Hey all,

I am going to be in New York this weekend, but I decided against shelling out the money to go see the game live at Madison Square Garden.  Are there any Zag fans in the New York area who might be interested in gathering at a bar somewhere to watch the game?  It would be great not to be outnumbered by Duke fans.

Hope to see some of you there!

x x x 

As being the Most Disappointing Team of the season .  The M's "won" a matchup against the Tigers, Mets, Rockies, Padres, and Indians.  Take that, all you other fans of bad teams!

I, for one, am grateful to have our suffering legitimized by the national sports media.  It's amazing that the pro-M's hype was widespread enough that 9 out of 19 of ESPN's "experts" picked Seattle to win the AL West.  I particularly liked Crasnick's suggestion that the team trade Bedard for a left-handed reliever, a young OF prospect, and some minor leaguers.

Giuliani in Hospital With Flu-Like Symptoms

Isn't "flu-like symptoms" baseball code for a hangover?                                                                                                              

with one huge glaring exception.  

Caple's article offers up a reasoned rebuttal to the hordes of rabid sportswriters and fans who hate A-rod for his arrogance, phoniness, and supposed un-clutchiness.  

He makes several great points about how talent matters far more than chemistry and all that junk, but then he gets to this:

I understand people worrying that signing A-Rod would preclude their team from obtaining other necessary players. But that's a needless concern. Signing someone like A-Rod, Derek Jeter or Manny Ramirez to a contract for $20 million to $25 million per year isn't what hurts a team financially. It's signing the likes of Jeff Weaver for $8 million and Richie Sexson for $15 million, then trading for Horacio Ramirez and his $2 million salary (not that I have any particular team in mind). As Bill Veeck once said, "It isn't the high price of stars that is expensive; it's the high price of mediocrity." In that sense, signing A-Rod might help financially, because you'll be less likely to waste your money on some stiff who won't produce (hello, Adrian Beltre).

Ah, Jim, you had me right up until those last two words!

In Jayson Stark's ESPN column on Colorado's Game 1 win over Arizona, he spends a few paragraphs going on about Brad Hawpe's amazing ability to hit Brandon Webb, based on his 2007 record against him of 11/17 with 13 RBIs.  After interviewing other Rockies about Hawpe's dominance and even suggesting that Hawpe should make a "How to Hit Brandon Webb" video, he finally interviews Hawpe himself, who says:

"Aw, he's tough ... and it's just a small handful of at-bats. It's not like it's 500 ABs or something."

And with that, Hawpe has displayed more baseball knowledge than the majority of players, managers, columnists, and fantasy baseball enthusiasts.

From a Yahoo Sports feature on the Tigers' lineup:

"Carlos is probably one of the clutchest hitters in the game," says hitting coach Lloyd McClendon. "He loves those situations." Guillen also has deceptive power. "His legs and his butt are as strong as anybody's," McClendon says. "He uses that to generate power."

I can't believe the Mariners let this marketing opportunity go by:  "You can't beat our shortstop's butt!  Mariners Baseball - get all of it!"

I didn't see this discussed anywhere else, so here goes:  Ichiro got named to his 7th AS game, and Putz got named to his first.  Wooooooooooooooo!

Notable AL snubs: Joe Mauer, Gary Sheffield, Kevin Youkilis, Jeremy Bonderman, Roy Halladay...

Anybody else?                                                                        

Vidro, on reacting to the recent changes in baseball teams' alcohol policies, from ESPN's article:

http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/news/story?id=2874252

"To be honest, I think it's us as human beings who should decide what is good and bad for us. When and where to [drink]. We should police ourselves," said Mariners designated hitter Jose Vidro, a veteran of 11 seasons in the major leagues.

Vidro said he and fellow Mariners were saddened by Hancock's death.

"Man, we've got such a beautiful life. We've got such a beautiful job," said Vidro, who is earning $7.5 million this season.

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/baseball/282395_mbok24.html

It contrasts the Mariners' # of pitches seen with the Yankees' and has some interesting quotes from Pentland and Hargrove:

 "It's not a philosophical thing. It's our philosophy to get in good hitters' counts," manager Mike Hargrove said. "I think it's a combination of hitters' styles and the fact that we have younger hitters, less experienced hitters."

It also talks about TJ Bohn's first MLB at-bat, and has this hilarious quote:

"I know Hargrove uses his bench guys a lot and I knew it was a possibility," Bohn said Wednesday.

Hmm, I think a coupla guys named Lawton and Petagine might disagree with that statement.

It looks like Carvajal has been traded to the Devil Rays for RHP Jose De La Cruz:

http://www.rotoworld.com/content/playerpages/player_main.asp?sport=MLB&id=613

Has anybody seen anything about this someplace besides rotoworld?  And anybody know anything about De La Cruz?

More characters needed.  More characters needed.  More characters needed.

I'm just curious if anybody thinks that Choi could be a possibility for our Left-Handed Sock.  I haven't heard him mentioned in any trade rumors, except that Boston might try to acquire him now that Olerud's retired.  It sounds like the Dodgers aren't too fond of him, so maybe they'd let him go for relatively cheap?  Sure, he doesn't play LF, but he could make a fine DH.  Is he too much of a three-true-outcomes player for the M's to go for?

Now that there seems to be some talk of trading for Pavano, I'm curious ... where would he fit in on the chart that Jeff made last Friday.  Dave's latest post at USSM http://ussmariner.com/?p=3101 says that the M's think he's "perfect for Safeco field", so I'm wondering ... does the data support this?

Check out this article by David Gassko in the Hardball Times on Ichiro's steady pattern of decline over the past five years, ignoring 2004.  It shows an interesting correlation between Ichiro's batting average on ground balls and his batting average overall (not too surprising, really).  Gassko concludes that it's opposing teams' defenses -- not Ichiro slowing down -- that is resulting in fewer ground balls becoming hits.

http://www.hardballtimes.com/main/article/whatever-happened-to-ichiro/

Personally, I think it's a pretty convincing argument, but it still is puzzling.  Ichiro has always been able to make adjustments in the past to overcome whatever tricks opposing pitchers and defenses try to throw at him.  And you can't just dismiss last year as a complete anomaly, can you?