River Ave. Blues posts an interesting graph showing the ups and downs of the Yankees offense and pitching in 2008.
Scoring and Preventing
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Monthly Archives: January 2009
Blacked Out
Eight teams are not scheduled to appear on the national broadcasts of ESPN and Fox this year.
Blue Jays, Marlins, Padres, Nationals, Pirates, Reds, Rockies, Royals- 0
I’m guessing the Rockies will be good enough to appear on a broadcast before the season is over.
Happy Birthday 42!
Volcano Sunrise
Here’s a picture of the Redoubt Volcano in Alaska at sunrise this morning:
Redoubt Volcano
Photo: Alaska Volcano Observatory
There are rumblings under this cone and they are expecting it to erupt any time.
Giant Plan
The Giants’ plan to land Manny Ramirez seems to be to wait until Manny is so upset at the Dodgers he’s willing to take below market deal someplace else.
Executives with other teams do not believe the Giants are serious players in the Manny bidding. They think San Francisco’s real intent is to keep the Dodgers honest, to force them to give Ramirez at least a two-year deal. And if somehow Ramirez gets angered by the Dodgers’ level of interest and decides to deliver himself to their division rival, well, all the better for the Giants.
I’m somewhat surprised that a team like the Nationals or Orioles, who were in the bidding for Mark Teixeira, wouldn’t commit some of that money to a two-year deal for Manny just for the publicity.
Talking to Verducci
Alex Belth interview Tom Verrducci about his new Joe Torre book at SI.
Violating the Rule
I have a friend who has a rule for determining how young a person you should date. Take your age, divide by two, then add seven. So if you’re 30, the youngest person you should date is 22. If you’re 50, a 32 year old is as young as you should go. If you’re 59, the person should be no younger than 36 1/2. John Henry doesn’t come close.
Red Sox owner John Henry is engaged to girlfriend Linda Pizzuti.
…
It will be the first marriage for Pizzuti, who has been dating the millionaire businessman since she was introduced to him last summer at Alibi, the bar at the Liberty Hotel. Henry, the 59-year-old founder of the Boca Raton-based investment firm John W. Henry & Co., has one daughter from his 14-year marriage to Peggy. He was also married once before.
Pizzuti, 30, is from Lynnfield, and she and her family are in the real estate development business. She’s been a near-constant companion of the Sox owner in recent months, traveling with him to Europe and hosting parties on his 164-foot yacht.
At least she’ll be a rich widow before she’s too old.
Contract Offer
Heh.
Giving Arbitration the Byrd
The Texas Rangers sign Marlon Byrd, and clear their arbitration docket.
Yankees Settle
The Yankees reach a contract agreement with Brian Bruney. He’s the last of the outstanding contracts, and New York won’t need to deal with the arbitrator this season.
Varitek Agrees
Jason Varitek blinks, returning to the Red Sox for $5 million dollars:
Varitek, who turns 37 on April 11, will earn $5 million in 2009, according to baseball sources, with the club holding a $5 million option for 2010. If the Red Sox do not pick up that option, Varitek has the choice of remaining with the club on a $3 million deal. In ’10, he can earn another $2 million in incentives based on playing time, beginning at 80 games started.
The incentives apply to the player option only and come increments of $400,000 payable to Varitek for reaching plateaus at 80, 90, 100, 110 and 120 games started in 2010.
I actually think the Red Sox would have been better off letting Jason go and hoping they get a draft choice out of a team that was willing to sign him. I guess $5 million was better than nothing for Varitek, and this will make his Boston fans happy.
Pitch Volume
Razzball looks at the effect a high volume of pitches has on success the next season.
Challenge from Brazil
Tuffy R sent me this link, as the Brazilian curling team calls out the Americans:
“We knew they were out there playing,” Patzke said, “but we didn’t really have them on our radar until they made the challenge.”
The best-of-five match against the United States team, beginning Friday in Bismarck, N.D., will be Brazil’s international curling debut, an appearance about as unlikely as that of the Jamaican bobsled team at the 1988 Winter Olympics.
“When I mention it to friends and family, the first question they ask is, ‘Are you going to Brazil?’ ” said Todd Birr, the skip, or captain, of the United States team. “No, we’re going to Bismarck. But it should be fun.”
The World Curling Federation allots two berths in the 12-team world championship to countries from the Americas, and in the 50 years of the event the lone representatives have been the United States and Canada. Only two other countries in the Americas belong to the federation: Brazil, which joined in 1998, and the United States Virgin Islands.
Canada can’t be bumped as host nation and world champs, so the Brazilians get a chance to knock off the US. It looks like you can follow the event here. Does anyone know if there will be live television coverage?
Rally Manny
Mets fans rallied for Manny Ramirez outside the SNY studios (owned by the Mets). It was called the Million Manny March, although they were about 999,970 people short.
Should teams listen to their fans? If the Mets sign Manny and still fall a game short of the playoffs, would Omar Minaya get to fire the Manny maniacs? (Not to be confused with Yacko, Wacko and Dot.)
Coast to Coast
There’s some confusion on the Varitek deadline. Is it Eastern or Pacific time?
Update: Or maye there’s no deadline at all.
I Will Find You and Kill You
Every time I see an ad for Taken, I think of this.
Bobby and Barry
A former teammate of Barry Bonds is going testify against the slugger:
It looks like Barry Bonds has more than just a failed urine test to worry about when his perjury trial gets underway on March 2nd. According to ESPN, Bobby Estalella, a former Giant who admitted using steroids provided by Bonds’ trainer Greg Anderson, is prepared to provide “significant testimony” to back up the government’s claim that Bonds knowingly took steroids.
Estalella admitted using the same substances, as well as human growth hormone, during the same BALCO investigation that led to the Bonds statements being questioned by federal prosecutors. He’s reportedly able to provide first-hand knowledge of Bonds’ steroid use, something that would be quite damning to Bonds’ case.
The spoilers keep coming. They’re taking all the drama out of the trial!
Update: Add the Giambis to the list of people called to testify.
Specifically, the prosecutors want to use the Giambis’ testimony to establish that Anderson created doping calendars for both men. If the Giambis testify to that effect, the prosecutors will then be free to argue that Anderson created similar calendars to monitor Bonds’s use of banned substances, according to a person briefed on the government’s evidence. The person spoke on the condition of anonymity because he did not want to jeopardize his access to sensitive information.
The trial continues to leak like a sieve.
Improving Pitching?
Looking A’s
Athletics Nation takes an indepth look at the A’s propensity to strikeout looking. The team does rank high in the stat, but more interesting are the player charts. There are players like Sweeney and Crosby who get called on the edges, but there are also players like Cust and Hannahan who just takes hittable pitches.
Varitek to Retire?
Jason Varitek is threatening to sit out the 2009 season. Given the environment for free agents, I suspect the Red Sox would be happy to take him up on the offer.
Kubel Contract
The Twins buy out the last two years of Jason Kubel’s arbitration and are down to one arbitration case.
Secret Surgery
Carlos Pena underwent abdominal surgery over three weeks ago, but should be ready for spring training. He won’t play in the WBC, but should be ready for the season. I wonder why they didn’t announce this earlier?
Joe on Joe
Joe Christensen reports the latest news on Joe Crede.
Hacking A-Rod
New York Baseball Hack Dan Graziano offers his take on A-Rod:
A-Rod is actually an interesting guy to talk to about baseball. He loves the game and works so hard at it that he has a great deal to offer in terms of analysis — of his own game and other people’s. I have had many one-on-one conversations with him about baseball, and they’re almost always educational. We’ve discussed technical aspects of playing third base and of basestealing. We’ve talked about the perception of him as a poor “clutch” player, what he thinks of that and how he copes with it. When you ask him a good question about the game, he can help educate you about the game. The hardest part is finding him. Or getting him to take those stupid headphones off and talk to you.
Are we really surprised to hear, from Torre, that A-Rod “needs people to make a fuss over him?” This couldn’t be more obvious to anybody who watches the guy. Every movement is measured, every ounce of attention absorbed. When all the Madonna stuff was going down last year in late June and early July, I talked to a person in the Yankees’ clubhouse and asked how he was handling it. The answer: “Are you kidding? He loves this stuff. He loves being a big enough star to be on the cover of US Weekly. This isn’t going to bother him one bit.”
The sense I get is that A-Rod is trying to put on a front. If the real A-Rod needs attention all the time, isn’t he better off not being himself?
Maholm Extended
The Pittsburgh Pirates agreed to a three-year contract extension with Paul Maholm. There’s no word on the money yet, and the Pirates hold an option for a fourth year. This buys out Paul’s three years of arbitration, always a good move for a club, and possibly his first year of free-agency. Paul does a good job of limiting walks and home runs, and is coming off the best season of his career.
More Revelations
Zog’s Point reveals what Joe Torre left on the cutting room floor.
Torre almost ruined David Cone’s perfect game in 1998 by trying to bring in Tanyon Sturtze, before realizing Sturtze was on the White Sox.
There’s plenty more.
Off the Cuff
Baseball Time in Arlington comments on Joaquin Benoit’s surgery:
Benoit, coincidentally, is set to earn a base salary of $3.5 million in 2009. Toss in Frank Catalanotto’s seemingly immovable $4 million salary (coupled with a $2 million buyout for 2010), and that’s suddenly more than 10 percent of the projected 2009 payroll sunk into either damaged or superfluous goods.
With the injury to Hurley, I’m betting Texas is being pushed more toward signing Ben Sheets.
Stupid Clauses
Sheets to the Mets?
The headline made me laugh but this paragraph slayed me:
“It’s not Ben’s Spanish-speaking ability that interests me,” Minaya said. “I’m interested in Ben for other reasons. I mean, look. Here’s a pitcher who is not getting any younger, who deals with severe arm injuries on an almost annual basis, who has never fully reached his potential for an extended period of time and could likely end up being a high-priced bust signing. Those elements are all more interesting to me than his Spanish.”