EVIL~! alkeiper

C'mon. Sal Fasano's slow but he makes the most of what he has.

Actually, Sylvester Stallone built the statue and donated it to Philadelphia. There's a fair bit of debate where to place it right now.

It's paid attendance, including season tickets and all. Really, that's pretty sad in itself. Consider that the Sacramento Rivercats of the PCL drew an average of about 10,250 this season.

By the way, I'm surprised there's little mention of the San Diego/Cincinnati series this week. The Reds can pull to a half game back with a sweep. If they lose two of three though, it's all but over.

I'm surprised if there's ever more than a couple thousand fans at that stadium.

7 RBIs for Abreu now with a sac fly in the third. Of course, the Yankees will lose this game because Abreu doesn't hustle.

I think it's silly to discount a player from a losing team being MVP given the manner in which we can separate a player's individual performance from his team these days. I don't think MVP voting should come down to who has the best teammates. In fact the MVP voting instructions specifically state, "The MVP need not come from a division winner or other playoff qualifier." It really shouldn't be an issue. The MVP comes from a last place team maybe 10-15% of the time. The only losing team player really in consideration this year is Travis Hafner, who's out for the season and a DH. There are rare circumstances where a last place player is so much better that he deserves consideration. It doesn't happen often. As for a separate award, first remember that the best player contributes both offensively and defensively, so creating a best hitter award wouldn't work. Besides, the fans wouldn't buy it. As for Johan Santana, that statistic quoted earlier is telling. However, if you were to point out that the White Sox were much better last year in the month Frank Thomas played (not true, just theoretically), would that make him the MVP? Or would you point out that a guy who missed five months of the season couldn't possibly be the MVP? There is no doubting Santana's dominance. The question is whether a player who plays 20% of the games can be the Most Valuable Player. Santana's at least top five, but I'm not sure if I'd make the jump.

Ugh. 2:1 says my local Fox affiliates both decide to play the Yankees/Red Sox game.

To elaborate, here were the standings on September 20, 1964. Phillies 90-60 Cardinals 83-66 (6.5 back) Reds 83-66 (6.5 back) Giants 83-67 (7 back) And the standings on September 30. Cardinals 92-67 Reds 91-68 (1 back) Phillies 90-70 (2.5 back) Note that while the Phillies went 0-10, the Cardinals went 9-1 and the Reds went 8-2. There are a few things I would like to note about collapses/comebacks in general. 1. Teams with abnormally great or poor records usually regress to the mean. The Tigers were on pace for 109 wins, but we all know they are not THAT great a team. The same goes for a poor team like the Royals. A team on "pace" for 120 losses is probably not going to reach that mark. 2. Teams go through poor stretches all the time. Those Cardinals above had a stretch where they went 4-12. You just don't notice them because they happen early in the year or they're otherwise buried somehow within the season. 3. A collapse is almost ALWAYS accompanied by an amazing stretch run from the opposing team. The 1978 Red Sox won 99 games. You wouldn't have thought anything was bad about their season if the Yankees hasn't won 29 of their last 38 games.

The Tigers then were on pace for 109 wins. Right now they are on pace for 97 wins. Their problem is that they have two teams chasing them that are on pace for 94 and 93 wins, respectively. But they haven't missed the playoffs yet. Baseball Prospectus considers it a 100:1 longshot that the Tigers miss the playoffs at this point. The biggest collapse will always be the 1964 Phillies.

I'd like to note that there's a certain level of fun in rooting for a team that no longer exists. I never knew how much I liked the Expos.

Interesting Topic. A few devil's advocate questions I'd like to throw out there before adding my two cents. Regarding athletes who consider their sport just a job. What do they say then to the fan who watches the sport during its season, and then shuts it off and moves on to the next sport during the winter? Anyway, I think most athletes care deeply about the success of their teams, perhaps moreso than the fans. We have a lifetime to witness a championship. They have until their mid-30s. There's always going to be some disconnect between the fan and athlete. The athlete, after all, is usually playing for a team he didn't choose, and probably didn't root for growing up. At some point, fans need to relax and remember that it is just a game. An athlete is what he is, and it is unfair to expect too much out of them. Many have various reasons for doing what they do. But if you think they don't care, remember, when's the last time you showered your buddies with champaigne after your team won?

Moving is an acceptable reason to switch teams, provided you're adopting your new hometown team.

Win for the Red Barons tonight. Tomorrow I'm heading up to see Francisco Liriano's rehab start.

Posters should be warned, as I'm noting now. ANY use of such slurs outside of the Chocolate Socket is unacceptable. I have my doubts about this thread though.

On another note, the Red Wings/Red Barons series comes to Scranton, after the Barons dropped the first two in Rochester. It's a best of five, so the Barons need to win the next three to advance. If they win tonight, they get to face Francisco Liriano on rehab tomorrow.

It's a reasonable theory. For those unfamiliar with the concept, the idea is that players who are unathletic, derive much of their value from walks and little else early on, do not age as well as players who contribute across the board (remember I'm paraphrasing here). One of the players it was coined in reference to was Tom Brunansky, who hit 30 home runs a year but was finished at age 33. Howard's type should carry their skills easily into their early 30s. It is what happens beyond that's unclear. Howard doesn't run tremendously well and he strikes out a TON. As far as a long, successful career, I think he'll last until he's 34/35, and hit about 350 career home runs. I think that's a success. There tends to be a mindset that when a player reaches a Hall of Fame peak, the Hall of Fame label gets thrown around. I've seen it in recent years with David Ortiz and Eric Gagne. If Howard did this every year, he'd be a Hall of Famer. That's why it comes up for discussion. Howard isn't in the discussion, it's just that fans love to speculate on the future.

Howard is older (by two months), according to Baseball-Reference.com. This is a key point. A friend asked me a month ago about Howard's HoF chances. I told him Howard has a snowball's chance in hell. Only one Hall of Fame position player (Sam Rice) became a regular at 25 or older. But few players are EVER as good in their careers as Howard is right now.

I agree. Whether or not it's true, it is this kind of blind hero-worship that created such a problem when McGwire came back to Earth.

Byrnes was out by about six inches.

Jorge Posada hit a second 3-run homer in the 8th. And given that it's a Yankee catcher, I can't resist saying it's deja vu all over again.

The Phils are mounting a comeback, but Willy Taveras just cut the wheels off of it.

Bud Smith's no hitter was one of the five most nerve-wracking games I've ever watched. I can't helped but wonder if the stress of that game contributed to his arm problems.

The Tigers losing out would be FAR from the biggest choke of all time. It shouldn't even register really.

The Phillies are leaving Northeast PA. There's an excellent chance that the Mets pick up the affiliate in Scranton/Wilkes-Barre.