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November 21, 2003
by Joe Sheehan
For the first time in a while, I didn't think there were any major mistakes in the BBWAA awards. Or more accurately, I didn't find any outcome that I couldn't understand.
That's not to say that everything was perfect. The one award that clearly went to the wrong person was the NL Rookie of the Year honor. Dontrelle Willis had the story, though, and combined with his clear advantage over Brandon Webb in the W-L column, there wasn't much doubt that Willis was going to win. It was the wrong choice, but one that had been a fait accompli for some time.
American League voters got their rookie honors right, although perhaps for the wrong reasons. Angel Berroa came from behind to grab the award, something that rarely happens with this particular balloting. Berroa was helped by the refusal of two voters to put Hideki Matsui on the ballot, despite Matsui being eligible by the rules of the voting and pretty clearly one of the top three rookies in the AL this year. The two writers, Bill Ballou and Pat Souhan, both cited Matsui's experience in Japan as a factor in their decision, and both are wrong for doing so. Matsui was a rookie, and acceptance of a ballot in this process should mean acceptance of the eligibility rules, not an opportunity to make a statement against them.
November 13, 2003
by Joe Sheehan
Five days in Phoenix would have been a lot more enjoyable if MLB hadn't gutted the Arizona Fall League schedule. No night games, no Sunday games, and no doubleheaders meant that I saw just three games in five days, as opposed to the five games in three days I saw during 2002's trip.
Nevertheless, the visit to Arizona was enjoyable, not least because I was again a part of Baseball HQ's First Pitch Arizona. Ron Shandler puts on a great program for fantasy players, more than 100 of whom were treated to analysis and opinion from John Sickels, Rob Neyer, Brent Strom, Rany Jazayerli, Jim Callis, David Rawnsley and a host of HQ's own experts.
Here's bunch of semi-connected thoughts from the weekend...
November 5, 2003
by Joe Sheehan
On Monday, The Phillies and Astros kicked off what should be an interesting off-season by making a four-player deal. The Astros swapped long-time closer Billy Wagner for three young pitchers, the most accomplished of them Brandon Duckworth. My knee-jerk reaction was that the Astros had done well for themselves. Wagner is a great closer, but he's a closer, and as such is limited in what he contributes to a team. The 'Stros have Octavio Dotel to replace those innings, and an assortment of arms to replace Dotel's workload. Moreover, I'm high on Duckworth, even after his second straight disappointing season. The deal allows the Astros to take the $8 million they had committed to Wagner and use it on a #3 starter, something they'd been playing without the last couple of years. Andy Pettitte is the likely target. A rotation of Roy Oswalt, Wade Miller, Pettitte (or another free agent), Duckworth and Jeriome Robertson would be one of the better ones in the NL. The more I thought about it, though, I didn't mind the deal from the Phillies' standpoint.
October 29, 2003
by Joe Sheehan
Monday, the Red Sox announced that they would cut ties with manager Grady Little. The decision wasn't a big surprise; Little wasn't fired as much as he wasn't re-hired, given that his contract was just about to expire. Little was never the choice of the revamped Red Sox front office. He'd gotten the job as something of a little-known compromise candidate in early 2002 and guided the team to a 93-69 record in his first season. He was inherited by the new, performance-analysis-driven front office a year ago, and kept the job as much to provide some continuity as because of any particular skills to brought to the position.
I think too much is being made of the influence on this outcome of the last major decision Little made. Little isn't unemployed this morning because he left Pedro Martinez in too long in Game Seven of the ALCS. Certainly, that decision will stick in memory for years to come, but I doubt there are a half-dozen cases in history where a manager lost his job for making one wrong move. I expect more from Theo Epstein and Larry Lucchino, and to say that Little isn't the Sox manager today because of that decision is to give them far too little credit.
October 26, 2003
by Joe Sheehan
The Marlins have a cleanup hitter too young to drink and a manager too old to drive. They're owned by a man who was a key part of one of the ugly episodes that marred MLB's integrity in the late 1990s. They drew 8,362 fans to a Memorial Day home game as years of neglect, deception and wheedling continued to hold down interest in the team. And yet, they're the champs, and they stood on one of the game's sacred spaces last night and beat back a team that was supposed to be too experienced, too well-paid, and too blessed by the gods to lose to such an upstart. As a Yankee fan, I hated it. As someone who despises the way in which Jeffrey Loria came to own the Marlins, I hated it. As a baseball fan, it was hard not to love it.
October 25, 2003
by Joe Sheehan
It's official: Josh Beckett will start Game Six for the Marlins on three days' rest, with Carl Pavanoscheduled to do the same if the Fish can't put the Yankees away tonight. I strongly disagree with this decision. It's a move you make when you're down 3-2, not up 3-2. It's a decision you make when the difference between your best pitcher and the rest of the staff so large that going with anyone else in Game Six almost guarantees a Game Seven. Neither of those apply here. The Marlins need to win just one game to be champions, and they don't get style points for winning in six. The Marlins have at least one pitcher available, in Mark Redman, who was arguably their #3 starter during the season. They certainly have Dontrelle Willis available for at least a few innings, and Willis was lights-out for a good part of 2003 and has been tough on Yankee lefties in this series. Frankly, outside of Game Five starter Brad Penny and Beckett (assuming you hold him back), the Marlins have nine pitchers who can give them at least a couple of innings, and some of those are the better pitchers on the staff. It's Pavano's throw day, so even he can give the team a couple of innings. Deciding that you'd rather start someone--two pitchers, actually--on short rest rather than use those guys is an inexplicable vote of no confidence.
October 24, 2003
by Joe Sheehan
How many people, with Ruben Sierra standing on third base Wednesday night, Aura and Mystique shaking their moneymakers just behind second base, and Mariano Rivera getting loose down the left-field line, would have figured this World Series would not only be going back to New York, but going back with the Yankees down three games to two? Other than Jack McKeon, I mean. The idea that the Yankees have some stash of special skills that only come into play in October took a huge hit the last two nights, as the Marlins not only bounced back to win Game Four in 12 innings, but took advantage of the Yankees' bad fortune and bad baseball to move within one win of their second championship in seven seasons.
October 23, 2003
by Joe Sheehan
Dear Aaron Boone: It was a home run, not diplomatic immunity. Love, Joe Boone, whose Game Seven home run won the ALCS and sent the Yankees to the World Series, has been swinging at pitches he has no hope of hitting ever since then. I looked it up, expecting to see that Boone has taken about four pitches in the World Series. It turns out that he'd actually let 25 baseballs go by in the first three games, just shy of half of the 51 pitches he'd seen. He's pushed counts to 3-2 in a number of at-bats, so it's hard to make the argument that he's not being patient enough. That said, he was horrific last night. The Yankees' three biggest chances to win the game landed in his lap, and he approached his at-bats as if it were fifth-grade gym class or a co-ed softball league with some goofy rules like "swing or you're out." Against Carl Pavano in the second inning, with the bases loaded, one out and the Yankees down 3-0, Boone swung at the only two pitches he saw and flied to center field on the second one. Sacrifice flies down three runs with the pitcher coming up aren't team baseball, they're a lifeline for the opposition. Boone got another chance in the ninth, after Ruben Sierra's triple tied the game. Boone again went up hacking, fouling off the first and third pitches he saw to fall behind 1-2, then grounding out weakly to shortstop after two more foul balls. Finally, in the 11th inning, Boone again batted with the bases loaded and one out. And just as he had against Pavano and Ugueth Urbina, he made Braden Looper's job easy by hacking at fastballs up and in, pitches he doesn't have the bat speed to hit. Boone swung at six of the seven pitches he saw, looked completely overmatched, and struck out. Three at-bats, two pitches taken out of 15 seen, three times falling behind in the count, three outs. Boone needed to have a solid approach last night, and his mental effort was completely lacking, leading to wild swings that gave the pitchers all the leverage they needed to get out of jail.
October 22, 2003
by Joe Sheehan
I tried to get inside Roger Clemens' head before his last final start, which turned out to be a mistake. I won't do that this time; I have no idea how this being his current final start will affect him. None. I do know that, this being Game Four, it is his final final start. There can't be a next final start unless.you know, I don't even want to imagine what kind of scenarios Bud Selig and Jeffrey Loria might concoct to bring us a Game Eight.
I do know that he was up in the zone in his Division Series outing against the Red Sox, which was his seventh or eighth "final start" after his final regular-season start, his final start at Fenway Park (which was only his next to final start at Fenway Park), his final start in the All-Star Game, his final start at Yankee Stadium (also just his next-to-final), his final start in a foreign country, his final start in front of a record-low crowd and his final start with nasty heartburn.
This matchup isn't as bad for the Marlins as Mike Mussina was. Clemens works up and down with the splitter and fastball, and has shown a fairly persistent reverse platoon split since joining the Yankees. With a bunch of right-handed hitters who can drive a good fastball but who will chase once they fall behind in the count, Clemens' success will again come down to getting ahead in the count and avoiding leaving his fastball up in the zone. There's not a lot of middle ground here; look for a 3.2-7-6-6-4-2 line, or a 7-4-1-1-2-10 one.
October 21, 2003
by Joe Sheehan
With no baseball games last night, I watched, or tried to watch, Monday Night Football. I cannot for the life of me fathom how people can directly compare baseball and football and conclude that baseball is boring. The pace of a pro football game is completely unbelievable, with television timeouts after nearly every possession in some stretches, regardless of length. Play, play, play, punt, break. Play, play, turnover, break. Or my favorite: towards the end of a drive, one team calls a timeout. Commercials. On the next play they score, kick the extra point, commercials. Kickoff, touchback, more commercials. You end up with one actual play run in a 12-minute stretch.
If it's interminable watching at home, what's it like at the game? I haven't been to a pro football game in nearly a decade, and the idea of sitting through that kind of stretch--10 minutes without any actual football in some spots--isn't likely to push me into breaking that streak anytime soon.
October 20, 2003
by Joe Sheehan
It's been so long since we've seen a nondescript baseball game that when we finally got one, it felt strange, and I'm left not knowing how to write about it. Think about it. For the first time in weeks, we had a day of baseball that provided no real tension, no elimination hanging over a team's head, and no question as to who would win. Other than Friday, when no games were played, we'd been riding a red-stitched roller coaster for two weeks, spoiled by games that left us on the edge of our seats, holding our breath and repairing the damage to the walls of our homes and offices. (OK, so that last one is just me.) In fact, the only think we learned yesterday was how Hideki Matsui, with just 16 home runs and a .435 slugging percentage, Matsui turned on a 3-0 fastball from Mark Redman and launched a three-run home run over the 408-foot marker in center field that put this game away early for the Yankees.
October 19, 2003
by Joe Sheehan
As you might expect from managers Joe Torre and Jack McKeon, there were plenty of decisions made in advance of Game One that provided cause for discussion.
The most significant of these was McKeon's decision to make Dontrelle Willis a reliever. This move addressed one of the Marlins' key disadvantages in facing the Yankees: the lack of a good left-handed reliever to counter the team's left-handed power late in the game. Michael Tejera is neither a specialist nor a safe bet in high-leverage situations. Willis' motion makes him tough on lefties (.216/.293/.307) and he is good enough against right-handers that he can be used for multiple innings.
The move paid immediate dividends, as Willis threw 2 1/3 shutout innings last night with the Marlins protecting a one-run lead.
October 17, 2003
by Joe Sheehan
I predict that the Marlins will be a great value bet. They can't be that big an underdog to win four out of seven games from this Yankee team. They've been outplaying the Yankees for four months, and other than the bullpen situation, they match up well with the Bombers. Whatever the odds end up being, they'll be way out of line.
I also predict that whichever teams gets to three wins, with a three-run lead and one out in the eighth inning, is just asking for trouble.
This is a much closer series than the reputations of the two teams would have you believe. It's tempting to pick the Marlins just on the basis of the edge they have hitting the ball into the Yankee defense's holes. That's worth a lot of runs, and more to a team that goes first-to-third and second-to-home a lot.
However, the Yankees, unlike the Giants and Cubs, are almost certain to not lose a game they lead in the seventh inning. Nelson and Rivera are going to shorten these games to six-inning affairs. The Marlins' great postseason has been built on overcoming bad starts and beating opposition bullpens. That's not going to work this time.
by Joe Sheehan
It's 2:32 a.m. PDT. Let me check again. Wow. It really happened.
It still doesn't seem real. Game Seven of the American League Championship Series, even now, feels more like a weird morphing of Game Six of the NLCS and Game Four of the 2001 World Series.
Three runs down... five outs left... best pitcher in the league... tiring suddenly... manager riding him... extra innings... solo home run... Yankee Stadium bedlam.
It's like a playoff edition of Mad Libs.
I gave up. I carried hope through the seventh inning, but when Alfonso Soriano was allowed to face Pedro Martinez as the tying run--I was begging for Ruben Sierra, to give you an idea of the desperation--with as much chance of hitting Martinez as he did of spontaneously combusting, I packed it in. The Sox had outplayed the Yankees, they had the best pitcher in the game pitching well, and for the umpteenth straight game, the Yanks hadn't looked good at the plate. Jason Giambi's two home runs only served to taunt Yankee fans with the thought of how either of those blasts, in one of his many high-leverage at-bats, could have made all this unnecessary.
October 16, 2003
by Joe Sheehan
If the last three weeks have taught us anything, it's that the baseball postseason is the greatest sports theatre in the world. We've seen almost every form of drama the game can provide, from game-winning home runs to stunning pitching duels to comebacks from one foot, two hands and most of a head in the grave.
Yesterday, we saw the Red Sox jump out to a 4-1 lead against a pitcher they shouldn't hit, then watched that edge disappear a half-hour later. On the road, deep into the recesses of their pitching staff, fighting wind and cold and history, the Sox could have called it a season and no one would have been surprised. They didn't, and thanks to some help from the twin weaknesses of the Yankees--defense and every non-cyborg reliever--they'll get the Game Seven they came to New York to play.
The Cubs, who could have curled up and died when Miguel Cabrera put them down 3-0 in the first inning, battled back to tie the game and then take the lead. I don't care that they lost: a team that lacks some blessed intangible doesn't even get that far, not after the events of Tuesday night.
The Marlins weren't supposed to contend, weren't supposed to win the Wild Card, weren't supposed to beat the Giants, weren't supposed to even come back to Chicago after being down 3-1 Saturday night... and their biggest problem this morning is that they'll have to wait until tonight to make their flight plans for the World Series. Well, that and finding a good hangover cure.
October 15, 2003
by Joe Sheehan
Lately, I've been doing my writing late at night, with the day's games fresh in my head. For this one, though, I had to put a night of sleep between me and what transpired. I've seen a lot of baseball in my 32 years, but the way last night's game turned was as sudden and as shocking as anything I've ever seen in baseball.
I could point to Game Six of last year's World Series, or Game Four of the 1996 Series, but those comebacks happened over a period of innings. Game Six in 1986 might be the best parallel. Just like the Red Sox, the Cubs went from a few outs away from the World Series to dead in the water in just a few minutes, and I never saw it coming. Heck, as I look over my notes, there's this gem:
It would appear I was wrong about Mark Prior.
I was. For six innings, Prior was the same awesome pitcher he'd been since coming off the disabled list in July, workload be damned. His command was a little off at times, but he wasn't giving up solid contact, and his velocity was good. There was some degradation in both areas beginning in the seventh inning, and that would become important in the eighth, but I had no idea it would lead to what we saw.
October 14, 2003
by Joe Sheehan
If you were a Yankee fan looking for a sign that Game Four was going to go differently than Game One did, Alfonso Soriano leading it off with a walk wasn't a bad one. Unfortunately, Soriano's was just about the last good plate appearance the Yankees had all game. As in Game One--and for that matter, as in most games this postseason--the Yankees treated their outs like the mashed potatoes at a Vegas buffet: eat all you want, someone will refill the tray. There was no refill, though; 27 outs later, the Red Sox had tied the ALCS at two games apiece.
This isn't the same team that scored 877 runs during the season. The Yankees are drawing about one fewer walk per game, which doesn't mean much in a four-game sample. The quality of their at-bats has fallen through the floor, however. With the exception of Bernie Williams, Yankee hitters have been jumping at the ball the whole series. They're exhibiting no patience, especially with runners on base, throwing away at-bat after at-bat after at-bat. Look at the way they're swinging: they're out in front of everything and trying to hit every ball out of the park. It's exactly the opposite of how they got here in the first place.
Right now, the Red Sox are playing better baseball than the Yankees are. They're hitting for power and their pitchers are exploiting the Yankees' sudden need to be the Cubs. The Sox won last night's game not with the sacred little things, but with the big things: home runs, good starting pitching, dominant relief.
October 13, 2003
by Joe Sheehan
I know Don Zimmer has become this cuddly-cute baseball icon, especially in New York, but the man ran across the field and took a swing at the opposing starting pitcher. Martinez, in an impossible situation with a 72-year-old man bearing down on him, did the best he could to deflect Zimmer's blow without taking aggressive action. Unfortunately for Martinez, he pushed Zimmer to the ground in the process, which made him look like a bully.
Of all the inexcuable behavior that occurred Saturday afternoon, Zimmer's actions were the most out of line. The Yankees' milked the situation by having Zimmer taken to the hospital in an ambulance. I know they said he was dizzy and had a pulled muscle, but it looked for all the world like a publicity stunt designed to make Martinez and the Red Sox look as bad as possible.
I'm not excusing anyone, but take the individual names off of the page and just describe what happened: a coach ran across the field and tried to punch the other team's starting pitcher. Just because the coach has been in baseball since before chewing tobacco and the pitcher was a jerk who might well have deserved to be decked doesn't change the fundamental fact that the act was so far out of line as to be absurd. The situation could have been so much worse; it's entirely possible that Martinez could have hurt himself dodging the blow, in which case you would have had the Sox' ace taken out of the game by the Yankees' bench coach.
October 11, 2003
by Joe Sheehan
In a game that could have been lost many times, Dusty Baker did all the right things to win.
That line may not ring true, given how strenuously I criticized Baker in Thursday's column and in a number of others this year. All of those criticisms still hold, which doesn't change the fact that Baker made the right decisions Friday to help the Cubs take a 2-1 lead in the NLCS.
The biggest thing Baker did was use his best pitchers in the biggest situations. In the 11th inning, nursing a one-run lead, Baker rode Mike Remlinger through a series of Marlin hitters who hammer left-handers rather than go to the inferior right-handers left in his pen. Baker not only correctly overrode platoon considerations, but left the closer myth behind as well, choosing the guy with one save in three years ahead of former closers Antonio Alfonseca and Dave Veres.
October 10, 2003
by Joe Sheehan
In the wake of the A's' loss to the Red Sox in the Division Series, the fourth straight year in which they've bowed out in the first round, there's been a maelstrom of psychoanalysis, criticism, and...oh, what's a good Chris Kahrl word?...foofaral! Yes, there's been foofaral a-plenty as talking heads, and some thinking ones, try to explain four straight series losses. Many of the rationalizations are flat-out wrong, even counterfactual. There's still a popular notion that the A's are a "sabermetric" team, following the walks-and-power, damn-the-defense approach that defined them back in the late 1990s. Actually, the A's are a pitching-and-defense team, have been for two years now, and were especially so this year with the addition of Chris Singleton and the commitment to Mark Ellis at second base. Accusations that the A's lose in the postseason because they can't play defense are patently absurd. The A's prevent runs far, far better than they score them. What they don't do is score enough runs; in fact, the Red Sox triumph over the A's should be see as a validation of troglodyte baseball. The Sox are much better offensively and don't have a real good defensive team outside of a few players. They won, so where is all the praise for that approach? (I'll leave it to the reader to discern where these facts intersect with the media's preconceived notions.)
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