Frayed Knot

]but they will certainly do me harm if their requests are ignored And this should concern us because ... ? Actually, I might get the joke a bit better if either link were working for me. (on edit: OK, the second two are now working)

]But what does SC=zero mean? SC = Sarcasm Content It's a leftover expression from a past board when joking and/or sarcastic comments were often missed or misinterpreted. An SC score from 1 to 100 would allow the writer to explain how sarcastic his post should (or shouldn't) be taken. Zero means 'not sarcastic at all'

But if you're going to go back that far (or even less than that far) you're gonna find that virtually all lineups had several holes (usually catchers, SSs, 2B-men) where offense was lacking making the "productive out" a sound (or soundER) strategy. But the days when you could win pennants with Dal Maxville-like offense getting 400+ ABs are long gone. Not that Crandell (or Loduca for that matter) are offensive "holes", it's just that there are other and likely better options available.

Of course installing LoDuca in the #2 slot would mean re-arranging the lineup each time (1/4? of the time ... 1/3?) that Castro starts (assuming that he wouldn't put Ramon the Slow that high) so it might be at least as interesting to see who hits 2nd on those days; Beltran? ... an improved Matsui? I think part of the reasoning in having LoDuca up there is to use his very low K-rate to hit-n-run often and/or take some pitches to allow Reyes to run on his own. Is that a good enough reason? ... probably not, at least unless LoDuca returns to the offense he showed a few years back. Either way, the bigger problem still stems from how often the top guy gets on to begin with since any lineup theory takes a hit when the leadoff guy makes outs at a 70% clip.

Last Night of the Yankee Dynasty focuses on Game 7 vs the D'Backs '01 WS and attempts to make the case that it was that loss which sent George back into his 1980-ish BUY! BUY! BUY! mode and in doing that the Yanx lost some of what had made the '96-'00 teams special. I don't think it's that simple (neither I'm sure does Olney who covered them for the NYTimes in those years) but it's good none-the-less and that it came out in 2002 and there have been no parades in lower Manhattan in the 4 Octobers since kind of backs his point at least a little. ]Any arguments for keeping any of the existing six? I can always make a case for keeping Ball Four around. That the concept of ballplayers struggling for money and the fact that the book was considered controversial at the time are both strange and dated ideastoday might make an argument that it's no longer as relevent in these times ... or maybe that it's even moreso.

Not a whole lotta Met-related questions to Jim Callis in BA's Q&A (not surprising really). - Was Anderson Hernandez close to making it? [Callis] No, his sudden offensive outburst in 2005 likely a fluke and I see him as a utility player - What are the chances of either Milledge or Pelfrey making the team out of ST? Virtually none - One guy asked about Mike Jacobs (who's not on the list) Dont' like 25 y/o 1st basemen. More Kevin Maas than someone special - Also one about Y. Petit The usual answer about wondering if his lack of "stuff" will eventually allow batters to catch up to him Btw, the big "winners" in this year's BA top-100: Dodgers with 9 players! Anaheim & Florida w/7 each D'Backs also w/7 including 6 of the top 32 !!

I think 'Moneyball' is one of the more important and interesting baseball books from recent years ... and NO, it's not a stats book despite numerous claims from those who haven't read it. It's as much a business book as a sports one really. Also along those same lines (if you don't mind going back a few years -- like around 10) 'Lords of the Realm' is still a good one. A lot of the explanations as to how and why MLB got itself into a financial & competative mess are still relevent. I liked Buster Olney's Last Night of the Yankee Dynasty - so long as having the letters Y-A-N-K-E-E in the title isn't a disqualifier. It's really neither pro nor anti Yankee as such but tells a good story and, even if I don't fully buy the author's thesis that there was something unique about those Yanquis which drove them to win regularly, it's been somewhat prophetic for 5 straight years to this point (and counting!!!!) Biographies: Leigh Montville's one of Ted Williams or Cramer's 'DiMaggio' (see Dickshot's thread) are both well done and certainly more recent than the Cobb/Veeck ones in your current lineup.

"That doesn't rule out a late-season 2006 callup" I think that's pretty much what they mean; that he'll make his first ML appearance at some point in 2006, not that he's destined to hold down a full-time job from opening day onward.

It didn’t take long for the Dr. K nickname to catch on and begin an upper-deck trend that’s still very much with us. Fans in the far reaches of Shea Stadium, after every Gooden strikeout, would hang a red “K” placard over the railing. More of a minor point, but also not entirely accurate; The K-cards were used during Nolan Ryan starts for a while - probably starting in Anaheim. It was new to Shea with Gooden but it was a "tradition" which was, how you say ... borrowed from elsewhere.

Baseball America's list is out; 51-100 1-50 and Milledge gets some top-10 love: #9 - Lastings Milledge, OF Mets (#11 last year) "He's going to be an all-star caliber player. You hit home runs with a quick bat, which he's got, and down the road he could steal 35 to 40 bases." -- anonymous scout ETA 2006 10 - Matt Cain, RHP Giants 9 - Milledge 8 - Justin Verlander, RHP Tigers 7 - Chad Billingsley, RHP Dodgers 6 - Francisco Liriano, LHP Twins 5 - Stephen Drew, SS D'Backs 4 - Jeremy Hemidia, OF Marlins 3 - Brandon Wood, SS Angels 2 - Justin Upton, SS D'Backs 1 - Delmon Young, OF D-Rays Putting Upton - a high-schooler who signed late and has yet to play as a pro - reflects BA's penchant for believing in a player's "tools" even prior to performance. Consequently they also rank Pelfrey #36 -- "He's one of the few guys in the aluminum-bat era who gets people out with his fastball. Ben Sheets is another guy who could do that." -- Former Mets scouting director Russ Bove ETA: 2007 No other Mets crack the top-100 Y. Petit = #69 J. Huber = #84 There'll be a 2PM live on-line chat at their site for those with questions/complaints

Hey cool, an early visit! Thanks for coming by Adam and don't forget to tell us a bit about what to expect from the book. Would I be correct in assuming that this is a more-or-less chronological account of Met-land dating from the Omar hiring through the '05 season? And, since much has been made about the "Latinization" of the team via Omar's signings/trades plus the team's marketing focus, is that a major theme of the book or simply one aspect of it that just happened to make for a snappy sub-title?

Hopefully this'll be the last we hear of it ... until the post-opening day columns after Beltran leaves a few on and Manny goes wild and we'll get the inevitable, 'see they shoulda' columns.

22 in May -- picked in the June '02 draft out of HS He got more pub earlier in his minor league career than most because of his daddy. Also helps when writers remember you from the time you were hitting BP HRs out of Tiger stadium at age 13.

It's that time of year again and, quite conveniently seeing as how the topic of how prospects are judged came up in some thread the other day, there's a good piece in Baseball Prospectus on what goes into prospect evaluation (at least from their viewpoint). BP, btw, released their top 50 list a few days ago: 10 - Alex Gordon; 3B Royals 9 - Prince Fielder; 1B Brewers 8 - Chris Young; OF D'Backs 7 - Andy Marte; 3B Braves ... I mean Red sox ... errr make that Indians 6 - Brandon Wood; SS Angels 5 - Howie Kendrick; 2B Angels 4 - Francisco Liriano; LHP Twins 3 - Ryan Zimmerman; 3B Nationals 2 - Jeremy Hermidia; OF Marlins 1 - Delmon Young; OF Devil Dogs Met related: Milledge #13 (#19 on same list last year) Yusmeiro Petit = #33 Justin Huber = #34 Mike Jacobs = #42 Pelfrey was the only other Met I thought had even a possiblity of sneaking onto their list if only as a token to his promise since obviously there's no prof track record to go by. But he's nowhere to be found even in their dozen or so honorable mentions although they do manage to sneak last year's #1 pick Justin Upton onto the list (#41) despite the fact that he is a high-schooler who didn't sign any earlier than Pelfrey. BP is traditionally very cautious with hyping pitching prospects which perhaps explains their thinking there.

I was just reading about that Damon card the other day. They started producing that about 10 minutes after the singing and said they used the NYY road uni because it's easier to fake than the pinstripes.

Nady has played CF before and would probably be the guy to give Beltran a day off here and there if Chavez/Redman don't make the cut. He certainly wouldn't be the train wreck out there that Diaz would. I'm not sure they'd want to see Nady out there all that often so a longer Beltran outage would probably prompt a move of some kind.

Of course it is. I'm just saying that there's an awful lot of speculatin' goin' on 'round these parts as we make assumptions about "deservedness" based on how pure we decide their reasons are for wanting the number. Doesn't matter; the league denied his request, he's a long-shot to make the team anyway, and I've already wasted too many keystrokes on this relatively unimportant issue.

The Nady-v-Diaz battle should be interesting to watch over the next month. Adam Rubin in the Daily News notes that Willie prefers someone win the job outright rather than going with a platoon, and gives a list of reasons why it's Nady who could hold the edge going in Over at Newsday, Dave Lennon makes the case that the popular Diaz and his semi-incumbency makes him the players' choice

"Im glad this is now a mute point" Is this a point that we remain silent about? "I would recognize Rivera's attachment to the number" And we all know about Rivera's personal attachment to it because ... well, he says so!! I'm sure Jackie was on the mind of most Panamanians growing up and there's no way that the NYY publicity machine pass a story like that if it weren't 100% true.

"Either 42 is retired by every team or it isn't" It isn't, not yet anyway: hence Mariano.

New York Daily News Met reporter (and Bellmore, Long Island native) Adam Rubin has written a book about the 2005 Mets: Pedro, Carlos & Omar: The Story of a Season in the Big Apple and the Pursuit of Baseball's Top Latino Stars "P, C & O etc" will available in all the usual places* on or just after March 1st (otherwise known as a week from Wednesday) and in an effort to promote the book (plus the honor of posting on the CPF) the first-time author will be taking a dive into the Crane Pool for a live chat on Monday, February 27th at 9PM. So if you blokes have any questions that you'd like to ask an active NYM beat reporter for a quaint metropolitan newspaper - either about the book specifically or about the team in general - drop by at that time armed with your best. In the interim you might want to take the upcoming week to keep up on Adam's columns in the Daily News to get an idea about the latest topics he's writing about now that ST has started and columns are appearing on an everyday basis. You can also pre-submit questions in this thread if you aren't able to drop by the pool at the designated hour. * Just a note: In ordering the book via Amazon I was immediately led to a suggested package of P, C & O along with the 2006 edition of The Baseball Prospectus Handbook for around $28 for the two, not much higher than the list price of either one and conveniently in that free shipping range. Good deal.

]I'd guess they rate "tools", and "potential" highly instead of already demonstrated baseball ability, because of how high Gomez and Bowman are rated. Most list-makers try to find a balance. They generally want to target the guys ceiling and temper that with the likelihood of him actually reaching that level. So guys like Keppinger, while they might be closest to ready, get dropped on lists because few think he'll advance a whole lot beyond what he already is.

I think this whole shoe project is going to give rise to a new Nike slogan: Just RE-Do It!

Yeah he wore #42 at one point but then wound up on the Dodgers who wouldn't let him use it even though he was permitted to via the grandfathering clause. So I guess he still has the right to even though he hasn't worn it continuously.

I thought you meant Tinker