Jayhawk Bill

Checking Pitch f/x logs this morning, I show only thirteen wrong calls by umpires. Eight of the calls went against Boston pitchers (5 Wakefield, 2 Aardsma, 1 Lopez) and five of the calls went in favor of AJ Burnett. That's 13 wrong calls in the same direction--that's a 1/8192 chance--a 0.0122% chance--a game called so badly in favor of the Blue Jays that it would happen once every 8.8 MLB seasons to some team or another at random. At a 99.9% certainty, I say that last night's game was rigged by the home plate umpire, Gerry Davis. Of course, your mileage may vary: I may have somehow misinterpreted graphs of the data, or made a math error. But I don't think so.

Pardon my detouring the game thread slightly. For historical purposes, that game was considered humorous in 2006, and it got us through some rough late-summer games as a source of humor, but I don't think that there was ever a competitive game.

I'm going with "Who cares." The odds of Boston's scoring 3+ runs is rather low in any case.

Now Javier Lopez: why not Timlin or Tavarez?

I'd've gone to Timlin or Tavarez, not Aardsma, trailing by three runs late.

OK, people are starting to get justifiably grumpy and gloomy. Just to offer a change of pace, here's the (Un)Official 2006 Red Sox Season Drinking Game: *** Definitions: a “drink” is a normal sip for the individual concerned. For many beer-drinkers, a “drink” is approximately one ounce of beer. A “chug” finishes the remainder of the current beverage at once. *** When Tito folds his arms and rocks back and forth like “Rain Man,” take a drink. When he does it while his starting pitcher is imploding, drink two. When Tito’s thrown out of the game, chug. When Dave Wallace visits the mound, drink one slowly to give the bullpen pitcher a chance to warm up. When Theo Epstein shows up on camera, drink. If the announcers mention his fianc?e, drink two. *** When Tek is shown on camera doing the “Captain Thing” despite injury, drink one with leadership. If Tek gets into a fight despite being on the DL, chug. If Javy Lopez grounds out to shortstop, drink. If he grounds into a 6-4-3 double play, drink two. If he allows a passed ball or throws the baseball into the outfield, chug. When Youk works the count from 0-2 to 3-2, take a drink. When Youk walks, drink two. When Loretta turns two, drink two. When Youks and Seabass turn a 3-6-3, drink three. When Seabass hits a home run, chug. When (if ever) Seabass smiles on camera, chug. When Lowell hits a double, drink two. When Manny walks, drink. When Manny goes yard, drink two. When Manny is being Manny on the bench or between plays in the outfield, chug. When Coco wiggles his fingers on the bat, drink (but no more than once per at bat). When he steals second, drink two. Heck, if anybody on the Red Sox steals second, drink two. If they steal third, drink three. If they steal home, chug. When Wily Mo catches a fly ball, drink. If he catches a ball while playing right field, drink two. If Wily Mo is being Manny, chug. If Doug Mirabelli strikes out, drink. If he hits a home run, chug. If the announcers comment on how great-looking Gabe Kapler is, drink. If a player comments on how great-looking Gabe Kapler is, the player drinks two. If the announcer mentions the words “Achilles tendon” with respect to Gabe Kapler, drink three. If the announcers comment how great Alex Cora is, drink. If the announcers comment how great Terry Francona thinks Cora is, drink two. If Papi looks intimidating on camera, drink, but no more often than once per at bat. If Papi looks intimidating during another hitter’s at bat, it still counts--drink. Papi, however, cannot be considered intimidating while playing defense. *** When Schilling strikes out a batter, drink. When Lester strikes out a batter, drink. When he walks a batter, drink. When he hits a batter, chug. When Beckett allows a hit on a fastball grooved down the middle of the strike zone, drink three. When Johnson allows a ground ball, drink. If the ball is fielded, drink two. Every time David Wells retires a batter, drink. Every time he allows a hit, drink one for every base (one for a single, two for a double, etc.) Every time an opposition runner reaches base any other way, drink two out of frustration. When Wells leaves the game, chug. (This is the “David Wells Rule.” While it may seem extreme and supportive of alcohol abuse, it is, after all, “The David Wells Rule.”) When Kyle Snyder starts, drink from the can or bottle to prevent pouring errors for as long as he’s pitching. If he tops 90 on the radar gun, drink. If he enters in long relief, take a loooooong drink. If Keith Foulke tops 88 on the radar gun, drink. When David Pauley starts, drink double on double plays. When Lenny DiNardo starts, drink two with a big smile each time he gets out of an inning because he’s such a great guy. When any relief pitcher whose name ends in “ez” enters the game, drink three. You’ll need them. When a relief pitcher who has pitched fewer than ten innings with the 2006 Red Sox enters the game, drink two. Drink one more for every batter faced after the first. When Jermaine Van Buren allows a stolen base, drink two, just as if it were a Red Sox stolen base. When Craig Hansen gets an out after looking dorky on the mound, drink one. When Mike Timlin enters the game, shout “Set-up man!” as soon as he’s formally announced. Those not first to do so (ties permitted) drink two. Calling “Set-up man!” too soon is a penalty—drink three. Calling “Set-up man” when Timlin does not enter the game to face the next batter is a worse penalty—chug. When Jon Papelbon enters the game, drink one and smile. If Papelbon leaves the game without earning a save or a win, chug and frown. Winning the game: any player still playing who knows the score and which team won within five minutes of the end of the game is declared a "winner."

Kennedy is grossly overrated--his velocity is too low for a rookie, and his control is normally good, not great (except right now it kinda sucks.) Kennedy is the prototypical AAAA career pitcher. He'll have an MLB career, barring injury, but I'll be surprised if he isn't traded away from the Yankees. With a payroll over $200 million, Steinbrenner and Cashman can do better.

Love the expression on Timmay's face after Manny's catch...kinda like, "Oh, Gawd, Manny, do you have to create the drama of coming so close to letting it go over your glove?"

Why is the song "Wild Thing" running through my head?

...and three solid strokes of the bat become two deep fly outs and a line drive out.

Ninth rib? First rib? Yeah, OK. That happens on occasion. But pitching a baseball doesn't usually create a stress fracture of the ninth rib. Two possibilities: 1) Hughes's motion is really, really messed up somehow, or he let himself get badly out of shape this winter. Most stress fractures for baseball pitchers occur half a ribcage away from Hughes's alleged crack, but an unusual circumstance could cause an unusual injury. 2) The Yankees have found a "shadow of opportunity" on the MRI and they're using it as their excuse for removing Hughes from further damage to his ego.

Excepting Rios, Toronto's starting lineup hits pretty well against Wakefield. (Zaun, McDonald and Lind are on the bench; Rolen is 0-5 but it's just five at bats.) This isn't going to be another pitchers' duel. Boston will have to score runs to win. The trouble is, excepting the success Dustin and Manny have had in their nine combined career appearances against Burnett, Boston's lineup has struggled. Casey, who owns Burnett (13-23 career) is on the DL; Drew, who has a career .400 OBP vs. Burnett, is resting his quad again. Boston's last four batters are a combined 0-11 vs. Burnett for their careers. http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/players/bvsp?playerId=2748 http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/players/bvsp?playerId=4153 It will be challenging for Boston to prevail. Still, with Timmay pitching, anything can happen!

You very often are--I respect your views regarding our team. By the way, where would YOU rank Youkilis?

Owings gives Arizona an extra bat on their bench if he's used as a starting pitcher 80% of the time. That's a big factor in the NL. Also, having him pitch gives Arizona a huge edge in their batting order those days, something on the order of a run. His career ERA is 4.17, but adding his bat makes it more like a 3.20 to 3.50 in total effectiveness as a player, and that's Cy Young-caliber for a starter. Furthermore, using him as a pinch-hitter between starts doesn't mess his rest too much but it leverages his single plate appearance tremendously: he got 15 RBI in just 60 AB last year, a rate of roughly 150 RBI for a nominal 600 AB season. Even Manny and Papi don't do that most years--they possibly get less critical average batting situations. I'd let him pitch. Of course, YMMV.

This has gone from the sublime to the ridiculous. It couldn't possibly be because he sucks, could it? Nah, just go read the press clippings and the Yankees scouting reports. Silly me. My bad. In jacksonianmarch's defense, my parents always told me that if I was too much of a cockpumper that I'd start to go blind. I don't think that we have either the stats or the game films to rule out that possibility regarding Hughes's struggles in 2008. :dunno: Wow, Gom. That's a sentence I never thought that I'd see you write. Here's my take: Boston and New York are still the two best teams in a strong AL East. Nothing is guaranteed; nobody is yet close to elimination. BP has several methods of assessing teams' performance. One of my favorites is their ELO ranking system, similar to that used in World Cup soccer to assess teams' quality. Here are the top five AL teams, ranked by ELO, using the chance of reaching the ALDS as the metric: LA Angels 67% Boston 62% Athletics 43% Guardians 42% Yankees 42% Other AL East teams: Rays 16% Blue Jays 12% Orioles 12% That looks just about right to my perspective. The Yankees are down three Hall of Famers, one All Star and two uber-prospects, but they're still putting four All Stars onto the field, they have three All Star pitchers still in their rotation, and they have Joba and Mo as their set-up/closer duo. The Red Sox, right now, are better than the Yankees right now. The Yankees of June probably won't be the Yankees of right now, though, because health issues will be resolved and Cashman will buy some more talent. The second-half Yankees will be very good, and it's going to be a great AL East race this year. And when the Yankees make their comeback, unless Rasner and Igawa channel the spirits guiding Small and Chacon in 2005 those two guys will not be the heroes.

If I'm following the timeline correctly, Ms. Daly's alleged affair follows Ms. McCready's alleged affair, and the two bargirl incidents mentioned yesterday either completely precede or completely follow both of these. I say that Roger Clemens is serially monogamous, not some guy who plays the field. That's what confused Jose Canseco. It's just that he's faithful to a succession of women other than his wife.

Nah, it's just cuz he's in the NL. In the AL, he'd hit under .100. *** OK, maybe not. ORS, I knew that Owings had enjoyed success as a batter in MLB, but I'd ascribed that to small sample size. Here's what I learned in five or ten minutes of research following your post: 1) While his MLB career is a small sample size, it's already big enough that binomial theorem suggests that we're 95% confident that he's a .265 hitter or better in MLB. A guy who hits .265 with power (and Micah Owings definitely has power) is good enough to earn a roster spot with his bat. 2) Although, again, it's a small sample size, his batting average shows exactly the type of drop I'd expect when pinch-hitting rather than starting, dropping from .366 to .250. He still posts a 1.025 OPS as a pinch hitter. 3) Although he has a high overall BABIP (.418), that's driven primarily by his hitting lots of line drives. He does enjoy a high .360 BABIP on ground balls, but so did Wily Mo when he played for us--power hitters hit line drives so hard that they drive through infields. Almost a quarter of his balls in play have been line drives--that's what's driving the high BABIP. Luck seems to be a lesser factor. 4) His minor league career batting line was .371/.375/.516, not too far from what he's doing right now. 5) (The big one). Check out this: http://tulanegreenwave.cstv.com/sports/m-basebl/mtt/owings_micah00.html Owings led his NCAA Conference in home runs and SLG while ranking second in wins and strikeouts. *** Yeah, that batting ability is for real.

Let's not be hasty in our judgment, MDF.

Yeah, it was. Barajas should've been put on the DL by Lowrie, though. It's technically against the rules to block the plate, but MLB allows a catcher to plant himself in front of it. Barajas sat directly on the plate: I would've come in with my spikes aimed for his kidneys if I'd entered a slide, and with my elbow aimed for his neck if I hadn't. There's no other way Lowrie could've scored: he was past the plate trying to outflank it when Barajas tagged him. Lowrie beat the throw. He should've injured Barajas for how he was occupying home plate.

Lind had a career batting line of .190/.239/.298 vs. power pitchers entering tonight's game. He got his hit on a 96mph fastball...I often fault Tito, but not this time.

Awesome catch by Moss: JD wouldn't've had that.