Archive for August, 2011

Aug 31

Postgame Shot Of Joe: Rays Need Another August

BJ Upton, James Shields No Comments »

Yet another game tonight that makes you pound your head against the wall over where the Rays could be.

It shouldn’t be so damn hard for the Rays to scratch out a few runs night in and night out and win a pile of games. Tonight at Texas was a classic example. Alexi Ogando struggled with his command. B.J. Upton takes a fast ball to the ribs. Everybody stays patient at the plate. John Jaso fights off a two-strike fastball. And, poof, two quick runs for James Shields, who jumped his record to 13-10 (2.84 ERA).

Shields not having at least four more wins will go down as one of the saddest memories of this season.

But the Rays sit 7 1/2 games back of the Yankees for the Wild Card, and there’s plenty of hope to go around if you don’t look at the Yanks’ schedule. Ten of the Yanks’ next 14 are against the Mariners, Jays and Orioles. But the scoreboard watching is still a blast and still worthwhile.

The Rays finished August 18-10. They’re surely capable of a September like that, which means the bad guys would roughly have to play .500 ball or less for the Rays to work a late-season miracle.

For now, Joe will settle for a series win in the Texas swelter — probably the first “must-win game” of the season.

Aug 31

Did Mayor Foster Just Loosen His Stance On Moving The Rays, Or Dig In Deeper?

Bill Foster, fight!, New Stadium, Stuart Sternberg 18 Comments »

During a City Council meeting recently, St. Pete Mayor Bill Foster, raised some eyebrows when he suggested that he had a “detailed plan” to keep the Rays in St. Petersburg. What was curious about Mayor Foster’s plan was that despite his vow to be open and honest with the people, he refused to speak with the media about the plan.

But now, Mayor Foster has written a guest column for the St. Pete Times in which he reveals his “plan”…sorta.

Foster’s column says a lot of things. It gives us a definition for “plan.” It tells us that there is no plan for a new stadium. And it tells us the “strategic elements” of the plan…

  1. Ensuring that the legal integrity of the city’s agreement with the Rays is not compromised.
  2. Supporting private sector efforts to retain the Rays as a regional asset without compromising the city’s agreement with the Rays.
  3. Continuing to support and promote the Rays as a professional sports franchise in west-central Florida.

Mayor Foster goes on to say that with the “investment of hundreds of millions of dollars by the people of St. Petersburg and Pinellas,” and with 16 years remaining on the Rays contract, “one would be naive to believe that the city did not have a detailed plan to ensure that the Rays remain in St. Petersburg…” But as best we can tell based on the contents of this column, the actual details of the plan only consist of one goal (protecting the interests and investment of the citizens of St. Pete and Pinellas) and one vague action (supporting groups in the private sector that are looking for a solution for the Rays).

On the other hand, the second part does appear to be a step, albeit a small step, in the direction of compromise. Twice Mayor Foster refers to the Rays as a Read the rest of this entry »

Aug 31

Breaking Down The Rotation’s Adjustments

David Price, James Shields, Jeff Niemann, Jeremy Hellickson No Comments »

Is the Rays’ rotation as good as the Phillies’ starting pitchers? Maybe not yet, but they are getting there. And recently, the Rays’ top four starters have all made adjustments that have made them more dominant. ESPN.com’s “Stats & Info” blog takes a look at the adjustments. Good stuff. [ESPN.com]

Aug 31

The Best Picture You Will See Of Joe Maddon This Season

Joe Maddon 3 Comments »

Yesterday, Joe Maddon’s son posted the picture below of his dad playing golf in 1978, with the following caption (click on the image for a larger version)…

Love my old man. Especially when he looks like Wario from Mario Brothers.

Almost as good as Maddon looking like Pete Rose back in his college days.

[Update] We were so caught up on the comparison to Wario, that we missed the obvious one (as pointed out by several people) Gallagher.

Aug 31

[THE HANGOVER] The One Where We Discuss Sinkers, Longo, And Waiting For Lobaton

Desmond Jennings, Jose Lobaton, Russ Canzler, Tim Beckham 20 Comments »
Click Here For Boxscore
Rangers 2, Rays 0 (click image for boxscore)

The GBT – The Good, The Bad and The Telling sandwich, where The Bad is nice and lean and the The Telling is ripe.

THE GOOD: Hellboy. Let’s just pretend that Josh Hamilton home run never happened. And yes, we hate it when managers defend an outing by saying “he made one bad pitch.” In this case, that one bad pitch didn’t make a difference. The Rays weren’t scoring last night if the game went 18 innings. And any pitcher will take 6 innings and 2 runs against the Rangers offense. If there was a black mark it was the walks. Once again Hellickson struggled with his control walking 4 (1 intentionally). When Hellboy is great, he is a control and command wizard. But this season his strikeout-to-walk ratio is only about 2-to-1. He needs to be at least 3-to-1 and maybe more like 3.5-to-1.

THE BAD: Sunk by the Sinker. Prior to the 9th inning, the Rays hit a grand total of 3 balls out of the infield. And one of those was a groundball single…Not My Longo. It is not often you see Evan Longoria get cheated on swing. But with 2 outs in the 9th, two runners on base, and 2 strikes, Dirtbag got a cutter down-and-away and while just protecting the plate, hit a weak groundball to second base for a game-ending double-play.

THE TELLING: It looks like Jose Lobaton is the catcher the Rays want to call up on Thursday, but he might not be ready…It is not even September, and the 8 teams that lead the playoff chases all have at least a 79.4 percent chance at making the playoffs. That means there is a 60.1 percent chance that all 8 playoff spots in baseball are already decided. It is going to be a boring month…Tim Beckham will be one of the seven prospects that will participate in the Arizona Fall League.

THE JUNKYARD DOGS WEBTOPIA…

  • 3B Russ Canzler was named International League MVP. Prior to last night, Canzler was 4th in the IL with a .312 avg, and leads with a .932 OPS. Canzler joins Dan Johnson, Kevin Witt, Toby Hall, and Steve Cox as Rays prospects to win the IL MVP award. [@SteveCarney]
  • Dirk Hayhurst writes about his release by the Rays. [DirkHayhurst.com]
  • John Romano jumps on the Desmond Jennings-for-Rookie of the Year bandwagon. [TampaBay.com]
  • Dave Schoenfield of ESPN.com wonders if Read the rest of this entry »
Aug 30

FALSE RUMORS: Nashville Is Pursuing The Rays

F*ck the Heck?, Stupid human tricks 6 Comments »

Twitter is a wonderful thing. It can also be an evil game of “telephone” gone mad. The latter struck the Raysiverse last night when a rumor spread like wildfire that the Mayor of Nashville said during a radio interview that he is pursuing the Tampa Bay Rays to move to his city.

Here is how it happened:

4:00pm: Somebody named @JohnBakerFSU sends out a tweet saying:

“Nashville mayor tells @1025TheGame there that the city wants to pursue the #Rays.”

As with any false rumor, it’s life expectancy is dependant on the right formula and the right person hearing it. In this case, @JohnBakerFSU used a radio report which is not as easy to verify as a newspaper or online report.

He also sent his tweet to Buster Olney of ESPN who just happened to live in Nashville for eight years and apparently got excited by the idea. Only 200 followers read @JohnBakerFSU’s Tweet, but Olney redirected (retweeted) the same tweet to his 260 thousand followers. And hundreds of those people redirected the same tweet to their followers.

After Olney relays the report to all of his followers, he then sent out several of his own tweets expressing how great of a baseball city Nashville would be.

At this point, the fire is out of control.

There was only one small problem: The original tweet was not true…

Austin Huff, a producer for 1025 The Game tried to correct the situation with several of his own tweets directed at the two men that started the rumor…

@JohnBakerFSU The Mayor never said anything about going after the #Rays. So I ask again, did you even listen to the interview?

@JohnBakerFSU …The Mayor never said he wants to pursue the Rays. You put out false information.

@Buster_ESPN I was in studio w/ the Mayor this morning. He never said anything about wanting to pursue the #Rays. It was mere hypothetical.

@Buster_ESPN We were discussing a new [Nashville] Sounds stadium and the idea of an MLB team came up. The #Rays were just thrown out randomly.

From someone who was there in person, there’s NO truth to rumors of Nashville Mayor Karl Dean wanting to pursue the #Rays. Did not say it.

The problem? Huff only has Read the rest of this entry »

Aug 30

Is Desmond Jennings A Rookie Of The Year Candidate?

Desmond Jennings 14 Comments »

We have made a big deal around these parts recently about the great play of Desmond Jennings. He has come a long ways from when we were wondering if the Rays still considered Jennings a top prospect.

Jennings has been so good in his first 35 games that we are beginning to wonder if he is doing enough to make a case for Rookie of the Year, in a season where there is no clear-cut favorite.

Of course, the biggest factor working against Jennings is his late call-up. If Jennings plays in all of the Rays remaining 29 games, he will have played in just 64 games this season.

There is precedent for a player winning Rookie of the Year with limited playing time. In 2004, Ryan Howard won the award having played in just 88 games. But to find a position player that played in less than half of his team’s game, we have to go all the back to Willie McCovey in 1959, who played in just 52 games on the way to top rookie honors.

In the cases of Howard (22 home run), and McCovey (.354 avg, 13 HR) they dominated in limited action. The same can be said for Jennings. Let’s take a look at how Jennings’ numbers compare to some other Rookie of the Year candidates*…

If we look at Wins Above Replacement (WAR), we see that in just 153 plate appearances, Jennings has already been worth 2.3 Wins to the Rays, which is tops among the rookie position players. This tells us that Jennings numbers are so much better than the other hitters, that it makes up for his limited playing time.

The only player that might have a Read the rest of this entry »

Aug 30

[THE HANGOVER] The One Where We Discuss Hitting Them Where They Are, September Call-ups, And The End Of Garfoosian Era

BJ Upton, Dirk Hayhurst, Hak-Ju Lee, Tyler Bortnick 11 Comments »
Click Here For Boxscore
Blue Jays 7, Rays 3 (click image for boxscore)

The GBT – The Good, The Bad and The Telling sandwich, where The Bad is nice and lean and the The Telling is ripe.

THE GOOD: Johnny Biceps. Johnny Damon became the third Rays player this season, and third in the last four games to homer twice in the same game.

THE BAD: Wade Davis. Just one of those nights Big Dub is going to have from time-to-time. He gave up 6 runs and failed to get out of the 5th inning…JP Howell. The rest of the pitching staff pounded Jose Bautista up-and-in, often brushing him back. But Howell left an 88-mph fastball out over the plate and Bautista scrambled it into his 38th home run…Luck. Sometimes the hard-hit balls find the openings. Sometimes they do not. Last night was the latter. Twice the Rays hit into inning-ending double-plays with runners in scoring position, one on a hard line drive by Ben Zobrist. And twice the Jays third baseman made throws on the run to make the third out with runners on base.

THE TELLING: This was just the 3rd start this month in which the Rays started failed to work at least 5 innings. David Price and Alex Cobb did in back-to-back starts on August 6 and 7…The Rays are now 7.5 games behind the Yankees, 8 in the loss column…Tyler Bortnick and Hak-Ju Lee were named postseason All-Stars in the FSL.

RANDOM THOUGHT: At some point we might dig through the data to see if this is true (maybe somebody already has), but our hunch is that a team with great starting pitching is better able to avoid sustained losing streaks. But a team with a great offense is more likely to go on a sustained winning streaks. And when playing catch-up, winning streaks are important.

THE JUNKYARD DOGS WEBTOPIA…

  • In a sad moment last night, Dirk Hayhurst, triple-A pitcher, author of “The Bullpen Gospels,” and alter-ego to The Garfoose, announced that he had been released by the Rays. Hayhurst was expected to come off DL soon. And with rosters set to expand later this week, the Rays may be giving Hayhurst a shot to catch on with another big league team.
  • Not surprisingly, BJ Upton was not traded yesterday before the deadline of his waiver claim. [The Heater]
  • Joe Maddon says to only expect 3 players to be added to the roster on Thursday when teams are allowed to add as many as 15. Look for Robinson Chirinos, Brandon Guyer and a reliever to be the first wave, with more coming as needed or after the Durham Bulls playoff run ends. [The Heater]
  • Should Justin Verlander be the AL’s MVP? [Business Insider]
  • You think the Rays regret having Read the rest of this entry »
Aug 29

VIDEO: Tampa Bay Rays Join “It Gets Better” Campaign

BJ Upton, It Gets Better, Joe Maddon, Johnny Damon, Rays Do Good Things, Sam Fuld, Sean Rodriguez 1 Comment »

We’ve mentioned this before, but we now have the video of the Rays supporting the It Gets Better campaign and The Trevor Project.

Congrats to the Rays and the players that participated, including BJ Upton, Joe Maddon, Johnny Damon, Sam Fuld, and Sean Rodriguez. You can read more about The Trevor Project at their werbsite…

Aug 29

Brian Anderson Tells The Yankees To “Shut Up”

Brian Anderson 7 Comments »

We mentioned this briefly this morning, but somebody suggested we post the audio. And well, who are we to turn down a second-chance to hear TV commentator Brian Anderson tell the Yankees to “Shut Up.”

Brian Anderson Says What We Were All Thinking

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