Tag: baseball

The Curley Shuffle

By Blaidd Drwg

Back in my younger days when I was just a pup, they used to play this inbetween innings at Mets games at Shea Stadium. I have absolutely no idea why this popped into my head completely out of the blue recently. I probably have not heard this song in 20+ years.

When Steve Carlton was the Strikeout King

By Blaidd Drwg

Really Goosh? How?
Really Goosh? How?

I recently decided to buy back a small piece of my youth and purchased a 1984 Topps complete set. It was fun reliving the memories of the 1983 season and my 10 year old self putting together the set. Living in NJ in 1983, there was excitement over the big rookie in NY that took the league by storm – Darryl Strawberry. His rookie card is in that set, along with another NY rookie who wouldn’t really make an impact until the next season – Don Mattingly. There are also cards of a very young Tony Gwynn, Cal Ripken, Wade Boggs and Ryne Sandberg, a very old Pete Rose and my all-time favorite name Doug Gwosdz (pronounced GOOSH, had the nickname “Eyechart”).

One of the cards that caught my eye was a highlights card that had Steve Carlton, Nolan Ryan and Gaylord Perry on it. I had forgotten this, but 1983 was the year that Walter Johnson’s 55+ year old record for strikeouts in a career fell, and 3 pitchers managed to pass the total of 3,509. Here is the way things stacked up going into the 1983 season:

Player Age Strikeouts
Walter Johnson n/a 3,509
Nolan Ryan 36 3,494
Gaylord Perry 44 3,452
Steve Carlton 38 3,434
The card that inspired the post.
The card that inspired the post.

Obviously Nolan Ryan was the one who was going to break the record first give he was just 15 behind Johnson going into the season. Ryan was starting to look like it might be near the end for him – he had been good but not great for a couple of seasons, so 4,000 strikeouts looked like it might be his upper limit. Perry was a bit of a longshot to catch Johnson because of his age and general ineffectiveness over the previous few seasons. Carlton, despite 1983 being his 38 year old season, had come off this 1982 season:

  • Cy Young Award
  • 295 IP
  • 23 Wins
  • 19 CG
  • 286 K
  • 5.5 WAR

Ryan passed Johnson first and then Carlton and then Perry. Something strange then happened at the end of 1983. Here is how Ryan and Carlton pitched that season:

W-L ERA IP SO
Carlton 15-16 3.11 283.2 275
Ryan 14-9 2.98 196.1 183

Carlton again led the league in IP AND SO, at age 38! So despite being the first pitcher to pass Walter Johnson, Nolan Ryan was not the all-time strikeout leader at the end of 1983:

Player Age Strikeouts
Steve Carlton 38 3,709
Nolan Ryan 36 3,677
Gaylord Perry 44 3,534
Walter Johnson n/a 3,509

Carlton was not nearly as good at age 39 in 1984 (nor for the rest of his career) and Ryan was about as good as he had been the previous 4 seasons, allowing Ryan to finish up 1984 as the all-time strikeout leader, a spot from which he never looked back, adding 1840 strikeouts to his career total after age 37. Since Johnson’s record was initially broken, 5 other pitchers passed the 3,509 total. For one brief season, Steve Carlton was baseball’s all-time strikeout king.

Robinson Cano and Free Agency

By Blaidd Drwg

I saw this piece on espn.com and my reaction was 3 words:

AIN’T GONNA HAPPEN!

Here are the details:

The gap between second baseman Robinson Cano and the New York Yankees on a new contract is enormous, with sources telling ESPN’s Buster Olney that the soon-to-be free agent is seeking approximately $305 million over 10 years.

Cano is going to be 31(ish) next season and, while he has been durible and excellent, he is on the wrong side of 30 and is more likely to get, at best, a 7 year $150 million dollar deal, and that is probably only if the Yankees bid on his services. He is due to decline, and I just don’t see any team willing to pay 30 million a year for a guy over 40, including the Yankees. It just won’t happen.

Tossing a Ball to the Fans

By Blaidd Drwg

The River City Rascals of the independent Frontier League, instituted and then reversed a rather interesting policy concerning players and coaches tossing balls into the stands.

From ESPN.com (this is the entire piece):

A unique policy devised by a baseball club in the independent Frontier League was quickly reversed after commenters on social media panned the move.

The club, the River City Rascals, which plays in O’Fallon, Missouri, posted a sign in its home dugout that said that, as of yesterday, players and coaches would be charged for throwing balls into the stands.

“Players and coaches will now be fined $5 for each ball that is tossed into the stands,” the sign read. “We ask that you return every ball back to the dugout, including at the end of innings and games.”

The notice warned team personnel that the $5 would be taken directly out of their paycheck and that it was ownership’s wishes that this was not discussed with fans.

But after negative reaction over taking away a common fan friendly practice filled Facebook and Twitter on Wednesday night, a club official acknowledged it reversed course by the morning.

“We have reversed it, but won’t be discussing it any further at ownership’s request,” said the team’s general manager Dan Dial.

The 14 Teams in the Frontier League have a $75,000 salary cap for a 24-man roster, which means players are earning as little as $600 and as much as $1,600 a month. They are subsidized with meal money and free housing.

I know that independent teams operate on a shoestring budget, but that is beyond silly. Did they think that this was the 1910’s, not the 2010’s, where games would routinely use the same ball for the whole game?

“I picked the wrong week…”

By Blaidd Drwg

I moved to Seattle from Boston 10 years ago today. With my beloved Red Sox playing well and looking like the front runners for winning the World Series, I came to the realization that if they pull it off again this year, it will be 3 World Series Championships in my lifetime, all of which occurred AFTER I left Boston.  It isn’t like the Sox weren’t good when I was living there, it is just that they were getting caught behind the Yankee dynasty and couldn’t overcome it. I will count 2003 as a year in Boston, since I was there for most of the time, but here is how the team fared in my time back east vs. my time in the land of salmon and rain:

 

Years W-L PCT World Series Playoffs Winning Seasons
1991-2003 1081-959 .530 0 4 9
2004-Current 898-702 .561 2 6 9

 

Not really a point to this, just marking the 10th anniversary of my move to Seattle with something vaguely sports related.

Oh, and this:


 

Let the HOF Debate Begin

By Blaidd Drwg

I happened to be watching the America’s Cup race (don’t ask, it is one of my guilty pleasures) and I noticed on the crawl that there were two retirements announced from baseball today: Vlad Guerrero, who actually hasn’t played in the majors since 2011, and Todd Helton, who made his effective at the end of the season.

Guerrero will always hold a soft spot in my heart. Back in 2003, in what would be Vlad Guerrero’s last game as an Expo, I remember him getting a 5 minute standing ovation from the crowd as he was replaced in right field by Ron Calloway. Everyone knew that Vlad, who was going to be a free agent at the end of the season, was going to sign somewhere else.  Vlad will also be remembered by me for being listed at 10-1 in Vegas for the 2004 AL MVP. Needless to say, my bet paid for my 2005 trip to Vegas.

Helton is an interesting case – he is a guy who put up some pretty good career numbers but played half of his games in Coors field.

Just for comparison, here is how they both stack up:

AVG HR RBI H SB OPS OPS+ WAR
Guerrero .318 449 1496 2590 181 .931 140 59.9
Helton .317 367 1397 2505 37 .954 133 61.1

 

They had very similar career numbers. Sadly, I doubt that either of them will end up in the HOF, although they both have a pretty strong case that they belong. Vlad would get my vote and I think Helton would get mine eventually – heck he is a much better choice than either Tony Perez or Jim Rice.

“Shall we play a game?”

By Blaidd Drwg

“How about global therm0nuclear war?”

No, well how about this?

Let’s say the season ended on September 3rd and we were going to vote on the Cy Young Award. Here are the AL WAR leaders according to Baseball-reference. Com:

1.

 Sale (CHW)

6.2

2.

 Scherzer (DET)

6.0

3.

 Iwakuma (SEA)

5.5

4.

 Hernandez (SEA)

5.2

5.

 Sanchez (DET)

5.0

6.

 Darvish (TEX)

5.0

7.

 Quintana (CHW)

4.1

8.

 Kuroda (NYY)

4.0

9.

 Holland (TEX)

3.9

10.

 Buchholz (BOS)

3.9

Let’s assume that is all of the contenders for the award. It is a pretty big spread between 6.2 WAR and 3.9 WAR, so let’s eliminate anyone with a WAR below 5.0. That leaves us with this:

1.

 Sale (CHW)

6.2

2.

 Scherzer (DET)

6.0

3.

 Iwakuma (SEA)

5.5

4.

 Hernandez (SEA)

5.2

5.

 Sanchez (DET)

5.0

6.

 Darvish (TEX)

5.0

While Iwakuma’s total numbers are good, he really has been pretty pedestrian since about mid-June, so let’s take him off the list. Besides, Felix is really the guy you would rather have on the mound for the Mariners anyway. I am going to eliminate Sanchez for a similar reason – he isn’t the best pitcher on his team. That leaves us with Chris Sale, Max Scherzer, Felix Hernandez and Yu Darvish.

Here is how they stack up:

W-L ERA SO WHIP ERA+
Chris Sale 10-12 2.97 199 1.055 144
Max Scherzer 19-2 2.88 209 0.940 146
Felix Hernandez 12-9 3.01 200 1.132 122
Yu Darvish 12-6 2.73 236 1.025 151

While Felix is having a good season, he hasn’t been dominating, so he probably finishes #3 or #4 in the voting with Chris Sale occupying the other spot. Sale has been outstanding, but voters will be turned off by his 10-12 record. That leaves it as a battle between Scherzer and Darvish. Both pitch for teams that are heading to the playoffs. Scherzer has benefited from outstanding run support, but he has also been pretty dominating in his own right – his WHIP leads the AL (Darvish is 3rd), he is giving up just under 6.3 hits per 9 innings (Darvish leads the AL with 6.1 per 9), he has a 4.5 to 1 strikeout to walk ration (good for 5th in the AL, Darvish is 8th at 3.9) and has the highest WPA of any starting pitcher in the AL. With how close the stats are between Darvish and Scherzer, it is going to come down to wins for the voters and that 19-2 record looks awfully nice, so Scherzer would win the award.

Given that, I have no idea what Jim Leyland is complaining about.

Maybe a nice game of chess is in order.