All this talk about managers is making me yell at Dusty Baker in my mind “Get this shit together! We’ve lost five in a row!”
Jesus Christ! The Reds needed 10 runs and five errors from the shitty Cubs to squeak out a win 10-8 to snap their losing streak. They were up 8-3 in the top of the sixth inning!
Apparently the wind was really crazy at Wrigley today.
The Orioles brought Manny Machado up for his Major League debut yesterday. He went 2-4 with a triple in last night’s loss to KC, and tonight he went 2-4 with his first two big league homers, knocking in 4 of the Orioles’ 7 runs.
The Yankees really did a number on the Las Vegas 51’s tonight.
Seriously, what a depressing sight. Jose Bautista out indefinitely, Arencibia out, Lawrie out, half the pitching staff out, much of it for most or all of 2013, too. Shortstop’s playing hurt, ace pitcher’s playing hurt (he hasn’t admitted it, but you can tell) and the first baseman, after coming back and appearing to be hitting okay, is now hurt. Everyone is fucking hurt. They fight the good fight but it’s half a AAA team.
Reminds me of how I felt a few weeks back when the Nats were up 9-0 over the Braves after 5 innings. The Braves scored a shitload of runs over the next few innings, went ahead 10-9 in the top of the ninth, and the Nats tied it in the bottom of the ninth only to lose in the 11th.
The fact that they’re 17-5 since that night has helped to ease my pain, though. 
As good as advertised.
Fuck. Will Middlebrooks is out for the year with a broken wrist (HBP last night). Ortiz’s Achilles looks worse every day, too. Boston’s chances of finishing above water are looking doubtful.
Still, if they were only .500 in games started by Beckett and Lester, they’d have a wildcard. Lester is coming around, but Beckett has perhaps the worst case of contract-itis ever, other than Lackey’s.
The D’backs ended the Nats’ winning streak at 8 yesterday. So some history on Nats’ winning streaks:
The Nats’ longest winning streak since coming to DC from Montreal was 10, back in 2005.
The longest winning streak ever by the 1961-71 Senators was 8 games, in 1967.
The Senators v.1.0, now the Twins, went from 1950 through 1960 without having a winning streak as long as 8 games. (Their longest winning streak in several of those years was 4 - can you blame their fans for losing hope?) They had a 9-game winning streak in 1949, you have to go back to 1943 to find a 10-game winning streak, and to 1933 to find a winning streak longer than that - 13 games.
The Braves lost too, so still up by 4.5 games. Got tix for Braves at Nats a week from Wednesday.
Steve Delabar just struck out four men in one inning, making two firsts:
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He is the first Blue Jay pitcher to do this, and
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He is the first pitcher in major league history to ever do it in extra innings.
The Nats are trying to singlehandedly shift that ratio: after 5 innings, they’re beating up on the Giants 14-0. They’ve been through the order 4 times already, and right now it’s an act of mercy that there’s no DH in the NL, because the carnage would be a lot worse if Gio didn’t have to bat for himself.
Nats at Giants while the Braves hosted the Padres looked like a chance for the Braves to narrow the gap, but so far it isn’t quite working out that way.
I was watching the Nats/Giants last night and told myself I’d go to bed after the 3rd inning, but then the nats kepts scoring and scoring. I went to bed when it was 8-0 with a smile on my face.
I forget: how does this happen again?
There should be a mercy rule in MLB. If you score 14 runs and the other team doesn’t have any, AND its after the 5th inning, they should just call the game. No team has ever come back from a deficit larger than 12 runs, and even that was with having a run or two of their own. AFAICT no team has ever come back from being down 12-0 or greater ever.
Dropped third strike, batter beats throw to first.
Ah, that’s right. So its still scored a strikeout, but not a technical out because the catcher dropped the ball? Seems weird. Not sure if I like the rule. You get three strikes and you’re out. Why does it matter if the catcher drops the ball? Its already an out (well…it SHOULD be)!
Why penalize the pitcher?
Why is the pitcher penalized under my scenario? If the pitcher throws a 3rd strike (does it matter if its called or swung on?), its still a third strike. Why should the catcher have to catch the ball? The 3rd strike occurs before the dropped or passed ball, which in my mind should pre-empt the opportunity to outrun a throw to first.
I realize this rarely happens, but to me its kind of a dumb rule. Why give a batter an extra chance to take a base when he doesn’t deserve it because he’d already “struck out”?
I believe the rule was originally instituted to prevent the catcher from purposely dropping the ball and then using it for a double play.
And the strike doesn’t count as a our-making strike until the ball is in the catcher’s control. That requires the catcher to essentially not commit an error.
Ah. That makes sense. Reds locked in a titanic struggle with the Mets through 6 innings, 0-0. C’mon Reds!
I’m not following this. How would dropping a third strike lead to a double play opportunity?
I think this rule is just a leftover from the early days of baseball. The idea was the ball was always put in play for every batter. If the batter did not hit it fair, then the ball was automatically in play after the third strike. Catchers played farther back and the ball usually bounced before it got to them. Catching the pitch before it hit the ground was essentially the same as catching a fly ball. The rules just never really changed to reflect the way we think of the more modern game.
And I could be completely wrong here.