Tag: Major League Baseball

It’s just unbelievable that Bud Selig cancelled the All Star Game in the 11th inning last night. The 1987 All Star Game went to 13 innings. Surely these steroid-juiced 2002 players could go an extra couple innings.

ESPN.Com’s Jim Caple writes of the debacle,

Fans in Milwaukee threw garbage on the field and chanted “Let them play,” as if it were “The Bad News Bears in Breaking Training” instead of the All-Star Game. That was fitting, too. After all, the managers treated the game as if it were a Little League game, making sure everyone got into the game so as not to hurt anyone’s feelings.

And it was also fitting that no one listened or cared what the fans think. Hey, we have planes to catch, people.

For a night when baseball honored Ted Williams (interesting how time will transform you from a mean SOB into a revered icon — there’s hope for Barry Bonds), MLB doesn’t seem to understand Williams ethos at all,

You know why the 1941 game Ted Williams won with his homer is so treasured? Because winning was paramount. Not only did Ted play the entire game, so did Joe DiMaggio. Each team used just four pitchers each. You know why we cared so much about the 1970 game that ended in 12 innings? Because Pete Rose cared so much. Because after replacing Hank Aaron midway through the game, he stayed around long enough to crash into Ray Fosse instead of showering and leaving after one at-bat.

It doesn’t work that way anymore. That’s why interest in the game keeps declining. That’s why Tuesday’s catastrophe took place. The disaster hit Tuesday, but this has been building for a long time. People will say this was the last thing baseball needed, but this ending was what the All-Star Game needed most.

What if they hold a strike and nobody cares?

The New York Post reported in March that Anaheim Angels pitcher Kevin Appier is one of many farmers who receives a federal subsidy for his 270-acre Kansas farm.

Since 1996, Appier has received $4,042 in price supports and other assistance for soybeans, corn and sorghum he’s grown. Appier is in the middle of a 4-year, $42 million contract with the Angels.

David Williams of Citizens Against Government Waste told The Post, “I guess Appier is participating in the second great American pastime: taking government subsidies.”

In an interview with the Associated Press, Appier recently told a reporter that he didn’t grow up on a farm but always wanted to own one because, “I just always thought it would be neat.”

What would be really neat, Kevin, would be if you’d use your $7 million average annual salary to pay for your farm rather than taking handouts from the rest of us.

Source:

$42M Baseball Player Reaps Farm Aid. Bill Heller, New York Post, March 27, 2002.

Roger Clemens became only the sixth pitcher in modern baseball history to acheive a 16-1 record. The last person to post a 16-1 record was Dave McNally, who did it while pitching for the Baltimore Orioles in 1969.

Still, the best quote in ESPN’s story on the record and the Yankees’ 10-3 win over the Tampa Bay Devil Rays came from losing Devil Rays pitcher Paul Wilson who gave up a three-run homer to Clay Bellinger in the 7th inning. As Wilson put it, “It was a good ballgame until that three-run homer.”

Salon.Com’s Allen Barra makes the case that in all of the hype over Barry Bonds’ incredible home run numbers (for those who don’t follow baseball, he’s on track to break Mark McGwire’s already ridiculous record of 70), sports reporters are missing the bigger picture: Bonds is on track to have one of the best seasons every by a hitter.

Barra is measuring hitters by what he thinks is the formual that best measures hitter performance (and I tend to agree) — Slugging Average multiplied by On Base Percentage (sometimes called SLOB or alternatively Batter Run Average). Other measures like RBIs, and Runs Scored are too dependent on the players hitting before and after a player in the lineup, and there isn’t necessarily much of a factor in determining overall contribution to scoring by a given batter.

Anyway, at this point in the season, Bonds SLOB rating is an incredible .4418. Only one player has ever maintained a higher rating over an entire season — Babe Ruth who in 1920 managed an amazing .4506.

Barra doesn’t think Bonds has a chance of maintaining this pace. But then who thought McGwire would ever hit 70. Either way, Bonds is putting on a show unlikely to be repeated anytime soon. Enjoy.

The baseball world is finally rid of Albert Belle, who was a poster child for spoiled, self-indulgent athletes. But what made Belle probably the worst behaved professional athleted of the 1990s was that on top of spoiled and self-indulgent, Belle was just plain mean. How mean?

Who can forget the 1995 World Series in which Belle directed a string of obscenities at NBC reporter Hannah Storm. Storm was waiting in the dugout for a prearranged interview with Kenny Lofton, but that didn’t stop Belle from taking offense and trying to throw Storm out. Later he actually tried to excuses his behavior by saying he thought Storm was Leslie Visser.

How mean? In 1996, Belle was leading in home runs when he belted his 21st out of the park. Belle requested a meeting with the fan who caught the home run. It’s customary in that situation for the fan to give the home run ball back in exchange for an autographed ball. Belle proceeded to cuss out the fan and told him he wouldn’t be getting sh– for the home run ball (and the fan left the park with the ball).

The same year he threw two baseballs at a Sports Illustrated photographer (he once beaned a fan with a baseball during a game after the fan taunted Belle about his much-publicized bouts with alcoholism). In another infamous incident, after a couple kids threw eggs at his condominium because Belle refused to hand out candy. Belle got in his car and came darn close to running down one of the kids. He was charged with willful disregard of safety and fined $100.

And of course any number of teams would gladly pay his ridiculously high salary at the drop of a hat if it weren’t for his arthritic hip. Lets be honest — if by some miracle Rae Carruth were released from jail this spring, there would be several teams lining up to pay him good money.