JTC2784

Jerry made the moves that seemed right and really who can question letting Colon go into the ninth and then using Marte? It was the players that's for sure. Not JM's fault tonight. I don't get the Marte move... why not bring Marte in before the IBB knowing that Aurilia (RH hitter) is available to face Marte? If you bring him in one hitter earlier (while 1B was open), he can pitch around Aurilia himself, thus leaving him the possibility of NOT facing a dangerous hitter (RH hitter at that) with the bases loaded. Good point here. Also, letting Marte issue the IBB would qualify as his required one batter faced, then if the Giants decided to pinch hit RA at that point, JM could have made a pitching change. Exactly. ...though the righty warming up in the 'pen was Gordon... but that's beside the point...

Jerry made the moves that seemed right and really who can question letting Colon go into the ninth and then using Marte? It was the players that's for sure. Not JM's fault tonight. I don't get the Marte move... why not bring Marte in before the IBB knowing that Aurilia (RH hitter) is available to face Marte? If you bring him in one hitter earlier (while 1B was open), he can pitch around Aurilia himself, thus leaving him the possibility of NOT facing a dangerous hitter (RH hitter at that) with the bases loaded. Good point here. Also, letting Marte issue the IBB would qualify as his required one batter faced, then if the Giants decided to pinch hit RA at that point, JM could have made a pitching change. Exactly.

It's Fair Ball: a Fan's Case for Baseball".

The problem was that he didn't have anyone warming up in the 'pen 'til after the homer. If I were JM, I wouldn't have IBB'd Alfonzo; I would have just brought Marte in right there and then to face Alfonzo. Even though he's a righty, JM probably shoulda known that Alou had Aurilia on the bench available to PH. Pitch to Alfonzo and his .214 average. Hell, Alfonzo was 0-for-3. Maybe they would have PH for him instead of for Bernard. Pitch around Aurilia with 1B open. Though there are a million and one things that could have happened, I think more good could have come out of it than what actually happened had JM brought in Marte to face Alfonzo.

Jerry made the moves that seemed right and really who can question letting Colon go into the ninth and then using Marte? It was the players that's for sure. Not JM's fault tonight. I don't get the Marte move... why not bring Marte in before the IBB knowing that Aurilia (RH hitter) is available to face Marte? If you bring him in one hitter earlier (while 1B was open), he can pitch around Aurilia himself, thus leaving him the possibility of NOT facing a dangerous hitter (RH hitter at that) with the bases loaded.

I woulda laughed at you 'cause the 'Spos would never have given up Vlad for Maggs... money considered.

It's definitely a good read. Even if you don't agree with what he says, he brings up a lot of facts that were at least new to me (and supports the arguments well enough to make you agree with what he says, or at least see the rationale behind the arguments). I highly recommend it, especially for $4.99 at the bargain books section at Barnes & Noble

That's news to me If you put the Sox in the "not competitive" category, then you'd have at least 10-12 teams in that group. We don't need to get rid of that many teams...just 2, 3, or maybe 4. Not only that, but the Sox are #5 (I think) in TV revenues. That's a much bigger piece of the pie for MLB.

The only knock on Vladdy is his errors...12 in '97, 17 in '98, 19 in '99, 10 in '00, 12 in '01, 10 in '02. Other than that, he's the best IMO.

I thought this was about Mauer vs. Reed. I think everyone agrees that Prior beats the hell out of Mauer....

Yes... not yet even 19 here

Sadaharu, to you!

Any time. If you ever go to Japan, definitely catch a baseball or hockey game. It's definitely an experience.

I've been to baseball games. Several Yomiuri Giants games, several Seibu Lions games, and a couple of games against the MLB All-stars (saw Black Jack's game in '93 I think). Believe it or not, it's far rowdier over there at ball games, though in a much more controlled manner. Each team (home AND visiting) has its own cheering section with a band and everything (like a collegiate football game). Each player has his own specialized song and cheer for him every time he's at bat (during the at-bat). They play the song on their horns, followed by what would translate as, "Slug it, slug it (name)!" They wave giant banners and flags in the cheering secions. Each and every play is applauded. The fans there are the most devoted fans I've seen by far (though I only have Sox games, Cub games, and Mariner games to refer to). As for the broadcasting, they know more about the game than any ML announcer seems to (or at least they show it a hell of a lot more) and get more excited about the game than the Chipster himself. They seem to get more and more excited with each and every pitch, and keep rolling stats off their tongues to keep the interest of the viewer ("so and so is 15-for-50 in his career after fouling off 3 outside pitches with a runner on 3rd and fewer than 2 outs, but he's been held to .203 against this pitcher in his career... let's see how this plays out"). But we digress.... MB needs to start winning some games!

MB's gotta get out of the first and get a good second started... that's his key.

Well, I was born in '84, but I didn't follow ML baseball 'til '93... I moved to Japan when I was 3, and followed the Seibu Lions of the Pacific Leage over there . When we moved back for a bit in '93, I started following the Sox... moved back to Japan for 2 more years, came back here, and the rest is history ( again)

I really can't say I 'remember' any season before '93.

Or do you blame the old roman himself for underpaying the players and not hearing Jackson's case when Jackson went up to tell him what was going on?

Like someone said, a lot of high school players develop their "pop" after a couple of years in the minors. Also, a catcher hitting .300 and playing solid D is much harder to find than a CF playing solid D and hitting .300. You just don't find offensive catchers that can play D too often.

With JM calling the shots and with it being MB's arb. year, they'll keep putting him on the mound. Money over pride.

Just read Costas' book... it seriously looks at these very issues, in addition to revenue sharing. Here's his basic proposal (if I recall correctly): 1) move Houston to the AL West. They don't have much of a history in the NL, and it'll have the Texas rivalry going all year. It'll also balance each division at 5 teams. 2) stop having spurts of interleague play. In other words, don't have ALL teams having interleague play at once. Since there'd be an odd number of teams in each league, somebody would (by numbers) have to play someone else from the other league on a given day. 3) no unbalanced schedule. 4) no wild card. Have the top team in each division (who should have no schedule advantage because of the balanced schedule) get a playoff bye from the best-of-5 first round. They can play their minor leaguers and have intrasquad games if they want to stay sharp and maybe rake in a few extra dollars from people like us that'd go see those intrasquad games 5) day games in the World Series (he proposes this only for the sake of tradition) 6) NO MORE Cubs-Sox, Yanks-Mets, A's-Giants types of matchups every year. (he proposes this for the sake of knocking off a few interleague games to help maintain a balanced schedule) I can't remember a lot of the other points he made, but he definitely backs his arguments up very very well. He also discusses revenue sharing (should be percentage of ticket sales/broadcast revenue; not percentage of salary)

But would you agree that he should be reinstated before Pete Rose? Technically his "lifetime ban" should have expired at the time of his death anyway, no?

Like I've said... he may be as "ready" as anyone, and, under the circumstances, I'd rather have him up here struggling and have Borchard in AAA working on his swing in a lower-pressure situation.

This brings up another question... how much longer until it happens to the Sox????

He was stellar last year until they put him in the rotation... Just give him regular BP work and I think he'll be fine.