Foley's is famed for its collection of sports memorabilia, which certainly makes for a great atmosphere for this type of event. However, I have to wonder about the wisdom of their web page discussing said artifacts. When they enumerate their baseball holdings -- which include hundreds of baseballs and jerseys and over 300 bobbleheads -- first on the list is their 40 game-used bats, including the likes of Gerald Williams ("Step right up and see the bat with which the Iceman went 0-for-17 in his second tour of duty with the Yankees!"), Roger Cedeno ("Does it really have a hole right in the middle, or did it just seem that way?") and Billy Ripken ("Do all of his bats have 'Fuck Face' written on the knob?"). Not sure why they failed to list the one I found myself next to when chatting with Pete, Alex and Cliff, an Andy Fox ("The bat he left behind to pinch-run in the 1996 World Series!"). Better talk to the PR department on that one.
A performance that has been compared to Kirk Gibson circa 1988 enabled Friday's Hit List to be completed amid the mayhem, which also included a stop by one of my all-time favorite bands, Devo (whose "Uncontrollable Urge" would be my first choice for at-bat music if I ever played in the major leagues, as sacrilegious a topic as that may be for purists).
Anyway, that's all old news. What's new is that I'll be part of an extended Baseball Prospectus posse administering the usual savage sabermetric beatdowns at a Pizza Feed at Foley's Pub and Restaurant on 18 West 33rd Street in Manhattan. Fellow BP colleagues Will Carroll, Joe Sheehan, Steven Goldman, and Derek Jacques are on the bill, along with the MLB.com Fantasy 411 folks, Will Leitch, and more surprise guests, each more surprising than the last. The chatter will be better than the pizza, I promise.
Turning from We Would Have Played for Nothing to the latest installment from the high priests of statistical sophistication, 'the Baseball Prospectus team of experts,' and their thick tome It Ain't Over 'Til It's Over: The Baseball Prospectus Pennant Race Book, edited by Steve Goldman, I thought at first that I would be trading the allusive power of story for the hard empiricism of the number-crunchers. Having previously reviewed a book of essays by this innovative squad, I knew that I was in for elaborate formulae, charts and graphs a-plenty, and a Soviet-style panoply of acronyms with strangely affecting phonetics, such as VORP (the crucial measure of a players worth over a completely average replacement player), and WARP (Wins Above Replacement Player, a yet-more-elaborate calculation that gets at the bottom-line: how many wins did the player create?). These are new kinds of numbers, generated by the desire to show real worth, rather than just let us live by the "nutrition-less bread" of Batting Average, RBI, and ERA (all of which delude more than clarify).
Enough said on the numbers racket, because I was wrong about this book! The authors are interested in story, the true story, the deep-down story of reasons, besides (but not precluding) luck and cruel twists of fate, for why several great pennant races in baseball history were great. And whether you go numbers-heavy, digging into the charts and taking stock of the VORPs and WARPs, or numbers-light, skimming the charts and muttering, "This is why I teach English" frequently under your breath, you will be enlightened by this book. These mathematician-writers are able to captivate us with pinpoint moments, exact pitches or managerial moves or mental errors or emotional collapses (or all of the above) that decided the outcomes of entire seasons. Horrible moments for the eternal goats (such as Ralph Branca giving up the "shot heard round the world," or Gene Mauch micromanaging the 1964 Phillies into a late-season collapse, or Fred Merkle's boneheaded play that seemed to sink the 1908 Giants) are shown as only small pieces of much more complex puzzles. Likewise, legendary feats like Carl Yastrzemski's final two weeks of torrid hitting for the Red Sox miracle in 1967, or Tug McGraw's emotional bravado with the "You Gotta Believe" 1973 Mets, are scrutinized and "right-sized"—fine feats, yes, but surrounded always by a broader context. The writers thus walk a fine line between clarification and revisionist demythologizing, and I think they carry the task out with a healthy balance of both love of science and love of mystery. In some ways, their work is more true to Medievalism than to Modernity.
I can only give a few highlights of this elaborate, somewhat diffuse volume, so I'll just trot out my favorite quirky points. Jay Jaffe's essay "The Replacement-Level Killers" reveals how managers sticking it out with certain veteran players during a pennant race can do irreparable damage, all in the name of loyalty and supposed worth. So the Angels use of Bob Boone as their catcher throughout the 1984 AL West race, with his supposed defensive acumen used as a cover for a horrific year at the plate (hitting only .202 and slugging a mere .262!), led to a VORP of -24.1, a pennant-killing formula. Not quite as numerically destructive was Don Zimmer's perverse insistence on playing Butch Hobson at third base for the 1978 Red Sox, victims of the Yankee charge and the "Boston Massacre." We read with fascination this description: "Revered by Zimmer as a gamer, Hobson played the field despite bone chips that locked up his elbow when he threw and—cringe!—had to be rearranged after each play. He made 43 errors, was 21 runs below average, and fielded .899, becoming the first regular to break the .900 barrier since 1916, when gloves were little more than padded mittens." It's just this mix of numerical exactitude and rhetorical flourish that gives It Ain't Over its flair, a combination that gets at baseball's distinctive appeal as the sport of both head and heart.
One of the nicest reviews the book received, and certainly the best review I've received for my work there. That's the value of clean living, folks.
Halfway through my mad, mad month here. Thus far the spring update coverage for Fantasy Baseball Index has gone well. Though I'm actually less of a fantasy junkie than my intended audience, it's one of my favorite projects of the entire year. Not only do I immerse myself in the familiar tropes of spring -- job battles, injury comebacks, hot shot rookies wowing the scouts ("Cueto is the ace of that staff. Right now...") and humbled veterans appeasing the gods with their sacrifices in an effort to eke out one more season (Hideo Nomo and Orlando Hernandez both junking their distinctive deliveries) -- but I come out of it with a great picture of the strengths, weaknesses and narratives of all 30 teams, ideal for the upcoming Hit Lists as well as all of the preseason chatter I get to do on my various radio gigs. It's my own spring training, whipping me into shape.
The BP promo-rama has gone well thus far. Last Thursday we packed 40-something people into the 18th Street Barnes and Noble here in NYC as Steve Goldman, Joe Sheehan, Derek Jacques and I took questions for well over 90 minutes, somehow managing not to trip over each other's sentences. Saturday's Long Island event was a smaller crowd, but one full of familiar faces, area friends who couldn't make our previous gig. Our sole misadventure involved getting from the train to the venue (memo to the surly, constantly muttering cabbie: Barnes and Noble and Borders aren't interchangeable if your name is on the marquee). On the docket next is a three-day trip to DC and then Philadelphia for appearances on the 17th and 18th. We'll have some media as well -- an XM Radio hit and even a TV spot, details forthcoming. Here's the plan:
• Monday, March 17th, 7:00 pm, Politics & Prose, 5015 Connecticut Avenue NW, Washington, DC 20008. With Clay Davenport and Steven Goldman
• Tuesday, March 18th, 7:00 pm, Barnes & Noble, Rittenhouse Square, 1805 Walnut Street, Philadelphia, PA 19103. With Steven Goldman and Joe Sheehan
Meanwhile, here's the transcript of last Friday's BP chat. More recently, on Thursday I followed up the work I've been doing on the way ballparks have evolved over the past 20+ years. Last time around I showed that contrary to popular belief, fence distances have not actually decreased over that time, they've increased, particularly on the left side. Even if we exclude Coors Field, they've increased:
2007' is the average fence distance sans Coors, 90-07' the change from 1990 to 2007 excluding Coors. Anyway, this increase to the left side appears to have an impact on the distribution of home runs. In 1990, according to data from the Baseball-Reference.com Play Index, 54.4 percent of homers were hit to left field and left-center field. Last year it was 50.8 percent. Sparing you my first-ever graph for a BP article, an ugly one that puts this graphic designer to shame:
As noted in the article, there's a bit of intermediate squirreliness with the data in a few years; not every year are the home run locations equally well-recorded, but the trend is apparent: fewer hoemrs are leaving the yard on the left side than before.
Beyond that, I took a look at the way the new ballparks may have had an impact on foul outs, and whether that impact results in more home runs. Short answer: foul territory is tough to get a handle on, and tremendously boring.
Foul territory area measurements aren't recorded in any official manner (since publication of this article, one data source has come to light, but I'll wait until my next installment to discuss that). Backstop distances don't make a great proxy; while such distances appear to have decreased, there's little correlation between them and foul out rates. Foul out rates actually appear to be a bit higher in the newer ballparks than the older ones -- contrary to the views of my readers, whose lines of questioning sent me trudging methodically down this rather bleak path -- but the problem with my finding is that the stadium changes I note are based on fence distances (which are well-documented) rather than foul territory adjustments (which aren't).
It's all just about as much fun as a field trip to the box factory, but I may have to take another swing at this if I get some better data. Still, if there's one take-home from of my recent articles, it's that it's time to retire the notion that parks have gotten smaller over the past two decades, thus driving up home run rates. Except when it comes to meat in the seats, parks aren't getting smaller.
You have my permission to swear at your TV the next time you're told otherwise.
In conjunction with a long-weekend ski trip to Salt Lake City that had my lungs searing due to an onslaught of fresh powder, said update kept me from checking in here to note my two most recent Baseball Prospectus pieces. The first took a look at some recent work done by Tom Tango over at the Hardball Times, work which provided some support for what I found in my contribution to Will Carroll's The Juice, namely that new ballparks and expansion can't explain the rise in home runs that's typified baseball's so-called Steroid Era:
Now the estimable Tom Tango has added some support for that viewpoint, at least with regards to parks and expansion. Comparing matched sets of head-to-head plate appearances between hitters and pitchers in the same park against all other pitcher/hitter/park combinations, Tango found virtually identical changes in home run frequency (HR per contact PA) from 1987 to 1988, and from 1992 to 1994. That is, both the matching combo and the unmatched combo saw their homer frequencies change at comparable rates during the same periods, first from 1987 to 1988, when a one-year home run spike came and went, and then from 1992 to 1994, a span in which homer and scoring rates escalated to levels that would be common over the next decade.
Like me, Tango then turned his attention to the baseball itself as an engine for the rise in home runs, and to evidence found via the University of Massachusetts-Lowell's series of tests back in 2000. But it appears he was a little off base when he tried to connect the ball's compositional changes with some data pertaining to fly ball distances:
In Tango's piece, he turns his attention to the ball as well, and to the UMass-Lowell testing in particular, focusing on testing director Dr. James Sherwood's report of an 8.7-foot difference in flight distance between tested major league balls and minor league ones, which differ in the compositions of their cores. Extrapolating from data provided by Greg Rybarcyzk of HitTracker Online, Tango finds that, lo and behold, an 8.7-foot decrease would reduce home run rates to almost exactly where they were in the decade prior to the surge. A tidy little explanation for where those extra long balls might have come from, right?
Not quite. Tango implies that what took place may have been as simple as MLB and Rawlings, the ball's current manufacturer, replacing balls made with a pure cork center (as specified for the minor league balls) with ones made with a compressed-cork center (a composite of cork and ground rubber, known as cushion cork or cushioned cork, which is part of MLB's official specifications for the ball). In actuality, the cushioned cork center ball is decades old: according to information provided by the Spalding company (which manufactured the balls up through 1976), it was officially adopted in the major leagues way back in 1926. Oddly enough, the words "cushioned cork center" imprinted on MLB balls were removed in 1999, the year before the UMass report was published, although the report notes that rubber continues to be added to the pill, the innermost element of the ball...
Though rubber and cork are still in the pill, its exact composition appears to have changed over the past couple of decades. A team from Universal Medical Systems confirmed this last summer, when they compared computerized tomography (CT) scans of baseballs from different eras. Whether simply due to technological advances incorporated into the manufacturing process or a calculated desire to produce more home runs, the pill has increased in size and density over the years. And that's without considering the aforementioned synthetic ring, or the increasingly synthetic composition of the yarn used to wind the ball, something a University of Rhode Island study identified back in 2000. While Sherwood and company continue to test balls on an annual basis for MLB and have even shown some teeth by criticizing the outdated specifications of the testing, they've remained conspicuously quiet as to the impact of the composition changes, to say nothing of MLB bulldozing its own published specifications.
Take a picture, kids -- it's not often a hack like me can legitimately find fault with the work of one of the field's top researchers. Then again, Enrique Wilson did get a few hits off Pedro Martinez, and D.J Houlton has struck out Albert Pujols in their only two encounters. It happens.
On the subject of The Juice, elsewhere in the piece, I re-visited some data from my chapter regarding the evolution of ballpark fence distances during the 1990-2004 period. Updating through 2007 and combining the two leagues:
With the exception of the teensiest of fractions for straightaway center field, fence distances have actually increased during the wave of building that's put 21 clubs (including four expansion teams) into new ballparks. What has decreased during the time period in question -- indeed, what may be confusing the issue -- is smaller park capacities. In 1990, the average ballpark held 53,057 patrons; last year it was 48,219, a drop of about 10 percent. So yes, parks are smaller, but not in a way that carries any ramifications for home run levels.
Since this article's publication, several readers have pointed out that while the fair territory of playing fields aren't getting smaller, a decreasing amount of foul territory may be contributing to the rise in homers and scoring in general. That's something I'll be examining in my next take on this subject.
Whew. My second recent piece at BP is a pinch-hit job on the Texas Rangers' Team Health Report, since Will Carroll's commitments prevented him from taking a swing. I wasn't able to bring quite the amount of background to the Rangers that I did to the Brewers' THR, since I didn't cover the former in the now-shipping Baseball Prospectus 2008, but I did discover that the Rangers led the majors in number of trips to the DL last year (23) and number of same which were pitchers (14). Those injuries didn't cause the team's 19-35 start in April and May; four missed Kevin Millwood starts didn't hurt nearly as much as a 6.44 ERA from the rotation, but it sure didn't help. Anyway, the Rangers' THR is free if you're inclined to check it out.
• • •
The other element of my personal March Madness is promotional appearances for BP08. My ski vacation cost me a trip to the Yogi Berra Museum, but I've still got a handful lined up for this month:
• Thursday, March 6th, 6:00 pm, Barnes & Noble, 105 Fifth Avenue (at 18th Street), New York, NY 10003. With Steven Goldman, Derek Jacques, and Joe Sheehan
• Saturday, March 8th, 2:00 pm, Borders Books, 1260 Old Country Road, Westbury, NY 11590. With Derek Jacques and Joe Sheehan
• Monday, March 17th, 7:00 pm, Politics & Prose, 5015 Connecticut Avenue NW, Washington, DC 20008. With Clay Davenport and Steven Goldman
• Tuesday, March 18th, 7:00 pm, Barnes & Noble, Rittenhouse Square, 1805 Walnut Street, Philadelphia, PA 19103. With Steven Goldman and Joe Sheehan
If you're nearby any of these, we hope you can make it out. Also, I'll be hosting a chat at BP on Thursay the 6th at 1:00 PM for those of you burning to talk some baseball but unable to make it out.
As for writing about the Rocket's 'roids-related revelations, I covered the pinstriped angle of the Mitchell Report for Bombers Broadside 2008, a forthcoming book on the Yankees from Maple Street Press. This is the second year in a row I've contributed to Bombers Broadside. In this edition's 112 pages of glossy, full color goodness you'll also find editor Cecilia Tan and such familiar names as Mike Carminati, Vince Genarro, Dan Graziano, Derek Jacques, Tara Krieger, Dan McCourt, Sweeney Murti and Pete Palmer. The book will be available on newsstands in the Tri-State area on March 4, and can be ordered directly from the publisher now.
As for what I actually think about whether Clemens used? As skeptical as I am of the Mitchell Report and of Brian McNamee's character, I've had a hard time believing the Clemens camp's protestations from the beginning. Furthermore, every weird turn this case has taken -- from the Mike Wallace softball interview to the taped phone call to Andy Pettitte's admission and testimony to the needles and gauze to the naming of Debbie Clemens to the Rocket's glad-handing up on Capitol Hill to Rusty Hardin's down-home machismo -- has further eroded my confidence in Clemens' version of events. The only major point scored in Clemens' favor since the report's release was the revelation that he was not in fact named in the Jason Grimsley affidavit, contrary to the Los Angeles Times' previous reports.
Which isn't to say that I particularly care whether Clemens used or not. Though his late-career accomplishments certainly fit a pattern not unlike that of America's previous Public Enemy #1, Barry Bonds, I'm more skeptical than ever about what the drugs he allegedly took may have done to his performance. In the context of the hundreds of other players who allegedly used PEDs prior to baseball's beefed-up policy, his case isn't especially remarkable; it's the denials which have amplified the coverage and given the story legs. What's certain is that the public persona of Clemens that has emerged through this saga is even less charming than the one on display throughout his career. And while I have to admit that I'm not really prone to sympathizing with right-wing, redneck bullies, I fear that the cover-up -- if this flurry of activity is indeed covering up for Clemens' misdeeds -- is worse than the crime.
That said, I doubt there will be enough evidence to convict Clemens of perjury, and I find the whole notion that Congress should be involved in this dispute to be patently ridiculous. Henry Waxman, Tom Davis and their colleagues -- particularly my old nemesis Christopher Shays, America's expert at Not Knowing Anything About Anything -- are a bipartisan bunch of camera-hogging assclowns who ought to be doing something more important, like begging their constituents for forgiveness for wasting their time and taxpayer dollars on such relatively trivial matters.
Anyway, as ever I'll try to impart a modicum of reason into the reportage.
As with the 2007 edition, I covered the pitchers in both leagues as well as creating staff depth charts for all 30 teams. Nearly 300 hurlers made the cut for the writeups, with projections for another 150 or so included in the alphabetical index. Alas, some of my best (or perhaps funniest) work writing about guys on the fringes wound up on the cutting room floor, but it's tough to complain when those guys have no fantasy relevance whatsoever. "Cow tipping" is the term my BP editor, Christina Kahrl, uses for writing about bad pitchers. It's easy and entertaining, if a bit cruel, to take the time to savage such defenseless beasts.
Anyway, this year's Index contains 829 player capsules with 2008 projections, position-by-position rankings, the FBI signature pullout "Cheat Sheets" with dollar values for 4x4 and 5x5 single and mixed leagues, depth charts, and a bunch of good features, including an experts poll, John Sickels on this year's crop of impact rookies and a piece that I wrote on ERA estimators (similar to last year's). The mag goes for $7, which also gets you an electronic update featuring revised projections, depth charts and Cheat Sheets as well as camp notes and analysis at the end of February. Also for sale via the Index store where you can order your copy directly is a separate series of electronic updates that happen on a weekly basis through March; for the third year in a row I'll be doing those as well. Get 'em while you can.
• On Monday (Labor Day), I worked from home and watched most of Pedro Martinez's comeback outing, which I then discussed with Joel Blumberg on WGBB SportsBreak, which aired later that afternoon. As I said during the discussion, I was quite impressed to see Pedro grit his way through five innings; even with less stuff than he had before, his mastery of the mental side of pitching will serve him well and will certainly help the Mets down the stretch.
• Tuesday morning, I headed down to Washington, DC, for an evening bookstore appearance to promote It Ain't Over 'Til It's Over. Around 30 people came out to Politics and Prose bookstore to hear what Clay Davenport and I had to say about the book, not a bad showing given how little advance publicity we were able to give it at BP. Several readers old enough to remember the races I wrote about had nice things to say about my chapters, particularly the 1967 one, which meant a lot to me; it's always good to know not only that you've brought something memorable back to life but that you've provided some new insights along the way. I'm not sure I could ask for a higher compliment than that when it comes to my work.
• Tuesday also saw publication of my latest Hit and Run piece at BP. This one took a close look at quality starts and at BP's Support Neutral metrics to evaluate the work of starting pitchers. Both individually and on a team level, there's a great deal of overlap when comparing what the two types of stats are telling us:
As defined by [Philadelphia Inquirer columnist John] Lowe, a quality start is one in which a pitcher goes at least six innings and allows no more than three earned runs. It's a simple and elegant stat that suggests a pitcher did a reasonable job of keeping his team in the ballgame. And while it's possible for a pitcher to earn a quality start with a game ERA of 4.50, such instances are rare. In the aforementioned ESPN column, [Rob] Neyer found that in 2005, the average quality start featured a game ERA of 2.04, a non-quality start 7.70 -- that's not a misprint, it's Boeing's next jet -- and the 6 inning/3 earned run/4.50 case constituted just 9.2 percent of all quality starts.
Based on this year's numbers, a team getting a quality start wins 68.0 percent of the time, on par with the 67.4 percent Neyer reported based on 1985 and 2005 data...
...As a metric, SNLVAR [Support Neutral Lineup Adjusted Value Above Replacement] certainly has its advantages over quality starts. It adjusts for ballpark and opposition strength, strips out things a pitcher can't control like run support and bullpen support, and expresses the result in wins above replacement level. For my money, it's the best metric in the BP toolbox with which to measure starting pitchers, and as such, I use it every week in the Hit List, along with its bullpen sibling, WXRL. However, you can't eyeball SNLVAR over a cup of coffee and a page full of box scores, nor can you impress mixed company with such an unwieldy acronym, one which brings to mind that old Serak the Preparer line: "To pronounce it correctly, I would have to pull out your tongue." The humble quality start is perfect for just such occasions.
Then again, the quality start metric does lack the zazz we at BP like to apply to things, so it's worth passing along a little tidbit from Keith Woolner: our Support Neutral family can provide a sophisticated approximation of quality start rate if we untether ourselves from replacement level and turn towards league average via the per-game stat SNLVA_R (Support Neutral Lineup-adjusted Value Added Rate). Simply put, a pitcher's SNLVA_R + 0.5 is the percentage of the time his team would win a game given average offense and bullpen support. So for Jake Peavy, who's got an SNLVA of 5.3 in 28 starts and thus an SNLVA_R of .189, his team can be expected to win at a .689 clip. That's tops among pitchers with 100 or more innings this season.
The piece was accompanied by an Unfiltered entry which clarified my decision to use a definition of quality starts that excluded unearned runs, which generally isn't how we roll at BP.
• Back from DC on Wednesday, I attended that evening's Yankees-Mariners game with an old college friend named Ben (readers may remember him from my wife's fabulous 2003 Game Seven story). After leaving his law practice, Ben has spent the last two years traveling around the world. "Since I last saw you, I've been through 25 countries," he told me. With the desire to catch up and the stresses of the week -- which included arrangements to close on my apartment at the end of the month -- weighing on me, I didn't even bother taking my scorebook to the game. Ben and I simply kicked back in our seats in Section 601 of the upper deck, right behind home plate, and concentrated on baseball and beer, hootin' and hollerin' and just having a good time.
We watched Philip Hughes, who'd been torched for 15 runs in 16.2 innings over his last three starts, overcome some early trouble to give the Yankees six solid innings with six strikeouts. After yielding two walks and an HBP in the first two innings, he surrendered a two-run homer to Raul Ibañez in the third inning -- it could have been a three-run job had the umps not blown a call at second base, when Ichiro Suzuki was out stealing after a single -- and when he yielded a leadoff double to Ben Broussard to start the fourth, it looked like he might be in for another quick exit.
But from that point on, Hughes faced the minimum number of hitters to get through six. Broussard was moved over to third on an infield grounder, but Hughes struck out Jose Lopez and got Yuniesky Betancourt to pop out to end the threat. The only other baserunner he allowed was Ibañez, who was nailed stretching a single into a double to lead off the sixth, though apparently the umps had also victimized Ichiro in the top of the fifth when they called him out on a bang-bang play at first base. Still, it was a good outing from the kid. In light of the injury concerns regarding Roger Clemens (my nickel, based on his comments, says he's got a bone spur) and the ineffectiveness of Mike Mussina, they'll need more where that came from if they want to play into October.
The Yanks could do almost nothing against Seattle starter Jarrod Washburn. In the bottom of the third they got their first hit, a solo homer by #9 hitter Jose Molina. His next turn at bat, he collected the Yanks' second hit, leading off the sixth with a single and boldly -- or foolishly, given how slowly he runs -- taking second as Lopez dropped the relay throw. Seriously, you could time the guy with a sun dial.
That hit went for naught, and following an 11-pitch, 1-2-3 inning from Joba Chamberlain (first time I'd seen him in person), the M's were still ahead 2-1 in the bottom of the seventh, when Alex Rodriguez, who'd been doubtful before the game after banging up his ankle in a collision with Adrian Beltre the previous night, bashed a solo homer to leftfield, his 47th of the year. When Robinson Cano reached on another error by Lopez, Washburn's night was done even though he'd allowed just three hits.
In came George Sherrill to face Shelley Duncan, a hacktastic over-age rookie whose swing is all-or-nothing. We watched in amazement as Duncan squared around to bunt. Ben was sure he was going to get one down; I was in total denial. "Attempting to bunt and getting one down are two different stories, and this guy doesn't have it in him to complete the job." One pitch later he'd done just that, sending Cano to second.
At this point, Sherrill lost the plate, walking Jason Giambi and Wilson Betemit, who was playing third base while A-Rod DHed. With Molina looming on deck as Betemit worked the count in his favor, I saw Jorge Posada don a helmet and move to the edge of the dugout. "Watch," I told Ben, "if Betemit gets on to load the bases, Posada's going to pinch-hit for Molina."
"But he's got two hits!"
"Yeah, and he also just got his bell rung." Molina had taken a foul ball off the mask in the top of the inning. "Posada's going to pinch hit because Torre knows he's good at working the bases-loaded walk."
Sure enough, that's exactly what happened. Posada took four balls in a row after fouling off the first pitch, and we exchanged high-fives as Ben laughed, "That's why they pay you the big bucks!"
Mariners manager John McLaren, who'd already endeared himself to the crowd by arguing over both Ichiro calls, came out for the second time of the inning. This time he summoned Eric O'Flaherty, who yielded one run when Johnny Damon legged out an infield grounder to prevent a double play, and another when Melky Cabrera singled to rightfield. Brandon Morrow came on and instantly yielded a two-run double to Derek Jeter, bringing up A-Rod again.
"Come on, A-Rod. Two in one inning!" howled Ben. Boom! Another shot to left centerfield for Rodriguez's second home run of the frame and his 48th of the year, tying his own Yankee record for righthanded batters. It was the first time I'd ever seen a player hit two in one inning, and the first time a Yankee had done so since Cliff Johnson in 1977. Amazing!
By the time the dust settled, McLaren had made four pitching changes as the Yanks scored eight run on four hits, four walks and an error to make the score 9-2. Just like the night before, the Yanks had broken open a close game in the seventh. They would add one more run and win going away. Good stuff.
• Thursday found me back on the Amtrak, headed to Philadelphia to make a TV appearance on Comcast SportsNet's "Daily News Live" show with host Neil Hartman and panelists Rich Hofmann and Mark Kram from the Philadelphia Daily News. On a 90-minute show that alternated between baseball and football in a 30-30-15-15 format, I had the final segment, but at virtually every commercial break, the host plugged the book and my appearance, showing the cover and mentioning my name.
Finally, after some time in the makeup room to keep me from looking as sweaty and disheveled as the week had made me feel, I was on. I did somewhere between eight and 10 minutes, answering Hartman's questions about the methodology which determined the races that made the book, explaining their relevance to the current races (the Phils, after blowing a six-run lead the night before in gut-wrenching fashion, were down to about a 25 percent shot at the playoffs according to BP's Playoff Odds report), kicking around the Phils' 1964 collapse and discussing my 1959 chapter. It was difficult to provide too much detail in such a short time, but I think I used what I had pretty well, and made the most of my brief moment in the spotlight. I'm hoping to get a clip to put up on the site soon.
• Finally, having gone to Philly and back on the same day, I returned home to finish this week's Hit List, one that featured a no-hitter, a near-perfect game, an imperfect game, Network, Old School, C. Montgomery Burns, a poorly-timed look at Troy Glaus' turnaround, and a whole lot of season-ending injuries. I always like the Hit List to feel like a wrap-up of a full, rich week, but this one only scratched the surface of my adventures. Still, given the chaotic circumstances under which it was produced, I'm proud that it went up more or less on time. Aside from the season-ending list, it's the last one I'll be writing given an upcoming trip to Europe. I'm ready for that vacation.
The D.C. appearance was great, last night's Yankees game -- first time I've been on hand for a player homering twice in one inning, as Alex Rodriguez did -- was even better. Tonight I'm headed to Philadelphia for a TV appearance to promote It Ain't Over 'Til It's Over. At 6:15 PM, I'll be on "Daily News Live" on Philly's Comcast Sports Net. Hopefully the segment will be added to the network's multimedia page and I'll be able to pass it along.
Don't kid yourselves, Yankee fans--despite the high ranking and the upcoming soft schedule, it's all over but the shouting and pouting, not to mention the laying of bets on whether Joe Torre, Brian Cashman, or Alex Rodriguez will be around for the next step. The team's worst first half of the three-division era has left the Yanks needing to play .684 ball the rest of the way to reach the 95-win level of the last two AL Wild Card winners, not to mention a .737 clip to match Boston's 99-win pace. Injuries, age, and overpriced underachievement are the predominant themes here, and neither Torre nor Cashman deserve a pass for building a weak bench, forgetting first base, or the puzzling bullpen management which has contributed mightily to a 6-14 record in one-run games. For all the finger-pointing, Cashman's efforts to rebuild the organization's pitching depth may pay off down the road, and keeping his head at the trading deadline should merit sparing his neck come October.
Of course, even the news of the Yanks reaching .500 has been trumped by the fact that the team's overtures to extend A-Rod's contract have been rebuffed both by uber-agent Scott Boras and by Rodriguez himself; he'll exercise the opt-out clause in his contract and become a free agent at the end of the season. Say what you will about the odiousness of Boras, he's the best in the biz because he has the foresight to protect his clients with such loopholes in addition to prising the most money out of teams in the first place.
Rodriguez took the high road: "I think it would be selfish on my part to talk about my contract status when our team desperately needs wins... My goal is to win as many games as we can, focus on my teammates and really play at a real high level in the second half. That sort of thing I leave to the people upstairs. My only concern is to play baseball and play at a high level."
Of course, what A-Rod could have said is that the team and its fans deserve to sweat a bit for the shoddy treatment they afforded him last year; he owes them no discount for the times Joe Torre, Derek Jeter, unnamed front office officials (you think that Post cover happened naturally?) and a certain segment of the fan base (to say nothing of the rabid media) have thrown him under the bus. I'm reminded of the great Simpsons "Trash of the Titans" episode, where Homer's stint as sanitation commissioner ends with the re-election of the man he deposed, Ray Patterson. Upon returning, Patterson tells the crowd, "You know, I'm not much on speeches, but it's so gratifying to leave you wallowing in the mess you've made. You're screwed, thank you, bye."
As it is, even without the verbal dis, Rodriguez's dealing the team a painful enough blow by invalidating a contract to which the Texas Rangers are still contributing some $21 million over the next three years, plus another $3 mil a year (unclear for how long) in deferred payments. If the Yankees want to re-sign A-Rod, they'll be paying all the freight next time around. Payback is a bitch.
As for the rest of the Hit List, there's more Simpsons to be had, along with nutritional information, robot overlords, Harvey's Wallbangers and other fun stuff. Enjoy!
• • •
On a separate note, I just got word that the first copies of It Ain't Over 'Til It's Over: the Baseball Prospectus Pennant Race Book--to which I contributed six chapters, including the book's first two narratives, on the 1967 AL and 1959 NL seasons--have made their way into editor Steven Goldman's hands, which means I'll hopefully have my copies in hand next week. Both Basic Books and Amazon lists August 13 as the publication date, and the latter is pre-selling the hardcover for $17.13. It's never too soon to reserve your copy!
Most importantly, the 2007 baseball season is upon us. Plugging away at my final Fantasy Baseball Index spring update, I didn't have the luxury of sitting still to watch either Sunday night's Mets-Cardinals affair or Monday's Yankee opener, but the magic of TiVo allowed me to get the gist of both. On Tuesday I made my first foray into MLB.tv's Mosaic, as it appeared that would be the only way to see out-of-market ballgames this year; I watched the Dodgers cough up a 3-2 lead on Kevin Mench's two-run homer, and sampled a few other games from the West Coast, impressed at the software's integration with the Mac OS X platform but exasperated by the glitchy sound cutouts and the between-innings Pong bleeps.
I didn't get to see any baseball Wednesday night; instead I went out to see Steven Goldman and Jonah Keri read at the Gelf Magazine Varsity Letters series, where both deviated from the script to read something a bit less... Prospectus-y than BP07 and Baseball Between the Numbers. Steve read some passages from Forging Genius, including my suggestion of the story where Casey Stengel, manager of the Worcester franchise in the Eastern League, sent a letter to Charles D. Stengel, club president of said franchise, requesting that he be freed from his contract so that he could take a better job with the Toledo Mud Hens; president Stengel wrote back, acceding to the manager's surprising request. Jonah read his farewell to the Expos piece from BP as well as a segment from BBTN on Derek Jeter's defense. Also speaking were Cor van den Heuvel, who in three seperate (and somewhat interminable) interludes offered a number of baseball haiku, and Curt Smith, who read from The Voice, his biography of Mel Allen, the famed voice of the Yankees and "This Week in Baseball," making a case for Allen as the greatest sports announcer of all time (my nickel goes to Vin Scully on that score, but I'll grant that Smith may have a point). Afterwards, accompanied by Derek Jacques and Jonah's friend Dave, we went out to dinner, and en route, Derek received an email from a BP colleague telling us the wonderful news: MLB and In Demand struck a deal to keep the Extra Innings package on cable TV.
That happy news meant that on Thursday afternoon, free from deadlines for the first time since, like, October (yes, I made it through an entire offseason gainfully employed from baseball writing, how about that?), I was free to kick back with the Extra Innings showing of Matsuzaka's major league debut against the Royals, with a compelling pitcher on the other end, too: Zack Greinke, making his first big-league start since September 2005 after missing most of last season due to what was termed a social anxiety disorder. For seven innings this turned out to be a hell of a pitcher's duel, though the 36-degree weather and ump Jeff Nelson's wide strike zone had something to do with that.
The Sox scratched out a run in the top of the first against Greinke, with Manny Ramirez doubling home Kevin Youkilis. But even then, Greinke looked promising; the double was sandwiched by backwards-K strikeouts of both David Ortiz and J.D. Drew, with Big Papi especially stunned. Matsuzaka, after surrendering a leadoff single to David DeJesus and then his only walk of the afternoon, needed a double play to escape the first unscathed. He got his first major-league strikeout on a 94-MPH fastball that fooled Ross Gload to end the second, and wound up ringing up 10 hitters, including the entire side in the fourth on a mere 14 pitches.
Matsuzaka's motion (dissected by Will Carroll over at MLB.com) was interesting, featuring a pause at the top of his windup that was noticeable but less pronounced than, say, Hideo Nomo. He went as high as 95 on the gun, but changed speeds effectively with a changeup, a splitter, and three or four breaking pitches, one of which may have been the fabled gyroball (the New York Sun's Tim Marchman does a nice job of describing his repertoire). Sick stuff that will give hitters fits this year, guaranteed.
Greinke, in a heartening comeback, struck out seven himself, including Ortiz twice more (once looking, once half-assedly swinging). But his defense let him down in the fifth, as the Sox doubled their lead when Julio Lugo doubled, stole third, and scored on a throwing error by John Buck. The Royals didn't score in the bottom of the inning, but K.C. phenom third baseman Alex Gordon led off the frame with his first major-league hit, a sharp single to leftfield. They got on the board in the sixth when DeJesus led off the inning with a solo homer to rightfield, and they should have tied the game shortly after. Esteban German singled to follow DeJesus, and then was thrown out at the back end of a strikeout-throwout double play -- which was immediately followed by an Emil Brown double that shoulda coulda woulda tied the game. Gordon struck out looking to end the frame, and that was that. The lines for the two starters wound up looking impressively similar:
IP H R ER BB SO NP-St Dice-K 7 6 1 1 1 10 108-74 Greinke 7 8 2 1 1 7 101-64
With Greinke done for the day, Royals reliever Joel Peralta instantly surrendered two runs in the eighth, and Boston's Jonathan Papelbon came on to close the door in the ninth, more or less completing the checklist of what to watch for. Not too bad for a Thursday afternoon. (to be continued)
• As announced last week, Baseball Prospectus 2007 is on the New York Times Bestseller List for the first time in its 12-year history. The March 18 list had BP07 at #15 on the Paperback Advice, How-To and Miscellaneous list, while on the March 25 one, we're up to #9. Look out, What to Expect When You're Expecting bitchez (ironically, published by BP's former publisher).
A reminder that I'll be on the promo trail for BP this week and next:
Thursday, March 22, 6:00 PM with Christina Kahrl, Steven Goldman, Neil DeMause, Derek Jacques, and Will Weiss
Columbia University Lerner Hall 2920 Broadway (@ 114th Street) New York, NY
Saturday, March 24, 2:00 PM with Christina Kahrl, Steven Goldman, Ben Murphy, John Erhardt, Neil DeMause, Jim Baker, Derek Jacques, Will Weiss, Clay Davenport, Will Carroll, Kevin Goldstein, and Marc Normandin
Yogi Berra Musuem Monclair State University 8 Quarry Road Little Falls, NJ 07424 973-655-2378
Monday, March 26, 6:00 pm with Steven Goldman and Neil DeMause
Barnes & Noble Yale University 77 Broadway New Haven, CT 06511 203-777-8440
If you're not in the area, see the BP events page for local listings in your market (not that all are as well-served as the Tri-State area).
• Last weekend, I got my copy of Bombers Broadside, which is now shipping from Amazon.
It's a nice piece of work, 112 pages of glossy, full color, pinstripe-flavored content about the current team as well as its illustrious history -- including features about the 1977 champions, and Babe Ruth's (in)famous "Called Shot" -- sure to appeal to Yankee fans, and featuring a roster that includes myself, editor Cecilia Tan, Alex Belth, Mike Carminati, Vince Genarro, Gary Gillette, Mark Healey, Derek Jacques, Tara Krieger, David Laurila, Dan McCourt, and Pete Palmer. I'll wager a guess that more than one of those names means something to those of you reading this, so cut yourself a slice. Belth's bittersweet piece on his childhood memories of Reggie Jackson and his recently deceased father is worth the price of admission alone.
For the first time in the colorful 12-year history of the BP annual, we have cracked the New York Times Bestseller List. Or will; as of March 18 (next Sunday), BP07 will be ranked #15 on the Advice, How-To and Miscellaneous list. Ergo, the 19 of us who contributed to this year's book and are listed on its title page are best-selling authors now, not that any of us are able to dine out on said laurels just yet. Anyway, a happy day here for the BP family.
My travels caused me to delay the posting of Part I of a two-part interview I did for the fine Yanksfan vs Soxfan blog on -- guess what? -- the AL East's big dogs as they stack up this year. Here's one of the exchanges:
YFSF:Josh Beckett and Chien-Ming Wang: They are the sabermetric paradox. Do you expect a big turnaround from Beckett? Can we expect another big year from Wang?
JJ: Beckett's more of an enigma than a paradox. It remains to be seen whether he can harness his curveball while at the same time keeping free of the blister problems that have plagued his career; last year he wore a band-aid between starts and it prevented him from tossing the curve in bullpen sessions. If Lester is healthy, the Sox might have enough depth in the rotation to cover for a 150-inning season from Beckett where he does throw the curve and deals with the consequences. But right now there are a lot of questions about Schilling, about Matsuzaka, about Wakefield, and about Papelbon, so that may be too risky.
Wang is certainly a paradox in that he succeeds while striking out only about 3.1 hitters per nine. But so long as he throws mid-90s heat with that great movement on his sinker, I expect him to throw a lot of innings and be pretty successful, if not quite so so much as last year. He'll never be an ace, I don't think, but especially at his current price, he's a very valuable commodity and fun to watch as well.
Part II of this home-and-home series will be posted in this space on Monday. As you read Part I, please note that the introduction includes one innacuracy that bears correction. As I've said in this space, I covered the Dodgers and Red Sox for BP07; Steven Goldman is the one who wrote about the Yankees.
This morning I recorded a radio spot for WGBB 1240 AM's Sports Break with Joel Blumberg. Over the course of about 20 mintues (starting 7:45 in), Joel and I talked about Brian Cashman's bold power play, the Mets' middle relief, the Red Sox's winter spending, and (sigh) the impact of steroids on the single season and all-time home run records. You can hear it all here.
On Thursday night I got together with Bronx Banter's Alex Belth and Cliff Corcoran and SI.com's Jake Luft for some burgers and balltalk. It was typically rambunctious, with the four of us barely restraining ourselves from talking over each other like sugared-up six-year-olds as we discussed Bernie Williams, fantasy baseball, Ronnie Lott (how'd he get in there?), Steve Rushin, Tropicana Field, spring training and the Hall of Fame. If only I could remember what I was supposed to check out on YouTube...
Cliff, who edited Baseball Prospectus 2007 for Plume (a division of Penguin), showed up carrying his hot-off-the-press copy of the book, promising mine would arrive Friday, albeit with slighly less ketchup on the cover. It did, and aside from a couple of surprise commas -- them's the breaks when you play subordinate-clause chicken as often as I do -- I couldn't be happier. My contributions to the book were the Dodgers and Red Sox chapters, as well as a back-of-book collaboration with Will Carroll on the effects of the amphetamine ban.
The book is 48 pages longer than last year, weighing in at 602 in all (biggest BP ever, I'm told), and the switch in publishers from Workman to Plume looks like the difference between Scranton and New York City. Hats off to BP editors Steven Goldman and Christina Kahrl, as well as Cliff, for a job well done. We at BP like to say that we write the baseball book that we'd want to read. Here's hoping you readers come along for the ride and enjoy the advances we've made.
On the promotional front here in NYC, the March 22 Columbia University time and location have been changed:
March 22, 6 PM Columbia University Lerner Hall 2920 Broadway (@ 114th Street) New York, NY
The changes inadvertently accomodate my previous commitments (Willie Nelson, Merle Haggard and Ray Price getting their Western Schwing on at Radio City) and thus shift me from tentative to probable, with a 60 percent likelihood of watermelon smashing. Consider yourselves warned.
Thursday, March 8, 7:00 PM with Christina Kahrl and Steven Goldman
Barnes & Noble Rittenhouse Square 1805 Walnut Street Philadelphia, PA 19103 215-665-0716
I've done this one a few times. Philly's a nice hop, skip, and a jump away from NYC, and I'd make the trip more often if it wasn't for that ungodly awful switchover in Trenton.
Thursday, March 22, 7:00 PM with Christina Kahrl, Steven Goldman, Neil DeMause, Derek Jacques, and Will Weiss
Columbia University Barnes and Noble 3954 Broadway New York, NY 212-923-2149
Slightly more tentative than the other appearances, as it was announced just after I bought tickets to see Willie Nelson, Merle Haggard and Ray Price at Radio City later that night, and that's not the kind of thing I can easily pass up.
Saturday, March 24, 2:00 PM with Christina Kahrl, Steven Goldman, Ben Murphy, John Erhardt, Neil DeMause, Jim Baker, Derek Jacques, Will Weiss, Clay Davenport, Will Carroll, Kevin Goldstein, Marc Normandin
Yogi Berra Musuem Monclair State University 8 Quarry Road Little Falls, NJ 07424 973-655-2378
I talked so much at last year' Yogi Berra Museum event that BP decided to fly in even more heavy hitters.
Monday, March 26, 6:00pm with Steven Goldman and Neil DeMause
Barnes & Noble Yale University 77 Broadway New Haven, CT 06511 203-777-8440
was singled out for praise in, of all places, the 
