OOTS: 8/13-8/19

[Ceetar]

Mets are off tonight and have given us a reason to scoreboard watch the other races, so this week starts off with

the Yankees hosting the Rangers. Yankees pitching, particularly the starters, looks like June was the fluke 2.99 ERA. 3.97 and 4.41 in July and August since. Rangers are pretty good at that hitting thing, so this could be fun.

Dodgers vs Pirates, Dodgers trail them by 2.5 in the 2nd wild card. (although only the giants by 1 for division)

Giants get the Nats.

Phillies vs. Miami battle for last place in the NL East.

[Guest John Cougar Lunchbucket]

CC onto the DL again, they signed Derek Lowe.

That said these pieces of shit nearly came back from a 10-1 deficit yesterday in Toronto.

[Ceetar]

John Cougar Lunchbucket wrote: CC onto the DL again, they signed Derek Lowe. That said these pieces of shit nearly came back from a 10-1 deficit yesterday in Toronto.

on the flip side their bullpen has nearly (and has) given up a lot of big leads lately.

i missed the CC thing, wow. I've been a little unfocused lately.

[Ceetar]

read the news on CC. Elbow pain but MRI is fine. Isn't that what happened to John Maine?

[Edgy MD]

Derek Lowe on the Yankees is just so right. It's like the universe self-correcting. It's like water finding its level.

[Ceetar]

Edgy DC wrote: Derek Lowe on the Yankees is just so right. It's like the universe self-correcting. It's like water finding its level.

He has a 0.91 K/BB rate this year. That's awesome.

[Edgy MD]

2004 Red Sox who became Yankees:

[list:2ssqsgig][*:2ssqsgig]Mark Bellhorn[/*:m:2ssqsgig]
[*:2ssqsgig]Johnny Damon[/*:m:2ssqsgig]
[*:2ssqsgig]Alan Embree[/*:m:2ssqsgig]
[*:2ssqsgig]Derek F. Lowe[/*:m:2ssqsgig]
[*:2ssqsgig]Ramiro Mendoza[/*:m:2ssqsgig]
[*:2ssqsgig]Doug Mientkiewicz[/*:m:2ssqsgig]
[*:2ssqsgig]Mike Myers[/*:m:2ssqsgig][/list:u:2ssqsgig]

[Ceetar]

• Mark Bellhorn
• Johnny Damon
• Alan Embree
• Derek F. Lowe
• Ramiro Mendoza
• Doug Mientkiewicz
• Mike Myers

Edgy DC wrote: 2004 Red Sox who became Yankees:

Yankees have always seemed to have an obsession with players that did well against them.

[Frayed Knot]

Or ones who stole headlines from them:
Dwight Gooden
Darryl Strawberry
Kevin Elster
Rafael Santana
Sid Fernandez

[Ceetar]

Frayed Knot wrote: Or ones who stole headlines from them: Dwight Gooden Darryl Strawberry Kevin Elster Rafael Santana Sid Fernandez

didn't the Yankees sign like every '86 Met at one point?

[Frayed Knot]

- Atlanta probably thought hosting San Diego was a good time to close the gap in the East while Washington was out in SF
Except they acted like us and got out-hit 12-5 while losing 4-1

- Ryan Vogelsong, who had maybe been the Giants best pitcher over the last month or so, got smacked around by the Nats for 8 earned runs in less than 3 innings. The SF defense made it a bit worse than it should have been as the brief half-inning I saw (the 7-run top of the 3rd) included the infield muffing three consecutive plays with 1-out and the bases loaded, although somehow all were scored hits.
Nats scored all 14 of their runs by the 5th inning.

- Make that two bad outings in three games for Ryan Dempster with Texas.
He was perfect thru 2 innings but then started the 3rd: Single - Single - Bunt - Walk - Grand Slam (Swisher) - Walk - Single - Single - Sac Fly
Yanx continue to hit like idiot savants. Exactly half of their runs this year are via HRs and, despite hitting like shit with the bases loaded (.236) they have more XBHs (14) than they do singles (11) and nearly as many GS (9) as singles.

- Tampa gets the Mariners this week and won their 7th straight to keep pace with the Yanx (4 back)

[Frayed Knot]

Ceetar wrote: Edgy DC wrote: Derek Lowe on the Yankees is just so right. It's like the universe self-correcting. It's like water finding its level. He has a 0.91 K/BB rate this year. That's awesome.

So, naturally, last night he debuts in the Bronx against Texas with 4 full innings of 2-hit, 0 BB, 4 K ball

[Ceetar]

Frayed Knot wrote: Ceetar wrote: Edgy DC wrote: Derek Lowe on the Yankees is just so right. It's like the universe self-correcting. It's like water finding its level. He has a 0.91 K/BB rate this year. That's awesome. So, naturally, last night he debuts in the Bronx against Texas with 4 full innings of 2-hit, 0 BB, 4 K ball

Prompting the brilliant Mike Lupica to say on his show today that he thinks Lowe will be the #2 in the playoff rotation.

[Frayed Knot]

Derek Lowe on the Yankees is just so right. It's like the universe self-correcting. It's like water finding its level. He has a 0.91 K/BB rate this year. That's awesome. So, naturally, last night he debuts in the Bronx against Texas with 4 full innings of 2-hit, 0 BB, 4 K ball Prompting the brilliant Mike Lupica to say on his show today that he thinks Lowe will be the #2 in the playoff rotation.

That's just fuckin' absurd.

Let me guess, his logic has something to do with either:
- the mysteriously transformative properties of the mere act of putting on a Yanqui uniform?
or
- the fact that Lowe had a lousy season followed by a good playoffs eight years ago means he can simply decide to do that again?

[Ceetar]

I was only half listening for obvious reasons. coworker I went to lunch with had it on. It was basically Kuroda-hate and no believe in Nova or Hughes.

[Frayed Knot]

Well maybe someone should tell Lupica that Kuroda threw a CG 2-hitter at Texas last night.
Those two hits (both singles) for the Rangers match the number of DPs they hit into and also the number of times they were picked off in game 1 of the series. There are still two more games to go in this series, but it would have been nice if the visiting team had actually shown up for either of the first two.

[Gwreck]

Felix Hernandez perfect through 8 innings for Seattle (vs. Tampa)

[Frayed Knot]

Desmond Jennings, leading off for Tampa

[Frayed Knot]

Frayed Knot wrote: Desmond Jennings, leading off for Tampa

STRIKE - STRIKE - FOUL - FOUL - STRIKE THREE



Jeff Keppinger - pinch-hitting

[Frayed Knot]

GO to SS

One out to go

Shawn Rodriguez batting

[Frayed Knot]

CALLED STRIKE THREE

12th K of the game - including 5 of the final 6

23rd Perfect Game in history
3rd of the season
2nd in Seattle this season (Humber)


1-0 final, btw. Pressure on all the way.

[Guest John Cougar Lunchbucket]

All hail the King.

[Edgy MD]

The mountains the Yankees are going to move to get his perfect ass in pinstripes.

[Frayed Knot]

Wow, Texas got a whole four more hits yesterday, which brings their total in this series -- calculating -- to SUCK!
Although, in their defense, they have been facing the CY-caliber trio of David Phelps, Hiroki Kuroda, and Freddie Garcia, along with the likes of Derek Lowe and Boone Logan coming out of the pen.
I hope both Anaheim and Oakland catch and pass you bunch of non-hitting chumps.



And speaking of blowing playoff chances, Pitt loses their third straight to the Dodgers (twice by blowout) and now sit 7 games in back of Cincy (we're not exactly helping their cause). McCutcheon suddenly not hitting in August although anything after his .446/.510/.739 July!! was going to seem like a let-down.



Each set of chumps has a shot to avoid 4-game sweeps this afternoon.

[Frayed Knot]

Nice of the Rangers to grab [u:2c4axauw]One[/u:2c4axauw] win before getting out of town.
Not that they didn't try hard to lose it, blowing an early 4-0 lead and almost a later 7-5 one.
Fortunately Joba sucked and gave Texas back the lead plus enough to make a cushion.
Yanx only hit one HR, I think that's around 3.5 below their daily average.
Jeter got two hits, one actually left the infield.

[MFS62]

Frayed Knot wrote: Jeter got two hits, one actually left the infield.

He must have found an old stash of Melky's PEDs.

Later

[Frayed Knot]

I mentioned the Jeter single for two reasons.

- One was because I was making a big deal about a week ago about what a large segment of his hits (over 20%) have been IF singles. And since I wrote that I've seen at least 3 different IF singles from him.

- I saw the hit today and it should have been: A) an error, and a double play, but wound up being neither. The flip from the SS pulled the 2Bman off the base and also caused his relay to be late.
Couple more calls like that one and he won't have to get the ball out of the infield in order to pass Rose

[Ceetar]

Frayed Knot wrote: I mentioned the Jeter single for two reasons. - One was because I was making a big deal about a week ago about what a large segment of his hits (over 20%) have been IF singles. And since I wrote that I've seen at least 3 different IF singles from him. - I saw the hit today and it should have been: A) an error, and a double play, but wound up being neither. The flip from the SS pulled the 2Bman off the base and also caused his relay to be late. Couple more calls like that one and he won't have to get the ball out of the infield in order to pass Rose

I was briefly toying with it the other day. Fangraphs only seemed to have data for infield hits back to 2002, but it's Ichiro 1, Jeter 2.

Jeter and Tejada both at 110 OPS+. Jeter has .30 more OPS, mostly in slugging. (actually .33 more) That's adjusted for league and park, and doesn't seem right.

[Edgy MD]

Eight hits short of Eddie Murray for 12th place all time.

1. Pete Rose: 4,256
2. Ty Cobb: 4,189
3. Hank Aaron: 3,771
4. Stan Musial: 3,630
5. Tris Speaker: 3,514
6. Cap Anson: 3,435
7. Honus Wagner: 3,420
8. Carl Yastrzemsk: 3,419
9. Paul Molitor: 3,319
10. Eddie Collins: 3,315
11. Willie Mays: 3,283
12. Eddie Murray: 3,255
13. Derek Jeter: 3,247
14. Nap Lajoie: 3,242
15. Cal Ripken: 3,184
16. George Brett: 3,154
17. Paul Waner: 3,152
18. Robin Yount: 3,142
19. Tony Gwynn: 3,141
20. Dave Winfield: 3,110

[Frayed Knot]

Ceetar wrote: I was briefly toying with it the other day. Fangraphs only seemed to have data for infield hits back to 2002, but it's Ichiro 1, Jeter 2. Jeter and Tejada both at 110 OPS+. Jeter has .30 more OPS, mostly in slugging. (actually .33 more) That's adjusted for league and park, and doesn't seem right.

That Jeter & Ichiro have the most infield hits over the last whatever years isn't surprising seeing as how they both, I'm sure, have among the most total hits over that time.

What struck me recently (first by eye, then confirmed by data) is that both the pct and the number of IF for Jeter has gone up in recent years to where it's nearly the highest in his career now at age 38. Some of that could likely be explained by his decreasing power (fewer XBHs means the smaller hits are now a bigger pct of the whole) but the number of IF hits* is going up too and, unlike a speedy, slappy-hitting LHB such as Ichiro, Jeter's IF hits seem to mostly come off of full swings matched with 'you couldn't have placed there any better' good fortune (plus a friendly scoring decision here and there) which you think would just be the result of random chance.
And yet it continues.





* he's on pace to wind up with nearly twice as many IF hits during his age 36-38 seasons as he had during his 26-28 years