Hey... Listen!

Ran into this positive piece about Nick Vatterott. The set-list bit that's talked about is a great bit, even though I've never actually seen him perform it. He had it hanging on the wall in his old apartment, though, and explained it to me.

Now just who is Brian Cartie? Brought up to A+ Palm Beach out of Extended the other day, he's off to a 5-9 start with two doubles and a home run. If he keeps up that sort of hitting, we'll all know a lot about him in a coupla months.

Memphis burned through seven pitchers in a 12-inning game tonight. Conspicuously, Chris Perez was not one of them... And he hasn't pitched since Tuesday, so it's not like he wasn't physically able. I'm hoping that means that Isringhausen will be DL'd and sent to EST to work with Strom on getting himself right, with Perez filling out bullpen depth while he's getting his confidence together. A roster move is expected Friday.

Labels: comedy, minor leaguers, roster moves

has been canceled for this gal.

If you missed Rick Ankiel's two outfield assists last night: behold.

That's unreal.

Labels: Ankiel

After taking 2 of 3 from the Cubs, the Cards head off to face a badly struggling Colorado Rockies team for four games. Not that I'm expecting it, but a four game sweep would put the Cards at double over .500, or twice as many wins as losses—the beastly .666 winning percentage that the 2004 and 2005 teams flirted with.

Game starts at 7:35. Meanwhile, Mark Mulder will be making his penultimate rehab start against the Colorado Springs Sky Sox, the Rockies AAA affiliate. He seeks to complete a five-game sweep for the Memphis Redbirds. Kick some tail, Mark!

Labels: gameday, minor leaguers

I've long been a fan of Skip Schumaker (list of references here), ever since he made an exceptional throw from the warning track to home back in 2005 during his first call-up. It didn't beat the runner, but it was a one-hopper that made the runner giddyup scoring from third on the sac fly.

People within the organization have said for years that his upside is a Brian Giles-type gap hitter. That's a rosier upside than reasonable given the changes in the league since Giles' peak in the early aughts. The similarity is worth looking at, though. Both players established/are establishing themselves as everyday-quality players in their age 28 season, are roughly the same size, and are high-batting average offensive players. Schumaker certainly won't ever pile up the gaudy home run totals that Giles did in his heyday, but it's conceivable that he'll out double him.

Even without showing much HR power before last night, Skip's been able to walk more frequently than he's struck out. He's on pace to walk 70 times if he gets as many PA's as Giles had in 1999, his age-29 season, although if Skip can keep pitchers honest by elevating the ball a tad more, you could see that total exceeded.

Skip's not the powerhouse that Brian Giles was, but he's definitely looking like this could be a real break-out season for him.

Labels: schumaker

The Pittsburgh Steelers took Rashard Mendenhall with their first round pick in this year's NFL draft. Mendenhall was the best player Illinois fielded during my time at the University of Illinois. He reminds me quite a bit of the best RB I've ever seen, Terrell Davis, but without the history of leg problems. That he's going to a team with a tradition of putting the ball on the ground is gravy.

I find it surprising, then, that the Illini chose to cut his brother from the team. Walter would have been able to contribute as a running back, one of the weak points on this team, and letting him finish his master's degree at the U of I would have been a classy thing for the team to do. Always good for recruiting to maintain good relations with your players that make it to the NFL. It'll annoy me more than usual if Mendenhall introduces himself in Monday night games as "Rashard Mendenhall: School of Hard Knocks."

Looking forward to seeing what Mark Tupper has to say about this.

Labels: illinii football

Kary Booher, beat reporter covering the S-Cards for the Springfield News Leader, has been on a tear of late at his Cardinals Corner blog/columns (nee Kary's Hot Corner).

The latest post is on Mike Roberts, a very bright "old-school" scout for the Cardinals and one of the senior supervisors of the department. Contrast Roberts' view of the organization with Booher's story on Gene Tenace, who railed publicly about his low opinion of Jeff Luhnow. Tenace is an interesting character. As a player, he's noteworthy for taking Dave Duncan's catching job for the A's, among other things. He's also one of those players whose career looks much better under sabermetric light. But like another such player, he seems to find the illumination repulsive and dangerous.

Labels: minor leaguers

by this comic.

Mythbusters is a swell show.

This one too, although I'd argue with the placement of pineapple on the vertical axis.

I've seriously considered building a device much like this one.

Labels: comedy, personal nonsense

Following the game on television and via gameday, the Cardinals take on the Pirates to conclude a short two-game series. The Brewers and Cubs have both lost already today. A win tonight puts the Cardinals 1.5 back from Chicago in the NL Central.

Nice looking lineup, with an outfield of Ludwick-Schumaker-Barton and Brendan Ryan making his first start at shortstop and batting ninth. With the talented lefthander Gorzellany on the mound for the Bucks, Aaron Miles is playing 2nd and batting in front of the pitcher.

Top First: Skip draws an easy walk. Barton grounds a double play ball to second but legs out the throw. Pujols walks to bring up the clean-up hitter, Ryan Ludwick. Lud the Stud's been impressive this season, performing as projected. With an 0-1 count, Brian Barton gets caught stealing. Badly. He left before Gorzellany thought about going into his motion. Ludwick strikes out looking to end the inning. I serve myself a second bowl of menudo.

Bottom First: Piñiero comes out throwing strikes. He gets a 4-3 groundout from McLouth, then makes Freddy Sanchez his first strikeout victim of the season. Jason Bay, who homered last night off Wellemeyer, walks on six pitches. Jo-El's fastball is sitting in the upper 80's, topping out at 90. Doumit grounds out to Albert, who handles the sharply hit ball and steps on the bag to end the half inning.

Top Second: Glaus K, Molina G5-3, Miles F9. Ugh. The Southwest Airlines commercial with Amy Anderson blocking the dude from the buttons is pretty funny. Much more entertaining than that half-inning. While looking for that clip, I found out that hot chicks are having trouble flying that airline—the stewardesses tell them to cover up. The irony is overwhelming.

Bottom Second: Piñiero's cruising along through that 1-2-3 inning, which saw Adam LaRoche strike out swinging. Jo-El's pitch count is 25 through two innings. Nice efficiency. I argued last year that Piñeiro is a similar pitcher going into this season to Soup when we signed him. It'd be nice if we could get him his first win so casual fans will stop complaining about him.

Top Third: The lone survivor of planet Krypton strikes out swinging at a belt-high fastball to lead off the inning. Brendan Ryan beats out a groundball to the shortstop that's ruled an error. Good to see him back with the team. He injured himself the day I went down to Spring Training, so I didn't get to see him do anything but pound out a pocket in his glove with a wooden mallet of some type. Skip grounds into a double play to end the half-inning. Tom's a good pitcher, glad to see him getting his act together. Not so happy it comes against the Cardinals.

Bottom Third: Brian Bixler picks up the first hit of the game, lining one to Ludwick for a single. Gorzelanny sacrifice bunts him to second. McLouth flies out to Skip Schumaker in center field. Piñiero throws breaking stuff to Freddy Sanchez: low and away, up and in, then a curve over the plate that Sanchez grounds to Ryan, who gobbles it up cleanly and makes a solid throw to Pujols to end the inning. Nice to have you back, Brendan. In case anyone was wondering, Tony La Russa is a Brendan Ryan fan.

Top Fourth: Brian Barton draws a walk to lead off the inning. The best baseball player in the game steps up to the plate. On a 3-1 count, the catcher sets up inside and low. Gorzelanny doesn't have the nerves to throw it there and walks el Hombre with a pitch away. Ludwick steps up to make 'em pay. Unfortunately, he flies to deep center field, deep enough for Barton to advance to third. Some may wonder why Ludwick's playing in left and Barton in right. PNC park has a strangely deep left field, so Tony's playing his better corner defender in that field. Barton's got some serious speed that might've given him an advantage in that gap. Want to see a left field really out of left field? Check out the Midland Rockhound's dimensions. Glaus strikes out swinging and Molina flies out to spoil the opportunity we had with two on and no outs. Aggravating.

Bottom Fourth: Piñiero strikes out Bay to start the inning. He's looking very good tonight. Doumit pops up into no-man's land between Ludwick, Schumaker, and Brendan Ryan for a single. Xavier Nady hits a slow roller past the pitcher than Ryan fields and throws to first. Doumit was at the bag ahead of the ball so no force or DP was possible. At AAA, Mike Parisi is facing down the Iowa Cubs who have the lefty J.R. Mathes pitching. David Freese has the lone Redbirds hit, a double. Couldn't be more impressed with that kid, who's showing a strong bat after making the big leap from A ball to AAA after being acquired from the Padres for Jim Edmonds, who's not off to a good start. Adam LaRoche drives a ball to the wall to score Doumit from second. Pirates take the lead 1-0 over my beloved Cardinals here in the 4th with two outs. I hold Piñiero to Cardnilly's Suppan standard: 6+ innings with three runs scored is a good start, it's up to the bats to score enough runs to win a high percentage of such games. Bautista ends the inning with a flyball to Thudwick.

Top Fifth: Aaron Miles doesn't get it done, grounding out to lead off the fifth inning. Piñiero, at 59 pitches, watches four straight pitches miss the zone and takes his walk. Brendan Ryan comes up and works a considerably more difficult walk. We've got first and second with one out and the top of the order coming up. This'd be a good time to score some runs. Skip comes up, skeptical of Gorzelanny's ability to locate his pitches and takes the first two for balls. The third pitch in the sequence paints the low-and-away corner. Pitch four is lower and awayer and runs the count to 3-1. Gorzelanny hits the same corner as strike one and Skip fouls it off before walking on the next pitch. That's the sort of AB I was wondering whether Skip'd be able to take when he was leading off for Memphis the past two years. He'd take a lot of strike 3s with a full count, leading me to question his batter's eye. Like to see him foul off those borderline pitches. Brian Barton steps up with the bases loaded and one out. El Homb looms large on the on-deck circle. Barton lines it over the infielders' heads for a single that plates two baserunners and advances Skip from first to third. Albert's up with second open, one out, and two in. Delightful! Pujols drives a 3-1 pitch throw the hole between short and third to score Schumaker. Ryan Ludwick flies to right-centerfield and Glaus grounds out 6-3 to end the inning. I have the utmost confidence that Glaus will get his bat going and am pleased with his defense. Just in case one gets that grass-is-greener feeling, Sco-Ro (who's one of my all-time favorite ballplayers) is hitless through three games on his rehab assignment with the A-Advanced Dunedin Blue Jays. Just saying.

Bottom Fifth: Piñiero resumes work on the mound with a nice two-run lead. He induces a grounder on three pitches, then gets the pinch-hitter Chris Gomez to fly out on five, before ending the inning with a three-pitch strikeout. Dude's efficient even when he's striking out their leadoff hitter. He's at 66 pitches through five innings and looks like he could carry this one through 8 innings.

Top Sixth: Molina leads off the inning with a ground-rule double to the left-field corner. This team needs a good, punishing win to get a little swagger going with the (surging?) Astros coming to town this weekend. Aaron Miles grounds out, advancing Molina to third. It's odd seeing a longman out of the Pirates bullpen who's not Ryan Vogelsong, who's been pitching for Hanshin in Japan the past two years. Joel strikes out swinging at a ball in the dirt. Brendan Ryan singles to score Molina from third. Skip comes up and hits a classic Brian Giles-esque gap double to score Ryan. Brian Barton skies a ball to the 383' mark at the left field wall that finds Jason Bay's glove. That would've been his first MLB home run in most other parks. Inning's over with the Cards up 5-1.

Bottom Sixth: Holy smokes! Freddy Sanchez scorches a grounder off Piñiero's calf. The ball pops about twenty feet in the air and fifteen towards the 3B side. Jo-El picks up the ball in the air, gloves it, whirls and throw to first to get Sanchez out. Unreal play. Had to rewind it and watch it a few times. That's simply exceptional. Jason Bay follows that up with a 3-2 grounder that bounds past Glaus for a single. Doumit comes up and grounds the ball to Aaron Miles, who throws to Ryan covering second to get Bay out. Doumit beats the ball at first by a whisker to keep the inning going. Xavier Nady comes to the plate and grounds into a 6-4 forceout to end the inning. Dan points out that the Pirates are the only team in the major leagues to have grounded into a double play in each game so far this season. That's gotta hurt. I wouldn't mind if they end that streak against us if it means they don't get any more men on base. Piñiero's at 86 pitches. He'll have to be extremely efficient in the seventh to make it into the 8th.

Top 7th: Pujols leads off by pounding a rocket to the base of the wall in the right field corner. Nady plays it cleanly and makes a stellar throw to 2nd, beating Pujols to get the first out. Ludwick flies out to Nady for the second out. Glaus lines a single to Nady and Molina doubles to the left field wall. Glaus is held up at third by Oquendo. Aaron Miles is intentionally walked to load the bases for Joel Piñiero with two outs. Joel's looked pretty lost at the plate in this game, but he looked fine hitting off the pitching machine at spring training. If Dumatrait makes a mistake here, it wouldn't be inconceivable for Piñiero to make the Pirates pay dearly. Unfortunately, he strikes out looking at a belt-high fastball away. Let's hope that Glaus run won't be needed.

Bottom 7th: Extreme efficiency, here we come! Adam LaRoche flies out on a first-pitch fastball. Bautista strikes out looking at two pitches then foul tipping the third into Molina's glove. Brian Bixler then strikes out on four pitches. Superb 8 pitch inning keeps his pitch count at 94. If he were pulled here, Joel would have a FIGS of 69. If he can finish the 8th, he'll have tied Wainwright for the longest outing by a Cardinals starter in 2008.

Top 8th: Ryan leads off with a grounder misplayed by the third baseman Bautista. Skip grounds into a double play for the second time in this game. Brian Barton singles through the left side of the infield. Albert Pujols gets drilled in the lower back after Barton very nearly committed a second baserunning gaffe in the game—he was almost picked off third wandering. Ludwick comes up with two outs and runners at first and second. Lud's the only starter for the Cardinals who's failed to reach base tonight. Osoria strikes him out swinging to end the half inning.

Bottom 8th: Tony opts not to push Piñiero and brings in the lefty Villone, who I think may be the fourth-best healthy lefthanded pitcher in the organization behind Randy Flores, Ron Flores, and Jaime Garcia. He strikes out the righty Rivas, then runs the count full on the lefty McLouth before inducing a pop-up. That's only the second lefthander he's faced where the plate appearance didn't result in one of the three true outcomes. In 8 PA, he'd walked three and struck out four. The right-hander Freddy Sanchez then grounds out 6-3. I expect Villone will pitch again in the ninth, giving the heavy lifters in the bullpen a badly needed day off.

Top 9th: Troy Glaus leads off: ball outside, swinging strike at a pitch away, then doubles on a sharply hit ground ball down the line and past his counterpart, Jose Bautista. I'd rather play David Freese over Bautista. Freese, by the way, has gone 2-3 so far for Memphis tonight with a double. Yadier Molina singles to advance Glaus to third. Aaron Miles grounds into another double play, scoring Glaus to run the lead to five. Tony makes the questionable decision to pinch-hit Duncan for Ron Villone with two outs and the bases empty. The move gives Chris Duncan an at-bat to keep the rust off and gets Russ Springer some work, his second appearance since returning from the DL.

Bottom 9th: Russ coaxes a fly ball to Ryan Ludwick off Jason Bay's bat. He falls behind 3-0 against Ryan Doumit, who has Danzig's "Mother" playing when he comes to bat, before walking him on the fifth pitch. Thinking about Ryan Vogelsong earlier made me recall one of my favorite depth-starter type pitchers, Chris "The Missle" Gissell. I was also prompted by this Future Redbirds post by Azruavatar, celebrated Jack Cassel, who's his pet pitcher of that ilk. Chris pitched for Seibu the past two years. It turns out that he's back in the US with the A's organization. I dug up a nice story about his comeback. He's on the disabled list for Sacramento, but I can't find any story about how he's injured. Xavier Nady singles and advances Doumit to second. The next batter up is Adam LaRoche, who singles on a ground ball to right field. Barton picks up the ball and throws home, well wide. Doumit scores from third on the throw with Springer backing up to allow for a close play at the plate. That was poorly played by Barton. With runners at first and second, up by four, we've entered a save situation and Jason Isringhausen comes in to work it. He inherits the two runners and has one out already taken care of by Springer. It'd have been preferable to get Isringhausen a day off as I expect he'll be needed for the expected sweep of the Astros this weekend. Jose Bautista flies out to Skip Schumaker in deep center field. Doug Mientkeiwicz then grounds out to Pujols, unassisted to end the game. Cards climb to a game and a half back from the Cubs. We'll be hosting the Astros this weekend, a matchup featuring a showdown on Saturday between aces Adam Wainwright and Roy Oswalt.

The Cubs, meanwhile, will be playing in our nation's capitol, facing three Nationals lefthanders. The North-siders are batting .299/.386/.443 thus far against left-handed pitching. We'll need to play well in order to keep pace. Excellent game tonight with effective, efficient pitching and excellent defense overall behind it, Barton's ninth inning boner excepted. Good to be back on a winning streak.

Labels: game liveblog

I want off.

One way or another, we're all going to be voting for someone who pandered to voters by appearing on this past week's WWE Monday Night Raw. That's unacceptable.

Labels: comedy, politics

From jnai at Sons of Sam Horn, a handy primer for Pitch F/X data. The data is generated by an array of high-speed cameras installed in all MLB parks last season and streams to the gameday applets to show the path of each pitch thrown in a game.

This tool is an easy way to take a look at the information.

Labels: gameday, tech

Thought this would never come out:



The original, if you never saw it.

I've got my stopwatch going to see how long it takes for that to be translated into German.

Update: Pretty close... Someone added German subtitles.

Labels: comedy, socks and sandals

In case you've been living under a rock that's not attached to the Earth, there was a quake in southern Illinois last night that registered 5.4 on the richter scale, followed by a few aftershocks. The only damage I've heard of involved some concrete falling an overpass at Kingshighway and (Southwest and Shaw). (What overpass at Kingshighway and Southwest? I-44? What are they talking about Southwest and Shaw and Kingshighway being at the same place? What the heck?)

Here's a roundup of stories:

My earthquake experience:

I woke up with a start at 4:38 to the sound of my bedroom door vibrating. My first guess was that some fool had broken into my house and couldn't figure out the doorknob. I grabbed a weapon and went patrolling in my pajama bottoms. House was perfectly still and quiet, nothing was amiss. Nobody was outside. I thought I was going nuts. A text message came from Jeff asking if I'd felt the 5.4 earthquake that just hit. Can't shoot an earthquake.

Jeff's story:

He thought it was the wind. His fiancee didn't, so he went looking for prowlers. Found out it was an earthquake and sent me a text message.

A co-worker's story:

Thought there was someone climbing around on his roof. He pounded on the walls and yelled, "Get the #@*% off my roof!" until he tired of it and went back to sleep.

Another co-worker's story:

Woke up to the bed shaking and the cat going nuts. Thought the cat was jumping on the bed to make it shake and yelled at her. Woke up to text messages about an earthquake and felt remorse for yelling at the cat.

I didn't feel the 10:24 aftershock at all, but that one registered over 4.

Labels: personal nonsense, weather

During the offseason, I made some guesses on unheralded players in the Cardinals farm system that have the right skillset to establish themselves in the 2008 season. Of the three I picked, only one earned a spot on a full-season team. That's Brian Broderick, the big right-hander from Grand Canyon State. He'll make his second start for Quad Cities tomorrow. In his first, he struck out three, walked two, and collected eight outs on groundballs versus four in the air. He benefited from a 6-4-3 DP in the first started by 2008 first-rounder Pete Kozma and pitched around an error by his first baseman in the second. Two runs scored on him, one on a two-out bunt single in the third, the other on a pair of line drive doubles in the fourth. He took the loss as the River Bandits were shutout for the day.

A sleeper Erik pointed out in the comments to that post is Nick Additon, a lefty drafted out of high school who had phenomenal strikeout numbers in 2007 with a low walk total. He started the day after Broderick and pitched four shutout innings while striking out nine batters and walking only one. He struck out the side in the first and sat two down on strikes in the fourth inning, with the third out coming on a baserunner caught stealing.

My other two sleeper picks are Jameson Maj and Juan Mosquera. Jameson's a big, strong RHRP who struck out 100 batters and walked only 7 last season across three levels (D-IIA, TCL, SS) while getting presumably a lot of groundball outs, extrapolating from the number of assists and putouts he himself had a hand in. When I was down at Jupiter, I had the opportunity to talk to him a bit. He's a nice fella, but seemed a bit startled that I knew so much about his 2007 season and self-identified as a Jameson Maj fan considering he only pitched 1 1/3 professionally and was drafted in the 45th round. When I mentioned how impressive his peripheral numbers were last season, he grinned and said, "Yeah, I don't like walking people." Unfortunately, his elbow's a bit sore, so he's in extended spring training and expects to start out at Batavia again when their season begins. I should've asked him about his repertoire, but I was distracted by concern for the elbow. Looking forward to seeing him put up huge numbers this year.

I didn't see Mosquera at all in Jupiter, but there were a ton of players around and four games to watch at once, so it doesn't mean he wasn't there.

Labels: minor leaguers, vacation

Swamped with work and research, but a big ol' post is coming down the pike. Included: travel tales and Spring Training pictures.

A picture to whet the appetite:

Labels: personal nonsense

Back from sunny South Florida and parts elsewhere, here are this week's gameday links:

Monday, March 24, 2008

NY Mets at Baltimore
Atlanta at Cleveland
St. Louis at Minnesota
Detroit at Washington
Houston at Florida
Pittsburgh at Tampa Bay
San Diego at LA Angels
Colorado at Milwaukee
Chicago Sox at Seattle
Texas at Chicago Cubs
San Francisco at Arizona
Toronto at Cincinnati
Philadelphia at NY Yankees
LA Dodgers at Kansas City

Tuesday, March 25, 2008

Boston at Oakland
Florida at Baltimore
NY Yankees at Cleveland
Tampa Bay at Toronto
Cincinnati at Philadelphia
Minnesota at Pittsburgh
Washington at St. Louis
Atlanta at NY Mets
LA Dodgers at Milwaukee
Chicago Cubs at San Francisco
Chicago Sox at Colorado
LA Angels at Arizona
Houston at Detroit
Seattle at Texas
Kansas City at San Diego

Wednesday, March 26, 2008

Boston at Oakland
Tampa Bay at Minnesota
Washington at Atlanta
Cleveland at Houston
NY Yankees at Philadelphia
Detroit at Pittsburgh
Baltimore at St. Louis
Florida at NY Mets
Chicago Cubs at LA Angels
Milwaukee at Chicago Sox
Seattle at Kansas City
Texas at San Diego
Arizona at Colorado
Cincinnati at Toronto
San Francisco at Fresno

Thursday, March 27, 2008

Tampa Bay at Cleveland
Philadelphia at Detroit
Houston at Toronto
NY Mets at Atlanta
Minnesota at Cincinnati
Baltimore at Washington
St. Louis at Florida
Pittsburgh at NY Yankees
Colorado at LA Angels
Arizona at Chicago Sox
San Diego at Seattle
Kansas City at Texas
Milwaukee at Chicago Cubs
LA Dodgers at LA Angels
Seattle at San Francisco

Friday, March 28, 2008

NY Mets at Baltimore
Pittsburgh at Minnesota
Cincinnati at Tampa Bay
Toronto at Philadelphia
Cleveland at Atlanta
NY Yankees at Florida
Kansas City at Milwaukee
Chicago Sox at Texas
Detroit at Houston
St. Louis at Springfield
Colorado at Arizona
LA Angels at San Diego
Seattle at Chicago Cubs
Oakland at San Francisco
Boston at LA Dodgers

Saturday, March 29, 2008

Tampa Bay at Cincinnati
Toronto at Philadelphia
Minnesota at Pittsburgh
Cleveland at Atlanta
Detroit at Houston
St. Louis at Springfield
Kansas City at Milwaukee
Chicago Cubs at Seattle
San Francisco at Oakland
Chicago Sox at NY Mets
Baltimore at Washington
NY Yankees at Florida
San Diego at LA Angels
Boston at LA Dodgers
Texas at Frisco
Monterrey at Arizona

Sunday, March 30, 2008

Oakland at San Francisco
Boston at LA Dodgers
Atlanta at Washington
Philadelphia at Lehigh Valley (Don't know code for Iron Pigs)

Labels: gameday

(3/24-3/30 links are here)

Wednesday, March 12, 2008

Houston at Detroit
Boston at Minnesota
Pittsburgh at Toronto
Washington at LA Dodgers
St. Louis at Florida
NY Yankees at Tampa Bay
Baltimore at NY Mets
Kansas City at LA Angels
Colorado at Chicago Sox
Arizona at Oakland
Milwaukee at Seattle
Chicago Cubs at Texas
San Diego at San Francisco
Cleveland at Atlanta
Cincinnati at Philadelphia

Thursday, March 13, 2008

Minnesota at Baltimore
Tampa Bay at Boston
Toronto at Cleveland
Atlanta at Detroit
LA Dodgers at Houston
NY Mets at St. Louis
Pittsburgh at NY Yankees
LA Angels at Kansas City
San Francisco at Seattle
San Diego at Chicago Cubs
Texas at Colorado
Milwaukee at Arizona
Philadelphia at Cincinnati
Florida at Washington

Friday, March 14, 2008

Baltimore at Boston
St. Louis at LA Dodgers
Cleveland at Washington
Atlanta at Philadelphia
Cincinnati at Pittsburgh
NY Mets at Florida
Toronto at Tampa Bay
Pittsburgh at Minnesota
NY Yankees at Cincinnati
Oakland at Chicago Sox
Texas at Kansas City
Colorado at Seattle
LA Angels at Chicago Cubs
Arizona at San Francisco
Detroit at Houston
Washington at Cleveland
Milwaukee at San Diego

Saturday, March 15, 2008

San Diego at LA Dodgers
LA Dodgers at San Diego
Cincinnati at Boston
Houston at Cleveland
NY Yankees at Detroit
Pittsburgh at Toronto
Tampa Bay at Atlanta
Atlanta at Houston
LA Dodgers at Washington
Minnesota at Philadelphia
Baltimore at Florida
St. Louis at NY Mets
Tampa Bay at NY Yankees
Arizona at LA Angels
Chicago Cubs at Chicago Sox
Kansas City at Milwaukee
San Francisco at Oakland
Colorado at Texas
Oakland at San Diego
Seattle at San Francisco

Sunday, March 16, 2008

LA Dodgers at San Diego
San Diego at LA Dodgers
Washington at Baltimore
Toronto at Minnesota
Philadelphia at Cincinnati
NY Mets at Houston
Boston at Pittsburgh
Atlanta at St. Louis
Florida at LA Dodgers
Detroit at Tampa Bay
Detroit at NY Mets
Cleveland at NY Yankees
San Francisco at Kansas City
Texas at Oakland
Milwaukee at Seattle
LA Angels at Chicago Cubs
LA Angels at San Francisco
San Diego at Colorado
Chicago Sox at Arizona

Monday, March 17, 2008

Florida at Minnesota
Detroit at Cincinnati
Houston at LA Dodgers
NY Mets at Washington
Cleveland at Philadelphia
Toronto at Pittsburgh
Atlanta at St. Louis
Boston at NY Yankees
Chicago Sox at Milwaukee
Kansas City at Oakland
Milwaukee at Seattle
Seattle at Texas
San Francisco at Colorado
San Diego at Arizona

Tuesday, March 18, 2008

Minnesota at Baltimore
Washington at Detroit
Pittsburgh at Cincinnati
Tampa Bay at Philadelphia
LA Dodgers at Florida
NY Yankees at Virginia Tech
Milwaukee at LA Angels
San Diego at Chicago Sox
Oakland at Texas
Kansas City at Chicago Cubs

Wednesday, March 19, 2008

Toronto at Boston
St. Louis at Baltimore
Philadelphia at Tampa Bay
Milwaukee at LA Angels
LA Angels at Oakland
Oakland at Chicago Cubs
Colorado at Chicago Sox
Atlanta at Houston
NY Yankees at Pittsburgh
Cleveland at NY Mets
Arizona at Seattle
Chicago Cubs at San Francisco

Thursday, March 20, 2008

Tampa Bay at Cleveland
NY Yankees at Toronto
Pittsburgh at Philadelphia
Florida at St. Louis
San Francisco at LA Angels
Colorado at Chicago Cubs
Chicago Sox at LA Dodgers
Texas at Arizona
Cincinnati at Minnesota
Detroit at Atlanta
Houston at Washington
Baltimore at NY Mets
Milwaukee at Kansas City
Seattle at San Diego

Friday, March 21, 2008

Toronto at Detroit
Philadelphia at Minnesota
Cleveland at Atlanta
Florida at Houston
Cincinnati at Pittsburgh
Baltimore at St. Louis
Washington at NY Mets
San Diego at Milwaukee
Kansas City at Seattle
Chicago Sox at San Francisco
Chicago Cubs at Colorado
LA Dodgers at Arizona
Tampa Bay at NY Yankees
LA Angels at Texas

Saturday, March 22, 2008

Florida at Baltimore
NY Mets at Cleveland
Cincinnati at Houston
Atlanta at Washington
Detroit at Philadelphia
Minnesota at St. Louis
Pittsburgh at Tampa Bay
Toronto at NY Yankees
San Diego at Kansas City
Texas at Seattle
Chicago Sox at Chicago Cubs
LA Angels at LA Dodgers
Milwaukee at San Francisco
Colorado at Arizona

Sunday, March 23, 2008

Cleveland at Detroit
Baltimore at Minnesota
Philadelphia at Toronto
Houston at Atlanta
Tampa Bay at Cincinnati
NY Yankees at Pittsburgh
Washington at Florida
St. Louis at NY Mets
Seattle at LA Angels
Kansas City at Chicago Sox
Arizona at Milwaukee
San Francisco at Texas
Chicago Cubs at San Diego
LA Dodgers at Colorado

Labels: gameday

Barowners in Minnesota are exploiting a loophole in the state's smoking ban. Hilarious:

At the Rock, a heavy-metal bar in Maplewood, owner Brian Bauman explained why his clientele were doing little more than sitting around, smoking and drinking to a soundtrack of deafening music.

"They're playing themselves before 1 October - you know, before there was a smoking ban," he said, according to the Associated Press.

"We call the production, Before the Ban!"

That sounds like a blast. We had a best-of-all-worlds situation in Champaign for about nine months last year, between the time when the newly elected Champaign city council repealed their city smoking ban and when the state-wide ban took effect. About half the bars allowed customers to smoke indoors like civilized people and the other half were non-smoking bars. Everyone had the opportunity to be happy.

Even the humorless, over-the-top control freaks who say things like the following comment to that BBC article.

There will always be resistance to such a move [as a smoking ban], but there was also resistance to the abolition of slavery.

Harriet Tubman, this statist ain't.

Labels: anti-smoking fascism

The actor behind the counter is James Madio, who played the role of Frank Perconte in Band of Brothers. He also played Lazzarini on the first season of USA High, which I'm almost positive was filmed on the same soundstage as Saved by the Bell: The College Years.

Labels: comedy, potty humor

The Chicago Tribune is running a Peep-a-looza contest in which members of the public submit photographs of a diorama featuring Peeps. This is the second greatest thing you can do with Peeps, after the Easter Turducken. They've set up a gallery of submissions for you to amuse yourself with. Speaking of gallery of submission, here's the entry that me and my friends made last night:



If you click the picture, you can marvel at a larger version and enjoy such details as the pink peep on the left's ball-gag. It was four women making this, mind you, with me and another fella egging them on.

I bet we win.

Update: Holy smokes... It's actually on the Trib website!

Labels: comedy, egg jokes

(3/24-3/30 links are here)

March 12-18 games posted here or bookmark mlb.com's link.

I lost the script I'd written last spring to generate the unpublished MLB.com gameday links from the online schedules. I spent the last hour taking a break procrastinating from writing the chapter I'd meant to finish this past weekend to slap together a greatly improved version. This one requires me to do literally no work but run the script and copy the output to this page.

Wednesday, March 5, 2008

Minnesota at NY Yankees
Florida at Baltimore
Cincinnati at Boston
Atlanta at Cleveland
Philadelphia at Detroit
Philadelphia at Toronto
Detroit at Pittsburgh
Washington at St. Louis
Houston at Tampa Bay
LA Dodgers at NY Mets
San Diego at Oakland
LA Angels at Seattle
Milwaukee at Texas
Kansas City at San Francisco
Chicago Sox at Colorado
Chicago Cubs at Arizona
St. Louis at Florida

Thursday, March 6, 2008

LA Dodgers at Boston
Atlanta at Detroit
Baltimore at Minnesota
NY Yankees at Cincinnati
Cleveland at Houston
Tampa Bay at Philadelphia
Toronto at Pittsburgh
Florida at St. Louis
San Francisco at LA Angels
Texas at Chicago Sox
Arizona at Kansas City
Seattle at Milwaukee
Chicago Cubs at Oakland
Colorado at San Diego
NY Mets at Washington

Friday, March 7, 2008

Boston at Baltimore
Minnesota at Boston
NY Mets at Cleveland
Minnesota at Toronto
Detroit at Atlanta
Pittsburgh at Cincinnati
St. Louis at LA Dodgers
Washington at Florida
Philadelphia at Tampa Bay
Houston at NY Yankees
Chicago Sox at LA Angels
Arizona at Chicago Sox
Colorado at Kansas City
Texas at Milwaukee
Seattle at Chicago Cubs
Arizona at San Diego
Oakland at San Francisco
Cincinnati at Pittsburgh

Saturday, March 8, 2008

NY Mets at Baltimore
Florida at Boston
Philadelphia at Cleveland
Detroit at Toronto
Houston at Atlanta
Atlanta at Cincinnati
Washington at Houston
Minnesota at Pittsburgh
LA Dodgers at St. Louis
Florida at NY Mets
Tampa Bay at NY Yankees
San Francisco at LA Angels
San Francisco at Chicago Sox
Kansas City at Milwaukee
Chicago Cubs at Oakland
Oakland at Seattle
San Diego at Texas
Arizona at Chicago Cubs
LA Angels at Colorado

Sunday, March 9, 2008

Washington at Cleveland
Pittsburgh at Detroit
NY Yankees at Minnesota
St. Louis at Atlanta
Boston at LA Dodgers
Cleveland at Washington
Toronto at Philadelphia
Baltimore at Florida
Cincinnati at Tampa Bay
Houston at NY Mets
Texas at LA Angels
Chicago Cubs at Kansas City
Seattle at Milwaukee
Milwaukee at Oakland
Chicago Sox at San Diego
Colorado at San Francisco
Seattle at Arizona

Monday, March 10, 2008

LA Dodgers at Baltimore
St. Louis at Atlanta
Toronto at Houston
Detroit at Washington
Philadelphia at Pittsburgh
Minnesota at Florida
Cleveland at Tampa Bay
Boston at NY Mets
Oakland at LA Angels
Seattle at Chicago Sox
San Francisco at Kansas City
Chicago Cubs at Milwaukee
Arizona at Colorado
Cincinnati at NY Yankees
Texas at San Diego

Tuesday, March 11, 2008

NY Mets at Boston
Detroit at Cleveland
Cincinnati at Detroit
Tampa Bay at Minnesota
Houston at Cincinnati
Florida at LA Dodgers
Baltimore at St. Louis
Toronto at NY Yankees
San Francisco at Milwaukee
Chicago Sox at Texas
Oakland at Chicago Cubs
LA Angels at San Diego
Seattle at Colorado
Kansas City at Arizona
Washington at Atlanta

Labels: gameday

Rick Porcello threw his first professional pitches last week in a Tigers spring training game against the Toronto Blue Jays. He retired the top six in the lineup. He induced groundouts from David Eckstein, Alex Rios, then got Vernon Wells to pop-up to end the fifth inning of this game. In the sixth, he struck out Frank Thomas, then got groundball outs from Russ Adams and Matt Watson.

Here's an article about how great his character and work ethic is. Trying very hard to remember: don't fall in or out of love too early in Spring.

Labels: minor leaguers, mlb draft

At Future Redbirds, a game is afoot to guess the Redbirds opening day roster. Naturally, I had to play along. I'm going to dress it up here with links and annotations.

Lineup:

• Johnson C:

  Veteran catcher expected to play the Crash Davis role. If he can maintain the great hitting he showed last year, he'll be valuable depth.

• Phelps 1B:

  Slugging 1B/DH provides decent depth for Albert

• Hoffpauir 2B:

  Puny on-base machine finds his wood-bat extra-base power at age 24. Expectations are high.

• Freese 3B:

  Lafayette grad blocked in the Padres system is traded for legendary CF Jim Edmonds leapfrogs AA. Pressure's on, but he has the coaches' confidence and a solid statistical record.

• Jimenez SS:

  30-year-old with a reputation for getting on base may end up being valuable if Izturis is as useless as expected.

• Stavinoha LF:

  Fast-moving outfielder had difficulty adjusting to AAA in 2007, needs to rebound in age 26 season.

• Rasmus CF:

  Power. Speed. Smarts. Instincts. Scrap. Grit. Hustle. Don't be distraught by any early season struggles. Don't be surprised if he sheds that reputation by not battling a sinus infection while advancing a level. Memphis fans rejoice for a few months.

• Mather RF:

  Winner of 2007 Terry Evans Jr. Award for late-blooming outfielder looks to continue raking his way to the majors

Bench:

• Gonzalez OF/DH:

  Two-time AL MVP attempts comeback, takes AAA roster spot from Amaury Marti. Rakes and gets traded.

• Haerther OF:

  Is he eligible for the 2008 Terry Evans Jr. Award? Competition for Jon Edwards and Daryl Jones, if so.

• Barden IF:

  Super-slick 3B suffers near total power loss in 2007, aims to become useful utility infielder. I'm a big fan, and would love to see his bat come back.

• Washington IF:

  Uncle Rico splits time with Freese and Barden at third and gives Phelps off days at first.

• Pagnozzi C:

  Tom Pagnozzi's nephew returns as AAA backup catcher.

Rotation:

• Boggs R:

  Fastball-slider pitcher continues his rapid ascent

• Hawksworth R:

  Former prospect looks to pitch fully recovered from serious labrum and sundry other injuries and reignite his star potential.

• Parisi R:

  Durable groundball machine with a suddenly unfortunate name returns for second season on the cusp of the majors

• Brazelton R:

  Exceptionally talented pitcher who was pushed far too hard, far too soon joins his fifth organization since the 2005 season. If you aren't rooting for him to breakout, you're a scoundrel. Brent Strom and Dyar Miller have a great opportunity before them.

• Haberer L:

  Durable lefty groundball machine desperately needs to improve his performance against right-handed batters to take advantage of his strong body. 2007 (quick n' dirty) FIP splits: vs. LHB-2.78; vs. RHB-5.28 I'd like to see him add a splitter to complement the sinker against right-handed batters.

Bullpen:

• Perez CL:

  I can't wait to see this guy throw in person

• Motte R:

  Catcher-turned-Pitcher has his fastball close to triple digits.

• Worrell R:

  Nifty straight-over-the-top delivery provides a different look out of the 'pen and Worrell cashes in.

• Politte R:

  Vianney grad came up as a starter for the Cardinals, left in a trade for Stephenson and Bottalico the offseason after his first call-up, he went on to have several excellent seasons in bullpens in Philly and with the White Sox. Returning from surgery, if he looks good, I'd rather have him that Kelvin Jimenez.

• Scherer R:

  Big righty from Poughkeepsie did absolutely everything you want to see after moving up a level. Keep 'im moving. Needs to improve against left-handed batters.

• Flores L:

  Randy's little brother joins the Cardinals at the same age Randy did, sporting a much more impressive resume.

• Villone L:

  If the 38-year-old accepts an assignment to AAA, he and Politte would make valuable mentors for the youngsters on the pitching staff with their nearly 1,500 combined Major League innings. Used properly, he's a fine lefty out of the bullpen.

Some notes: I like Castellanos to make the ML roster. I expect McClellan to start the year out at Springfield making the transition to starter.

Marti either plays in Mexico again or goes back to AA. If Gonzalez makes the STL roster, I’d guess that he’d push out either Barton or bump Ludwick down to AAA, both undesirable outcomes.

Labels: minor leaguers, roster moves

A colleague brought to work the other day a catalog that'd mysteriously been sent to his house. This catalog was full of ridiculous swords and sundry nerd/skinhead paraphernalia. Included in this collection of stupid crap was this ballcap meant to double as a club, containing a "pocket of a unique impact material that is 110% the density of lead."

It made me think of Anthony Reyes.

Labels: personal nonsense

In the show, Lost, who the heck was Kelvin Joe Inman? I'm guessing that character will be brought back to tie up some loose ends, but I can't guess which group he'd've been affiliated with. I suspect he works for whichever organization Naomi's with.

Incidentally, the actor also does the voicework for Mr. Krabs on Spongebob.

Labels: personal nonsense

Derrick Goold reports that Matt Clement won't be ready for opening day and that he'll likely go on a rehab assignment to get back into the routine. That means that my most recent roster prognostication is wrong in at least one place: the starting rotation. I'd guessed it'd be [Wainwright, Looper, Clement, Piñiero, Hawksworth], Blake Hawksworth being a long climb out on a thin limb on the reasoning that unless Reyes has an excellent Spring, the team would avoid bouncing him up and down from Memphis and that giving a young pitcher a shot for the month or so that Mulder's out would be a fine idea.

Clement's signed to a guaranteed major-league contract, so if he were sent on a rehab assignment to start the season, he'd need to be called up to the big club within 30 days of the assignment. The Memphis and Palm Beach seasons both start on April 3rd—30 days from then is May 3rd. Clement could potentially be out for the first month. There's no word on when Mulder will be available, but I'm guessing he'll be sent on a rehab assignment whenever that is. Let's say he starts his rehab at the end of April and he comes up in mid-May. That's two starters needed for the first month and another for the first month and a half to two months.

Before, I'd guessed the bullpen as [Izzy, Springer, Franklin, Flores, TJ, Wellemeyer, Castellanos], with Castellanos the inaugural holder of the Token Funky Delivery Guy role after narrowly beating out Worrell. I suppose a more realistic opening day pitching staff would include Brad Thompson in the long-man role with Wellemeyer moving into the rotation. There's talk of Perez making the team out of Spring Training, which would certainly be exciting, although while spoiling my dreams of a permanent funky delivery guy in the 'pen. It's hard to imagine that one of the best five starting candidates out of the group not including Carp, Mulder, and Clement wouldn't be Anthony Reyes, so I'll guess this staff:

Rotation: Wainwright, Looper, Piñiero, Reyes, Wellemeyer

Bullpen:Izzy, Springer, Franklin, Flores, Johnson, Thompson, Perez

When Clement joins the team, either Wellemeyer goes to the 'pen and bumps the least effective reliever or Reyes returns to Memphis.

Later on that evening: Two articles of interest popped up.

This one has Bryan Anderson and Jaime Garcia returning to AA for 2008.

The second says Kyle McClellan and Blake Hawksworth have caught Dave Duncan's eye. Sounds likely there's a chance for a solid AAA pitching staff, at least.

Labels: roster moves

It came out a while back that Anthony Reyes has an option year remaining, in spite of the fact that he'd spent time in the minors the last three years while on the 40-man roster. I thought that maybe I'd misremembered that he'd spent fewer than 20 days in the minors last year. He was sent down on May 27th and brought back on June 16th, so that's 19 days. But he was sent down again from the 2nd to the 28th of July. That's not the loophole he's passing through. (Perhaps to his misfortune, some would think.)

Turns out that you need to be in your fifth pro season in order to be out of options. Reyes was brought up in his second professional season for four appearances in 2005. This will be his fifth pro season, so he doesn't have enough service ti