LOL, I’m going to try to verify this. I’m going to load up the archived game on mlb.com archived games and see. I could see those West Virginia championship t shirts as having an error as they’re printed in a hurry and kept under lock and key. Regulation MLB jerseys? I’m calling this a photoshop job unless I see otherwise.
I thought the same thing until…
http://www.chicagotribune.com/sports/chi-21-bb-briteapr21,0,4162062.story
http://wfmz.com/view/?id=805125
http://www.usatoday.com/sports/baseball/nl/2009-04-21-3631088007_x.htm
Majestic even apologized according to these stories. Funny stuff.
Heh, they just mentioned it on the WGN broadcast of the Cubs vs Reds.
I wasn’t able to get the Saturday night broadcast to load up from the mlb.com archive game to see it for myself. I’ll try again tomorrow. I love their new broadcast service, but it is very buggy right now in the first part of the season.
How do you like MLB tv? I briefly considered it. But, the price and the fact that Idon’t really enjoy watching things on my computer kept me away. But, it does look really cool and I can see someone getting a lot of use out of it.
When I get back to the west coast I am considering buying the MLB iphone app, so I can listen to the philly broadcasters even so far away. Which will be enough for me. Plus, it’s only 10 bucks.
The Nationals are a disgrace to baseball and I love it. I am still mad that they relocated to DC from Montreal and not Portland. DC already has a team nearby in the Orioles and the closest team to Portland is 168 miles away. Also, Portland is the largest city in the US with only one major league team.
The Mariners lost the series to Detroit, but won the first game against the Rays. Wash has been a very pleasant surprise. I keep having to remind myself that’s only April and anything can happen still. The last time the Angels started off this bad, they ended up winning the Series. But right now, they are a MASH unit. I am starting to believe that this team has a shot at winning the division.
He threw his fourth straight no-hitter this past week, and will be going for five in a row, later this week (I think) in the first round of the playoffs. Here’s feature type article from the St Pete Times. Keep the name Patrick Schuster in the back of your mind for a few years.
I really like it although, as dalej42 says, they have a LOT of bugs at the beginning of each season. Rather than get it right before the season, or during Spring Training, they seem to use their customers as Beta testers during the first few weeks of the season. It’s been working fine for me the past few days, though, so hopefully things are all ironed out now.
The only thing i hate about it is the way they enforce blackout restrictions on their internet customers. You can’t watch any of your team’s home games, and you can’t watch any nationally-televised game, which blacks out every Saturday afternoon, as well as the Sunday night game, and all playoff games.
It doesn’t affect me as much this year, because i’ve moved away from Baltimore and can now watch my Orioles without worrying about blackout restrictions. I’ve also found it relatively easy to circumvent, using overseas proxy servers. Still, i think it sucks.
On a different note, did anyone see umpire Kirwan Danley go down after being hit in the head with a flying bat during the Rangers-Blue Jays game? The bat broke off near the batter’s hands, and the whole barrel went hard into the ump’s mask. He apparently has a mild concussion. It’s been a bad couple of seasons for Danley, who missed over a month last year after being struck by a Brad Penny fastball. Hope he’s OK.
There was almost a double play at home plate in the Padres-Giants game. San Diego had runners on first and second, and Kevin Kouzmanoff hit a high fly ball to right. Adrian Gonzalez on second waited near the base to tag up, but the ball went off the wall so he set off for third and then home, with Chase Headley (coming from first) only a few steps behind. The ball beat them both to the plate, but Gonzalez managed to slide just past the tag of Molina. Headley might have made it, except he chose to try and jump over the catcher, and Molina tagged him while he was in the air.
Huh?
According to this list, Portland is #30 on the list of US cities, by population.
San Antonio (#7) has one major team, the Spurs (basketball).
San Jose (#10) has only the Sharks (hockey).
Jacksonville (#12) has only the Jaguars (football).
Columbus (#15) has the Blue Jackets (hockey).
Austin (#16) has no major teams.
Memphis (#18) has the Grizzlies (basketball).
El Paso (#22) has none.
Las Vegas (#28) has none.
Louisville (#29) also has no major league team.
My mistake. What I should have said was Portland is the largest market with one team.
I love, love it. Yeah, the bugs are annoying. Living in the Pacific time zone and working until 6:30 PM at night most weeknights, I can play the archived games when I get home if there aren’t any late starting games that night. I love being able to pick the feed I can watch.
I’m off on Wednesdays and since they tend to be getaway days, there are usually games on all day for me. I love that!
During national blackouts, I can put on either team’s radio feed. As the season goes on, there aren’t many games which are blacked out since most teams schedule night games. Of course, there are some Saturdays where Fox will have 3 possible games scheduled. Those will be blacked out.
Overall, for $20.00 per month, it is worth it for me. I really like the on demand feature and archived games, plus I’m not hogging the big screen as much. I can just take the laptop and watch games anywhere in the apartment. If I’m doing something online, I can switch to the radio feed if I like the local announcers and then switch back to the tv coverage once I’m able to watch again.
You mean The Natinals?
Fair enough.
San Antonio is the 28th largest metro area
San Jose is 12th, but considered for these purposes to be part of SF
Jacksonville is 40th
Columbus is 32nd
Austin is 37th
Memphis is 41st
El Paso is 68th
Las Vegas is 30th (and might have issues because of sports wagering)
Louisville is 42nd.
Portland is 23rd, the largest metro area, besides Riverside/San Bernadino/Ontario is also considered part of the greater LA combined area.
City size is not the issue.
Just got back from a great, albeit abbreviated, game at Fenway. Wakefield pitched another stellar start, 7 innings with one earned run, while the Sox offense seems to finally be kicking into high gear. We got a two run homer in each of the first three innings, and a four-run 7th that could probably have been even bigger had the game not been rained out at that point.
It was my first time seeing Wakefield pitch in person, and getting to see the knuckleball on a good day was definitely a treat. As was seeing the unfortunate Juan Morillo go from an ERA of 0.00 to 36.00 (with the first run walked in)!
I note that the first splash headline on the Natinals’ home page is one exhorting the fans to vote for their favourite Natinals to make the All-Star Game.
I know every team has homer fans, but surely people in Washington have enough self-respect not to vote a Natinal to the All-Star Game?
Yanks won with a 14th inning walk off homer from Melky Cabrera after another bad CC start. This puts them 3 games over .500.
Wang went to Tampa for pitching help. He is scheduled to throw 100 pitches for the Yankees organizational gurus.
God, B.J. Ryan is a big fat peice of shit. The Blue Jays would be well advised to just fire him and eat the salary. He’d help the team most by pitching for another team.
Toronto won anyway so I’ve calmed down.
Baseball’s obsession with “Closers” is one of the more irrational behaviours in the history of pro sports, and I am sure than 40 years from now people will be totally perplexed by the “closer” concept and wonder why baseball teams used to do that, putting lousy pitchers into roles to get saves just because they had gotten saves before, or were paid lots of money - or, in many cases, would use their best relief pitcher ONLY in save situations, in amyn cases avoiding using them in much more important situations (bases loaded, tie game, eighth inning, two out) in order to save them for less important ones. Historians will write articles trying to explain the “Closer” concept.
I mean, here the Jays are consistently, with absolute determination, sending out B.,J. Ryan, a guy who, while I am sure he is trying his best, can’t get the ball above 84 and isn’t one of the fifteen best pitchers in the Blue Jays organization, in every save situation that comes up. This is not a team short on skilled relief pitching, but the instant “Save opportunity = Yes” happens, they send in Ryanm who then pitches terribly, since his arm is clearly blown out.
And why? Because he’s The Closer. He has saved games before, and so must be sent out to save them again, even though he’s physically unable to be an effective major league pitcher.
I’m actually amazed, given the increasing influence of stat people in many baseball organizations, that there hasn’t been a fairly drastic rethinking of the Closer role.
Stat folks have advocated for quite a while now exactly the sort of thing you are talking about—using the best relief pitcher possible in the highest-leverage situations, whether it be in the seventh inning or the ninth or whatever. The idea that you send out some scrubber middle reliever when the score is tied in the seventh, and leave your best guy (assuming the Closer is your best guy, which is not always the case anyway) for when you’re up (or down) by 3 in the ninth is completely bizarre.
Getting rid of the Closer role, and using ALL relievers intelligently would probably also allow organizations to get more value for money from their high priced acquisitions.
The Cubs bullpen is a mess right now and Lou Pinella has been using our “closers” in earlier situations. Marmol came in in a tight spot in the 7th inning against the Cardinals even if he’s probably our best reliever right now. Gregg has been used in tie situations and other non-save situations even though he is ostensibly our closer. I’d love it if Lou just said screw it and started using the best-pitcher-in-the-toughest-spots method and never declared a “closer” for the rest of the season.