Thoughts at the Break
A few thoughts going into the All-Star break.
How in the world are Morgan Ensberg (290/22/63) and Travis Hafner (313/18/58) not on the All-Star team? There are a couple of players on each side that they should be there in place of. Maybe we can’t do much about fans voting in players who shouldn’t be there (although we did pretty well this year for the most part), but we definitely need to change the rule that makes it necessary for each team to be represented.
Hey, if your team doesn’t have any All-Stars, then they don’t have any All-Stars. Let’s not start making things up just to get a representative from each team. I want to see the best players in the game playing in that game, not the best players from each team.
With Damon, Tek, Manny, and Papi, this is the first time that a team has 4 players starting an All-Star game since 5 members of the Big Red Machine did it in “75”. Not too shabby. It also gives us a lot of weight in deciding whether or not we start the World Series at Fenway again.
If Rafael Palmiero gets 3 hits in this last game before the break he will be able to get to 3,000 at home in front of all the Red Sox fans. That's okay though; Sox Nation will make him feel right at home by giving him the appreciation he deserves.
Speaking of Oriole’s players, I can’t believe this September 6th will be the 10-year anniversary of Cal’s record-breaking game. Ten years already? Damn, that went by quick.
While I’m on the subject of iron men, Johnny Damon is one of the toughest players this game has ever seen. I can’t even imagine how much pain this guy plays through. Sometimes I think he should be laid up in a hospital bed when instead he’s out patrolling center field. I don’t want to overpay for this guy, but I hope he and the Sox can work something out to keep him here. Kyla will be very disappointed if it doesn’t work out.
One of the greatest things about this game is how unpredictable it is. No one really knows what’s going to happen, even the experts. The Yankees pitching staff is riddled with injuries and ineffectiveness, it keeps getting worse for them and everyone is starting to write them off, yet they’ve still managed to win a lot of games and have bashed their way back into the race. We now have our hands full, and it’s probably going to go right down to the wire again. Of course, that could all change again by the end of the month.
Meanwhile, our invaluable closer has been everything but invaluable all year and our ace starting pitcher has been on the DL all year, yet we will go into the All-Star break in first place in the AL East. And now, our closer finally gives in to his knee problems and goes on the DL for 4-6 weeks to recover from surgery, and our ace starter is going to come off the DL and become our closer. Dizzying. What a wacky game.
Not even GM’s know what will happen. This off-season, David Wells goes to Yankee GM Brian Cashman and tells him he would love to come back and play for the Yankees. Cashman tells him, sorry but we want to get younger and go in another direction. He then goes out and trades for Randy Johnson and breaks the bank to sign him to a long-term deal. Johnson is a full 6 months younger than Wells. Meanwhile, Theo signs Wells to an incentive laden bargain contract. Their numbers at the break: Johnson 8-6, 4.14 ERA, Wells 6-5, 5.00 ERA. Both have been hurt, both have been inconsistent, but it cost us a lot less to get almost as much as they got so far.
Everyone thought that Carl Pavano was the free agent pitching prize of the off-season and we tried like hell to get him over here, but lost out to the Yankees and had to “settle” for Matt Clement. How is that working out so far? Pavano 4-6, 4.77 ERA and he just went on the DL. Clement 10-2, 3.85 ERA and he just got named to the All-Star team. I’d say that one worked out pretty well for us.
The Yankees also paid big money for Jared Wright who was supposed to be one of the keys to their rotation as it was being overhauled. Meanwhile we took a flyer (with another bargain contract) on Wade Miller who was rehabbing from a mid-season shoulder injury and was not expected to be back until mid-season this year. Their numbers: Wright 2-2, 9.15 ERA, on the DL most of the year. Miller 2-3, 5.03 ERA, came back in May and has been contributing and improving. Miller, despite only having 2 wins and a 5.03 ERA has really only had a few bad starts accounting for the high ERA, and he’s had some bad luck with the bullpen blowing a bunch of his leads. Meanwhile, Wright didn’t get a chance to pitch very much and when he did he was bad.
When I look at the starting All-Star teams, 2 conflicting questions come to mind about the batting orders: 1. How can you possibly go wrong no matter how you set them? 2. How can you justify batting any of those guys at the bottom? The funny thing is, the answer to both questions is the same, you can’t. Here’s my attempt at what I think they’ll look like, followed by my explanation.
AL
Damon
Roberts
Big Papi
Manny
A-Rod
Vlad
Miggy
Teixeira
Tek
Damon and Roberts are both table setters and interchangeable at the top. Damon gets the nod because he plays for the manager. I also think that Francona will go with Ortiz and Manny in their customary spots for the same reason. After that, it’s anyone’s guess, but I pretty much put them in the order I think they rank as hitters and I’m guessing Terry will do the same. I thought about left/right matchups but then realized, this is an All-Star lineup and all of these guys can hit either side so it doesn’t make a difference.
The NL in my opinion is a little tougher. First of all, the fans didn’t vote in a DH so LaRussa has to pick one. I’m guessing he’ll go with Pujols, because that’s his man. I also believe he probably deserves it the most. But then the question becomes, does he put him near the top because that’s his man, or does he put him near the bottom because the fans didn’t vote him in? My guess is he drops him down, but not too low. Here it is:
NL
Eckstein
Beltran
Lee
Pujols
Edmonds
Rolen
Kent
Abreu
Piazza
This isn’t exactly the way I would do it; I’m guessing that Tony will do it this way. He’s going to put his guys near the top, even though Rolen probably doesn’t deserve to be there, the fans voted him in so it’s justified to bat him 6th. Eckstein’s his leadoff guy and the rest of the Cards are just one spot down because he’s got to insert Lee into that 3-hole.
We’ll see how close I get.
It’s been quite an interesting first half and promises to be an even more interesting second half. We’ve got a race on our hands, so buckle up and get ready for the ride.
How in the world are Morgan Ensberg (290/22/63) and Travis Hafner (313/18/58) not on the All-Star team? There are a couple of players on each side that they should be there in place of. Maybe we can’t do much about fans voting in players who shouldn’t be there (although we did pretty well this year for the most part), but we definitely need to change the rule that makes it necessary for each team to be represented.
Hey, if your team doesn’t have any All-Stars, then they don’t have any All-Stars. Let’s not start making things up just to get a representative from each team. I want to see the best players in the game playing in that game, not the best players from each team.
With Damon, Tek, Manny, and Papi, this is the first time that a team has 4 players starting an All-Star game since 5 members of the Big Red Machine did it in “75”. Not too shabby. It also gives us a lot of weight in deciding whether or not we start the World Series at Fenway again.
If Rafael Palmiero gets 3 hits in this last game before the break he will be able to get to 3,000 at home in front of all the Red Sox fans. That's okay though; Sox Nation will make him feel right at home by giving him the appreciation he deserves.
Speaking of Oriole’s players, I can’t believe this September 6th will be the 10-year anniversary of Cal’s record-breaking game. Ten years already? Damn, that went by quick.
While I’m on the subject of iron men, Johnny Damon is one of the toughest players this game has ever seen. I can’t even imagine how much pain this guy plays through. Sometimes I think he should be laid up in a hospital bed when instead he’s out patrolling center field. I don’t want to overpay for this guy, but I hope he and the Sox can work something out to keep him here. Kyla will be very disappointed if it doesn’t work out.
One of the greatest things about this game is how unpredictable it is. No one really knows what’s going to happen, even the experts. The Yankees pitching staff is riddled with injuries and ineffectiveness, it keeps getting worse for them and everyone is starting to write them off, yet they’ve still managed to win a lot of games and have bashed their way back into the race. We now have our hands full, and it’s probably going to go right down to the wire again. Of course, that could all change again by the end of the month.
Meanwhile, our invaluable closer has been everything but invaluable all year and our ace starting pitcher has been on the DL all year, yet we will go into the All-Star break in first place in the AL East. And now, our closer finally gives in to his knee problems and goes on the DL for 4-6 weeks to recover from surgery, and our ace starter is going to come off the DL and become our closer. Dizzying. What a wacky game.
Not even GM’s know what will happen. This off-season, David Wells goes to Yankee GM Brian Cashman and tells him he would love to come back and play for the Yankees. Cashman tells him, sorry but we want to get younger and go in another direction. He then goes out and trades for Randy Johnson and breaks the bank to sign him to a long-term deal. Johnson is a full 6 months younger than Wells. Meanwhile, Theo signs Wells to an incentive laden bargain contract. Their numbers at the break: Johnson 8-6, 4.14 ERA, Wells 6-5, 5.00 ERA. Both have been hurt, both have been inconsistent, but it cost us a lot less to get almost as much as they got so far.
Everyone thought that Carl Pavano was the free agent pitching prize of the off-season and we tried like hell to get him over here, but lost out to the Yankees and had to “settle” for Matt Clement. How is that working out so far? Pavano 4-6, 4.77 ERA and he just went on the DL. Clement 10-2, 3.85 ERA and he just got named to the All-Star team. I’d say that one worked out pretty well for us.
The Yankees also paid big money for Jared Wright who was supposed to be one of the keys to their rotation as it was being overhauled. Meanwhile we took a flyer (with another bargain contract) on Wade Miller who was rehabbing from a mid-season shoulder injury and was not expected to be back until mid-season this year. Their numbers: Wright 2-2, 9.15 ERA, on the DL most of the year. Miller 2-3, 5.03 ERA, came back in May and has been contributing and improving. Miller, despite only having 2 wins and a 5.03 ERA has really only had a few bad starts accounting for the high ERA, and he’s had some bad luck with the bullpen blowing a bunch of his leads. Meanwhile, Wright didn’t get a chance to pitch very much and when he did he was bad.
When I look at the starting All-Star teams, 2 conflicting questions come to mind about the batting orders: 1. How can you possibly go wrong no matter how you set them? 2. How can you justify batting any of those guys at the bottom? The funny thing is, the answer to both questions is the same, you can’t. Here’s my attempt at what I think they’ll look like, followed by my explanation.
AL
Damon
Roberts
Big Papi
Manny
A-Rod
Vlad
Miggy
Teixeira
Tek
Damon and Roberts are both table setters and interchangeable at the top. Damon gets the nod because he plays for the manager. I also think that Francona will go with Ortiz and Manny in their customary spots for the same reason. After that, it’s anyone’s guess, but I pretty much put them in the order I think they rank as hitters and I’m guessing Terry will do the same. I thought about left/right matchups but then realized, this is an All-Star lineup and all of these guys can hit either side so it doesn’t make a difference.
The NL in my opinion is a little tougher. First of all, the fans didn’t vote in a DH so LaRussa has to pick one. I’m guessing he’ll go with Pujols, because that’s his man. I also believe he probably deserves it the most. But then the question becomes, does he put him near the top because that’s his man, or does he put him near the bottom because the fans didn’t vote him in? My guess is he drops him down, but not too low. Here it is:
NL
Eckstein
Beltran
Lee
Pujols
Edmonds
Rolen
Kent
Abreu
Piazza
This isn’t exactly the way I would do it; I’m guessing that Tony will do it this way. He’s going to put his guys near the top, even though Rolen probably doesn’t deserve to be there, the fans voted him in so it’s justified to bat him 6th. Eckstein’s his leadoff guy and the rest of the Cards are just one spot down because he’s got to insert Lee into that 3-hole.
We’ll see how close I get.
It’s been quite an interesting first half and promises to be an even more interesting second half. We’ve got a race on our hands, so buckle up and get ready for the ride.
posted by Bob at 7/09/2005 10:45:00 PM
1 Comments:
Bob,
I like the new, second-half of the season, blog color scheme. Its easier to read.
Damon sure seems to be setting the stage to depart with his comments lately. I can't see him going to a small (media) market team, he likes the limelight too much. But I don't see ownership breaking the bank to keep him here, despite his MVP-like season. Not to mention his pain in the butt agent.
My prediction is he's gone. Sorry Kyla.
-Censy
Post a Comment
<< Home