasm that no one over the age of 21 could possibly have had for the Bush/Quayle ticket, in Massachusetts, in the fall of that year. The Mets had a better year in 1992.

I was with Shawn Regan, a friend and the head of the CR group at the time, and one of us (Regan, I think) had thought to bring a camera. Early on, I believe, we managed to snag a picture with Bill Weld, then the governor of the state (politicians, wisely, are pretty generous with having their pictures taken with young volunteers, even if we weren't really all that useful to the campaign). But Williams was the evening's big attraction; he was speaking to a fairly modest-sized conference room full of people (us included), raising money and enthusiasm for the first President Bush's re-election. This being 1992, of course, the politics of military service were about the opposite of what they are today, and Williams' brief talk focused heavily on George H.W. Bush's distinguished service as a World War II fighter pilot in the Pacific, an experience Williams himself famously shared, and on the contrasting service record (or, rather, the absence thereof) of Bill Clinton. Teddy Ballgame, to put it mildly, did not think much of Clinton.

Williams was then still in great health and vigor - as he would remain until his stroke two years later - and that night he was in full John Wayne mode, wearing a bolo tie and pressing on through his speech with more force than eloquence. Of course, it was tribute enough to hear a speech from a man who so visibly did not enjoy giving them.

The chronology escapes me now, but I believe it was before Williams' speech that we ran into him (almost literally) as he was coming out of the men's room, with a fairly small group around him. Regan, who had a bit more presence of mind than I did at this juncture, managed to get out, "Mr. Williams, do you mind if we get a picture with you?" So, each of us got to stand shoulder-to-shoulder with the great hitter himself. As we posed for the photo, Williams said something along the lines of "two fine fellows," to which I believe I responded something like "urk". I mean, how can you not be in awe of Ted Williams? And I still have a copy of the picture to this day (not the original photo, which was in my office at the World Trade Center, but a copy of my parents' copy; it'll do).

Read More »

Mets are fielding an even worse lineup today, with Guitierrez and Zeile in the infield and a AAA outfield of Karim Garcia, Jeff Duncan and Eric "Prince" Valent.

The results thus far have been predictable - drop what you're doing and go check out what's in progress at Wrigley.

UPDATE: Jinx worked; Matt Clement lasted one more inning with the no-hitter before surrendering a homer into the foliage in dead center by Garcia and, for good measure, a single by Valent (Mike Piazza gets an assist for an 8-pitch at bat before Garcia came up). But Clement's still in with 12 whiffs and a 3-run lead with one out in the top of the 8th.

Your New York Mets starting lineup today against Kerry Wood:

Kaz Matsui, SS
Todd Zeile, 3B
Mike Piazza, 1B
Shane Spencer, LF
Karim Garcia, RF
Mike Cameron, CF
Vance Wilson, C
Joe McEwing, 2B
Tyler Yates, P

You just aren't going to win much with that; is it any surprise they got shut out? And while we're at it, why have Zeile hit second and Cameron sixth? At least Cameron can run if he manages to get on base; Zeile was slow 15 years ago. Actually, despite a few lapses in the field, Cameron has basically been exactly what he was cracked up to be, batting .236/.418/.348 after hitting .253/.431/.344 last season and .239/.442/.340 in 2002.

Like most bloggers, I get emails from time to time asking me to check out new blogs. Generally, like most bloggers, I'm more interested in someone sending me an interesting post they've written rather than a general "look at my blog" or "let's trade links." But I also remember when, not so long ago, this was a small blog in internet nowhere, so I hate to just blow people off.

My two cents, by the way, on getting linked? Here's a few tips:

1. Write regularly. Regular content is huge in getting noticed.
2. Write during the business day. Hard to do if you're employed, but let's face it - that's when a lot of blog reading happens, and if you're writing regularly, people will come back to see what's new.
3. Pitch the post, not the blog. See above - this is standard advice.
4. Know your audience - don't pitch everything to everyone. Every time I send an email about a post, I think hard about who might be interested in it.
5. Link the post. There's no better way to get a blogger's attention than to write about something they've written, preferably in a thoughtful way, whether you agree or not. It won't work with Glenn Reynolds or Andrew Sullivan or other really huge bloggers (den Beste is an exception to this), but for most of us, we check to see what's written about us.
6. Comments. Regular and thoughtful comments on a site will lead the blogger and other readers to click through and see how you write on your own.
7. Donate to Spirit of America and drop a line to me, Michele, and/or Kevin!

Anyway, presented without further introduction, here's a list of blogs who have dropped me a line the past few months, mostly baseball blogs and also some message boards, if you're looking for new content to read; some of these are no doubt good sites and some are not, but I haven't had time myself to tell the difference:

The Bug (Mudville Magazine Blog)
The Galvin Opinion (Holy Cross Grad!)
Mets Forever
Beer and Whiskey League American League Blog
News to Me
BostonSportsNation.com
TheSportsCritics.com
Detroit Sports Blog
Top’s Seattle Mariner Forum
Oakland A's Fans Baseball Discussion Forum

Enjoy!

Michael Fishman, a new contributor over at Dan Lewis' new site, demands to know why Jose Lima is starting for the Dodgers and Wilson Alvarez isn't.

Following up on yesterday's review of Tony Gwynn and Tim Raines . . . there are a variety of statistical metrics out there to measure a player's career value. Let's mix and match, with a hearty helping from the Baseball Prospectus, sticking to the same comparison group of Gwynn, Raines, Rod Carew, Wade Boggs, Paul Molitor, Pete Rose, and Ichiro.

PLAYER	WS	OPS+	XO/600PA	RC/27	EqA	EqR	WARP3	TrAvg	TrSlg	TrOBP
Gwynn	398	132	23	6.76	.306	1658	119.2	.352	.496	.405
Raines	390	123	17	5.92	.307	1703	127.3	.308	.475	.401
Carew	384	131	23	6.25	.301	1651	115.6	.339	.465	.405
Boggs	394	130	15	7.03	.309	1685	138.2	.336	.467	.425
Molitor	414	122	17	6.07	.297	1881	123.9	.315	.482	.379
Rose	547	118	15	5.64	.288	2242	153.6	.310	.448	.386
Suzuki	84	121	14	6.19	.294	332	26.2	.342	.460	.390

Holy acronyms, Batman! See below for explanation. You will notice a few things:

*Again, these players look pretty similar, at least as hitters, once you adjust for context.

*If you're wondering, Raines earns 51 fielding Win Shares to Gwynn's 45, which helps even the score a bit despite Gwynn's offensive advantage.

*The BP stats - which love Wade Boggs - prefer Raines to Gwynn with the bat despite Gwynn's higher batting average. That "XO" category tells a big part of the story - Raines made very few unnecessary outs (he rarely hit into DPs and was the greatest percentage base thief of all time, almost 85% in nearly 1000 attempts), while Gwynn and Rod Carew made the most such outs of anyone in this group.

*Gwynn's high batting average gives him the best translated slugging percentage in the group, although Molitor had the most power.

*Ichiro, even just on three seasons of his prime, barely keeps pace with the rest of the group. He's an outstanding player, but he's not Gwynn or Raines or the others.

*Yes, Tony Gwynn was a great player. But if you can find a dime's difference between Gwynn and Raines, you are stretching. Raines should be every bit as much the no-questions-asked Hall of Famer as Gwynn.

Read More »

Geoff Young at Ducksnorts has some well-deserved fun at the expense of Baseball Prospectus' comment that Ichiro Suzuki "is the player people think Tony Gwynn was." Now, it's true enough that Gwynn's high batting averages led many casual observers to overrate him over the years. But BP's disdain for Gwynn goes overboard, and shows a real lack of appreciation for the man's talents, as well as for the broader point: the value of batting average.

Which presents two questions. The first is about batting average itself. As I noted three years ago in my tribute to Ichiro, the hallowed place of batting average in the minds of sportswriters can be traced to the fact that, back when the game began in the 1870s and early 1880s, the ability to "hit 'em where they ain't" really was the game's one and only really critical offensive skill.

Guess what? For all the uses of power, speed and patience, it's still the most important skill. Don't believe me? Simple math tells the story. Let's look at the league totals for 2003:

League	Hits	Extra Bases	BB	SB
NL	23126	13763	8666	1294
NL	49.4%	29.4%	18.5%	2.8%
AL	20931	12553	7223	1279
AL	49.9%	29.9%	17.2%	3.0%

Yes, I know this is a crude calculation, but it makes the point (in fact, Hits still outweight Extra Bases if you add the number of home runs to the latter and subtract it from the former, even in our homer-happy era). While there are exceptions (like the extreme case of Barry Bonds), the ability to get hits is still the most valuable single skill in the offensive toolkit.

(The other major objection to batting average, set out at some length in the Orioles team comment of this year's Prospectus, is that the ability to hit singles, doubles and triples is a more volatile and less dependable skill from year to year. That's a valid objection, but it's a far cry from showing that it's not a statistically significantly measurable individual skill).

Anyway, the other question raised is about Tony Gwynn himself - how good was he? I've been looking at Gwynn in the context of comparing him to Tim Raines, for purposes of explaining Raines' Hall of Fame candidacy, and I'll admit that I was surprised myself to see how well Gwynn stacks up. Rather than a systematic analysis, let's just show how a variety of different career offensive measures stack up both Gwynn and Raines against four other similar recent players of undeniable Hall of Fame credentials - Rod Carew, Wade Boggs, Paul Molitor, and Pete Rose. I'll throw Ichiro's numbers through 2003 in the mix just to fill things out.

Let's look at the raw numbers first:

PLAYER	PA	TOB	TB	R	RBI	SB	Avg	Slg	OBP
Gwynn	10232	3955	4259	1383	1138	319	.338	.459	.388
Raines	10359	3977	3771	1571	980	808	.294	.425	.385
Carew	10550	4096	3998	1424	1015	353	.328	.429	.393
Boggs	10740	4445	4064	1513	1014	24	.328	.443	.415
Molitor	12160	4460	4854	1782	1307	504	.306	.448	.369
Rose	15861	5929	5752	2165	1314	198	.303	.409	.375
Suzuki	2191	815	887	349	182	121	.328	.440	.374

(TOB=Times on Base)

At first glance, aside from the massive size of Rose's career and Boggs' superior OBP and lack of steals, what's remarkable is how similar these guys look. Continued tomorrow - some more sophisticated measurements.

I have to say, at this point there just isn't anybody in the Mets' bullpen I would trust. Tonight's game was yet another fiasco . . . I suppose Weathers has been reliable at times in the past, but he's probably the best they've got, and that's not saying much (Looper can be dominating when he's on, but he's basically just a cheaper, wilder Benitez). I know spending money on the bullpen is justifiably a low priority for a rebuilding team, but that doesn't make it more fun to watch, and it does make me appreciate Bobby Valentine, who whatever his other faults always managed to put together a pen that could hold leads.

Cleaning out old emails, a reader had sent me this WaPo article forever ago - it's got some interesting lore on baseball bats.

A reader writes to ask, "Omar Vizquel is about to get his 2000th hit. How many players who have achieved such a milestone have been worse offensively?" I think we have an answer, at least on the question of who was the worst.

Vizquel - who stands at 1998 hits entering tonight's action - has been, on balance, a pretty mediocre hitter, albeit a good one in his best seasons and more than productive enough to go with his slick glove at short. His career averages are .273 batting, .356 slugging and .340 OBP.

According to Aaron Haspel's invaluable search engine, thirty players have (like Vizquel) notched 2,000 hits without either a career OBP of .350 or a career slugging % of .400. Aaron's search engine hasn't been updated with stats beyond 2001, but the only other recent entrant to the 2,000 hit club who approaches this level of futility is Marquis Grissom, who last season became the 24th player to clear 2,000 hits with an OBP of .330 or less.

The leading contenders for worst of the bunch are the five players with career OBPs below .310 and career slugging percentages below .400 - Tommy Corcoran, Frank White, Larry Bowa, Bill Mazeroski, and Garry Templeton. Each has his own merits - Bowa has the lowest slugging percentage of the group at .320, White struck out twice as much as the others and had the lowest batting average (.255) plus playing in a DH league, and Mazeroski was the only one who didn't steal bases. But it's nearly impossible to argue with Corcoran; the former Dodgers and Reds shortstop had the lowest OBP of the group (.289) and a poor slugging percentage (.335), while being an everyday player through the 1890s, the highest-scoring offensive era in baseball history. In 1895, for example - not a particularly atypical year for Corcoran - he batted .265 with a .299 OBP while the National League as a whole batted .296 with a .354 OBP, and the average team scored 6.58 runs/game. After the offensive bonanza of the 1890s turned to the low-scoring 1900s, Corcoran was even worse relative to the league, a .240 hitter with no power who regularly drew less than 20 walks a year. Given that he played regularly for many years, mostly on winning teams, Corcoran must have been contributing something with his glove; he sure wasn't helping with the bat.

With last night's strangulation by Tyler Yates on the way to his first major league win, the Expos have scored 20 runs in 12 games, an average of just 1.67 runs per game and nearly a run below the worst mark in major league history, the 1908 Cardinals, who averaged 2.41 runs/game in a league where the average team scored 3.33 R/G.

The Expos shouldn't be quite that bad, particularly if Nick Johnson ever returns, but the offense does look grisly. However, asking the good people of Montreal and San Juan to sit through the 1899 Cleveland Spiders - Part Deux! is too much. With the departures of Vladimir Guerrero and Javier Vazquez, this team no longer even pretends to be a competitive franchise any longer. And why Frank Robinson, baseball legend and successful manager and executive, has bothered to stick around when he no longer has Guerrero to mentor is just beyond me.

Put them out of their misery. Now.

I meant to link to this one back when I was looking at Fred McGriff - Rich Lederer stands up for McGriff as a Hall of Fame candidate.

This weekend's series with the Pirates was one of those where-do-you-even start deals - just everything went wrong. The lowlight was Friday night's bullpen implosion that turned a 2-0 lead in the eighth inning into a 7-2 deficit, a hole that was just a bit too deep for the comeback that followed. And we still have yet to see the Mets' entire lineup on the field at once. Ugh.

In a move that will be of interest only to the most hard-core devotees of the encylopedic trivia of baseball history, the Mad Hibernian has informed me that The Pitcher Formerly Known Only As Fast has been identified.

I noted this in the comments the other day to the Mad Hibernian's post on Dontrelle Willis' slugging exploits: there's actually an active pitcher who's tied for the all-time record for career slugging percentage among players with more than one major league at bat: Esteban Yan, who has a homer, a single and a sacrifice hit in his three major league plate appearances. Equally interesting: he's only seen five pitches in those three plate appearances, and he's never batted in the minor leagues (I noted Yan homering on the first pitch he saw as a professional ballplayer as a sign of the apocalypse back in June 2000).

Yan's career slugging % of 2.500 ties him with pitcher Frank O'Connor, who posted a similar batting line for the 1893 Phillies. Two others have a slugging average of 2.000 - Ed Irvin, one of the sandlot subs from the famous Tigers strike game in 1912, who tripled in two of his three at bats, and Red Sox pitcher Hal Deviney, who singled and tripled in his only at bats in 1920.

The Royals cruised to an early division lead last season by whomping on their division rivals; despite some great hitting early on, looks like we won't see that repeated, as KC has a 4-5 record (all against division rivals) and a 5.83 team ERA. Wednesday's game against the White Sox captured this perfectly, as the Royals rallied from a 6-0 deficit to get to 6-5, only to see Shawn Camp and Scott Sullivan give back two runs in the bottom of the seventh; then, after a stirring 4-run ninth inning rally involving back-to-back homers by Carlos Beltran and Mike Sweeney off Billy Koch (who doesn't look right now like a great bet to hold the closer job for the ChiSox), Curtis Leskanic blew the save and lost the game 10-9. Add in yesterday's 6-5 loss in 10 innings to Chicago, and you've got some real lost opportunities in the early jockeying for position in the AL Central.

What on earth has got into Henry Blanco? The Twins looked to be in a tight spot indeed when, opening the season after dealing A.J. Pierzynski to the Giants, they lost Joe Mauer and Matt LeCroy to injuries, leaving the weak-hitting Blanco as the Twinkies' everyday catcher. This is a guy who's never slugged .400 or batted higher than .236 in five major league seasons; his career high OBP was .320, and that came in Coors Field.

So what does he go and do? Through 7 games including tonight's explosion, Blanco has cracked 3 doubles and 3 homers and drawn 5 walks for a Ruthian .364/.909/.500 line. My first instinct is to point out that, even in such a small sample size, patience pays off; Blanco's been seeing almost an extra pitch per at bat compared to the past two years; the result is both a higher walk rate and the power that comes from seeing good pitches. The more obvious answer, other than the fact that anybody can have 4 good games (Blanco opened the season 0 for his first three starts), may be some of the same thing that helped Orlando Husdon's spike in seeing pitches: the Tigers. Blanco's faced nobody but Detroit and Cleveland.

Sometimes, a hot streak is just a soft spot in the schedule.

Soxblog has some thoughts on the applicability (or not) of the Bill James/Moneyball approach outside of the baseball world (which rather completes the circle, since Michael Lewis' book worked in large part because he brought lessons from Wall Street to bear on baseball). I agree with his diagnosis that baseball is much more easily subject to objective analysis because the number of variables that have changed over time is pretty minor compared to other fields. Mike and the Mad Dog also interviewed Lewis today (audio link here; hat tip to Dr. Manhattan, who emailed the link with the comment that it shows "an example of parties speaking different languages even though the conversation is in English").

With a dominant performance last night against Montreal, Brad Penny is off to one blazing start this season:

IP	ERA	H/9	HR/9	BB/9	K/9
15	1.80	3.6	1.2	1.2	9.6

Small sample size, of course; anybody can have two good starts. But not just anybody puts up an eye-popping 16-2 K/BB ratio even in that small a sample.

*The Mets' hopes of ever having their entire projected starting lineup on the field don't look great after Cliff Floyd pulled up lame yesterday with a quad injury that looked just awful (he had to be helped off the field). Jose Reyes remains sidelined. The Mets' offense looks pretty good to me, if they could ever all get healthy. If.

*From the Department of Trends That Won't Continue, Victor "Old Hoss" Zambrano, who got an extra start from the trip to Japan, is now on pace for 69 wins, 9 or 10 (depending what source you believe) ahead of the all time record, 27 ahead of Jack Chesbro's AL record and 55 ahead of Rolando Arrojo's club record of 14 (I'd at least make Zambrano a decent bet at the latter). More at-this-pace nonsense for Zambrano: 409 innings, 347 hits, 69 home runs, 231 walks, 347 strikeouts. Sure, Zambrano hasn't even pitched outstandingly well even in the small sample - but don't wake Devil Rays fans yet, who get so few brushes with history.

Will the Brewers be better than you or I think this season? Well, for me, it wouldn't be hard. The Albethke Round Table thinks that, at a minimum, the Brew Crew will do a better job of getting on base this season, although the most optimistic number floated is 76 wins. Read the whole thing.

Great Met game tonight in San Juan, featuring great pitching by Tyler Yates (making his major league debut) and former future closer Orber Moreno, some fine hitting by Cliff Floyd, and a game-winning hit in the 11th by prodigal sub Todd Zeile. But I have to think that Art Howe was kicking himself for pulling Floyd, Mike Piazza and Jason Phillips - the core of his lineup - while clinging to a 2-run lead in the bottom of the 8th, only to wind up in extra innings. I know that removing Piazza and Floyd shores up the defense and Phillips went out in a double switch, but collectively that's just too high an offensive price to pay when the other team is two swings of the bat from sending you to extra innings.

I haven't yet done anything with the release of Harry Blackmun's papers from his years on the Supreme Court, but Shea Hot Corner reprinted some images of some of the more amusing examples pertaining to baseball. (And did you know that Blackmun belonged to a society of Cubs fans co-founded by Dick Cheney?)

On another note, Blackmun's papers include this item:

Chief Justice William Rehnquist set up an intricate pool for the 1992 presidential election with justices wagering on the results of each state. After the election Rehnquist announced that "Sandra (Day O'Connor) proved to be positively prescient," winning $18.30.

Presumably, if they ran one like that in 2000, they had to disband it.

The Blue Jays, like the A's, have a brain trust committed to, among other things, patience at the plate. But while the A's have had some signal successes with that formula in the past, we have yet to really see dividends in Toronto.

One player on the Jays' roster who could use an infusion of patience is 26-year old second baseman Orlando Hudson, an athletic player who's flashed signs of power but has yet to make himself an offensive asset. Hudson drew just 39 walks last season. If you've been watching Hudson thus far for signs of patience, though, the early signs may be modestly encouraging.

Through the opening three-game set (albeit) against the Tigers, Hudson saw 4.09 pitches per plate appearance, up from 3.65 and 3.76 his first two seasons. Today, against the Red Sox and Bronson Arroyo, Hudson was a picture of patience his first four trips to the plate:

Second Inning, first and second, none out: Ball, Foul, Foul, Ball, Ball, Hudson walked.

Fourth Inning, leading off: Strike looking, Ball, Foul, Ball, Ball, Hudson walked.

Fifth Inning, second and third, one out: Ball, Strike looking, Ball, Ball, Foul, Hudson struck out looking, Hinske caught stealing, catcher to shortstop.

Eighth Inning, runner on first, one out: Foul, Ball, Ball, Hudson doubled to center, Hinske scored

In the ninth, however, Hudson faced David McCarty, making his debut as a pitcher with a runner on first and one out; Hudson swung at McCarty's first pitch and grounded out. I wasn't watching the game; maybe McCarty threw him a meatball. Still, you'd like a guy to take a pitch in that situation, see what McCarty has to offer and whether he can get the ball over the plate in a real game.

Overall, though, looks like another small step towards Hudson learning a valuable skill: 5 plate appearances, 23 pitches seen (4.6/plate appearance), including 13 balls, three strikes taken, 5 fouled off, and an extra-base hit. Keep your eyes on Hudson to see if this keeps up; if it does, I wouldn't be surprised to see more power follow from forcing pitchers to throw him better pitches.

By now, you've probably seen Alex Belth's interview with Bill James. I just wanted to highlight one of the best non-answer answers to a question I've ever seen, when James says, "This question requires me to think in ways that I simply don't think." That's a combination of blunt candor, evasion and philosophical depth that even Don Rumsfeld would have to envy.

Joe Mauer's promising rookie season gets put rapidly on the shelf, as he'll need knee surgery and is expected to miss a month. Matt LeCroy, the only plausible alternative with the bat at the position, left tonight's game in the 2nd inning with a rib injury. Johan Santana left last night's game with cramps in his pitching arm, while Torii Hunter's hamstring is ailing and could sideline him for4 or 5 days. Tough times in Minnesota.

From the CBSSportsline play-by-play of the first inning tonight (in reverse order):

Phillips singled hard to right. Cameron homered hard to deep left center. Piazza homered hard to deep left center, Floyd scored. Floyd singled hard to right.

As opposed to soft home runs?

Looks like another good first inning, anyway. Could be a long year in Atlanta.

UPDATE: 6-0 entering the bottom of the third. I'm starting to feel pretty good about the Mets' offense, if they can keep them all healthy (with Jose Reyes on the DL, we're not there yet). Score one for the incurable optimists.

FOURTH INNING UPDATE: Not feeling so good about the pitching staff. Traschel blew the whole 6-run lead. Grant Roberts is in. Bases loaded, nobody out.

UPDATE: 11-run inning for the Braves. Long night for all concerned.

UPDATE: Piazza cracks his third home run in two days. Of course, it's still 14-7 Braves.

FINAL UPDATE: Braves win 18-10. Piazza has an even better game than Matsui did yesterday, and is now just one homer shy of Carlton Fisk's career record for catchers.

George Bamberger has died.

Bamberger's tenure as Mets manager wasn't the high point of his career, but he seemed like a decent guy who just didn't have the horses, much like Joe Torre before him. I'll always remember him more as the manager of the Brewers in the years when they gave full time jobs to, among others, Gorman Thomas, reclamation project Mike Caldwell, platoon players Cecil Cooper and Ben Oglivie, and raw rookie Paul Molitor, and wound up with an overnight contender.

Happy blogoversary yesterday to our friends at Redbird Nation, which has really become one the web's best and most prolific baseball blogs.

Here I was, listening to the Met game on the radio and opening the play-by-play on CBS Sportsline, and before CBS even gets the lineups loaded, Kaz Matsui jacks the first pitch of the game, the first official pitch he's seen as a major league ballplayer, out of Turner Field for a home run.

Nowhere to go but down? Maybe. But it's a start. (Meanwhile, looks like the Yankees are reminding Victor Zambrano not to tug on Superman's cape).

UPDATE: RBI double for KazMat in his second time up; Glavine and Russ Ortiz are both getting teed off on tonight.

Mmmmmm . . . a full day's action yesterday, highlighted by the Royals' late rally and the Twins' dramatic 11-inning victory on Shannon Stewart's walk-off three-run homer. One interesting development in the Twins game that I'd missed in spring training: Michael Cuddyer's appearance at second base (actually his second, as he spotted there once last season). In the short run, Cuddyer's effort to reinvent himself as a utilityman who can play second and third should help alleviate the Twins' logjam of outfielders. But you have to wonder: if Cuddyer can handle the position defensively well enough to be out there in an extra inning game, maybe it will wind up being worth considering a full-time move so he can eat Luis oh-for-Threevas' lunch.

From the Indians' perspective, it's pretty sad to have had to deal Milton Bradley, although as David Pinto has noted, Bradley's latest antics didn't really give them a choice, especially on a young team where the rules of the road still need to be imprinted on the youngsters. Of course, while they may be in a weak division, the Indians weren't likely to go far this year anyway, so losing Bradley's not as bad as it looks. And the player they got in return, 21-year-old outfielder Franklin Gutierrez, appears to be a Grade A prospect of the type the Indians don't presently have anywhere near the major league level (the Baseball Prospectus compares him to Juan Gonzalez).

For the Dodgers, while Gutierrez is a stiff price to pay and Bradley is a certifiable head case, this should be a steal unless Bradley just spins out of control. It will definitely be a challenge to Jim Tracy to get the most from Bradley, but if he can repeat his monster year last season, he'll give the Dodgers a desperately needed offensive infusion in a division LA can definitely win. (I'm not so much in favor of reviving the Shawn Green-to-1B idea, but given the absence of a decent first baseman, that may have been inevitable).

UPDATE: Fun but misleading fact to cheer up Dodgers fans: baseball-reference.com tabs the most similar player to Bradley, through age 25, as Gil Hodges. Well, except for the being totally insane part. (PECOTA prefers Roy White).

The Mets dump Roger Cedeno on the Cardinals and eat most of his salary, getting just minor league veterans Wilson Delgado and Chris Widger in return. From the Mets' perspective, this had to be done; Cedeno didn't have a place on the team and wasn't happy or motivated.

For the Cards, you'd be tempted to say that a change of scenery would do him good, but he's had four changes of scenery before, and it's only done him good once. First thing I'd do is get Cedeno's eyes tested. . . he's a corner outfielder who's got no power, terrible defensive instincts, and sporadic plate patience; he's a speed player who's lost a step, and who knows how old he really is? I can't see him as a useful spare part.

I'd echo the Mad Hibernian's comments on Jae Seo not making the Mets' rotation, which caught me (and, apparently, Seo) by surprise, even though I'd been following the battle for starting slots. While my gut reaction is to rip the Mets for giving a rotation slot to a retread like Scott Erickson, I can understand the logic in trying to get Erickson back to top form and then flip him for prospects. On the other hand, you hate to do this to a guy like Seo, who's young and was the team's best pitcher for much of last season. (Of course, the real problem is giving a big contract and a rotation slot to a pitcher who is both washed-up and untradeable, but that's another matter). I'm less upset about Grant Roberts failing to make the rotation, as I remain unconvinced that he has the arm strength to throw 200 innings.

On the plus side, Tyler Yates really has impressed this spring; while his minor league record is unimpressive, you never know with pitchers. And Aaron Heilman, who was so horrendous last year that I was ready to give up hope, was much more effective this spring. If the team can deal Erickson and - much as I hate to see him go - Leiter, things may be looking up.

Sunday at 8 on TNT, Matthew Modine is going where, apparently, no actor has gone before: portraying Honus Wagner on film. The tall, thin, and rather callow-looking Modine doesn't seem like the best choice for the rough-hewn, barrel-chested, bow-legged slugger from coal country in Western Pennsylvania, but Robert DeNiro, who seems the obvious choice if you've seen pictures of Wagner, is too old for the part, and it sounds like Modine's at least made a sincere effort to pick up some baseball chops and some of Wagner's mannerisms. Time will tell if he's successful (not that I'll be watching a movie that's on against the Sopranos, but I'll be tempted to see if I can catch a bit of the first hour). Wagner's certainly a guy worth remembering: as I've noted before, for the decade of his peak he was the best hitter for average in baseball, the best hitter for power in baseball, the game's best base thief, tough as nails and unafraid of anyone, and the nicest guy in the game to boot. As Modine learned from his research for the part:

"I didn't know much about Wagner besides the baseball card," he says. "When I researched him, I found out he was one of the best guys ever to play the game. I couldn't find anything negative about him."

Of course, the cast list suggests cause for great concern: will no one portray Butts?

Jon Weisman has some cogent suggestions for making spring training stats more meaningful. Personally, while I'd like to see this, I don't pay attention to spring stats unless they're real outliers, like a guy with a 12.00+ ERA or something, or a pitcher (such as Aaron Heilman this season) with a newly impressive K/BB ratio.

From a Daily News item about Elaine's, the famous celeb-infested Manhattan eatery:

Where else would Keith Hernandez make love to a socialite's girlfriend in the bathroom, only to be discovered by the guy and say, "Sorry, man," with a pat on his back?

If you missed it, as I did, Richard Ceccarelli at Pearly Gates has a few quotes from Bill James' appearance on Dennis Miller last night.

Well, I'm feeling much better now about coughing up $22 for Jorge Posada for my rotisserie team. I also have a second team, an AL-NL league, auto-drafted on Yahoo, 5x5 (traditional 8 categories plus Runs Scored and K), head-to-head, ten franchises, so each one is quite a bit stronger than your regular roto squad. Here's how mine came out in yesterday morning's auto-draft:

Read More »

The potential loss of Mark Ellis for the season (also noted here) is a big blow to the A's, who had counted on Ellis as the lynchpin of their infield defense, especially while breaking in new shortstop Bobby Crosby (who, as it turned out, broke Ellis instead). With the demise of the A's high-OBP formula, the team has increasingly relied on pitching and defense, and will now scramble for the latter. Frank Menechino and Esteban German are named as likely stopgaps, although ex-Met Marco Scutaro may also be in the mix.

Jon Weisman says I told you so in observing that promising youngster Edwin Jackson's rotation slot with the Dodgers is in jeopardy from a bad spring.

Ladies and Gentlemen: your last place New York Yankees!

Head here and scroll down to see David Pinto's live blogging of this morning's game. From what I saw, the Yanks have some work to do on their defense. But, of course, it is early.

At long last, I've gotten back around to finishing another Established Win Shares Levels report, this one for the NL West. It's not looking so hot for getting the other two divisions up before the non-Japanese part of the MLB schedule opens up on April 6, but I'll do what I can, and hope to have the whole thing wrapped by the first week of the season. If you're just joining this enterprise in progress, you can start by checking out my prior reports:

*Top 25 Players in Baseball and explanation of EWSL method

*AL West EWSL Report & explanation of team method

*AL East EWSL Report & slight modification to team method

*AL Central EWSL Report

Recall that the projected win totals are probably a bit on the low side, in part because I only list 23 players, and that these aren't really projections at all, so much as estimates of how much established major league talent is on each roster. On to the Mild, Mild West:

Read More »

If you think you've had a tough month: Brendan Donnelly has lost half the blood in his body from severe nosebleeds after breaking his nose in 20 places when he was hit in the face by a fly ball March 9.

So the Mets have dealt Timo Perez to the White Sox for Matt Ginter, a decidedly unimpressive pitching prospect. This was the next best thing to dumping Roger Cedeno, who unlike Timo is entirely useless, as GM Jim Duquette concedes:

"We're still trying to find a more meaningful role for Roger, which I'm not sure exists right now,"

More cleaning out the archives of things I'd meant to post . . . Greg Skidmore at Sports Law Blog argues that the steroid scandal and the Kobe Bryant scandal are just the latest examples of things people talk about but that, in the end, fans will ignore when it's time to pony up for tickets:

[F]ans care much less about what players do on their own time and much more about what they do on the field. Major League Baseball lost its greatest number of fans, not because of any off-the-field scandal, after the strike in 1994, which took players off the field and cancelled the World Series. Fans have often responded to criminal allegations with cheers and not boos. The sports world has recently witnessed this phenomenon in the context of Kobe Bryant, who has been resoundly cheered in many arenas. Ray Lewis was charged with manslaughter, but Ravens fans continue to buy his jersey by the hundreds. Numerous professional athletes have been suspended for drug abuse, sanctioned for domestic battery and charged with driving under the influence. Does this matter? Not so long as the player continues to hit home runs, hit buzzer beaters and rush for 100 yards a game.

I don't think it's just sports fans, either; this is equally true of Martha Stewart, who people want to see stay out of prison more because she does good things for them than because they care about her. It's also why Marv Albert was welcomed back by Knicks fans. Forgiven? Not so much as we just wanted to hear him do the games again.

Chris at A Large Regular has some thoughts on the 1991 baseball draft.

David Cameron had a mixed review of Kaz Matsui's batting technique over at Baseball Prospectus (subscription only):

The main obstacle to overcome will be balance at the plate. Matsui, like Ichiro, tends to transfer his weight forward far earlier than most major league hitters. By the time the bat catches up to his body, he's leaning forward on his front foot, and has eliminated the power that comes from the lower half of the body on contact. His wrists are quick enough to get the bat through the zone and his bat speed still allows him to pull the ball. However, with the weight already leading him toward the mound, he compensates by swinging down on the ball, creating a large number of worm-burning grounders and low line drives.

Occasionally, he keeps his weight back in a more orthodox approach, but adds an uppercut loop to his swing, ostensibly to create more power. Whether this is something the Mets have been working with him on or something he brought from Japan, it does not look natural, and it creates a hole in his swing that can easily be exploited by good breaking balls down in the zone. It is clear that he prefers his hack-and-slash method that improves bat control but robs him of any real power.

Read the whole thing, if you can.

Jody Gerut, at his weblog, argues why baseball's steroids policy shouldn't be beefed up:

The point of most contention is that the first time you test positive, your identity is concealed. Personally, I like the idea that if by chance a player tests positive the first time he has a chance to correct it before his identity is made known, and I don't believe this is clandestine, sneaky, or underhanded in any way. I don't take steroids, but I do take a number of vitamin and protein supplements in order to make sure I'm getting enough nutrients. If by chance one of these supplements is creating an anabolic effect causing me to test positive, I want to have the chance to show the designated doctors all of my supplements to determine which one is creating the false positive. That way I can either throw it out or if the test itself is flawed they can reassess the test before anything is made public. Consider what happens to me if on the first try I test positive and that information is made available to everyone. Everything that I have worked for in my career is now tainted with this false positive. All the weight training, mental training, visual training, education, preparatory work with defense, offense, my reputation, everything... thousands and thousands of hours of work- gone in an instant. And even if I am later cleared of any wrongdoing and it is decided that I did not violate the spirit of the rules, that accusation would follow me forever, even after I was done playing the game.

Quite frankly, I don't need that stress.

We could go to Olympic testing standards. 365 days a year, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. Sounds good, right? It sounded good to me until I heard it like this: 365 days means that every time you go to your uncle's house, or to a movie, or to a bar, or to church, or if you are sound asleep in your own bed, a knock on your door can come at any time of the day for you to be tested. And if you are not home they will come and find you whereever you are and force you to test. They even go as far as making you register when you leave your hometown and for any reason, be it Thanksgiving at a family member's house, and weekend in South Beach, or a safari in Africa. They will find you if your number is called. Still sound good to you? No, it didn't sound good to me either after it was put to me this way.

I think Gerut is probably overstating the privacy intrustions on 365-days-a-year testing, but he does have a point about not releasing the player's name on a single test result. Read the whole thing.

(Link via Clutch Hits).

Following up on my point the other day on Fred McGriff, the Baseball Prospectus' PECOTA forecast is pretty kind to McGriff, projecting out his weighted median forecast at .265/.472/.346, with a 60th percentile projection of .273/.486/.352. Those aren't great numbers, but they certainly suggest a guy who deserves a roster spot. Then there's his baseball-reference profile; consider the OPS+ figures at age 40 for the 10 most similar players at age 39:

Reggie Jackson - 116
Willie McCovey - 97
Willie Stargell - 130
Chili Davis - Retired
Tony Perez - 105
Ernie Banks - 52
Dave Winfield - 137
Harold Baines - 132
Dwight Evans - Retired
Eddie Murray - 87

Two retired guys and two disasters (Banks and Murray), yes, but also one guy who was still a contributor (Reggie) and three who were still smacking the ball (Stargell, Winfield, and Baines). But all this assumes that you're taking McGriff straight up, when in fact, like a lot of aging players, his value could be maximized by platooning him. The Crime Dog batted .275/.441/.365 last season against RHP, compared to a pitiable .194/.398/.219 against LHP. Over the past three seasons, his splits are .297/.532/.380 against RHP and .240/.431/.304 against LHP. That's where he could still have value.

Nice little move by the Expos to pick up onetime hot prospect John Patterson in exchange for Randy Choate, a serviceable but replaceable reliever. Still just 26, Patterson has struck out 74 batters in 85.2 major league innings while walking 37. He needs to improve that walk number and get the gopher balls under control; there's no question that Patterson's still a project. But he's still got upside.

So, Fred McGriff has been cut by the aimless Devil Rays, who decided to go with that young up-and-comer, 36-year-old Tino Martinez. Honestly, I'm baffled by the idea that McGriff can't get any kind of major league job. He's always kept himself in good shape, he seems to be well-liked, and he's apparently healthy again after last season's knee injury. And his days as a serious masher are hardly ancient history; compare his average season from 1999-2002 to that of Tino or of last year's Tampa 1B, the man the Yankees picked up to back up Jason Giambi, Travis Lee:

PLAYER	AB	H	2B	3B	HR	R	RBI	BB	AVG	SLG	OBP	OPS	HPB	GIDP
McGriff	533	155	25	1	30	73	104	77	.291	.512	.379	891	2	14
Martinez	565	150	28	2	25	79	96	55	.266	.456	.334	790	4	14
Lee	468	117	25	7	13	60	66	62	.251	.394	.338	732	2	12

The point here isn't that this is a particularly relevant comparison, but it was not long ago at all that McGriff was churning out 30-HR, 100-RBI seasons and an OPS close to .900 like clockwork - not impressive for Fred McGriff, but numbers that most mere mortals would be more than happy to see from their first baseman. McGriff had a bad year last season, due to a combination of age, his first-ever serious injury, and Dodger Stadium; even so, he batted .249/.428/.322 (park-adjusted OPS+ of 99), compared to .273/.429/.352 (OPS+ of 106) for Tino and .275/.459/.348 (OPS+ of 111) for Lee. That's not that much of a difference, particularly compared to Tino. And yes, McGriff is 40 and it's hard to bounce back at that age. But given how productive he was and how recently he was doing it, don't you think somebody would give him a chance, at least as a part-timer or a bat off the bench?

David Pinto also speculated a while back that McGriff wouldn't belong in the Hall of Fame. That, too, is a subject that merits more extensive analysis another day, when you look at how today's offensive standards have changed. Just on the quick-and-dirty OPS+ metric, McGriff's career OPS+ of 134 is pretty healthy for a guy who had just over 10,000 plate appearances; that puts him just off the top 100 of all time, and I wonder how many guys with an OPS+ of 130 or higher and 10,000 plate appearances aren't in the Hall.

But at least on the raw numbers, it's worth remembering how unprecedented it is for a guy with McGriff's numbers to be on the outside looking in. There are 24 players who have played 2000 or more career games with a career OBP of .370 or higher and a career slugging average of .500 or higher - 21 Hall of Famers, plus Barry Bonds, Rafael Palmeiro, and Fred McGriff. If you drop the bar to .475 career slugging, you get 5 more, 4 Hall of Famers and Norm Cash. That's pretty good company.

Skip this if you're bored to tears by someone else's fantasy baseball team, but in the interests of putting my mouth where my money is, here's my 2004 rotisserie team. AL league, traditional roto rules (4x4, 12 teams, $260 for 23 slots, 10 reserves).

Read More »

Kelly Wunsch's delivery is nasty in more ways than one: last season, Wunsch allowed just 17 hits in 36 innings - but hit 7 batters with pitches, a ratio that has to be some kind of record. Over the last three seasons, the White Sox middleman has drilled 18 batters compared to just 64 who have gotten a hit off him, almost one hit batsman for every three hits allowed.

Two new-to-me Cubs blogs: Cubs Now and The View From The Bleachers. Check 'em out if you're looking for more on the Cubbies.

Buster Olney has an interesting anonymous interview with "Player X" about steroids and the union. Check out the Primates, who of course are busy trying to guess his identity, assuming that Olney didn't change any details (the best guess there sounds like Matt Stairs).

Two words to send a chill down any Met fan's spine, when seen together: "Reyes" and "hamstring."

Two good ones from Redbird Nation: Brian Gunn thinks Joe Sheehan is all wet for doubting whether Joe Mauer can succeed as a 6'4" catcher, given the success of a number of 6'3" catchers, including Mike Piazza; Brian also has a fun rundown of the spring training records of teams that made big leaps forward the past few years.

It's official: I concluded after catching a replay of some of Wednesday night's Mets-Astros game (mmmm . . . game) that the Astros' spring uniforms with the red jerseys are, incredibly, even uglier than the Mets' spring uniforms with the orange jerseys, the sole purpose of which appears to be to humiliate guys who come into camp overweight.

(By the way: yes, I know the blog's been a bit lean on the baseball content lately. I've been running behind on getting the latest Established Win Shares post together, and maybe it's just me, but there doesn't seem to be a whole lot of baseball news to write about since the A-Rod trade, other than the steroid issue and the usual spring training blather. But I'll be back in gear in another week or two, especially after my rotisserie draft on March 21.)

With the Cardinals banking on a surgically reconstructed Chris Carpenter to be their #3 starter in 2004, I have to reiterate what I wrote three years ago (eighth item down): the fragile Carpenter should be moved to the bullpen, where he'll have a better chance at staying healthy to unleash his nasty stuff on hitters.

Of course, the Cards are too desperate for starters to consider that option, and to be honest, there are certainly examples (Steve Karsay, Tom Gordon) of converted relievers whose health records haven't improved much on the switch to the bullpen. But I'm not optimistic about Carpenter as a dependable every-fifth-day guy.

I've been wondering lately: what's the right age to start playing organized baseball? We had signed up my son (who's 6) for Little League, but he just kept saying he didn't want to do it. He enjoys playing whiffleball with me and sometimes with his sister or his cousin, but he was insistent that he didn't want to play in the league. It's hard to tell with kids that age; he's been known before to resist things but ultimately enjoy them once we made him go. Then again, we didn't want to spoil the fun of baseball for him by forcing it down his throat. Finally, as we approached the time for us to start attending meetings, we decided to leave the decision to him, and explained that if he said no, that was it for Little League for this year (although he could try next year).

Perhaps predictably, once the dynamics shifted from him resisting us to having to take responsibility for the decision himself, he was less resistant, and told us he needed some time to think about it. Ultimately, though, he said no, and we passed on this season. But it left me wondering if we're making a mistake -- whether he really should be playing this year if he wants to keep up with the other kids, or whether he'll be able to pick things up just fine a year or two from now. I'm not under any illusion that he's going to go on to play professional baseball some day, but I'd like him to have the opportunity to play the game for a few years and be good enough at it to at least have a little fun, unlike my own disastrous one-season playing career in the town recreational league at age 9. I'm just wondering if missing a year of Little League while his contemporaries are playing it will put him behind the curve.

Via David Pinto, we caught up with Brian Gunn's look at Barry Bonds' 2001 power surge in the context of the steroids/HGH flap (which remains basically unproven at this point). The interesting part: Bonds' tremendous leap forward in walks in 2001 didn't start until after his home run rate took off.

(Also note that the steep decline in Bonds' strikeout rate didn't come until 2002).

I can't say the Mets got off to an impressive start yesterday, but it sure is good to see box scores again.

Travis Nelson over at Boy of Summer has a fascinating, in-depth look at historical attendance patterns when a team enters or exits another team's market. The results may surprise you.

Alex Belth argues that the 2004 Yankees' apparent dominance could evaporate quickly:

As great as the Yankees and Red Sox appear, they are a string of injuries away from missing the playoffs (remember the 1987 Mets?). It's this uncertainty, this vulnerability that helps make the game so compelling.

Well, there are few seasons I remember better (or more bitterly) than 1987 . . . the '87 Mets were actually well-equipped to deal with injuries, just not injuries so concentrated on one part of the team, including all 7 of their quality starting pitchers (Gooden, Darling, Fernandez, Ojeda, Aguilera, Cone and Leach) and their relief ace. To summarize:

*Dwight Gooden: Missed April & May in drug rehab.

*Ron Darling: Tore thumb in critical September 11 game (on a Vince Coleman bunt that broke up Darling's no-hitter in the sixth inning); the Cards won the game and Darling missed rest of the season.

*Sid Fernandez injured his knee running out a triple in late May, missed several starts and wasn't quite right thereafter.

*Bob Ojeda and Rick Aguilera suffered arm injuries when Davey Johnson pushed the team to a 4-man rotation in April in Gooden's absence; Ojeda, who'd gone 18-5 the prior year, missed most of the season (starting just 7 games on the year), and Aguilera didn't return until late August.

*David Cone, a rookie pressed into the rotation in April when Ojeda went down, had just gotten in a groove for a few starts when his finger was crushed while bunting. He did not return until August.

*Terry Leach stepped in brilliantly to the rotation, but Leach also went on the 14-day DL in late July with a knee injury.

*Closer Roger McDowell missed the first six weeks with a hernia operation, leading as well to a subpar year for Jesse Orosco, who was heavily overworked in McDowell's absence. McDowell wasn't the same after his return and gave up the Terry Pendleton homer that turned the season in that same September 11 game.

Add it all up, and a team with 7 outstanding starting pitchers wound up giving 19 starts to raw rookie John Mitchell, 5 to hopeless cases Don Schulze and Tom Edens, 1 to rookie reliever Jeff Innis (who lasted 4 innings; Innis hadn't started since high school), 3 to an ineffective John Candelaria, and even tried to drag Tom Seaver out of retirement.

Besides, if there had been a wild card and current divisional alignments, the Mets (with the same record) would still have won their division every year from 1984 to 1990. It would take a monumental catastrophe to keep the Yankees out of the postseason. If this Yankee team loses Rivera for six weeks and has serious injuries to Mussina, Brown, Vazquez, Lieber, Contreras . . . well, they'll just be the 1999 Indians.

Via David Pinto, I found the link to this fascinating Eric McErlain analysis from 2002 arguing that many nutritional supplements may contain steroids, and that this could present real enforcement problems for baseball if players didn't actually know that they were taking them (or conveniently find themselves able to claim so). My summary doesn't do this justice; go read the whole thing.

Dr. Manhattan is back from another of his hiatuses (hiati?) with lots on the Yankees' acquisition of A-Rod, starting here.

While I'm at it, go check out Richard Ceccarelli's Angels blog, the Pearly Gates.

More baseball blogging around here as we get closer to the season.

So the Cubs tear up the contract they signed with Derrek Lee to give him a better deal, a 3-year deal instead of a 1-year deal. Remember when Gene Orza from the Players Union told us that "A-Rod shouldn't be allowed to tear up his contract in the same way that Tom Hicks shouldn't be allowed to"? You think the union will tell the Cubs they can't do this?

Didn't think so.

I am shocked and saddened (well, mildly miffed) that my hometown newspaper, the Rockland/Westchester Journal-News, managed to write a profile of baseball bloggers and leave out this site, given that the Mad Hibernian and I are originally Nanuet natives. Go check it out, anyway - it has some good coverage of a number of other fine baseball bloggers who are worthy of the ink.

David Pinto links to a cool chart developed by Colby Cosh graphically illustrating a number of major league starters' relative averages of walks, strikeouts and homers allowed per inning.

I'm a little late to this one, but Al Bethke had an interesting interview (second item down) with minor league veteran Chris Coste, now with the Brewers organization.

Jeff Kent tries lamely to justify the possible prevalence of steroids in today's game:

“Babe Ruth didn’t do steroids?” Kent was quoted as saying. “How do you know? ... People are saying Lou Gehrig and Babe Ruth — how do you know those guys didn’t do steroids? So all of a sudden, you’ve got guys doing steroids now in the 20th century, 21st century? Come on.

“Keep going backward. Pete Rose? Who knows? ... How do we know those guys were clean? Did they test those guys?”

Um, has Kent ever seen a picture of Ruth in the 30s or Pete Rose in the 70s? Maybe there was somebody out there experimenting with the stuff, but it's a well-known fact you can document just by looking at photographs that before the late 80s it was largely believed (with a few exceptions like Honus Wagner and Stan Musial) that strength training was bad for ballplayers. I doubt much of anybody took steroids in baseball before around 1987-88 or so, when you began to see the first signs of guys lifting weights.

Andrew Koch runs his own Win Shares-driven AL standings analysis, although he departs from my Established Win Shares Levels analysis (see here, here and here) in two ways, only one of which is an improvement:

1. He uses only 2003 WS, rather than a 2- or 3-year Established Performance Level. I prefer my approach, since a longer sample gives you a better look at a player's abilities. Randy Johnson's 2001 and 2002 are highly relevant to projecting him in 2004, for example, notwithstanding the injuries that wrecked his 2003. This also creates a second problem associated with the other adjustment.

2. He adjusts for the fact that a team's players will wind up with a fixed number of plate appearances and innings pitched, and thus projects various players' time upwards or downwards and adjusts them. In some ways this is an improvement, since my EWSL system doesn't adjust down when a team picks up everyday players to ride the bench or, like the Indians, gives everyday jobs to a bunch of guys who didn't play full seasons last year. In others, it's not so good, because he has to make rough estimates about players who were hurt last season.

It's a useful and interesting exercise, anyway, and I found it an interesting contrast, although his projected standings came out pretty close to mine anyway - both of us project the Yanks, Royals and Mariners to take the divisions, with the Red Sox winning the wild card as with 100+ wins but not finishing a particularly close second to the Yankees and with the AL Central as a whole having a lousy year.

Neither of us really has a formal adjustment for player age, of course (which is why I think the Angels should be favored above the Mariners and why I'm somewhat optimistic about the Twins), although Koch is certainly cognizant of the issue. Go check it out.

Yes, now it's official. Spring training isn't officially underway until the year's first story about the new, mature Darryl Strawberry.

(Stay tuned for the other signs of spring).

Moving on to the AL Central . . . you may have wondered, watching as the Yankees, Red Sox and Angels grew stronger while other teams East and West held their ground, who was going to lose all those games that other teams plan to win . . . look no further. This is one ugly division. There are only three players in the whole division with an EWSL of 20 or greater, which is one fewer than the Yankees have just in their infield (counting Posada).

This is the fourth in my series on Established Win Shares Levels; see here for an explanation of the EWSL method and ranking of the top 25 players, here for an explanation of the team-by-team method in the post on the AL West, and here for my AL East analysis (in which I noted a downgrade of the arbitrary rating of rookie starting pitchers from 7 Win Shares to 5). (I haven't yet gone back and re-adjusted the AL East and West numbers after the Rodriguez-Soriano trade).

As I and others have noted before, EWSL isn't a perfect tool for evaluating team rosters; again, what it measures is how much established major league talent is on each roster. A quick reminder on notations: players marked # are evaluated on their last 2 seasons rather than last 3; players marked * are evaluated only on 2003; and players marked + are rookies assigned an arbitrary WS total.

The AL Central:

Read More »

In case you missed it, from late last week: did you know that the YES Network (presumably at the urging of George Steinbrenner, who was once convicted of making illegal campaign contributions to Richard Nixon), was a major donor to the group (also including such distinguished John Kerry supporters as Bob Torricelli) that ran particularly pointed anti-Howard Dean ads in Iowa (the ads that showed Osama bin Laden and questioned whether Dean had the experience to deal with him)?

One wonders whether YES' anti-Dean position had anything to do with his threat to regulate the media.

Damien at Shea Daily (now jedikaos.net) notes that if you average out the portions of A-Rod's contract that the Rangers actually paid against the three years he played in Arlington, you get an average annual salary of $46,666,666.67. Even I can't justify that as a good deal.

Not much blogging this morning, as I'm finishing up my Established Win Shares analysis of the AL Central, which is on deck for tomorrow morning (early preview: the Central stinks). In the meantime, if you haven't already, head on over and check out the conclusion of Mike Carminti's seemingly interminable but fascinating "Halls of Relief" series (I've only had time to read parts of it myself), in which he wraps up his history of relief pitching by stacking up the greatest bullpens of all time (there's also links to the rest of the series). Nobody goes off on a tangent quite like Mike Carminti; he's practically got enough material there for a book.

Jurgen at the uniquely-named Some Calzone for Derek looks at established performance levels for Runs Created for the 2004 Yankees lineup. Check it out.

John Perricone at Only Baseball Matters has been on a bit of a crusade to dial down the anti-steroids speculation and rhetoric around the game. He links here to this Reason Magazine article in which Dayn Perry argues that the adverse health risks of steroids haven't been scientifically proven, and here he makes an essentially libertarian argument against regulating steroids, at least until there's better science on the issue.

I've agreed before with the point Perricone makes repeatedly (see here and here for examples) that the media has been way too quick to point fingers at specific players (or, for that matter, quote generalized percentages of players) without any evidence. On the other hand, the lack of evidence is no excuse for giving up on the story; the answer is to keep digging.

I haven't really digested Perry's piece yet . . . I'm sympathetic to anti-junk-science arguments, but I'm not sure I buy the "there's nothing wrong with being on steroids" argument, which sometimes tends to sound a bit too much like the tobacco executives for even my right-wing tastes. But it's a perspective worth taking seriously.

I don't doubt that there's a lot of players out there who are clean, and that a lot of guys are bulking up with the help of supplements and the like that are perfectly legit but just way beyond what was available until recently. Still, I do wonder: I was a diligent 5-6-days-a-week weightlifter myself for about 4 years in college and law school, at an age when it's a lot easier to build muscle mass than it is in your thirties. I started out weighing around 120 (I'm just under 5'10"), which was way underweight and down from where I'd been when I started college, and got up to about 140 in a year or so, but never got past that; I came away with a real appreciation of how hard it is to keep bulking up (then again, as you can guess from the numbers, my frame isn't really designed for being Arnold Schwarzenegger).

Anyway, go follow the links; there's a lot to chew on there.

A friend recently sent me an email about an event where a prominent baseball writer spoke freely about, among other things, the view that a certain well-known player is on steroids and another recently stopped taking them and has slimmed down dramatically . . . I won't reprint the charges, since (1) they're third-hand at best, (2) they weren't really intended for public distribution, and (3) it's not my place to smear the names of prominent players without any personal knowledge of the facts.

But face it: the fact that a well-known insider would make casual remarks about this stuff to strangers . . . what that says to me, really, is that the insiders know that the truth is coming out soon, and respecting a code of silence about it all doesn't really serve much purpose anymore. (David Pinto has noted one prominent crack in the wall). I really, really don't want to learn that one of my favorite players has been using steroids; chances are, you don't either. It's going to be unpleasant and distasteful all around. But as I noted in May of 2002, the truth is coming sooner or later. To me, it smells like sooner.

David Pinto alerts us to the death of Lawrence Ritter at age 81. The Mad Hibernian and I paid tribute here and here to The Glory of Their Times.

Matt Welch and the Primates tear into this turgid muck of a column by know-nothing LA Times sportswriter Bill Plaschke, ripping into the Dodgers for hiring the young, stat-oriented Paul DePodesta as GM (unsurprisingly, I like the move, as does Pinto). From what I've seen online, the LAT is something of a West Coast version of the Boston Globe -- the same dull, biased newswriting, the same dreary, don't-read-me layout, the same fatuous editorials and idiot left-leaning op-ed columnists, and the same bitter, flat-earth troglodytes on the sports page. In short, a newspaper where nothing has changed and nothing has been learned since 1975. Anyway, Welch has more patience than I usually do for plowing through this stuff, and promises to start a "Moneyboner of the Day" feature mocking this kind of anti-knowledge baseball writing. Good luck.

I did get one useful thing from this, though; the Clutch Hits thread had a link to this proto-sabermetric LIFE Magazine article by Branch Rickey, reprinted at Jim Fraser's homepage (I've added it here as the link by the Rickey quote as well), in which Rickey lauded on base percentage, a combined OBP/Slugging % metric and ERA and its components as the keys to evaluating players. As Rickey noted at the time:

It is the hardest thing in the world to get big league baseball to change anything—even spikes on a pair of shoes. But they will accept this new interpretation of baseball statistics eventually. They are bound to.

An optimist, Rickey was; and an incredibly forward-thinking guy, for a man whose playing career began in 1905.

While he's apparently still in talks with the Cubs, ESPN reports on rumors that Greg Maddux could be close to signing with the Yankees. The rich get richer? Brian Cashman denies that he's talking to Maddux. Maddux is ideally suited for a team like the Yanks or Cubs, that can put him at the back of the rotation; he's basically a league-average starter at this stage, which is still a useful commodity as long as you don't expect him to have an ERA around 3.00 or lower.

(Warning: ESPN link opens a popup that's very hard to close).

Here's some internal links to give you my take on the Yankees' apparent acquisition of Alex Rodriguez:

*Links here, here and here on my Win Shares analysis of the Yankees, Rangers, Rodriguez and Soriano.

*A look here (and an update here) on the historic nature of Rodriguez' productivity.

*My take here and here on the Players Union sabotaging the Red Sox' attempt to get A-Rod.

*My thoughts on A-Rod's MVP award.

*Here's where I ran the numbers last fall on the Yankees' financial dominance, before they brought in Rodriguez, Sheffield, Kevin Brown and Javier Vazquez. What's scary is that they've moved on to snagging players the other rich teams can't afford.

So here I am minding my own business last night, and I check my Blackberry, and what should be there but an email message from Dr. Manhattan saying that the Yankees have all but finalized a deal with the Rangers to send Alex Rodriguez to New York for Alfonso Soriano. Lest there be any doubt what this deal was about:

"It's about flexibility," Rangers GM John Hart said last night. "We're trading the best player in the game and we're getting tremendous financial flexibility."

Sources said Texas had agreed to assume about $67 million of the $179 million left on Rodriguez's $252 million contract. The AL MVP also has agreed to defer some money by five more years - pushing the last payment back to 2025 - and at a reduced interest rate, one of the sources said.

Now, Soriano (who's young and makes very little money) is a real good player, although I remain skeptical as always about his ability to sustain a high level of offensive productivity unless he learns some plate discipline. But this leaves the Rangers with two second basemen and no shortstop; I wonder if Soriano will be moved back to short, where he played in the minors. As for the Yanks, it appears that they intend to move A-Rod to third, rather than Jeter, despite A-Rod being a far superior defensive player, and go looking for someone to play second. It won't matter; this team will be so loaded that the infield defense will be an afterthought.

Still not much doing over here on the baseball front (other than continuing work on the Established Win Shares Levels project). In the meantime, Al Bethke has a roundtable on the Brewers (really!), and Kyle Rosenkrans has news and pictures to make you think of springtime for the Mets (Newsday has more on the scientific approach of new Mets pitching coach and former A's pitching guru Rick Peterson).

Time to continue my division-by-division look at team rosters by Established Win Shares Levels. EWSLs are explained in my post raking the top 25 players in baseball by EWSL, and the team-by-team method is explained in the post on the AL West. One small change in the methodology: I downgraded rookie starting pitchers from 7 Win Shares to 5, given that rookie pitchers often struggle and given how many pitchers with a track record have less than 7 EWSL. As I and others have noted before, EWSL isn't a perfect tool for evaluating team rosters, and I'll note some of the flaws in the system as I go on; just bear in mind that what it measures is how much established major league talent is on each roster. EWSL can't and doesn't predict future progress; it just gives a sober assessment of what each player has proven in the last three seasons. A quick reminder on notations, for those of you who read the prior posts: players marked # are evaluated on their last 2 seasons rather than last 3; players marked * are evaluated only on 2003; and players marked + are rookies assigned an arbitrary WS total. On to the AL East . . .

Read More »

Joe Posnanski of the KC Star had an interview a few weeks back with Robin Roberts, baseball's best pitcher in the early 1950s and, relative to the standards of his time, one of the two or three greatest workhorses ever to take the mound in his prime. I've been reading Roberts' autobiography, My Life in Baseball (I read books a few bites at a time, and I'm generally in the middle of several at any given time); Roberts has some interesting stories (nearly everything he tells Posnanski here is almost verbatim of how he relates the same stories in the book). Roberts is 77 now, but apparently still sharp as a tack. I had the good fortune of meeting him at an autograph event a year ago; he looks kind of like Don Rumsfeld these days, a square-jawed, broad-shouldered man in his 70s.

One amazing detail that Posnanski catches that also struck me in reading Roberts' book: Roberts once threw 28 consecutive complete games. Descriptions of Roberts' tools as a pitcher often make him sound like Mariano Rivera: a guy who was able to get away with throwing nearly all fastballs due to a combination of pinpoint control, outstanding velocity and remarkably nasty movement on his heater. Roberts' vulnerability to the gopher ball made him less effective than Rivera, but imagine Mariano Rivera throwing 340 innings a year, and you've got a heck of a pitcher. (Oddly, Roberts reports that the consistent velocity and movement just came to him one day in 1947 while pitching in a summer college league; his mechanics had just clicked).

That workload -- or perhaps just an idiot manager -- caught up with him near the end of the 1955 season, though. Roberts notes in the book that he threw a complete game victory on August 19 of that year (his 20th win for the sixth straight season), and his manager, Mayo Smith, called him in the next night to relieve. He retired one batter to end the game without incident, but his arm wouldn't straighten out after his next start, and he was never the same pitcher, going 2-5 the rest of the year and seeing his ERA balloon to 4.45 the following year. Smith -- who would later lose ace Denny McLain, a similar pitcher, to arm trouble in Detroit -- had been trying to get the Phillies to .500; they finished the season 77-77, 21.5 games out of first place.

Here's a fun trivia quiz for you: there have been ten 150-RBI seasons (by nine different players) since World War II. Name them.

THE ANSWERS HERE:

Read More »

The Newberg Report, always a great source on the Texas Rangers, has some thoughts on Mike Lamb's departure from Arlington. Personally, I still think Lamb has a good year or two with the bat in him, but his horrendous fielding record (.914 career fielding percentage at 3B) will make it difficult to find work, and it wouldn't be the first time a guy who struggled in the field let it affect his hitting as well.

Don't forget to check out Jay Jaffe's Defense Independent Pitching Stats (DIPS) calculations for 2003. Having done the mid-season computations myself on the simplified version of the DIPS formula, I can appreciate how much work goes into this.

Gary Sheffield is offering to return to third base to solve the Yankees' dilemma that arose when Aaron Boone went down. As David Pinto has noted, this would be a logical solution even though it would exacerbate the extent to which the Yankee infield is already a defensive disaster.

In this post, I introduced Established Win Shares Levels, a combination of two Bill James stats, to rank the top players in baseball based on a weighted average of their accomplishments for the last three years. But EWSLs have another use: you can add up the totals on a team's roster to get a fix on how much talent (or at least, how much established major league talent) a team has, and thus an early read on comparing the strength of teams as they enter the season. Lots of cautions apply here, as you'll see as I walk through my method; this is more art than science, although I do try to make my methods as transparent as I can for purposes of allowing people to analyze and critique them.

I'm starting with the AL West, which is the smallest division, and in theory at least I'd like to find the time to get through all six (we shall see; I reserve the right to switch to doing 1 team at a time if it's easier to swallow). Here are the basics of the method:

*23 players from each team, 9 starters, 4 bench players (8 and 5 for NL teams), 10 pitchers.

*For players who only played one or two years, I used those years if the player was playing regularly in the minors or overseas the other year (except veterans who had been sent back to the minors due to poor play). This was a judgment call, but let's face it: it doesn't make sense to project Hideki Matsui by slicing his 2003 numbers in half. I didn't adjust for guys like Gil Meche who missed two years with injuries. I've indicated the players who got 2-year credit with a # and 1-year credit with a *, so you can back out the numbers if you like.

*For rookie non-pitchers with everyday jobs, I've arbitrarily pencilled in 10 Win Shares (indicated with +), which may sound optimistic, but 10 WS for an everyday player is pretty poor, and it helps counteract the bias in the system towards established veteran talent. I'll use 7 WS for rookie pitchers with rotation slots, 3 for bench players and 2 for relievers.

*I'm listing each team's unadjusted and adjusted numbers, to show the effects of the two adjustments listed above.

*I fiddled with having an age adjustment, but it got too complicated and arbitrary. Instead, I'm listing side-by-side each team's weighted average 2004 age (weighted by adjusted EWSLs). This takes studies like Avkash's recent look at average age by playing time to the next level, focusing on which teams' talent is aging (after all, if you're the Giants, it's Barry Bonds' age that matters most).

*I used WS figures from the new Bill James Handbook, so there could be slight discrepancies with online WS numbers, including the ones I used for my earlier EWSL post.

*Team EWSL totals, adjusted and unadjusted, are done from the un-rounded numbers, but I report the rounded-off totals by individual player. Don't be thrown by the fact that the "best" team in the AL West comes in at 93 wins; the way the system is structured and the fact that I'm limiting myself to 23 men per roster means we'll come in a bit below enough wins to bring the whole league home at .500.

Without further ado, in declining order of Adjusted EWSL, your American League West:

Read More »

Congratulations are in order for David Pinto, who's moving on to a job with Baseball Info Solutions, the publishers of the new Bill James Handbook. David's been a great friend to this site, and I wish him well; he'll apparently be moving his blog to their site.

I have to wonder if the Sporting News, which bought out STATS, Inc. and shut down its annual baseball handbook (which competed with TSN's inferior publication), made a huge mistake common to arrogant baseball men by failing to consider that the key STATS employees, starting with John Dewan, might go and re-start essentially the same book with a new company. Had they thought about that, they could have (1) incorporated more of STATS' elements in the TSN annual or (2) included contract provisions in the sale requiring that key employees not compete with TSN for a number of years. Looks like they whiffed on that one.

On another note, David has this amusing nugget from Peter Gammons:

Gammons and [John] Kerry played hockey against each other in prep school, and Peter told me once that Kerry was the dirtiest hockey player he ever saw.

Expect the baseball content around here to be more sporadic from now until at least mid-February, for at least three reasons:

1. There's usually not a lot of hard news coming out between late January and mid-February.

2. I'll be focusing a lot of my attention on the Democratic primaries, which are shaping up to be quite a race, at least for the next few weeks and possibly until March 2 or later.

And most importantly:

3. I'm hard at work on some bigger, more labor-intensive stuff, which I'll be rolling out intermittently over the next few weeks if I have the time; mainly, now that I have the Bill James Handbook to work from, I'll be trying to expand my look at Established Win Shares Levels to a team-by-team rundown of each division. Of course, it wouldn't be the first time if this blog started a series and couldn't finish it, but I'll get through what I can. But the EWSL stuff will eat up most of my baseball-blogging time.

Andrew Koch crunches some numbers on the question: will Roger Clemens get beaned in the NL? His answers:

Does Roger Clemens hit more batters than the average pitcher? Nope. In 2003, the average AL pitcher hit 10 batters per 1,000 batters faced (BFP), while Clemens hit only 5.7 per 1,000 BFP. Maybe Clemens has mellowed in his old age -- he must have hit more batters earlier in his career, right? Right, but not that many more. Over his career, Clemens has hit about 8 batters per 1,000 BFP. He's really not that reckless.

Do NL pitchers hit fewer batters than their AL counterparts?
Eh... sorta. National League pitchers hit 9.6 batters per 1,000 BFP, slightly less than the AL's 10. That works out to about .72 HBP per AL game and .68 HBP per NL game, a marginal difference.

Do NL "head-hunters" get hit by a lot of pitches themselves?
Yes. Eighty-two National League pitchers made at least 10 starts in 2003, and they averaged about 9 HBP/1,000 BFP. The pitchers who hit more batters than expected ("Headhunters") were hit by pitches themselves once every 224 plate appearances, while the "more gentle" pitchers were only hit half as often (once every 487 PA).

The lesson learned: If you hit too many batters in the NL, expect to get thrown at yourself.

Of course, Clemens also throws at a lot he doesn't hit; the third finding is the most interesting . . . read the whole thing. (Link via Will Carroll).

Nothing scratches the blog itch quite like a little bout of list-making. With that in mind, I decided to draw up a list of my all-time favorite books. For reasons that will become obvious, I limited myself to one book per author, and in some cases the one book is something of a stand-in for a larger body of work. The top 10-15 of these are the real immortals, the ones I go back to again and again. In some cases, I suppose, I've also stretched the definition of "book," but hey, it's my list. I also decline to apologize for the paucity of literature and the prominence of baseball memoirs on this list; I've always preferred polemics, analyses, humor and great storytelling, and I've never made pretense at being deeply intellectual in my interests:

25. Michael Lewis, Moneyball: This would rank higher except that so much of the story was already familiar to me, although in a few years' time I might change my mind. I discussed Moneyball here.

24. Raymond Woodcock, Take the Bar and Beat Me: I enjoy my job and the law, but not to the point where I can't see the humor in the profession of law. Woodcock, a reformed lawyer, graduate of Columbia Law School and practitioner at a big New York firm that has since gone under, wrote a scathingly humorous look at law school and the legal profession, and one I highly recommend to anyone considering a career in the law. Woodcock's take is blithely cynical in some places, but also self-critical, as he looks at how the law changed him, including his divorce (an occupational hazard of lawyering).

23. Leo Durocher, Nice Guys Finish Last: Leo's book, like Leo himself, is funny, vindictive, manipulative and an essential key to understanding six decades of baseball history, from Leo's run-ins with Ty Cobb to his frustrations with Cesar Cedeno.

22. Ayn Rand, Atlas Shrugged: A cliched choice for conservatives, although I came to read this one relatively late in life (just a few years ago) after I was pretty well set in my thoughts, and I still haven't read any of Rand's others. It's a tale well-told (even if John Galt's didactic speech drags a bit), skillfully playing on the unfairness, pettiness and venality of a system that gives some people the ability to decide how to dispose of the fruits of others' labors.

21. Joe Garagiola, Baseball is a Funny Game: Garagiola's was one of the first baseball books I read as a kid, and dog-eared it rather severely. It's unmistakably pre-Ball Four in its G-rated treatment of the game (it was published in 1960), and thus will seem horribly dated to the modern adult reader, but still manages to capture the earthy humor of ballplayers and the genuine love for the game of guys like Garagiola and his boyhood pal Yogi Berra, who came up from a working-class Italian-American section of St. Louis. Garagiola also captures an up-close look at important figures like Branch Rickey and Frankie Frisch. A similar collection of humorous stories about the game from the 1970s can be found in the late Ron Luciano's books.

20. Stephen Carter, Reflections of an Affirmative Action Baby: A tough choice between Carter's books on church and state, affirmative action, and judicial confirmations, so I picked the one I read first. Carter describes himself mostly as a political liberal, but he fits comfortably in the neo-liberal camp in his willingness to challenge orthodoxies of the Left, especially on questions of race and religion. His writing is also a model of clarity and directness.

19. Scott Turow, One L: Yes, this was particularly influential because (like most everybody else in my law school class) I read it the summer before starting law school at Harvard. Harvard and law schools generally have changed a good deal since the 1970s, but Turow captures perfectly (and contributes to) the essentially internal psychodrama of the place. I'm also giving Turow credit here for his works of straight fiction, which are intricate and absorbing, however seamy.

18. Stephen King, Christine: King's books are always gripping, most of all The Shining and Christine. The latter gets extra points here for King's vividly accurate portrait of the minds of high school kids and the real and imagined terrors that can overcome them.

17. Mark Bowden, Black Hawk Down: As frightening as any Stephen King book, but much sadder; Bowden not only rescued the Battle of Mogadishu from historical obscurity, but in the process drew a compelling picture of the modern American military and the men who populate it, the mindset and tactics of its Third World adversaries (sometimes in spite of decent men in their midst), and the gulf that separates the two. The book's indictment of foreign-policy adventures like Somalia is almost an afterthought but one that stays with you.

16. Barbara Tuchman, The Guns of August: If Bowden provided a readable and engrossing look at war from the ground level, Tuchman's World War I classic did the same from the top down. Tuchman recognized the Shakespearean tragedy of the onset of the Great War, and presents the plans of the various generals and the vissicitudes of the onset of war to maximize that effect. I also loved her book A Distant Mirror, a chilling compendium of the ills (literal and figurative) of 14th Century Europe.

15. Raymond Smullyan, Alice in Puzzle-Land: One of the many things I got from my mother was a love of logic puzzles, and Smullyan is the master of them. This book isn't just a collection of increasingly brain-bending puzzles, like his book The Lady or The Tiger?; it's also a clever and stylish takeoff on Lewis Carroll's bizarre cast of characters. The book is out of print and hard to find, but it remains a favorite.

14. J.K. Rowling, Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban: I was a bit of a latecomer to the Harry Potter books, having seen the first two movies with my wife (who'd read the books) before diving into this, the third installment (I've subsequently read the first two to my son); now I'm hooked. Having read all five, the third is the best, with a taut, fast-moving plot carrying lots twists (granted that a number of the surprises are telegraphed in advance). Perhaps as importantly, for the adult reader, Prisoner of Azkaban introduces the series' serious adult characters (i.e., characters who are more than just quirky authority figures).

13. The Opinions of Justice Antonin Scalia: The Caustic Conservative: Yes, I'm cheating here by citing a book that hasn't been released yet, based on its likely contents consisting of judicial opinions. I'll narrow it down here to its essence: the two opinions I particularly have in mind, and which have greatly influenced my thinking about American government and its principles, are his lone dissent in Morrison v. Olson (in which he argued that the independent counsel statute was unconstitutional, in terms that his nearly unanimous critics eventually had to concede a decade later), and Planned Parenthood v. Casey (his denunciation of the theoretical emptiness and illegitimacy of the Court's abortion jurisprudence). Taken together, the opinions set out a central theme of conservative thought about government: the need to draw governmental power only from sources whose legitimacy can be reaffirmed by keeping them accountable to the people.

12. Dr. Seuss, Horton Hears a Who: In enumerating favorite and influential books, too many people neglect the books they learned from first. But Dr. Seuss deserves a special place, and not only for charming this and many other hearers of his books to become readers of books in the first place. (I've also noted their usefulness in teaching children to read aloud). His longer books, with stories that have a moral to them, are masterpieces of precise and whimsical use of the English language, and in most cases manage to make their point without getting preachy, even on subjects (e.g., The Lorax and environmentalism) that are prone to heavy-handed one-sidedness. And they hold up so well that they are the rare children's book that an adult actually enjoys reading for its own sake.

My current favorite of these is I Had Trouble In Getting To Solla Sollew, which is a none-too-thinly-veiled slap at utopianism of all kinds. But the one that's endured the most in my consciousness since childhood is Horton Hears a Who, with a mantra that should be the creed of any pro-lifer: "A person's a person no matter how small." And its message of Horton's solitary courage when surrounded by neighbors who wish to define the Whos out of existence (one with undoubted Holocaust overtones) remains a powerful one for readers tall and small alike.

11. Baseball Prospectus 1999: I've arbitrarily picked the first of the BP books I bought. The Prospectus hasn't always been on the right side of the many arguments its staff has raised. Nor has it been as influential or groundbreaking, or nearly as entertaining, as Bill James' work; but the comparison is unfair. What matters is that they've consistently asked the important questions that were needed to move serious analysis of the game forward in the 1990s and beyond, and in so doing they've done a lot to drive the terms of debate ever since. I would never have understood baseball's post-1994 business environment and its ramifications without BP, and their work on projections, translations and pitcher workloads has often been groundbreaking. This is the first book I turn to every year to get a handle on the new season.

10. Tom Wolfe, Bonfire of the Vanities: Wolfe's novel about a Wall Street investment banker who becomes a cause celebre after hitting a young African-American teen with his car after taking a wrong turn in the Bronx just perfectly sums up all the ills of pre-Giuliani New York (only some of which have been fixed since then). The satirical bite of the book is only enhanced by Hollywood's ham-handed efforts to sanitize its portrait of New York's ethnic politics. My dad, who was on the NYPD until the late 80s, swears by the authenticity of many of the scenes in this classic.

9. Dave Barry's Only Travel Guide You'll Ever Need: If you've only read Dave Barry's columns and skipped his books, you've missed a lot. I had a tough choice between the Travel Guide and Barry's Short History of the United States, which is basically his annual year-end column writ large, but the Travel Guide packed in just an unbelievable number of laughs in a short space.

8. Lawrence Ritter, The Glory of Their Times: Simply the best oral history of baseball ever done, and the one all the others copied. Ritter got a number of ballplayers from the early 20th century to open up to him; all or nearly all of them are dead and gone now, but not their stories.

7. The Book of Job: As you can no doubt tell from the balance of content on this blog, I'm a Catholic who doesn't think about religion as often as I should. But the Bible undoubtedly informs my thinking in ways I can't even perceive, and when I have read Scripture, the book I've most enjoyed reading (from the Old Testament, ahem) is Job. Job deals with the toughest questions that face any believer in an omnipotent and benevolent God must grapple with -- why bad things happen to good people, where sin and suffering belong in the world -- and doesn't provide any easy answers.

6. Peter Gammons, Beyond the Sixth Game: The best assignment I ever had in school was when my sophomore English teacher, Mr. Donnelly, gave us a list of books to report on and one of them was this classic by Peter Gammons. Gammons is a lot of things to a lot of people, and these days he's best known for (1) having the game's most extensive network of sources, and (2) uncritically repeating everything those sources tell him (which is not unrelated to the maintenance of (1)). He is at times an open mind friendly to statistical analyses of the game, and at times gives a soapbox and his imprimatur to denunciations of statistical analyses of the game.

But first and foremost, Gammons is a guy who loves baseball, loves the Red Sox, and can really write. Beyond the Sixth Game is the tale of the Red Sox from 1976-1985, when Gammons was the Boston Globe's beat writer for the team, and it's a love letter to every fan whose heart was broken by those teams, and a cold-eyed analysis of how it happened (Gammons' thesis is that the ownership of the Sox failed to appreciate the new financial realities of the free agent era). His portraits of the players are detailed and affectionate (especially Carlton Fisk and Luis Tiant, two guys Gammons obviously really did think were very special people), and his narratives of the pivotal 1977 and 1978 seasons soar. No Red Sox fan - no baseball fan - should do without this book.

5. Peggy Noonan, What I Saw at the Revolution: Ask conservatives of my generation about Ronald Reagan or conservatism, and chances are pretty good that you will get a picture heavily influenced by one of his "wordsmiths," Peggy Noonan. The book is only secondarily a memoir, although it does capture (with Noonan's eye for sympathetic detail) numerous Washington figures of the 80s, as well as her previous boss, Dan Rather, of whom Noonan was very fond despite his politics. More importantly, it's a book about writing -- about a particular kind of writing (political speeches), how they get created, why they matter, and what's important in crafting them. It's also a tribute to a set of conservative ideals, and how they continued to inspire conservatives even when their practitioners didn't always live up to their promise.

4. The Orwell Reader: Yes, I'm cheating again by including an anthology. Another invaluable assignment -- the best thing I got out of college, academically -- was buying this book for Professor Green's British Empire class. I re-read it end to end again after September 11. Orwell hardly needs my introduction; his depictions of working-class life in the 1930s (coal miners, dish washers) are famously vivid, and his jeremiads against those who wouldn't stand up to fascism are the stuff of legend. My favorite essays are "Politics and the English Language" and "England Your England" (I reached for the latter in the opening of my September 11 column, as well as reaching for a scene from the Council of Elrond from the next selection) and I'm sure I'm not alone in those choices.

3. J.R.R. Tolkien, The Fellowship of the Ring: I had a tough choice here; The Hobbit was the first "grownup" book I ever read, back in the second grade, and it remains Tolkien's best-written book. But Fellowship of the Ring perfectly bridges the gap between the lighthearted adventure of The Hobbit and the epic sweep of Lord of the Rings, and launches the greatest fantasy epic of all time. The question: what will good men do in the face of unremitting evil? Tolkien's answer isn't always reassuring.

2. P.J. O'Rourke, Parliament of Whores: As far as I'm concerned, still the best book ever written about American government; O'Rourke brings his vicious humor to every branch and agency of the federal government he can locate. His chapter on farm policy is the best thing I've ever read on the subject, and his account of a Housing NOW! march is sidesplitting. Along the way he encounters everyone from Pat Moynihan to Mike Dukakis to Ken Starr. But the book does have just one terribly cringe-inducing line, in retrospect; in his look at American foreign policy in Pakistan and Afghanistan, O'Rourke states that

the main thing to be learned about foreign policy in this part of the world is that a wise foreign policy would be one that kept you out of here. There are some things you ignore at your peril, but you pay attention to Central Asia at the risk of your life.

If only.

1. The Bill James Historical Baseball Abstract:

Well, you knew that was coming; if I hadn't limited myself to one book per author, I'd have had a top 10 of Bill James books. As I've repeatedly noted, James has had a tremendous influence not only on my thinking about baseball but on my entire thinking process. I picked the first edition of the historical book because it is, on balance, the largest compilation of James' most pointed and entertaining writing and original thought, effortlessly spanning twelve decades of baseball history and bringing even the most distant past vibrantly to life. (I reviewed the new Historical Abstract here).

Honorable Mentions:

Read More »

So they tell us the Mets are looking at Scott Erickson, El Duque, Garrett Stephenson and some Cuban guy to join Leiter, Traschsel, Glavine and Seo in the rotation, and they are talking to Todd Zeile to shore up the bench and Karim Garcia for right field. Remember this when you start getting excited about the team's prospects in 2004 . . .

I've liked Garcia's power for some time (31 homers in 491 AB the last 3 years), but his career .282 OBP says it all about his limitations (although I'd rather have him than spend a bundle on Brian Jordan). Zeile is 38, and his OPS+ the past three years have been (in order) 96, 89 and 78. The pitchers are all wild cards given their injury histories; El Duque might not be a bad gamble if he's cheap, but none of them inspire confidence.

UPDATE: I should note that acquiring Garcia would probably signal a Timo-Garcia platoon in right.

Chris Kahrl at Baseball Prospectus (subscription only) has some sobering thoughts about Kevin Brown:

The problem is that few pitchers put more balls on the ground than Brown does, and now, instead of having a strong middle infield with a very good shortstop behind him, he's got Derek Jeter and Alfonso Soriano, which is something like knowing that Belgium's got your back in a World War. The Dodgers allowed 1,966 ground balls and 895 singles last year, or a 1B/GB figure of .455. The comparable Yankees figures are 2,023, 1,009 and .498. So you could say that a ground ball is roughly 10% more likely to become a single against the Yankees. Brown got 374 ground balls last year and allowed 147 singles. Allowing 10% more hits on ground balls would mean 15 extra singles against Brown, or nearly 10 runs' worth. Do the same for Weaver and the result isn't nearly so dramatic, but he looks a bit better than he did last year.

He also notes that the same goes double for Paul Quantrill.

Terry Pluto has a fond remembrance of Leon Wagner, who died last week at age 69.

Yes, to the surprise of nearly no one, Roger Clemens has un-retired and signed with the Astros. It's all about loyalty, with Clemens . . . as I've been saying for some time now, I still expect Clemens to go in the Hall of Fame wearing a Devil Rays cap.

Clemens batting is only the second-most-entertaining moment of 2004, of course; I haven't seen the schedules, but I'd love to see the Yankees face the Rocket so that Joe Torre can go back to calling Clemens a head-hunter after defending him the last few years . . .

(That said, I should note that Clemens of late has been the anti-Kirby Puckett: while's he's been a big jerk around the game, his work with soldiers, cops and firemen shows that he does, ultimately, have his priorities straight overall).

On another note, Bullpen Stomper Jeff Nelson looks to be signing with the Rangers (along with Kenny Rogers), thus cutting the list of Yankees who have won a World Series with the team to four: Jeter, Bernie, Posada and Rivera.

Instapundit is a Red Sox fan! (Link via Volokh). Of course, the fast-typing prof also says that watching sports on television is a waste of time, so I guess he sees the Sox play when they're in Knoxville . . .

If you're just checking in, it's been a busy weekend here, with lots of posts by me and by the Mad Hibernian. Keep scrollin', and don't forget to check out my look at baseball's top 25 players according to Established Win Shares Levels.

If I can find a way to work it in, I'd still like to add an age adjustment to increase the all-in-one-number aspect of EWSL, but I'm still working on it. Which raises a related issue. You can never tell, when you write up a widely-read post, what will attract the most comment. The Baseball Primer crowd jumped all over my offhand skepticism about Albert Pujols' age. Well, I've seen a good deal of skepticism on that source in various places, but I'll freely admit I'm no expert on the subject. But Brian at Redbird Nation has done the homework and thinks that Pujols' claimed age of 24 really does stand up OK. Read the whole thing.

Who are the best players in baseball, at any given time? Well, one easy way to frame the question is, what players have been the best over the past few years. As it so happens, Bill James has provided us with two tools ideally suited to measuring this question, although unless I've missed something (I haven't received my 2004 Bill James Handbook from Amazon yet), nobody has yet combined the two: Win Shares (which purport to measure a player's total contribution to a team's bottom line win/loss record) and Established Performance Levels, which take a weighted measurement of a player's accomplishments in a given category over the prior three years, giving the most weight to the most recent (I explain the EPL method in a little more detail in this column).

So, for the past month or so, I've been working up Established Win Shares levels for the game's top players. Although I haven't got to everyone, I'm far enough down the list that I can say with confidence that there are, conveniently enough, 25 players with an EWSL of 25 or greater entering 2004. Here they are, in descending order (I rounded off; players are listed as tied only if they were tied before rounding); listed age, position and team is for 2004:

Rank	Player	EWSL	Pos.	Team	Age
1	Barry Bonds	45	LF	SF	39
2	Albert Pujols	36	LF	STL	"24"
3	Alex Rodriguez	34	SS	TX	28
4	Jason Giambi	32	1B	NYY	33
5	Jim Thome	32	1B	PHI	33
6	Gary Sheffield	31	LF	NYY	35
7	Todd Helton	30	1B	COL	30
8	Bret Boone	29	2B	SEA	35
9	Carlos Delgado	29	1B	TOR	32
10	Chipper Jones	28	LF	ATL	32
11T	Bob Abreu	28	RF	PHI	30
11T	Brian Giles	28	LF	SD	33
13T	Manny Ramirez	28	LF	BOS	32
13T	Lance Berkman	28	LF	HOU	28
15	Miguel Tejada	27	SS	BAL	28
16	Luis Gonzalez	27	LF	AZ	36
17	Scott Rolen	27	3B	STL	29
18	Alfonso Soriano	26	2B	NYY	26
19	Carlos Beltran	26	CF	KC	27
20	Ichiro Suzuki	26	RF	SEA	30
21T	Jim Edmonds	26	CF	STL	34
21T	Shawn Green	26	RF	LA	31
23T	Eric Chavez	25	3B	OAK	26
23T	Jorge Posada	25	C	NYY	32
25	Andruw Jones	25	CF	ATL	27

A few thoughts and observations:

*No pitchers. That says a lot about the volatility of pitchers. By contrast, lots of left fielders and first basemen.

*Much as I can't stand the guy, there's still Barry Bonds, and there's everybody else.

*Most of these guys are in their thirties, which is suggests that at least at the very high end, investing in players in their early 30s may not be a terrible bet.

*I was a little surprised at how high Thome and Boone ranked.

*Chavez is easily the most consistent of the players listed here, with WS totals the last three years of 26, 25 and 25. Of course, at his age, you'd like to see more forward progress.

*The most glaring absence is Vladimir Guerrero, due to the injuries and weakknesses I noted yesterday (I'd still love to have had him, though): his WS totals are a less than spectacular 23, 29 and most recently 18. Oddly, he's never had a 30-WS season.

UPDATE: Turns out that Soriano is 28, not 26.

Back to the drawing board: the Angels sign Vladimir Guerrero.

NY Daily News reports the Mets have raised their offer to Vladimir Guerrero to $70 million over 5 years. For the record, I'm still very much in favor of this. (These guys should be happy too). Yes, Guerrero's back makes him a Juan Gone-sized risk. (Then again, Randy Johnson's bad back created the same risks when he signed in Arizona, and they did OK). Five years is absolutely as far out as I'd go with him. Yes, the Mets are in a rebuilding phase. But there are some risks worth taking no matter what stage your team is at, and Guerrero is one, a guy who's putting up Frank Robinson-type numbers and is right smack in the prime of his career.

Here's Guerrero's 'Established Performance Level' for 2001-03 (EPLs are explained here):

G	AB	H	2B	3B	HR	R	RBI	BB	K	SB	CS	HPB	SF	GIDP	AVG	SLG	OBP
136	502	164	30	3	31	89	95	70	65	24	12	7	4	20	.328	.585	.413

Pretty good, I'd say . . . yes, Guerrero has his flaws. He's error-prone: .959 career fielding percentage, terrible for an outfielder. He gives away way too many outs on the basepaths with GIDP and CS (a 63% career base thief, meaning it would be better if he never tried). He has horrendous plate discipline that's belied by his numbers; remember that a third of his walks are intentional, and that his low K rate is because he gets good wood on pitches most guys would get benched for swinging at. As long as he's healthy he'll get away with that, but if the back starts to go, the plate discipline could catch up to him in a hurry. But for all that, Guerrero is a legit superstar who's only missed time to injury once.

David Pinto notes that the Marlins have jumped into the bidding, and that the Dodgers could yet as well if they ever get their ownership straighened out. It's far from over yet. But the Mets are clearly a factor in the bidding.

I usually try to keep my politics out of my baseball posts - I respect the fact that not everyone who comes here for the baseball content agrees with my political opinions - but I'm making an exception here, so consider yourself duly warned. David Cameron at USS Mariner says of Pete Rose:

Rose is a scumbag lying weasel who has spent the past 10 years assailing the character of men who were telling the truth. Now, when it interests him financially and potentially leads to reinstatement, he's willing to say he was lying for the past decade and hope that we don't mind. There's absolutely no reason to put Pete Rose in the Hall of Fame, and I hope he never gets to enter Cooperstown, even if he tries to buy a ticket from a scalper.

(Emphasis added). The point about smearing his accusers is particularly relevant; one of the things that most horrified conservatives about Clinton, especially given his constitutional status as the nation's chief law enforcement officer, was the smear campaign conducted against Ken Starr and others who sought to hold him accountable. Ditto for the convenience of his apology; George Will makes the parallel explicit: "Rose's coming clean is the most soiled conversion of convenience since . . . well, Aug. 17, 1998, when DNA evidence caused Bill Clinton to undergo a memory clarification."

Although I disagree with Cameron about Rose and the Hall, my argument on this point almost four years ago was always the same as about Clinton: his actions had disabled him from holding a position of trust:

Badgering the man to apologize also misses the point; the continuing ban on managing isn’t so much a punishment as a preventative measure, like impeaching a public official or disbarring a crooked lawyer (to give two obvious parallels). Nor would I accept his apology. Rose’s decade-long denial of his problems, as well as his numerous false denials at the time, even under oath, of various easily provable facts suggests that he is not to be trusted even when and if he ever makes a public display of contrition.

Slate carries a nice little tribute to the page sponsorships on Baseball-Reference.com. I've got several of them by now, generally cheap ones.

I agree with The Mad Hibernian that while Mets fans will regret the Braden Looper signing due to his fits of awful control, the team isn't really doing itself much harm by signing Looper to a 2-year, $3.25 million/year deal. Dayn Perry at the Baseball Prospectus (link for subscribers only) hones in on the larger point: by throwing reasonably priced contracts at free agents who weren't offered arbitration (like Mike Cameron) or come from foreign lands (like Kaz Matsui), the Mets aren't really setting back their rebuilding, because they aren't giving up draft picks or blocking the progress of significant prospects (a closer, of course, rarely really blocks anybody, although I'm not sure off the top of my head whether Looper was offered arbitration). Moreover, Perry notes that high-salaried veterans may not command much in trades these days. Conclusion: continuing to bring in veterans while rebuilding may not be as uniformly foolish as it once was.

I'm still unconvinced that the Mets management finally 'gets it,' but thus far they haven't done anything nearly as awful as, say, the Glavine signing.

Well, the votes are in. WFAN is reporting that the writers picked Paul Molitor and Dennis Eckersley.

As discussed below, here was my ballot (if they gave me a vote, that is):

Molitor
Eckersley
Rich Gossage
Bert Blyleven
Ryne Sandberg

I'll link to the full ballot when it's available.

UPDATES: Francesa says Sandberg is third at 61%, which is close enough that he'll probably make it in a year or two.

ESPN says Sutter finished fourth, also within 100 votes, while Keith Hernandez and Joe Carter dropped off the ballot for lack of support. I guess it's progress when a guy with as many 100-RBI seasons as Carter is almost universally recognized as being far short of the Hall's standards.

Here's the full ballot. The other also-rans, with their percentages:

Ryne Sandberg 61.1
Bruce Sutter 59.5
Jim Rice 54.5
Andre Dawson 50.0
Rich Gossage 40.7
Lee Smith 36.6
Bert Blyleven 35.4
Jack Morris 26.3
Steve Garvey 24.3
Tommy John 21.9

Sutter, Sandberg and Blyleven gained the most support; Goose and Smith both declined (even though, as I noted this morning, Gossage has the best numbers of any of the relievers), as did Garvey. Dennis Martinez also failed to stay on the ballot; in fact, Molitor and Eckersley were the only new names on the ballot to clear the 5% threshold.

One prediction before I sign off for the day: Blyleven, who was helped when Jim Kaat dropped off the ballot this year, will benefit again in a few years when John is off the ballot as well.

I've dated this post ahead so it will stay at the top of the page until the Hall of Fame selections are announced at 2pm on Tuesday, January 6, 2004.

Returning Candidates

I've listed each candidate with their % of the vote in 2003 in parentheses. 75% needed for election. I've also included links to my previous columns, since I've looked in depth at the cases for nearly all these guys before. (I'm adding links as I go).

1. Bruce Sutter (53.63%) - OUT. See here and here for my reasons.
2. Jim Rice (52.22%) - OUT, I guess. See here and here for my initial takes on Rice, and here for more. I view Rice as being just about on the bubble, along with Keith Hernandez and Dick Allen, and I go back and forth on all three.
3. Andre Dawson (50.00%) - OUT. See here.
4. Ryne Sandberg (49.19%) - IN. See here.
5. Lee Smith (42.34%) - OUT. See here.
6. Rich Gossage (42.14%) - IN. See here and here
7. Bert Blyleven (29.23%) - IN. See here.
8. Steve Garvey (27.82%) - OUT. See here.
9. Jim Kaat (26.21) - OUT. See here.
10. Tommy John (23.39%) - OUT. See here.
11. Jack Morris (22.78%) - OUT. See here.
12. Alan Trammell (14.11%) - OUT, I think; I haven't looked real closely at this one. But Whitaker was robbed.
13. Don Mattingly (13.71%) - OUT. See here.
14. Dale Murphy (11.69%) - OUT. See here and here.
15. Dave Concepcion (11.09%) - OUT. See here.
16. Dave Parker (10.28%) - OUT. See here and here. (Also, Michael Wolverton dissents from my take on Parker).
17. Fernando Valenzuela (6.25%) - OUT. But I do wax nostalgic about Fernandomania here.
18. Keith Hernandez (6.05%) - OUT. See here.

OK, few Hall of Fame candidacies conflict me as much as Dennis Eckersley. Let's run a little chart to explain why:

Pitcher	W	IP	ERA	H/9	HR/9	BB/9	K/9	ERA+
Dennis Eckersley	197	3285.2	3.50	8.43	0.95	2.02	6.58	116
Dave Steib	176	2895.1	3.44	7.99	0.70	3.21	5.19	122
Jimmy Key	186	2591.2	3.51	8.74	0.88	2.32	5.34	122

Now, you can see that Eck was a better pitcher than Steib or Key - he pitched more innings and did more (in terms of K/BB ratio) to control the game rather than rely on his defense. But the difference isn't that great. The problem, of course, is in even trying to compare him to contemporaries who are starters . . . Eckersley's career high in Win Shares is 24 in 1978 and 1979, but other than that he was a mediocre starting pitcher. The really defining numbers are from his 11 years in Oakland and St. Louis; I don't have time for a full comparison here, but I'll offer a few comps for perspective:

Pitcher	G	SV	IP	ERA	H/9	HR/9	BB/9	K/9
Goose 1975, 77-85*	554	253	974.2	2.06	6.39	0.46	3.27	8.52
Sutter 1976-84	549	260	890	2.54	7.30	0.58	2.63	7.61
Quiz 1980-86	474	224	806	2.48	8.79	0.49	1.31	3.15
Henke**	642	311	789.2	2.67	6.92	0.73	2.91	9.81
Eckersley 1987-97	645	386	750	2.87	7.55	0.88	1.27	9.02
Rivera 1996-2003	493	283	582.2	2.15	6.86	0.40	2.27	8.20

* - Excludes ill-fated year as a starter
** - Whole career

Again, the comparison is not a bad one for the Eck, although he hardly stands out in this crowd, and even adding some subpar years as a closer in to the mix, he's still behind Gossage, Sutter, Quisenberry and Henke in innings for the comparison seasons.

In the end, Eckersley is too much unlike anyone else to really compare him. If I had a ballot, I might well leave him off just because it's too tough to see where the line is for relievers. But I can't really argue with wanting him in, given how the combination of his two careers elevates him above your typical also-ran HoF candidate like Steib or a short-career closer like Henke; he's really Steib and Henke combined. I've got to commit here, so I'll swallow hard and say IN.

No, I'm really not ready to talk about this one: Tug McGraw is dead. I really don't think anybody symbolized the spirit of the New York Mets better than Tug.

So, just in time to overshadow the Hall of Fame's big day, we're about to be treated to another rehash of the endless Pete Rose saga, as Rose is finally about to admit that he bet on baseball (no report I've seen yet says whether he'll admit he bet on games in which he was involved; I'd put my money, so to speak, on no). Rather than repeat myself ad nauseum here, I'll just link back to my prior works on this issue:

*My two-part June 2000 column (yes, it's been that long) on Rose and Shoeless Joe Jackson.

*My November 13, 2002 post re-thinking the Dowd Report in light of Derek Zumsteg's attack on Bill James' critiques of the report.

*My November 11, 2002 post criticizing Dowd's post-1989 activities.

*On Rose's merits, my response to Zumsteg's inexplicable assertion that Rose wasn't a Hall of Fame caliber ballplayer, and an April 8, 2001 column in which (among other things) I compared Rose to Roberto Clemente in their primes.

UPDATE: Rose admits he bet on the Reds.

Let's run through the Hall of Fame ballot's easy "No" answers: good players all, but guys who don't in my view merit any real discussion:

Cecil Fielder
Kevin Mitchell
Juan Samuel
Danny Darwin
Randy Myers (see my comments on Lee Smith)
Doug Drabek
Bob Tewksbury
Terry Pendleton
Jim Eisenreich

Taking away these guys and Molitor, that leaves us with five new candidates who at least merit a little analysis:

Joe Carter
Dave Stieb
Jimmy Key
Dennis Eckersley
Dennis Martinez

UPDATE (1/5): OK, I didn't intend to suggest that Carter, Stieb or Key were serious Hall of Fame candidates, although Key and Stieb were better pitchers than many people remember (and finished their careers with remarkably similar numbers), only that I had intended to give their careers a little more review than I've had time for here. Carter has the 10 100-RBI seasons in 12 years, plus the big home run, but there's not much beyond that; with his .306 career OBP, Carter's got the same issues as Andre Dawson.

As for Martinez, with his 245-193 record, as I've noted before, his credentials are actually quite similar to those of Jack Morris, but that says more about why Morris belongs out than the other way around.

I hope to get to the Eck tonight or tomorrow morning, time permitting.

The one easy "yes" among the newcomers on this year's Hall of Fame ballot is Paul Molitor: over 3300 hits (9th all time), lifetime averages of .306/.448/.369 (and .368/.615/.435 in 29 postseason games), 17th all time in Runs Scored, 504 stolen bases against only 131 caught stealings (almost an 80% success rate) and just over 11 GIDP per 600 at bats for his career.

The oddity is that Molitor will walk into the Hall as the first career DH to be inducted, having spent 1174 games at DH compared to 791 at 3B. What's odd is that Molitor was generally well-regarded as a defensive player at nearly every position on the diamond. I forget where he played in the minors - I think he was a shortstop - but Molitor came up as an everyday SS in 1978 when Robin Yount abruptly retired at age 22 to become a professional golfer. Molitor played short for a little over a month until Yount came to his senses, and was moved to second when Yount returned. After 3 years at second, the Brewers moved Molly to the outfield to keep him healthy, and he was their everyday center fielder in 1981, when the Crew had the best record in the AL East. The following year, he was moved to third, which he played well yet again, and the Brewers won the pennant. He was splitting time between second and first by 1990, and played a lot of first base the next two years before heading to Toronto and full-time DHing.

Here's some fun numbers I've run before on Molitor:

Milwaukee Brewers' record, 1978-92, with Paul Molitor in the lineup:
1004-851 (.541), 10 winning seasons in 15 years.

Milwaukee Brewers' record before 1978 arrival of Paul Molitor:
614-836 (.423), no winning seasons in 9 years (includes 1969 Seattle Pilots).
Milwaukee Brewers' record, 1978-92, without Paul Molitor in the lineup:
237-281 (.458), losing season the year he missed most of the season, losing seasons in two years when he missed 1/3 of the season.
Milwaukee Brewers' record since 1992 departure of Paul Molitor:
758-957 (.442), no winning seasons in 10 years.

Total:
Milwaukee Brewers' record with Paul Molitor in the lineup: 1004-851 (.541)
Milwaukee Brewers' record, 1969-2003, without Paul Molitor in the lineup: 1609-2074 (.437). The Brewers franchise has never had a winning season when Molitor played fewer than 50% of team's games.

Those of you who prefer to skip to the baseball content, or who want to check the category archives, may have noticed that three of the categories here (Baseball, Politics and War, my three main areas of interest) load very slowly due to the huge number of entries since the blog started in August 2002 (as well as a few oddball archived emails from before that date). To remedy the problem for the new year, I've renamed the old categories ("Baseball 2002-03," etc.) and created a new set of categories ("Baseball 2004," etc.) to hold this year's entries. I've also changed the link at the top of the page so it goes to the Baseball 2004 category, and I'm notifying the few sites that link to my baseball category page rather than the main page to fix their URLs.

If you're looking for baseball entries from 2003 and earlier, click here for the Baseball 2002-03 category.