Tag Archives: baseball

On Manny Machado’s injury

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Short version:

Longer version:

Injuries happen in all sports, and they can happen at all times, to all players. Nobody is immune. And yesterday’s injury to Manny Machado is further proof of that. Since arriving in the big leagues, he had not missed a game and he had been a staple of highlight reels both on the field and at the plate. And now, in a freak injury, his season is done and it’s entirely possible he may miss a good chunk of next year as well. And, worst of all, who knows how this knee/leg injury may affect him in the future:

Could this slow him down and turn all of those doubles into singles?

Could it make it so that he will never be able to move to SS, which is technically his natural position?

We don’t know, and that is the thing that makes his injury so sad. Baseball lost one of it’s brightest young stars yesterday for the rest of the (admittedly short) season, and now, all everyone can do- in Baltimore and across the world- is wait, and hope that this injury isn’t as bad as it looked.

The clever baseball reference in the “Parks and Recreation” book

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In 2009, Parks and Recreation first aired. A spiritual spin-off (but not an actual spin-off) of The Office, it follows the life of the Leslie Knope (Amy Poehler) and the rest of the staff of the Parks and Recreation Department in the fictional, Springfield-like city of Pawnee, Indiana.

In 2011, Knope released a book on Pawnee in the show, entitled Pawnee: The Greatest Town in America. NBC released the book in the real world.

In 2013, as part of a Netflix/Hulu binge to get caught up on Parks and Recreation before the next season starts, I also read Pawnee: The Greatest Town in America. I got it from the library (thankfully, my local library is not run by Ron Swanson’s second ex-wife Tammi). In doing so, I was able to catch a clever baseball reference in it during a section on Pawnee’s school board- which is filled with people who have lots of A’s at the start of their names in order to be at the top of the ballot, helping them win simply through the laziness of the voters of Pawnee. I’ve put the page up below the jump*, can you spot it?

*(Please don’t sue me, NBC!)

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How scouts saw young Todd Helton

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Todd Helton, as you no doubt heard, is retiring at the end of this year. I decided to look up what the Diamond Mines Scouting Reports database had to say about what he looked like as a young prospect.

The first in the database, from Expos scout Ed Creech in 1992, looked at him as a senior in High School. Creech didn’t seem too impressed, as projected him as having below average hitting ability.

Another Expos scout, Pat Sullivan, was more optimistic, seeing him as having an average future at the plate but noting he was still “crude” and had a ways to go with the bat.

There are a bunch of ones from later in the decade. One of the more interesting ones include a 1995 one by Russ Bove of the Brewers, which projected Helton as being a .265 hitter in the big leagues. Note that Helton has only four times in his 17-year career been under .265 hitter, and three of those times have been in the past four years and the other one was during a year where he had injury problems. Another one, by George Bradley of the White Sox, is interesting if only for the fact it compares Todd Helton’s physical form to an old man and not a big-name school’s quarterback (Helton infamously was replaced by Peyton Manning at the University of Tennessee). Of the reports, perhaps the one that came closest to seeing Helton’s potential was Ed Pebley, also of the White Sox, who saw him as being a .280-.300 hitter.

In other words, none of the scouts really saw Helton’s career- one that may land him in the Hall of Fame- coming. At least, they didn’t see it as being a possible Hall-of-Fame one.

Famous for Something Else: Max Patkin

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Max Patkin was a famous “baseball clown” during the second half of the 20th century, even making an appearance in Bull Durham. But before he became the Clown Prince of Baseball, he had a brief minor league career that was interrupted by WWII:

Year Age Tm Lg Lev Aff W L W-L% ERA G CG IP H R ER BB SO HBP WP WHIP H/9 BB/9 SO/9 SO/BB
1941 21 Wisconsin Rapids WISL D CHW 10 8 .556 3.94 27 13 178.0 170 94 78 95 134 9 13 1.489 8.6 4.8 6.8 1.41
1942 22 2 Teams 1 Lg D CHW 3 4 .429 3.74 13 65.0 59 32 27 39 1.508 8.2 5.4
1942 22 Green Bay, Wisconsin Rapids WISL D CHW 3 4 .429 3.74 13 65.0 59 32 27 39 1.508 8.2 5.4
1946 26 Wilkes-Barre EL A CLE 1 1 .500 5
3 Seasons 14 13 .519 3.89 45 13 243.0 229 126 105 134 134 9 13 1.494 8.5 5.0 5.0 1.00
D (2 seasons) D 13 12 .520 3.89 40 13 243.0 229 126 105 134 134 9 13 1.494 8.5 5.0 5.0 1.00
A (1 season) A 1 1 .500 5
Provided by Baseball-Reference.com: View Original Table
Generated 9/17/2013.

John Philip Sousa once wrote a Baseball March

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John Philip Sousa, the man who wrote such patriotic standards as The Stars and Stripes Forever, also wrote a march for baseball, entitled The National Game. I’ve heard it performed at Orchestra Nights at the ballpark (yeah, Rochester has orchestra night every year), but I just found it on YouTube, so, well, here it is.

Feel free to imagine 19th century baseballers taking the field to this, dressed in uniforms for the Providence Grays or the Boston Beaneats, perhaps while also getting into drunken saloon brawls and going into second base with sharpened spikes. It’s what Old Hoss Radbourn (or at least @OldHossRadbourn) would do.

MVP of Yesterday (Sept. 14, 2013): Wladimir Balentien (actually Brandon Belt)

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Wladimir Balentien broke the NPB single-season HR mark early this morning, hitting his 56th home run of the year, breaking a record held by the great Sadaharu Oh since 1964. Check out this video, it’s awesome:

And, later in the game, he hit number 57.

However, the MVP of Yesterday is technically meant just for MLB, and thankfully, there is a very good candidate: Brandon Belt, who went 5-6 with a HR and 6 RBI in the Giants’ runaway 19-3 victory over the Dodgers. He JUST edges out Hunter Pence, who had 7 RBI, but only 3 hits.

Standings, as usual, under the jump:

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In honor of Friday the 13th: My Greatest Baseball Fears (mostly humor)

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It’s Friday the 13th, so here are my greatest baseball fears (these are mostly meant to be humorous):

  • I go to a ballgame, have to leave early due to some external circumstance, miss a no-hitter, and get ticked off at whoever it was that caused the external circumstance.
  • Some family member or friend schedules a wedding, Bar Mitzvah, funeral, or other major event during an elimination game of the World Series. Had the 2008 World Series gone to Game 7, this would have happened and I would have probably ruined the Bat Mitzvah of a family friend.
  • Even worse than that: the power goes out during the playoffs. The horror…. the horror.
  • Or even worse than THAT: a blackout brought about by a dispute between the TV station and the cable provider. A torch and/or pitchfork would probably be involved.
  • Another work stoppage. I was four when the last one happened so I had no clue. I have a hard enough time getting through the off-season. A work stoppage would probably cause me to enter a grief-coma or something. Is a grief-coma a thing? I don’t know.
  • I miss a walk-off play in deep extra innings because of my bladder.
  • Line drive to the face.
  • Line drive to the groin.
  • Really, line drives in general are terrifying.
  • Hard enough grounders, too, especially if they are bouncing.
  • Somebody other than Andrelton Simmons wins Gold Glove for SS in the NL this season, causing the baseball-related internet to enter a conflagration that would make the Trout-Cabrera WAR debate of last year look like a campfire.
  • No, seriously, he’s had one of the best defensive seasons in history. If he doesn’t win, the baseball-related internet will probably cease to exist. The center will not hold, the falcon will not be able to hear the falconer…
  • Finally: I’m somehow managing a major league team, my team is down in the ninth, and Mariano Rivera is coming in.

Random Thing: Former Major League Stadiums That Are Still Standing

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The (exhibition) return of Olympic Stadium got me to thinking for no real reason: What are other former MLB stadiums that are still standing? I don’t mean cases where they knocked down almost the whole thing but kept the diamond there (as has happened at Tiger Stadium), or cases where they demolished most but not all of the stadium and then it was made into something totally different (as with what used to be Braves Field).  I’m talking about actual former stadiums that are still standing and could, in theory, still be used for baseball.

I came up with this list:

I can’t think of any others… can you?

Wladimir Balentien ties Sadaharu Oh’s single-season record

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Wladimir Balentien has tied Sadaharu Oh’s record for single-season HR in Japan with his 55th HR. Others have tied it in the past, but none have been able to break it, partly due to Japanese pitchers avoiding him in order to preserve Oh’s record from being broken by a Gaijin. That attitude may now be a thing of the past though, and even if it isn’t, Balentien still has 22 games left, and it seems doubtful that they’d be able to avoid him for all of it.

Random Goofballey: Denny McLain on the Organ

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After his 31-6 1968 season, Tigers pitcher Denny McLain was offered- and accepted- an offer to play the organ in an album for Capitol Records. This is a sampling of that work: