The Sox just reacquired Doug Mirabelli, just in time for him to catch Wakefield tonight at Fenway against the Yanks. I feel pretty damn good about that.
The Indians are treading water. The starting pitching has been iffy and the bullpen not so good. Wickman is now the team’s all time saves leader but the next time he gets a 1-2-3 9th inning will be the first time its happened. The White Sox and ol’ friend Jim Thome are in town for 2 starting tonight and it be great to sweep them, but who’d a thunk the Tigers would be doing so well?
That’s bad news, I was looking forward to an awful year by Wakefield. Bringing Mirabelli back, basically is like adding a good pitcher.
The Royals are in midseason form.
Pathetically enough, they still look better than last year. If Hernandez is for real (I’ll wait till he’d pitched at least three more starts before judging him on his good game last weel), Greinke returns to the form that made him a phenom, and Macdougal comes back as closer so Burgos can be moved to middle relief and Luke Hudson, the new kind of blown saves, can be dumped, the pitching staff will be in pretty good shape.
Not that they do much without an offense, but I count at least four games this April that a better bullpen might have saved, and 9-13 looks a hell of a lot better than 5-17. Replace Joe Mays as a starter with a good-pitching Greinke, and you might be able to turn two other losses into wins, which could have made it an 11-11 April.
And THAT, ladies and gentlemen, is how Royals fans make it from year to year.
The Royals are in midseason form.
Pathetically enough, they still look better than last year. If Hernandez is for real (I’ll wait till he’d pitched at least three more starts before judging him on his good game last weel), Greinke returns to the form that made him a phenom, and Macdougal comes back as closer so Burgos can be moved to middle relief and Luke Hudson, the new king of blown saves, can be dumped, the pitching staff will be in pretty good shape.
Not that they do much without an offense, but I count at least four games this April that a better bullpen might have saved, and 9-13 looks a hell of a lot better than 5-17. Replace Joe Mays as a starter with a good-pitching Greinke, and you might be able to turn two other losses into wins, which could have made it an 11-11 April.
And THAT, ladies and gentlemen, is how Royals fans make it from year to year.
Oops, mods, can you delete the first of those two duplicate posts?
The Cardinals are kicking ass and taking names.
Watch out.
I believe my exact words this offseason were “Why the hell would you trade Mirabelli? He’s the only guy who can catch Wakefield.”
Glad Wake has his catcher back.
(While I will forever hold a serious grudge against the Red Sox, Wake’s cool because he’s a knuckleballer.)
cmkeller, what do you think about Mark Teahen? (Be careful now. He’s a former student. 
)
This week is going to be a real test, with the seemingly-less-than-hapless Reds and the Tequila Sunrises on the road.
silenus:
Sweet swing, not enough patience, liability in the field. Not really worth 1/3 of Carlos Beltran (from what we’ve seen so far), but that could be said about most major leaguers.
I was away this weekend, so I wasn’t watching the A’s game on Saturday. I saw that they were losing 5-0 or something like that in the third inning, and I turned away in disgust–“How can you get blown out by the Royals?”–and didn’t bother to check for the final until much later. Imagine my surprise when I saw the game was rained out. I mean, that’s truly pathetic, to get off to a start like that in a game and then have the skies open up. And of course the A’s blew them out on Sunday. At this point, if the ground doesn’t open up and swallow the team whole, that’s a good day for the Royals.
Do you guys ever wonder what would have happened if you’d moved to the NL Central rather than the Brewers? I mean, yeah, you’d still be last in the division, but at least you’d have competition for it from the Pirates and Reds.
I agree. If they keep up this way, I may actually make it a point to get to Shea this year. (instead of just watching them on TV)
Not a Tame Lion:
But what makes it so maddening for a Royals fan is that the offense (on a three-run homer by silenus’s formar student Mark Teahen) tied the score at 5, and then the leaky pen immediately gave the A’s back their lead, with interest! When you see the end result, you see a blowout, but for one bad inning by a reliever (the aforementioned Luke Hudson), the game could have been close, or better!
brianjedi:
But as you said, they’d still be a second-division team. At least in the AL, they’re still visited somewhat frequently by their historical rivals…the Angels, the Yankees, to a lesser degree, the Twins. If they need competition for the bottom of the barrel, they still have the Tigers (granted, they’re improving, but that’s a recent development). The city of Milwaukee has a bona fide National League legacy to build off. The choice was smart for both teams, and I see no reason to think the Royals would have benefited from being in the NL Central.
[QUOTE=cmkeller]
Not a Tame Lion:
But what makes it so maddening for a Royals fan is that the offense (on a three-run homer by silenus’s formar student Mark Teahen) tied the score at 5, and then the leaky pen immediately gave the A’s back their lead, with interest! When you see the end result, you see a blowout, but for one bad inning by a reliever (the aforementioned Luke Hudson), the game could have been close, or better!
I get what you’re saying, but the fact is, it’s the Royals. That they would come back and then immediately cough up a scad of runs again is a foregone conclusion. I see this all the time; the A’s will fall behind certain teams (KC among them) and I think, “It’s OK, I know this team sucks. They’ll fold soon enough.” And they do. Because they just aren’t very good. In fact, they’re quite bad. And they need to face up to that fact. It’s one thing for a fan such as yourself to take a wishful approach to the team; what’s poisonous is, I think that’s the approach management takes to the team. They hope things will improve, rather than making the effort to make the improvement. And it’s a shame, because the Royals had such a good history until about a decade ago. Kansas City deserves better than that. You definitely have my sympathy.
raises hand I had faith. It wasn’t a lot of faith, but it WAS there.
Baseball be tough in the Most Difficult Division in Baseball these days.
“What happened to you? You look in worse shape than a Cubs pitcher.” --today’s Get Fuzzy
Can the idea of a Shea stadium Dopefest be far behind?
You exist? I thought I was the only one left. I don’t think they will collapse this year. I doubt they will continue to keep pace with the Sox, but I do think they will have thier best season in a decade.
I just hope they don’t go and trade off all the young talent they have in place.