Better luck next time?

I and every true Packer fan woke up this morning with a sore right elbow. Sympathy pains for Brett Favre? Yes, but mostly from throwing the remote at the referees on TV. I'm going to spend the next hour watching Animal Planet and rooting against the zebras.



I can't completely blame the refs, nor the injuries - Favre, Charles Woodson, Kabeer Gbaja-Biamila - but obviously both were factors. The game-calling in those first 20 minutes was atrocious, especially when you see how well the dinking-and-dunking was working later in the game. And why did we decide we couldn't run against the Cowboys, even when they were dropping five guys back into coverage? Every play-action, Ryan Grant runs untouched while Favre heaves into double coverage. It didn't make any sense. Not going for it on fourth-and-inches in the fourth quarter also was a dumb call. Yeah, Mason Crosby kicked the figgie and we needed two scores, but I would've gone for it.

But the refs blew three huge calls. Al Harris stripping the ball from Terrell Owens, but no, it was uh... huh. The horrible spot in the fourth quarter that led to the field goal - it appeared Grant had the first down. And the ridiculous pass interference call when Miles Austin whined and whined until a flag came out 30 seconds - literally, if you didn't see the game - after the play ended. All were terrible calls. If just one of them goes our way, maybe the outcome is different.

I guess the news with Favre is as good as we could have hoped - he expects to be back for their next game, which isn't until Dec. 9. As for Woodson and KGB, I expected them to play last night, so who knows.

Worst of all it almost guarantees we'll be back in Dallas for the NFC championship. We have four games left - home against Oakland, at St. Louis, at Chicago, home against Detroit. We could (should?) go 4-0 against that slate, which leaves us at 14-2. But the Cowboys are at Detroit, home against Philadelphia, at Carolina, at Washington. They too could run the table. But maybe they lose one - that still leaves us tied, with the Cowboys holding the tiebreaker. So we need to win out and have the Cowboys go 2-2. Possible, but not probable.

I guess I have to be a Lions fan next week...



Wow, two lions videos in one post. Maybe it's a good sign for Detroit!

Will the status quo be good enough?

The Yankees are putting the band back together.



I was hoping for two out of the big three - Alex Rodriguez, Mariano Rivera and Jorge Posada - and they got all three. And Andy Pettitte is still flirting with retirement, but he might be back, too. For all the talk after the Cleveland series about the end of the dynasty (which has been pronounced "ended" every year since 2001), the 2008 Yankees may be the same team as the 2007 Yankees.

Guys like Steve Phillips like to say that's not good enough. The Yankees can't be as good as they were last year -- they have to be better. Because, after all, they didn't win the World Series last year, so they have to try to be better, right? (Yes, these are the same guys who say every year that the Yankees are stupid for thinking they can win the World Series every year.)

But which 2007 Yankees will these 2008 Yankees be? The first half of 2007, when their Opening Day starter was Carl Pavano, and when the rest of the rotation was whoever could make the next train from Scranton?

Apparently Phillips thinks the Yankees will tie the Major League record they set last year by using 10 different starters (six of them rookies) in their first 30 games.

Let's remember: At the end of May, 22-29. At the end of September, 94-68. That's 72-39 -- a .649 winning percentage. Over a full season, that's 105 wins.

The same team, but with a better manager, a full year of Joba and Hughes, and a reasonable, non-record setting number of injuries? I'll take the status quo.

All I ask is a decent lefty in the 'pen... and better bug spray.

Posada's Pay-Day

You'd be smiling too, if you just got a $13.1 million a year contract.

Yes, following the 2010 season, this may look like a lousy deal. But I think the Yankees did what they had to do to re-sign Jorge Posada, closing what would have been a far bigger hole than the one at third base.

It's true that we won't be able to find a third baseman with 54 home runs, 156 runs batted in and a 1.067 OPS -- or even one with 35 HRs, 139 RBIs and a .915 OPS, what Alex Rodriguez did in his "off year" of 2006. But the drop-off from A-Rod to whoever plays third for the Yankees, even if it's a worst-case-scenario platoon of Wilson Betemit and Aaron Bleeping Boone, won't be as ugly as the drop from Posada to Jason LaRue or Damian Miller or Yorvit Torrealba. Now that Posada's off the market, the best option available is arguably Paul Lo Duca, who hit .272 but with a ridiculously empty .689 OPS, or maybe Michael Barrett, who hit .244 with a .653, but is a guy a smart organization would target with a one-year make-good contract. After that it's all guys who should be back-ups.

Posada isn't a great defensive catcher. Over the years, he's improved when it comes to throwing out baserunners -- from awful to below average -- and for a lot of people, that's the only factor they consider when it comes to evaluating a catcher's defense. But Jorge allows a lot of passed balls -- 13 in 1111.3 innings last year. On the ESPN leader board, that's the fourth-most in the majors. That doesn't count all the wild pitches that are charged to the pitcher but that an average catcher probably could have blocked. And when you watch a Yankee game, what's even more frustrating are the pitches that simply pop out of his glove. The ball doesn't get far enough away for the runner to advance, or there's no one on base anyway, so it doesn't go down as a passed ball. But how often is an umpire going to give you a strike if the catcher drops the ball?

All that said, here's a catcher coming off a career year -- .338 BA, .426 OBP, .543 SLG -- in a very weak market for free agent catchers. To quote Teddy KGB, "Pay that man his money."



Jorge isn't likely to put up those numbers again, so what's a reasonable projection for next year? How about he hits .262 with a .782 OPS, which is what he did in 2005 -- his worst numbers since '99, when he was still sharing the job with his new manager. That seems like a reasonable expectation for a minimum level of production for the next two or three years.

That's 100 more points in OPS than you'll get from any other catcher on the market. And 100 points in OPS makes up for a lot of passed balls.

Donnie Baseball or Joltin' Joe Girardi-O?

The New York Daily News and Sports Illustrated's Jon Heyman reported today that Joe Girardi will be the next Yankee manager.

I don't buy it.

I think it will be Don Mattingly. And more than that, I think it should be Mattingly. Or at least, shouldn't be Girardi.

The Daily News had this lovely little chart today with the pros and cons for each managerial candidate -- Girardi, Mattingly and Tony Pena, who, let's face it, was there just to fulfill the MLB requirement that you speak to a minority. (After Pena interviewed, the headline on the back of the New York Post should have been: "The Token Has Spoken.")

Anyway, so here's this chart that was in the Daily News today:



I don't think you can disagree with the idea that, when it comes to the '08 Yankees, the most important category out of those four is "handling of pitching staff." Phil Hughes, Joba Chamberlain and Ian Kennedy are three terrific young arms, and Chien-Ming Wang has to get straightened out. After 12 years of watching Torre falling asleep in the dugout, "Game strategy/decision-making" is obviously not a priority with this team. I don't think either "Communication with players" or "Relationship with front office" will be a problem with either guy.

So, if I was advising the Yankees, my priority would be getting a guy who knows how to handle a pitching staff. And, according to the Daily News article, that's one of Brian Cashman's top priorities, too. Good, so we're all on the same page.

But why does Girardi get four checkmarks for handling the pitching staff? "Because he used to be a catcher, and catchers know how to handle pitchers." Really? Joe Torre used to be a catcher, how were his pitcher handling skills?

I have three reasons why Girardi shouldn't get any positive marks for handling the pitching staff: Josh Johnson, Anibal Sanchez and Dontrelle Willis.

Johnson was probably the reason Girardi got fired. Girardi brought Johnson back into a game after an 82-minute rain delay and right after that, he hurt his arm. Marlins owner Jeffrey Loria blamed the injury on Johnson pitching after the rain delay. Is he right? Who knows. But if Girardi does the same thing to Joba or Hughes and he gets hurt, will we still be patting him on the back for his great handling of a pitching staff?

And then there's Sanchez. Marlins fans blamed Girardi for Sanchez's injury as well. Sanchez threw 76.1 innings in Single A in 2004, 136 innings between Single A and Double-A in '2005, and then 200 innings between Double-A and the majors in 2006. That includes 114.1 innings in the majors in '06, including six starts in September totaling 43 innings, including two complete games (one of them a no-hitter), and two starts after hurting his hand trying to barehand a comebacker. More evidence of Joe's careful use of young pitching talent?

I really can't fault Girardi for riding Sanchez and Johnson through July and August, as they were realistically in the Wild Card hunt. But by mid-September they were basically out of it.

As for Dontrelle, I don't know what's wrong with this guy. And apparently Girardi doesn't either.


YEAR ERA WHIP K/9 BB/9 K:BB HR/9 IP
2003 3.30 1.28 7.9 3.2 2.4 0.7 160.2
2004 4.02 1.38 6.3 2.8 2.3 0.9 197.0
2005 2.63 1.13 6.5 2.1 3.1 0.4 236.1
2006 3.87 1.42 6.4 3.3 1.9 0.8 223.1
2007 5.17 1.60 6.4 3.8 1.7 1.3 205.1


It doesn't look to me like Girardi, in '06, figured out the key to Dontrelle. Maybe '04 and '06 represent his true ability level and '03 and '05 are the upper limit on his ability. But if Girardi is so good with pitchers, shouldn't he be getting those upper limit results?

Again, where's the evidence Joe has a knack for working with pitchers?

Given his track record, does Girardi really deserve four out of five checks for pitching staff?

And if Girardi isn't good at handling pitchers, what's the point?

This sounds crazy but... I think the Royals might know what they're doing!

Until a man reaches, say, 35, we all hide this sneaking suspicion that we have some undiscovered talent for baseball.

For those of us who never picked up a glove or bat after our Little League days were over, we wonder: What would have happened if we had stuck with it? Maybe we could hit triple digits on a radar gun, or pick up the "red dot" of a slider. It's not like those are abilities that you find a use for in every day life. How would we know if we had them?

Or, even if we had played a little high school or even college ball, you can still convince yourself it'd all be different with just one little change somewhere. A coach makes a slight adjustment to your swing and suddenly you're Rod Carew. Or they draft you as an emergency reliever during a blow-out and see the erratic arm you displayed in outfield is a naturally sinking fastball when you're on the mound. Someone pushes you a little bit harder or not quite as much or whatever, and just like that, you would've been in Yankee Stadium.

It's a nice fantasy, until you reach the age when you can't get out of bed without everything hurting, and then you have to face the fact that, even if you were blessed with some hidden ability, it will remain buried somewhere between your pot belly and your love handles.

At that point, you stop fantasizing that you could be a professional baseball player. And then you begin fantasizing that you could run a professional baseball team.

Naturally, we'd all love to marry Jennifer Steinbrenner and take over the Yankees, but even in a fantasy, you have to be a little realistic. But hey, how about the Devil Rays? The Pirates? The Royals? Do the guys running those teams really know more about baseball than you or I? Probably -- not that you'd know it from the results.

So let's fantasize. Let's pretend the owner of one of those hopeless, hapless teams reads your blog and says, "You think you're so smart, young man? You can run my team. Good luck."

What would you do? And you can't just say you'd "sign Alex Rodriguez" or "trade some prospects for Brandon Webb." We're trying to be realistic here. A-Rod? You're the general manager of a small-market team with a tight-fisted owner. Webb? Sorry, you can't use the Jedi Mind Trick on your fellow GMs.

OK, so... how do you turn around a terrible franchise -- without spending a lot of money -- before your owner loses confidence and fires you?

I can think of two ways to do it. The first method, the conventional strategy, is to promote everybody from your farm system and hope for the best. Yes, we'll lose a lot of games at first, and along the way probably burn out a few guys who weren't really ready for The Show. But if we get lucky, maybe by the end of the second or third year, we'll have the core of a decent team, and then -- maybe -- we can convince the owner to splurge on some free agents and make a run at a pennant or two before we have to start over.

The advantage here is that it's safe. If it doesn't work, it's not your fault -- it's because your owner is too cheap, your farm system is too weak, your division is too good. You get fired after three or four years because you never made it to .500, but even so, you'll be credited with "developing" the half-dozen or so players who pan out as genuine Major Leaguers, even an All-Star or two. And people will say, "If only he had some payroll to work with, he'd be a good general manager." And you get another job in another front office.

But if it works, you're a genius -- you rebuilt a franchise from the ground up!

The first year you lose 100 games, but the next year you shock everybody and win 80. Your owner opens his wallet and says go get some free agents. Year 3, you almost win the Wild Card! And then, finally, the fourth year, it all comes together, the home-grown talent and high-priced free agents, you win the World Series! You quit and get hired by a real team, and the next sucker inherits a team about to lose all its young players to arbitration and saddled with all the overpriced contracts you signed the year before.

The second method, the Moneyball strategy, is to identify and sign undervalued players. The advantage, provided you're good at the identifying part, is that you can be reasonably competitive right away.

But remember, despite what John Sterling thinks, Moneyball is not a 200-page lecture on the importance of on-base percentage at the expense of all other considerations. Moneyball is about spotting undervalued commodities. And now that everybody is down with O-B-P (yeah you know me!), you have to dig a little deeper to identify guys who are cheap but good: Washed-up All-Stars who can still contribute in platoon roles or off the bench; catchers and middle infielders who can no longer field, but can still hit; guys coming off scary injuries or struggling with weight problems. Sign former prospects who never made it and guys you never heard of who lit up the Mexican League or Frontier League. Offer low-ball one-year contracts to the headcases, the malcontents and the cancers in the clubhouse and tell them it's their big chance to shove it to the other guys. Use the Rule 5 draft wisely -- while everyone else is fighting over the pitchers with incredible stuff but can't throw strikes, claim low-cost solutions for your bullpen and bench. And promote from within, but carefully, making sure no one arrives as a savior or is thrown in as cannon fodder.

The problem with this strategy is, at least at first, you will look like an idiot. Nobody else wanted those guys for a reason. Your first deal is to give up a no-name minor leaguer for Michael Barrett and cash, and on ESPN they make jokes about your pitchers needing to take boxing lessons in case he wants to fight them in the dugout. You sign Jon Lieber to a bargain-basement one-year contract, and some a-hole blogger like me opines maybe you didn't know he missed half the season with an injury. You buy Victor Rodriguez from the Newark Bears and sports talk radio callers say, "Real teams get A-Rod -- we get V-Rod!" You claim Tomokazu Ohka off the scrap heap and convert him to a reliever, and sportswriters ask why you think a guy who can't get people out at the beginning of a game will be able to get them out at the end.

If it doesn't work out -- let's say Barrett punches out Lieber, causing him to miss the rest of the season, while the only guy Ohka can get out is V-Rod -- and you've just proven that all those people are smarter than you. Instead of making it to your third or fourth season, you get fired midway through your second year. And executives in other front offices won't even look at your resume. You can't even apply for a job outside of baseball without some human resources guy saying, "Hey, you're that guy who wasted all that money on Joey Eischen, right?" Well, actually, it was a league-minimum contract and- "Joey Eischen! What the hell were you thinking?"

And even if at first it does work out? It may not look like a success to the outside world. Remember, you're trying to be rebuild a franchise -- the goal is to be competitive for the next decade, not just this year -- and that may mean taking one step back in order to take two forward. Not everyone will like that.

Let's say a couple of the veterans on short-term contracts make good: At the end of June, Barrett hasn't punched anybody and is hitting .300 with an .800 OPS; you trade him for a top catching prospect and now they're howling on sports talk radio. "Our only good hitter and he trades him for some minor leaguer!" Ohka is pitching lights out in the middle innings, and Peter Gammons wonders why you won't use him to replace a struggling rookie in the rotation. "What's the point of having a good reliever if you never have a lead?" All the sportswriters in your town want you to call up some kid who is crushing the ball in Double-A, but you won't do it after hearing he's afraid to leave his hotel room on road trips. "Why won't they promote this guy and let him get some experience?"

So obviously, while the second strategy is a lot riskier, I think it's the right way to go. And more and more, I'm convinced it's what the Royals are doing.

Despite having finished last in the A.L. Central for the fourth straight year, and despite posting just one winning record (83-79 in 2003) since the strike-shortened '94 season -- hell, they haven't been to the post-season since winning the World Series in '85 -- I think GM Dayton Moore is moving the Royals in the right direction. They didn't panic when Alex Gordon was hitting .185 after his first two months in the majors; he hit .275 the rest of the way. They didn't rush good-hit, no-field prospect Billy Butler to the majors and force him into the outfield; instead, they waited for Mike Sweeney's inevitable injury so he could ease in as a DH. They took cheap fliers on no-names like Joakim Soria and has-beens like Brandon Duckworth. They signed Octavio Dotel, let him pick up some saves and then shipped him off to the Braves. They turned Ambiorix Burgos into Brian Bannister and J.P. Howell into Joey Gathright. I thought signing Gil Meche was insanity and the guy posts a 3.67 ERA and 1.296 WHIP.

I really like that he hired former Yankee minor league manager Trey Hillman. I don't know much about Hillman, but I'm sure, after 12 years as a manager from the New York Penn League to Triple A, he knows how to handle young players. He also led the Nippon Ham Fighters to the playoffs in three out of his five seasons and won the Japan Series last year.

So, as I said, I don't know much about Hillman. Why, then, do I think he's a smart hire? Because he's not Larry Bowa or Lee Mazzilli or any of the other re-treads they could have hired. He's not the safe choice. They could have hired Jamie Quirk (or any other random Royal from the mid-70s to mid-80s) and made a lot of people in Kansas City happy, and if it didn't work out, no one would blame Moore. Instead, he went out and found a smart guy who is liked by smart people.

Ordinarily, as a Yankee fan, I wouldn't give a shit either way about what the Royals are doing. It's not that I hate them; it's just been about 20 years since I've had to worry about them. (To quote Scrubs, "I don't hate you. I nothing you.") So, speaking as an objective observer, I think they're making the right moves and heading in the right direction. Rebuilding the right way isn't easy -- it's a long, slow, painful process. But I think they're doing it right. Next year they might be flirting with .500; the year after that, maybe even a Central Division title. If they pull it off, remember you read it here first.

If they don't... blame Dayton Moore. What an idiot!

Welcome to the 2007 New York Jets

Top 10 things overheard while watching the Jets this season:

10. "That pass was woefully underthrown." (Woefully Underthrown is also the subtitle fo the 2007 NFL films Jets video)

9. "Are there 5 teams in the NFL with worse quarterbacks than Chad Pennington?"

8."Vinny Testaverde won a game in the NFL today, how did we not resign him?"

7. "Truly terrible... that pass was truly terrible"

6. "Good f-ing G-d he is going to get Coles and Cotchery killed before this game is over."

5. "Mangenious? More like Mangina."

4. "How do they NOT start Kellen Clemens next week?" (repeated at the end of every game)

3. "Doesn't matter if we get the first overall pick. This is the Jets, you know whoever they pick is going to suck."

2. "Pennington's mind is writing checks his arm can't cash"

1. "Kind of makes you miss Ken O'Brien"

OK, that didn't work

Four months 'til pitchers and catchers report!

That sucked. Chien-Ming Wang gave up 4 runs on 5 hits and couldn't get an out in the second inning, forcing a switch to Mike Mussina. And while Moose wasn't great (2 ER, 4 H, 4 BB in 4.2 IP, plus he allowed two of Wang's inherited runners to score), he kept the score reasonable. The final score, 6-4, makes it look like it was a nailbiter, but it really wasn't. It was a frustrating, slow, agonizing game. The Yankees had 12 hits, including three home runs and a double, plus 3 walks, but left 10 men on base. Bleh.

Derek Jeter went 2-for-5 with an RBI, but killed us in the bottom of the 6th, grounding into a 4-6-3 double play. The Yankees had runners on the corners and one out; just a fly ball would've made it a three-run game with three innings yet to play. Alex Rodriguez also went 2-for-5 with an RBI (a solo home run in the 7th), but he also came up empty in a big spot, striking out with two on and one out in the bottom of the 1st.

The Yankees teased you a little bit in the bottom of the 9th, as the Indians went to Joe Borowski. After Jeter popped out, Bobby Abreu hit a shot into the upper deck to make it 6-4. "A bloop and a blast" as John Sterling says, incessantly. But no bloops were to be had. A-Rod flew out to right, and then it all came down to Jorge Posada, who in any other year would be every Yankee fan's MVP candidate. Posada drove one down the right field line and Sterling gave us a classic "It is high! It is far! It is... foul!" Then Posada struck out swinging to end it.

Inning over... game over... American League Division Series over... the Indians win, the Indians win.

There's plenty of blame to go around. The list is shorter of guys you can't blame: Robinson Cano (.333, 1.175 OPS), Johnny Damon (.278, .927) and Bobby Abreu (.267, .886), and Andy Pettitte (0 ER, 7 H, 2 BB, 5 K in 6.1 IP), Phil Hughes (1 ER, 3 H, 0 BB, 6 K in 5.2 IP) and Mariano Rivera (0 ER, 2 H, 1 BB, 6 K in 4.2 IP). You can add Moose in there if you want. Joba Chamberlain has ugly numbers (2 ER, 3 H, 3 BB, 4 K in 3.2 IP) but he deserves a pass as all the damage happened in the freakish bug bowl of Game 2 and in his second inning in Game 3, when the game was already won.

So, who's the goat? The two obvious candidates, as always, are A-Rod and Torre.

Blame A-Rod! He didn't come through in the clutch in a couple big spots. But his overall line isn't bad (.267, .820), and considering how much worse some of the other hitters are, it's a real stretch to blame him. Yankee haters always have something to say about Rodriguez -- no matter what he does, they try to talk about him. If he has a horrible night, they kill A-Rod; if he has a great night, they kill Yankee fans for not loving A-Rod enough. But for this particular series anyway, there's just not that much to say. He got some hits, and he made some outs. He's not the story, but some people will try to make him the story anyway.

The rest of the lineup? The Yankees collectively hit .228 and stranded all those runners on base, so let's blame the batters. But which one? Melky Cabrera hit just .188 but he did have the only big hit against Fausto Carmona, and he was great in the field. Matsui had only 2 hits in 11 at-bats, but he also drew 5 walks, so who's going to fault a .438 OBP. Doug Mientkiewicz went 0-for-6 but if you're relying on Minky for offense, you're doomed. Jason Giambi only had 1 hit, but he also had just 4 ABs.

No, if you're going to blame a batter, it's got to be Jeter or Posada. After having great regular seasons, each was really awful in the playoffs. Jeter went 3-for-17 with 3 GIDPs and probably should have been charged with an error in Game 3, but the Yankees won that game anyway. Posada went 2-for-15 and was charged with one passed ball and probably deserved another that went down as a wild pitch to Joba. But you might have a hard time finding a Yankee fan willing to pin anything on either Derek or Georgie, who are not just True Yankees, but were two-thirds of the foundation of the 1996-2001 dynasty.

Blame Torre! Sure, why not? Maybe he could have pulled Wang earlier in Game 1, after the 4th inning, when the Yankees were down 4-3 and had just missed an opportunity to regain the lead (bases loaded, one out, no runs). Maybe he could have delayed Game 2 long enough for the bugs to disperse, or switch to a less tasty reliever. Or I can be a total hypocrite and say he was wrong for starting Wang in Game 4. Hey, I didn't want to bring him back last year so I'm certainly not advocating he be brought back for next year, but in this series, I don't think you can blame Torre.

And how can you fault Torre for how he handled Wang, but not Wang himself? I'm not sure if he's hurt or wore down or if the Indians just had his number, but Wang looked flat-out awful out there. Hell, the Yankee team ERA with Wang was 5.89, without him was 3.48. The Indians team ERA in the series was 3.41. Wang's pre- and post-All-Star break numbers suggest something happened over the second half (3.36 ERA, 1.20 WHIP vs 4.07 ERA, 1.40 WHIP). But again, Wang, as a True Yankee, might not catch a lot of flak. You can try to blame Roger Clemens (3 ER, 4 H, 2 BB, 1 K in 2.1 IP), but the Yankees won that game anyway. Luis Vizcaino blew Game 2, but how do you blame him and not Joba? Ross Ohlendorff coughed up some big runs in Game 1, but again, you can't blame him but not Wang.

The bottom line: Ah, what the fuck. Blame A-Rod and Torre anyway. They won't be here next year.