Traschelled

I made it out to see the Giants lose 1-0 to The Phoenix, Steve Traschel, who arose from the dead to pitch his first game of the season, allowing only 2 hits in 8 innings. I don’t know exactly how he did it, because he sure didn’t seem to have great stuff, and he can’t top 90 on his fastball anymore. His pitches must have a lot of sneaky movement, because the Giants’ slop hitters were off stride all night. Randy Winn got the first hit, a ground ball with eyes hit up the middle in the sixth inning.

Sorry, but I’m never going to trust Traschel. Not ever. We had him a number of years ago in that fatal season when our entire pitching staff headed by the fabled Jim Bullinger stunk beyond The Elder Barry’s wildest dreams. I always remember a game in which Traschel faced Bullinger, and the final score was something like 16-13. Neither guy made it out of the third inning.

We got to see our mainstay closer, Braden Looper, pick up a classic Looperesque save, giving up a lead off double to Omar Visquel, and then retiring the next three batters. Looper doesn’t throw quite as hard as he used to, or at least he didn’t last night, (93 on the gun), but he’s having a better season than you think.

I was at the game with my buddy Will, who commented in the 7th or 8th inning that the game was kind of dull. I looked at him quizzically and said, “You’re crazy. It’s one to nothing. Nothing beats one to nothing. One to nothing is art.”

The machers at major league baseball don’t agree with me, which is why the balls are tighter, and why the suspensions of players whose balls are tighter are so short. (That one was pretty funny, if I do say so.)

Meanwhile, the game took two and a half hours. There were only 10 hits in the game. There were no mid-inning pitching changes. That was a game that could have gone under 2 hours, but Traschel and Correia (he pitched well last night) just don’t have that Tomko-Reuter tempo. Come on, guys, get up there and throw. Stop picking your nose on the mound between pitches.

My Giants’ season record is now 7-8. I’ll get to see the Mets again on Sunday with 3 other BABI Boys.

The Saturday morning standings are:

Pecklers 67.0 (E)
Any 9 65.0 (E)
Cappers 64.0 (-3.0)
Busch Leaguers 64.0 (+2.5)
300 Pounders 62.5 (E)
Bats 60.5 (-.5)
Lickers 60.0 (+2.0)

Hobo has 56 points, but they’ve only got about 4 points upside, maximum, so again, I’m not going to evaluate them.

The Cappers gave back those batting average points yesterday with a flailing 8 for 39 day at the plate. Three of those eight hits came from Neifi Perez. They also had a zero RBI day.

Meanwhile, thought the Leaguers hit an even more anemic 5 for 32, They had 2 wins (Harang and Sheets, both beauties) and a save from Todd Jones. Throw in a hard luck loss by Derek Lowe (2-1) and the Leaguers’ pitching numbers were pristine: 24 IP, 4 ER, 20 H and 4 BB. Their upside points, though, came from moving back to the top of the bottom win pack. They need 5 more wins to pick up another win point. So it was the easy win points that moved them up yesterday. It helps when you have 3 starters going.

Here are some random notes I saw this morning:

Lastings Milledge NYM OF AA. Really starting to heat up at Double-A; he's hitting .337/.389/.491 with 11 steals in 42 G. I think he’ll surface in the majors some time in 2006.

Matt Cain SF AAA. Had his ERA dropping toward 4.00, but it has ballooned back up to 4.58 after 25 GS. He’s going to pitch for the Giants this week. He’s not doing as well down in Fresno as we all assumed.

Gavin Floyd PHI AAA. Has ERA down to 5.77 at Triple-A, which is actually some pretty good progress. Not likely to be activated in September by the Leaguers.

Ian Stewart COL 3B A. Numbers are now back right where they should be after a slow start; slugging .490. Maybe we’ll see how much George wants to finish in first by whether he trades this guy.

Michael Bourn PHI OF AA. The Phillies are expected to bring up speedster Michael Bourn who is hitting .268 with 34 stolen bases for Double-A Reading. We really liked this guy when we drafted him. Larry might have gotten a good one that he doesn’t yet appreciate.

Nomar Garciaparra of the Chicago Cubs played third base for the first time since high school on Friday afternoon against the Florida Marlins. I wonder who the shortstop on his high school team was.

Ken Griffey Jr. is now batting .298 with 32 homeruns and 89 runs batted in. And still we all discount his keeper value.

Michael Barrett of the Chicago Cubs continued his climb back towards the .300 mark on Friday afternoon as he went 2 for 5 against the Florida Marlins. Barrett is now batting .292 with 13 homeruns and 53 runs batted in. Recent rumors out of the Cubs camp have Barrett among Derek Lee and Aramis Ramirez as the only position players who will for sure be back next year. Since Barrett is among the top three catchers offensively in all major categories in the National League that makes sense. This is here as an advertisement paid for and endorsed by the Pickled Pecklers.

According to the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel, "Russ Branyan swung a bat Friday for the first time since the weekend, joining the group of Brewers who took early batting practice. He said his back, which became stiff after a chiropractic adjustment, felt better but was still a little sore. I thought your back is supposed to feel better after an adjustment.

According to the Miami Herald, "McKeon said Damion Easley would remain at second as long as the Marlins continue to win." And he’s not going to change his socks either.

The Assman on Ayala

We received this observation from Howard Cooperman, M.D., aka "The Assman" regarding the Ayala for an open spot deal:

A central issue in the Ayala deal has yet to be discussed.

Namely, the use of external experts for your fantasy decisions.

Until now, I assumed I was the only one who pegged his entire pitching staff based on Mike Krukow’s (aka “The Kruk”) in game commentary. Now that Greg has admitted he uses the same source, I am forced to admit that “The Kruk” is indeed the guru of the Falkuhns’ stellar pitching performance this year.

Whenever I hear “The Kruk” say “he can really bring the gas”, I make a note of it and that pitcher ends up a Falkuhn. And when he says a pitcher is performing “as good as or better” than any other Giant pitcher, I break the bank to get that guy. I don’t even think about what the relative skills of the current Giant staff is. I trust in “The Kruk”.

What the heck, you could do worse and actually PAY for bad advice. That happens to me every year.

And the real truth is, you often gamble to get a cheap closer. It’s too bad Brower didn’t make it. If he had, there would be little to discuss regarding “The Kruk”, Ayala for a dead guy or the effect on the race.

Howard Cooperman, M.D.

And it's too bad for the Giants, who might be only 12 games under .500 instead of 16.

Fanmail from a Flounder?

I got a note from the Dapper Capper this morning about one of the players he sent to us in the Edmonds deal back in March:

“Did you know that Mohr-on is the HR leader for Colorado? Is that more unbelievable than the fact that no one on the Rockies have more than 16 HRs? Maybe it’s time to rethink the strategy of buying Rockies at the draft.”

The Doc speculated that Coors has actually turned into a pitchers’ park.

Meanwhile, his box score line was classic Mohr-on: 4AB, 1RB, 1RBI, 3K. He’s hitting .225, but he’s going to finish with about 20 homers. Was he worth $5? We had a similar situation with Marquis Grissom when he was in LA, having bought him for $4 and he hit 20 homers while batting .220. We threw him back, and he proceeded to have 2 pretty decent seasons for the Giants.

Looking back on the trade, which was Chad Tracy and Mohr-on for Edmonds, I’d say it was a push, maybe slightly in favor of us. Tracy has 19 homers and Mohr-on 16. Meanwhile Edmonds is having a good year, but it was clear that 2004 was a career year for him. The deal did leave us with too much money at a highly inflated draft.

We also heard from The Elder Barry this morning, in a message entitled “Why Ties are Bad:

There are no ties in Major League baseball and there should be no ties in BABI baseball either.

According to the Washington Post, "Reliever Luis Ayala has tendinitis in his right elbow, and an MRI confirmed the there was no further damage. He is listed as day-to-day." Ayala has 7 wins for the Leaguers since they traded an open spot for him.

SOUR GRAPES ... If the Bat Out of Hell had had an injured player when Greg was looking to move Ayala, his 7 wins would have me in 4th place right now and only 2.5 points out of first. Something this capricious and arbitrary shouldn't be a factor in determining the winner of our league.

I don’t have an opinion about this yet. But having read the intro to Barry's latest mystery novel, I do think his writing is hilarious.

Here are the standings after Thursday’s play:

Pecklers 67.0 (+.5)
Cappers 67.0 (+2.0)
Any 9 65.0 (E)
300 Pounders 62.5 (-1.5)
Busch Leaguers 61.5 (-.5)
Bats 61.0 (E)
Lickers 58.0 (-2.0)

The Cappers are making a move in the lower echelons of hitting. Their 24 RBI’s are leading BABI this week, and they have picked up a couple of BA points, though they are still in a virtual tie with the Lickers and Hobo. Rumor has it that George thinks the Leaguers have it in the bag, and that he’s playing for 2nd place. He might be right. And he might not be right.

Any 9 picked up a couple of saves yesterday, moving a little closer to the pack. I suspect that they will pass the Cappers and the Lickers, but it will be close. These are critical points for Any 9 if they are going to get to the magic 70 point threshhold. Also, the Bums and the Pecklers are fighting them for BA points. Ken probably is also targeting the Cappers and the Pecklers for a couple of WHIP points.

The Busch Leaguers have now dropped to 11th in wins, but they have good upside there. On a day to day basis wins can be a function of whether you had starters going that day. The Bats, with 8 starters, have one going almost every day, but the other contenders have between 4 and 6 starters. It is clear that the Leaguers are going to need more than those extra saves points, and they will have to come from pitching, because the Leaguers have virtually no upside in hitting any more.

The Lickers are on the verge of falling out of contention. They are only 3 points ahead of Hobo. We appologize to Hobo if they are insulted that we don’t include them in the race, but they sold out, so we can’t take them seriously. On the other hand, 3 weeks ago we weren’t taking the Pounders seriously either, so you never know. Hobo is a major spoiler in several categories, and they will get some notice here during the next month.

And as for the Pecklers, we got a win and a save from our Mets combo (Martinez and Looper). We’re building up that saves lead. A closer for a starter trade looks inevitable. We’re on the Cappers’ tail in ratio. Any day that could result in a 2 point swing between the league leaders.

Foul!

The Cartel has responded to my note about Ayala as follows:

A rebuttal to your comment about trading Ayala for an open spot in which to retain Jim Brower (implying this was a poor move). Mike Krukow had said the day before that Jim Brower was throwing the ball “as well or better than anyone in the Giant pen”, implying that he was a leading contender for the closer job. And I had to chase every possible closer as both Borowski and Tsao went down to injuries early on, and thus I chased Brower as I had/have chased many other potential closers: Wellemeyer; Bernero, etc. I believe I was second to you guys on Farnsworth (in this case for next year, and you know I took a flyer on Bruney during the draft). I’m still chasing them… Wuertz, Wheeler, Aquino, etc.

Retrospective analysis of moves without context is a little misleading.

So what if it’s misleading? That’s the fun in this! It's my newspaper, and here at Sour Grapes, our motto is "All the news that's shit, we print."

On a completely unrelated note, has anyone in the history of baseball batting in the middle of the order ever had a softer season than Sean Casey? He was 3 for 4 today, bringing his average up to .322. No RBI’s today, batting 5th in the order. He generally bats 5th, sometimes 3rd. He has 456 AB’s and 145 hits, but only 8 homers and 50 RBI’s.

Speaking of that game, Weathers got a save for Any 9. They’ve got a lot of saves ground to make up in the next 5 weeks.

Got Milk?

Kenny9 was kind enough to send over a couple of items he found on the net that we consider blog-worthy. We appreciate all contributions, because sometimes it’s hard to come up with new and refreshing ideas. Speaking of refreshing…

A batboy who took a dare to chug a gallon of milk has been suspended six games by the Marlins. The batboy drank the milk in the alotted time frame (an hour), but couldn’t hold it down. Brad Penny, the instigator in this dare is not happy with the suspension, and has a good point. “It’s kind of ridiculous that you get a 10-game suspension for steroids and a six-game suspension for milk,” Penny said.

Meanwhile, the about to be DL’d Milton Bradley had some comments on Barry Bonds’ favorite former teammate, Jeff Kent. Lance Berkman’s take on the Milton Bradley-Jeff Kent racial feud provided what is possibly the baseball quote of the year:

“I think (for Bradley) to make it a race issue is ridiculous,” Berkman said. “J.K. doesn’t
discriminate against anybody. He ignores Latinos, blacks and whites equally.”

The Colonel has a Jeff Kent story that bears out the conventional thinking on Jeff Kent’s racial sensitivity which ends with the quote “We’ve got enough of those on the team.” That’s enough to put into print here.

And here are a couple of useful notes from my daily service:

According to the Arizona Republic, "Chad Tracy fell down trying to catch a fly ball in right field." Thank God we got rid of him just in time, too.

According to the Newsday, "Mike Piazza was feeling so good about the healing pisiform bone in his left hand that he doesn't anticipate a problem coming off the disabled list when he is eligible on Wednesday." He probably has lost his starting job to Ramon Castro this week, though.

According to the San Jose Mercury News, "Reliever Tyler Walker, on the disabled list because of inflammation in his right shoulder, said he has noticed improvement. ``You can tell when you're moving it around,'' he said. ``It doesn't hurt as much putting my seat belt on anymore. It's starting to calm down.'' I'm sure we all can't wait to get him back.

According to the Washington Post, "Reliever Luis Ayala has tendinitis in his right elbow, and an MRI confirmed the there was no further damage. He is listed as day-to-day." Ayala has 7 wins for the Leaguers since they traded an open spot for him. That open spot was used to retain Jim Brower, if you don't remember.

According to the Newsday, "Doug Mientkiewicz went 0-for-3 with two strikeouts and played five innings at first base last night in a rehab start for Class-A St. Lucie." The Pecklers can't wait for him to come back and give us those stats.

I hope nobody was counting on Garciaparra to bring them to the promise land. The Cubs will make a decision tomorrow on whether or not to shelve Nomar with a bad back. A once Hall of Fame type career has taken a Griffey Jr. like turn for the worse. That trade by Any 9 seemed like a good idea at the time.

According to the St Louis Post-Dispatch, "Rick Ankiel had a solo homer and a two-run double for Class AA Springfield Tuesday in an 8-2 win over Tulsa." Bums should have kept him. I wonder if he'll be called up after September 1?

Here is the standings at the end of Wednesday’s games. There wasn’t too much movement yesterday:

Pecklers 66.5 (E)
Cappers 65.0 (-1.0)
Any 9 65.0 (E)
300 Pounders 64.0 (+.5)
Busch Leaguers 62.0 (-.5)
Bats 61.0 (E)
Lickers 60.0 (E)

As the week goes on, it’s harder to identify what specific categories changed. I do know that the Pecklers lost another half point in wins, but picked up a half point in RBI’s. Furthermore, we moved closer in BA to Any 9 (this could be a critical point), and closer to the Cappers in ERA and WHIP.

The Pounders took a half point from the Leaguers in saves yesterday. This saves category, as I have been writing, is going to be a key in the race, as both the Pounders and the Leaguers have a lot of upside there. Meanwhile the Pecklers picked up saves from Wagner and Farnsworth to extend our lead to 3 saves, and 8 over the Pounders and 9 over the Leaguers. This probably makes Farnsworth tradable for a starting pitcher to shore up the wins. And yes, we’re logged in on that.

My next analysis will be to look at the pitching strategies for the 7 contenders this weekend. In the end, it looks like the pitching categories will determine the final standings (ignoring the effects of injuries during the stretch). It’s a tough thing to predict, but I’ll give it my best.

Mid Wednesday Update

I feel like CNBC with stock updates here.

This just in:

Atlanta 3
Chicago 1

W - Sosa
L - Prior
S - Farnsworth (1)

As predicted. Atlanta's new closer. And keepable at $16.

Yeah for us.

Meanwhile, Kip Wells didn't make it out of the first inning against the Cardinals.

The Daily Market Update

There was a little movement in the standings from Monday to Tuesday. At the moment, the standings are as follows (increase/decrease from prior day):

Pecklers 66.5 (+.5)
Cappers 66.0 (+2.0)
Any 9 65.0 (-.5)
300 Pounders 63.5 (-1.0)
Busch Leaguers 62.5 (-1.0)
Bats 61.0 (+1.5)
Lickers 60.0 (E)

The Pecklers picked up a half point from the Bats in Homers, and tied the Bums in RBI’s. This was offset by another half point loss in wins. The Pecklers need another starter. The Pecklers also moved in range of Any 9 and the Bums in Batting Average.

The Cappers had some miserable pitching, but picked up 2 BA points by passing the Falkuhns and Hobo. George is right on the Lickers’ heels in BA. The Pecklers and Any 9 moved closer in WHIP.

The Pounders took a half point in homers from Any 9. The Lickers and the Pecklers moved closer in RBI’s. The Pounders took a half point from the Pecklers in Wins.

The Leaguers lost a point to the Lickers in steals. The moved pretty close to the Lickers in ERA after a horrible Licker pitching day. That point looks inevitable.

Bats picked up a couple of pitching points, passing the Lickers in WHIP, and moving one ahead of the bottom pack in wins.

It’s close. The saves category is a mess. I’m no longer sure anyone is going to get 70 points, though the winner will be awfully close. That means someone is going to put on some kind of a stretch drive. There’s only 1 more week of trading, and then it’s up to the players.

Closer and Closer

I’m going to make an entry every day that I can reporting on the standings of the top 7 teams so that there is an archive of the movement in the race.

Yesterday the race got even tighter, with the seven teams only 6.5 points apart, ranging from 66.0 to 59.5. The order is:

Pecklers 66.0
Any 9 65.5
Busch Leaguers & 300 Pounders 64.5
Cappers 64.0
Lickers 60.0
Bats 59.5

The top 5 teams are only 2 points apart.

I keep asking people how many points it’s going to take to win. The most common answer is 72. I’m not convinced it will be that high. I do believe the Leaguers will finish around 70, so that means every team will have to increase from where they are.

It’s not clear to me where the Lickers and Bats can find those points. Zack Duke racked up his ankle tonight and is likely done for the Bats this season. In this the last week of trading, the Lickers and Bats still have to make some kind of move, though the teams playing for next year are running out of guys that will help.

Any 9 and the Cappers are putting up Elder Barry pitching numbers tonight. Several starters have been killed tonight: Marquis and Tomko each went only 3 innings (Lickers), C. Vargas and Armas got beat up for the Cappers (ERA and Ratio points are critical to them), Beckett did not make it through the 4th (Any 9, also with critical pitching points) and Thompson was a little ugly for the Pounders. Meanwhile, the Pecklers’ pitchers haven’t pitched an inning yet.

Speaking of the Pecklers’ pitchers, Atlanta send Reitsma out for the 9th inning down 8-1 tonight, and he gave up 2 runs. That’s not exactly how you treat your closer. Prediction: the new Braves closer is Kyle Farnsworth.

Finally, early in this blog I spoke about Mr. Leaguer’s bet on the Warriors and how every $10 is important. We blew off $10 by reserving Tyler Walker today. He won’t be back until sometime in September, and he’s clearly done as the closer. There is no sense to it except we’re playing balls out, and we just had to spend it. Meanwhile, I wish we had bid $25 on Todd Jones and not $21. We’ve got plenty of FAAB money left.

Wheelin' Toward the Finish Line

There were three trades this week which will have a big effect on this amazing race in BABI. First, let’s recap the standings from this morning:

Any 9 & Pickled Pecklers are tied for 1st with 66.5
Cappers & Busch Leaguers are tied for 3rd with 64.0
Resurgent 300 Pounders are 5th at 63.0
Lickers are 6th at 60.0
Bats are 7th at 58.5

Hobo is fading at 53, and with the trades this weekend, can be said to have officially dumped.

This race really has been astounding. In the past couple of weeks, first place has been held by Any 9, Pecklers, Cappers, Leaguers and Lickers, who have faded. The Pounders have come from nowhere with a big drive in pitching, and in particular, saves.

Here are the three trades from this weekend:

The Busch Leaguers traded Matt Holliday and Glendon Rusch to Hobo for Austin Kearns and Ryan Dempster (tied to Gavin Floyd). The Leaguers get a closer, get rid of the volatile Rusch, and give up some hitting. Hobo gets some keepable pieces.

.300 Pounders traded Willy Taveras, John Mabry and Jose Valentin to Hobo for Corey Patterson, Troy Glaus and Mark Loretta. The Pounders give up their stolen base king for more hitting and the volatile Patterson. Hobo gets some more keepable pieces.

Finally, Any 9 sent Paul LoDuca and Roberto Hernandez to the Pounders for Johnny Estrada (might be coming off the DL today) and Dave Weathers. The Pounders get a little hitting and Any 9 gets another closer.

The saves category is extraordinarily close, and could have a great bearing on the final outcome:

All Tease and Pecklers have 50
Hobo has 49
Lickers have 48
Cappers have 46
Pounders have 44
Leaguers have 43
Any 9 has 39

The Pecklers have caught the Falkuhns, and the Falkuhns will be fading downward in the category. Any and possibly all of these teams could pick up that point for passing them.

The Pecklers have 2 bona fide closers, Wagner and Looper. We lost Walker this weekend, but have hopes that Farnsworth is going to steal the job in Atlanta. If he does, we should finish first in the category. If not, it’s going to be a race, but we're probably in the top 2 or 3.

Hobo is back down to a single closer (Cordero), and should be passed by most of the teams. Since the Pecklers already passed Hobo, we don’t have this potential upside point.

The Lickers have only Mesa as a closer. They are going to lose a few saves points to their rivals. Again, we already have this point.

The Cappers have only Hoffman, having traded away Lyon this week. They are going to lose two and possibly three saves points, and they may not pass Hobo (or who knows, the Falkuhns) while their rivals are doing so. Once again, we already have this point.

The Pounders suddenly became closer rich, with Duaner Sanchez (originally purchased at the auction by the Pecklers for $2) and Turnbow, and occasionally Valverde. Trading Weathers means that they probably won’t pass the Pecklers, but they should get the Falkuhns, Hobo, the Lickers and the Cappers.

The Busch Leaguers had only Todd Jones coming into the weekend, but have now added Dempster via trade, and lest we forget, Armando Benitez, back from oblivion. The deal for Dempster suddenly puts the Busch Leaguers in position to finish 1st or 2nd in the category, representing a 5 or 6 point pickup. Depending on how Kearns hits for the next 6 weeks, the Leaguers may not have sacrificed any hitting points. On the other hand, beware batting average downside. BTW, Kearns cannot be waived (on a contract).

Finally, Any 9 had Isringhausen, and was flailing with Brazoban and Belisle. Ken has now picked up Weathers, but it might not generate many saves points. He’s not likely to pass either the Pounders or the Leaguers. He’s 7 behind the Cappers, 9 behind the Lickers, 10 behind Hobo and 11 behind the Falkuhns. Any 9 might not pick up all of those points, rendering this trade useless.

Each team is targeting some other category, and of course everyone is hoping beyond hope for a couple of extra wins points. I think the end result of these deals, but the return of Benitez has made the Busch Leaguers the odds on favorite to three peat. Bastards.

Changing of the Guard

I’ll write something longer tomorrow, but this weekend has seen a big change for the Giants which will also affect our BABI race. Friday night Tyler Walker blew a 4-0 lead in the ninth inning, costing the Giants the opening game of the Cardinals’ series.

Today, with Walker nursing a sore elbow, Armando Benitez came in to close it out in the ninth for his first post-DL save. It’s unlikely Walker will be the closer again this season (or ever, given his inconsistency). And it’s likely Benitez has regained the role he was paid millions of dollars to do, at least until he tears something again.

Bad for the Pecklers, with Walker acting as their third closer with the team on the cusp of the saves lead. Doubly bad given the acquisition this weekend by the Busch Leaguers of Dempster from Hobo. The saves category is very close among all of the leaders, and could well be the key category down the stretch.

One last item from today: the Braves scored 5 in the 8th inning to take a 6-2 lead over the Padres tonight. It was a non-save situation, but traditionally the closer will come in with a 4 run lead for the 9th inning. The Braves brought in Farnsworth to finish it off, not Reitsma, who has been ugly. Had the lead been smaller, I wonder what they would have done. Anyway, the Pecklers are sitting on him at $16. Maybe….

From The Elder Barry

Here is certainly proof that The Elder Barry is following this blog. He has passed on the following little ditty. This even made my wife laugh.

Highlights of My Day

1. Visited the Urologist's office this morning and had the Hubbell Telescope inserted into my bladder through my penis.

2. Learned there's no word in the English language that adequately describes that feeling.

3. Discovered first hand that the next voiding of the bladder is less than comfortable.

4. Learned there's no word in the English language that adequately describes that feeling either.

5. Discovered that it's not always easy to concentrate on baseball

6. Just noticed that the first guy to die in my new book was named Mark Prior.

7. I'm still upset I didn't extend Mark Ensberg's contract to 07

8. Just learned that even at only $15 a visit my Kaiser bill can mount up almost as fast as my BABI charges.

9. Just beginning to realize that the Golden Years are not always golden.

10. I'm very happy to learn that so many of my BABI friends are concerned about my health.

The Elder Barry lives.

Seeking Professional Help

I sent an email yesterday to a fellow who writes a column for The Talented Mr. Roto (entertaining site, not as useful as they think they are). He had kind of made a joke about Woody being put on the DL because of gout in his big toe. I sent him a nice note to say that I’ve had gout, and it is one of the nastiest, most painful maladies on earth. It may sound funny that a guy had a gout attack, but believe me, it’s serious business to the guy who is suffering.

He wrote me back today, a nice note thanking me for emailing him and for indicating that gout attacks weren’t all that funny. Now Sammy Sosa sneezing his way onto the DL is funny (though I’ve sometimes felt a twinge in my back on a sneeze too). Anyway it was a nice note and he offered to evaluate my team in our league race.

Realistically, we have such a deep league, with such experienced players, that I don’t think it would be easy to put into place any of the suggestions he might make. We’re in the end game now. Telling me to trade this guy or that guy probably wouldn’t be easy to do at this point, particularly with the trade deadline coming up. And the free agent pool is so sparse, it couldn’t help much. We’re reaching the point where the players you’ve got need to stay healthy and perform. At some point, it’s pretty much in their hands. Jason Schmidt has to pitch better than he did Tuesday night, or else we’re not going to win. And that’s really true, because since he’s on contract, we can’t even waive him.

I did tell him that our league, which has been around since the late ‘80’s has never seen a race this deep and close, and that it would make a good case study. In fact, I told him that this blog is essentially the chronicle that could be used as a case study. It doesn’t have all the details, but if I were a writer making my living writing about fantasy sports, I’d read this blog from beginning to end.

I like to think that my work here now qualifies me as a writer, though I’ll never make my living at it, so I went ahead and scanned through a lot of the blog today. To be honest, it made me pretty proud. There is a lot of good information here, a lot of thoughtful analysis, and some good humor. I only have 6 weeks to go to complete this project, and I know at this point that I’ll do it.

Even though they call it The Talented Mr. Roto, they don’t really help leagues that are deep keeper leagues like the original Rotisserie League. The information there is mostly for leagues with more free agents, oriented to weekly activations and deactivations. They don’t really get into values and dump deals because that’s not what the majority of leagues is out there. BABI is pretty pure in the original sense of Roto, but it’s also pretty rare. I’ll bet most of those writers have never been in a league like this with this kind of history. So what can they really offer?

This is not to put you down, Nando, if you’re out there looking at this. I enjoy what you do. And if you want to take a good look at the race, I’ll be happy to provide the details about the standings and the rosters. It’s a really amazing race. Believe me, the players in this league are playing their asses off. You’d have to be a hell of an analyst to help anyone in this league very much. Great case study, though.

On a final note, The Talented Mr. Roto himself, Matthew Berry, is auctioning himself off for charity on EBay to be your assistant general manager for your fantasy football team. Here is the link. But since PEFA is actually older than Matthew, he’d be welcome to join us for a drink, but he wouldn’t be of much help to anyone.

A Classic Blog Entry

This entry has nothing to do with baseball. Which might be said about many of the entries here.

I found the funniest blog on the net. I can officially attest to this because I've seen absolutely every blog ever created and this one is the funniest. Period.

It's called "The Casual Friday." It is written by a 23 year old guy in Illinois named Brian who should be writing for television.

Check it out. And when you do, make sure you click through to see the things he links to (many are pictures).

Brian is my new hero. Sorry Colonel.

Art Vandalay's Poker Memory

I received this story from Mark today. McGwire broke the record in 1998, so that means the poker game has probably been going on for about ten years. Whew! Time flies. Anyway, here's Mark's comments:

I don’t know if this will help you identify how long this monthly ritual has been going on, but I remember the first poker game that I participated in. It was on the same day that I was at a Giants game vs. the Cardinals at the ‘Stick with Josh & Seth during the year that McGwire made his home run record. We were sitting about half way down the right field line which happened to be right by the Giants bullpen. Old rag-armed Danny Darwin was pitching that day for the Giants and the Giants had also just called up some rookie pitcher that day from Fresno whose name I can’t remember.

It was a typical Danny Darwin game, lots of baserunners and in constant trouble. The Giants got this kid up at least 3 times during the game to warm up and Josh, Seth & I were ragging this guy relentlessly every time he started throwing. A number of people sitting nearby joined in on the action and I can only wonder what this poor kid must’ve been thinking to himself about his first day in the majors. It must have been something like Tudor Turtle yelling to Mr. Wizard, “Help me Mr. Wizard! I don’t want to be a big leaguer any more!” They shipped him out the next day and I don’t think this guy ever made it back to the big show. That’s a shame.

At one point during the game, Josh & I were negotiating a trade (what a surprise) and one of the guys I was supposed to getting back was an injured Alan Benes. Just at that second, he pops out of the visitors clubhouse door down the right field line and begins to make the long trek down the first base line to the visitors dugout. As he gets close I yell out, “Hey, Benes. I’m about to make a trade for you. Are you going to pitch this year or what?” He looks over without breaking stride and gives me the thumbs up. Well, I had to make the trade at that point. We all know how that turned out. What a freakin’ bum!

During the game we managed to also organize a pretty healthy attendance pool in our section. We got 24 people to throw in a dollar and the pot was won by a guy I knew, Pat Bechelli, who happened to be at the game sitting 3 rows behind us. What is interesting is that Pat, who happens to be one of the owners of Bechelli’s Restaurant on Chestnut Street in the Marina, was at the game because McGwire arranged to have him cater the clubhouse spread for the Cardinals team. When McGwire was a member of the A’s, he lived in the Marina and he often frequented Pat’s restaurant and they struck up a friendship.

That day before the game in the clubhouse, he gave McGwire a red Bechelli’s Restaurant T-shirt. Anyway, we fast forward to a month after the season ended and a package shows up at his restaurant. He opens it to find quite a bit of Cardinal memorabilia and the very same Bechelli’s Restaurant T-shirt he had given McGwire, but with the arms cut off and the following inscription hand-written on the shirt:

“I wore this shirt under my uniform for homers #48 through #70. Thanks for being a good friend. Mark McGwire.”

Pat had this shirt framed and it hung in his restaurant for quite some time. Channel 4 did a news story about it and soon after, the memorabilia buzzards starting circling. I think he finally did sell the shirt after holding out for a while. I don’t know what he ended up getting for it, but I do know at one point that he turned down over $200K for it. Not bad, huh? I think a replica of the shirt still hangs in his restaurant to this day.

Anyway, just like a Seinfeld episode, I’m going to tie all this back to the start. I invited Josh & Seth to go have a beer after the game and they declined, telling me that they had to get to their poker game that night. “Poker game? Hey, can I get in on that?” Josh says sure and a tradition was started. I don’t think I’ve missed more than 1 or 2 games since.

The Poker Boys

We had our monthly poker game at the Doc’s place last night. I started this tradition around 6 or 7 years ago (actually it might be longer, I can’t really remember). It’s always a great evening, with good food, good camaraderie, a lot of laughs, and a few bucks changing hands.

The participants changed over the years, and it’s become more like a monthly BABI meeting for the past few years. We only have three regulars from the original game left: the Doc, the Colonel and myself. Over the years we subsequently added Mark, Noel, Ken, Mr. Leaguer, and Larry Dot Net, in addition to a client/friend of mine who participates in neither BABI or PEFA (my fantasy football league, founded 1981) has no idea what the hell we are talking about most of the time, and has a tell that his hand stinks in which he throws his chips across the table. (BTW, The Colonel is in PEFA.) In addition, Kevin of the Pounders is the first alternate for our game, and makes it to two or three games per year.

It’s really an evening of rip roaring man fun. The Doc and I generally cook dinner for everyone, and there are a few bottles of wine brought in and opened during the evening. During baseball and football seasons there is usually a game on in the background (we don’t have games on Mondays anymore, because everyone in fantasy football leagues is way too distracted).

And the laughs. This is a pretty funny group of guys. And that is a heck of an understatement. We joke about everything. It’s a real dormitory atmosphere. Frankly, I just love the games, and I think everyone really looks forward to them. As Ken has said, the poker is just an excuse to have a little party and hang out.

I’ve been told by others in BABI that sometimes they feel like outsiders because the poker crew has gotten so friendly. I can’t ever remember a trade actually happening at a poker game, though some have tried. Ken once spent half the evening away from the table negotiating by phone with the Pounders, to the annoyance of everyone, though I must say, since we kept him in every hand until he folded, he lost a hell of a lot because of that deal.

The Doc and I didn’t know anyone in BABI when we joined 12 years ago. In fact, we responded to an ad in Baseball Weekly, I think. We didn’t actually get into the league for another year after we responded. Now some of our best friends are guys we met through being in this league. We golf together, go to sporting events together, split a meatpie at Henry’s together and play poker together. Noel and Mark are now in PEFA, going on 4 or 5 years, and Ken and Larry are at the top of the waiting list.

My wife makes fun of all this sports stuff, but this league has introduced me to some guys who are going to be my friends for a very long time. As my PEFA partner once said, he imagines a day when we meet for our annual pre-draft pow wow at the House of Prime Rib rolling our oxygen tanks in front of us. I hope it’s that way in BABI, too.

And at the poker games.

A Dot in the Distance

Today there were some sparks flying on the internet regarding the effect of open FAAB this season. I was going to send a "reply all" email regarding this, but then realized that Noel and Hank hate that, and after all, that’s why I write this thing.

Barry suggested that the close race this season was an outgrowth of open FAAB. He said, tongue in cheek, “yeah ... we wouldn't want another season were six teams are still competing for first place in August ... that would suck (lol).” I particularly like the fact that he refers to 6 teams, not 5 or 7 or 8. Guess who is in sixth.

George, who rarely puts his two cents in, responded, “Not saying that there’s anything definitive, but I wouldn’t attribute open FAAB as the factor. More like injuries to Leaguers and some other teams that had the potential to put some distance in the standings. Where would we be if Gagne was Gagne for the whole season?”

Of course, Mark, who hates open FAAB because it reduces the need for others to trade with him (not that he hasn’t been able to make trades this season) added, “. . . or if George had Bonds all season. Open FAAB is not the reason this year’s race is so close.”

These are all reasonable opinions. Now here is the answer:

The Pecklers were and remain big proponents of open FAAB. As for what causes a race to be close, there are many factors. Open FAAB allows teams to manage their teams more proactively after the draft, giving them some opportunity to fix bad picks that would otherwise drag that team down. The fix comes at a cost, which is FAAB dollars, which are fixed in amount.

Certainly injuries and luck combine with good management and poor management to produce results that affect every race. Referring to Gagne and Bonds is just rehashing the classic woulda couldas we all talk about after the fact. Actually Gagne was hurt before the season started, and the Leaguers could have thrown him back by buying out his contract if they so chose. His injury was obviously bad.

And although Barry’s return date has always been hazy, George spent $31 on him after his 3rd operation of the off season. That was a calculated decision, not a matter of just luck. He could have spent that same money on a hell of a lot of hitters that would have helped him. Plus he has turned down trades for Bonds.

These things have nothing to do with the open FAAB issue. I agree with Mark and George that open FAAB in and of itself does not make for a close race.

However, open FAAB allows teams an opportunity to fix their teams instead of giving up. Why are we so arbitrary about preventing teams from doing so before a certain date? If you think you can be in the race, you’ll try to be in the race, and that makes the race better, and postpones dumping.

I used to make the argument that teams should pay for their draft mistakes. I still believe that. But paying by not being able to even try to fix your team is stupid and self-defeating. And we do pay, by using up our FAAB budgets earlier in the season. It didn’t matter at the major league deadline this season, but it certainly could have, and it certainly has in previous years.

And of course many teams figured out with open FAAB that they can take chances in the draft, particularly with starting pitching. If the guy sucks, throw him back. If he turns out good, you got a bargain. A lot of the pitchers drafted by the Lickers turned out pretty good, and they were cheap. On the other hand, Ken fired off on Dohmann. And soon after, he simply fired him.

If we think that teams don’t pay enough for those mistakes, we can assess a FAAB surcharge for non-open spot replacements before a certain date. This would be a surcharge against the FAAB budget, causing someone to use up their FAAB budget at an even faster rate. I’m actually for this concept, which distinguishes between an injury replacement and a bad choice replacement.

In the end, who knows why we have a good race? Everything is the cause and nothing is the cause. It’s luck, it’s injuries, it’s skill and lack all three. As for the Pecklers, had Milton Bradley not given us the finger and had we spent the $38 we spent for Kaz Matsui and Jose Cruz for Willie Taveras and Chase Utley, we’d be so far ahead of everyone we’d look like a dot in the distance.

That's a shame.

Elder Barry Whine

It’s Monday evening, and the Giants are struggling to hold a 4-3 lead over the Reds in the 5th on TV in the background as I write. The Pecklers’ own Sean Casey is coming up with men on 1st and 2nd and two out.

I just got off a long phone call with our buddy, The Elder Barry. I remember learning early on that Barry is more of a phone guy than an email guy. It’s always fun to talk with Barry, as the conversation wends its way through a variety of topics, punctuated by comments about baseball and BABI. Medical problems, mystery writing, sleep, work – it’s always fun to chat with Barry.

Casey walks to load the bases. Correia can now go ahead and get the third out because the Pecklers don’t care.

I called Barry, of course, in response to his recent email with the simple message: “I Give Up”. It’s a message of frustration with the one thing we’ve all struggled with: decent pitching. Frankly, Barry has done more than struggle. He’s had some really bad pitching. He’s got 46.5 hitting points, but only 9.5 pitching points. This week he’s sporting an ERA of 7.52 and a WHIP of 1.892. Yesterday’s line was 13-2/3 IP, 16 ER, 21 H and 9 BB. Those are some bad numbers.

The easiest thing that can happen to a fantasy team is to have bad pitching. Every move makes it worse. Ultimately when your numbers suck beyond belief, your only hope is to load up with starting pitchers because you need lots more innings to fix anything. It takes weeks to fix a line like Barry’s yesterday.

And it can happen to anyone. The Leaguers have been masters of pitching. The team was pretty bad early in the season, but the pitching numbers have steadily improved bringing them in hailing distance of the leaders. Until today. So far, the Leaguers’ pitching numbers are: 8 IP, 7ER, 18 H, and 2 BB. That’s a WHIP buster.

The Pecklers have certainly been there too. Old timers in BABI will remember our pitching staff which included Jim Bullinger, Steve Traschel, Livan Hernandez, Al Leiter and Hideo Nomo all having terrible years. They were all pretty cheap ($10 or less), but that hardly matters when they all have ERA’s north of 5. For years we had a BABI rep of good hit, no field.

Our pitching isn’t so bad this year, but don’t think we’ve actually learned any lessons. Actually, we have, the only lesson that counts regarding pitching. It is: no matter how much study you put into pitching, it’s all a matter of luck. Now Noel, the pitching guru of the Hobos, may take that as an insult. Noel, don’t take it that way. Consider your job to manage your team’s pitching luck, which is even harder than managing the pitching itself.

It’s not much different in real baseball. Remember how in the off season the Giants and their fans were so confident about the team’s prospects? They spent money on hitting and a closer, but started the season with the same starting rotation that they ended last season with. It didn’t work out so well. Woody was released yesterday, Jerome Williams has been gone for months, and Schmidt, Tomko and Lowry, despite flashes, have been disappointments. Dave Righetti is not managing the team’s pitching luck very well, and it may cost him his job.

Getting back to Barry, he really hasn’t given up. At least he hasn’t given up enough to want to sell his players. If you’ve got the right thing, you can probably get Ensberg, but he’s going to try to battle his way to 5th place, and his current 6th place gets some money and the #1 minor league pick next year. He’s still got some upside in ERA and wins, but some more days like yesterday and he’ll be looking up and the Pounders too.

We’re looking down from the top again today for the first time in a while. We are the 4th team to hold first place this week. It’s the best BABI pennant race in our 12 years in the league. There is still a lot of baseball to be played, and most of the contenders are running (or have run) out of chips. Pretty soon it’s just going to be in the hands of the players themselves. Good luck to them all.

Correia snuck out of the 5th after loading the bases. Then in the 6th, the Giants had a rally that brought the score to 7-3. Hey, they’re only 7-1/2 out. Like in BABI, hope springs eternal.

Spam

Just a note to alert my avid readers that we have reached a new milestone in blogging as Sour Grapes goes international: We received spam comments. I have deleted them, and will continue to do so.

Next will be Google offering to pay me to place ads.

This was brought to my attention via Larry Dot Net, which I'm sure has been struggling with this spam problem for decades.

From the Assman

We received the following post from our avid reader, Dr. Howard Cooperman, aka "Assman" via Larry Dot Net this morning, and post it for you here:

Johnny Carson made the Great Karnak famous as early as the 60s. He would appear in this ridiculous velvet turban festooned with beads and a satin cape. Smiling in a way that let everyone at home feel like they were in on the secret, he would utter inane philosophical gems like: "May the bluebird of happiness make a nest in your navel." Then he would go to the usual Karnak schtick of answering questions which were presented to him in sealed envelopes. He would pronounce each answer with great aplomb, and Ed and Doc would repeat it as though chanting Latin prayers. After each answer had sunk in, he would open the envelope and read the question, which he had always answered correctly, in whatever fractured fashion. The answers were almost always laced with double entendres.

As you may know, Letterman and Carson were buddies and Letterman is carrying on classic Carson silliness like "Stump the Band" and Karnak. On another topic, Leno is a hack and cannot be suffered. That was Johnny's opinion and I'm sticking with it.

So on Letterman tonight, Paul Schaffer dons the turban (as he does every week) and as the Great Karnak raises the envelope and tries to divine the question sealed inside. Finally he has the answer to the question he is holding within the envelope.

He announces: "Gov. McGreevy of NJ and Rafael Palmiero"

He then opens the envelope and reads the heretofore unknown question:

"Name two guys who've lied about what they put in their ass."

Thanks to the good doctor for his professional analysis of a delicate situation.

Double Duty

I’ve been overwhelmed at work, and have used this as an excuse not to write anything here. I’ve even been to two Giants games which they won since I last wrote. They won that final day game against Colorado with 7 hits in the 8th inning, three of which went off the pitcher’s glove. I also saw them beat the Astros on Friday night, with Schmidt throwing an eight inning three hitter the day after I traded for him (not our stats, though). We were concerned about Schmidt because he’s just not the same pitcher, but when you have 60 points and not 70 points, you’ve got to take some chances. Anyway, season record at SBC is now 7-7.

Ken sent me the attached article reporting the death of 103 year old Ted “Double Duty” Radcliffe, who pitched in the Negro Leagues back in the ‘30’s. He played with and against everyone from Satchel Paige to Jackie Robinson. At the time of his death he was thought to be the oldest living professional baseball player. At age 96 he returned to the field to throw one pitch for the Schaumburg Flyers in a minor league game. If by some miracle I’m alive at 96, I hope I can stand on the mound without assistance, no less reach the plate.

My favorite story is how he got his nickname. He caught Satchel in the first game of a doubleheader in the 1932 Negro League World Series, and then pitched a shutout in the second game. When you see pitchers tiring after 80 pitches in games today, imagine how they might feel if they had caught nine innings earlier in the day.

Greg Maddux had a Maddux-like game today: a complete game win, giving up 4 runs and 12 hits but walking no one. Nomar is back (2 for 5 today), and Derrick Lee got off the August schneid with a couple of jimmy jacks. And Corey Patterson started today, picking up 3 hits. I guess that along with Matt Lawton, we’re looking at the Cubs lineup for the stretch.

Gee, I talked about the Cubs before talking about the Giants? Yep, stick a fork in them, they’re done. They’re losing to the Braves as I write this, with Schmidt showing why we were nervous about him No sign of Moises Alou returning to the lineup. They could have used him as a pinch hitter last night, but didn’t want to screw up the ability to put him on the DL retroactively. Get real.

I haven’t spoken yet about Oatmealgate. Larry Krueger is an oaf, and he got what he deserved. What is interesting is I heard him last week yakking about the Giants, and he seemed so angry about the state of the team. Angry? Why is he angry? Why is anyone angry? What’s so important about baseball, or any form of entertainment? If you don’t like it, don’t go. Don’t watch. Don’t pay for the product. Oh, yeah, he doesn’t have to pay because he’s a journalist, so called. I’ve done plenty of complaining about the Giants here, but I’m not angry about their performance. Do I seem that way? I’m still enjoying the season, I’m just disappointed after having such high expectations. But I still enjoy watching Omar Vizquel’s jump throw to turn a double play, and JT Snow’s dive to catch that popped up bunt last night after which he rolled over and looked to make the throw to 1st to double off the runner (he didn’t go). Why be angry?

Scott Ostler, who I’ve met, but don’t often read, wrote an excellent column today about what he called Kruegergate. I think he got it pretty much right, and I particularly liked his ending:
“Krueger learned a tough lesson on the choice of words and the expression of thoughts.
Meanwhile, lest we forget, the Giants still suck.”

That they do, Poot, that they do.

The other guys that got fired really deserved it. Making fun of Felipe’s righteous complaint simply can’t be forgiven. Hatchet time.

Apparently Cameron and Beltran collided in the Mets’ outfield today, a head on crash after they both dived for a ball. Cameron was carried off on a stretcher, done for a while. Beltran walked off, but hurt his shoulder. You know, the Mets are still in this thing, but this can’t be good. And it’s not good for the Cappers (Cameron) or the Leaguers (Beltran) in BABI. It often comes down to injuries in a close race. So who besides the Pecklers would have thought that Cliff Floyd would turn out to be the most durable of the Mets’ outfield this season?

Finally, Dustan Mohr-on. What a package. Thirteen homers, batting about .210. Can’t waive him, can’t trade him. Like the old line about women: can’t live with them, can’t kill them. Let’s put it differently. He’s keepable at $5. Thirteen homers. Who wants him?

One more trade thought: might Professor Pennypacker be interested in trading Luis Gonzalez for Luis Gonzalez?

Anatomy of a Blockbuster Deal

Last week among a few deals that were struck was a blockbuster between the Lickers and Hobo. For the most part the deal was negotiated between Lou’s new partner Rick and Noel. We have a tendency to always talk about “Lou’s Team”, but it’s clear from this deal that Rick is taking a much more active role than Larry’s Junior Partner (what the heck was his name again?).

I asked Noel if he would mind providing to Sour Grapes a blow by blow, which I present in italics below with a little editing. Any comments I make will not be in italics and be in . Thanks to Noel for this story, which took place over a long period of time, as will reading about it.

I had been talking to them for about a month. Rick is a good guy to deal with. The Hobos have traded with Lou almost every year that I have been in BABI, usually small deals, one or two players, to fill a need. I think the Lickers are one of the most underrated teams every year.

In early July, this deal started with Burnitz & Lawrence for J. Patterson & Sullivan.

After the Oswalt trade I started looking at our roster and realized we could probably make more points in ERA, Ratio & Wins with Patterson than we would lose in the hitting categories. Even though we were high in ERA & Ratio, I thought Patterson would be a difference maker. At least that was my thinking.

Once Doug sent out his Dump-Bomb email to the league, couple with the Hobos’ on-going slide into the mid-fifty point range, I knew we had to act. We could come in under the radar if we acted quickly. I had targeted two teams: the Cappers & the Lickers. Rick & Lou had a great draft. They waited until the end and got a ton of value.

I really wanted Capuano and Patterson for this year and next. We’re going to move up in wins with those two guys, plus we are sitting at 12 points in ERA & ratio. We lost Lawrence, Tomko and Tejada - that was the easy part.

About a week ago I threw out to Rick:

“How about Burnitz, Helton Tomko & Lawrence for Sullivan, Capuano & Patterson?”

Rick responded:

“Hey Noel, we’re very interested. We’d have to work a corner into the deal to take Helton’s spot.”

This is when it got interesting. I was heading to Tahoe on Wednesday for the rest of the week. I countered:

“What if we added Nevin & Dempster to the deal?”

This is when the blockbuster part started. Rick’s reply was great...

“Noel, how about this blockbuster ??

you give : nevin - you get : matheny ($2)
................ helton....................saenz/ j.baker ($3)
.................burnitz..................sullivan ($1)
.................wilkerson..............ellison ($1)
.................tomko....................capuano ($9)
.................lawrence................j. patterson($2)
.................tejeda....................dempster ($13)

I started looking at it. The more I looked, the more I liked it. The Lickers were getting a lot of hitting, but this helped us in Steals, Wins & Saves. We could not make up enough ground in HR’s & RBI’s, and we thought we should focus on these categories for this year. We are at 55 points today. I bet this improves us by the end of the year. I know Rick and Lou were happy, but so were Hank and I.

Now the hard part: Rick and I had to get Lou & Hank to sign off. Hank was in Napa, Lou’s in Vegas, and I was in Tahoe. This may have been BABI’s longest distance trade. Fortunately, the house in King’s Beach had a laptop with internet access. What a godsend! I could get email, and Hank’s phone numbers. One of the few things I leave home when vacationing are my BABI partners contact info. I left Hank a couple messages, and emails. Rick, I am sure was doing the same with Lou. I had forwarded all of Rick’s emails to Hank, so I had an idea that Hank knew what was going on.

One interesting note... I could not login to TQStats. I forgot my login & password. It is embedded into my office & home computer and never type them in.
Mark was also in Tahoe last week. We went to his place in Homewood on Thursday night, and were playing golf at Northstar on Friday morning. Homewood does not have cell reception. When I got back from the BBQ at Homewood I had two voicemails from Rick. These stated he was talking to the Bums about Patterson, but liked our deal better. Doug was going to Hawaii on Sunday and he wanted to know where we stood.

At about 12:30 in the morning, three sheets to the wind - ask Mark how much vino we drank that night, plus I came home and cracked another bottle of juice. I sent Hank an email asking what he wants to do. I also started looking at ESPN.com to check out the evening box scores. My wife was not too happy with the choices that I was making at this point, but Patterson’s line that night was a complete game, four hit win. Man, if that isn’t sex in BABI, I don’t know what is.

So I went to sleep with thoughts of Patterson dancing in my head. I heard the 5:30 AM alarm to play golf. My first thought? Coffee - stong, very strong. No Peet’s in Tahoe - bummer. I checked email to see if Hank gave the approval of the trade. No email, but I did see the Bums made the trade with the Pecklers. I knew that had weakened the Bums hand with the Lickers.

Mark came by at about 7:00 and picked me up. We teed off at 7:45. On the third tee my phone rings. I let it go to voice mail. I hit a perfect six-iron right down the middle of this short, narrow, dog-leg right par four. I listened to my voice mail and it’s Hank. I called him back with my nine year old daughter now driving the cart. Mark was in another cart with his buddy Joe. Hank & I started talking about the trade. He is giving up a lot of hitting, but understands we probably can’t do any better in the standings than 5th or 6th place. He signs off on the deal.

At this point Mark was on the green waiting wondering what the deal is.

I was now about 110 yards away. I hit a wedge into the bunker. I called Rick. He has the best voicemail system. Vivaldi, I think, maybe, Mozart. I told him we are in for the trade. His reply “excellent, done deal”. As I got to the green I told Mark that I had made a Blockbuster deal with the Lickers. All that I said for two minutes was “I made a blockbuster, I made a blockbuster...” Mark parred the hole and I got a bogey. I changed my mantra to “Blockbuster Bogey, Blockbuster Bogey.” We laughed for at least three holes.

And there is the answer to your question of how we made the deal with Rick & Lou.

Three words my friend.....Life is good!

Thank you, Noel, for the details. I had heard from Mark that Noel had disappeared on a hole only to show up eventually with the deal done. Great story. Hobo probably hasn’t given up anything net for this year, and they’ve now got a lot of stuff for next year. If any other team decides to throw in the towel (not naming names), they’ve got a lot of dry powder to make a deal now. If they don’t they’ve got to be the leader in the clubhouse for the 2006 BABI title.

The Fun Bunch

I always said that when I figured out how to add images to my blog, this would be the first one I would post. This was taken at the World Series of Fantasy Baseball in March in Las Vegas. Most of you know the world famous Bum on the left, our buddy Doug. That's his much, much better half on the right, Patti. And in the middle is the country's most infamous fantasy baseball nut, who is competing against Doug and his virtually all-Giant team, Meatloaf. We can confirm that it was not Meatloaf who described Doug as that nut who drafted nothing but Giants. That's right, he didn't actually say it. But we're sure he was thinking it.

I wasn't sure if the Bums of Modesto were reading the blog, but Doug confirmed that they are. Apparently Frank is a regular. Here is a snippet from his email today:

Its funny but Frank was always complaining about all the emails, but he loves the blog you write. He reads it all the time. He called me yesterday and read it to me over the phone! As he would say, "It's really well written." I agree.

Except, of course, when I make fun of them. Actually, I love the way those two crazy guys play this game, which I've said many times here. One of the things about the players in BABI is that they are really passionate about this game, though they tend to express that passion in different ways.

I can't tell you all how excited I was about today's postings, which is what spurred me onto figuring out how to add pictures to the site. Some days it's kind of a drag to write for the blog, but other days I'm just as inspired as hell. Today I just enjoyed the heck out of writing about last night's game, and when someone from the great beyond took note of it, I just thought that was the funniest thing that's happened in the course of this little adventure. I'm now 5-1/2 months into this project and we're headed for the top of the stretch. I hope it's added to the fun of this baseball season for all of you. Thanks for all the encouragement.

Eddie

I wrote “Taking One for the Team” before I went to lunch. Occasionally I write something here that I really enjoy, generally because it’s not too fantasy baseball oriented and because it’s usually pretty funny. In those moments, I can’t wait to write the next entry.

That’s exactly what happened today. I left the office chuckling about “Canoodler” and looking forward to the next great inspiration. When I got back and sat back down at my desk, it was there in front of me.

I had left Sour Grapes up on my screen in my absence. The Doc threatened to write something after the game, so I did a refresh on the page to see if he had posted anything. (Nope.) Then I took a look to see if Art Vandalay or Professor Pennypacker had left a comment.

Sure enough, there was a comment, but not from a Seinfeld character. It was from “Eddie”. The comment was “LOL”.

I drilled down, and it turned out that Eddie was surfing, somehow came across Sour Grapes, and took a look at it, reading about Mr. Canoodler. I’ve had this blog since early February, and that’s the first comment I’ve had from someone who is not “one of the guys”. The idea that somebody would for some reason come across this page and find it interesting or funny is amazing to me. Not Ken, or Noel, or Mark, or any of my regulars who are actually IN BABI, but someone wasting time at the office who has absolutely no idea what a BABI is. Eddie.

I know that theoretically blogging puts me out there in the world. But since the topic of this blog is so narrow, and I don’t advertise it, and despite the brilliant writing, I am not, at this time, well known, it seems unlikely that anyone would come across it. Blogger posts on their main page the most recent updated blogs, so maybe Eddie saw Sour Grapes listed there the moment I posted that piece. I doubt he found it using a search engine, because even though my blog might actually be included in them, if you type Sour Grapes into Google, you’re going to have to drill down a whole bunch of pages to find me, if you find me at all.

By the way, it turns out, coincidentally, that Eddie is a CPA, and reads the same kind of financial journals I read. He apparently subscribes to The Street Dot Com (I used to at one time, but I kind of got sick of Cramer despite the fact that he sent me an autographed Street Dot Com T-shirt for a good email I wrote him once.) He follows Buffett (I’ve been following him since the early ‘80’s, though didn’t buy any Berkshire until much later). Unlike me, he has advertising on his blog.

Anyway, I’m stunned. I’m thrilled. And I’m out there. Peckler Can.

Taking One for the Team

The Doc and I were out last night to see the Giants blow an ugly one, losing 4-3 to the Rockies. More on the game in a bit. My season record at SBC is now 5-7.

The people in our season ticket group organized a group night by buying up 10 seats in our row. We’ve sort of known one another over the past five years, meeting annually to split up our tickets and occasionally semi-annually to split up playoff tickets. It’s a good group, all connected through the Colonel, who had the ticket rights, but we had never gone to a game together, so at our ticket distribution dinner in January we planned this. You notice we actually ended up doing it in August, because agreeing on a date among that many people is nigh impossible. Even with the tickets in hand and the date inked in 8 months in advance, two people couldn’t make it because of a death and an illness. We found suitable replacements, met at the Brickhouse on Brannon for libations and walked over to the park for the game. Except for the game, we had a ball.

There were a number of interesting observations we had last night. First, the Doc noticed that the 8 position players in the Rockies’ lineup were ALL first or second year players: Sullivan (1st), Quintanilla (1st week), Holliday (2nd), Atkins (1st), Bigbie (2nd), Shealy (now a Pickled Peckler-1st), the other Luis Gonzalez (another Pickled Peckler, 2nd), and Closser (sort of 1st as he came up in September last season). This is one young team. Then, on the other side, were the Giants, with Vizquel and Snow and Alou, and the young guys like Alfonso and Durham. Sabean should note that they may not be good, but the Rockies have the right idea when it comes to rebuilding.

The Giants started their new catcher last night, Yamid Haad. Yamid comes from Columbia, but he sure seems to have an Arabic name. The Colonel thinks he may be a potential terrorist. Are there any Arab players in baseball? In any sport other than soccer? Haad has that story about this being his first game in the majors in 6 years, having had one at bat for the Pirates in 1999. Anyway, in addition to going oh for three, he made one of the plays of the game, dropping a pop foul right in his glove. The batter proceeded to hit a triple, leading to a 3 run inning that won the game for the Rockies. Of course, Mr. Tomko poured gasoline on the fire by not covering first base on what would have been the third out of the inning. So despite ringing up the loss with 8 hits and 3 walks in a WHIP crushing 6 innings, he only gave up 1 earned run.

Anyway, getting back to Yamid Haad, we think that the Bums kept that last $5 to buy this guy, because they simply MUST have the Giants’ backup catcher. It’s a jones. Doug can’t live without the Giants’ backup catcher. Well Doug, he’s your guy. And he got the start because Matheny went on the bereavement list, unbeknownst to everyone in the stands. This became an issue in the desperate bottom of the ninth. After a Feliz double, an Ellison sacrifice, and a Cruz popout, with Latroy Hawkins scheduled to hit, Felipe turned to the last pinch hitter in his dugout, a name never heard by anyone in the stadium. Justin Knoedler. His announcement produced the biggest “WHOOOO?” in the history of baseball.

Now there are very few players in the National League that the Doc and I have never heard of. The Rockies had David Cortes warm up last night, which had the Doc and me shaking our heads. But the idea that the Giants have a player that we’ve never heard of just seems impossible. For the record, “Canoodler” is 25, a 5th round pick by the Giants in 2001. The crowd just loved him. Here he is, in his first major league at bat, there as an emergency move, with the winning run on 3rd with 2 out in the ninth. Casey at the Bat. He looked completely overmatched on the first 2 pitches, waiving futilely. Then on a 2 strike count, Fuentes threw one inside and just like a veteran, Canoodler took one for the team. The crowd (or what was left of it) went wild. The man now has a 1.000 OBA. After Vizquel walked, Randy Winn, with a chance to create a headline today “Randy Winns Game”, didn’t. He hit a feeble grounder to the shortstop (or maybe 2nd baseman) for the force at 2nd. No 1st Giant game heroics.

So Canoodler’s great moment was for naught, and he may head back to the minors with that perfect OBA. Or maybe he’ll get his big chance to start today or tomorrow, before Matheny comes back. I hope so. I’m on the Canoodler Bandwagon. And maybe the Bums should spend that last fin on this Giants' backup catcher. Justin has got to be the most obscure player I’ve ever seen, the start of the Giants’ rebuilding process. The motto: Canoodler Can!

Much Ado About Nothin'

In the end, no one major came over from the AL, not Soriano, not Ramirez. Who would have thought that Randy Winn would be the biggest name traded at the deadline, and that the Giants would get him? Of course, that meant that the Bums would buy him ($98), partly because they had the dough and partly because, well, he’s a Giant. And the Bums kept 5 bucks for some future pickup. Gotta love it. Though now that Yorvit is gone, they must be in mourning.

Of course, like it’s been all year, we had the 2nd Winning bid. We bid what we could, $55. He wouldn’t have helped us that much, just like he won’t help the Giants too much. We did win the Farnsworth sweepstakes (could end up the closer there, which would make sixteen bucks a bargain), and we also got Juan Padilla, another closer of the future. No one bid on Padilla in 2 weeks? We would have bid on him last week, but we were hoarding our money in case a big bopper came over. Maybe he’ll even be the closer for the Mets next year! A guy can dream, can’t he?

So the Bums are going to start to sell their pieces: Wagner, Schmidt, Wood, Byrnes and Winn. Not quite the same as …and Ramirez. Or …and Soriano. The Bums rarely are sellers, so it should be interesting to watch. I hope they will still talk to us after we traded Cabrera today. We had been talking to them about Cabrera in case they did pick up a monster hitter, Yup, done deal. Our 2 month subscription to Larry Dot Net ended at 11AM today. Actually, as I typed this sentence I got a call from Larry Dot Net congratulating me on getting Farnsworth, so I guess I’ve still got a complementary (so to speak) subscription.

Of course, everyone has been talking to Larry about Andruw Jones. We had passed on a previous deal which did not include Jose Guillen because Cabrera is just so valuable in the categories we need the most: BA and RBI’s. Finally we told Larry we had to have them both if we traded Cabrera. We tried to get Reitsma, but we agree with Larry that he’s nuts to trade him, even though he’s is really unlikely to be the closer next season. He’s just got to take the chance that he will keep the job.

We were offering Milledge for Reitsma, more or less. Of course, Milledge came awfully close to having zero value when the Mets offered him to the Bosox. He’s 20 years old, now playing in AA, with speed and power and all the tools. And he’s available to the right bidder who would like to offer what we need. As is a $3 Mike Hampton.

Now we’ve all poked fun at the Falkuhns and the apparent difficulty in making a deal with Larry. Yeah, you’ve got to carry on conversations with little Robert getting into some kind of trouble in the background, and you’ve got to discuss voter fraud in Ohio, and you have to listen to all the other offers Larry is getting for the players you want. And, most of all, you have to realize that any deal is going to move at glacier speed. But the Falkuhns have made deals with at least 4 different contenders this season, each one of them has been pretty reasonable, and none of them will have a huge effect on the race. He’s extracted some nice pieces. Of course, it’s been a seller’s market, with 8 teams in some kind of contention and no one else with many chips left actively seeking deals. (The Bums begin today.) I’d just like to say that making a Larry Dot Net deal is like making a deal with no one else, but in the end, he’s getting the job done with nary a wimper from the other contenders. Good for him.

So we’ve now got a bunch of ridiculously expensive keepable guys for next year. Jones - 36. Guillen - 29. Pedro - 30. Floyd – 26. Looper – 25. Lawton – 28. That’s 6 for 174. Clearly, we won’t be able to keep them all. Or will we? I ask the following question about my hero in BABI: What would Lou do? One thing about out team: if we decide to quit the race (unlikely), we’ve got some incredible names to trade. Of course, it’s not clear on what the contenders have left for next year that they will trade. Whatever, we’re here. And remember: we’re email guys.