[THE HANGOVER] The One Where We Discuss
Joe Dillon, Jonny Gomes, JP Howell August 14th. 2009, 7:02am
The GBT – The Good, The Bad and The Telling sandwich, where The Bad is nice and lean and the The Telling is ripe.
click above image for boxscore
DEVIL DOGS WEBTOPIA…
- Not for nothin’, but Jonny Gomes hit 3 home runs last night. Of course, this wasn’t the first time he has accomplished that feat. We’re not sayin’, but we’re just sayin’.
- Joe Dillon cleared waivers and accepted his assignment to triple-A. [The Heater]
- The Rays are close to signing their 3rd, 4th and 5th round picks. [St. Pete Times]
- The Rays Party breaks down JP Howell’s pitches with some pretty pictures for those of you that are more visually oriented…A couple of things we love: 1) All 3 of Howell’s pitches cross the plate in a different vertical plane. Important because hitters can’t sit on a particular zone; 2) both his Curve and Fastball absolutely paint the black on average (inside to a right-hander), while his nasty change is much more tempting out over the middle; 3) and look at how much vertical break he gets on the curve. You don’t see that much anymore as more pitchers throw a slider or something more akin to a slurve. [The Rays Party]
- According to Buster Olney, “some rival talent evaluators” believe the Rays are going to shop BJ Upton this off-season (link hidden behind ESPN’s “Insider” wall). [ESPN]
- Andy MacPhail says the O’s expect to complete their deal with the Rays for Gregg Zaun on Monday, but that the player coming back could be “pretty much anything.” [MASN]
- Rays the Stakes juxtaposes the seasons of Jason Bartlett and BJ Upton. [Rays the Stakes]
- JoeMaddonSucks.com noticed that the MSM is no longer kissing Joe Maddon’s behind. [Joe Maddon Sucks]
- The New York Daily News has the Rays falling all the way to #14 in their latest power ranking. [New York Daily News]
- The Top 177 Devil Rays ever is back for their latest installment. They are now into the top 50. [Bugs and Cranks]
Related posts:
I miss Gomes. The Red’s are my second team as my entire fam is from Cincy so I was hoping they would do well this year, not so much. Anyway, we’ve still got 6 head to head with the Red Sox this season, don’t give up hope yet Ray’s. We can do this.
Hey, first time Gomes-ey did that, weren’t all three home runs against Zack Greinke?
Close. First 2 were off Greinke. Third was off MacDougal.
Please shop Upton–perhaps with Kaz–this offseason. He has been terrible at the plate. I love his defense, but he literally does nothing for us offensively.
Too late now…. but how about Kazmir plus Bj for Halliday!
We dump enough payroll to pay Halliday…plus have a leader for a staff going south!
That Buster Olney article was some “tea leaf reading.” I’m getting really tired of these national columnists coming out with misleading headlines without any punch in the article. Look, I’m all about getting “hits,” but have some standards. “Talent evaluators” are “convinced” the Rays will “dangle” is not exactly clear cut from the horse’s mouth. I understand that the Rays aren’t going to come out and say, “hey, we’re going to deal Upton this off-season.” But, reading Bossman’s “kick in the head” article and then asking a couple of scout buddies if you think the Rays will trade Bossman doesn’t qualify as hard-core insider reporting. Now, fanboys all over the internet will be salivating at the idea of Bossman Junior gracing their CF for the next five years.
This was the same kind of link gathering reporting I saw all over twitter during the trade deadline. Grandiose headlines with little substance. It’s funny. You don’t see as much of that kind of stuff from the independent bloggers… only the guys with the “big boys.”
Cork, keep up the good work. You do a good job of not becoming a “link whore” and trying to generate hits with over-the-top headlines that have fanboys drooling. You use your creativity and knowledge.
Agree it is bad, but what really pisses me off is that this story will now be misinterpreted by 20 other outlets in the coming months and people will say “well, the Rays are trying to trade Upton” or “Upton is available” or Similar. And while it may be true, that is not what this article said.
The one that annoys me the most is when a writer will say “a person familiar with the Rays thinking…” what does that mean?!? You will be amazed how many times they use that line (try googling it). Did they talk to their plumber? I mean, I am familiar with the Rays thinking, as are many Rays fans, but that doesn’t mean we know what they are going to do.
I think it was 2 yrs ago and Joel Sherman used that line to say Rays would trade Kazmir. Next thing I knew everybody was reporting that the Rays were shopping Kazmir and wondering who would get him. Frustrating.
Maybe I’ll make that my new byline: Michael Weber, a person familiar with the Rays way of thinking. Anyone reading this can now feel free to quote me.
Jonny Gomes also has more strikeouts than hits and has struck out in 34% of his at bats, worse than Bossman and Pat the Bat. So for every multi-homer game the Reds fans get to see, they get many more multi-throw-things-at-the-TV games.
I will say this though – even if his bat is slightly overrated, the Rays could absolutely use his fire right now.
Thanks for this reality check. And here’s more: Gomes’ BA was .216 in 2006; .244 in 2007; and .182 in 2008. Each year he had more — in some cases two times more — strikeouts than hits. And his defense was never better than average. This isn’t obscure sabermetric analysis — this is just a clear look at the man’s record.
I’m glad he’s doing well this year, and it was fun to watch him the first half of 2005, when he also did well. Maybe he’s like one of these comets and he lights up every four years. Or maybe the national league pitchers haven’t yet figured out his weaknesses. But I can’t possibly second-guess the Rays for letting him go. With rosters limited for most of the season to 25, you simply can’t make space for someone just because he’s a lively guy.
I don’t think it’s a matter of “every four years” as much as being healthy and actually having a chance at regular playing time.
You can point out the strikeouts, ok, but I’d like to point out his OPS. He has also made some great plays defensively this year. Just sayin.
Jonny Gomes reminds me of Bluto from Animal House. He’s never, ever going to to be the greatest achiever in the world. But with him around, whether he’s on the sidelines or on the occasion that he does something spectacular, you start to believe that anything is possible. And, he’s also the one who will take a flying leap onto a celebratory pile.
Again, the kind of stuff that all the sabermetrics in the world will never add up to a quantitative statistic.
I said before that who knows that if Gomes was on the Rays right now that he’d be doing the same thing, or that the Rays would be better or worse. (Fun to talk about it, but if anyone says “for sure,” they’re lying through their teeth.) So basically, I’m not going to cry about someone who’s not here now.
On another note, the great thing about baseball is that it’s not over ’til it’s over. I’m still going to hold out hope that they can make the playoffs until their mathematically out of it. Otherwise, what’s the fun?
I agree with your first part about Gomes, but disagree about the playoffs. While we are not out of it, the inner Tampanian in me knows that you can still root for a team, playoffs or no.
I enjoy watching the Rays, regardless of playoffs, otherwise, what IS the fun? I’ll tell you: representing Tampa Bay. And watching teams flounder when they play in our dome.
Not sure if it was last night or the night before, but Gomes also made a great play from left to gun down a runner on a sac fly attempt. Maybe we’re in Bizarro-World right now
*Of course, some outsiders would say the Rays even being a winning team puts us in Bizarro-World