EVIL~! alkeiper

I can't stand alcohol at sporting events. It's a huge cash cow so it'll always be there, but it just creates a breed of obnoxious fans.

Tony Kornheiser had a great line today about how he's responsible for at least two of them. Wilbon said he's not that old and Tony responded "no, but she was."

What I can't stand is a no-DQ tag match where the tag rules are enforced. See Nasty Boys/LOD at Summerslam '91 for an example. Also every ECW tag match.

They probably looked at the box cover and not the dvd itself.

Won't they have to wait until after 2008? That's a shame as Trenton is quite a nice park. I'm betting the Yankees want to aim for one of the Connecticut teams in the Eastern League. Trenton is only 15-20 miles from Philadelphia and it's not quite a Yankees' hotbed. I can't see who would want Trenton right off. Baltimore has Bowie, Washington has Harrisburg and the Phils have Reading. Maybe the Mets will leave Binghamton behind.

It sounds impressive but it's mostly because Pujols got to play a full season his first year, without getting a cup of coffee first.

Littleton getting a save was a little silly, but at least he did pitch well in the game. He pitched three scoreless innings, only running into any scoring threat in the eighth.

Quite possibly. The only other candidate is Carlton Fisk, who trails in every statistic except home runs, but finished third in MVP balloting. Posada won't finish as high.

Some more fun stuff from yesterday's game. * Brian Burres' ERA rose from 4.45 to 5.24 * Rob Bell's ERA rose from 4.18 to 6.14. * Paul Shuey's ERA rose from 6.75 to 9.49! *David Murphy added 81 points to his career batting average.

Texas vs. Baltimore: 8/22/07, the blowout of the century. http://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/BA...200708221.shtml

Since this time of the offseason is fairly slow for baseball, it's a good opportunity to reminisce. What I propose is to collect a list of classic games in Major League Baseball. We all know about the postseason games. What about the regular season games? Post whatever games come to mind and maybe we'll collect a list. http://www.retrosheet.org/boxesetc/B05170CHN1979.htm Ever get the feeling the wind is blowing out? The Phils led this one 21-9 at one point before the Cubs finally tied the game in the eighth inning. Both starters combined to last two thirds of an inning. http://www.retrosheet.org/boxesetc/B06080PHI1989.htm After the Pirates score 10 runs in the first, announcer Jim Rooker states "If we lose this, I'll walk home." Rooker conducted a 300 mile charity walk following the season. Steve Jeltz entered the season with one home run in 1,383 career at bats. He homered from both sides of the plate. http://www.retrosheet.org/boxesetc/B08210LAN1990.htm The Phils trailed 11-1 after 7 innings and 11-3 after 8, but scored 9 runs in the top of the ninth to win. http://www.retrosheet.org/boxesetc/B07040ATL1985.htm This game on July 4 started 90 minutes late due to rain. Another rain storm created another 41 minute delay in the third. The Mets led 7-4 in the eighth before the Braves plated four. The Mets tied the game in the ninth. The Mets scored two in the thirteenth on Howard Johnson's home run, but Terry Harper tied the game in the bottom of the inning with a two out, two run home run of his own. Eighteenth inning, the Mets score a run. Two quick outs in the bottom of the inning bring up Rick Camp, the Braves' pitcher. The Braves were out of pinch hitters and relievers. Coming into the 1985 season, Camp held an .062 career batting average with no home runs and five career RBIs. So naturally Camp homered to continue the game. The Mets responded by scoring five off an exhausted Camp in the next frame. The Braves scored two in the bottom, and had two runners on for Rick Camp, who struck out. The game ended at 3:55am. At 4:01, the Braves proceeded with their scheduled fireworks.

Beetlejuice is now 20 years old. Yet every time I go to a baseball game, I have to hear this insipid crap three or four times a game, where the loudspeaker will play "Day-O" and the crowd repeats it like trained sheep. It's annoying as hell.

Two final points about that game. 1. It got out of hand because Dave Trembley was saving his relievers for game two, not wanting to use his best options in a blowout game. No one was even warming up in the ninth inning. 2. Not only do I have the ticket to that game, it's autographed by O's legend Boog Powell.

Or he could be addressing the misuse of statistics. I'm not certain.

Vin Scully was perhaps one of the most adept announcers at blending statistics into a game. That said, I'm not sure I understand the meaning behind it, though I've never been good at deciphering literature anyway. Absolutely. I drove 3 1/2 hours to get to Baltimore, I'm not about to leave during game one of a doubleheader. Besides, it was a rare historical event, rarer than a perfect game.

I was indeed at that game live. F'n unreal. Orioles fans were actually cheering at the sheer novelty by the end of the game. They figured if they scored 27, they might as well go ahead and score 30. We stayed through three innings of game two, at which point we took off for home. I got home just 15 minutes ago (it's 2:25am now). It was nice to see former Red Baron Marlon Byrd hit a grand slam. For the record, this was the greatest blowout in modern baseball history. It was my first trip to Camden Yards, and I saw history. The park definitely lived up to expectations.

ok some of you may not know me very well, i have been here for a few months, anyway onto the subject, over the last couple weeks TSM has seriously went from a great product to a shit hole suffice to say, i encourage you guys if your true fans and you want TSM to succeed they need to realize we wont stand for their piss poor standards any longer, its time we as fans put our damn foot down

-Summerslam Hits -Championship Wrestling From Florida (1/4/86) -Monday Night Wars (3/3/97) -NWA (11/23/85) The Monday Night Wars feature Bulldog/Owen in the Euro title finals.

I'd say the Orioles are suffering more of the curse of putting shit on the ballfield. Ever since they started doing that, they've failed to clear .500. Or firing Davey Johnson.

Teams that overperform almost always regress. The question is whether they regress to the point where the Padres can make up 3.5 games. They could, but I don't get the sense that the Pads are that dominant. I don't necesarily agree with this. While the general rule dictates that teams regress to their true talent level (i.e. pythagorean record), most good teams outperform their expected win-loss and most bad teams underperform. There are several reasons why this happens. Teams with strong bullpens generally do better than expected because they win close games at a higher than normal rate. Second, teams that rely on young players and good organizational depth (e.g. the Braves) can overperform because their run scoring isn't normally distributed. They have the ability to make themselves better during pockets of the season than their previous underlying statistics might suggest. Therefore run differential maybe significant in one portion of the season but not enough to balance their earlier performance. The D'backs probably fall into that second category of team. Here's why I don't expect them to regress: The team is about 10 games over the pythagorean record right now. However, all those wins are banked alreay, so to speak. There is nothing in their current performance that would suggest they might start underperforming down the stretch. As long they play as an average to above average ballclub it won't necessarily matter that they have a better record than they should because they'd actually have to start underperforming to lose those "credited" wins. Why are they classified as good teams or bad teams in the firs place? The only teams I've noted that were able to maintain the discrepancy year after year were the 1929-31 Philadelphia A's, and the 2001-05 New York Yankees. Both teams had lights out closers (Lefty Grove and Mariano Rivera). There are certainly good teams that underperform, but we don't take note of them because we generally ignore non-pennant winners. As for regression, it should be understood that of course it doesn't change past performance. If the D'backs pythagorean record is .472, you would expect them to do that the rest of the season. You don't expect them to go under to level out the first four months. All I'll claim is that the pythagorean record is a better predictor of future success than the real win/loss record.

Hehe yeah. I've currently got a dual bachelor's degree in History and Political Science. Haven't gotten a job with it yet, but I'm working on that.

Earl Weaver's standing among the great managers is due to his excellent career .583 winning percentage in the Majors, ninth of all time. Weaver's teams made the playoffs six times and won one world championship. Four of those times they won the American League pennant. So overall they were 5-5 in postseason series. Three of those postseason losses went the distance. So I don't think it's any great commentary on his managing skills other than some poor luck. If there's a certain genius about Earl Weaver, it's getting the most out of his roster. Weaver in September would bat a bench hitter second on the road at shortstop, let him hit in the top of the first, and THEN put Mark Belanger in the game. You have to appreciate a manager who thinks outside the box to get the most out of his team on any given night.

Teams that overperform almost always regress. The question is whether they regress to the point where the Padres can make up 3.5 games. They could, but I don't get the sense that the Pads are that dominant. They're not detrimental, but there is certainly a break even point where it helps or hurts your club, these days it stands around 75%. The higher the level of offense in a league, the higher the break-even percentage. And vice versa. Tim Raines is actually the highest percentage basestealer in baseball history (or was, depending on how Carlos Beltran finishes). That is enormously valuable. The big considerations are making sure that your runner is stealing bases at a high percentage, and that you're not playing a poor hitter for the sake of his speed, like Juan Pierre. A player like Tim Raines with a .385 career OBP and 84% stolen base percentage is a devastating offensive force. Eaton easily, because he sucks. I didn't think the Marquis signing was all that bad. If we scream fluke when a player like Gary Matthews has a great season, why not go the other way if a player like Marquis has an out of context bad season?

You can make a case for Pedro being the best "peak" pitcher of all time. Right now Pedro's ERA relative to the league is the highest of any pitcher in baseball history. The only issue is how much importance you place on longevity. 2004 they acquired a legit superstar at the deadline. Otherwise their pitching gets better midseason, and I'd say that is likely a product of finding which pitchers work and which don't get the job done. That's more speculation than hardcore analysis.

Sweet! I assume it's a straight doubleheader, standard admission. I'd like to park at the ballpark if possible, as I'll have a three hour drive ahead of me after the game to get home.