Frayed Knot

The games are often played too slowly, he noted. The audience of Major League Baseball is aging, with polls indicating that the youngest generation expects faster and fastest in what it consumes. I've been a big a critic as anyone about slow games, but I heard Bud Selig recently (like last week) citing a written article claiming the exact same thing: that the young were abandoning baseball yadda, yadda. The only difference here was that the article was from 1958. Anecdotally, I've been hearing the same thing my whole life -- and yet the sport somehow seems to survive and even thrive. There are ways to speed up the game, maybe the owners could, I dunno, TRY some of them before they resort to measures that lop off 20+ percent of the game. At the same time, the exec said, teams are struggling to find enough good pitching � and, at the same time, the number of injuries is skyrocketing. If oblique strains were the prevalent injury two years ago, ulnar collateral ligament strains are the ailment du jour. Top prospect Jameson Taillon of the Pirates is the latest pitcher to be headed for Tommy John surgery; maybe he�ll bump into Bobby Parnell along the way. As Edge said, is pitching really hard to find? If so then why have runs scored and most other offensive numbers across the board been declining for more than a decade now? Wasn't it Marvin Miller who, while mocking the owners' stance in negotiations, said that two things have been "true" since the beginning of the game: that no teams are making any money and that one can find enough pitching? Yet none of the teams ever go out of business, and pitching staffs always manage to get filled up. And, btw, complaining about there being more TJ surgeries lately is like saying that deaths in outer space were higher in the 2nd half of the 20th century than they were in the first. Ummm, yeah.

So now we know the REAL reason they don't have names on the backs of their unis ... of course.

Kimbrel's been used in three games so far. He's faced 9 batters, gotten 9 outs, K'd six of them, two have hit fair balls.

Various stuff from Martino (NYDN) - Parnell simply thought about the surgery over the weekend and decided in favor. No new setbacks or anything else "I want to make sure if I do have surgery I give myself the best bet to get back for next year and have the recovery time,� - On Joel Hanrahan: One Mets official who checked in on Hanrahan recently said that the closer, who underwent Tommy John last May, was progressing fine in his rehab, but �not close� to pitching in the major leagues. - The Mets declined an opportunity to send a scout to a January showcase for Ryan Madson -- and anyway, one executive for another club that did scout Madson said that his asking price was surprisingly high. There�s also Kevin Gregg, Octavio Dotel and others out there, and the Mets are open to everything, but more likely to proceed deliberately, and not acquire a player in direct response to the Parnell news.

Not a lot of surprises in the Braves everyday lineup as their offense went essentially unchanged during the off-season at seven positions and so has their lineup over the six games played to date. IF = Freddie Freeman, Dan Uggla, Andrelton Simmons, Chris Johnson. OF = Jason Heyward + Upton^2, the same crew they finished up with last year (except for when NYM pitchers were smoking Heyward in the face w/fastballs). All those players have started and finished every game over the first week. Hitting so far this young season: Freeman, Johnson & Simmons. Not = Upton, Upton, Heyward & Uggla Losing longtime catcher Brian McCann was the only real change on offense this winter so not surprisingly that's the only position where they're switching things up so far, giving three starts to caveman Evan Gattis, two to backup Gerald Laird, and one to off-season pickup Ryan Doumit. Definitely some power in that trio although even France's 'Maginot Line' was better defensively. Bench squad includes OF Jordan Schafer, and IFs Taylor Pastornicky & Ramiro Pena, but those three have combined for all of 3 ABs over six games.

May as well use the off-day to get to start to know our next enemy as we head to the first road trip of the season. Tuesday, 7:10 Bartolo Colon vs Aaron Harang (game sponsored by Polident) Harang is actually only 35 (36 if a few weeks) but is now with his 7th team. Rumor has it that one of those teams was the Mets although I have no memory of such and can't confirm or deny such accusations. Naturally in his first and only start with the Braves he skunked the Brewers on 2 hits and a walk over 6.2 innings in what became a 1-0 Atlanta win. Wednesday, 7:10 Wheeler vs Ervin Santana Santana ( RHP 31 y/o) will be making his first ever start for the Braves, having seen his FA attempt ignored until the closing days of ST when Atlanta suddenly lost like nine pitchers to TJ surgery in the same afternoon. Coming off a pretty good year in KC [9-10; 3.24; 1.14 WHiP] after a mostly good eight year run with Anaheim: 105-90 w/a 4.19 career ERA Thursday, 7:10 Mejia vs David Hale (he regrets that he has but one sucky night to give for his team) Hale (RHP, 26 y/o) has made three starts in MLB, two in 2013 and one this year,. Got a ND against the Nats last week, giving up 1 ER over 5 innings. He was a Braves 3rd round pick in 2009 out of (say it with me folks) Marietta, Georgia although in this case via Princeton University. Not exactly young (27 by the end of the year) and didn't really tear up the minors or get tabbed as a top prospect so we probably shouldn't expect him to be the next great Braves pitcher. But that doesn't mean this game will be pleasant.

I was sure that was gone too. Sometimes batters hit those with a top-spin that makes the ball dive downward rather than with backspin that tends to keep them aloft longer. d'Arnaud has a record of decent power in the minors so I don't mean to imply this will be an ongoing problem although some players keep that trait their whole careers.

PSA: Today is Jeter's last home opener ever. Ever! I have a funny feeling that the media is going to over-do this angle of Jeter's season HIS LAST SHIT EVER IN THE COMERICA CLUBHOUSE TOILET!!! ... film at eleven.

The box score link for the 4/5 game is still linking to the wrong game.

Ceetar wrote: What did pitchers do 50 years ago? retire? suck? Usually suck while pitching in pain and then retire because no one wanted them anymore. Or maybe sit around for a while hoping it would get better and then when he couldn't throw right the following spring he'd simply be cut. At that point his bio would then read: "Blew out his arm" and left baseball to enter the insurance business. Rarely if ever was there mention of the Ulnar Collateral Ligament because it probably wasn't known what the cause of the pain and sucking was. Or did they suck and then recover? Did said partials heal over time? If Parnell took his PRP and didn't throw for a year, would it be healed? Healed? - no. Ligaments aren't muscles and so don't heal themselves or regrow to close up the tear. You can strengthen areas around the injury and hope that things don't get worse and/or that you can manage the pain and adjust to the diminished velocity.

Niese - 3.3 Germen - 0.6 Fransworth - 0.4 Valverde - 0.4 Davis - 1.1 Lagares - 1.1 Young - 0.6

Mejia = yes; Franco = yes Also Stephen Matz and Phlip Humber while they were still in the system working their way up. I'm sure there are others as well.

Quite possibly the end of the line for him as a Met. Certainly not guaranteed to get a contract next season as it'll likely be mid-2015 before he's ready to return and as a 5th year player you can't get him on the cheap without cutting him loose first. Once you cut him loose of course then he's free to scout around for someone who would be willing to offer him the best shot. All that's getting ahead of ourselves though. Certainly suxx for BP. Seemed like he was in the midst of transforming from a thrower into a pitcher.

Lefty Specialist wrote: Looks like a nice board Glad that wasn't followed by, "It'd be a shame if something happened to it...." No, but that's probably how metfanclemenza would introduce himself.

"Oh it's a nice pretty board with lots of swell people, a lovely blue background, and ..."

The back-to-back Ks by Muffy & Wright w/runners on 2nd & 3rd were the obvious wet blankets today. As soon as the ball was hit I thought Niese had a decent shot of scoring on Young's double but, with just one out and those two coming up, stopping him at 3rd was probably the smart move, even if it didn't end up that way. Other than that, just the usual assortment of too many Ks and Niese having his hits allowed all bunched up in that one inning - starting with the one by the pitcher leading off. Not a lot of suds to spread around today.

btw, Lagares's leadoff walk in the 9th jumped the 'Expected Win Pct' from 17% to 30% the bunt/reversed call that followed then jumped it to 49% I'd have to find another game where a team was in a one-out/down-by-one/runner-on-1st situation to see exactly where the win pct would be had the call NOT been reversed, but suffice to say it would have been below 30% with the same runner position plus one extra out and considerably below the 49% that it wound up being. IOW (not like you need precise numbers to tell you this) but that replay reversal call was HUGE

Gee - 3.3 Rice - 0.3 Torres - 0.3 Granderson - 2.0 Davis - 3.3 Lagares - 0.6 Murphy - 0.2

John Cougar Lunchbucket wrote: John Harper already written a column advocating the MFYs trade for Davis. Even Gary mentioned that angle briefly today. Of course that was prior to the GW GS

And now suddenly when the Nats are playing the Braves they can't do anything right. Not just multiple errors, plays not made in the field and runs not scored (just 3 scored so far over 14 innings against a supposedly decimated pitching staff) but they're running into outs all over the field: several guys thrown out at home in just a game and a half so far, plus runners thrown out at 3rd with no one out, etc. Funny how that works: you play against a good team and suddenly YOU don't play as well.

smg58 wrote: Francesa and Esiason are on the losing side of history. The rest of us won't let the door hit their asses on the way out. It's not even the wrong side of history so much as it is the wrong side of common sense. Two guys with football mentalities (one played in the NFL, the other worships and shills for it) preaching the idea that each and every game is more important than life itself and therefore to miss one contest is not just an act that lets your teammates down but also lessens yourself as a man. Boomer talking about undergoing elective surgery for the sole purpose of not interfering with the almighty schedule (which is EXACTLY what he said no matter how much he wants to re-write it after the fact) is just plain stupid not to mention incredibly invasive about something that's none of his fucking business; and Francesa's brag about him going to work the day after (or was it ten minutes after?) his kids were born is a lot easier to say and do when your home, your wife, and your job are all within a 20 mile radius, not 1,000 miles apart.

Teixeira to DL -- hamstring.

Frayed Knot wrote: Now we need contact, I'd PH Flores rather than Ike. . Ike sez: "SHUT UP, BLONDIE!!"

Now we need contact, I'd PH Flores rather than Ike. ... and, yes Gary & Ron, I'd run for Recker too.