The Man in Blak

Sure, there's definitely some game theory at work here. They did have the advantage of a right-handed batter at the plate (Molina), Pujols is a decent, if not especially swift, baserunner, and the pitcher has his back to the play. It's the rest of the context that bothers me - Bengie Molina is no dummy, there are two outs on the board to begin with, and you're getting deeper into extra innings on the road. It just seems like there's just as many red flags as there are green flags with this situation, in my opinion.

You might also consider the possibility that Nintendo is intentionally holding off from expanding their customer base until they can either release another killer app (Super Mario Galaxy or the upcoming Metroid Prime game, perhaps?) or finish fine tuning their internet connectivity. Limiting distribution early not only allows you to induce additional demand for the product, but it allows you to monitor customer experience for a smaller group of early adopters and tweak your product before you really ramp up the distribution. And it's not like Nintendo is wanting for any kind of momentum right now, as the sales figures and general buzz around the Wii have them poised atop the console race, for the time being. The console production business usually yields the lowest profit margins of any revenue stream in the industry, so I don't blame Nintendo for biding their time and making sure that they are primed to yield the most possible value out of a maximized distribution of the Wii.

I agree that the call would make sense if the odds of success were in that range but, intuitively, it doesn't seem like stealing home would have that kind of success rate. Intuition doesn't really hold a lot of water in a debate about probabilities, though, so I dug up some numbers (graciously compiled and provided by John Jarvis on his website) and put together a rudimentary spreadsheet on Google Docs (which I could directly put into this post, if we had <doHTML> tags activated in this folder, hint hint): http://spreadsheets.google.com/pub?key=pgX...LFEG9WZRENyvvKQ I used Jarvis' data from 2001-2005 (he hasn't published numbers for 2006 yet), just to give us an estimation of the current modern playing environment, and the success rate of attempts throughout all of major league baseball in that five year period is around 27%. What's really interesting about it, though, is the difference between the leagues; even though the success rate for stealing home in 2005 came in at an appealing 34%, the percentage was weighted heavily by the numbers from the American League that year (5 steals in 12 attempts). By and large, stealing home is a much more risky proposition in the National League, with a five year success rate of ~23% and a one-year peak of ~31% in 2005, compared to the respective numbers of the American League over this time (36% five-year percentage, 42% one-year peak in 2001). Contextually, this makes some sense - managers in the National League are more inclined to use "smallball" and aggressive base running strategies to play off of the less potent run environment and, as a result, are more prepared to defend against these strategies as well. Considering these odds when approaching the situation that the Cardinals found themselves in last night, it still doesn't seem like an advantageous play to me for the Cardinals to attempt a delayed double steal of home, even with Professional Catcher Yadier Molina at the plate.

Any manager that green-lights a double steal on the road in extra innings with two outs and Albert Pujols at third base needs to have their fucking head examined.

I thought of Shelton as well, but one key difference lies in experience - Shelton hit .299/.360/.510 in 2005 before going on his home run binge to start last season. Hamilton has been pulling this off with a resume of barely over a thousand plate appearances at .293/.338/.469 (none above Double A). Sigman is a fascinating comp - where in the world did you pull that name from, Al?

The references to reggae surround the original take on the song, which was supposedly much, much slower (and much closer to the reggae style that we're familiar with) than the final cut that made the White Album. Lennon, who absolutely despised the original track, mocked the song during one recording session by playing a super-fast version of the song as a satire which, ironically, McCartney enjoyed and decided to use as the final version of the song that we know today.

Speculating what one could have done in this situation is kind of useless but, regardless, I don't think there's much you can do if you're unarmed in that situation, short of desperately trying to rationalize with the guy and bring him back to reality. Charging at the madman (armed or unarmed) for tackling/disarming makes you an unbelievably easy target for a small firearm, and it's highly unlikely that said madman is going to allow time for anybody to coordinate any kind of cooperative maneuver. I think the first four steps of theintensifier's plan for escape is about as good as you get, unfortunately. In terms of campus security, it's going to be difficult to implement a security strategy that specifically deals with threats from the students themselves. Establishing keycard access to entry points in each building is useless, since the student would presumably have the access required to bypass, and placing metal detectors and/or guards at each door isn't really a feasible option, especially for a public university like VT. Even focusing on improving an "escape strategy" may not apply in this situation, as any additional venues you create for evacuation could potentially double as an entry point for an intruder. The more likely alternative is to focus more on speeding up reaction time from the authorities but, even then, there's only so much that you can do. You can increase campus police presence to improve coverage and give those officers more options as it regards to containment - add electronic locks to classroom doors (with multiple secured access points for remote lock control), install "panic buttons" in each classroom to allow faculty/staff the option for immediate notification of a dangerous situation, etc. Ultimately, it's just a difficult situation for the university. Allowing students to carry firearms could potentially invite more of this behavior, rather than deter it, but you can emphasize other means of self defense among the students. Depending on the legality of the area, pepper spray is a possibility; I personally carried a very small collapsible outdoor knife in my pocket throughout much of my time at college. Unless you intend to completely strip personal liberty from the student population, though, it's kind of hard to deter an attack of this magnitude and, for lack of a better word, randomness.

I don't doubt that Hamilton could very well be the best athlete that could take the field on any given day for the Reds, but there's still a question of his mental capacity for the game. He's been battling into some deep counts, which is definitely a great sign for his future development, but part of that is also a result of pitchers not really having a scouting report on him. As the season progresses and those same scouts that complemented him begin to write the book on him, you may see the opposition pitch to him more aggressively. All of that being said, I tend to agree that you might as well push the pedal to the metal and start this kid in center. Hamilton is 26 and he's locked into the roster for the whole year, per the Rule 5 stipulations, so you might as well throw him out there and see what you get from him. He's absolutely abysmal against lefties right now, but he's never going to learn how to hit them if Narron platoons him around them so cautiously. Furthermore, Freel is hardly a game-changing player and he has stated that he's willing to step aside for Hamilton to become an everyday player. If the fans are behind him and (much more importantly) the players are behind him, why not give Hamilton an extended audition?

Rotoworld says he got plunked in the right hand and "appeared to be in a lot of pain." Good news, Los Angeles fans of Anaheim.

It's stuff like this that will forestall the inevitable globalization of our cultures.

I'm already sitting at three myself and that's only because I dropped Wood and Prior. It's been an interesting season so far.

Does Run Devil Run or Coltrane's My Favorite Things count as a covers album?

Manning's career postseason numbers: 290/475, 3495 yards, 18 TDs, 15 INTs (13 games) Moon's career postseason numbers: 259/403, 2834 yards, 17 TDs, 14 INTs (10 games) Is there really that much of a difference?

Bledsoe barely threw for over 100 yards in that game against the Steelers. If anything, Kordell Stewart probably contributed more to the Patriots victory by throwing three picks, two of which came in the final minutes and completely iced the game for New England.

The remaining value on Santana's contract is an absolute steal for the Twins, so I can't see why they wouldn't want to wait as long as possible before dealing him off. I know that the Soriano non-deals from last year's deadline are still in recent memory, but Santana is a much more valued commodity than that and, as a result, I can't really see any scenario where the Twins would have difficulties dealing him next season.

I don't think I'd vote him in. Though he did bring a lot of excitement to a moribund Patriots franchise, he never ended up being the successor to Dan Marino that many thought he would eventually become. He failed to throw more touchdowns than interceptions in half of his seasons in the league, his postseason numbers are abysmal, and he was replaced twice by teams (Patriots, Cowboys) that went onto immediate success after his demotion. The guy is a class act but, if he leaves any legacy behind, it's one of unmet expectations, in my opinion.

Well, it's not dysthymia either, because that's a prolonged depression of up to two years and snuffbox has already assured us that this Droopy phase in Marvin's life has only lasted but a few months.

WM2000 is really close to No Mercy when it comes to in-match gameplay quality, but the CAW and match options in NM just completely blow it away. Even if certain trademarks were removed, I could see a No Mercy VC port being a huge hit, because the port could remove the slowdown issues (which were never that bad, but always seemed to be a big sticking point with some) and the CAW would allow for players to create any of the characters that might be removed as a result of licensing. I agree with Andrew, though - THQ isn't going to jeopardize their new wrestling brand with what essentially would boil down to a cash-in port, no matter how wildly successful that port would be.

That Pierzynski HBP was a bit of a joke, BTW, just glancing off his elbow on a check swing where he made no attempt to get out of the way at all. I know that there's little or no enforcement of the HBP rules anymore, with Craig Biggio stepping into pitches and Barry Bonds standing over the plate with armor, but the umpires have to draw the line somewhere at some point, right?

Matsuzaka has obviously been impressive, but how about Zack Greinke? One earned run through five and six strikeouts to one walk for a kid that many KC fans imagined would never start again.

Hey, I went to great lengths to say that the Cardinals weren't going to do as well as expected this year, so I'm not really surprised. I didn't expect that they'd be this bad to start off (and, to be fair, I can't see them continuing to have one embarrassing outfield error after another in every game for the rest of the season), but there are some fundamental problems with this club that will plague them all year, some of which were actually positives for the series with the Mets (the pitching performances of Kip Wells and Braden Looper). What's great, though, is that you can see exactly how bad the Cardinals currently are in relation to the rest of the NL (they're hitting .200/.280/.289 as a team!) through BRef, which now maintains and updates their stats in-season.

Pretty much. The Cards threatened in the eighth, getting a runner on first and third with two outs for Pujols, but he couldn't cash in. Kip Wells was a bit of a rollercoaster ride. High counts for seemingly every batter, but he had some decent stuff and got some key strikeouts when he needed them. He's definitely going to be a project, but he could turn into a real pitcher later on this year, once he gets a handle on his location and works more with Duncan. I have no such optimism for Looper, though. I'm expecting something on the order of a 9-2 Mets win and a sweep.

"Jose Reyes is the most exciting player in baseball because everything he does is exciting." - Joe Morgan, ESPN (Opening Night)

Literally beat me to it, as I was about to post some clips from the Post-Dispatch article. Edmonds and Spiezio have owies as well. If Carpenter goes down for any extended period of time, the Cardinals are sunk and TSM NL Only team is officially screwed.