*Nothing quite like Jose Reyes scoring from first base on a wild pitch last night. Speed gets overrated sometimes compared to the ability to get on base – without which it’s of little use – but that play was a perfect illustration of how speed can really unsettle a defense: Nick Hundley may well have let the ball go by and Luis Castillo score from third in part because he was distracted by Reyes taking off for second, ending with Reyes coming all the way around to score on a comedy of bad throws.
The Mets radio announcers were complaining that neither they nor the managers nor the team PR staff that runs the scoreboards can see into the new bullpens to figure out who is warming up. Last night that was multiplied by the fact that everybody was wearing #42, which is a nice tribute to Jackie Robinson but kind of confusing in mid-April when people haven’t absorbed all the rosters yet.
*Lyford notes an even more no-hitter friendly lineup. Ouch.
*Matt Wieters walks in his only appearance against David Price; presumably there will be many, many more rematches. Is PECOTA overprojecting Wieters by virtue of overly lenient adjustments for players from the Eastern and Carolina Leagues? And how long will it be before I can remember to write “Wieters” instead of “Weiters” without checking?
*I am shocked, shocked I tell you, that Chris Carpenter is injured.
*I don’t love all aspects of the new baseball-reference.com redesign (which converts the site to features that had already been in place for the sister sites covering football, basketball and hockey); I’m always skeptical of things that make a site run slower and less clean, and that create more hazards of clicking something that will do something on a page when you are just moving your mouse or trying to scroll down. And some information seems to be harder to find or navigate to. That said, there is a huge amount of new data, and from my personal perspective, the ability to copy and paste stats into an Excel spreadsheet is a colossal improvement – I experimented with the method I use for my Hall of Fame columns in particular and found I could run four or five players in the time it used to take to run one. On balance, I give it a big thumbs up.
*Not baseball, but big sports news: John Madden is retiring. Madden’s not as sharp as he used to be, but he’s still entertaining, and he’ll be remembered as the man who revolutionized NFL analysis.
2 thoughts on “Quick Links 4/16/09”
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I will miss Madden a lot. I’d like to think that Frank Caliendo could replace him, but I guess that would be the ultimate triumph of style over substance. As long as it isn’t Olberman, I’ll live with it.
Will not miss Madden in the least, he’s been a weak comic book character since the Clinton admin. JM should have packed it in when Pat Summerall did.
But I will miss the Ratt, latest and greatest member of the Obama admin to flop ethically. Tax Cheat Timmy should breathe a sigh of relief, this further thins the bench. Leaves Tall Paul and Bair as the obvious choices. The Pres will have an interesting decision when PPIP flops and markets make new lows: status quo (Shelia) or a rumble with the Street (Volker).