Frayed Knot

Harvey almost banged the wall, which would make him a ...

Shoppach's NYM OBA = .500 Sign him to an extension NOW!!!!

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

#937 = Kelly Shoppach

Shoppach is 32 years old folks. There's not a lot out there to learn about him.

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.

The 2nd half slide is a lot simpler to explain than pythagorean shifts (that 'gap' had self-corrected prior to the tumble) or reversions to the mean involving 2-out hits or whatever. Pre-ASB: RS = 4.58/G; RA (ERA) = 3.97 Post-ASB: RS = 3.64/G; RA = 5.10 Basically Wright stopped being an MVP candidate, Nieuwenhuis & Duda stopped hitting (and eventually stopped playing), Tejada missed a month and Ike has never really started hitting. On the other side, Johan went from good to awful (with a stop at unavailable), Dickey slid from fantastic to merely very good, and Gee stepped out of the picture altogether. And virtually nobody, save for Rauch and maybe Muffy, has had a better 2nd half than 1st

What Edgy said + what GWreck said. It'd be different if Shoppach was younger and/or more controllable, but he's neither.

Under different circumstances or timing this could be a good deal. How it's a good move for this team at this time is a mystery to me. I hope they have plans for Shop-vac beyond just playing out the string - although any plans by mgmt are going to require his cooperation as well.

The biggest legacy Beato will leave is the circuitous route he took to get here ... and now leave. - A 17th round "draft and follow" guy (a category which no longer exists) he pitched well in JuCo and impressed the Mets enough to offer him around 2nd round money - But he and agent wanted 1st round money and so a signing which all concerned thought was sure to happen didn't happen and so he re-entered the draft and went to Baltimore (signing for right about the mid-point between what the Mets were offering and what he originally wanted) - he pretty much scuffled in the Baltimore system until being moved to the pen a few years later, but by then it was time to protect him and the O's chose not to - so the Mets plucked him in the 'Rule 5' draft and, unlike most who go that route, he stuck, having a decent year although with fairly pronounced home/road splits (home = good, road = not so much) and 1st-half/2nd-half splits - there were always the occasional rumors that mgmt wanted to try him out in the rotation but those never seemed to materialize - injuries delayed his 2012 season and, freed from the Rule 5 requirements, was able to work in the minors where his stats look decent even if nothing eye-popping. In the end you'd have to think he failed to impress someone - or several someones - with his work this season. When you fail to crack THIS bullpen for more than 4 innings then it's probably time to say "somebody up there doesn't like me"

It all makes the timing of this trade even tougher to understand.

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.

Baxter - 1.5 Tejada - 1.5

I don't, but I do occasionally ladle out lentils.

Look at it this way: If we keep hitting like this we won't see Chapman the whole series.

As first mentioned by 'Guys' during tonight's telecast, starting on Sunday in Washington the team will go with a six-man rotation with the exception of RA who gets his spot every five games. All others get at least an extra day of rest and on days when Dickey jumps in front of them and/or an off-day comes up they will get an extra day on top of that. So for Santana & Young it gives them extra rest time for their surgically repaired arms, and for young'uns Harvey & Niese it keeps their innings totals down. Harvey - Santana & Niese go on Thurs, Fri & Sat, then Hefner Sunday, but then it's Dickey's turn so Young becomes the first one affected.

Weird night for Dickey: Whole lotta strike-outs (10 I think) but a bunch of balls hit on the nose too.

- Mike Leake was struggling over the last month or so ... Cured! - Jay Bruce has been in a slump ... Cured! - Scott Rolen sitting out for the last week ... Cured! The Mets have a better track record than the doctors on Gray's Anatomy

The main problem with those HRs is that three runs seems beyond the capability of our offense these days.

TransMonk wrote: ... but the problem has been addressed, right Bud? Well, the fact that they've tested, caught, and punished the reigning league MVP and ASG MVP (even if one was reversed by outside forces) almost immediately afterward indicates that they are at least attempting to address it and aren't sweeping things under the rug when they do find it. Compare this to the NFL which somehow went from 3 300-pound players in the early 1970s to over 350 current 300+ pounders and yet seems to catch almost no one.

Well, at least there won't be two perfect games today. And we break the shutout too - although not in a good way.

Abraham really writes a strong column there complete with a warning to Pedroia. I can imagine their interactions might be dicey for a bit. I wonder what pct of the Boston media is willing to take Bobby's side like this. Usually that figure isn't too high. But when he concludes his column with: [firing him] "might be doing him a favor. Then he can sit around for a season, collect on his contract and not worry about winning. In that sense, he would be just like the players he was given to manage."; I'm not sure he's correct there. If Bobby gets fired one year into this job it becomes highly unlikely that he's ever hired again.

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.

GO to SS One out to go Shawn Rodriguez batting

Frayed Knot wrote: Desmond Jennings, leading off for Tampa STRIKE - STRIKE - FOUL - FOUL - STRIKE THREE Jeff Keppinger - pinch-hitting