Frayed Knot

More two-out walks and defensive incompetence plus a 27-pitch inning despite only two base-runners, and all this from the guy who is in the game on account of the starter giving up too many two-out runs with too many high-pitch innings.

At the pace this game is going we're going to be here for a while.

Yanks lose, after their "swing as hard as we can in case we hit it" offense nets two to tie. walk-off loss. I didn't stay up for the end of this, which sounds like it spared me first the frustration of watching the Yanx tie it with two swings of the bat while the A's were leaving scoring chances on base all night (14 LOBs in total) but then I missed the part where I get to watch the Yanx walk off the field with heads hanging. Oakland's actually having an interesting season out there. Five games over .500 after hitting a low of eight games under on June 1st, they're almost certainly not going to win their division but they are right in the mix for the WC race to the point where they might actually be buyers at the trade deadline. And they're doing all this with a line-up that's half anonymous, especially to those of us in the east: Last night they trotted out: CF - Coco Crisp (2012 salary ~ $6 mil) 2B - Jemile (younger and considerably smaller brother of Richie) Weeks (<500K/min wage) RF - Josh Reddick who they got for dealing Boston their closer - who promptly got hurt (<500K/min wage) LF - Yoenis Cespedes, their high-priced Cuban import over the off-season. Looks so far like it's money well-spent. ($6.5 mil this season as part of a 4-yr/$36mil package) RF - Seth Smith, off-season deal with the Rox ($2.4 mil) 1B - Brandon Moss, 32 combined ABs with Pirates & Phils over last two seasons. Called up last month (<500K/min wage) 3B - Brandon Inge, Tiger cast-off. (2012 salary is $5.5mil but I'm sure Oakland is only paying min wage) SS - Erik Sogard, Who? (<500K/min wage) C - Kurt Suzuki ($5 mil -- no wonder they want to trade him) So that's about $23mil for their starting nine hitters last night, or about equal to either of the Yanx corner infielders and maybe $90mil or so less than the hitters the Yanx usually trot out. Meanwhile their pitching staff is entirely under 30 except for like two relievers and they've now held the Yanx to just 5 runs over two games (3 of the 5 via HRs of course) and have the lowest staff ERA in the AL. Last night Tom Milone, one of the guys they got from the Nats in exchange for Gio Gonzalez, shut the Yanx out for seven innings.

Young - 3.0 Rauch - 0.4 Wright - 2.1 Bay - 1.4 Duda - 0.8 Torres - 0.8 Hairston - 0.5

Braves eke out the win with the help of a Zimmerman error and a passed ball followed by a bloop over the drawn-in infield on account of those first two miscues. Chad Durbin then did what the nominal closers failed to do, toss a 1-2-3 inning for the save. Other 1st-v-2nd matchups this weekend included the Tigers, behind Verlander, drawing to within a half-game of the ChiSox with a 4-2 win. And Anaheim is leading Texas in mid-game although they're six games back so could only make a small dent unless they sweep. - Thome passed Sosa to take over 7th place in career HRs by hitting his 610th

Phils and Marlins both lost, so the eventual winner of the Nats/Braves game (currently tied and headed for bottom 10) gains a full game on everyone in the division. Yanx down 1-0 in the 3rd in Oakland after losing last night. I think that was Oakland's first win over the Yanx since like 1991 or something but it did spawn comparisons of the payrolls; you know, the one where the entire A's lineup doesn't add up to one ARod bi-monthly take-home pay or something.

I getting sick of these hard-fought, one-run losses.

And now Danny Espinosa HRs off Kimbrel to tie it with one out.

It's the little lefty who's coming through tonight

And Bourne triples in two runs and the Braves are up 10-9 I don't know who I should be rooting for here, but it is nice to see the Nats start to run into bullpen problems lately.

Well, the big lefties we were discussing earlier have a second chance to come through here.

Nats, once up 9-zip on the Braves, are holding on to a 9-8 lead and the Braves have the first two on in the 9th against Clippard. And now Ross Ks for out #1

I'm done with Batman movies.

The Second Spitter wrote: Here's why burning a pinch hitter to lead off the 3rd may not have been the best idea by TC. Is there anybody left on the bench that can hit? The PH spot I wouldn't have made was Nieuwenhuis for Beato an inning or so later. Especially with the way Kirk's been (not) hitting you practically had as good a chance with a reliever up there - plus you then get an extra inning out of him.

Swan Swan H wrote: You spin me right 'round baby, right 'round! Change that to: 'You Speen me right 'round ...', put it on a bed sheet and take it to the next Banner Day

Sum-bitch!

WATPs Live On!! Warning: The linked thread may cause readers to lose IQ points.

When was the last time this team had either a catcher or an outfielder who could throw consistently?

As it turns out, Tejada's mad dash home wound up stealing us a run even though it looked, at best, like a questionable decision at the time with Wright coming up and only one out.

One (or both) of the big lefties has to come through here.

The Second Spitter wrote: Shocked to see Ike has a higher SLG% than Duda. Especially when Ike is starting with a 40 point gap in BA Lucas's Isolated Slugging numbers are right around league average which isn't a good thing for a 250 pound right fielder with neither speed nor a glove.

Wild-Assed Trade Proposal The idea being that if you were going to post something ridiculous you should label it with the above acronym in the subject heading so as to warn folks in advance that the ensuing post was going to be some made-up hail mary of an idea.

Ah yes, the old 'throw in a couple of prospects' rider was added to the basic definition of the WATP* because it was essentially an admission by the wannabe-GM that his proposal was otherwise totally one-sided and so the phrase was tacked on to the end in a lame attempt to balance the scales. The prospects were always nameless of course with the only stipulation being that they weren't going to be any of your good ones. Yanqui fans on WFAN were always quick to use that bailout. "Hey Mike & Dawg - long-time/first-time. Listen, I think the Yanx could use another outfielder for the post-season. How about we offer [insert backup catcher] to the Cubs for [in his prime] Sosa? No, you don't think they'll go for that? ... well how 'bout if we t'row in a coupla prospects?" * My coinage of the term WATP remains my one enduring legacy at the old MoFo (last time I checked anyway). People posting there now who never crossed paths with my/our time there are using the label with no idea of its origin. I should probably sue. IIRC, among the conditions which definitively stamped a proposed trade as a WATP included: - deals involving (7?) or more players and/or more than three teams - "serial" trades which required, for instance, first dealing players A, B & C to one team for D, E & F -- and then immediately turing around and flipping D & E along with an existing player or two to a third team for G, H, & I - and the good old "and t'row in a coupla prospects" clause.

Well there essentially are no scheduled DHs in the traditional meaning where you're scheduling them prior to the start of the season. I suspect that whole two-day window thing was put in as a fail-safe to keep the home team, which controls the fate of a game up until first pitch, from calling off a game prematurely so as to take advantage of the new call-up rule within the same scheduled series because they took a look at how the pitching lined up for the two teams and thought it might be to their advantage.

Mets � Willets Point wrote: This is the kind of thing that makes the people who make WATPs think that their WATPs have a chance of happening. Except that the ten-player WATPs that spring from the minds of most fans involve at least seven players who are currently All-Stars.