My-T-Fine

I’m quite proud of the Hal Trosky article from Friday. It’s a great story. I was telling a tennis pal of mine, Dale, today about it. He brought up his favorite, Willie “Puddin’ Head” Jones. Puddin' Head played from 1947-1961, mostly for a bunch of bad Phillies teams. I like the nickname, and plan on assigning it to one of you, all too soon.

Other notes:

Interleague play sucks. It takes me forever to look at all of those box scores in the morning. It’s nice to see some name of old, like Julio Lugo and Corey “$39” Patterson.

Mystery pitching line of the day: 6 innings, 5 hits, 3 walks, 1 run, 8 strikeouts. No decision. Answer below.

I took the over on Kenny 9’s over/under bet on Eric Reed’s return to the Marlins. The line is July 19. He was really bad.

Remember last season when the NL West looked like it might not have a team over .500? Right now the Giants are in last place, but are 2 games OVER .500. Is it suddenly the powerhouse division? Actually, there are only 5 teams under .500 right now, and that will be 4 if the Braves hold on to beat the DBacks (they’re up 2-0 in the 8th right now). So basically there are 4 horrible teams, the Cubs, Pirates, Nationals and Marlins.

The Cubs were doing fine until Derrick Lee went down. When are they going to trade for Ryan “$8” Sheely? Our closer, unfortunately, is their closer: Ryan Dempster. He’s pitched well, but they are so bad his save today was his first in about 3 weeks. We finally got our first “vulture” save of the season from Adam Wainright, who finished off 2-2/3 innings for the Cardinals a couple of days ago. COTF? The Doc says he’ll be a starter before the season is out.

Matt Cain took a week off and it really paid off for the Giants today when he threw a complete game one-hit shutout. Chad Hensley threw one of those last week, but got tagged for 9 hits and 6 runs yesterday for the Padres. We’ll see if Cain is a one day wonder, but he does have some seriously great stuff.

There were quite a few ugly pitching performances yesterday. The Brewers’ Ben Hendrickson started yesterday against the Twins and got nobody out, giving up 5 hits, a walk and 6 runs. The Brewers gave up 15 hits, 11 walks and 16 runs (only 15 were earned) in the game.

Billy Wagner did not blow the save yesterday for the Mets, but only because he came in to close in the ninth with a 4-0 lead. He got one out, giving up 4 runs on 2 hits and 3 walks. That was an ugly loss for the Mets.

Rich Hill got knocked around pretty hard, 5 hits, 5 walks and 7 earned runs in 4 innings as the Cubs got whitewashed. He was probably bothered by the Pecklers’ own Michael Barrett’s ejection for smashing AJ Pierzinski in the face yesterday. Three things to say on this: (1) that was a hell of a right hand he threw, (2) Pierzinski can really take a punch, and (3) how can anyone get thrown out of a game for hitting AJ Pierzinski? Barrett played today, by the way, but a 5 game suspension is just around the corner. It was worth it.

Andy Pettite gave up 12 hits and 5 walks over 6 innings. Now that is a WHIP buster outing.

Ian Snell is on the waiver wire, for you cheap teams, and he got the win for the Pirates yesterday. It wasn’t pretty, though: 5 innings, 4 hits, 5 walks and 5 runs, though only 2 were earned. Someone should certainly pick him up.

Florida had a blown save in the ninth yesterday, but it wasn’t Borowski, who didn’t come in at all. It was some guy named Logan Kensing, who has a career ERA of 9.88. I suspect if Travis Bowyer weren’t hurt, he’d be their closer right now. Meanwhile, in the Borkowski-Borowski competition, it’s not close.

Speaking of blown saves, Dave Weathers blew one yesterday for the Reds. The clock is ticking loudly on him.


Meanwhile, Anthony Reyes shutout the Royals on 4 hits for 5-2/3 innings yesterday in his long awaited season debut. Reyes may slow up Adam Wainright’s move to the rotation. Izzy got save #14, which leads the NL. Josh Beckett hit the first home run by a Red Sox pitcher yesterday since 1972. The team gave him the silent treatment in the dugout for about 20 seconds, and then everyone cracked up.

Mystery pitching line. That was Boof Bonser's major league debut for the Twins against the Brewers today. Yeah, he made it! His namesake, Boof Brittain, is so proud.

Oh yeah, Barry hit one yesterday. That was…what number was that again? At left is the front page of the New York Post. They love Barry in New York, can't you tell? The Shambino's ok with me, and I'm a fan of his TV show, too. I just wish I could remember when it's on.

Speaking of numbers, this is our 250th post.

Whodathunkit?