Marco's Baseball Blog-O-Roonie 2021: CANNONS!

 

Marco’s Baseball Blog-O-Roonie 2021: CANNONS!

Rocky Colavito was a power hitting outfielder for the Cleveland Indigenous North Americans and the Detroit Large Striped Felines from the mid 50’s until the late 60’s.

Led the league in homers once, rbi’s once, slugging once...a real steady producer and a huge hit with the fans. Women thought his unibrow was a real turn on and they loved it when he’d go through a kind of yoga-calisthenic stretching procedure before every at bat. It was always an “Oh! Rocky!” Picture Show kind of moment. In fact, when the Cleveland club traded Rocky to Detroit for batting champion Harvey Kuenn it was a scandal. Superstitious fans (in other words all of them) say this rotten trade put a curse on the team which is still going strong today.

One thing the Rock had was an incredible throwing arm. Ralph Kiner, the old Pittsburgh slugger who worked in the Cleveland organization after his playing days, said Colavito had the best arm in baseball...the best arm he’d ever seen. Ralph himself was a Hall of Fame slugger and was around the game for awhile and saw a lot of players. Many other players are quoted as agreeing that Rocky had the most powerful arm in baseball. Some said Willie Mays, Mickey Mantle and Carl Furillo got rid of their throws quicker, but nobody could match the power of Colavito.

Back in 1956, the year Colavito was called up to the big league club, he was playing for San Diego in the Pacific Coast League and some of his teammates got him into some promotional pre-game stunt to see if Rock could break the record for longest throw. The record at that time was 434 feet by an unknown minor league Hearty name of Don Grate. They set up the throw starting in the right field corner throwing to the left field foul pole which was a certain 460 feet away, but the wind was bad that night and Rocky moved to home plate and decided to throw to center with a cross wind. He threw a couple of long warm ups and then unloaded four straight heaves from home plate over the 420 mark at the center field fence. One throw landed on top of the batting cage and couldn’t be accurately measured. It was the longest though. The best throw that they could measure with certainty went 436 feet...a new record by 2 feet.

That may be the longest distance anybody has ever thrown a baseball, considering conditions..

The history of the long throw record is one of those fascinating by-products of baseball, like Bob Feller measuring the speed of his fastball against a motor cycle going 98 mph. Has nothing to do with an actual game, but it’s the kind of thing that it’s just fun to know.

The original long throw record was set by a member of the Cincinnati Redlegs (baseball’s FIRST professional team) in 1868. John Hatfield was his name and he threw a ball 396 feet. By 1898 somebody noticed that Honus Wagner...then playing third for Louisville after giving up his career as a coal miner...had an awfully strong arm. Honus threw one they measured at 407 feet. Sheldon Lejeune (he tried to rename himself “Larry” but it never took) upped it to 426 feet in 1910 but they said it was definitely wind aided. In 1952 Hugh McMullen increased the record by one foot in the dry air of Arizona for a recorded distance of 427 and then came Don Grate in Chattanooga with 434. (Legit but at altitude and inland. Colavito was throwing at sea level in the humid sea breezes of San Diego.) The last time the record was broken was when Glen Gorbous tried it in 1958. On a very hot night in Omaha at over 1000 feet elevation, Glen uncorked one 445 feet with a long running start. This is now the official record, but considering the conditions, many people think Colavito’s was the more impressive throw.

(You can read nice tidbits about these players and their arms at …

“The J.G. Preston Experience” website.)

Mike Riley has written an excellent in depth examination of the subject and has made a conclusion primarily based on assist statistics and frequency of runners trying to take extra bases on various candidates. He doesn’t trust the eyeball test or folk stories. I won’t spoil the fun by blurting out who he thinks the best arm belongs to, but I must point out that assists are not a hard fact of statistics. Like a lot of fielding stats, they can be misleading.

The all time leader in outfield assists is Tris Speaker with 449. Tris was the first superstar centerfielder and an awesome Hall of Famer who played 22 years, from 1907 until 1928. That can lead to a lot of opportunity. But Tris is famous for playing an extremely close in “rover” type of center field. This was back in the dead ball era and not many hitters could hit it over him. So he controlled base runners and threw guys out at second on singles that other outfielders couldn’t. These days the outfielders have to stay back. Tris had over 30 assists in a season 7 times...all in his early days with the Boston Red Sox. (see “park effects” coming up)

Other effects on assist totals are ballpark configuration. How many hitters slam a line drive off the Green Monster in Boston and just assume they hit a double, only to Die the Death on a throw to second...not on a great throw from a Tris Speaker but by Kiki Hernandez or some other ordinary thrower who just got a good bounce and padded his assist total?

Or pitching staff proclivities? What if you play on a team with a staff of split finger/sinker types who rack up ground balls? Quite a few less outfield assist opportunities? How about a bunch of strike out artists like we have today? And then there’s a team full of fly ball pitchers where the outfielders are gunning down base runners because they have more opportunities to field balls hit to them.

With a stat like assists, where 15 can lead the league, a few weird conditions can make a huge difference.

By far the hardest thing to evaluate is the fact that once a player gets a reputation as a dangerous arm, base runners stop trying for the extra base and base coaches are reluctant to send them. So does the great arm guy get any statistical credit? Not as far as assist totals go...but esoteric things like how many runners on second tried to take third on a fly ball to deep right...that’s a stat, but it depends on the runners on base and the judgement of the base coach as to how much credit the player with the shut down arm gets.

Just my opinion, but I think that once a player gets credit for having a “cannon”...most of his assists come from either mistakes or truly awe inspiring greatness. Clemente had high assist totals year after year when everybody knew you just didn’t take a chance running on him. So the only assists Clemente was getting at the peak of his career were when a fast runner was sure he could get to third on that double to the gap and...surprise! Or a runner on third was sent home on a single to right just because the pitcher’s spot was next in the line up and the third base coach had to take a chance that Roberto’s throw would be up the line just this once.

My point is that other people’s opinions and experience shape statistics. High, steady assist totals surely mean that the players like Furillo, Mays, Clemente, Parker, Evans, Barfield, Ichiro and Bo Jackson have guns. It is an indicator, but not a proof that one is better than another. The greatest arm in the world would be some guy that was so scary that he would never have an assist because absolutely nobody would ever run on him. Assist total...zero.

And it’s not stats that decides who has the best arm, but word of mouth on the league “telegraph” and the wisdom and experience of the best judges of baseball talent we have...the other players, managers and coaches of the game. These guys have seen more games than anybody and they have seen players perform. I, for one, will pay attention to their opinions.

We also have the miracle of film, video and digital playback nowadays. Good luck trying to find a film of Tris Speaker throwing a strike from centerfield, but you can see Bo Jackson throwing out Harold Reynolds from the left centerfield fence to home plate when Harold was stealing on the pitch and he’s one of the fastest men in baseball and he’s passing second at full speed while Bo was still trying to find the handle.…

And then Bo lets it rip...all the way from the fence in the air...no hop...yer out Sonny!

Or Jose Guillen of Pittsburgh butchering a shot off the wall in right center, scrambling toward the infield fifteen feet to pick up the caromed baseball and like a javelin thrower, getting everything behind the throw...all the way to third base in the air for the out! (It’s called “the mutant throw”.)

Or Bo Jackson again, starting in almost the same spot on the field in right center, corraling a gapper and with absolutely no run up just arm firing the ball to kill the runner trying for second.

Clemente in the 1971 series, which Roberto owned, fielding a ball in the extreme right field corner and throwing a strike to third base to get the runner. (Well, he was actually called safe but the umpire blew the call!)

There’s a reason they call him “El Howitzer”.

Jesse Barfield from the track in right center...don’t even think about it.

Rick Ankiel getting two Mariners at third in the same game on impossible throws from centerfield.

And one more from a player that is all but forgotten...Ellis Valentine of the Montreal Expos. He only had one gold glove year. 1978 when he led the league with 24 assists. But when other players were asked to rank the great arms in the game...most of them started with Ellis. They put him in a special category all his own before talking about the other gunners.

That throw he makes against the Reds on a fast runner from second. A smash down the first base line that Valentine traps at the base of the wall, turns and with no momentum, fires a head high laser beam to catcher Gary Carter in the air to get Davey Concepcion by ten feet. No arc to that throw, just power and line...a perfect, perfect throw.

Let Gary tell it… starts at 1:25 if you feel like pasting this short youtube clip

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CQwfvNtAFyk

So who is the Big Daddy of outfield arms? My firm belief is that this will never be completely resolved because of the number of variables. Conditions change. It’s probably from this group though…

Roberto Clemente/ Jesse Barfield/ Ellis Valentine/ Bo Jackson...

...or Rocky Colavito!

Happy Holidays!

Marco's Baseball Blog-O-Roonie 2021: Golden Moments of Destruction

 

Marco’s Baseball Blog-O-Roonie 2021: GOLDEN MOMENTS OF DESTRUCTION

Framber-Fest: The recent sporting dispute between the Atlanta Politically Incorrects and the Houston We-are-not-Besmirched-Stros showcased the awful knife’s edge upon which baseball contests are filagreed and frickaseed.

The climax of the series was an awesome home run by Jorge Soler that wound up in south Waco somewhere, but there were other Golden Moments where the fates inexorably ground the Astros into dust.

In game one Dusty Baker sends Framber Valdez out to try to duplicate his dominant start against the Red Sox in the ALCS a few games earlier. After that contest, Framber giddily explained his stratee-gery as consisting of a reliance on his sinker and fastball the first time through the line-up, eschewing the curveball to showcase later. How nice it was for him to broadcast his pitching philosophy to the attentive Bravos! Dusty Baker and John Smoltz up in the booth each contributed their appreciation of this “scoop”. Can’t you just imagine the pre-game talk-through in the Braves’ locker room?

Hitting Coach: “Okay men, this Framber guy is only going to throw you a sinker or a fastball the first time up. You don’t have to worry about any curve balls because he said he’s not using them until later, after he announces his dominance with his fastball and sinker. Now, if I remember correctly a sinker will kind of be low in the zone where you don’t want to hit it. And if he’s like the other 500 pitchers in the majors, his fastball will be faster and higher than the sinker. So you might think about laying off the low pitches and look for that high hard one up in the zone and hit that instead. Just a suggestion you understand. Who knows, might work out for us! And remember...no curvy balls. It wouldn’t be fair!”

So, first two innings of the first World Series game the Braves pummel Framber’s fastballs in the zone for 5 runs on 8 hits! Riley doubles, Soler homers and then in the third Duvall homers and Framber gets the hook before recording an out, after going one and a half times through the Braves’ lineup.

I’m sure the Braves were waiting for the Astro’s second game starter to explain his game plan to the media the next day.

This was a Golden Moment of Destruction that put the Astros behind the eightball for the rest of the Series. Why? Because the Astros pen had to pick up 7 innings of work and that started their relief pitchers on a downword spiral of overwork.

Meanwhile, the Braves starting pitcher Charlie Morton took a liner off the shin and broke his femur. Normally if the other team’s Ace gets hurt and knocked out for the duration, it’s an advantage for the team that DIDN’T get their pitcher’s leg broke. But not in this case...the Braves had a one game lead and that was huge for the rest of the Series. The Astros never stopped playing catch up.

Golden Moment Number Two: Outfield Algebra... Dusty Baker looked at his lineup card and realized that playing without a DH in Game 3 back in Atlanta was not exactly going to be Easy Street.

The Stros had nicely tied the Series at 1 game apiece with a 7-2 Altuve-goes-boom kind of game. But now, in order to get Yordan Alvarez, pulverizer of the Red Sox, into the lineup he had to completely rework his outfield defense with Brantley moving from left to right, Tucker going from right to center and Alvarez having to shuffle around in left on two recently operated upon knees. New turf for everybody, and not the best of arrangements.

Somehow in the confusion, Dusty failed to notice that his lineup was not hitting squat. Indeed, this was the big surprise of the Series. Despite facing starters who couldn’t make it past the third inning the Astros were flailing in the shallows like so many beached narwhals while the Atlanta left-handed bullpen contingent casually harpooned them.

Just a note: Braves starter Ian Anderson left the game after five innings having allowed NO...that is ZERO hits. Will we ever see another one-pitcher no-hitter in a World Series? Not if this pitching philosophy prevails...”never let your starter face a lineup for a third time through.”

Altuve hit the only two homers of the Series for the Houstonians ( Atlanta had 11) but averaged .222. Bregman lost his confidence and was way out in front of every pitch he swung at. .095. Correa .261 with one double. Yordan Alvarez .100. The only consistent offense was being delivered by Michael Brantley who hit .333 for the series and seemed to handle any kind of pitching, Kyle Tucker a threat at .286 and the aged Cuban Yuli Gurriel who hit .273. Catcher Martin Maldonado had some clutch hits in Game 5 to salvage some pride but offensively his Series was a Cave of Black Despair with a sign above saying “Enter and Be Nullified”. And for the games in the National League Park, American League pitchers trying to hit for the first time all season (including batting practice?) were a joke except for throwback Zach Greinke, who pinch hit a single to right to give pitchers who CAN hit some comfort as the dawn of the NL DH ensues.

GMOD Number Four: Swingin’ Swan Song… this was the swing game that let us know that the Astros were like the frogs in the kettle on slow boil. (Narwhals, frogs...I got ‘em all if you like weird animal/sports metaphors)

The bottom of the seventh. Houston leads 2-1. Dusty sends Javier out to deal with the bottom of the Braves lineup. Swanson up. Swanson is a known quantity. He has a pretty swing and hits fastballs belt high out of the yard. But he can’t lay off sharp breaking sliders or high hard fastballs. He struck out 6 times on these pitches in the Series. Javier gets ahead of him with two sliders. Swanson looks really bad. So 0-2 count, what next? Well….not a mid speed fastball down the middle of the plate! Maldonado had his glove right where the pitch went and I can only assume that he meant for it to be low over the outside corner or close enough to get a swing. Certainly not belt high and biting off a chunk of the plate. Anyway, Swanson licks his chops, counts his blessings and gratefully deposits that baseball into the right field stands. Tie score.

Next hitter is Soler, pinch hitting. Javier starts him with a hanging slider chest high. Klah-Jhon-Goh! Hang that Baby on the Board! Braves 3-2.

So the Astros get almost nothing from their bottom of the order in this series and the Braves get some clutch hits from the 8-9 spots. And now the Atlanto-politans are up 3 games to 1. Houston’s pitching staff is tired. Meanwhile Atlanta’s closing quartet of Martin, Matzek, Jackson and Smith gives up only 2 singles in the last four innings.

The Golden Moment of Destruction that Wasn’t: Game 5 and the big question...can Houston come back? Can they even send the series back to Houston? The answer is a resounding “YES!”...but only if Atlanta sends out the “B” Squad of its pitching staff to throw batting practice.

Brian Snitker’s playing defense now. His main goal is to preserve his two good starters, Max Fried and Ian Anderson for possible starts in a Game 6 or a Game 7. He also needs his prize bulls in the pen to stay rested and ready. Therefore he names as starter the famous...Tucker Davidson??? He’s actually making his first start of the season? You got to be kidding me. Meanwhile, Dusty Baker is ready for...FRAMBER FEST 2!

Bottom of the First and the bases are already loaded with bravos. Adam Duvall is up. (he’s one of the Fab Four outfielders that Atlanta went out and stole after Ronald Acuna Jr. tore his ACL. I say stole because the Braves gave up not one of their top prospects to get forty homer threats Duvall and Soler, a left handed power source and locker room entertainer Joc Pederson and an all-round star and MVP of the Playoffs Fast Eddie Rosario.)

Anyhow, it’s the bottom of the First and Duvall is up with the bases loaded and he accepts Framber’s burnt offering of a hangar belt high outer half and booglarizes it to right for a granny. A Golden Moment of Destruction for sure, right?

Not! That’s because the Astros love to give up grand slams! They gave up three in two games to the Red Sox and then came back to win that series in six. Giving up a grand slam is like snorting a spoonful of wasabi for the Astros. Clears the sinuses, focuses the mind and sends you screaming into the night, howling for some milk of magnesia.

They come back to score nine runs in Game 5 off pitchers like Davidson, Minter and Drew Smyly. But the Astros had to use Urquidy, Maton, Stanek and Graveman and their bullpen is officially extended. Who is left to start Game 6?

Luis Garcia...Mr. Rockabye Baby.

I wish Luis was in the National League so I could watch him face Juan Soto. Juan does that little slide step tango as he rhythmically smooths the dirt with his foot and dances on tip toe when he takes a low pitch. It would be fun to watch him match up with Luis., who does that little cha cha step as he rocks the baby-ball into its next slider.

The Golden Moment of Destruction for this World Series comes in the third inning. Two on, two out. Jorge Soler at the plate. What should Maldonado call here? How about he should maybe call a hearse… Garcia kept throwing breaking balls that Jorge would pull down the line foul. So I guess Maldonado said keep ‘em coming and Luis did...except this ball didn’t break. It hung up there like a sad little red helium balloon after your three year old daughter let go of it at the carnival. Who hit that ball, you ask? Maybe it was the great Italian slugger Harry Ver-derci? No, it was a Cuban...Jorge Soler. Nickname “El Crudo”. It means “Raw!” Which is what a hanging slider is to this man...Raw Meat!

That shot reminded me of nothing so much as Albert Pujols’ epic blast off Brad Lidge in the 2005 play-offs against the Cardinals. Out of site over the tracks...El Ka-Boom-O.

When somebody hits the ball THAT hard, it just seems like The End.

It was certainly that for the Houston Astros, Their Golden Moment of Destruction.

Marco's Baseball Blog-O-Roonie 2021: HOT HITTERS

 

MARCO’S BASEBALL BLOG-O-ROONIE 2021: HOT HITTERS

There’s almost nothing as fun in baseball as when some hitter goes cosmic and starts getting a hit 3 or 4 times a game for like a week. A no-hitter is riveting for that one game...miraculous fielding plays are ooh and ahh for a while, but when a player just goes bonkers at the plate and starts unloading extra-base hits and hitting walk offs right and left...that’s the game at it’s exciting peak.

‘Oh boy, here comes this guy again...Don Mattingly has now homered in seven straight games...whoops! Make it eight straight!”

“Rennie Stennett of the Pittsburgh Pirates has just gone seven for seven in a ballgame at Wrigley Field.”

“Joe DiMaggio has just gone 3 for 5 to extend his hitting streak to fifty-six games!”

“Big Papi Ortiz gets on base 19 times in 25 plate appearances for OPS of 1.948 and is named MVP of 2013 series.”

“Chris Taylor of the Dodgers hits his third home run of this playoff game!”

“Yordan Alvarez goes 4 for 4 with two doubles, a single and a triple to lead Houston over Boston.”

Baseball is such a random thing that it’s almost unpredictable. All we really know is that the law of baseball averages tends to keep batting averages under .500 over any fifty game span no matter how hot the hitter. And sometimes he’ll bat Mendoza level (under .200) for a season. (Cody Bellinger? Are you still there?)

Chris Taylor of the Dodgers was an All Star in 2021 but in September he hit .104 with an on base of .154 and slugged .188. That’s really, really low. Then in the Playoffs he went off like a Roman candle and won big games with big hits. What happened?

Well, to put it succinctly, Chris Taylor is a good fundamental hitter with an aggressive style who never met a fastball he didn’t want to swing at and the opposing pitchers, for some reason...thought they should pitch him fastballs up. He had a great time blasting long drives into the stands or off the walls for the whole playoff run.

Kike Hernandez of the Red Sox was also white hot...at least until Game 4 of the Divisional Playoffs against the Astros. Then he went stone cold at the plate because Dusty Baker decided to watch him try to hit sinkers and sliders instead of change ups and fastballs. Suddenly, no more chest high straight meat to deposit over the Monster.

It’s my contention that Taylor and Hernandez are both examples of happy circumstance: The pitchers were throwing it where they wanted to hit it. And when you’re that hot, your long drives bounce off the fence just inches above the left-fielder’s glove and your wounded duck broken bat mis-hits fall just in front of the center fielder who had just been moved back to defend against your awesome display of recent power. Tends to inflate the average.

Most of Taylor’s hits were pulled. Most of Hernandez’ hits were pulled or to center. No shame but neither of these guys is really that good a hitter.

Eddie Rosario hasn’t looked like a good hitter for his career. He was non-tendered by Minnesota two years ago, then traded for a washed up Pablo Sandoval by Cleveland just to dump his salary. He found something he liked in Atlanta and he’s proved to be their Big Noise in this season’s playoffs. Rosario is not being fed pitches he likes. From what I’ve seen he’s spraying the ball all over the lot. He’s a leftie who’s pulling the inside pitch for homers and slapping the ball down the third base line against the shift. He’s getting the barrel on the breaking balls he’s seeing and not futilely trying to pull them with power. Very impressive. His lifetime OPS is .782 but for some reason it’s .903 since he got to Atlanta and is off the board this playoff season. He’s also hitting like a demon in the clutch. He beat the Dodgers with his bat and his glove in Game 6.

Eddie reminds me of Harold Baines, although Hall of Famer Baines was a better hitter for average. Harold also had a twenty year career with high numbers.

Yordan Alvarez is the fourth Hot Hitter that has taken a turn at being the Man as THE offensive player of this year’s post season. And Yordan is the one guy that I would have to say is a real HITTER now and in the future. He was rookie of the year when he came into the league in 2019, had knee issues in 2020 and hit well this year. His playoff OPS is .938 and he was MVP of the ALCS this year.

Yordan has something going that these other hitters don’t: he can hit the ball to Beaumont. His kind of power (he’s 6’5” and 225 lbs.) let’s him swing easy at pitches off the plate and still hit it over the fence. Anything over the plate is likely to wind up over the center field wall. So far, the Red Sox and Braves have the same remedy for the Alvarez situation...Ball Four! Also, they’re not letting him bat against a right handed pitcher. This guy scares people. He’s the second coming of Willie McCovey.

Good hitters who also hit with power are a special breed. Alvarez is still developing, but he’s already a must to avoid for pitchers. The truly great hitters in baseball history come in differing types. Now these are the guys who would get hot and stay hot season after season. I’ve run this down before so I’ll keep it short:

Scientists: hitters who study the game and maximize batting average over the long ball.

Ty Cobb, Rod Carew, Tony Gwynn, Wade Boggs, Ichiro. They all could hit .350 in their sleep. But don’t expect more than fifteen homers a season out of them. All of them used the opposite field to maximum effect.

Beast Savants: not really the thinking types, these guys overpowered the other team by hitting the ball out of the yard until the outfielders had to move back and let their singles drop in. The result? 40-50 home run guys who also hit .350+. Babe Ruth, Jimmy Foxx, Hank Greenberg, Lou Gehrig, John Mize, ..and more recently since pitching got much deeper, faster and trickier and outfielders got more athletic and gloves got more high tech and hitters faced a new pitcher every at bat...Papi Ortiz, Miguel Cabreras, Albert Pujols, Manny Ramirez, Mike Trout.

Special Cases: Rogers Hornsby...he won two triple crowns as a three time .400 hitter with 40 homer power. He was a Scientist AND a Beast. As was…

Ted Williams… probably the ultimate Scientific hitter of all times. His power kept the outfield deep. He could have hit over .400 a couple more times if he’d been content to go to left against the shift. But he would have had to sacrifice home runs and be content with 60 doubles a season off the Monster.

Joe DiMaggio combined a brainy approach to the game with raw, God-given talent. At his best, Joe would just destroy pitching staffs single handedly.

Stan Musial hit in the .350 to .370 range year after year and hit 39 homers a couple of times. He was so blessed with great eyes and quick hands that he barely had to study pitchers...he could just hit them. A spray hitter first and foremost, he could turn it on when he played in a friendly park like Ebbet’s Field and be an ultimate bomber.

Mickey Mantle combined the threat of on base speed with the biggest power bat in baseball. Speed gave Mick the ability to beat out an extra twenty infield hits a year that gave him averages of .353 and .365 in his prime while still being a 50 homer threat. Willie Mays was close to the Mick in power and had years of .345 and .347. Aaron and Frank Robinson were similar power/average hitters with good speed.

George Brett...A real Science hitter made the choice to hit .330 and above with 20 homers instead of .290 with 35. This was mostly because of the home park he played in. Kaufmann was Yellowstone.

Rockies: a couple of Colorado Rockies had big seasons in the 1990’s and 2000’s. I’m not sure how to score them because of the Mile High effect and the steroid era but Todd Helton and Larry Walker both had multiple seasons where they batted above .350 with 40+ home runs. It’s not their fault if they were hitting in Colorado.

Other hitters of the steroid years will not be discussed here. I’ve already mentioned Manny Ramirez and I’m not sure about some of the others. Broke my own rule dammit.

SHORT PLAYOFF NOTES:

TWO SONGS FOR THE BOSTON RED SOX:

...”I’m Sittin on Top of the World” games two and three of the ALDS. “Nobody knows you When You’re Down and Out” games four and five and six.

THE STOLEN BASE RETURNS: Teams got tired of waiting around for another home run and went out and played some real baseball with steals and productive outs, just to get something on the board. Result...40 steals and 2 caught stealings. (Or something like that.)

BUT NOT THE BUNT: the Red Sox , desperate for a run, had runners on second and third with nobody out and failed to score. They even had a right handed batter up with nobody on the shifted right side and had a strike out instead of dropping any kind of bunt down. If it’s on the first base side it’s an automatic run. No dice.. Renfro mght finally do something except strike out ...nope.

Astros in 6...my pick.

Later...

MARCO'S BASEBALL BLOG-O-ROONIE 2021: PLAYOFF EDITION..."UNDEAD!"

MARCO’S BASEBALL BLOG-O-ROONIE 2021: PLAYOFF EDITION---UNDEAD!

High up in the Carpathian Mountains north of Albania the Tampa Bay Rays have a dark castle on a rocky crag. The peasants thereabout bar their windows and hang ropes of garlic on their doors. Beneath the castle in a moldy crypt is where they keep the pitchers.

The bodies are pale white and tall...none under 6’ 6”. The Rays keep them on ice and every other year or so they thaw a couple out and pour some steaming warm wolf’s blood on their elbows and chant the encantations...”Let There Be Sliders!” Then they release these lanky golems and ship them off to Florida, to wreak havoc on the American League. They all look twenty. They will always look twenty.

The Red Sox continued their adventures by scoring 14 runs against the (formerly Devil) Rays (and now we know why!) in Game 2 of the ALDS, including 5 homers by the visitors. They could have used some of those runs in Game 1 when they got shut out by the Dracs and suffered the indignity of a straight steal of home by Randy Arozarena. That steal was pretty great, as is Arozarena. (The Cardinals gave him away just like the Cubs traded Lou Brock to them in ‘64… like the Dodgers failed to protect Roberto Clemente...like Boston traded Jeff Bagwell...like Tampa Bay absolutely violated Pittsburgh in the Archer trade… it’s the hard truth that sometimes stardom is hard to recognize but how do you miss somebody like Randy A?)

The favored Rays looked fantastic in Game 1, but removed their second game starter after a brief two innings and let the Bosox ravage their bullpen for the rest of the game. Could have been a mistake. Now the Red Sox know they can deal with the Rays’ bullpen.

The Giants don’t seem to mind facing the Dodgers. They calmly went about their business in Game 1 and sat back and watched as their young stud starter Logan Webb carved up the stacked Dodger lineup with about 10-12 slider/change ups per inning. The Dodgers never figured him out. The commentators kept rhapsodizing over Walker Buehler and his ten strike outs. Hey, this is the National League and at least three of those Ks per game are token at bats by feeble National League pitchers! An American League pitcher with ten per game is actually much more impressive.

Webb was a quarterback in school and he kind of reminds me of another tough monkey QB who used to play for the Washington Politically Incorrects back in day...Billy Kilmer. Same jutting jaw and thin lips. Just flat out tough looking. Anyway, he’s going to be a star if he keeps pitching like that.

It’s fun to watch the Giants/Dodgers because there’s all these MVPS on the field and a bunch more gamers who COULD be MVPs. Pujols,Bellinger, Betts and Kershaw are the annointed Dodgers and the Giants add Posey and Kris Bryant. The could have beens or still could bes are Evan Longoria, Brandon Crawford, Tre Turner, and Justin Turner.

Los Angeles vaulted into the Divisional series by walking off with a Wild Card victory when slumping Chris Taylor pulled one into the seats. It was a glorious ending that the game deserved. Both the Cards and the Dodgers fought hard and I’m glad somebody didn’t drop a pop up or something like that to end it.

It’s Game 2 of the Divisionals...already! I’m waiting for Mookie and Trea to start running crazy. If the team doesn’t hit, they better run. And can’t there be just ONE bunt down the third base line when the extreme shift is on?

What an absolute Fogey! Still waiting around for somebody to bunt!

Later...

Marco's Baseball Blog-O-Roonie 2021: "ACTIVATE JUJU!...ENGAGE!"

MARCO’S BASEBALL BLOG-O-ROONIE 2021: “ACTIVATE JUJU!... ENGAGE!”

No more messin’ around with no more Wild Cards. It’s time to get serious. We now enter phase two of the 2021 Playoffs, when the contenders separate themselves into contenders or pretenders. These are the fateful five game playoffs. The divisional champ with the best record overall plays the winner of the Wild Card game and is assumed to have an edge since they have been able to line up their pitching staff for the long Playoff road ahead.

Of course this advantage is usually countermanded by taking five days off to cool down the offense and any momentum they may have had.

The AL participants this year are the Division winner Tampa Bay and Wild Card winner Boston... still flushed with victory goose pimples from defeating their nemesis, the Yankees. (Who are probably still suffering PTSD from seeing Aaron Judge being sent home to his death on a single off the wall by Stanton; the third base coach Nevin whirling his arm to beckon him disastrously onto the Siren rocks of the catcher’s mitt, filled with a relayed baseball inscribed “Greetings from Xander...Welcome Home!” )

The other game tonight (Thursday Oct.7) is between the Central Division champion Chicago White Sox and the Western Division leading Houston Astros. These teams are pretty evenly matched. They each feature:

1/ a strong offense with lots and lots of power.

2/spectacular defenses

3/lots of fragile and/or psychotic pitchers

They also have managers who take turns being Ahab or Moby Dick every other decade. Tony LaRussa is managing the White Sox, just like he did forty-odd years ago. Dusty Baker came back from retirement to manage the Astros. These guys have managed against each other in 208 games and have each won 104. They are in their seventies now and they make the game of baseball much more interesting with their august presence.

I give the Astros the edge in this series. They’ve been to see the elephant often in the last few years and I think they’ll handle the hype better. Also, their hitting stars include crafty vets like Altuve, Gurriel, Brantley and Bregman to help young guns Tucker and Yordan Alvarez stay focused. They also have home field advantage in this series.

The Sox have vet Jose Abreu to lead but their young guys Luis Robert and Eloy Jimenez have to get hot for them to stay with Houston. Also, two of their top pitchers have health issues. Lance Lynn, their first game starter, was on the injured list with a bad right knee in September. No-hit fireballer Carlos Rondon has had arm problems lately.

As far as the Bosox and Rays? Boston hasn’t been able to stay with Tampa this year. The Rays bullpen is strong and they use it wisely. The Red Sox will need Nate Eovaldi to be Madison Bumgarner circa 2014 to beat the Rays. And Nate doesn’t pitch again until Sunday.

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Playoffs? Who said anything about Playoffs?

The first playoffs to break a regular season tie and decide the World Series participant was in 1946. The thing to remember about playoffs is that in the National League the Dodgers have been in all of them...at least before the Wild Card era.

I know you remember 1951 and “The Shot Heard Round the World.” It was a three game decider and the Giants’ Bobby Thompson decided it with one of the most famous walk-off home runs of all time. Dodgers lose. Unlucky Dodger hurler Ralph Branca crying on the dugout steps.

But the Dodgers were back in 1959...this time representing Los Angeles... to take two games against the defending pennant winner Milwaukee Braves and win the World Series over Chicago’s White Sox that year. Then the now San Francisco Giants won a classic two out of three against L.A. in 1962. The Dodgers lost again in 1980 when the Astros won a one game playoff after the Dodgers had swept them in four straight at Chavez Ravine to end the season tied.

So, the Dodgeheads have suffered mostly a grim fate in these games. Just as they did in the very first playoff in 1946, when the St. Louis Cardinals came from behind to tie the Brooklyns on the next to last day of the season. Then both teams lost their finales.

St. Louis won the first game at home when Musial tripled in the eighth and Joe Garagiola knocked him in with his third hit of the game. Cardinal starter Howie Pollet pitched with a pulled muscle in his side and went 9 gutsy innings to win 4-2. The Dodger losing pitcher? Ralph Branca...Destiny’s Darling.

At this point, the Dodgers pitching staff was in shreds. Ebbets Field couldn’t save them. St. Louis got 3 triples and 2 doubles and won going away 8-3 in Game 2. The Dodgers went home and the Cardinals played an epic series with the Boston Red Sox, decided by Enos Slaughter’s famous “Mad Dash” to score from first on a double by Harry (“The Hat”) Walker.

An interesting footnote in the “For want of a nail” department:

The Red Sox complained to the Commissioner about the best of three playoff format making the Boston team sit around waiting to play the winner in the 1946 Series. They had to schedule an exhibition game just to keep their players tuned. Ted Williams played the outfield in this game and banged into the outfield wall, hurting his elbow. The Bostonians blamed this injury on The Kid’s 5 for 25 performance in the Classic. All singles including one bunt laid down against the shift by a wounded Splinter. The Red Sox brass demanded a change to a one game playoff for future tie breakers. The American League agreed and voted yes. The Senior Circuit kept their best of three format so they could continue to torture the Dodgers.

Two years later, in 1948, the American League played their first ever tie breaker series when the Cleveland Indians tied up the Red Sox and went to Fenway for the now one-game playoff. Knuckle Baller Gene Bearden pitched a complete game for the Tribe and player/manager Lou Boudreau went 4 for 4 with 2 homers over the monster. The Clevelanders won 8 to 3.

Ted Williams went 1 for 4 with a single and dropped a fly in the outfield for an error that cost them a run. Maybe if the Sox were in a best of 3 format, they might have come back and won. Maybe Ted would have redeemed himself somehow. But that AL format change after the 1946 series killed that option and Ted got to play in only one World Series in his career, and had to play it with a bad elbow.

The Red Sox got beat by the Yankees on the last day of 1949 and they never got close again.

So the consequences of the 1946 Playoffs reverberated in the career of one of baseball’s greatest players.

But don’t cry for Ted; Stan Musial never played in another World Series after 1946 either!

MARCO'S BASEBALL BLOG-O-ROONIE 2021: PLAYOFF EDITION...A SHORT, FEARLESS PREDICTION

 

MARCO’S BASEBALL BLOG-O-ROONIE 2021: PLAYOFF EDITION

FEARLESS PREDICTION:

According to widely distributed punditry the Los Angeles Dodgers absolutely CANNOT lose tonight.

HERE IS WHY THEY WILL!

PROBLEM NUMBER ONE: The home plate umpire tonight will be Joe West, dean of all MLB umpires. Record holder of most games officiated all time. That’s a whole lot of games. And as everybody can tell you, Joe is one tough grumpy Horned Goblin of a Grey-Grouch if ANYBODY dares get in his face about his calls. He has a sense of humor if approached right but a really short fuse if somebody...even old pros he’s known for a decade … start jawing and spitting on his shoes. He’s Joe West dammit, and it’s his damn baseball field. Joe West and the honey badger don’t give a shit.

PROBLEM NUMBER TWO: Joe West is almost the worst umpire in baseball. He’s number one in controlling the game but number 96 (out of a hundred umpires) in call accuracy. That’s right, the longest tenured ump has almost more blown calls than anybody else. Hey, he’s old and grumpy and that chest protector is hot and he has to stand up all game and he’s fat and sweaty and the hell with it, that sounded like a strike. Who can tell with sliders anyway?

PROBLEM NUMBER THREE: Joe West LIKES the St. Louis Cardinals. Especially Adam Wainwright and Yadi Molina. Those guys are like him; they’ve been around forever. They’re good and they know the game. (Joe is sentimental...the Dodgers should start Albert Pujols instead of the human attic fan, Cody Bellinger.)

Wainwright doesn’t bother disagreeing with Joe on ball/strike calls because he knows it will just make trouble for himself. He gets a hurt expression and walks slowly to the back of the mound when Joe blows yet another call, but he doesn’t stare in or anything. Meanwhile, Yadi Molina is the best catcher in the game (or close to it) at framing pitches. Waino will throw those ridiculous slow curves up to the plate and Yadi will twist his glove just so to get the strike called. Now, Joe can’t really follow those curves that wind up in the dirt, but if Yadi catches it, he’s likely to get the call from Joe West. That’s because Yadi is also great at blocking wild pitches and Joe hates to get hit with errant fastballs and bouncing sliders. Yadi will protect Joe and Joe likes catchers who protect him. He’ll even let Yadi yell at him because...”well if Yadier thinks it’s a strike it probably is, so I’ll wink and give him a make up call”. Which is why…

PROBLEM NUMBER FOUR: ...Will Smith, the Dodger catcher, will suffer by comparison. Now Will is pretty good and he’s learning fast in only his second full year. “But, Son, I know Yadier Molina. I’ve worked with Yadier Molina. Son... you’re no Yadier Molina.” And so when Scherzer unleashes those sharp, nasty sliders at 95 mph, and they dive into the opposite batter’s box from where they started out, Will is going to miss framing them a few times and Joe isn’t going to call them strikes. And that’s going to piss off…

PROBLEM NUMBER FIVE:... Mad Max Scherzer. Max is going to be amped to the Max. (See how nicely that works?) It’s a win or go home game and Max loves that. He will be up to his eyeballs in adrenaline ‘cause that’s how he rolls. Lots of heavy breathing and grunting. And Joe is going to make bad call after bad call until Max can’t stand it anymore and he’s going to blow. Max and probably his catcher Will Smith and maybe even manager Dave “Beaming Buddha” Roberts will very likely all get run out of this game when they finally complain once too often about Joe West’s very approximate strike zone. The sponsors who are in the tank for the Dodgers will cringe but Joe West don’t give a shit. Spit on my shoes or say the magic word and you’re gone. “You boys get your asses into the clubhouse. I’ll be behind the plate chewing up this cobra.”

Meanwhile Yadi and Adam will cruise along with Peace in Our Time.

The Dodgers will have trouble scoring because they’ll have to be swinging at all the garbage Wainwright will be throwing their way. Either that or get rung up when Yadi makes Adam look like Leonardo da Vinci. Max will be grooving fastballs in frustration by the fifth after walking six Cardinals on all those overamped sliders.

The Dodgers will sorely miss their leftie home run bat Muncie. I see them scoring a couple of runs when either Mookie Betts or Trea Turner or both top a dribbler to third and get on and proceed to steal a base or two and score on another dribbler to third. Speed will be their only offense.

And, just like the other favorites of Madison Avenue, the New York “is that the Yankees wearin’ Spankies?”, the Los Angeles Dodgers will crater and usher in the New Age of the Robot Umpire to call balls and strikes.

Remember to thank Joe West.

MARCO'S BASEBALL BLOG-O-ROONIE 2021: WHAT WE KNOW

 

Marco’s Baseball Blog-O-Roonie 2021: WHAT WE KNOW

WHAT WE KNOW AL EAST: It’s a Wild Card Goat Rope is what we know. I’m looking at the Almanac to figure out who plays the most games against the Orioles in the stretch and it’s the Red Sox, so they should probably win the first Wild Card. That leaves New York and Toronto to slug it out for the second Wild Card. Problem for the Red Sox is, New York and Toronto typically beat up on Baltimore. It’s like Foreman vs. Frazier. I mean, they can hardly wait to see the orange bird on those Baltimore jerseys.

Boston seems to struggle against the Birds, both the Orioles and the Jays. They also struggle against the Yankees and they can’t handle the Rays at all, so expect Boston to fold under the pressure and finish out of the money.

But of course, Boston has already gone through a Covid crisis and lost twelve players or more for a week each. Builds character. Both the Yanks and the Jays had Covid issues earlier. The Jays seem to have the spark, though, and a healthy young glow, so I pick them.

WHAT WE KNOW: the Yankees are streaky. They won 13 in a row in August and then went 5-11!

WHAT WE ALSO KNOW: The Yanks have so many big guys...Stanton, Judge, Gallo, Rizzo, LeMahieu, Sanchez, Voit...but if it comes down to a clutch moment you know who will be coming to bat? Brett Gardner...every time. And he comes through, too.

WHAT WE DON’T KNOW BUT MOST CERTAINLY SUSPECT: It doesn’t matter who wins the Wild Card, Tampa Bay will smoke them in the divisional.

WHAT WE KNOW A.L. CENTRAL: It’s a tip toe through the tulips for the Chicago South Siders...the Pale Hose...the Tony LaRussa-rarians. The Hosers have acquitted themselves well this season, weathering the loss of several key players and still cakewalking into a division crown. But can they rally to the pressure of the playoffs and do some damage?

I love the White Stockings. They are one of the only teams that has enough starting pitching to challenge the Rays in that department. But I don’t think they’ll get past the battle-tested Houston Astros.

WHAT WE KNOW A.L. WEST: Houston’s offense is fairly awesome. And they play like they want to hurt somebody. Being reviled by the rest of baseball is obviously good for their concentration. The ‘Stros are counting scalps right now. I don’t see this slowing down in the playoffs, either. Houston’s pitching has to hold up, but they are the best bet against the Rays.

WHAT WE KNOW ABOUT SHOHEI OHTANI: Without Trout and Rendon, Ohtani has been without any protection the whole second half. The league is not pitching to him. He takes walks like a good player should, but he strikes out too much trying to hit bad pitches out of the park to please us. What a player... in a bad predicament.

WHAT WE KNOW ABOUT THE MVP: A.L. MVP is Shohei Ohtani. If Ernie Banks can win two MVPs on a losing team, so can Showtime. Second place is Salvador Perez of the Royals...where would they be without him? A new record for catcher home runs? From the top defensive catcher in the league? Forget-about-it! Vlad Guerrero Jr. would win it any other year but he finishes third if people can calculate the value of an ace pitcher and home run leader IN ONE PLAYER like Ohtani. Or a great defensive catcher who rakes like Sal. My hat is off to all three of these remarkable players. Well done, gentlemen!

WHAT WE EXPECT TO TRANSPIRE: Toronto wins the first wild card and defeats the Yankees at home in the play-in game, but uses up their ace Robbie Ray. Tampa makes short work of the Canadians in the division five-gamer.

Houston bludgeons the White Sox in the divisional, then gets sliced and diced by the Rays in a repeat of last year. Rays go to the Series.

WHAT WE KNOW N.L. EAST: The Mets are going to put you through a Circus of Pain. Their latest caper is for Lindor and Baez to play like helpless zombies for weeks...for the whole season in Lindor’s case...and then when the fans boo them...as they must in Queens...make rude gestures to the stands.

So Baez doesn’t care because he’s only signed for the rest of this season. Lindor, though, signed on for, what was it, ten years for $341 million? It was a mistake on the Mets’ part, whatever it was. No matter how good a shortstop Francisco is...and he is one of the very best defensively...this was a rash move. You can’t expect Lindor to hit home runs in Citi Field like he hit them in the A.L. in Cleveland. The ball park at Citi is just not that conducive. And Lindor is not a high average hitter. I expect him to hit around .260 with 20 dings and 80 rbis regularly. He is not Mookie Betts at the plate.

So now all the Mets fans are furious at him for failing to produce offensively and seeming to not care very much about it. Great...the Face of the Mets is now in an adversarial relatonship with the city of New York. For the next ten years?

Two words for the Mets front office: Miguel Cabrera. He was worth the money for the first six years of his gigasmic contract but since then it’s been a pain fest. Albert Pujols? He was already a Hall of Famer before he got to the Angels. It’s all been downhill from there. The new law of front office baseball is NO LONG TERM CONTRACTS. The Mets should have known that Lindor had peaked before he even came to New York. They couldn’t remember what happened with Robbie Cano? The Padres gave Tatis the giant contract but he was a rookie of 21 when they signed him up. Lindor is 27. And Lindor can’t hit like Cabrera. He can’t hit like Pujols. He can’t hit like Tatis. Right now he has 17 homers and a .228 average.

But then a funny thing happens. In the midst of the hate-fest controversary, the Mets suddenly wake up and start playing hard. They still lose one run games with alarming frequency and won’t make the playoffs regardless, but they look like a team again, at least. And who were the obvious leaders in this resurgence? Baez and Lindor of course. Lindor even had a three-homer game the other day. All is forgiven. These guys , in the best of all possible baseball worlds, would be the next classic keystone combo. Make everybody forget the Tiger Twins Trammel and Whitaker and play together into a happy old age.

What can you say? It’s the Mets!

WHAT WE KNOW BUT ARE REALLY ONLY GUESSING: The Atlanta Braves are the favorites to win the East?? Maybe?? They’ve shown some spunk rebuilding their offense with Adam Duvall and Jorge Soler, but the real change is Austin Riley providing power behind Freeman after they lost Marcel Ozuna to injury and marital assault and Acuna Jr. to a knee. They also got good years from Dansby Swanson (26 homers) and Ozzie Albeis (28 homers). Their starters are at least four deep and that may be enough to carry them home because…

...the Phillies tried to put on a rush but gagged in the turn. If Wheeler hadn’t gotten hurt, if Arrieta hadn’t lost it, if Nola was more consistent...alas, none of that happened and I think the Phils have settled into the position they have earned ...second in the East. Bryce Harper and Jean Segura had good years and should be acknowledged.

WHAT WE KNOW N.L. CENTRAL: Christian Yelich won the MVP in 2018 and finished second in 2019. Who won it in 2019? Cody Bellinger of the Dodgers. Since then, both of these dynamic, multi-talented superstars have practically disappeared. I’ll get to Cody in a minute.

Yelich has a history of back trouble. It’s very hard to play baseball with a bad back. In his 2019 season, Christian hit .329 (tops in the league) with 44 taters, 30 steals and an OPS of 1.100. One of the best seasons of all time, in fact...and that’s after his MVP season of 2018. In 2019 Yelich struck out 118 times in 580 plate appearances. This year he’s struck out 106 times in 419 PA’s. He’s hit 8 homers and is batting .249 with an OPS of .734. I hope he comes back strong and I hope he has a good playoff run this year, because the Brew crew is...well, cruising.

Everything changed for the Crew when they traded to Tampa for Willie Adames. Once they had Willie at shortstop it gave them an up-the-middle of Omar Narvaez at catcher, Adames at short, Kolton Wong at second and Jackie Bradley (with platooner Lorenzo Cain) in center. All of those guys are Gold Glovers or Gold Glove threats. This focus on defense (and at least four of those guys can hit) backed up by their very strong pitching staff has made the Brewers big winners this year. Burns, Woodruff, Houser and Peralta with Hader and company in the pen. They’ve opened some eyes in the National League.

WHAT WE KNOW: The Reds are even streakier than the Yankees. For one shining moment in July, Joey Votto ruled the world. Nine homers in 7 games? Am I counting right? Talk about carrying a team! But comes the sober dawn and Joey is a mortal once more. I’m not sure what’s missing for this team. They hit plenty and they have several stud pitchers. They just never seem to put it together at one time. Unless they get on another hot streak they don’t make the playoffs.

WHAT WE KNOW...THE CARDINALS ALWAYS SHOW UP: Sooner or later, you have to deal with the St. Louis club. They have that certain something...True Grit or something. They start channeling the Gas House Gang of 1934. Yadier Molina starts beating up the rookie pitchers who dare talk back to him. (Adam Wainwright always has Yadi’s back of course.) Nolan Arenado goes deep a few more times and Goldie starts bashing. The ghost of Dizzy Dean appears in the clubhouse and yells out: “HE SLUD INTO THIRD!!!”

If the Cards are going to contend for the second wild card we’ll know in a week, after they play the Padres and the Brewers back to back. Should be some good baseball. I wouldn’t advise the Milwaukee club to rest their regulars yet. They might load up to try to eliminate the Cardinals if they are smart. Drive a stake through their heart, because St. Looey keeps comin’.

WHAT WE KNOW N.L.WEST IS BEST: All season it’s been the same...the West rules the National League. We all know this. So why are we even playing these games? Because the Dodgers...by far the strongest team on paper going into the stretch...have not been able to put away the Giants and win their tenth title in a row. They are only a game and a half back but they are facing a Wild Card Play In game against San Diego or St. Louis or Cincinnati or somebody like that. And who knows...Joe Musgrove might throw another no hitter in that game and the Padres could advance. Maybe Adam Wainwright and Yadi Molina can pull a rabbit out of the hat and beat L.A. One game playoffs are a crap shoot.

In a seven game series, the Dodgers are really, really hard to beat because they have such good starting pitchers and so many more of them than anybody else. The Padres have an injured Blake Snell and a curiously ineffective Yu Darvish backing up Musgrove. The St. Louis Cards have Wainwright and some spare change.

But the Dodgers have been dealt a Cool Hand, so I expect them to finally “get mad at them damn eggs” and send the rest of the N.L. into the Sweat Box for the next two weeks. They need to spring this joint. After a season of failing to communicate (Trevor Bauer...Where Are You Now?) the Boys in Blue need to steal the truck and put some pepper out for the bloodhounds.

WHAT WE KNOW: The L.A. Dodgers once had a wunderkind in their outfield. His stats in 2019? .305/ 47 home runs/115 rbi’s/ OPS 1.035. He was the MVP. Yep...I mean Cody Bellinger.

Cody has been exceptionally streaky...probably because of his all or nothing lefthanded power swing and his obstinate insistence on TRYING TO PULL glorious bombs into the right field seats all the time. This year Cody hurt and then retweaked his left hammie after suffering a hairline fracture in that leg. He also had shoulder surgery to fix a dislocated socket that he aggravated in the 2020 World Series when he got a brutal high five from his congratulating teammate after hitting a dinger. His timing got off. His swing got off. He changed his stance. He changed it again. Now he’s hitting .161 with an OPS of .536. 9 homers and 86 Ks in 333 plate apearances. Just about the worst stats in baseball for a big star.

I think the Dodgers better look for another hitting coach who can communicate with him.

WHAT WE KNOW: The San Francisco Giants are playing Throwback Ball. Today’s game is dominated by young, fast, power hitters and pitchers who are making their mark at 21,22 years of age. Not the Grizzled Vets of the City by the Bay. They should change their team mascot name to the O.G.R.E.S...(Old Guys Roaming Everywhere, Sonny.)

This season the Giants started quickly and then got better and better. We were waiting for the breakdowns and injuries to occur, and they did. But when the Giants lost a Vet they had another one step up. Donovan Solano goes down, Tommy LaStella comes up. Wilmer Flores plays all over. Longoria gets damaged so they trade for Kris Bryant. Still, at any given time of the season, the Giants would likely have at least 7 guys over 30 in the everyday line up. Everybody contributes on this team. They’ll have 15 players with over 200 at bats by season’s end. The main constants? Buster Posey (34)...the leader...having a terrific year after taking 2020 off for Covid. And Brandon Crawford...a criminally overlooked shortstop who scrapped his way through his very best season at age 34. Props to 33 year old first baseman Brandon Belt also.

The Ogres are for real. I expect them to fight like hell for the pennant, but if the Dodgers catch them, to go out and win the Play In with Gausman pitching in the must-win game. Then we’d surely get what we haven’t had in many a long year...a playoff series between the ancient enemies...the Giants and Dodgers.

Willie and Sandy will be there, I’m sure.

HAPPY PLAYOFFS!