Um, I don’t even remember who won the first game. We played two 5-inning games, both of which were intense. I called a batter out for 3-foot running lane interference. I had to make a close call as to whether it was too dark to play; we got in all 5 innings of game 2, which was won by Prospect Heights Middle school on a walk-off single. Thank goodness, too, because the high school rule is the same as the silly college rule – if a game is suspended, the score reverts to the end of the last completed inning. (And, I think the game wouldn't have counted at all, 'cause a regulation is five innings. No clue whether that rule applies to a scheduled 5-inning game.) See below for more discussion of the possible consequences of such a dumb rule.
After 10 innings behind the plate, I just want pizza and bed. The Nachoman feels tremendous sympathy for minor league umpires, who do this EVERY DAY. And, they often can’t just go to bed afterward – they might have to drive many hours to get to their next city. Remember to pity the umpires next time a game goes extra innings, especially 22-inning marathons like that worked by plate umpire Alfonzo Marquez. At least he got to fly first-class that morning.
Careful what you wish for
Thursday night’s Rockies – Padres game went 22 innings, finishing at 1:20 A.M. PACIFIC time. Final score: Colorado 2, San Diego 1. During the Nationals-Mets game, which went 14 innings and 4:45, the Gnats announcers mentioned the Padres game. “Wow, Jake Peavy vs. Jeff Francis. They’re in the 5th inning already. That could be a two hour game!” they commented wistfully, as the night wore on.
But, my goodness. I understand that Cat ‘n’ Dog Park is not hitter friendly, but really, 13 innings without scoring a run? And 22 innings of scoring three runs total? One of the runs came on a bases-loaded walk; another came as a result of two errors. These pitching staffs are good, but *that* good?
How well do you play the night after a 22 inning game?
You’re the starting pitcher. You’re up 6-0 in the bottom of the 1st, and the other team’s starting pitcher is already out of the game. Your team played 22 innings last night before flying halfway across the country, arriving in town at 9:00 a.m. Your bullpen was brutalized last night. But YOU got to fly out a day early, and you fell asleep at a normal hour.
What do you do?
Why, walk the second batter of the game, get behind every other hitter, show absolutely no control. You give up a bunch of hard-hit balls after falling behind hitters and coming in with hard but poorly located fastballs. You go 3-1 on the RELIEF PITCHER with two outs, having already given up four runs in the 1st inning.
You throw 100 pitches over the first four innings. You finally pitch a 1-2-3 inning in the 4th… but you went 3-2 on EVERY SINGLE HITTER that inning.
Franklin Morales of the Rockies, you earn a Stinky Cheese award from the Nachoman. YOU are the worst pitcher in the majors right now.
Au Contraire, says the Rockies fan
Says Daniel Holst, Colorado resident and physics student in the Nachoman’s class, about Mr. Morales:
“Perhaps you should give the poor kid a break. Although he is sometimes a bonehead on the mound (not throwing strikes, getting down in the count, etc.), he is in his first full season as a MLB pitcher and is only 22. Before giving him such a title, try watching a little more than his third/fourth start of the season. His stuff can be electric, though not as good as Ubaldo Jimenez's stuff.
In short, be careful what you say about young Morales. I'd hate for you to be eating your words in a couple years...”
Could be, Mr. Holst, could be. He might turn out great eventually, if he either has a frontal lobotomy or if he listens to his pitching coach.
You see, if Mr. Morales were throwing his good stuff for strikes, even if he were to get knocked around, I'd say fine. But, consider:
* He came into this start having already thrown a couple of games where he walked a bunch of hitters and got behind batters.
* He got to leave San Diego early, thus missing the 6.3 hour game.
* The entire bullpen pitched last night.
* He was staked to a 6-run lead in the first inning.
* He went to 3-ball counts on 10 of his 24 batters.
* He only threw first-pitch strikes to 9 of 24 batters.
* He threw 113 pitches in only 5 INNINGS!!! Only 63 of these pitches were strikes.
* He faced 9 batters in the first inning with that 6 run lead. That inning:
* cheap single
* walk (4 pitches)
* double on a 3-1 count
* ground out to score a run
* fly out
* double
* walk (5 pitches)
* single
* strikeout, after going 2-0 and 3-1 on the pitcher.
* Mr. Morales’ first inning overall: 4 runs, 4 hits, 2 walks, 44 pitches, letting the Astros back in the game after they had taken a first-inning beat-down.
Mr. Morales didn't get any better until the fifth. He was painful, painful to watch. He never hit his catcher's glove. He reared back and threw wildly, and got hit hard.
There are plenty of pitchers, both young and old, who can pitch smarter, better, and more effectively. Maybe this guy will be good someday. But Daniel, I can't see making your team suffer while he pitches stupidly. Send him to AAA until he shows he can throw strikes. Call up someone with less "potential", who doesn't light up the radar gun, but who throws strikes and uses what stuff he has.
Oops, they blew it again
The Padres bullpen has been lights-out this season… meaning, when they enter the game, might as well turn the lights out and go home, ‘cause they’re gonna blow it. On Tuesday night it was Heath Bell and Joe Thatcher giving up the game: Jake Peavy had an atypically rough outing, allowing four runs in six innings. The Pads offense responded, scoring seven runs. Too bad that Mr. Thatcher gave up three runs in his 2/3 of an inning. And, after the Padres heroically tied the game with a 4-spot in the top of the eighth, too bad that Mr. Bell’s inning included two walks, six hits, and four runs.
Oh, you say, but the Padres have four saves, which is just about the league average. They’re not that bad.
Um, saves are the least useful statistic since average velocity for a room’s air molecules.[2] The Padres starters rank 6th in ERA; their relievers rank 28th. The bullpen has eight of the Padres twelve losses on its record. I could go into more statistical detail, but you get the picture… this team needs better relief pitching.
Deep Dish on Fukudome
I am pleased to appoint Dr. Matt Boesen, Woodberry history professor, as assistant Nachoman for Chicago Cubs affairs. He shall heretofore be known as Deep Dish, a theme name chosen by Dr. Boesen himself.
Deep Dish sent the Nachoman the following commentary on the Cubs right fielder, which I quote nearly verbatim:
“Bottom of the eighth Tuesday -- two on, no out. Kosoku Fukudome runs up a 2-2 count and then fouls off five straight pitches -- before he hits a single to load the bases. I'm writing this to you because, well, he's doing this sort of thing ALL THE TIME. He seems to have 1-2 at-bats every game that go to 8-10 pitches, and more often than not it seems that he finishes off a long string of fouls with a hit. Fukodome leads the majors with 4.65 pitches per plate appearance. I'm still not quite sure exactly what "plate discipline" is, but it's clear that this guy has it.
Thanks for reading this far. Thought that you may be the only person around who could muster up the same kind of excitement about this sort of thing.”
Are you kidding, Deep Dish? I write 3500 words of this sort of stuff EVERY WEEK. :-)
Yeah, I could not be more impressed with Fukudome. I noticed Mr. Fukudome’s ability to make frustrating contact when I watched the entire Reds-Cubs series last week. Plate discipline is indeed a nebulous concept, but a fan knows it when he sees it -- e.g., Mr. Fukudome has it, Adam Dunn emphatically does NOT. I'd probably get the folks at Fire Joe Morgan extra-angry at me, but I want to explore this concept.
One could make the argument that hitters like Mr. Fukudome make a lot of contact, but they’d be more valuable if they struck out a few times but hit a lot more doubles and home runs. His OPS (on-base plus slugging) is .957, which is outstanding, good for 23rd in the majors; but some might point out that nearly half of that .957 is the on-base part, not the slugging part. I would argue that Mr. Fukudome is doing an awesome job with the first priority of a hitter – DO NOT MAKE AN OUT.
Mr. Fukudome’s plate discipline might be a product of Japanese training, but I doubt that he couldn’t hit for more power if he wanted to. I THINK that he just has enough game sense not to be swinging for the fences in every at-bat. I THINK that power-obsessed Americans who came up though the youth system have far less of a sense of the game than someone like Mr. Fukudome. Kosoke has a sense of when to swing hard, when just to get a base hit, a sense of the value of a solid single over the home run. Mike Maddux (Greg's brother) referred recently to "Academy Kids," young Brewers pitchers who have been trained to throw hard, to follow their coach's instruction, but whose sense of the game is utterly lacking. I'd say the same thing about, say, Reds hitters. But I wouldn’t say that about KF.
Dr. Dish responds once again:
“So, then, is the conclusion here that "plate discipline" simply can't be taught (at an "academy" or anywhere else)? -- is it temperament or just raw, god-given talent? Ichiro obviously "has it" -- could it be a by-product of growing up in Japanese culture, or is there something in the way the game is played in Japan that may illuminate the issue?”
I'm not sure, because the Japanese connection is antithetical to the Fundamental Theorem of Nachodom, which says that baseball is learned best by playing intense but unsupervised playground-style games against good competition between the ages of 10 and 15. I know Japanese youngsters are taught in a more regimented way than even American players. (Of course, there are what, 10 Japanese major leaguers, as opposed to 100 Latin players who learned the game the Nachoman way?) First of all, we're seeing only the best Japanese players. Secondly, the game is taught differently there, emphasizing the value of the single over the homer. I suspect that Japanese baseball might be improved by convincing the light-hitting high-average guys to develop more power via weightlifting and occasional hard swings.
I’d also like to continue this discussion in a future column. Anyone have any insights into whether the success of Mr. Fukudome (and Ichiro Suzuki, for that matter) has to do with Japanese upbringing, or with their own natural baseball instincts?
Yes, Duke was unsporsmanlike, classless, and evil… but it’s the NCAA’s fault.[3]
Rabid Duke-hater El Molé couldn’t contain his excitement when he brought the Nachoman the news of a Clemson-Duke baseball game that ended in a 6-6 tie. In the top of the 11th, Clemson took the lead with a 2-run homer. As the batter-runner crossed the plate with Clemson’s eighth run, a “Duke official” – I still can’t figure out exactly who from the accounts I’ve read – informed the umpire that lightning had been spotted in the area, and that the game must be suspended for a minimum of 30 minutes by rule.
After this, accounts differ. It’s not clear exactly who, if anyone, spotted lightning. Several sources indicate that the lightning warning came from a weather center in Wichita, which did not have the ability to determine how close to the ballpark the lightning hit. Clemson radio man Dan Scott did not see any lightning whatsoever, until the skies opened up and rain poured forth from the heavens – 32 minutes after play was stopped. However, the goduke.com report claimed otherwise.
Duke made no efforts to cover the field with the tarp. They had sent the grounds crew home earlier (?), and their coach hid behind safety rules – he claimed that during a lightning delay, he was not allowed to send players out of the dugout. So of course, the field was rendered unplayable by the storm.
My first thought was, who cares? By the rulebook – at least, by the rulebook I learned at Umpire School – if the game is called in these circumstances, it becomes suspended, and must be resumed later from the point of suspension. Okay, it’s pretty danged obvious that Duke was trying to weasel out of playing for the afternoon, but they still have to come back some other day from a 2-run deficit. Right?
Wrong. The NCAA rules for some silly reason state that if a game is called during an inning, the score reverts to the previously completed inning. Thus, Duke’s intransigence wiped Clemson’s 2-run dinger off the board. The final score was considered 6-6, and Duke has a much better chance of making the ACC baseball tournament.
Duke’s sports information office has defended their baseball coach’s actions, citing safety as the excuse for their malaise. If I were ACC commissioner or American Sports Czar, the Duke baseball coach would be banished to the nether reaches of heck, and the baseball program would be put on four years of probation for their shenanigans. They committed sacrilege against the game of baseball, and for that they should be held accountable.
HOWEVER… the NCAA is complicit here! Think about why the suspended game rule is written as it is in professional baseball. Rulebook writers foresaw the possibility of the manipulation of weather delays to a team’s advantage. Therefore, after five innings any game that is called during an inning in which the lead has changed is automatically suspended, to be picked up later. Even before five innings, if a game is called due to any device failure under the control of the home team (i.e. lights, sprinklers, etc.), the game must be resumed from the point of suspension. There is very little room to take advantage of the professional rule.
So, I ask… why is it that in high school and college ball, the score can revert to that of a previous completed inning? Doesn’t the NCAA *invite* dishonest programs to cheat, as it appears to me that Duke did?
Correlation does not imply causality
The 2000 book The Baseball Astrologer and other weird tales credulously examines baseball superstitions, coincidences, and “freakish occurences.” (If you buy the book from amazon.com, it comes with a free copy of Us Weekly!) As the title implies, one issue investigated is how a player’s astrological sign impacts his playing ability. Now, the Nachoman’s readers are (hopefully) familiar with the vast body of anti-evidence showing astrology to be, at best, bunk.[4] So, of course you expect the Nachoman to pitilessly and sarcastically deconstruct the book’s conclusions. Right?
Well, slate.com’s Greg Spira presents evidence that some of the conclusions of The Baseball Astrologer actually stand up to statistical scrutiny. Specifically, players born under Virgo, and a few late Leos, are significantly more likely to become major league ballplayers than others, especially moreso than early Leos or Cancers. Do the stars really affect baseball players’ fates? Should Jeane Dixon become the next commissioner of baseball?[5]
While the conclusions are correct, the fundamental causality proposed is, obviously, ridiculous. The key dates are not the August 23-24 Leo-Virgo boundary, but rather the July 31-August 1 youth baseball cutoff date. Until recently, most youth baseball leagues adhered to an August 1 birthday cutoff – to play in an under-12 league, you must be under 12 years old on the cutoff date. Thus, players born in August are 11 years and 11 months old, and are playing with players who are 1-2 years younger than they. Then, when these players graduate to the under-14 league, they are still on the high end of the age range.
A pubescent boy may grow substantially in a few months. The 12 year, 1 month boy is not likely to earn playing time over the 13 year, 11 month boy – the sheer size, strength, and speed difference is virtually guaranteed to give the older boy an insurmountable advantage, especially with a volunteer youth coach who is likely size, strength, and speed obsessed. But what if that July-born boy has more natural ability? How many such boys give up on baseball for lack of playing time, and find success in football or basketball? How many of these kids could have developed into excellent players had they been given an extra 11 months for their bodies to grow into their skills? We’ll never know…
I’m not proposing any radical action to help the poor, downtrodden Cancers. Mr. Spira notes that USA baseball has now pretty much uniformly changed this cutoff date to April 30 all over the country, making Aries replace Cancer as the oppressed sign. He does tantalizingly note that one easy solution would be for local groups to set their own cutoff dates, allowing players to “shop around” for advantageous leagues that meet their skill set rather than their age. With that not likely to happen, we can expect that, a decade or two from now, May will replace August as the most common birth month for major leaguers.
Mathematical reference of the week:
Firejoemorgan.com, a sort of sarcastic sports media watchdog site, noted that on numerous occasions recently, sportswriters have seemed to write articles in full consciousness of the potential for criticism from FJM and other, similar blogs. In fact, FJM suspects that some authors may be going out of their way to bait critics such as they, either as a publicity-seeking mechanism, or just for the sheer thrill of engaging in a battle of words with their intellectual superiors.
In any case, FJM notes that such articles might be called “sports journalism criticism criticism. This is one of those f(f(f(x))) deals that make [FJM author] Junior giddy.”
Biggest busts that GMs should have known would be busts
For Reds fans, there’s Corey Patterson and Josh Fogg… but I don’t count them in this category. Sure, anyone who does statistical analysis can show that Mr. Patterson has been practically useless over the latter stages of his career. His VORP – Value Over Replacement Player – has routinely been negative. That means he did not outperform a free agent off the streets, or a good AAA player. Sure enough, after a four-homer week, Mr. Patterson has batted around .100 and been replaced by a good AAA player as the Reds starting center fielder.
As for Mr. Fogg… Historically, he’s dared hitters to make contact, relying on a big ballpark and good defenders to win about half the games he started. His career ERA of 4.99 is pretty poor, but his strength has been to eat innings for his team while keeping them in the game sometimes. In Pittsburgh he benefited from the spectacular infield defense of Jose Castillo and Jack Wilson, the best double play combo since Ozzie Smith and the Busch Stadium peanut vendor. In Colorado his defense played well, plus spacious Coors Field turned a large number of potential home runs into long outs hit to speedy outfielders. Now, though, Mr. Fogg’s home field is the Great American Ballpark, a true pitcher’s Heck where pop flies turn into home runs. And, Mr. Fogg’s defense includes Edwin Encarnacion and Adam Dunn, the Nachoman’s early season nominees for the Coprolite Glove award.
These two gentlemen came to the Reds as stopgaps. Mr. Patterson was signed as a non-roster invitee; Mr. Fogg turned down a lucrative contract with Colorado, and ended up signing with the Reds for less. Neither man was projected as the savior of a poor franchise.[6] Thus, neither man qualifies as a “bust.”
I consider a true “bust” someone signed, promoted, or traded with great fanfare and monetary commitment, who subsequently performs as if he’s a minor leaguer. Presumably, major league GMs are aware of previous performance, and that past performance – all of it – is the best predictor of future results. When a GM “makes a splash” by signing a historically poor player, or a player with exactly one good season behind him, or a famous player on the downside of his career, that GM usually gets in trouble. These are busts that could have, should have been predicted. Two examples:
Matt Morris
He had three good years (1997, 2001, and 2002), and one not-bad year (2003). Since then, all the way through the first 21 games of 2007, his ERA has been well over 4.00. Why, oh why, would the moribund Pirates trade prospects for a bad pitcher in the twilight of his career? The team said, with some logic, that they wanted a veteran to lead their young pitchers. Okay, I can’t argue that Mr. Morris’s veteran presence would be worth it if he were hired instead of, say, a 20 year old with a 9.00 ERA who can’t throw strikes. But, a 20 year old with similar numbers to Mr. Morris is likely to improve with experience; a 33 year old with Mr. Morris’s numbers is likely to continue his slide. Furthermore, look at the economics of the situation. Just how much money is a “veteran presence” and a crappy ERA worth? Apparently, about $10 million. Think of how many Dominican pitchers could have been hired for that sum. And most would have been just as good as, or better than, Mr. Morris.
Eric Gagne
Milwaukee signed him despite his disastrous end-of-season gig with Boston, despite his HGH history.[7] The most likely explanation for Mr. Gagne’s recent decline is that he might be off of the juice.
As an aside, is a closer EVER worth this kind of money? I think of closers like I do running backs in football. Sure, there are good, even great, closers. But chances are, you can find one nearly as good within your organization who’s just dying for the opportunity. Check out sometime how some of the great closers got started. There aren’t many who were anointed from day 1, not even the Great Mariano (who was an unknown setup guy in 1996).
Barry Zito
Okay, I can forgive San Francisco’s management for this one. If you’re going to pay for anything, pay for proven starting pitching. Mr. Zito had three dominant years, 2001-03. He had a bad 2004 (when he still pitched more than 200 innings, and had a better ERA than Matt Morris of recent vintage), and decent 05 and 06 campaigns. I don’t know if I agree with the richest contract for a pitcher in baseball history, but certainly Mr. Zito had demonstrated his worth.
Too bad he hasn’t lived up to the hype. Mr. Zito’s 2007 season was poor by any measure; this year he has a 5.61 ERA, and has walked more than he’s struck out. Sorry, Giants fans, you’ve got seven more years in purgatory for your support of The Sourpuss.
Shut *UP*, Hank.
Apparently Hank Steinbrenner told the press, either instead of or in addition to manager Joe Girardi, how he wants his pitchers to be used.
Just once I’d like to see a major sports website or television entity simply ignore Mr. Steinbrenner. I will add to my list of people who should NEVER be quoted in sports journalism.
Next week, hopefully…
The Nachoman reacts to Hank Steinbrenner’s criticism of the Nachoman’s criticism, driving this site’s traffic into the stratosphere. Wouldn’t that be awesome…
NM
[1] If such a thing even exists.
[2] Since, on average, as many molecules are moving north as south, up as down, etc., the average velocity of the molecules is zero. The useful measure is called RMS speed, which gives a statistically meaningful idea of how fast a typical molecule moves. The answer, in a room-temperature room: a thousand or so miles per hour.
[3] It usually is.
[4] And at worst, a way to make money by exploiting the gullible masses. But buy this book!
[5] Sure. She’d be an improvement on Selig.
[6] Compare that with the fanfare over Eric Milton a few years ago, who had lifetime stats similar to those of Mr. Fogg, but who nevertheless got top dollar and top billing from the chumps in the Reds front office.
[7] Mr. Gagne was named in the Mitchell report, which was released a few days after Milwaukee signed him. Either Milwaukee knew about Gagne’s use of human growth hormone and didn’t care, or they were deliberately deaf, blind and dumb. Either way, the Brewers are paying the price ($10 million) right now.
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