Frayed Knot

="metirish"]I wouldn't mind snapping up Kenny Williams if he became available. After this deal ChiSox fans may want you to snap him up. KW just gave up 3 of his top 5 prospects for a good, though not great, OFer.

De Los Santos has the best upside of anyone in that trio, although is still at least a year away. BP's analysis had him a the ChiSox top prospect; a RHP who'll turn 22 next month he split last year between low A and high A; features a 91-95 MPH fastball, power curve, improviong change-up, etc, with the usual caveat that he's young and overthrows at times and needs to pitch and not just throw, yadda, yadda. Can become a frontline starter if his change comes around or maybe evolves into a closer if not. Gio Gonzalez (LHP) is also just 22 and is coming off a decent year at AA John Sickels gives both De Los Santos and Gonzalez 'B+' grades - which are very high praise from him. Sweeny = 'C+' which is still above average although he worries about his power Bottom line: he thinks that the ChiSox took a mediocre system and "gutted it" for Swisher

msilva177 wrote: Glad I came across this forum. Please let me know how I can be of help Well, you could bring a good starter, two decent relievers, and a righty bat off the bench with you next time you stop by.

metsmarathon wrote: am i the only one who didn't know leyritz' nickname was "the king"? It was actually a bit of a derisive name coined by teammates to mock his high opinion of himself. Leyritz loved it (again, that high opinion thing) and turned the put-down around by adopting it as his own self-aggrandizing moniker.

Former major leaguer Jim Leyritz, who played the hero in the Yankees' 1996 World Series run, is in Broward County's Main Jail, charged with DUI homicide after a Friday morning crash in Fort Lauderdale, the Miami Herald reported on its Web site. Leyritz was charged with two counts of drunken driving, including DUI that causes death to a human, the Herald reported, citing the jail's Web site.

Just seeing this now .... ummm, don't think I can make it.

http://www.rogerclemensonline.com/

Roger seems determined to go as far as it takes to fight his recent ties to PED's After the initial statements via agents and lawyers, he is now using his own voice on camera (OK, one on his own website) to issue more complete, and seemingly loophole-free, denials of use and repudiation of MacNamee's claims via the Mitchell report. He also announces that he will do a sit-down interview with Mike Wallace on the subject for '60 Minutes' to air sometime in January.

"I played golf with Roger Craig last week." That's cool. "He is 77 and has a ten handicap." That's awesome! He could be one of the relative handful of men who, on a good day, can 'shoot his age'. * I'm Keef !!

Sid lives in Hawaii man, he's gotta keep up his buff bod for the benefit of the beach babes.

Yeah, I pretty much feel the same way about Spring Training as I do about Spring itself. As much as I like baseball I wouldn't want it to be a 12-month sport so I appreciate having an off-season. Under similar logic I don't complain about winter as much as many others seem to. But as soon as it starts getting a bit warmer and the days a bit longer I find myself getting impatient that the warming trend isn't quick enough for my liking. March & April (and a fair munber of days in May) contain a lot of lousy weather meaning that, more often than not, Spring finishes dead last in my ranking of seasons. ST is a lot like that; baseball's here ... except it's not really here, and it seems to take forever until it actually is here.

As the article I (partially) stole this list from said; the stories behind and around these picks could constitute it's own book. Chilcott/Jackson would just be one chapter and seperating the myth from facts would keep the writer busy for a while. - The biggest story is the one where Jackson claims his college coach told him the Mets backed off due to his (in the parlance of the time) 'uppity nigger' style and that his black self was dating a white (actually Mexican) girl. The only source of that, however, appears to be Jackson himself and I'm not sure he should be treated as Mr. Reliable. - Others look at that pick as an example of NYM woeful history, but the difference looks bigger in hindsight than it was at the time. Whitey Herzog was the Met talent guru that year and he claims to have gone to his (then) 19 counterparts after the draft asking them who they would have picked. Acc to Whitey, 9 told him they would have gone w/Chilcott with 10 opting for Jackson, meaning it would have been a 10-10 tie with the Met vote counted in. Now maybe that ratio would have been slanted more towards Jackson in later years as clubs started to recognize the colleges as an important source of talent their players as less risky than HS talent, but this was just the 2nd draft ever. - The other oft-skipped part of the story is that Chilcott's career was curtailed by injuries and not lack of talent.

So does Scott Rolen now that I read the list more closely. Pre-injuries he might have been the best glove at the hot corner since Brooks. Of the others, Ralph & Dicke Allen certainly weren't winning any gold gloves, and Bob Horner was exactly graceful either. I remember Jim Ray Hart but not enough about his defense to make a judgement. Hank Blalock is OK but nothing special. Don't know about the rest.

I don't really have a specific point in mind here, just was going through some stuff and decided to break down the list of all those drafted #1 overall. 43 years of MLB drafts produced [u:0d9b955496]42 different players[/u:0d9b955496] picked #1 overall; that's because Danny Goodwin was picked #1 twice: in 1971 by the White Sox (and didn't sign) then again in 1975 by the Angels (and did) [u:0d9b955496]None[/u:0d9b955496] of the 42 are in the Hall of Fame Of the 25 who [u:0d9b955496]played MLB ball but are no longer active[/u:0d9b955496] only Harold Baines (White Sox 1977) has a shot at reaching Cooperstown (but probably won't) The others, who had varying degrees of success, are: Rick Monday (A's 1965), Ron Blomberg (Yankees 1967), Tim Foli (Mets 1968), Jeff Burroughs (Rangers 1969), Mike Ivie (Padres (1970), the aforementioned Danny Goodwin, Dave Roberts (Padres 1972), David Clyde (Rangers 1973), Bill Almon (Padres 1974), Floyd Bannister (White Sox 1976), Bob Horner (Braves 1978), Al Chambers (Mariners 1979), Darryl Strawberry (Mets 1980), Mike Moore (Mariners 1981), Shawon Dunston (Cubs 1982), Tim Belcher (Twins 1983), Shawn Abner (Mets 1984), BJ Surhoff (Orioles 1985), Jeff King (Pirates 1986), Andy Benes (Padres 1988), Ben McDonald (Orioles 1989), Phil Nevin (Astros 1992), Paul Wilson (Mets 1994), & Matt Anderson (Tigers 1997) [u:0d9b955496]12 others are currently active[/u:0d9b955496]: - 2 of those ARE HoF-bound: Ken Griffey Jr. & Alex Rodriguez; both drafted by Seattle (1987 & 1993) - plus 1 other who might be: Chipper Jones (Braves 1990) - 3 of the remaining 9 active almost certainly will not: Daren Erstad (Angels 1995), Kris Benson (Pirates 1996), & Pat Burrell (Phillies 1998) - and the remaining 6 are still in the way too soon to tell stage: Josh Hamilton (1999), Adrian Gonzalez (2000), Joe Mauer (Twins 2001), Bryan Bullington (Pirates 2002), Delmon Young (Rays 2003), & Justin Upton (DBacks 2005) The remaining 5 are the ones who [u:0d9b955496]never played a day in the majors[/u:0d9b955496]: 2 of which never will: Steve Chilcott (Mets 1965) & Brien Taylor (Yankees 1991) And 3 recent picks who still might/should: Matt Bush (Padres 2004) though this one is NOT looking good as they recently changed him from SS to pitcher plus pitchers Luke Hochevar (Royals 2006) and David Price (Rays 2007)

MFS62 wrote: The only player on that list who played defense at a major league level was Duke Snider. Eric Chavez has several gold gloves (and even deserves them)

Trade him NOW while we still can get something in return !!!

My everlasting love and admiration.

An offical 'Carlos Silva to the Mariners' announcement is expected today. Indications are for somewhere in the $11 x 4 range. Meanwhile the Phils are saying they're out of the Kyle Lohse race on account of their refusal to go for more than 3 years. I'd like to think that Omar won't go for more than 3 either.

It seems that tell-all trainer and admitted steroid pusher Brian MacNamee went out of his way to deny that MLB players were taking steroids in an Op-Ed piece in The New York Times which appeared in October 2000. Specifically he was answering an earlier piece from Jose Canseco's ghost writer, claiming, among other things, that the superiority of today's player; "is not because of steroid use, but because of the advancement in sports-specific science and commitment of the organizations to strength, conditioning and nutrition. To suggest otherwise is irresponsible and disrespectful" .... and that; "the suggestion that steroids are the answer to the increased strength, recovery from injury and the improved performances of today's players is just wrong" We, of course, now know that during the same year this piece appeared MacNamee has admitted (under threat of prosecution if he wasn't telling the truth) to injecting Roger Clemens with steroids. Ooops! * Bonus points for anyone who can name the movie where the subject line comes from and the actors involved.

vtmet wrote: ... I'd rather break spring training with giving both Pelfrey and Humber a few turns in the rotation at the same time with El'Duque in the pen for a while to see if either/both can mature enough to be at least useful bottom of the rotation guys... Do keep in mind that this team has used 13 starters in each of the last two seasons - all but 4 of them for 3 starts or more. It's not like getting a spare vet (barring lengthy contracts) is going to block out a Pelfrey/Humber type from getting their chances. ] ... both pitchers have close to 300 innings under their belt since college (isn't the reason FOR drafting college pitchers, is so that you don't have to wait along time for them to be ready?)... 176 minors + 94 MLB for Pelfrey; 289 + 9 for Humber but never more than 139 in any one season and a major surgery in the middle there ]Yankees pitching prospects have less minor league innings (even after being drafted out of High School on some of them) and showed maturity at the mlb level... The only Yanqui HS pitcher right now is Hughes who threw a total of 275 IPs in the minors (plus 73 MLB) spread out over 4 seasons. Chamberlain & Kennedy were college hurlers and, while both went thru the minors very quickly, they still have all of 43 IPs combined at the MLB level.

="Vic Sage"]As for DHs, if they put up HOF worthy numbers, then they should get votes accordingly. Their defense cannot help them, obviously, but neither should their lack of defensive opportunities be held against them. I think it should - not to the point of making them ineligible but at least to a certain extent. The reason they're DHs is because they're not good enough/nimble enough to play anywhere else, even at the less impotant corner spots. To me that it means they'll need to make an even bigger offensive contribution than even a non-descript fielder to get over the bar. The offense is still going to be the main make-or-break factor. But I see being a full-time DH as a bigger strike against borderline candidates than I would almost anyone who played somewhere with a hunk of leather on one hand.

I'd like to put in a personal Matt Wise memory ... except I don't have one. His ERA and WHiP was up a bit last year, but it has still been better than lg avg for 4 of his last 5 seasons. That bad 2007 2nd half that CF points out occured following his beaning of a batter (I forget who) which is something that almost automatically gets cited as a cause-and-effect thing whether it's actually true or not.

Nymr83 wrote: ... but the writers who gave Palmiero a gold glove for playing 15 games at 1B that year do an excellent job. -- the fans would collectively do just as good a job as the guys who do it now. Actually, Gold Gloves are voted upon by managers & coaches not writers -- a fact which somewhat negates the argument against taking the vote away from the BBWA and the assumption that some other body is automatically going to do a better job.

="Valadius"]Why on earth would you spend time picking on someone like Sickels? Because he graded your player as a B- instead of a B+ Such sins can not be tolerated. And to be fair, I have little tolerance for Met fans who spend as much time and energy hunting for anti-NYM bias as Joe McCarthy did with communists. It's just that that attitude from NYY fans seems to be flowering as if from a rare desert rain on account of their title-less run here - especially since we now have fans old enough to enter these discussions who don't remember when they weren't a playoff team. I've yet to hear a talk-radio caller to introduce himself as "a long suffering Yanqui fan", but I honestly think that day is coming quickly.

="metirish"]="Edgy DC"]Jaw-dropping: http://blog.silive.com/yankeeswatch/2007/12/pettitte_once_again_shows_noth.html WOW, needs to be read to appreciate how bad this is. The attitude of this blogger has also been a staple of talk radio since the release of the Mitchell report: There's no proof! .... you can't believe a corrunpt trainer ... Mitchell is picking on the Yanquis because he's a Boston fan ... why aren't Papi & Manny on the list ... etc. Waah fucking Waah!! It's enough to make you wonder whether MFY fans are becoming more insufferable as non-winners than they were during their run. On a similar note, minor league prospect guru John Sickels is taking a leave of absence from his own website and its ongoing analysis of team-by-team prospects due to sniping from fans (his lists invite comments and discussion) which followed the posting of his NYY list. It seems that Yanqui fans, in the absence of championships, are reduced to hanging their hats on the belief that their up-and-comers are superior to those of all other teams (particularly the Sawx not surprisingly) or else use the same sort of anti-Yanqui bias claims if/when others don't see it that way.