MLB: August 2012

The Game Room
261

Everyone’s hurt. Here’s the starting lineup as was planned:

1B: Adam Lind. DL.
2B: Kelly Johnson. Playing with bad leg.
SS: Yunel Escobar. Playing with bad back
3B: Brett Lawrie, DL
C: JP Arencibia, DL
LF: Eric Thames; traded
CF: Colby Rasmus, playing with bad groin
RF: Jose Bautista, DL
DH: Edwin Encarnacion. Healthy.

SP: Ricky Romero, playing but probably hurt
SP: Brandon Morrow, DL
SP: Kyle Drabek, DL, out for a year or more
SP: Henderon Alvarez, healthy
SP: Drew Hutchison, DL, out for a year or more
CL: Sergio Santos, DL
RP: Jason Frasor, DL
RP: Darren Oliver, DL
RP: Luis Perez, DL
RP: Casey Janssen, healthy
Even many of the replacements are hurt. Luis Perez enetered the rotation after Hutcison was hurt, pitched well, and then promptly blew out his elbow and is gone for a year. The replacement for Arencibia would have been the highly touted Travis D’Arnaud, but he’s on the DL. Long reliever Joel Carreno went on the DL. Carreno would have been replaced by Robert Ceollo, but then he got hurt. Travis Snider would have replaced Eric Thames, but he was on the DL (and was later traded for a pitcher to shore up the injury-depleted staff.) Dustin McGowan was going to take Morrow’s place but got hurt again.

They’re playing a AA/AAA team because that’s who’s left.

262

Geez, I knew the Jays were having some injury troubles. But that’s insane.

Condolences to the team. And their fans.

263

Seconded. I can’t remember a team ever being hit by injuries to that extent. Or even close.

264

It was a quiet night in [del]Lake Wobegon[/del] MLB last night.

Of note, the Giants beat the Braves, putting the Giants 3 ahead of the Dodgers, and dropping the Braves to 6.5 behind the Nats. (No complaints here.) The Reds, by losing, failed to eliminate the Astros from the race; that’ll probably happen tonight. And the Cards, by sweeping the Astros, moved to #1 in the race to be the team facing the Braves in the NL wildcard game. Oh, and some games were played in the AL too, but nothing important. :wink:

265

I’ve been a baseball fan all my life and have never seen anything like it. I never make excuses for my team for injuries, 'cause everyone has some injuries, but in tehi case I will, because NOBODY has this many injuries all at once. I’ve seen teams with silly injury problems - a few years ago the Red Sox had both their catchers hurt, plus both the guys who had been catching in AAA, at the same time - but I’ve never seen a situation where essentially the entire team, except four or five guys at best, was injured.

BTW, I forgot to mention at Adam Lind’s (DL) replacement, David Cooper, who was hitting pretty decently, just got hurt. He went on the DL.

It’s legitimately discouraging. The team was playing very well at one point and has sunk at a rate proportional to the number of guys on the DL. At season’s commencement I was making a point of getting in to Toronto every three weeks or so to see a game; now I just can’t see myself investing the money and time to watch a bunch of AAA players who are trying their best but are hopelessly outclassed by actual major league opponents. If the team was losing because they were just young guys being built up that’s fine, but they’re losing because they are young guys being thrown together in desperate attempts to field the required number of players. Players like Anthony Gose and Adeiny Hechevarria are good prospects but against big league pitchers they look ridiculously out of their league, and one wonders if this is good for their development.

As incredibly terrible as the Astros have been, right now I’m not sure the Jays aren’t just as bad. I think they’re 5-19 in their last 24. They are a replacement-level team because they are in fact a replacement team.

266

Yeah, I was really impressed by Medlen. For some reason, the Braves’ decision to limit the number of innings he pitches to 130 doesn’t get the same level of second guessing that Stras’ upcoming shut down does.

267

Maybe because even casual baseball fans have heard of Strasburg, but Medlen’s not nearly as much of a household name?

Any idea what his story is? He only pitched 2 innings with the Braves last year, after over 100 the year before.

268

Not at Fenway. Boston blew 3 leads, including 6-0 in the 2nd, to lose to the Angels - the first time they’d lost after scoring 13 since 1970. Despite most of their injured players being returned, they’re now just 2.5 out of the cellar and the Las Vegas 51’s . Perhaps perversely, I’d *like *to see Boston finish last. It might put the needed fire under John Henry’s rich, thin, white, supercilious ass.

The Dodgers have claimed Adrian Gonzalez. Not the first salary I’d dump, since he’s been a very productive hitter despite a lack of homers, but apparently he’s considered part of the clubhouse problem.

269

Medlen missed most of last year because he got injured and had Tommy John surgery, that’s why the braves are limiting his innings this year to 130.

270

<nitpick> Adrian Gonzalez

271

:smack: Fixed in the edit window, thanks. Guess I’m too pissed at all of them to care what their fucking names are anymore.

272

On a related subject, does anyone know if Beckett’s (or anybody’s) 10/5 rights prevent him from being claimed on waivers? I know they can’t dump Lackey as long as he’s on the DL. But they’d both be addition by subtraction, even if they can’t get even a bag of balls in return.

273

Yeah, it’s hard to make any kind of comparison between the two. Medlen has been a decent prospect with mostly middle-relief/back-end-starter projections. His innings limit has more to do with his injury history and, to be frank, his athletic frame. Strasburg on the other hand, while the injury is a key influencer in the innings limit, is being evaluated as a vital (if not THE vital) franchise piece for the Nationals in the future. Plus, Strasburg is a freaking horse, and a lot of scouts are saying he absolutely could handle the full (plus postseason) workload this year.

274

What’s weird about Strasburg is that I don’t really hear much complaining about the shutdown here in DC. It seems like it’s mostly the national press, but it could be just that I’m not talking baseball with enough people.

275

Or that Washingtonians aren’t yet used to caring about a baseball team the way they care about the Skins?

276

People don’t care about the Skins at the same levels they used to. I know I stopped caring when they left the city. It’s not uncommon to see people wearing Dallas or Giants gear in town nowadays and there was a time when you never saw that.

I do see a lot of Nats gear on people in town and random strangers are talking to each other about baseball the way they used to talk about football. The attitude I see on the Nats blogs I follow is basically that Rizzo and Davey can do no wrong and whatever they say is good enough for us.

277

I believe so. The rule does not state that the 10-5 player cannot be traded, it states that it cannot be assigned to another team without the player’s consent.

Beckett could, of course, simply be waived outright. You can always fire him and pay out his contract. But they can’t give it away.

ETA: Beckett was claimed off waivers about an hour ago, according to CBS, allegedly by the Dodgers. No word as to what will happen now. He’d have to OK the trade.

278

I don’t know. I do see a lot of people wearing Nats gear*, but then I do spend a lot of time in the Navy Yard area, where the stadium is. If the team wasn’t so good, I’m not sure how popular they would be. Of course, this year might be the launching pad for long-term affection for the club on a very broad basis.

Driving around on the streets, I still see a lot of cars bearing Washington football club stickers and such. There are Dallas and New York football fans, but I think that might have a lot to do with the transplant nature of the populace.

That’s not to say that Washington isn’t on the road to being more of a baseball town than a football town, but I’m not sure the evidence is in.

**Along those lines, I’m really glad that in 2011 they ditched those horrible computer-ish logotypes so I don’t have to look at those ugly-ass logos. The current, more traditional-looking scripts look so much better, although I do still occasionally see someone wearing the old shirts.

As far as the uniforms go, I would just make two further suggestions:

(1) Change the blue road cap. A team that wears red as a primary color shouldn’t have a blue cap and a team that wears blue as a primary color shouldn’t have a red cap. Blue or red, one or the other, not both. – (I’m looking at you, too, Cleveland, Texas, St. Louis, and Philadelphia. Boston, it’s weird that you have “Red” in your nickname, but wear blue caps, but so long as your socks are red, I guess that’s okay.)

(2) Pick a slightly different shade of red. The current one is too close to Cincinnati Red. I think that it would be great if the baseball team took up a burgundy, like the football team, creating a pan-Washington identity, like Pittsburgh has done with black and yellow.*

279

I think it quieted down in DC circles when the following trivia question made the rounds two or three weeks ago:

Washington has the lowest ERA in the majors. If you took Strasburg out of the equation, where would they rank in ERA in the majors?
First.

I think public sentiment is really OK with him sitting.

280

I am happy to report that I am going to see the Reds play tomorrow against the Cardinals. My cousin got four “free” tickets for purchasing a set of four tires from some tire place.

What’s especially cool about this game is that an hour prior, they are retiring Barry Larkin’s number. The Reds also announced that they will give free admission to the Reds Hall Of Fame Museum to anyone named Barry tomorrow (my cousin’s name: Barry, of course).

Barry Larkin’s daughter Cymber, apparently an aspiring pop star at the ripe old age of 16 (release video here: http://www.nola38.com/videogallery/68206972/Sports/Varsity-Video:-Cymber-Larkin’s-music-video-) will sing the National Anthem.

And it’s a Reds beer stein giveaway night!

Oh yeah, and the game is kinda important to both teams, and its a somewhat heated rivalry.

Can’t wait! I love GABP!