This Week in Baseball 8/25 - 8/31

[Smartly Pretty 0]

aggggrrrrrhhhhhhhh

[strummer 0]

Aaron Heilman in. Game should be over soon

[Cheech Tremendous 0]

Yahoo Sports reporting that Mark Kotsay has been traded to the Red Sox for a minor league pitcher. Neither team has confirmed the deal.

 

Link

 

With Drew heading to the DL, the team had to make a move. Can't keep running out both Ellsbury and Crisp everyday. Kotsay's not going to give a lot, but he's a stop-gap for the rest of the season.

[EVIL~! alkeiper 0]

Phillies are looking for a left handed hitting outfielder with Jenkins on the shelf. Kotsay was on their shopping list but that's out. I'd like to see Snelling get a shot, but obviously his health is a real question mark.

[Smartly Pretty 0]

Phillies radio color guy is doing nothing but complain about umpiring tonight. Any validity to that?

[devo 0]

None. There have been a few borderline calls but no clear mistakes.

[EVIL~! alkeiper 0]

Except for that fair/foul call on Tatis's groundball in the third. Even the Mets' announcers thought they caught a break on that.

[naiwf 0]

Can someone please explain how Minaya still has a job when the bullpen has been the crippling weakness of the team since 2006?

 

[devo 0]

Except for that fair/foul call on Tatis's groundball in the third. Even the Mets' announcers thought they caught a break on that.

 

I disagree. Not to be crass but his BUTT looked like it was in foul territory.

[EVIL~! alkeiper 0]

As an aside, I respect Harry Kalas but the rest of the Phillies' announcing crew is definitely bottom third. They are the kings of the baseball cliche.

[EVIL~! alkeiper 0]

I assume Johan Santana is going nine tomorrow.

[devo 0]

If the Mets win this game Heilman deserves a medal of some sort.

[EVIL~! alkeiper 0]

Kyle Kendrick warming up for the 14th.

[strummer 0]

won't need him

[NYU 0]

Can someone please explain how Minaya still has a job when the bullpen has been the crippling weakness of the team since 2006?

 

If the Mets end up missing the playoffs this season, this is precisely the reason why the Wilpons need to take a long, hard look at Omar Minaya before giving him the green light for next year. To keep essentially the same bullpen that collapsed so brutally in 2007 is just mind-boggling. Coming into the 2008 season, the only bullpen change he really made was dumping Mota and acquiring Matt Wise -- what a stellar deal that was.

[EVIL~! alkeiper 0]

First place! What a great comeback.

[strummer 0]

blowing a 7-0 lead

[devo 0]

I was clearly mistaken when I called the loss to the Pirates the most embarrassing game of the year.

[jimmy no nose 0]

I don't follow the Cubs too closely, but after today's game I'm wondering; does Zambrano always face extremely lefty-heavy lineups? I noticed that the Pirates adjusted their starting lineup to have the top 6 spots be left handed hitters and managed to rough him up a bit, with 6 ER in 4.1 innings. I checked out his splits (he conveniently faced the same number of plate appearances from both sides) and it seems that there's little difference in hitting numbers (lefties actually slug a little lower), but he walks lefties a ton more. He also doesn't get nearly the number of strikeouts. The Mets may match up well against him in potential playoff games since they can legitimately field a team with 7 left handed hitters without sacrificing much of anything offensively.

[naiwf 0]

"Beat the Mets, beat the Mets,

Head for the park and beat the Mets.

Hot dogs, green grass all out at Shea,

Guaranteed the 'pen throws leads away.

Because those other guys are really rockin' that ball,

Hittin' those home runs over the wall.

Long Island, New Jersey, Brooklyn, Queens, Uptown and Down,

Motherfuckin' Mets: that's the cheer all over New York town."

 

I have updated the song from 1984 to 2008.

[Guest Smues]

I prefer Kornheiser's 'Eat the Mets' but that's good too.

[NYU 0]

To be fair to the bullpen though, it was Pedro Martinez that took a 7-0 and gave up five earned runs in five innings. I'll just be glad once the season is over so we can finally unload him and quit pretending that 88 mph fastballs are good for a supposedly #2 pitcher to have. Good for the first year -- pretty much a disaster every one after.

[naiwf 0]

To be fair to the bullpen though, it was Pedro Martinez that took a 7-0 and gave up five earned runs in five innings. I'll just be glad once the season is over so we can finally unload him and quit pretending that 88 mph fastballs are good for a supposedly #2 pitcher to have. Good for the first year -- pretty much a disaster every one after.

 

They still blew a 2 run lead with four to go. That's pretty much par for the course with those douchebags.

[NYU 0]

Oh, I completely agree. But this isn't a Johan Santana case where the starter had a stellar outing but the bullpen came in and ruined it for him. Pedro was just as awful as the pen tonight, if not more so.

 

And then we have the offense that stranded nine runners on base, not scoring once after the fourth inning against a bullpen that, for all intents and purposes, is just as bad as theirs.

 

Terrible baseball tonight all around. From all sides.

[garfieldsnose 0]

Surprised the Phils didn't bean Tatis after his stupid little celebration after his homerun.

 

Actually, the best part of the Phillies has been their bullpen. It in no way, shape, or form is "bad." It's been the most consistent piece of this team throughout the season, so please don't compare a really good bullpen to a minor league bullpen.

[Bruiser Chong 0]

I don't follow the Cubs too closely, but after today's game I'm wondering; does Zambrano always face extremely lefty-heavy lineups? I noticed that the Pirates adjusted their starting lineup to have the top 6 spots be left handed hitters and managed to rough him up a bit, with 6 ER in 4.1 innings. I checked out his splits (he conveniently faced the same number of plate appearances from both sides) and it seems that there's little difference in hitting numbers (lefties actually slug a little lower), but he walks lefties a ton more. He also doesn't get nearly the number of strikeouts. The Mets may match up well against him in potential playoff games since they can legitimately field a team with 7 left handed hitters without sacrificing much of anything offensively.

 

Zambrano's been mediocre to awful his last four times out, so I wouldn't take last night's game as anything too telling. I expect him to bounce back; there was no way he wasn't going to go through a phase like this after pitching so marvelously the rest of the season. I'm just glad he's getting it out of his system now.

[Boon 0]

Kotsay to the Red Sox finalized.

Also a welcome addition:

[jimmy no nose 0]

Scott Boras developed an awesome new strategy to extend the draft signing deadline. Apparently now he agrees to deals then has players refuse to sign them until they're renegotiated for more money. At least that's what he's trying to do with Pedro Alvarez and the Pirates. Apparently Boras was looking for 8 figures and the Pirates just stood still at $6 million the entire time. Boras waited until the last minute to start communicating with the team like he always does and they eventually agreed to the $6 million deal.

 

Alvarez hasn't signed the contract yet 16 days after the deadline and Boras is filing a grievance with the union saying the deal wasn't agreed to until after midnight, thus making it invalid. Of course Major League Baseball pointed out to him that the Eric Hosmer-Kansas City deal was submitted after the Alvarez deal, so if they rule the Alvarez deal was done too late it throws out his Hosmer deal as well. Eventually the teams are going to have enough.

[Guest WhackingCockDick]

Mariners are the first eliminated team of the year, with the Nationals to get a wild card E later tonight pending a Brewers loss/Dodgers win. Magic Number season officially begins!

 

LA Angels: 15

Chicago Cubs: 24

Milwaukee: 26

Arizona: 28

Tampa Bay: 29

Chicago White Sox: 29

Boston: 29

Philadelphia: 30

 

[naiwf 0]

Santana's not going to do anything tonight, so the Mets will be 1 1/2 back after bending over for the Phillies yet again.