SportsDystopia

For the Mets and the Brewers, the 2008 season came down to game 162 and the final Sunday of the season.  The two teams had staged an epic race from the playoffs, both surrendering impressive leads for the 2nd straight season.  Both teams had utterly depleted bullpens and injury riddled starting rotations.  New York had played it’s ace on Saturday, throwing Johan Santana on 3 days rest to try to save their season.  He went 9 shutout innings and allowed 3 hits.  But on Sunday, the Brewers’ CC Sabathia was able to match those 9 innings and circumvent his incindiary bullpen.  The Mets’ Oliver Perez was not.  He left in the 6th inning, with the game tied 2-2.  And that was the season.

Sabathia wanted this win every much as Santana wanted yesterday’s game, and he held the Cubs to 1 unearned run in the 2nd.  In the 8th, with the score tied, he bare-handed a bouncing comebacker to the mound to end the inning.  In the bottom half, Ryan Braun hit a 2-run homer, providing Sabathia with all the cushion he needed.

The White Sox stopped their 5-game skid behind Mark Buehrle, and will play Detroit on Monday to make-up a game rained out by the remnants of Hurricane Ike.  Gavin Floyd will face Freddy Garcia, in a meeting of pitchers traded for each other two years ago.  And if they win, the White Sox will then get to play Minnesota Tuesday in Chicago, after the Twins stopped their post-Sox skid by beating the Royals.  If the Sox win tomorrow, the Tuesday pitching matchup will be John Danks vs. Nick Blackburn.

Your Division Series matchups:

NL: Cubs vs. Dodgers, Phillies vs. Brewers

AL: Angels vs. Red Sox, Rays vs. Twins/White Sox

Predictions to come tomorrow…

With the New York Mets’ playoff hopes running on fumes, team ace Johan Santana met with manager Jerry Manuel, and demanded to be started Saturday on 3 days rest.  The originally scheduled starter for the Mets was Jonathon Niese, with a 7.07 ERA after only 3 career MLB outings.  But Santana stepped up and asked for the ball, and the result was a 2-0 victory over the Marlins, and a 3-hit shutout by Santana that ranks as one of the most impressive pitching performances in recent memory.  The much maligned bullpen got to take the day off, as he left nothing to chance.

The win meant that the Mets were tied with the Brewers in the wild-card race, after Milwaukee dropped a hideous 7-3 game to the Cubs.  Ben Sheets lasted just 2 and 1/3 innings in his first start since leaving a game earlier in the month with forearm tightness.  Making the loss even more bitter was that the Cubs were in full-out rest mode, with all of their everyday players getting the day off, but the Chicago back-ups and September call-ups rapped out 11 hits and scored 7 runs.  And when Milwaukee had scored 3 runs in the 7th and 8th innings to cut the deficit to 4-3, their closer Salomon Torres promptly surrendered a 2 run home run to Kosuke Fukudome, and left the game without having recorded an out.

In the AL, Minnesota lost 4-2 to the Royals, surrendering an opportunity to essentially ice the Central division, as the White Sox were also on their way to another ugly loss to Cleveland.  This meant that the Twins and Sox had gone 0-4 so far on the weekend, neither team able to make any sort of move in the standings.  But then, maybe that’s appropriate, considering that the teams have been separated by no more than 2 and a half games for the last two months.

If it weren’t for a beautiful performance by Johan Santana, it would have been one ugly Saturday.

On Friday afternoon, Cubs manager Lou Pinella announced his rotation for the NL Divisional Series.  His game 1 starter will be Ryan Dempster, followed by Carlos Zambrano, Rich Harden, and if necessary, Ted Lilly will take the hill in game 4.  Though Zambrano has been the Cubs ace over the last several years, Dempster has been nearly unbeatable at home this year, posting a record of 14-3 with a 2.86 ERA in the Friendly Confines, where he has also held opponents to a .229 batting average.  The question mark going forward is Rich Harden, who has struggled with his control lately, walking 11 batters over his last 11 innings pitched.  Harden has also seen a sudden and ominous drop in his velocity, with his fastball registering in the mid 80’s the last time out.  It seems like a clear sign he’s hiding an injury of some type, but as usual, the Cubs aren’t talking.  As I never tire of reminding people, this is the organization that once trotted out “The Mark Prior Towel Drill” to reassure fans of the health of a star pitcher.

It’s not easy being a Cubs fan, but it would certainly be alot easier if the Tribune Company hadn’t held such a naked disregard for the intelligence of it’s fan base these last few years.  Though I’m enthused that the Cubs will enter the playoffs as the NL’s favorite, I’ll be tempering my optimism.  Games 6 and 7 of the LCS in 2003 were a chorus-line kick to the balls that I’m not eager to relive.

This week’s meeting between the Chicago White Sox and Minnesota Twins has recieved considerably less attention in the media than it should have, given that it is the only head-to-head meeting between playoff contenders this week.  The media has preferred to cast it’s eye on the ups and downs of the Milwaukee Brewers and New York Mets, waiting breathlessly to see which organization will endure it’s 2nd straight hideous September collapse.  It’s understandable, as it’s a much easier headline.  But the Sox/Twins showdown represents more than just two teams fighting for the AL’s last playoff opening.  For one thing, it’s baseball’s two best minds, Ron Gardenhire and Ozzie Guillen head-to-head in what has quietly been one of the game’s best rivalries for several years now.  For another, it represents a missed opportunity to ask the question of why these two teams are here, fighting for this playoff spot, when the pre-season favorites in Detroit and Cleveland are nowhere to be seen.

It might surprise you to learn that the White Sox have the 5th highest payroll in baseball this year, at 121 million, even more than the crosstown rival Cubs who are percieved as the city’s big spending team. (Though that will soon change, as Carlos Zambrano’s and Alfonso Soriano’s big deals are both back-loaded)  Historically, however, the White Sox have been a spendthrift organization, and their 6 players making over 10 million this year (Jim Thome, Mark Buehrle, Paul Konerko, Javier Vazquez, Orlando Cabrera and Jose Contreras) have ultimately not had as much to do with their success as Ozzie’s ability to fit his pieces into a winner.  Though GM Kenny Williams has made some shrewd moves and pickups in his tenure, most notably Carlos Quentin and Bobby Jenks, the Sox do not have a clear organizational philosophy, something that could hurt them down the road.

Then there’s the Twins.

They are baseball’s best organization, and no one else is even close.  The only other team in the last decade to have the patience to stick to an overall philosophy in the same way is Oakland.  But while Billy Beane gets the headlines for his trades that keep the A’s organization stocked with talent, those trades have often come at the expense of the on-field product.  Beane’s philosophy is of course well known, detailed in the book Moneyball.  He believes in the Bill James philosophy of On-Base Percentage, opposes the stolen base and bunting for fear of an out, and will never hire a manager that doesn’t stick to the script.  Ultimately, he doesn’t believe in situational baseball, he believes in percentages, which, even when the A’s have been successful in the past decade, has led to playoff ousters against teams led by managers capable of applying situational baseball, most notably Joe Torre’s Yankees and Ron Gardenhire’s Twins.  This year, the A’s have baseball’s worst offense, and prospects aren’t good that next year will be much better.

Meanwhile, Minnesota’s organizational philosophy consists of 3 things: Speed, defense, and pitchers that don’t walk people.  They believe in manufacturing runs the old school way with bunting and stolen bases, the opposite of Billy Beane’s moneyball, and Ron Gardenhire is the best manager in the game at playing exactly that type of baseball.  The Twins year after year are the most fundamentally sound club in the game.  And while other teams struggle with inconsistent young pitchers, the Twins have success, because from day one, their pitchers are taught to pitch inside the zone. 

Witness what they’ve done this year, with a rotation consisting of rookies Nick Blackburn and Glen Perkins, 2nd year Kevin Slowey, 4th year Scott Baker, and Francisco Liriano, who like Baker debuted in 2005, but missed all of last year following Tommy John surgery.  Given the eye-popping success Liriano has had with the Twins when healthy, it’s easy to forget he was not a highly regarded prospect before he came to the organization, a throw-in part of the trade that sent AJ Pierzynski to San Francisco.

The Twins opening day payroll this year was 62 Million, ranking them 24th in the Majors.  It amazes me that while other clubs like the Blue Jays have been willing to emulate Oakland’s philosophy with limited success, not one of the small-market teams has tried to follow the road-map to build a yearly contender that the Twins have shown to be eminently readable. 

A quick rundown of yesterday’s action and how the last 5 days of the season are shaping up…

In the NL, the Mets cruised to a 6-2 win over the Cubs, and mostly avoided the troubled bullpen with Johan Santana pitching 8 dominant innings, and Luis Ayala threw an uneventful 9th  They maintained their 1 game lead over Milwaukee in the Wild Card chase.  The Brewers were on the verge of yet another collapse, after they blew two leads against the Pirates.  Salomon Torres then allowed a walk and a hit in the top of the 9th with  the game tied 5-5, but managed to escape the inning unscathed, and Prince Fielder hit a 2 run walk-off home run.  It was one of those moments that can lift a struggling team, a lift the Brewers sorely needed.  They will throw CC Sabathia today on 3 days rest for a 2nd straight outing, as they are very short on options in the rotation.  Sabathia will face Paul Maholm tonight, who has very quietly been one of the best and most reliable starters in baseball over the last 3 months.  After last night, Milwaukee has the momentum, but this is a team that has a serious history of falling asleep at the wheel in just such moments, and if Sabathia shows wear from his heavy use tonight, Milwaukee’s season is all but over.

The Dodgers crushed the Padres, and Arizona was out of it early against the Cardinals when Randy Johnson gave up 4 first inning runs, ending any serious hopes of contention in the NL West race.  The Dodgers remain a serious threat to make a deep run in October, as no two hitters in baseball are as hot as Manny Ramirez and Andre Ethier have been this month. 

In the AL, the Twins jumped all over Javier Vazquez and cut the White Sox’s lead to 1 and a half games.  Ozzie Guillen called on his pitcher to step up, but Vazquez didn’t deliver, and the 2nd inning home run he gave up to Jason Kubel was one of the hardest hit balls of the season.  Tonight’s matchup will feature Mark Buehrle against rookie Nick Blackburn, who has looked very tired of late.  The Sox can still clinch the division by winning the last 2 games of the series, but Minnesota has been the toughest home team in the majors the last few years, which was why Guillen recognized the importance of winning the opener.  He didn’t get it, but you have to figure the Sox have the edge in tonight’s matchup, with Buehrle on the mound. 

With his White Sox set to face Minnesota in what will be the AL Central’s deciding series, Sox manager Ozzie Guillen publicly called out Javier Vazquez, his Tuesday starter.

When asked by the Chicago Sun-Times about Vazquez’s credentials as a big game starter, Guillen replied “He hasn’t been.  That’s the bottom line.”  He went on to say “What you see is what you get.  Javy is going to be Javy.  I just want him to be aggressive, throw the ball over the plate and knock somebody on their ass.  That’s a big three games for us.”

While some in the media have questioned whether or not it was the right move, it fits cleanly into what he has always done as Sox manager, namely deflecting media attention away from his players onto himself, and then publicly calling out one of the guys in the clubhouse when Guillen feels it necessary.

Guillen’s detractors have grown more vocal throughout his tenure as White Sox manager, the most common complaint (for obvious reasons) that he needs to be muzzled by the organization.  But those detractors miss the point when they refer to him as a “loose cannon”.  Most famously, he was dubbed “The Blizzard of Oz” by former Sun-Times columnist Jay Mariotti, with whom Guillen had a well-known public feud through the years.  Guess which one of them still has a job.

Guillen is on the very short list for best manager in baseball, and a big reason for his success, in addition to his in game strategic abilities, is that he has always been able to deflect the media’s eye onto him, instead of onto his players.  It’s how he’s able to keep the pressure off the clubhouse, as in ‘05 when the Sox nearly blew their substantial division lead before going on to win the World Series with an 11-1 roll through the playoffs that ranks as one of the most dominant runs in baseball history, and it’s how he’s able to keep the Sox afloat now with the worst “on paper” team of any playoff contender, even after losing his best hitter, Carlos Quentin, for September with a broken wrist.  Like no other manager in the game, he turns his teams into more than the sum of their parts.

Also like no other manager in the game, he’s endlessly quotable and usually right.  The list of Guillen’s public feuds and dust ups is so long that just it’s greatest hits would fill a column by it’s self, so I’ll cite just one example.

“Tell that Triple-A f*ck to shut the f*ck up and start throwing strikes or he’s going to get Dusty Baker fired”, he said in May of ‘06 after Cubs pitcher Rich Hill called Sox catcher AJ Pierzynski “gutless” and “pathetic” for running over Cubs catcher Michael Barrett at the plate, which of course led to Barrett throwing a sucker punch at AJ and igniting a bench-clearing brawl.  What happened the next day?  The Cubs demoted Rich Hill to AAA.

Go ahead and keep ripping Ozzie for his public persona, if you like.  He’s more than happy to take the abuse, and never shies away from a war of words with anyone, be they players, coaches, radio, TV, or print personalities.  But be warned: by doing so, you’re playing right into his hand, and allowing him to play the game, both on and off the field, on his terms.  And as long as that’s the case, the White Sox are going to keep winning, because Ozzie Guillen understands baseball and what it takes to put a winning team on the field better than anyone in the game.

Summing up a season by calling it strange is a time-honored tradition in baseball as much as the Pirates losing or Joe Morgan talking about himself, but this year, with the Cubs going to the playoffs in back-to-back seasons for the first time in 100 years and the Rays going for the first time ever, the label actually fits.  It also saw two utterly baffling decisions regarding management in the NL Central.  The first was the hiring of Dusty Baker by the Cincinnati Reds.

Somehow Cincy failed to notice Dusty had spent 4 of the previous 5 years doing his best to utterly destroy another franchise IN THEIR DIVISION.  What the hell were they thinking?  They got to see him 18 times a year for 4 years in a row and somehow never seemed to realize that what he did best was destroy the arms of his pitchers and sit on his hands and chew his toothpick while games blew up in the Cubs’ face. 

And what’s happened this year?  He sent staff ace Aaron Harang out to pitch 4 innings of relief in an extra-inning game on 2 days rest, then started him following that relief outing on just 3 days rest.  8 starts later, Harang hit the DL with a strained forearm, his ERA having risen from 3.32 to 4.76.  His two talented rookie pitchers, Edinson Volquez and Johnny Cueto have now combined to toss 360 innings, with Volquez averaging 105 pitches per start.  He has also managed to place all 4 of his full-time starters- Harang, Bronson Arroyo, Cueto and Volquez- in Baseball Prospectus’ top 30 list for pitcher abuse, which could possibly be forgivable if the Reds had been anywhere near the playoff chase at any point in the last 4 months. 

Baseball Prospectus’ pitcher abuse points statistic gained credibility in the first place after the 2003 season, when Kerry Wood and Mark Prior were numbers 2 and 4 on the list, and both were visibly out of gas in the playoffs, with well-documented histories of injury since then.  I’m sure I don’t have to remind you who their manager was in ‘03.  In any case, it’s obvious that what Dusty’s doing is exactly what Dusty’s always done, and the Reds’ decision to hire him is absolutely inexcusable.

And of course, the other bookend is Ned Yost’s firing by the Milwaukee Brewers.

Don’t get me wrong, I have no problem with the Brew-Crew letting go of a man who’d probably be overmatched if he was managing in the Jaleco League.  But how on earth do you make that decision with just 2 weeks to play in the season?  Instead of firing Yost after the disaster that was 2007, Doug Melvin decided to wait until game 150 of this year, by which time Milwaukee had blown a 5 and a half game lead in the wild card race.  Why would GM Doug Melvin stand by him after last season’s debacle only to throw the team into turmoil when they’re still in the thick of the playoff chase?  Predictably, the firing has only worsened the state of affairs on the field, and the Brewers are just 2-4 since.  They’re only still breathing in the Wild Card race because of how awful the Mets’ bullpen is, but the Mets’ bullpen being awful doesn’t fix any problems for Milwaukee, who would have to actually win games this week to get in.  It ain’t gonna happen.

-Harrison Anderson

This has been, to put it mildly, a very strange season at the plate for Ryan Howard.  With just 8 games to play in the season, Howard’s numbers currently stand at .248, 46 HR, 141 RBI.  That isn’t just an odd line considering his batting average, historically speaking, it’s unprecedented.

Howard’s 141 RBI’s are already enough to put him at #96 on the list of all-time single season RBI leaders, and it’s likely he’ll climb a few spots on the ladder before all is said and done (He has 27 RBIs in his last 17 games, so 150 is well within reach).  I had originally set out to see who else was in the top #100 that had hit below .250 for a season.  It turned out, there wasn’t anybody.  Okay, I figured.  Howard’s been hot all month (hitting .371 for September), he’ll probably crack .250 for the year, was there anybody else under .260?  Nope.

Now I was really intrigued, so I gave the entire top 500 all-time seasons (119 RBIs and over to get into that club) a good going over.  Out of that 500, there were exactly four- that’s right, only FOUR seasons where someone had batted under .260, and I had to go pretty far down the list to find them.  The highest was Twins great Harmon Killebrew in 1962 , tied for #267 on the list with a line of .243, 48 HR, and 126 RBI.  The others, if you’re curious, were #325 Cecil Fielder in 1992 (.244, 35 HR, 124 RBI), #349 Gorman Thomas in 1979 (.244, 45 HR, 123 RBI) and #413 Jeff Kent in 1997 (.250, 29 HR, 121 RBI). 

What about the guys still in front of Howard?  Well, the lowest batting average for anybody ahead of him on the list was Roger Maris’ immortal 1961 season, which he finished at .269, 142 RBI, and of course, his 61 home runs, which are likely still the most non-chemistry influenced homers ever hit in a year.  Maris is the only other one below .275, and the entire list contains just 10 guys who hit below .300!

And if Howard can manage just 6 more RBI, he’ll crack the top 50, where there’s only one other sub .300 season, Vern Stephens in 1949, at .290 and 159 RBI.  There is an awfully big difference between .290 and .250, of course.

So, what gives?  The answer lies in the other thing he’s historically proficient at, striking out.  Howard’s on pace to break his own record for whiffs, which he set last year at 199- he has 192 entering saturday.  There is a HUGE difference in his batting average with runners on base .318, and his average with the bags empty, .190.  Howard is obviously not a terribly selective hitter, so when the sacks are empty, opposing pitchers are free to pitch outside the zone, and count on him to chase breaking balls in the dirt or high heat.

His power currently stands alone in baseball, and even after only 3 and a half seasons in the bigs, he has to be considered for anybody’s short list for most raw power at the plate ever.  If he can develop a more discerning eye for pitches in the next couple years, he could turn into the most unstoppable offensive machine the game has ever seen.

By this point, you’re probably well familiar with the controversy that has swirled around Dallas Mavericks forward Josh Howard in recent days over his comments made in July at Allen Iverson’s Charity Flag Football Game.  As usual these days for anything vaguely offensive, the reaction has been knee-jerk righteous indignation, as commentators can’t resist bludgeoning Howard, who’s become an easy target in the past few months, after he bafflingly confessed to the Dallas Morning News that he smoked weed in his free time, and then partied it up while the Mavs went down in the playoffs.

ESPN’s Stephen A. Smith called him “The franchise’s resident idiot, someone who is gainfully employed solely for his ability to bounce and shoot a basketball.”, which is 2 more reasons for him to be employed than Stephen A. Smith, as far as I can tell.  Smith claimed that “others around him respectfully stood in recognition” while Howard “spewed his rhetoric”.

Here’s the full video.  Howard’s comments come at 1:43, but if you start watching at 1:20, you’ll see there weren’t too many people on the field “standing in recognition”.

Others who’ve watched the video have also seen things that aren’t there in their eagerness to get in a free shot on Howard, like J.A. Adande, who said “the worst part isn’t in what Howard said.  It’s in the comments that follow, a free-flowing cesspool of n-words and orders to go back to Africa”.  Uh, I’m sorry, what was that J.A.?  Were we watching the same video?

Josh Howard’s comments were brief and not terribly eloquent, but I have to ask, why SHOULD a black man stand in respect for an anthem written by Francis Scott Key, a slave owner?  And why is that simple fact not mentioned in any of these commentaries that villify Howard, especially those penned by black commentators like Smith or Adande?

Even when Adande is trying to get to the heart of the matter, he still misses completely when he says “I’d bet Howard would tell you the country has been great to him. He went to college and made it to the NBA. Now his contract is being used against him, why is it that we hate it when athletes put money first, but so many believe that same money should trump their right to complain about the country?”  Again, did we watch the same video J.A.?  Howard said nothing about his country, nothing at all.  What he DID say was “Star-Spangled Banner’s goin’ on.  I don’t celebrate that sh*t.  I’m black.”  Considering who Francis Scott Key was, and the obvious hypocrisy of a man who kept slaves penning lines about “the land of the free”, how can you blame him?

Stephen A. Smith can take his free pass and call Howard “ignorant” all he likes.  It’s really Smith and his cohorts who are ignorant of the history that surrounds the Star-Spangled Banner, and it is they, the members of the media, who do us a disservice when they fail to understand or interpret the racial issues that surround the situation, and instead content themselves to take aim at the easy target.

Trailing 6-3 with 2 on and 2 outs in the bottom of the 9th, and the chaotic Brewers just one batter away from somehow taking 2 of 3 off the team with the best record in the league, Geovany Soto drove the first pitch he saw over the left center field wall, tying a game that the Cubs would eventually win in the 12th inning.  In a single moment, Soto had preserved the momentum the Cubs had gained with Carlos Zambrano’s no-hitter, and stopped the Brewers from gaining any steam in the wild card race. 

The Brewers were one batter away from back-to-back wins over the Cubs, back-to-back wins that would’ve been more than welcome for new interim manager Dale Sveum, who faces the improbable task of fixing what’s wrong with the team with just 2 weeks left to play in the season.  The win would’ve tied the Brewers with the Mets in the Wild Card chase, at least temporarily, and served notice to the NL that, internal turmoil or not, the Brew-Crew is not to be taken lightly in the playoff chase.  Instead, they will limp to Cincinnati, still looking to find the answer to what ails them, an answer that at this late date, is not likely to come.

Soto’s homer was big for the Cubs, too, who have now won 4 of their last 5 against division rivals Houston and Milwaukee, after previously dropping 8 out of 9.  A series loss to the Brew Crew would’ve raised uncomfortable questions about the Cubs’ playoff readiness.  Instead, the man who has quietly been the team’s MVP all season long needed just a single pitch to remind everyone that the Cubs aren’t going down easy this year.