Frayed Knot

Edgy MD wrote: I heard the real Rush, on the other hand, do "Xanadu" yesterday on the satellite radio. My word. Meandering and plodding, but wouldn't that be a heckuva format? Your home of extended progressive metal tracks by day, the New York Mets by night! A radio station devoted to nothing but Rush (the band) and the Mets ... my brother could simply weld his radio dial in place.

When WABC 770 was in the midst of shifting their talk format into a nationally syndicated line-up, WOR was the place for local talk and it was there where Bob Grant, with his growling, angry, confrontational style, was the afternoon drive-time star. So when Rush first became syndicated and came to NY w/WABC as his home station (he had been doing a local show in Sacramento) many simply transplanted Grant's act onto Rush as the assumed way all conservatives acted whether it was actually the case or not. Not sure what's going on at ABC now to cause the big right-wing draws of Hannity & Limbaugh to jump ship, but it appears the Clear Channel strategy is to now go the national route in place of the long-time WOR tradition of local programming. Clean Channel stations also hold the rights to several other baseball contracts. The current WOR lineup (acc to Wikipedia so you know it's true): 5AM - early news 6AM - John Gambling (either the 3rd generation JG or the 4th, I can't keep it straight) 10AM - Mark Simone Noon - Joan Hamburg (to be replaced by Limbaugh) 2PM - Dave Ramsey 4PM - Rita Cosby (presumably Ramsey & Cosby get bumped by Hannity) 6PM - 'America Now with Andy Dean' (I have no idea with Andy Dean is but I suppose he's a step up from 'America Now with Andy Dick') 9PM - (the above mentioned) John and Ken 11PM - 'Ground Zero with Clyde Lewis' (not sure I want to know what this is) 1AM - George Noory

MFS62 wrote: I hope they're going to simulcast on one of the WOR sister FM stations -- I doubt it. ... because I just tried to get 710 AM up here and got a festival of static. -- So you're in an area where you can't get AM NYC stations but you can get FM? That doesn't make much sense.

Amazing that the networks are so hard up for prime-time starts (and MLB so hard up for the cash that the networks will pay for said time-slots) that the game time for this Game 6/ALCS is contingent on NL game and therefore not decided until nearly midnight on the day before. That's gotta suck for the players as well as the ticket holders.

Kong76 wrote: I'd like to see Somers' contract! He pops up out of nowhere during extended rain delays. Maybe he has a mobile set up in his apartment. Also, he doesn't work on Sundays, must be in the fine print. Y'know, he always did that 20 minutes or so between the end of M&MD and the beginning of the pre-game show. After that, I think he just got paid to sit around the studio in case of a rain delay or, if not, wait until after the post-game was done. Nice work if you can get it. I just can't see Schmoozer with a whole set-up of high-tech equipment in what I picture as some hole in the wall apt with not much more in it other than a TV set, mini-fridge, and a bunch of empty chinese food containers.

Dodgers have been amazingly inept. - Puig has misplayed or mis-thrown three balls - Gozalez dropped a relay throw on Puig's short throw - Kershaw wasn't backing up his long one - they botched the run-down and almost lost the out - Ellis had either a DP ball or a play at home and got neither Oh yeah, and their pitching and hitting suxx too. And now throw in the always popular triple tag-up play.

Zvon wrote: I hope they bring Somers along. He is truly part of the Met fan experience. He's not theirs to bring. I have no idea what Somers' contract status w/FAN is like but WOR is buying the Met radio-telecasts (plus presumably a pre- and post- to go along with it) not the WFAN staff as the rest of their programming day isn't going to have anything to do with sports. If you still want to catch Somers after the game, no problem ... flip the channel.

WOR is one of the long-time, 50K Watt, clear channel (meaning no competition on the signal - not the parent company) NYC radio stations (does no one remember 'Rambling with Gambling'?) so if you get WFAN in your area you certainly should get WOR. But I can't see WOR hiring Somers.

Raissman/Daily News sez: - official announcement of deal next week - multi-year deal for more than the previous $7mil per/yr amount w/FAN - WOR (or, more accurately, parent company Clear Channel) will have final say on the broadcast team - Rose to return; Lewin "likely" to be back though maybe only on a one-year deal; Eddie C up in the air - team to get "heavy" cross-promotion from other NYC-based Clear Channel outlets: Z-100, Lite-FM, KTU, Q-103, Power-101.5

I'm going to go out on a limb here and guess that Bucket was talking about listening to NEW YORK METS GAMES on the odd Thursday afternoon. And, unless the Mets just signed the worst radio contract in the history of mankind, whatever is on the regular WOR sked during the day -- whether it be Hannity, Limbaugh, or the Mao Tse Tung Hour -- Met radio-casts are going to take precedence.

What's Hannity got to do with anything?

Underrated hero of the 2013 Sox: Koji Uehara. I recall him getting smacked around when with the O's. Funny thing about him; except for his first year in MLB (Orioles - 2009) he's had sub-1.00 WHiP numbers each year [career = .829] and has a career 322-to-38 K/BB ratio, and yet this is now his 3rd team in 5 years. Now granted one of those switches was in the deal that brought Chris Davis to Baltimore so I doubt the O's are crying in their crab cakes (although Chris Davis wasn't CHRIS DAVIS then) but the Rangers then released him at the end of last season and I don't recall too much off-season clamoring over the guy prior to him signing a one-year $5mil deal with the Sawx (about the same as what he had been making). And of course had the Sox known what they were getting they probably would have turned to him sooner for the closer's spot rather than deal away four players for Joel Hanrahan the very next week.

Edgy MD wrote: You should make a paper of this. I thought I just did. Guys who led their teams in saves in 2013 but didn't start the year in that role Uehara - Boston (Hanrahan) Benoit - Tigers (Valverde) Brothers - Rockies (Betancourt) Jansen - Dodgers (League) 2013 saves leaders who didn't finish the year in that role: Perez - Indians Wilhelmsen - Mariners Veras - Astros (traded) Parnell - Mets (injury) Mujica - Cardiinals Bell - DBacks

John Cougar Lunchbucket wrote: Underrated hero of the 2013 Sox: Koji Uehara. I recall him getting smacked around when with the O's. That was something I was going to mention in the 'Closerland' thread -- that about 1/3 of the guys who led their team in saves this season either didn't start or didn't finish the year in that job. In some of the cases it was injuries (Parnell) but in others a lack of getting the job done forced a change somewhere between opening day and closing. In fact, all four remaining teams are using a guy who wasn't in that role on opening day. - In the case of Uehara and Boston he was like their 4th choice after making some big trades over the last two years -- Andrew Bailey (from Oakland) Joel Hanrahan (Pirates) -- trying to fill that spot. Uehara's first save didn't come until late June. - Tigers were still revisiting the Jose Valverde angle early in the year (he had 9 saves for them) and were trying to groom youngster Bruce Rondon (1) for the job if Valverde should revert to late-2012 form (he did). When neither worked out they turned to Benoit but that wasn't until mid-June. - Cards were using Edward Mujica (their third guy in three years) who was cruising along with 35 saves and a sub-2.00 ERA until blowing up in September [11.05 ERA; .514 BAA] which forced the late-season switch to Rosenthal. - Dodgers signed Brandon League to a big deal (3 yrs/$22.5) last winter with the intention of handing him the closers job. After 4 blown saves and a 6.00 ERA in mid-June he got the boot and, while still on the roster, barely gets used these days. Jansen started closing in late June.

Yeah, I think a PttS claim makes a lot more sense in a one-inning situation then say the one the Jack Morris-for-HoF crowd makes in an attempt to explain his high-ish career ERA. The last thing you want to do when coming in to a game with three outs to go is to walk a guy, something which could lead to more hittable pitches. That a single base-runner wouldn't even bring the tying run to the plate in a three-run game might explain why the biggest gap in perfect/not-perfect innings is between the two and three run leads while the gap between one and two is virtually non-existent. It's also possible that managers sometimes don't always use their top reliever in three-run games. My little study here didn't discriminate as to whether the pitcher coming in fresh to start a close-out inning had the 'Proven Closer' stamp on his forehead or not. In some cases, and at least theoretically more often in three run leads, the guy being brought in could be someone giving the regular closer a day off.

The results of my year-long look into closers and saves (it�s not nearly as nerdy as it sounds - just a few minutes each day gathering the previous night�s results) My motive behind this is mainly that I was just plain curious. Simple raw save numbers and even save percentages are often flawed because obviously not all save situations are created equal. So in order to make them more equal-ish I chose to count only the single-inning saves that have come to define the modern save opportunity and closer usage. IOW, I included only those situations where a fresh pitcher was brought in at the beginning of a close-out inning with a lead of three runs or less. No multi-inning saves; no saves where the closer comes in mid-inning w/runners on; none where he needs to get fewer than three outs. And what I wanted to know about these saves were three things: 1) Was it a one, two, or three run save situation? Obviously in addition to seeing what the overall odds for success are, those odds should be quite different depending on the size of the lead. 2) Was the save successful? Doesn�t matter how ugly as long as the team got out of the inning with the lead and therefore the win. 3) Was the save �perfect�? Since, in addition to complaining about how often their closer blows saves, a common complaint from fans is about how often their guy makes them sweat by putting runners on base. So I wanted to know how common the 1-2-3 inning was in one-inning saves. What I found was this: All Saves Combined - 1,239 Opportunities Pct Saved87.8%Pct Blown12.2%Pct Perfect35.4% An easier way to look at this is that, out of every eight save opportunities: - approximately three are saved in 1-2-3 fashion - four are saved but with some degree of drama added - and one of the eight is blown Broken down further: One Run Saves - 525 Opportunities Pct Saved80.4%Pct Blown19.6%Pct Perfect38.5% Two Run Saves - 396 Opportunities Pct Saved90.4%Pct Blown9.6%Pct Perfect37.4% Three Run Saves - 318 Opportunities Pct Saved96.9%Pct Blown3.1%Pct Perfect27.7% So if you just want to round things off, what you should expect to get out of an average closer is about 1 blown save in every 5 chances when handed a one run lead, about 1 blown out of every 10 when given a two run lead, and the right to demand his immediate flogging when he lets a three run opp get away. I suspect most fans would guess that the percentage of perfect saves would be higher to the point where 1-2-3 innings outnumber the flawed ones even though �Not Perfect� is more common by nearly a 2-1 margin. One thing I found interesting was the higher pct of perfect innings in the closer games. One run saves were slightly more likely to be perfect than were two run saves and each was considerably more common than in three run outings. Pitching to the score?

MFS62 wrote: Is it still a rule that teams must wait until after the World Series to make moves? MLB put the rule in a few years ago so news about moves wouldn't take attention from the post-season games. I don't know that it's a written rule so much as it is a request from the Commish's office not to make attention-grabbing moves that would take attention away from playoff baseball. The original incident was, of course, instituted in response to Steinbrenner announcing a hiring (or was it firing?) of Billy Martin on the day of a World Series Game 7 figuring that if his team wasn't good enough to get the headlines in October then he'd bump the WS off the back pages of the newspapers in the largest city in the country with off the field news. Not surprisingly, the Steinbrenner for HoF backers conveniently tend to forget stuff like this when listing his "contributions" to the sport.

Looked good initially. Then not so much. Too many HRs. LHPs like him are often interchangeable.

For a marginal hitter who could be totally shit-down by LHPs, he had himself more than his share of walk-off hits during his time here. So while his overall tenure was largely inconsequential, he did have a knack for making his hits almost as timely as his best-known catch.

If someone were to show you then & now pictures of Mike Napoli, like they did the other night only just still shots, from back when he hit his 1st ML HR off Justin Verlander in 2006 and then when he hit the one which won the 1-0 game; and you were to compare the clean-shaven, relatively clean-cut, non-tatted look of the younger one to the shaved-headed, gnarly-bearded, inked-up version of today, which thought would pop into your head first: - Man, the last twenty years have not been kind to that dude! - I wonder which third-world country he had been held captive in over the last seven years?

The 1970s: Bad baseball stadiums, bad fashion choices, bad Presidents.

batmagadanleadoff wrote: Heath Bell? 2011 with Sandy Eggo 2012 for Miami 2013 for the Snakes Big-butted Bell wound up losing the closer job about halfway through this season (he didn't finish 2012 at the Marlins closer either) but his replacement, Brad Ziegler, fell just short of catching him for the Arizona saves lead. The Mets, btw, are one of Nine teams to have a different saves leader in each of the past three seasons: RED SOX -- (2011 - 2013) Papelbon, Aceves, Uehara ROYALS -- Soria, Broxton, Holland ASTROS -- Melancon, Myers, Veras NATIONALS -- Storen, Clippard, Soriano METS -- Rodriguez, Francisco, Parnell MARLINS -- Oviedo, Bell, Cishek CARDINALS -- Salas, Motte, Mujica ROCKIES -- Street, Betancourt, Brothers GIANTS -- Wilson, Casilla, Romo

HahnSolo wrote: Soriano? Nope. He did lead the Nats in saves this season and the Yanx last year, but back in 2011 he was a mere $12 mil/yr set up man for Mariano.

And now we're left with only the guy who somehow led THREE teams in saves over the last three years: aka - thanks for saving our games ... now get out. Part A -- Kimbrel & Chris Perez Part B: Led Two Teams Papelbon & Street Led Three Teams _______

Remember that the answers here have to have lead some team in saves over the last three seasons. Edgy got the only two who led the same team all three years, the remaining three we're looking for were also the main closer three years running but did so for different squads (in two cases for two teams, in one case for three). - Nathan is not correct because he missed a big chunk of 2011 (Matt Capps led the Twins that year). - Neither KRod nor, more obviously, Frank-Frank led any team in saves this year. Francisco did have two years running prior to this season (2011 w/Jays, 2012 for the Mets). Rodriguez hasn't been a team's main closer since the day he decided it would be a good idea to punch out his F-in-law back in 2011.