Frayed Knot

Edgy MD wrote: Crap, another night of YES. Costas & Kaat on MLBN for those of you who can get that.

Zvon wrote: I never look in this section. Afraid of spoilers. Nah, we're pretty good about warning of spoilers. Notice, for instance, how no one here revealed that Harry dies at the end of this movie .... Oooops!

Wednesday was, btw, not quite as good as Monday but we did pick up a game on every team in the east except for Philly. And, not surprisingly as they were playing each other, the Yanx lost a game to every team in their east except for the Red Sox (who almost pulled one out vs Papelbon and the Phils) So it was an Octuple Happiness day: Mets win, Yanx lose, Marlins, Braves & Nats lose, Jays, Orioles, and Rays win.

David Cone will be happy.

Swan Swan H wrote: Recker is playing? I have to get my hair and nails done before the game. And you can get them done by Vidal Nuno if you can get to the stadium early enough.

I LOVE John Sterling, and I'm terrified of those reports suggesting the MFYs will dump him after this year. I'm serious, I really like listening to him. I like that he's ridiculously pompous and gets confused way too often. I like that he never appears on camera anymore but always wears a suit to the ballpark. I like the way he says "Thuh-uh pitch.. a fast strike..." I often agree with him when he says "Y'know Suzyn, you just can't predict baseball. You can't!" I admire him for so shamelessly serving up cheese, knowing by now that everyone expects it from him. I like that there's someone out there with the balls to think we're actually entertained when the announcer tortures himself just to come up with this: "Oh, Lyle hits it a mile! I love it! I Lyle-love it!" Sure, but you'd be less forgiving if he were YOUR team's announcer. I get a kick out of him too, mainly because I only occasionally hear him, I don't take his multitude of mistakes personally, and I know how much he pisses off a certain pct of YLDB nation. Waldman's deference creeps me out, though. Sometimes she disappears for an entire inning and I forget she's there, and she just feeds him some stats from the data sheet she really doesn't seem to understand or doesn't seem to think it's her role to, but rather she's setting him up to pontificate on. She's like an assistant director who gets to occasionally be part of the show just to keep things colorful and familial --- like Gellman or Biff Henderson. Thing is, that's exactly what she was hired to do. When Sterling & Kay were teamed up on the radio they split p-b-p and color duties and it was probably the inability of the booth to hold both egos that prompted the break-up and Kay move to main man at YES. So they hired Waldman but, rather than split the p-b-p 7/2 or 6/3, Sterling had his contract call for him doing all nine every game* while Suzyn, who had been in radio for years but never live sports**, was in there just to read the stats plus the ever-increasing load of on-air ads they shoe-horn in each half-inning: 'and that failed sacrifice bunt was brought to you by ...' * Sterling has never missed a single game since being hired I think in the late '80s ** Sterling previously spent many years announcing Braves baseball, Hawks basketball, and even Islanders hockey

It's gone beyond Sterling's schtick at this point (which some Yanui fans hate as much as anyone), it's that he's just not a very good announcer anymore. He'll call hits foul that fell fair by nine feet; balls caught in front of the track are described as ten rows deep; he'll blatantly mis-call a play and then either make no apology for it or come up with some cock-eyed excuse that that particular booth's vantage point is a bit askew, or the clouds got in his eyes or something. And Suzyn will never correct him because there's some sort of deference thing going on there. He was good at one point. He still has the voice for it (at 70-whatever although he won't disclose his true age) and he knows the game itself well enough, but his eye-sight is going or his attention span wanes or something because his mistakes now are so common and laughable that they've become fodder for parlor and/or drinking games.

A unusual number of safeties tallied in that game.

I think that if they're going to continue with this four-game "rivalry" thing each year then the best time to do it would be immediately following the AS break. Not only does the schedule dictate the need for a four-game series there anyway--or else face the dreaded 4th consecutive off day when fans like us start going into withdrawl symptoms--but it would also allow teams to set up their rotations after the break so there'd be the best pitching match-ups and so on. If these games are as popular as Bud likes to claim they are it would be a nice kick-off to the 2nd half. What's holding this up is probably something stupid like the teams being unable to give ground over who gets the Thurs/Fri home games and who gets the more lucrative Sat/Sun; but if it's a true-intra-city match-up it's easy enough to just go 1-1-1-1 and if there's more travel involved (like that always popular Atlanta-Toronto tilt) then you alternate years as far as who gets the weekend.

Did Sterling have any clue on Byrd's HR? I could see him calling that one an out, an upper deck HR, a grounder to 2nd, or anything in between.

Edgy MD wrote: Heckuvan athlete is Hawk. I was gonna say, he's our next pinch-runner.

Crossing off any chance of me watching Jimmy Fallon when he takes over the Tonight Show. Not that it was high to begin with, but sitting in the front row with a Yanqui hat sealed the deal.

* Nats cruising on the strength of THREE Ryan Zimmerman HRs and with their best pitcher Jordan Zimmermann on the mound ... until the Orioles put up a 6-spot at home and win 9-6 * Cubbies win at Wrigley over the ChiSox on the strength of THREE Dioneer Navarro HRs * Braves shut out by the Jays 3-0

Frayed Knot wrote: Y'know, if the Yanx insist on going through this dog and pony show in every home game 7th inning, they should be made to forego the commercial break. The biggest problem MLB has these days, IMO, is the length & pacing of the games, so why should these clowns be allowed to add three minutes to theirs every night all because George Steinbrenner wanted to act like he invented patriotism? One or the other guys, not both. But seriously, the rules from MLB say that the half-inning break is to be timed at 2:05 (2:25 for GotW and 2:55 for playoff games) except that one team gets to make one of theirs into a six minute break whenever they feel like it.

Edgy MD wrote: Rice looking very krispie. Are you saying that his pitches have some snap, crackle, and ... well, you know, to them?

Mets pitchers have mostly made him into Robinson Cannot this series.

Y'know, if the Yanx insist on going through this dog and pony show in every home game 7th inning, they should be made to forego the commercial break. The biggest problem MLB has these days, IMO, is the length & pacing of the games, so why should these clowns be allowed to add three minutes to theirs every night all because George Steinbrenner wanted to act like he invented patriotism? One or the other guys, not both.

I want a run or two here, just to tell these skanks that there'll be no comeback tonight.

Zvon wrote: TEJEDA! WTF!? U hv a fuckin huge lead bro! Another one of his low energy plays. Weird that Hafner not getting a good break is what screwed Tejada up, but that's no excuse. Shouldn't even have been looking that way.

Frayed Knot wrote: A bit disturbing in that it's taken Hefner nearly 50 pitches just to get through two scoreless innings despite only three base-runners -- although I suppose that beats a low pitch count with runs allowed so we shouldn't complain too much. And Hefner responds with a 5-pitch 1-2-3 inning and all is right again with the world.

Yanqui relievers Adam Warren and Preston Clairborne are going to meet after the game in the club where they'll sink into their leather chairs, check the market reports, and complain how hard it is to get good domestic help these days.

The only possible HR that's shorter than that one was hit by Jeter some 16 years ago.

A bit disturbing in that it's taken Hefner nearly 50 pitches just to get through two scoreless innings despite only three base-runners -- although I suppose that beats a low pitch count with runs allowed so we shouldn't complain too much.

Damn, I wanted five more runs in the 2nd inning.

Edgy MD wrote: Some inneresting names on that list when I went back to check. Neikro didn't even make the top ten. Finish the Top Ten of Non HOF-ers in starts 1. Greg Maddux 2. Roger Clemens 3. Tommy John 4. __________ 5. __________ 6. __________ 7. __________ 8. __________ 9. (Really Hard) 10. __________ This is games started, not just appeared in, correct? Well I'm going to guess Jim Kaat anyway.