Frayed Knot

The early view for the top of the upcoming draft is one much deeper in pitching than in hitting - at least on the college level. So at around the midpoint in the college season, BA reviews two LHPs they think are ticketed for the top 10 in the draft - although, keep in mind, it's just one scout's opinion: "The scouting consensus is that junior lefthanders Drew Pomeranz of Mississippi and Chris Sale (also mentioned in an above post) of Florida Gulf Coast will both be drafted among the first 10 picks in June, and maybe the top five. Both have excellent stuff and good size, though Pomeranz is considerably more physical at 6-foot-5, 231 pounds than Sale at 6-6, 183. An American League crosschecker gave a side-by-side comparison of the two lefthanded aces "For me, they're probably the two best lefties out there, and I would love to have either one of them." "Sale's fastball probably has more movement than Pomeranz's does. Pomeranz does it as easy as you could see�it looks like he's throwing batting practice fastballs out there, and it's 93-94. It's just a very easy delivery, whereas Sale's a little bit herky-jerky with that delivery; he's got a lot going on. Sale I've seen up to 95, and he can reach back late in the game and maybe get a 93, but he'll pretty much settle at 91-92. Pomeranz can go back in the sixth or seventh and get 93-94 when he wants to. He'll probably pitch with a 60 fastball (on the 20-80 scouting scale), a firm 92. It's truer than Sale's, but the thing I like about Pomeranz's fastball is the angle he's able to create with it�he's able to go to both sides. Sale, with that cross-body finish, kind of struggles to get out on the front side consistently and get his fastball in on righthanded hitters. Pomeranz can get it in on righthanded hitters well. I would see Sale pitching more with a 55 fastball, whereas Pomeranz will pitch with a 60. "Sale has a good slurvy slider, but Pomeranz has a true 12-to-6 downer curveball that is a true swing-and-miss pitch for me. I would say Sale's breaking ball is a solid 55, and I'd give Pomeranz's a 60. Sale's slider is very effective to lefties because of the angle that he's throwing it from and the direction he's landing in his delivery�everything's pointing away from a lefthanded hitter. When he's throwing that slider slashing across, it's hard for lefties to hit it. Against righties he can bury it on the back foot at times, but he can get around it and give it a sweepy action at other times, and when it's up it can get hit. "Sale's changeup is really good�I would give it a 60. It's got good arm speed, good fade/sink action. He's able to repeat it and throw it back to back, which I like. He's not afraid to use it against lefties and righties. Pomeranz doesn't really have to use the changeup that much because he's not afraid to pitch with his fastball and he's not afraid to pitch to contact, but when he does throw it, it's a solid-average pitch with a chance to be a 55-type pitch in the future with more use. He's got enough hand feel with it and enough touch with it, there's no doubt it'll be a tick above-average pitch. "For me, the difference is Pomeranz is a bigger guy, more durable for a starting role, and Sale has a real frail body, for me. I'm not sure how long Sale's body will last, and I have some real questions about the arm action on the back. It's an upside-down takeaway�that's a red flag in the baseball industry, it usually leads to some elbow problems down the road. It's easier for Pomeranz to repeat it and there's less effort there. Over the long haul of a season, Pomeranz won't have to exert as much effort as Sale will have to exert. Command for me with Sale will probably be average, and Pomeranz for me would be a tick above�he throws more quality strikes in the zone. Sale will be a little more scattered. "With Pomeranz, the body's there, the stuff is there, he's durable, he's pitched in a major conference and been successful, he's pitched with Team USA and been successful. If I had to put my $2.5 million on one, I'd put it there."

Ready ... Fire ... Aim

There ya go kid!

Young Ruben certainly looks smooth enough on defense. Tonight's probably the last we'll see of him for a while but that's all for the best for now. Be nice if he could sneak in a hit before he goes. John Sickels had some nice stuff to say about him today in a section on SS "sleeper" candidates: iow, guys too young or without enough of a track record to get a high grade yet JS: Ruben Tejeda - Mets, 20 years old -- hit .289/.351/.381 with 19 steals for Double-A Binghamton. Good defender, makes contact, could draw more walks eventually. I like this guy quite a bit and he has significant breakout potential.

What wind?

John Cougar Lunchbucket wrote: What gets me about Fatcessa is that he doesn't understand them. He also carries on a weekly interview with Manuel that's painful to listen to. For whatever reason Mike tries very hard to be nice to Manuel and as a result he's never asked him a single tough question even if he'd bashed the Mets for days leasding up to the interview. Oddly, he's on very good terms with Manual (like you said, doesn't want/like to challenge him), is VERY tight with Omar, and is at least semi-tight and very respectful of Fred. I think that was at least part of the reason for his "gotta break up the cawr" campaign; he's gotta blame the players because he's been so supportive of the mgmt. There's also an element where he's trying to bait fans into a topic where the next 2 hours of programming is set with angry callers - only he's not as good at it as Dog used to be. Russo could say three sentences and get Yanqui fans P-O-ed for the next week.

Hurrajas for Barajas!!

Hardly the first time that one of Will Carroll's scoops has proven to be less than scoop-tacular.

In fact, that's true if you're following buffalo or if you're following Buffalo

So far the Niese-not-Marquis decision is working out in our favor JN: 6.0 IP; 3 ER; 8 H; 2 BB; 3 K JM: 4.0 IP; 6 ER; 8 H; 3 BB; 2 K

Seems to me that following buffalo could lead to stepping in some pretty large piles of shit.

This is probably a question which UMDB can answer - at least the first part of it. We all know that CitiField has become a triples haven in its short life and Gary mentioned the other day how that helped a stunning [u:2ew4zqwy]19 different Mets[/u:2ew4zqwy] hit at least one last season (with 12 having more than one)*. That result is shirley due to several factors, not only from the park itself but also the personnel and the fact that the revolving door that was the NYM everyday roster gave very few guys a full season but pushed a whole lot of folks over 100+ ABs to where three-baggers start to become more likely. - now I gotta figure that this is a team record anyway. Maybe not the 49 total triples hit (although that might be too) but the way they were so spread out over so many players - and then I'm wondering if that 19 number is an MLB record. Even in the first few decades of the 20th century when triples were more common it would still be tough to find so many having at least one. * Pagan - 11 Sullivan - 5 Tatis - 4 Murphy - 4 Wright - 3 Castillo - 3 W. Valdez - 2 A. Hernandez - 2 J. Reyes - 2 Reed - 2 Francoeur - 2 Sheffield - 2 Figueroa - 1 Thole - 1 Evans - 1 Delgado - 1 Beltran - 1 Cora - 1 Santos - 1 Just for kicks and comparisons I looked up the '09 Yanx and found them with 21 (total triples), 11 (players w/a triple) & 6 (players with 2 or more triples) and also last year's Phils who had 35, 10 & 6 -- with nearly 40% (13) coming from Shane Victorino and finally I grabbed what I thought, off the top of my head, might be a very 'triple-y' team: the 1962 Dodgers. And while they did hit a whopping 65 three-baggers that year "only" 15 different players had them and only 9 hit more than one. Maury Wills and Willie Davis had 10 each and Tommy Davis had 9. OK, no surprises there. But then 1B Ron Fairly and catcher Johnny Roseboro had 7 each while big Frank Howard chipped in with 6.

Neither Joe West nor Angel Hernandez are exactly favorites of mine, but I love the fact that Hernandez got all stingy on granting numerous 'time-outs' and that West backed him by going public with this. Both those clubs are a chore to watch separately much less when they're on the same field and, after years of MLB claiming they were trying to do something about the length of games, I'm fine with just about anything they want to try at this point. What's annoying in the aftermath of this flap is those trying to turn this back onto the umps, especially the cries of; 'well they should just call more strikes if they want to speed things up', as if that's a logical or proportional solution. No, get in the box, stay in the box, throw your pitches at a rate better than 2 per minute, and cut the mound meetings down to less than one for every third pitch.

Niese 2.3 Pagan - 1.6 Francoeur - 1.6 Bay - 0.6 Igarashi - 0.2 Takahashi - 0.2

Cora - 1.2 Wright - 1.2 Bay - 1.5 Mathews - 0.8 Francoeur - 0.8 Feliciano - 0.6 Rodriguez - 0.5 Nieve - 0.5

The priest's part in the flick and his conflict with Walt also sets Clint up for his none-too-subtle, 'why yes, I am a martyr' scene at the end. Certainly the actor was hired - at least in part - for his youthful and non-worldly look. Only other time I've seen him was as an extra in a 'House' episode, he played a dork.

metsmarathon wrote: what is the penalty for a batter leaving the batters box without time being called? is there any? If the batter steps out while only asking for time but it isn't granted, then the pitcher can throw the pitch and the ump will call it as he sees it. If the batter - for whatever reason, like excessive arguing - refuses to get back in the box after being told to, the ump then instructs the pitcher to throw the pitch and will call it a strike regardless of where it crosses

Running w/Jacobs up would have taken away the hole between 1st & 2nd for the lefty. Not so important with Bay up and one out less to work with. And, yeah, Wright stealing so they could IW Bay is the same result as Bay walking and forcing David over there and we certainly wouldn't scoff at that outcome. I was also OK with leaving Takahashi in. There's a limit on how match-up nutty you want to get, especially for a non-descript hitter in the 10th inning when you're already on pitcher #6

- I didn't have a problem with Wright stealing, mainly for the reasons Swannie mentions (odds of Mathews hit vs Bay XBH) And, btw, WTF was Ramirez doing playing almost directly up the middle?!? Off his bat I swore GMJ had hisself a game-winning hit only to find it a routine grounder. Both earlier and later the Mets hit grounders into the hole and in those cases Hanley was playing there. - would like to have seen Rodriguez for a second inning although it would have entailed a double-switch leading into his appearance as his spot was leading off the next inning. That bad call at 1B didn't help any as it made him pitch to 2 more batters than he should have. That he pitched in game 1 with a day off in between I don't think had anything to do with it.

Yeah, Tatis has got to be near 100% sure you can score on a passed ball there, but Geez that was a nice play by the catcher Baker! He probably makes that 90+% of the time. And speaking of chances, I would have sent Bay on that short-ish fly to Coughlin in LF based purely on the lousy throw he made earlier. Turns out the second throw was even worse but by then Bay had stopped and to re-start would have been a worse call than Tatis's. Tough to complain about a lack of big hits when you only get 6 hits to begin with.

Edgy DC wrote: I don't think mgr's are hired at all for their game skill; they have to have people skills and media skills above all. Completely agree there, and guys who have been fine tacticians --- Larry Bowa for instance --- have lost good jobs by lacking those skills. Bobby Valentine, of course, was all three. The answer to whether Bobby has people and organizational skills depends on to whom you are directing those questions. He'd get answers at both extremes.

Willets Point wrote: Benjamin Grimm wrote: The Commies? The team provided universal healthcare for all the kids. Hits from each player according to their abilities, runs to each team according to their needs.

The Commies? That was at one of those socialist summer camps that Woody Allen was talking about to Carol Kane in the flashback scene in 'Annie Hall'

If I were running a LL I don't think I could justify the expense of paying for the registered trademarks of MLB just so you could use their nicknames - especially when half, if not more, of the kids aren't going to like the team they've been assigned to. When I played they didn't have ML names and I don't recall anyone complaining about it. Instead, each level had a different 'theme'. One of the lower levels was all small furry animals; I was on the Beavers and you'd play the Bobcats and various other critters. At another level you'd move to birds: Wrens, Hawks, Falcons, etc.; then at another it was Indian tribes: Comanche, Kiowa, Mohawk, etc., and so on. Plus, you kind of knew in advance what team you were going to be on in the future because you tended to move up within your color. So if you, like me, were in Orange in the lower level you'd also be Orange at the middle and upper ones if you stuck it out.