Random Collection of MLB Thoughts re April 25

Which 6-5 game ending was more exciting?  The walk off grand slam by Jose Abreu lifting the Chicago White Sox over the Tampa Bays 9-6 OR the bases loaded, one out, great defensive solo doubleplay by Justin Smoak to preserve a 6-5 win for the Seattle Mariners over the Texas Rangers?


The Anaheim Angels did something Friday night they did not do all of 2013.  In 2013, the Angels had 11 games where they scored 10+ runs, all of which featured at least one Mike Trout hit.  Trout went 0-4 versus the Yankees while his Angels went on to win 13-1.


The last two big name pitchers to sign during the off-season are having very different starts to their 2014 seasons.  On March 12th, the Atlanta Braves signed Ervin Santana to one year deal.  After a win Friday night versus Cincinnati, Santana improved to 3-0 on the season with a 1.95 ERA and a 0.98 WHIP.  On Feb 18th, the Baltimore Orioles signed Ubaldo Jimenez to a four year deal.  After a loss Friday night versus Kansas City, Jimenez is now 0-4 on the season with a 6.59 ERA and a 1.83 WHIP.


The MLB has opened up its All Star Voting ballots.  I figured it would be fun to fill out 3 ballots completely differently and share my votes one position at a time.  Starting with first base, my American League selections are:

1. Miggy Cabrera - - the letters MVP gloss over numbers that may not currently lead the league
2. Albert Pujols - - power resurgence has been fun to watch
3. Jose Abreu - - batting average is starting to come around, his aptitude for multi HR games also

National League Selections are:

1. Paul Goldschmidt - - without him the Arizona Diamondbacks would be completely lost
2. Joey Votto - - the problem with on-line ballot voting is that it allows for "ballot box stuffing", being Canadian, Mr. Votto always gets my first.
3. Justin Morneau - - see "Joey Votto", at least this season Morneau is "earning" the vote  

Random Collection of Thoughts re: MLB action April 24

The surprising New York Mets took three out of four from the St. Louis Cardinals.  The nifty factoid to take from Thursday's 4-1 loss is the difference in average age in terms of the pitchers used in the game.  The Mets used Bartolo Colon, Carlos Torres, Scott Rice and the returning Daisuke Matsuzaka for an average age of 35.  The Cardinals used Lance Lynn, Kevin Siegrist, Carlos Martinez and Eric Fornataro for an average of 25.25. 


Toward the end of the exhibition season, Erik Bedard let it be known that if he was not in the starting lineup he would consider retirement over coming of the bullpen.  In Bedard's first start on April 18th, he never made it out of the 3rd inning while giving up 4 runs on 6 hits.  Bedard's second start came Thursday night giving up 4 runs on 5 hits while issuing 5 walks while struggling to make it through 4 innings.  Proving to the Tampa Bays Rays you belong, you're doing it wrong Mr. Bedard!!


How do you comeback from a sweep at the hands of a divisional rival?  If you are the Oakland A's, you throttle another divisional opponent 10-1.  Beating down divisional opponents was a theme in the AL East


The Baltimore Orioles defeating the Toronto Blue Jays by a touchdown, 11-4.  The New York Yankees beat the Boston Red Sox so badly, the Sox sent outfielder Mike Carp to pitch the 9th inning.  FIVE WALKS later that misery was over.


Scanned all the infielders stats using the stat column "at bats" to sort each position.  Safe to assume the players making the Top 10 in the "at bats" category are everyday starters.  Here is a look at the slowest starts by players in the top 10 of their respective positions using their batting average as a gage so far this season.

1. C - Sal Perez .213, Buster Posey .229, Juan Castro .217
2. 1B - Nick Swisher .205, Edwin Encarnacion .233
3. 2B - Aaron Hill .232, Brian Dozier .224
4. 3B - Marcus Semien .235, Martin Prado .234, Pedro Alvarez .176, Brett Lawrie .157
5. SS - Ian Desmond .200, Brad Miller .221, Asdrubal Cabrera .238

Random Collection of Thoughts re April 18 in MLB

Houston Astros uber-prospect George Springer collected his first MLB RBI and stolen base.  Shame his Astros were already 8-0 by the time he stole his first base in the top of the 3rd.  Not that it's any consolation to Mr. Springer but Chicago White Sox Cuban sensation Jose Abreu & Philadelphia Phillies sophomore starting pitcher Jonathon Pettibone also found themselves down by more than 8 runs in their respective games.


A late season call up by the Los Angeles Dodgers in 2012, relief pitcher Josh Wall is still struggling to find his groove in the MLB.  Mr. Wall never made it past last April with the Dodgers and Friday had his first appearance with the Anaheim Angels.  Mr. Wall never even got out of his inning.  Luckily he was "protecting" an 11-1 win.


The San Francisco Giants have played in 8 straight one run games with a .500 record of 4-4. Playoff wildcard runs by the 2013 Cleveland Indians (30-17) and the 2012 Baltimore Orioles (29-9) were in part fuelled by their record in one run games.  On the other side of the coin, the Boston Red Sox won their division and the 2013 World Series finishing .500 in one run games.  The Giants and Los Angeles Dodgers are currently tied for first place in the NL West.  The Giants have taken four of six meetings this young season against the Dodgers with a 2-1 record in one run games against them.


The Arizona Diamondbacks finally caught a lucky break!  A wild pitch on an INTENTIONAL WALK scored a runner from third base to give the D'Backs a 2-1 lead in the top of the 9th.  The curse that has been 2014 meant that naturally the bullpen would cough up the lead in the bottom of the ninth but the D'Backs would win the game in the 12th!


Remember ladies and gentleman, boys and girls of all ages, if you play baseball, don't use your face to stop the ball.  There has to be a less painful way to make it into the pages of Sports Illustrated.

Random Collection of Thoughts re April 17 in MLB

According to Wikipedia and their sources, the triple play by the New York Yankees during their game against the Tampa Bay Rays was the 692nd of all time.  While that is a nifty factoid there is something else to take from that game that includes a little bit fortune-telling.  Rays starter David Price had a sub-standard showing for a "regular" starting pitcher never mind his time-tested elevated standards.  The next scheduled start for Mr. Price will be versus the Minnesota Twins, bet on Mr. Price to find his groove.


The Pittsburgh Pirates hit four more homeruns Thursday night, three of them with runners on base, to dismantle the hot-no-more Milwaukee Brewers 11-2.  Pittsburgh is now second in the league with 23 round trips around the bases.  When I looked up that stat I was quite surprised to see the Baltimore Orioles, last years far and away leader in homeruns, sitting in 27th place overall with only 9 homeruns.  The next statement is brought to you by Captain Obvious - the only stat that really matters is both teams currently sit at .500 with their win/loss record.


I had asked for the "real" Washington Nationals to please stand up during this weekends 4 game series hosting the St. Louis Cardinals.  Thursday night's series opener featured 4 errors on defense and only 2 hits on offense by the Nats.  Maybe the Nats are just following the script of Hulk Hogan wrestling match and will use Friday to hulk up!


The uber highs and uber lows of being a Seattle Mariner fan can be summed up in the following sequence from their Thursday game with division rival Texas Rangers.  Down 4-0 going into the top of the 3rd inning, Robinson Cano finally hits his 1st homerun of the season (with 2 men on base as an added bonus).  Before their half of the inning was over, the M's would add three more runs to take a 6-4.  The next time Mr. Cano comes to the plate in the top of the 4th inning, the game is tied at 6 and with a man on first, Mr. Cano grounds into a double play. 


Look at the bright side Mariner fans, Toronto Blue Jay fans are all wishing they could call a mulligan on both their games yesterday against the Minnesota Twins.  In the morning game of a double header, Jays outfielder Melky Cabrera would have season long 14 game hitting streak snapped and R A Dickey would have his season long struggles continue.  In the afternoon game of the double header, EIGHT WALKS IN THE 8TH by their bullpen would cost the Jays the game.


One more three game sweep to report, this time by the Kansas City Royals over the Houston Astros.  Internet high five!

Random Collection of Thoughts re April 14 in the MLB

After six innings of play, the Cincinnati Reds and Pittsburgh Pirates combined for TEN homeruns.  That is more homeruns than the Baltimore Orioles (9), San Diego Padres (7), Texas Rangers (5), and Kansas City Royals have hit the ENTIRE SEASON. 


When doing research for the above stat I stumbled upon the following - - 16 of 30 teams were hitting under .250 (1 of 4) going into the evening's slate of games.  Last season finished with 13 teams under a .250 team batting average, 12 in 2012, 11 in 2011, 9 in 2010.  Furthermore not since 2008 has the MLB has averaged more than 9 hits per game.  Moral of the stat story, with so much glamor given to the homerun, if nobody is on base, it's just one run. 




A nifty stat was posted by the Oakland Athletics gameday Twitter account: "(Yoenis) Cespedes is 8-for-24 (.333) with runners on compared to 3-for-23 (.130) with the bases empty"  They posted this in the 9th inning trailing the Anaheim Angels by one with a man on first.  Cespedes would fly out but pinch hitter John Jaso would hit a 2 run homerun to give the A's the lead and the win.  Sooner or later the problematic pairing of "sabremetrics" and "moneyball" will fail.  I keep choosing sooner and it keeps becoming later.




16 games, about 1/10 of the season is over for the Arizona Diamondbacks.  A 7-3 loss to the New York Mets keeps the D'Backs at 4 wins on the season.  I feel sorry for the anxiety that must be running through the Kirk Gibson family in regards to his job security and will stop writing about it out of respect for a man with the most memorable homerun trot of my life.


The Colorado Rockies found an improbable way to lose to the San Diego Padres Monday night.  After WALKING THE BASES LOADED, a wild pitch would score the game tying run and an errant throw back to the plate would score the game winning run.  Wow, just wow!

As a wrestling fan I feel obliged to share this link,

 Pirates adopt wrestling champ Daniel Bryan's 'YES!' chant

Random Collection of Thoughts re: April 9 in the MLB

Three "first's" happened today that not many people would not have expected to wait over a week to see (or in the last example, expected at all).  The Kansas City Royals hit their 1st homerun of the season and the Cincinnati Reds speed demon Billy Hamilton stole his first two bases of the season.  Toronto Blue Jays catcher Dioner Navarro stole his first base since 2009.


Many people likely expected Ervin Santana to have some rust in his pitching debut for the Atlanta Braves.  8 innings played, 0 runs allowed, 3 hits against, no walks allowed, 6 strikeouts.  It doesn't matter that it's against the 4th lowest scoring team in the NL because coming in, Atlanta themselves are the lowest scoring team.  That's the real surprise, Atlanta is barely averaging 2 runs per game heading into Santana's debut.


Baltimore Oriole starter Miguel Gonzalez is set to earn $529,000 this season.  New York Yankee starter Masahiro Tanaka just commenced a seven years, $155M contract.  Both have almost identical lines from their meeting against each other, biggest difference, Tanaka was plus 7 in the strikeout category!  The Orioles would win the game in the 9th with Tanaka out of the game and no option to put in Mariano Rivera or his "replacement" David Robertson for the Yankees.


Game of the night honors goes to the Miami Marlins/Washington Nationals!  Marlins surge out to a 5-0 lead after two innings.  After marching back to take a 6-5 lead in the 6th, the Nats leave the bases drunk which naturally means the Marlins tie it the first chance they get.  The tying run came via the first uncontested homerun (first two were reviewed) of the game in the top of the 7th.  Marlins would take the lead in the top of the 8th on an umpire reviewed home plate play.  At this rate of reviews before reacting to anything on the field, you may want a minute or so.


I have professed my affinity for fantasy baseball in previous articles and through that affinity, I have learned that the last adjective to describe relief pitcher Carlos Marmol is reliable.  Now pitching for the Marlins, the game of the night would effectively end when the Nats were able to load the bases against him in the bottom of the 8th and Jayson Werth would empty the bases with a (un-reviewed) grand slam.

Random Collection of Thoughts re: April 8 in MLB

The San Francisco Giants won their game this afternoon.  Professional reporters will tell you it was in part because of a good outing from Tim Hudson and other valid baseball reasons.  I'm telling you they won from the good karma they promoted when they brought back "Batkid" to throw out the ceremonial first pitch.  If you do not know the story of "Batkid", please re-new your faith in humanity by clicking this link


How does Cincinnati Red Joey Votto break out of an 0-13 slump?  He wears a Mountie uniform on the show "Intentional Talk".  Votto was hit by a pitch in his first at bat and hit singles in the 3rd and 5th inning.


The New York Yankees won their home opener then got shellacked today in game two of the series.  Game 3 versus Baltimore features Masahiro Tanaka's 2nd MLB start.  For those fans who want to believe the Yankees will finish higher in the AL East than the Baltimore Orioles, Wednesday's game is about as "must win" as the series opener celebrating the home kickoff of Derek Jeter's farewell tour.


The Miami Marlins impressively built a 5-2 record versus two clubs that finished 2013 with 74 wins and 76 wins respectively.  Their first game of 2014 versus an opponent with a winning record from 2013, a 5-0 loss to the Washington Nationals.  If the Marlins get swept by the Nationals during these three games in Washington then again next week in the re-match series in Miami, all playoff prognostications for the Fish should read, "nope, not happening".


Going into this three game series in Colorado, the Chicago White Sox had a 5-1 lifetime record at Coors Field.  The Sox got hammered on Monday but Tuesday night put enough air miles on the baseball to almost fly around the world.  SIX HOMERUNS including Jose Abreu's first two in the Majors.

MLB Tidbits and Gems

This blog starts with an addition to the "Sweet Tweets" section.  Orioles skipper Buck Showalter has ordered prospect Josh Hart to write a report about Frank Robinson.  Don't know who that is, shhh don't tell Buck and just google it.


In my pre-preseason picks, I have selected the Angels to make the playoffs as a wildcard.  Josh Hamilton out the next couple days with a calf issue and CJ Wilson taking a ball off the side of his head while throwing batting practice has me a tad less confident.  Meanwhile in Oakland,  Sonny Gray Looks Like A Child According To (Manager) Bob Melvin and A.J. Griffin's weight issues.


Here's another Angels prediction: Albert Pujols will hit his 500th career homerun, his 8th of 2014, against my other pick to be an AL wildcard team, the Toronto Blue Jays on May 8th.


Did you know that Minnesota Twins pitching prospect Alex Meyer, if he makes the MLB, will only be the 9th player 6'9" or taller to make a start?

Spring Training starts tomorrow!!

Len being Len about Baseball

This morning Toronto Blue Jay Jose Bautista tweets "...fans are the most important part of baseball..." which got me to thinking - - aside from the typical "fan clubs" and "promotion nights" (which fans have been lucky enough to become almost become bored of) what are some of the niftier things baseball clubs are doing to reach out to their fans. 




The following is my top four finds:




1) Milwaukee Brewers Create a Commercial Contest
Contest closes on February 28th and is exactly what it sounds like, you get to make a freakin commercial to be aired during their games.




2) Baltimore Orioles - Orioles Magic Moments
A monthly contest where you send in videos of some of the "magic moments" of Oriole History.  This month it's Cal Ripken Jr setting the "iron man streak".




3) Detroit Tigers - Kids Opening Day Contest
"How do you and your child pledge to live a healthy lifestyle this summer?"  Parents write an essay on behalf of their kids and 21 winners will have the chance to a part of the production of the game. Example, Announce the Starting Line-Ups on the Comerica Park Public Address (two children)




4) Kansas City Royals/Texas Rangers/Los Angeles Dodgers
All three baseball clubs run "Rewards Play and Win" program where by registering to play, the fan collects points by visiting specified sections of their respective teams website and social media.



Blog Update:




a) I have added a "Sweet Tweets" side column to keep together some of the better finds throughout the season.  Today I added a tweet from the Medicine Hat Mavericks, a team in the WMBL




b) I have also added a "Words to Live By" side column to keep together some of the better quotes throughout the season.  Today I added a quote from Toronto Blue Jay GM Alex Anthopoulos