MARCO'S BASEBALL
BLOG-O-ROONIE 2017: BULLET POINTS FROM 30,000 FEET
That's right, I'm
way above your heads, flying into New Mexico for a little Rand r
relief from the Texas heat. If any of you are in Taos and want to
talk baseball, I can meet you at the Taos Inn for lemonade and
guacamole.
But you still want a
coherent appraisal of the pennant races and I know my duty is to blog
from out of the sky, so here goes:
*the winning team
this year will have to have two strong starters.
*The Dodgers are the
Uber-Meisters of the National League and just picked up Yu Daarvish
for the stretch. That gives them some insurance in the rotation but
still won't help replace Kershaw if his back doesn't heal fast. Also,
the Dodgers are leading by 14 ½ over Colorado right now, but I
predict they will only win by about 7 games by season's end. This is
because the Dodgeheads have been playing a lot of home games...60 to
be exact, against only 46 road games so far. This has to even up so
the Dodgers will be on the road heavily from now on.
*Nolan Arenado is
getting scary good for the Rocks. He's taken over the lead in the MVP
race from Goldschmidt and the Nationals' stars.
*Chicago's pick up
of Quintana from the cross-towner White Sox was one of the best gets
from the trading deadline. It fills a hole for the Cubs as they
slowly take over in the Central. Now they gotta hit! I like Schwarber
to lead them now that Rizzo and Bryant have settled into mediocre
production this year. The Brewers are doing their usual second half
disappearing act.
*Washington got what
they needed for their bullpen. That bodes ill for their playoff
match-ups cause the Nats haven't stopped hitting all year. They need
Strassburg to be healthy. Scherzer and GG Gonzalez look solid.
*The AL leading
Houston Astros somehow screwed up the trade deadline and did not pick
up the strong starter they needed. Their bullpen needed more than
Liriano from the Blue Jays. What they really need is Correa and
Springer back healthy but that isn't happening anytime soon.
*Altuve is the AL
MVP and is looking like the type of player who wins the batting title
every year ala Tony Gwynn, Wade Boggs, Carew in his prime etc. etc.
Heady company.
*Bow down to Frank
Cashman in Yankee-land. He shored up the bullpen and got the best
starter available in Sonny Gray without giving up the best Yankee
prospects. I have to favor them over the Red Sox now that Price is
injured ...maybe for the rest of the season. Tanaka's elbow has to
last and CC Sabathia keep it going, but the Yanks have enough to lift
them.
*The Red Sox miss
the magic. They keep getting hurt...Pedroia, Bogaerts, Benitendi,
Price. And their supreme closer Kimbrel has been giving up late bombs
and losing leads for them. They got bullpen help at the deadline.
Also, the kerfuffle with Price yelling at TV color man Eckersley is
not the sort of thing that teams of destiny go through late in a
pennant race.
*Watch out for Tampa
Bay in the East….they have hitting and the best starters and could
slip up on everybody.
*The Central is a
horse race now that KC is back and picked up Melky Steroid for old
time's sake. He started with them all those years ago. Gordon was
pulling down their whole lineup in left.
*Cleveland is still
my pick in the Central but they need more starter consistency. They
also need Encarnacion and Lindor to get hot at the same time.
*This is the
anniversary of Satchel Paige's first start as a major leaguer….for
the Cleveland Indians in 1948. This is after over a thousand starts
in the Negro Leagues, the Mexican Leagues, the Cuban Leagues etc. He
went 7 innings and beat the Senators in front of the biggest crowd in
Municipal Stadium history. Everybody wanted to see old Satch pitch,
and he didn't disappoint them. Greatest pitcher ever? For one season
I might take Sandy Koufax , Grover Alexander the year he threw 16
shut-outs, Bob Gibson's big year, Ron Guidry., Pedro,.....But for a
career as a whole...Warren Spahn, Walter Johnson, Cy Young...but I'll
still take Satchel.
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