To be fair, the Cardinals, Red Sox and Giants are not the New York Yankees. 
Given that Stan Musial would have broken Rogers Hornsby’s Cardinals record sometime back in the 1950s, I’m having trouble remembering. And Yaz’s Red Sox record (over Ted Williams) and Willie Mays’ Giants record (over Mel Ott) have stood for a while too, so comparison’s going to be a bit difficult.
…Or the Tigers’ hit record.
After poking around a little, it looks like Yaz passing Williams was the last time a team career hits record of more than 2,500 was broken. So this may be the first time in about 30 years that such a record has been broken.
Jeter now has more hits than the career leaders for the Cubs, Indians, A’s, and Phillies, plus 10 newer teams.
How come this thread is so sliggish lately?
Anyway, the Cards have been scuffling a little lately, but they managed to win two skin-of-the-teeth games against the Cubs in St. Louis. Franklin has looked shaky recently, but La Russa is standing by him as the team’s closer. Too bad Carpenter didn’t get a win yesterday after holding the Cubs to one run over eight innings. I watched a couple of the highlights from that game. My favorite was when Carpenter threw a pitch that caused commentator Al Hrabosky to say, simply, “Egads.” You don’t hear “Egads” very often, and It was it especially cool coming out of the mouth of an ex-pitcher like the Mad Hungarian.
Speaking of dominant pitchers, Cardinal great Bob Gibson has come out with a book, co-authored with Reggie Jackson. In the book, Gibson admits that his trademark glare was due partly to his squinting to see the catcher’s signs. Gibson wore glasses off the field, and he had trouble making out the signs during a game. When Willie Mays saw Gibson wearing specs off the field, he reportedly said, “Man, you’re gonna kill somebody out there!” Imagine how good Gibson would have been if he had put on some black plastic framed glasses, cranked up “Wild Thing”, and gone out there to give 'em the heater.
I think the thread is so sluggish because there aren’t many good races left. I guess the NL Wild Card is still up for grabs. The Rangers need to get hot in a hurry if they want to have a chance. Twins/Tigers are still battling in the AL Central.
I’m not entirely convinced the NL West is a done deal yet, either, although the Dodgers are fairly close to clinching at least the Wild Card. The Rockies simply won’t go away.
However, that didn’t stop me from buying playoff tickets the other day. I wish I could afford tickets beyond the first round, though. My normal Top Deck (read: cheapest) season package seats which cost me about $7 each during the season are $36 each in the first round (after Ticketmaster fees) and $61 for the NLCS. No, thanks. This is why I have HD and/or an abundance of bars to go to.
And, of course, those tickets will probably be snapped up by people who haven’t driven out to Chavez Ravine even once during the season.
As for the races, i think the Rangers are pretty much done. They’re 7 back with 15 left to play; it would take a great run, plus a miraculous collapse by the Red Sox, to change things now. I’d love for it to happen, but i’m betting against it.
My hope right now is that the Giants can catch the Rockies for the NL Wild Card. They’re 3.5 back, so it’s close enough to be interesting.
The Twins have been red hot lately, and Detroit has suddenly fallen in a hole. I picked the Tigers to win the division at the beginning of the year, but i wouldn’t be too disappointed if the Twins caught them. As long as the White Sox don’t make a run, i don’t really care who wins the Central.
Egads. I loved the Mad Hungarian…who was at least partly the inspiration for Wild Thing (the back of the mound, back to the plate, turn and glare thing).
Gibson was a bad mofo. He said once that he would throw at a batter for swinging too hard at a previous pitch – it made him look bad.
The Tigers are doing their best to blow a big lead.Down to 2 games from 7 a week ago. They are losing to everybody and looking bad doing it.
The Rockies just finished their last long roadtrip of the season, and after starting out 2-5 and letting the Giants get colse, they won the last two in Arizona and ended the trip just as they started it, 4 1/2 games up on the Giants for the wildcard.
They now have nine games at home, against the Padres, Milwaukee, and a St. Louis team that will probably have clinched the division by the time they get to Denver. The Rockies finish with a series at the Dodgers, which at this point is likely to be meaningless.
I really don’t know how they are doing it - they have lost their closer and their #1 starter, they strike out a whole lot, and the bullpen is a mix of over the hill veterans and really young guys.
I thought I’d check in on how Alex Rios is doing since the Blue Jays gave him to the White Sox for nothing.
He has, in fact, been the worst player in the major leagues. Here’s the stats:
17 for 107. That’s a sizzling .156 average. One home run. 2 walks… 25 strikeouts.
When they acquired him Chicago was above .500 and one game out of first. Today they’re below .500, five and a half games, and have let another team past them.
Alex Rios isn’t just a bum. He’s an uber-bum.
Sounds like the White Sox got the shitty end of that stick.
The Yankees have slowed down lately, but they’re still one win (or one Rangers loss) away from clinching a playoff spot, and I think their magic number is down to 9.
There’s always the awards. Although I guess a couple (Greinke & Mauer) are no-brainers.
Why Greinke?
Really? You need to ask?
ERA of 2.14, WHIP of 1.06, gave up 59 total runs (earned and unearned) and only 11 home runs in 210 innings pitched. Each of those figures was best in the AL, by a pretty comfortable margin.
I’m not saying he’s the only contender, or that there haven’t been other great pitching performances this year, but Greinke seems to be a pretty clear leader. Sabathia, Hernandez, and Halladay would probably all deserve a look.
Basically, the only things weighing against Greinke are his Wins total, and the fact that his team isn’t in contention for a playoff spot, both of which are basically unrelated to his pitching excellence, and which should be irrelevant, but which the dunces who vote on Cy Young awards tend to give way too much weight…
These discussions can be much more pleasurable if those with differing views are not preemptively dismissed as “dunces”.
Thank you.
You’re funny.
Whenever someone disagrees with you about the relevance of statistical analysis to baseball, you accuse them of not watching the game, not liking the game, and not understanding the game.
Physician, heal thyself.
Yeah, most of the division races are dusted (save the suddenly-interesting AL central) and 3 of the 4 major awards are pretty set as far as I can tell (Pujols, Mauer, Grienke) with only the NL Cy Young offering much of a debate (although for my money it’s Lincecum at this point - I could be swayed by a good argument).
So really the only thing to talk about right now is why the Cards couldn’t beat the Cubs three times in their last at bat over the weekend. Damn umps making a good call…