Keeping Up With the Joneses

ESPN so hired the wrong guy. Todd Jones (in the midst of his best season ever) has been chronicling the Marlins' fortunes in a blog for The Palm Beach Post and he definitely has the idea of writing for the web down pat. His posts are eloquent and witty and he's quick to put his intentions and thoughts right out there. Amen to the post about the lack of fan support at Turner Field: "I'd rather go to see the game marketed well than just sit around and wait for a no-hitter." And, if you dig far enough back in the archives, you'll find Jones giving some love to former Tigers (and current Marlins) 'pen mate Brian Moehler -- which is reciprocated in the comments section by Moehler's father-in-law!

Small Wonder


Earlier this week, Sony spokeswoman Shoko Yanagisawa brought a 2 foot tall robot named QRIO to RFK Stadium to throw out the first pitch. The Nationals dropped the game to the Mets, but QRIO made a distinct impression with a clean fastball straight to the catcher's mitt. QRIO knows how to dance and has a vocabulary of 65,000 Japanese words. He also knows how to talk smack. Here's a portion of an interview I was able to conduct before the game through a Japanese translator:

Hey, great arm -- President Bush couldn't even land it over the plate.
HA HA. BZZAP! LAURA'S WIFE CAN EAT A BAG OF DICKS.

If the opposing pitcher was beaning your teammates, how would you respond?
I WOULD REPLACE JOSE GUILLEN'S RITALIN WITH NO-DOZ AND WATCH HIM RIP THE PANELS OFF THE CENTER FIELD WALL AND TURN HIM INTO A HUMAN TWINKIE.

What's wrong with Cristian Guzman anyway?
BZZAP! I FEEL BAD FOR MY HOMIE. IT ISN'T EASY BEING THE WORST PLAYER IN THE HISTORY OF BASEBALL. ACTUALLY, IT IS EASY -- WHICH IS THE PROBLEM. DUDE NEEDS TO QUIT AND JOIN A PROFESSIONAL T-BALL LEAGUE.

What's your favorite part of the new (old) stadium experience?
ALEXANDER HAMILTON HAS SKILLZ. HE CAN DRIVE HIS CAR AND STOP AT AN ATM TO COUNT HIS MONEY AND STILL WIN THE RACE. WHEN MY AGENT SCOTT BORAS GETS ME OUT OF MY CONTRACT WITH SONY, I'LL BE GETTING MAD LOOT, HA HA HA.

Wait-you've retained Scott Boras as your agent?
GEORGE STEINBRENNER WILL PAY FOR ANYTHING. LOOK AT HOW MUCH MONEY HIDEKI IRABU GOT FOR TAKING A BREAK FROM THE BUFFET LINE. BZZAP! I MAINTAIN CONSTANT PITCH LOCATION AND VELOCITY THROUGH MY SUPERIOR PROGRAMMING. OTHER ATHELETES NEED TO GIVE 110%; I AM CAPABLE OF PERFORMING WELL AT 50%, WHICH LEAVES 60% FOR ME TO TEACH CRISTIAN GUZMAN HOW TO PLAY, TOO.

I suppose you've got a point...
I'M TAKING IT STRAIGHT TO THE MEIKYUKAI, MUTHAFUCKA.

My Milkshake Brings All the Boys to the Yard

Third game of the season for me in three different cities -- this time, in the cavernous environs of RFK Stadium. Messiah scored some sweet tickets on the first base line through his firm and I met up with the Blogroll All-Stars (Sean, Dan, Rachel) to see the Nationals continue their home-field dominance. First stop: Bill Cosby's favorite D.C. haunt, Ben's Chili Bowl, for chili-covered things and a pina colada milkshake. Great place to eat if you don't mind waiting (what seems like) hours to pay your check. So, anyway, the game: Esteban Loaiza carried a no-hitter through the 5th and the Nationals finished the month of June with a 20-6 record.

Still waiting for Dan to join the fray on his tract of internet real estate, but Sean has some deep thoughts and random musings about RFK's lack of ambiance up already. Not sure the Nationals are doing everything they could be doing to enrich fan relations with a winning team in town; everything -- from the dull banners draped over the outfield walls to the preternaturally mincing mascot Screech -- seems like an afterthought. Still, there are worse places to see a game: like the sixth circle of hell, where every seat has an enormous wad of chewing gum stuck to it (like mine) and the blue raspberry sno cones dye your teeth forever. See, Three Rivers Stadium wasn't so bad.

One-Run Wonders

On the opposite end of the Keystone State, the Pirates' record (34-41) also stands on the wrong side of .500. After an early season run of getting blown out of the park (the Brewers destroyed the team in back-to-back starts to open the season on an auspicious note), the Pirates are rediscovering what it means to lose ugly and sharing a little bit of the Phillies' pain. In back-to-back games against the Cardinals, the Bucs' offense vacationed in Cabo while the team lost 8-1 and 8-0. Painful.

The team's Pythagorean winning percentage (an estimate of a team's winning percentage given their runs scored and runs allowed) doesn't offer a ton of insight. Using the following formula, developed by Bill James:

(Runs Scored)^1.83
---------------------------------------------------------
(Runs Scored)^1.83 + (Runs Allowed)^1.83

We get a winning percentage of .471:

(316)^1.83
---------------------------------------------------------
(316)^1.83 + (337)^1.83

Which suggests that the Pirates have been slightly unlucky. The team's actual winning percentage is .453 (derived more easily by dividing the total games by team wins). At the midpoint of the month, before a series against the Yankees, the split was even larger -- though those two successive blowouts against the Cards erased a bit of the debt.

Still, last night's bummer of a loss against a surging Ryan Drese and the Nationals makes me think that the Pirates are even more unlucky that the stats suggest: 17 of the team's 41 losses -- a full third -- have been by a margin of exactly one run. Only 6 of the teams 31 wins have been by a margin of one run. Subtract the squeaky wins (this is NOT scientific) from the one-run losses, split the remaining number (the equivalent of a coin toss), award the Pirates 5 more wins -- and suddenly, we're looking at a 39-36 team...in the thick of the wild card race.

Somehow, it seems more noble to keep things tight and lose by smaller margins -- the whole "we almost got 'em!" principle in action. It does suggest that the Pirates are a better team than even Dave Littlefield would give them credit for. Pythagorean karmic discount or no, the true measure of a team's abilities rest in the W-L column. Either they're winning, or -- in the case of this year's Pirates -- they're simply handing games away.

Irrestible Force Meets Immovable Object

The Phillies' 2005 season is shaping up to be as good as the Philly faithful hoped, and probably much better than expected -- given the team's uncanny ability to play itself out of contention and into mediocrity in May. As of this writing, the team's 39-35 with a win percentage of .527, with a sharper overall record than twenty clubs in MLB. The Phillies are better than the team that's 0.5 games above them in the standings (Atlanta) and have less holes than the team that's 1 game behind them (Florida). And Manuel's militia is in serious contention for a Wild Card spot, since the Cubs and Diamondbacks are mostly smoke and mirrors, freak injuries and career years.

Yet phenom Ryan Howard is languishing in the minors; everyone's ready to anoint him the next Ricky Jordan. Can't believe that the Pirates passed on him as booty for Kris Benson in a proposed trade last season, or that the Phillies were so hot on giving him a bus ticket out of town. And considering the imbroglio earlier this season with Howard and his agent attempting to force a trade, NBA-style, for lack of playtime -- the kid needs to come up.

Howard murdered rookie league and A pitching and tore the cover off the ball in AA, before slackening his pace somewhat in a promotion to AAA Scranton last year. Still, he averaged a HR every 11 at-bats or so and the power and walks stayed constant. And, barring an early season call-up as Thome's replacement this year, he's on fire in 2005. Spring stats (.537 slugging/ 940 OPS in 50 at-bats) have given way to HUGE numbers in AAA: he's leading the International League with a .390 average/ .481 on-base percentage/ .738 slugging. The OBP/slugging split is ridiculous.

So my friend Albert preaches moderation on this one: dump Chavez or Jason Michaels, give Howard 100 or so more major league at-bats in left field. Bill Conlin of the Philadelphia Daily-News, perhaps forgetting the team's decent record with handling young talent, advocates a trade elsewhere: "Set the Prisoner of Thome free. A Ryan is a terrible thing to waste."

Here's an alternate plan: give 3B David Bell the boot, and eat the rest of this year's contract. He is, by far, the worst everyday regular on the Phillies and an offensive cipher. His OPS (total offensive production) mark of .650 in 250 at-bats is dreadful. What have you done for me lately? Next, move Jim Thome from 1B to 3B for the rest of the season, while he's shaking off the early-season injuries and dust. In his six seasons as a 3B for the Indians, between 1991-96, Thome's fielding stats were below league average -- but not by a significant margin. And Bell -- who committed 24 errors at the position in 2004 -- is no whiz, either. Third is a harder position than first from a defensive perspective; an average fielder with pop will win more games than a slightly better than average fielder with lesser offensive statistics.

And there's, what, three years to go on Thome's massive contract? Of course he won't want to do this -- he signed with Philly, at a discount, to stay installed at first base. But Thome will also be 38 at the end of his contract and is too valuable to move to a payroll sponge like the Yankees or a division contender. And he's slightly better than league average as a defender at 1st. But again: what have you done for me lately? Given the paucity of quality 3B around the league, coupled with the fact that the Phillies just shipped out their best 3B (Polanco) in this year's version of the annual hey-let's-get-another-middling-middle-reliever shuffle, production from that slot seems to address a far greater need than replacing Chavez or Michaels.

And, whoa, now there's room for Howard to collect some quality at-bats at first base, even though he seemed overmatched in his 28 at-at this point in the season. If the Phillies could stay patient with his predilection towards striking out (a prime source of tension with Byrd, Burrell, Rollins, etc), they might be rewarded with a significant power boost. Howard's piling up extra-base hits in AAA. One might question the wisdom of rocking the boat before the All-Star break, but the Phillies should consider being proactive for a change. A surgical strike might make the difference between another looks-great-on-paper 85-77 season (no playoffs) and a chance for a "Phillies!" chant during football season.

No Rest for the Wicked

Carl Everett has apparently used up every last ounce of remaining goodwill with his recent comments to Maxim Magazine. I'm with him on his Wrigley Field sentiments -- imploding the stadium, in the wake off Mayor Daley's ridiculous new parking regulations in the Belmont-Clark area, is the best thing that could happen to the city of Chicago, short of the Cubs moving to Iowa. But no way do I endorse Mr. Everett's Rocker-like sentiments on homosexuality. Here's a guy who rips into Jose Canseco for being "ignorant" and simultaneously uses the lowest common denominator platform of a skin-mag interview for not-even-thinly-veiled hate speech: "Gays being gay is wrong. Two women can't produce a baby, two men can't produce a baby, so it's not how it's supposed to be. ... I don't believe in gay marriages. I don't believe in being gay." Yuck, that's all kinds of reprehensible. Have we learned nothing from Julian Tavarez's Chi-town missteps of a few years ago? Dude, buy a ticket to see Richard Greenburg's Take Me Out next time you're in New York and learn something. Until then, kindly shut the fuck up. And if any reps from the commissioner's office happen to be reading this, please avail yourselves of the opportunity to place a gag order on Jose Guillen and Anna Benson, as well.

Less Than Zero

First White Sox game of the year was a total dud. Jose Contreras had his ass handed to him on a platter by an streaky Diamondbacks line-up in the first two innings and the game was a dismal 7-0 before I had finished my first drink. I find Contreras to be underwhelming and I guess the Sox brass does, too -- rumor has it that Orlando Hernandez is here to help ease Contreras' development and soothe his fragile psyche. Ozzie Guillen must feel that he needs some toughening, because he left him in there to sort things out for four more (scoreless) innings before going to the 'pen. Sox couldn't get it started offensively against Shawn Estes, either, save the Big Hurt's best Roy Hobbs/ Kirk Gibson impression with a line-drive solo shot to left field in the 4th -- a sort of weak reminder of what great things the team's capable of.

Still, this is a team built on the front of the rotation, a consistent bench and great coaching. The big weakness, outside of Dustin Hermansen, is a leaky bullpen. Last year's closing tandem of Luis Vizcaino (8th) and Shingo Takatsu (9th) came on to relieve Contreras and put together three solid innings between them. Neither has been particularly effective up to this point in the season, but I can't recall any reliever outside of Mike Jackson getting booed in a Sox uniform in the last few years. And the fans go nuts when Mr. Zero takes the mound: the jumbotron plays this ridiculous quick-cut anime style intro during his warm-ups and all of the other displays boast "Shingo Time!" Must be that awesome (and punishing) sidearm delivery. Why do so many Asian pitchers throw sidearm? I get the sense that it's something that's frowned upon in high school-college ball because of the damage it can do to yer elbow. Love watching it in action, though: Takatsu's arm has this ridiculous bull-whip motion where it snaps back into place after the ball has left his hand.

I'm not sold on the team as a contender yet, either -- though the team's working overtime to erase any lingering debt left over from the 1997 dump trade with the Giants. I think people are still steamed about that. Also, the team's division rivals Minnesota are, as always, dangerous and the Orioles and Angels look tough. I won't be around for the playoff run, either way; as I type this, all of our stuff has been packed neatly in boxes in preparation for the moving company to haul it out this afternoon. Of course, we'll be heading from one first-place town to the next. Actually, two: by the time next week, we'll be between Baltimore and D.C. in the Maryland suburbs. But no more games with my go-to guy Will, who I've seen, like, dozens of Sox and Cubs games with over the last 8 summers. In a sense, what happens on the field is almost irrelevant -- I'll probably remember our conversations long after the box scores have faded away.

The QT on OT

Great night for baseball if you're a fan of overtime games. Minnestota and Cleveland duked it out before the Twins thumped Riske in the 11th. Florida over Philly 4-3 in a 10 inning groaner. As I type this Pittsburgh and St. Louis are tied in the middle of the 11th inning (awesome game so far!) and Luis Ayala is facing Austin Kearns in the bottom of the 14th for a Cincy-Washington marathon. Wow. Was considering generating some statistics on the most cumulative innings played in an evening, but that might not be too telling in the expansion era. Now I could average it out to see the highest average of innings in any given baseball day, but that's a little to precious and geeky.

For our purposes, I'm more interested in something else: the longest baseball game ever played. Innings-wise, the longest was actually 26, but the game in question was played over a longer period: 8 hours 6 mins, 25 innings. Brewers (during the AL era) squaring off against my beloved Chicago White Sox on May 9, 1984. Interestingly enough, both teams were awful that year with sub-.500 records.

The game was so long that it had to be divided over two consecutive days: 17 innings were played on May 8th before play resumed on May 9th. Harold Baines hit a solo homer off of Chuck Porter in the 25th inning to give the Sox the victory; Tom Seaver was the pitcher of record after pitching a single inning and got the Win. Then he collected a win in the regularly-scheduled game that followed! Awesome. Also a record from that game: Tom Paciorek, a career .282 hitter, entered the game as a pinch-hitter in the 4th and came to the plate 9 times.

Now here's my question: does anyone know what the greatest number of overtime baseball games played in one single day is? Holla.

Snootchie Bootchies!!




John Rocker or Jason Mewes? I'm just sayin'.

Decoration Day

Heading off to D.C. for a week to hang out with my dear friend Messiah, look for some new living arrangements, and research initiating a discrimination lawsuit against my-soon-to-be hometown team the Washington Nationals. I see some excellent dinners at Ethiopian restaurants in my immediate future. While we wait for me to pull my head out of my ass and resume regular posting (er, in about two months), might I strongly encourage you to catch up on the latest installments of Paul Lukas' excellent Uni Watch column? Lukas, author of the essential Beer Frame 'zine, also has his own website and it totally rules!

Draft Day


Here's some advice for anyone entering the working world: always make friends with the security guard in your building first. He/she's the one who's gonna get your back when you do something stupid like stretch a 30 minute lunch-break into an hour-and-a-half. Or rush into your place of employment on a Saturday with 8 of your friends to trash a conference room during your annual rotisserie (that's the term, since I prefer my fantasies to involve something other than sports) league baseball draft.

As drafts go, this one was fairly uneventful. The meat flinging incident of '91 or '92 is still fresh in everyone's minds as an example of what not to do when you're locked in a room with a group of similarly cranky people. These days, we're just aging disgracefully and acting out in completely passive-aggressive ways -- and maybe not as invested in baseball as we should be. Still, Some of us, like Gobo, always take the time and effort to concoct a draft plan that takes statistics and permutations and general auction strategies into account. That's him above, either right before or right after one of his epic staredowns with the League Commissioner Marc, figuring out who to add to his team of creaky-kneed 1997 All-Stars.

My draft plan this year involved drafting breakout candidate Odalis Perez (despite his utter lack of run support last year) and making sure my partner Messiah -- who's been burning the candle at both ends in prep for a series of trials -- actually stayed awake during the draft. Also: not ending up the draft with either Joe Randa or Cristian Guzman in our infield. We now have Joe Randa and Cristian Guzman in our infield. Oh well. Guzman's his usual terrible can't-get-on-first-base-if-his-life-depended-on-it self and Randa's leading the NL in home runs. WTF? I guess that's how these things shake out. In fifteen years (!) of drafting, I've certainly seen stranger things happen. Brady Clark, we kiss you.

Barry Bonds and Eugenics

I'm going to take a short break from the in-joke of picking whatever's playing on iTunes at the moment as a title and molding a post around it. Did anyone pick up on that? I feel like I've been given a gift, people, and it would be irresponsible not to get sidetracked and sort it out. See, Barry Bonds wants you to know that steroids are no big deal. [The original link for the story on the MSN home page was even funnier, something like: "Barry Bonds on head, testicles -- OK!"]

Say...what? No, really: Barry Bonds called a press conference last week during spring training to tell people that his head size has not grown and his testicles haven't shriveled into little pits. Stephen Jay Gould would be so proud -- after all, large chunks of The Mismeasure of Man deal with the late 19th/ early 20th century pseudo-science of Eugenics and the metric of head size as a measure of intelligence. So we now that Bonds isn't any smarter, but credit him for being almost completely to the point in his observations, especially when you compare it to Jason Giambi's fruitless impression of Ronald Reagan at the Iran-Contra hearings at his own press conference. Two very different approaches to the same problem, which can be summarized as thus:

Bonds: I may have done these things that are associated with anabolic steroids and human growth hormone, but it was in the service of the greater good.

Giambi: I may or may not have done some things, but I can't tell you right now, so you'll just have to trust me to never tell you the truth.

To be fair, Giambi was already behind the 8-ball and Bonds initiated his own press conference as a preventative measure. Garry Sheffield thinks Bonds is full of shit, and it's a foregone conclusion for anyone who's kept even a passive eye on the sport of baseball over the past decade, but we'll pay good money to see Frankenstein lumber past Hank Aaron -- and hey, why not Josh Gibson or Saddaharu Oh, if his body can hold up -- for the home run title. Bonds recognizes his role as an "entertainer," which is what that press conference was all about.

Should be interesting to see what comes out of next week's congressional hearings on steroids, where both Bonds and Giambi have been subpoenaed to testify. Curt Schilling has already RSVP'd for the event -- which is sort of like placing John Denver in the same room as Dee Snider and Frank Zappa, but that's how it goes with a kangaroo court. And Bonds? Definitely on the 'roids. Wife knows it, kids know it, even his dog knows it. And the fact of the matter is that we can't rewrite history when it's convenient and, say, pull Ty Cobb out of the Hall because he was a douchebag. Bonds, like Cobb, is simply a product of his environment.

Get In or Get Out

The powers that be were really afraid that the Hall of Fame would become littered with plaques for a whole ton of undeserving Yankees, so they went ahead and revamped the credentials for the Veterans Committee. With the old Veteran's Committee, you always had to duck and wonder where the next Dom DiMaggio was coming from; a handful of undeserving candidates got inducted on the main ballot and the Hall suffers from bloat in general. But there was a fear that the Vet's Committee would stand in opposition of the dominant voting ideology and sneak a Roger Maris or a Thurman Munson through the back door.

Ron Santo and Gil Hodges picked up a few votes in this year's election, while Tony Oliva lost a few and Jim Kaat (fourth in overall voting) appeared on the ballot for the first time. Tony Oliva took it pretty hard during a spring training press conference and blamed geography/ playing in Minnesota for lack of exposure; the guy was a really great pure hitter (and led the AL in hits five times between 1964-1970) but not a HOFer by the magic standards. Hodges is probably even less interesting, though he has the Brooklyn Dodgers dynasty working in his favor. I can't believe Santo isn't in the Hall already -- extremely durable and he was probably the best 3B in the league during his prime. And one more thing about Jim Kaat, who has a lot of wins and a career ERA that compares favorably to the league average ERA: the guy won sixteen straight Gold Gloves at his position. Surely, that's some kind of record. Take that, Ozzie Smith!

What we've learned from the new Veterans Committee, which has now expanded to include everyone in the Hall of Fame: the passionate defense of Joe Torre's playing career will never approach a critical consensus. It's a red herring. Which is funny, because that was the whole reason for revamping the Veterans Committee in the first place. Turns out these guys are even more fiercely protective of the Hall's legacy than the Baseball Writers Association. Here's Tom Seaver on this year's deadlock, the second straight election with no new old-timers: ``I'm of the opinion it's going to be awfully hard [to elect additional members], and maybe that's how it should be.''

Yup.

I Used to Love H.E.R.

Yeah, I still visit this piece of internet real estate from time to time. Not as much as I'd like. I held out on the blogging cliche of apologizing for my shoddy lack of effort as long as possible -- who hasn't had an acute case of writer's block or a mountain of impediments to dance around, you know? But winter in Chicago is a harsh mistress. I always forget how dire everything gets when the world outside your window is blanketed in 12 inches of snow, how life suddenly becomes about holding on to your very last bit of energy until the eventual thaw -- and the deep feelings of remorse that accompany that action when the first signs of spring emerge.

You get a little crazy and sometimes, you go the other direction entirely and start to feel invincible. And maybe you sniff at the idea of giving $75 million to an injury prone Magglio Ordonez and watch him catch the bus to Detroit. And you take a long, hard look at Kyle Farnsworth and decide that he's the projection of all of your failures and give him the boot, too. Sometimes nice people -- like Moises Alou -- get hurt, because we live in a society where ageism is an ugly fact of life. And sometimes the culpable get what they deserve, like Sammy Sosa, even though his foul attitude is rooted in your own team's sliding fortunes. It's not even spring yet, but the realization that the Cubs and White Sox will be going at it without Sammy and Magglio in 2005 -- even though they weren't ever my favorite players -- is powerful and hard to shake. Because they've been in Chicago longer than I've been here. We can win without them -- management thinks so, at least -- by remaking ourselves into the Braves and the A's. But we've never felt so mortal.

Somebody to Love

Three cheers for the brain trust at Dan Nation for sponsoring a player page at the baseball site-to-end-all-sites Baseball Reference. Dan gave his love to commemorate Archi Chianfrocco, who rode the pine for Montreal and San Diego in the 90s. Dan's heartfelt dedication can be viewed here . Now I will gladly follow in his footsteps and present to you -- drum roll, please -- my Baseball Reference sponsorship . This may be the best $10 I've ever spent.

Wade Bloggs

Never really had a personal connection with Wade Boggs -- and this takedown by ESPN's Bill Simmons illustrates why there wasn't a whole lot to get excited about. I don't agree that Jim Rice is more deserving of Hall of Fame enshrinement -- as this piece suggests -- but I'm in 100% percent agreement with the rest of his sentiments on Citizen Wade. Awesome career stats, less interesting personality than Don Mattingly, Dale Murphy or Keith Hernandez. In a word: boring.

Ryne Sandberg, on the other hand, was (in my mind) the best position player on the ballot and I'm thrilled to see him get into the Hall of Fame. I don't even like the Cubs, but Sandberg defined '80's baseball for me. He held the career home run mark for a second baseman until Jeff Kent pulled ahead recently with his best Ryno impression, and his stellar MVP season was only his 3rd or 4th best from an offensive standpoint. It's shocking how his accomplishments have diminished in the eyes of the Chi-town faithful -- he left us at the altar with an early retirement, of course, and came back when he probably shouldn't of, sure. But the fact that Sandberg got in isn't -- as one of my customers in a (get this) Cubs jersey alleged today -- due to a weak ballot this year but a minor disturbance in pattern in the general head-up-assery that prevails amongst the voting committee.

Next up: Ron Santo, Veterans Ballot. That would be the poetic icing on the cake of justice, wouldn't it?

Writ Large

Peter Gammons wins the J.G. Taylor Spink Award and joins fellow luminary Ring Lardner in Baseball Hall of Fame. Throw ya hands up!

So, will Flogging Molly be playing the induction ceremony?

You're a mean one, Mr. Grinch

Marlins spokesman Bruce Rubin on owner Jeff Loria recent meeting with Las Vegas officials: "These were social discussions, a get-to-know-each-other meeting. Simply, Vegas wants a baseball team and the Marlins are a baseball team. It was decided that the two sides should get together."

I think I threw up in my mouth a little when I read this published report. It's not the sentiment, it's the phrasing. You know, peanut butter tastes good on sandwiches and chocolate is a delicious treat -- why not put the two together and make something even more delicious? No one who witnessed Art Modell's dismantling of the Browns and overnight move to Baltimore will buy this line, and Jeff Loria's Machiavellian maneuvering as owner of Les Expos assures us that it's all about the dollar for him.

Sure, sure, the only thing more cliche than an owner crying poverty is a fan complaining that an owner is a greedy pig. But Loria is truly a piece of work. Is Montreal a bad town for baseball? Yes. Is Miami a bad town for baseball? Maybe. But for the same reasons that the White Sox struggle to fill the stands in the third largest market in baseball. If you build a good team, the fans will come. And if you dismantle a team, the fans respond in the only way they know how. That's the simple economics of a 162-game schedule. People support the Marlins -- inclement weather and tropical rainstorms aside -- when the team is good. And the team has won two World Series rings in the last seven years, which is pretty terrific.

By all accounts, Pro Player Stadium is an awful place to see a game. And what team hasn't tried to strongarm its host city into financing a new park in the post-Camden Yards/ Jacobs Field era? Loria's timing is terrible, though: the threat of a move is appalling when used as a negotiation tactic. Is all hope truly lost in Miami? Have the Marlins explored all their options for financing a new ballpark? Why do teams feel like they bear no responsibility in making capital improvements? It's not that Miami is lucky to have the Marlins; the Marlins are lucky to have Miami.

Into the Void

;

My girlfriend used to work about a block away from a plaque commemorating the Haymarket Riots. Here in Chi-town, we've got public parks in the middle of nowhere dedicated to Eugene V. Debs. The City of Chicago built itself on the spirit of labor reform; the city's rise as a financial center is a natural outgrowth of a massive population explosion, but it still bleeds blue like Gary, Indiana or Kalamazoo, Michigan. I'll save my thoughts on labor unions for another day and another blog, but as someone who's paid dues for a union in the past (United Auto Workers) and has found himself employed a variety of mixed/ union/ non-union locations, all I can say is that the MLB Players Union is its own worst enemy right now.

MLB doesn't have a deep history of voided contracts -- Aaron Boone's basketball injury springs to mind immediately and a series of contracts were voided during some strange administrative reshuffling in the strike shortened 1994 season. And of course, Denny Neagle -- a poster-boy for salary bloat -- is all over the news wire right now for (literally) getting caught with his pants down. Forget about Boone, who was in obvious violation of the terms of his contract. And let's also not consider the aberration of '94, because so much of it flew under the radar. Neagle, though, is a warning sign for what happens when baseball half-heartedly attempts to enforce morals.

Let's set the record straight here: despite defaming him in the press, the Yankees did not terminate Kevin Brown's contract last season after a self-inflicted injury. Jason Giambi's job with the Yankees is probably safe, as is Barry Bonds' continued employment with the Giants; it's rough going from here on out for both, but their respective value to their teams is tied inextricably to their ability to place butts in seats. But what happens when you move on down the line to someone like Benito Santiago, who's been rumored to be on the 'roids and has a comparatively modest 2.5 million left on his contract with the Royals? Or The Neck that Ate Chicago? His trade value is less than nil in the wake of steroid allegations and the Cubs would love to take his contract and drop it like it's hot.

The MLB Players Union has zero leverage until it adopts a steroid testing policy. In the face of sharp criticism from bulldog Sen. John McCain, the Union is saying that it would be "open" to adopt a more stringent testing policy. Union boss Don Fehr has defended the current policy, wherein players were tested once between spring training and the end of the regular season. Once. So where's the statistical sample? And if everyone and their mom and their dog knew that Bonds and Giambi were on 'roids, then everyone knew about the prevalence of doping agents -- you could sleepwalk through the Summer Olympics and catch a fucking clue.

What the Players Union needs to understand is that its in their best interest to adopt aggressive testing measures, whether or not their interests fall in line with the "moral good" of baseball. Not because John Mc Cain or President Bush wants it or Bud Selig peeks out from under his desk to sheepishly agree, but because it's the only leg the players have to stand on when protecting their bloated contracts. What we'd definitely see is an impediment to owners/teams voiding player contracts, since all the Union reps would have to say is that Player A admits he has a problem, he will accept the attendant penalties and he will seek treatment and counseling to resolve the problems. Will testing drastically reduce the frequency of steroid use within the league? Hell no, baseball's too soft on crime and it'd take the threat of something like a salary cap to sort that one out.

Jason and the Argue-Nots

Seems like everytime I go visit my parents, Dave Littlefield dismantles the Pittsburgh Pirates. Folks, if you want to know what to get me for Christmas (er, Hanukkah) this year, it's really easy: make the bleeding stop! I spent 12 hours pacing nervously in O'Hare airport on the Wednesday before Thanksgiving, wondering if I should just resign myself to camping out there over the entire weekend a la Tom Hanks. Heard the Jason Kendall-to-Oakland rumors swirling all week (with Mark Mulder possibly coming in return, yeah right!) and then -- boom! -- cracked open the paper on Saturday morning to read all about the twin salary dump the teams orchestrated.

If you scroll down a few posts to early November, you'll see that I feel pretty strongly about Kendall. Mark Redman was a decent catch -- in light on Kris Benson's $8 million contract with the Mets, he'll provide similar production with no illusions of being anything other than a #4-5 starter. His lone season in the NL was his best (Florida, 2003), so his numbers should roll back a little in the less hitting-friendly league. And if the Bucs can trade for Prentice Redman and get an endorsement from Red Man Chewing Tobacco, they'll have a monopoly on all the major league Redmen. Arthur Rhodes, the other guy involved in the deal, was a major dud for Oakland last season -- though the Pittsburgh front office knows they're dealing from a position of strength in terms of the bullpen, and they'll try to spin him for some hitting (one rumor has him being flipped to L.A. for Milton Bradley, yeah right!) or, more likely, release him during Spring Training. So no thanks there.

In short, they made out as best as they could. Just like the Brian Giles deal, which, given some distance to reflect, turned out amazingly for the Pirates. You won't see the same kind of returns here, because of the strict major league talent ratio. Oakland obviously felt than Rhodes and Redman have nowhere to go but down, and no surprise that the Pirates felt the same way about Kendall. Last time out, I took the high road discussing Kendall -- trying to get into Billy Beane's head to figure out Kendall's present-day value as an OBP and defensive threat. Right here and now, he seems like an awfully good fit for the A's.

And present value is what you think of when the wounds are still raw. Pittsburgh Post-Gazette columnist Ed Cook slammed the deal in a front-page piece the morning after, and who could blame him? It's painful anytime a player with a modicum of talent gets shipped out of town. My esteemed colleague One Man Band pretty much encapsulates my feelings on the trade: bad deal, leaves the Pirates vulnerable at catcher, doesn't really provide the financial flexibility that you'd assume, and the Pirates won't do anything with the few million dollars in savings except pad the war chest. Totally on the mark!

Cook's colleague at the PG, The Stats Geek, took another tack and tried to calm nerves by weighing Kendall's injury history and future durability against the examples of Johnny Bench and the major drop-off in service time most catchers experience after age 30. Of the top 20 catchers who caught the most games up through age 30, only 2 rank in the top 20 of games caught after 30. Offensive production is a corollary to health behind the plate, too Johnny Bench caught 539 games from ages 27-30 and 415 from 31-34; his OPS dipped from .836 to .794 in the same interval. How about Carlton Fisk? 522 games from 27-30 and 453 from 31-34 with an OPS slide from .853 to .761. Mike Piazza? 592 games from 27-30, 438 (541 games total -- he also played a lot of first base in '04) from 31-34 with a huge OPS slide.

Folks like Gary Carter and Roy Campanella held up pretty well, of course, but Kendall has already caught 1252 games through age 30 and the major drop-off begins after 1300 games. I still think he has a lot of life left in him; save his gruesome injury in '99, he's been very durable. And he has three years left on his contract, not coincidentally the age 31-34 period discussed above. Can Kendall catch a lot of games in that interval and hit for a high average? History says no for catchers with an extreme workload. Kendall has only caught 442 games over the least three seasons, though; he'll have no problem equaling that production.