Frayed Knot

]Admit it. You started this thread with that post in mind Y'know, as someone who has been a member of this board for a long time and has started a thread similar to this in years past, I strongly object to the implication that I would stoop so low as to begin a countdown for something as sacred as the opening of the baseball season simply to get a laugh at the expense of a fallen politician at a time when his family must be going through ... OK, yeah I did.

NINE!!

Will Carroll in his 'Under the Knife' column over at BP isn't too optimistic about Patterson being all that useful anytime soon. The Nats' former ace was released on Thursday after the team determined that he wasn't getting better, and that the injuries had finally taken their toll on him. Patterson was never able to get above the mid-80s with his fastball and seemed confused by the team's demanding that he use it more often. It's not that he isn't back to his 2005 form after multiple arm surgeries; it's that the Nats saw him as a worse option than their various options for the back-end of the rotation, like Matt Chico or Tim Redding. Given the shallow pitching of many teams and the chance that Patterson could show some effectiveness down the line, he's likely to latch on with a team like the Cardinals or Red Sox that have shown a tendency towards taking chances on retreading projects. One observer that I spoke with thinks that Patterson is going to need to reinvent himself as a pitcher to be effective again.

Then there was the one just before ST where Astro OFer Hunter Pence walked into a glass door naked (or virtually so) and cut himself all up, although fortunately nowhere ... umm, vital. At least he didn't fare as bad as that ABBA drummer did.

If Spring results are any indication (and they're often not) we're going to get great pitching, lousy hitting, and get injured a lot. OK, maybe they are in this case.

OK, there IS something wrong with that!!

I'd still like to see him in AA this season - thru mid-season at minimum. His wrist injury last year curtailed his season and that was after skipping A+ ball entirely. Bobby V used to talk about a young player deserving a promotion only after they were able to 'put their current level behind him'. Considering that he's already about 2 levels above his age group and has barely 200+ ABs above Low-A let him develop at a more normal speed. His results will show them if that speed is too cautious.

... along with three pitchers: Nate Field, Toe-Knee Arm-Ass Jr., and Joselo Diaz Not that Fernando getting demoted was a surprise. It was probably more a surprise that he lasted until almost the final week. Of course all the injuries helped no doubt helped that a bit, but so did his .340/.373/.426 with four doubles and seven strikeouts in 47 ST ABs. Definitely not overmatched. While we're on the subject, John Sickels tries to sort out his future, and urges some restraint on those who might go overboard due to his (VERY) young age and limited sample size so far.

Listening to Howie in those last days of as a WFAN guy he barely disguised the fact that he was kind of fed up with talk radio by that point. Part of it was the shifts he used to draw, either getting stuck with the over-long 5-hour solo shifts on nights when there was no Met game, the kind of show where you run out of things to talk about and the topic of the day becomes so monotonous in all that time (more than 3 hrs for a solo host gets to be tough sledding for anyone) or - on game nights - drawing the other extreme of having the half-hour before the pre-game, then the official pre-game itself, then the post-game, and then an hour or so after the post-game. It was those back-and-forth between official NYM time and regular FAN time where he'd occasionally have to walk on thin ice. The pre & post was considered to be NYM time where the rules of what he was expected to do were more structured. But then, following a brief sign-off from the post-game and maybe a few commercials in between, he was expected to morph back into regular WFAN guy who suddenly had a bit more freedom to answer the same complaints from callers somewhat differently than he had just 15 minutes earlier. Trying to maintain that balancing act occiasionally ruffled a few feathers. You'll notice that the post-game show no longer takes calls. Howie also made it clear he wanted a talk-show shift to include more interviews and other discussions while the station wanted phone calls and phone calls, followed by more phone calls. I'm not surprised he claims to be uninterested in going back.

]I realize Howie's probably just being a pro and being kind to his colleagues in print, but how the heck are Mike and Mad Dog the gold standard? Because they're 'Masterpiece Theatre' compared to much of sports talk radio

- Tomorrow (Wednesday - 19th) they play their final ST game in Florida - They then travel to Japan where they'll play a couple exhibition games against Oakland, and then 2 reg season games next Tuesday & Wednesday - They then jet to the west coast and play 3 exhibition games against the Dodgers over the weekend - Then up to Oakland for 2 reg season games Tuesday & Wednesday - Then to Toronto (after a day off) for 3 vs the Jays on Fri, Sat & Sun - They finally get home where they'll relax with 3 against Detroit followed by 3 against the Yanx That's a tough first month: 6 exhibition games + 13 reg season games in 3 different countries, travelling in that time from Florida to Japan (for a week) to Celifornia (for a week) to Ontario and then finally to Boston for 6 games against what may be the two toughest AL teams

The two main catchers played on opposite sides of today's intra-squad game. Castro's MRI showed a "strained" hamstring. El Duque pitched for one of the sides, facing off against Pelfrey in a 5th starter smackdown. Duque lasted 4 innings/80 pitches and is scheduled to start in a real game next time around.

I'll sum this up and close it out a week from today.

I liked this one a lot better than Clint's English language film on the same topic (Flags of our Fathers)

Bonds wasn't offered arb ... mainly cuz he would have snapped it up in a minute and the Gigantors would have been on the hook for at least 80% of whatever he was earning last year. Piazza's a 'Type B' FA, meaning that Oakland would gain only a supplemental pick while the signing team doesn't lose one of their own. Remember also folks that this guy didn't catch at all last season (not even in ST) and wasn't very good at it when he was younger, healthier and working at it regularly ... not to mention that his hitting isn't what it used to be. His ship has sailed as far as I'm concerned. He's an AL DH at best and no one is rushing those jobs to him either.

The line from Lost Wages, Nevada for win totals for each of the NL teams this season. Pick either the over or under for Any Eight teams (any combo of overs or unders permitted) and we'll track this throughout the season and then both laugh at those with pathetic results and laud the winner with the usual CPF fabulous prize* NYM - 93.5 PHIL - 87.5 ATL - 84.5 WASH - 70.5 FLA - 68.5 CHIC - 87.5 MILW - 84.5 CINC - 79.5 StL - 78.5 HOUS - 72.5 PITT - 68.5 LAD - 87.5 ARIZ - 86.5 SD - 84.5 COLO - 82.5 SF - 71.5 * Absolutely fucking nothing

Well, if you're into conspiracies, Girardi is starting Duncan in today's game vs Tampa too. And while we're on the subject: Just in case there were those who may be on the fence about whether Yanqui arrogance and sense of entitlement are real or imagined, Hankenstein is nice enough to remove all doubt. From Kevin Kernan in today's NYPost: "There are going to be problems, especially if they go after our stars," Steinbrenner said. "It's not going to be tolerated. We never have done it to them. It's just not going to happen anymore." Guess he's forgetting about when Joba whizzed those two consecutive 100MPH-specials over Youkilis's head last season. And then there's my favorite part: "I don't want these teams in general to forget who subsidizes a lot of them ... I would prefer if teams want to target the Yankees that they at least start giving some of that revenue sharing and luxury tax money back." Yes, we're the Yanx, how dare you peons strive to compete. * Aaaaaaay, I'm Fonzie!

Hunt & Seaver never crossed paths as Mets so there was never any clubhouse tussles -- not sure about Seaver & Rocky although there was at least one with Swoboda & Cardwell that surfaced with the recent news of Cardwell's death. But I do remember hearing an interview with Hunt at one point long after his career was over and the questioning turned (as they often did with him) to HBPs. I forget the details but it was Seaver the opponent who pissed Hunt off for reasons involving some aspect of perceived intentional or malicious HBPs and Hunt wasn't shy about saying so. That said, it's probably not the reason why Hunt's been scarce around Flushing, Queens. I suspect that the Double-Pon ownership group's anxiousness to bury that early and inept Met past and keep a whole lot of distance between them and it is more likely the reason.

I remember Hunt didn't like Tom Seaver a whole lot; maybe that's a reason for his persona non grata status at Shea.

"Other than Brooks, whom else is he referring to there?" Tom Selleck and singer Bruce Hornsby have taken ABs during ST in years past, plus a few others I think. And I don't particularly care about this issue one way or the other -- it's just that, when Heyman was asked (M&MD chat) about whether he thought the majority of the MLB press would lean towards the 'it's harmless fun' or 'it demeans baseball' camps, I was thrown a bit when he suddenly launched into an anti-BC screed and claimed that as the prevailing view among working scribes. Kind of poked a hole in the whole funny, fuzzy, cuddly Billy routine too.

Jon Heyman, when asked about Crystal, said that most of the sportswriters didn't like his appearence because, unlike Garth Brooks and some others celebs who spent weeks in camp with the team in exchange for their brief moments of participation, Crystal dropped in just a day in advance and then acted like he owned the joint. Heyman also admitted that many in the press were anti-Crytals to begin with because they thought he made them, as a group, look like dorks in '*61'

"There's enough between the lines of what he said" Like what?

The problemis proving it. Girardi said and did all the right things, at least publicly.

3 game suspension for Duncan [u:aa1d09442c]and Melky Cabrera[/u:aa1d09442c] (apparently he threw a punch in the scrum) Gomes gets 2 games for his charge from RF Fines for Girardi and several Yanqui coaches