Some Phillies Links for You, April 29, 2010: Blown Saves, Bochy Boners, Reinforcements
by WholeCamels on Apr 29, 2010 9:03 AM EDT
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PrintNo reasonable explanation for Phillies' win over Giants
Sometimes you just accept that you're gonna win some weird ones, and you move on.
Phillies Notes: Phils' Hamels satisfied with outing
He was getting squeezed, yes, but there must be a middle ground between home runs and walks, right?
Blanton struggles in rehab outing
Eh, not freaking out.
Minor Leagues: Red Wings outlast IronPigs, 5-4 | Philadelphia Inquirer
A little minor league roundup (P.S. Philly Inquirer, kill the autoplay on your website)
Crashburn Alley - Addressing Howard and RBI
Bill looks at the "Ryan Howard rules because of his RBI totals" argument.
Chase Utley ‘Hits’ a Milestone - Chicks Dig The Long Ball
Second baseman collects his 1,000th career hit yesterday. Attaguy, Chase.
Oswalt returns to Astros after tornadoes destroy childhood home - Big League Stew - MLB Blog - Yahoo! Sports
Flatout awful, but at least there were no fatalities in his family.
Mets 7, Dodgers 3: Maine Great, Catalanotto Reaches Base - Amazin' Avenue
The Mets strengthen their stranglehold on first place.
And that makes 8: Braves Get Bashed by Cardinals 6-0 - Talking Chop
But for Ryan Madson and the Glaus/Heyward tragedy last week, they'd be looking at nine straight...
Fish Wrap - Marlins 4, Padres 6 - FishStripes
Aaaaand the Marlins lose.
Washington Nationals Take Two Of Three In Wrigley, Beat Chicago Cubs 3-2. - Federal Baseball
The Nationals continue their solid play, beating the admittedly woeful Cubs.
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File under "know your enemy"
I caught about two minutes of WIP this morning. The conversation went like this.
Cataldi: “My question is this. Who would you rather have, Jayson Werth or Cole Hamels? I say this because yesterday, you saw Jayson Werth in a bases-loaded, 2-out situation, basically the quintessential pressure moment in baseball, and he came through. While meanwhile, you have another guy who can’t handle pressure…”
Morganti: “Hold on a second. What’s the name of that trophy that Cole Hamels has again?”
Cataldi: “No! I don’t deal with history! I live in the moment!”
I turned it off not long afterwards.
I guess I should have seen it coming, but it looks like, as the Werth negotiations (which I believe are futile) continue to drag out throughout the year, the talking heads are not going to connect it to the Howard contract, because Howard, while not necessarily beloved, is comparatively too popular for them to criticize. Instead, they’re going to connect it to Hamels. It doesn’t matter that Hamels doesn’t really have very much to do with Werth’s contract situation.
Off the bat, I’d rather have Cole than Howard. People are just looking for the scapegoat, and because the rest of Philadelphia sports is looking good right now (Sixers aren’t in the discussion anymore). Flyers are about to start another series, Eagles had a promising draft, and then there is Cole Hamels. Nevermind that the offense has been god-awful and can’t overcome a 6 inning 4 run start by their pitcher, or the bullpen does its best impression of Lazarus when given the chance, our woes are all Coles fault.
That being said, kid has to jump out of his funk. He’s much better than his Jamie Moyer numbers suggest. He needs to kick it into gear, if not for the Phillies sake, but for FM
TAKE THE FALL, ACT HURT, GET INDIGNANT
by CoburnsCuddleBuddy on Apr 29, 2010 10:53 AM EDT up reply actions
If Werth can work on his secondary pitches, I’d be all ears. That’s a brilliant idea if you’re a big fan of incoherence. Which I am.
by Wet Luzinski on Apr 29, 2010 10:54 AM EDT up reply actions
Cataldi is a walking, talking stereotype. The real kicker is that he isn’t even from Philadelphia, so why does he feel the need to represent the lowest common denominator so?
"Tortorella’s got it all wrong ... Gaborik shouldn’t be messing with our skilled player." -Peter Luuko
The snippet I caught earlier in the week had him going on about McNabb vomiting in the Super Bowl. Guess we’ll call that “history’s mysteries.”
by Wet Luzinski on Apr 29, 2010 10:58 AM EDT up reply actions
I think it’s all a very cynical act. I don’t think he ever genuinely gets swept up in the passions and prejudices of the local fans. I think he is a pretty intelligent but amoral person who is very deliberate and calculating in the way he “draws up plays” that will get people agitated.
It’s entertainment, pure and simple, and I don’t get as agitated about these types as I do about political commentators who do the same thing, as I genuinely feel that these folk contribute little to Our Great Republic, and a few actually damage and cheapen it. (/Sam the Eagle’d) Not to minimize sport, but for the most part they are talking about games. Lots of the talk is highly representational, of course – meaning that you can analyze the talk that goes on as a great moral discourse.
The sorry part of it all is that there are guys who can be reasonable and insightful and entertaining at the same time, wholly independent of medium – print/radio/TV/webs, but they tend not to get great ratings. Up to all of us to seek them out and give them the traffic they’re due.
by Wet Luzinski on Apr 29, 2010 12:59 PM EDT up reply actions
But, see, I actually think they DO harm with this kind of commentary, because they help to strengthen the ire of the knuckle dragging fan who wants certain players or coaches tarred and feathered…not that you can blame talk show hosts for leading to anyone attacking another fan in a parking lot or anything, but the same could be said for your political hacks, too.
It’s the whole Oscar Wilde dueling ideology. Does art lead you to corruption or it is just a mirror image of society?
"Tortorella’s got it all wrong ... Gaborik shouldn’t be messing with our skilled player." -Peter Luuko
I think this is the subtle distinction that can be drawn between Eskin and Cataldi. Eskin is just as bad a person as Cataldi is, but Eskin is less dangerous because his hackery is designed to make his audience justifiably angry at himself, not unjustifiably angry at some third party.
I agree with WL’s point that if this stuff has to exist somewhere in society (and perhaps it does), then I’d rather have it be in sports than in politics. But at the same time, people are integrated beings and those who learn to think a certain way about leisure subjects will have a greater tendency to think the same way about serious ones as well.
Then you get the Vietnam War, I think.
http://www.amazon.com/Best-Brightest-David-Halberstam/dp/0679640991
Good point. You probably also get the Great Society. Which, compared to what we have now in the realm of the direct provision of social services, probably looks like Russia in the 1920s.
A fabled Golden Age?
"I remember being three and I wanted to be a baseball player, that's all I ever really wanted to be. That and Spider Man." -Raul Ibanez
by Jose and the Contrarians on Apr 29, 2010 6:24 PM EDT up reply actions
doubleh, I wouldn’t be a fan of sport if I didn’t believe that in so many ways it is representative of how life is lived out. Lord knows, every workplace is filled with talented youngsters who are misperceived as not being able “yet” to "cut it’ as well as Veteran Clubhouse Presences who are sucking up payroll for no discernable reason. And, as a manager, I love watching guys like Manuel, Torre, Girardi, Pinella, even Bochy yesterday, etc, operate.
So I really am in agreement with you, but I guess I take the longer view that this type of entertainment is really just latter day bread and circuses. We give it power.
by Wet Luzinski on Apr 29, 2010 3:31 PM EDT up reply actions
OK, I just wanted to point out something I read on the SF site:
Ryan Howard was the tying run, and Wilson teased him with several well-placed cutters on the outside corner that just missed
Those pitches “just missed”? Did he watch the same game I did? It almost looked like an intentional walk to me. Even Howard wouldn’t flail at pitches that far off of the plate.
"Tortorella’s got it all wrong ... Gaborik shouldn’t be messing with our skilled player." -Peter Luuko
philly.com autoplay
At least now you can turn the volume off after it starts going. Until a few months ago, you couldn’t even do that. I especially loved it whenever I was at work and got that Jimmy John’s ad that would begin with the pregnant woman screaming “AAAAHHHH! WHERE’S MY HUSBAND!!!!” I hate all those sandwich chains, but because of that ad, I hate Jimmy John’s the most. Even more than Subway.
One weird ass article...
From New York Sports with a decidely pro-Yankees twist. The gist is we had to badly overpay for Howard because he is “the face of the francise,” much like the Twins had to overpay for Mauer. The Yankess, however, because of who they are get mercenaries such as Texiera on the cheap, or “the non-home team discount”. Lots of haterade.
http://nymag.com/daily/sports/2010/04/why_ryan_howard_is_more_expens.html
Apparently, what he fails to recognize, is that the Yankees are everyone’s competition to resign these “hometown heroes.” Of course, they can get their own guys more cheaply (or bid against themselves in the case of A-Rod, Part Deux) as a result. How did they get Tex on the cheap, BTW?
"Tortorella’s got it all wrong ... Gaborik shouldn’t be messing with our skilled player." -Peter Luuko
For one thing, Howard is not actually more expensive than Teixeira. Which, in my view, is sort of problematic when your article is titled “Why Ryan Howard Is More Expensive Than Mark Teixeira.”
From 2010-2016, Howard is owed: 19, 20, 20, 20, 25, 25, 25 = $154 million
From 2010-2016, Teixeira is owed: 20, 22.5, 22.5, 22.5, 22.5, 22.5, 22.5 = $155 million
Howard does have the 2017 option/buyout, but:
(a) Even if Texeira isn’t playing 1B for the Yankees in 2017, someone else will be and he will be getting paid something, so the proper comparison there isn’t $10 or $23 vs. $0. It’s a significantly smaller number.
(b) Howard’s 2010-2016 is more backloaded and thus, because of the time value of money, he is actually more than $1 million cheaper during those years than Teixeira is.
Both are about the same age (Howard is like 5 months older). Teixeira is a better player but he isn’t that much better. The two contracts are very comparable. The article is moronic, which is to be expected from its author.
Exactly, I didn’t see the Tex contract to be all that cheap and as you said—I don’t see him being so superior a player that his contact should show that. Whatevs. The author is a Yankees fan, no?
"Tortorella’s got it all wrong ... Gaborik shouldn’t be messing with our skilled player." -Peter Luuko
Oh, his drivel read like a robot Yankees fan. My bad.
"Tortorella’s got it all wrong ... Gaborik shouldn’t be messing with our skilled player." -Peter Luuko
He is a robot, just not a robot Yankees fan. It’s painful anytime Leitch tries to talk about sabermetrics because he doesn’t really understand it. The only reason why he supports it because he enjoys seeing sabermetricians rip up traditionalists in arguments and wants to jump on the bandwagon. In other words, he’s a pure poseur. He wants the triumphalism without the underlying insight, which is the worst of both worlds. At least when someone like Rob Neyer gets snarky, which is often, he more often than not understands what he’s talking about instead of just parroting what other people have said.
People never seem to consider present value when looking at these contracts…
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Another game where Cole gets a ton of swings and misses, yet manages to also give up a bunch of runs. It almost defies explanation that a guy who is so good(literally among the best in the league) at getting swings and misses can also be so inconsistent.
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Optimistic about Cole
I am encouraged by Cole’s high strike-out rate so far this season. If he keeps it up (and he’s capable of doing so), he could challenge for the K title.
Hamel’s has had two four-walk outings in five starts. That’s uncharacteristic of him, and I expect his walk rate to drop eventually to about 2 per 9 innings.
I am somewhat alarmed by the number of hits and HRs Hamels has given up this season, but I am optimistic he will improve significantly on these early numbers over the course of the season.
Rather than judge his performance now or from start-to-start, we should withhold judgment until much later in the season. If Cole is not performing like a very good No.2 when we get to the playoffs, though, the Phils probably won’t go very far.
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