The Tribe didn’t score 3 in the 4th, but they made up for it by scoring 6 in the 5th. The Indians now lead the Yankees 15-0, and Westbrook is working on a 2-hitter. Cleveland has 13 hits; the Yankees staff has uncharacteristicly walked six batters.
Update: Oakland has a big lead in their [...]
Posted by David Pinto at 8:59 pm | Games | Permalink | 3 Comments
August 31, 2004
Triple Quad
Beltran, Bagwell and Berkman go back-to-back-to-back in the 5th inning against the Reds to give the Astros a 4-0 lead. All four runs have scored on solo homers. With the Cubs down 5-0 in the 5th at Montreal, Houston’s playoff hopes are very much alive.
Posted by David Pinto at 8:41 pm | Sluggers | Permalink | No Comments
August 31, 2004
Scoreboard Watching
The Red Sox are up 4-0 in the first; the Yankees are down 5-0 in the second. A Sox win and a Yankees loss puts the Red Sox 3 1/2 back going into September.
Update: The Indians have scored 3 runs in each of the first three innings to take a 9-0 lead on the [...]
Posted by David Pinto at 7:45 pm | Division Races | Permalink | 3 Comments
August 31, 2004
College Hoops
I’m not a big college basketball fan. When I was an undergraduate, hockey was the winter sport of choice. Being in the Band, if we had a choice of playing a hockey or basketball game, we would go for the ice. However, the basketball team was always very nice to us, because [...]
Posted by David Pinto at 4:49 pm | Blogs | Permalink | No Comments
August 31, 2004
Games of the Day
The Anaheim Angels arrive in Boston today to begin a three-game series with major wild card implications. John Lackey faces Curt Schilling tonight. Lackey has had an interesting August, in that he’s struck out a lot of batters (31 in 29 1/3 innings), but he’s also allowed a lot of hits (40). [...]
Posted by David Pinto at 11:19 am | Games | Permalink | No Comments
August 31, 2004
And My Wife Would Not Let Me Name a Child Ford!
Chipper Jones has named his son after Shea Stadium:
“I love playing there,” Jones said. “Check the numbers.”
Jones has hit 17 home runs at Shea, his highest total at a visiting park, and his first major league homer came there on May 9, 1995. He is a lifetime .314 hitter at Shea.”
(Repeated word removed in [...]
Posted by David Pinto at 10:10 am | Players | Permalink | 2 Comments
August 30, 2004
Nate’s Night
Nate Robertson did pretty much everything right tonight. He threw a 101 pitch complete game, allowing only six hits and 1 run. He struck out 7, and an amazing 77 of his pitches were for strikes. Yes, it was a very weak KC lineup, but those are the teams starters like Robertson need [...]
Posted by David Pinto at 10:40 pm | Pitchers | Permalink | No Comments
August 30, 2004
Quick Inning
In what may be the quickest first inning played this year, a total of 18 pitches were used to get through both halves of the first inning in the Cubs-Expos game.
Posted by David Pinto at 7:19 pm | Games | Permalink | No Comments
August 30, 2004
Old Man River
Julio Franco just tied the Giants-Braves game in the bottom of the 9th with a triple. It’s the old man’s 2nd triple of the year. The Braves have runners at 1st and 3rd now with no outs.
Update: Andrew Jones singles to win the game. The Giants offense got the job done without [...]
Posted by David Pinto at 3:56 pm | Games | Permalink | 1 Comment
August 30, 2004
Drew Carries
J.D. Drew has given the Braves a 3-0 lead with his 29th HR of the year. Looking at his stats for the season, there’s nothing wrong with his offensive game. He hits for average, (BA over .300), gets on base (OBA over .400) and hits for power (slugging in the high .500’s). [...]
Posted by David Pinto at 1:52 pm | Sluggers | Permalink | 2 Comments
August 30, 2004
Barry on the Bench
Bonds is not in the starting lineup for the Giants today. And I don’t remember ever seeing Turner Field so empty.
Posted by David Pinto at 1:09 pm | Players | Permalink | 4 Comments
August 30, 2004
Pot of Gold
While on vacation, I located the house where they keep it.
Posted by David Pinto at 11:12 am | Other | Permalink | 1 Comment
August 30, 2004
Games of the Day
The Giants and Braves finish up their four game series this afternoon at Turner Field in Atlanta. I’ll be interested to see if Bonds is playing a day game after a night game. The Giants have been careful to rest Bonds in situations like this, but with the Wild Card race this close [...]
Posted by David Pinto at 10:45 am | Games | Permalink | No Comments
August 30, 2004
Glaus in the House
Troy Glaus returned to the Angels lineup yesterday and will be the DH down the stretch for the Halos. Another power bat in the lineup makes Anaheim look strong down the stretch. The Angels are near the bottom of the league in HR despite the presence of Guerrero, so Glaus will be a [...]
Posted by David Pinto at 9:08 am | Injuries | Permalink | No Comments
August 29, 2004
Approaching 700
I was wondering in July if Bonds was going to reach 700 HR this year. He had slowed greatly after his 660 barrage and his injury, hitting only 17 HR from May through July. He’s gotten his HR swing back in August, however, with the two tonight giving him 11 for the month [...]
Posted by David Pinto at 9:47 pm | Sluggers | Permalink | No Comments
August 29, 2004
Extra! Extra!
Travis Hafner had another near cycle today, accumulating a single, double and triple as the Indians defeated the White Sox 9-0. Hafner now has 63 extra base hits, in the top 10 of the AL, and in the top five depending on what other players do today. He’s on a pace for 77 [...]
Posted by David Pinto at 3:34 pm | Sluggers | Permalink | No Comments
August 29, 2004
The Saga of Bowa
It looks like Larry Bowa’s days are numbered in Philadelphia.
Bowa Ball has struck out.
Larry Bowa, whose intensity and toughness has been admired by legions of baseball fans in Philadelphia for 35 years, will be fired as Phillies manager after the 2004 season, multiple team sources have told Calkins Media exclusively.
…
Informed of the news, Bowa contacted [...]
Posted by David Pinto at 1:59 pm | Management | Permalink | 2 Comments
August 29, 2004
Double Slide
A fun double play in Cleveland. With Broussard on 2nd and none out, Belliard hit a comebacker to the pitcher. Broussard had strayed too far from 2nd, and Garland had him dead to rights. Garland threw to the SS Valentin, who threw to the third baseman Crede, who ran Ben back to [...]
Posted by David Pinto at 1:38 pm | Base Running | Permalink | No Comments
August 29, 2004
Tarred Memories
Soxblog points out factual errors in Allen Barra’s piece on do-overs in the Wall Street Journal (Subscription required). The facts of the George Brett Pine Tar game are totally backwards; the ump invalidated the HR and the league reinstated it, causing the game to be replayed from that point on. It’s the only [...]
Posted by David Pinto at 9:05 am | History | Permalink | 1 Comment
August 28, 2004
Chasing New York
As a follow-up to this post, I find the Yankees in a very interesting position right now. The AL playoff hunt is resembling a bicycle race, in which the Red Sox are leading a pack that is trying to chase down a lone, lead rider. The Sox are out front, and the others [...]
Posted by David Pinto at 5:59 pm | Standings | Permalink | 1 Comment
August 28, 2004
Summer Reading
One nice thing about vacations for me is that I get to catch up on some reading. I’ve had Curve Ball by Jim Albert and Jay Bennett sitting on my shelf for some time, and found it a very good book on explaining baseball statistics using statistical models. I like their method of [...]
Posted by David Pinto at 5:54 pm | Books | Permalink | 1 Comment
August 28, 2004
Streaks
While I was having my own streak of not watching baseball games for almost a week, some major league teams have gone off on streaks of their own. The Boston Red Sox are now 5 1/2 games behind the Yankees, well within striking distance given that they have six contests between each other. [...]
Posted by David Pinto at 3:58 pm | Standings | Permalink | No Comments
August 28, 2004
I’m Back
I’m back from a week at the beach. I’ve not watched news or scores, so I have some catching up to do.
Thanks so much to Jim Storer for musing while I was away!
Posted by David Pinto at 2:17 pm | Blogs | Permalink | No Comments
August 25, 2004
What’s wrong with this “picture”?
About two weeks ago I was casually reading my local sports section’s article on the previous night’s Northeast League matchup between the North Shore Spirit and the New Haven County Cutters when this sentence caught my eye: “Klae Calvert pitched the final 5 1/3 innings to earn the save for the Spirit”. And [...]
Posted by JimStorer at 10:14 pm | Other | Permalink | 9 Comments
August 25, 2004
Olympic Gold
Just wanted to offer a tip of the cap to Cat Osterman, Lisa Fernandez, Jennie Finch and the rest of the U.S. women’s olympic softball team for so convincingly winning the gold medal in Athens. I wonder, though, if their opponents might have finally discovered a weakness – after all, in the gold medal [...]
Posted by JimStorer at 8:37 pm | women | Permalink | 4 Comments
August 24, 2004
steroid use – how widespread?
A.J. Brack was a pitcher for the New Haven County Cutters of the independent Northeast League earlier this year. He has ancestors from several generations ago who were from Greece, and thus qualified to play in this year’s Olympics for the host country.
Brack tested positive for steroids and was therefore barred from participating in [...]
Posted by JimStorer at 8:13 pm | steroids | Permalink | 12 Comments
August 24, 2004
Kazmir
Well, he ended up pitching 5 shutout innings and getting the win in his major league debut. I like the fact that Lou left him in for long enough to get the win but took him out after 101 pitches. That should help the kid’s confidence. Pitching against the lowly Mariners couldn’t [...]
Posted by JimStorer at 7:50 am | Trades | Permalink | No Comments
August 23, 2004
Schadenfreud
“Schadenfreud” is a German word meaning, roughly, the taking of pleasure in another’s misfortune.
Tonight 20-year old former Mets’ prospect Scott Kazmir makes his major league debut for the Devil Rays against the Mariners. Last year Mets’ management described Kazmir as “untouchable” – I guess that meant that he just couldn’t be touched, not that [...]
Posted by JimStorer at 8:35 pm | Trades | Permalink | 4 Comments
August 23, 2004
Remember this name
I just read in Baseball America that a Cuban player by the name of Kendry Morales has recently defected. I had the great fortune of having watched Morales play for the Industriales of the Cuban League two years ago. I believe that he was only 19 years old at the time, and believe [...]
Posted by JimStorer at 8:17 pm | Cuba | Permalink | 39 Comments
August 22, 2004
In for the vacationing David Pinto
Hi everybody! My name is Jim Storer, and as the author of this blog has already noted, he and I have been the best of friends since our freshman year in college, the year that the Yankees’ shortstop officially changed his name to Bucky “Bleeping” Dent in Boston. We watched The Game on [...]
Posted by JimStorer at 8:50 pm | Baseball | Permalink | 2 Comments
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