Showing posts with label Padres. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Padres. Show all posts

The Bronx is Burned

  The Bronx was once "Burning", but now it's officially burned. 

  The Yankees just finished a 4-game split with the Royals, cutting their lead over 2nd-place Tampa to 1 game.  The race remaining tight so whenever Pettitte is ready to come back won't be a day too soon.  As much as I like seeing Dustin Moseley have moments of brilliance, I still am about as comfortable with him as I am Sergio Mitre.  They need to win series' from here on out and take care of "the easy part of their schedule" as they keep saying on ESPN Radio.  Detroit (57-60) for 4 and Seattle(46-72) for 3 at the Stadium.  Then they go to Toronto (62-55) and Chicago (65-63) for 3-gamers.  Toronto   Following that, a 10-game homestand versus Oakland(57-59), Toronto, and Baltimore(41-77).  Buck has those boys in Baltimore playing well now though, so that may not be a walk in the park.  They do need to take care of business at home though against the weaker teams in the AL.  The AL (b)East and the NL West are the only two dvisions with four teams over .500.  That's a pretty astounding number.  The AL Central has two (MIN, CWS), AL West has two (TEX, LAA), NL East has two (ATL, PHI) and the NL Central has two (CIN, STL).  Winning either one of those two division ain't gonna be easy for the Yankees and Padres.  The Pads have a 3.5 game lead over the Giants and are showing no signs of slowing down.  Just hope their arms stay healthy.

  I returned Sunday night from a 3-day hiatus from this borough only to find my television not working - turns out the neighbor took it upon himself to take my DirecTV dish down.  I am going to cancel their ass, the service they've given sucks and God forbid it rains heavy or snows - service is spotty.  I guess I have no one to blame but myself so I can't be too angry.  I told them when they installed it that where they were going to place the dish was on my neighbor's yard.  This shmuck was sold on the fact that because the wall to the garage was facing my yard, it was OK.  Now take into consideration I'm renting, so whatever's whatever.  Neighbor comes around the block, tells me to move it, I relay the message to DirecTV, no luck.  They keep telling me it's fine.  Next time I need service, they come out, adjust the dish, I tell them it needs to move, they say it's fine.  Now it's sitting next to my house near the garbage pails.  Nice job DirecTV.


  We're looking for a new apartment, and had two in mind and were anxious to start somewhere new.  Broker called me today and both are rented - within the last 48 hours.  Keeping on with my hunt.

  There was a independent photo shoot on the side of the house, affectionately known as the "jungle" because of my landlords refusal to give a shit about what the yard looks like.  Sorry, it's not a yard, it's an empty lot.  Some dude was  on a motorcycle riding around in the side lot - it's a shame he wasn't able to use a lawnmower instead to cut some of those damn weeds.

  School starts in a few days, some of the athletes are back (volleyball, soccer) and the rest of the plebes come back soon.  Looking forward to another year - of baseball.  Summer is such a tranquil time of year here on campus except when the GYLC's are here.  Kids from all over the world come in and take over the dorms, forge new friendships, partake in summer love, and speak in foreign languages so that no one here can understand them.  Their invasion lasts about a week each, with 6 sets of GYLC's coming in throughout the summer.  It's over, they're out, thank God.

  Nathan had some shots the other day, one of which turned him from a dachshund into a shar pei.  His face turned into a giant swollen mess.  We raced back to the vet to get some benedryl for the swelling.  He's back to normal now, just have to keep medicating him twice daily for another 4 days.  It kind of knocks him out, so he's out of it.

  I am literally sweating my cojones off.  I have a little to nothing left to do today except see the apartment this afternoon.

  Adios kimosabe.

Break Time

   First of all, LeBron James is a bag of expletives.  Go after a title on a team where you're the man, not one head of a three headed monster.  Way to wimp out.

   Now that the MLB season has reached the All-Star break, I want to take a look at some of the top stories, as far as I'm concerned, in the first half.

   1.  Friar Power.  The San Diego Padres are 14 games over .500 (they were 75-87 last year) and up by two games in the much-improved NL West.  I mean this is a pitchers dominated team - with the best ERA (3.25) and WHIP (1.23) in the MLB.  They're hitting a paltry .250 but are in first place - pitching wins.  Look at the pathetic KC Royals - they lead the majors in hitting (.282) and are 10 games under .500 and 10.5 GB of the 1st place White Sox.  Watch out for the hooded clergy, they're here for real, and I don't think their pitching will go out of style.  They have no pressure to succeed and their best pitcher has only 27 starts under his belt for his career (Mat Latos) and a journeyman John Garland is reverting back to old form (when he won 18 games back-to-back years with the White Sox).  The Padres are good man, but so is everyone else in the West.  It's gonna be exciting.

   2.  Abe Vigoda (aka Jamie Moyer).  How in the hell is this guy 9-8?  I watched him dominate the Yankees (8 IP, 3 H, 2 R) and get shellacked by the Red Sox the very next start (1 IP, 9 H, 9 R).  He's got a 4.51 ERA in over 107 innings pitched - better than A.J. Burnett (4.75), John Lackey (4.78), and Brandon Morrow (4.86) - all guys with far superior stuff.  I watch him pitch and it actually infuriates me.  How can this guy do this at the highest level?  He throws 83 mph!  Are you kidding me?  I have to move on, it's pissing me off even thinking about it.  Good for you Jamie, you old bastard.

   3.  Vuvuzelas at a baseball game?  Really Marlins?  Fire the PR guy instead of letting Fredi Gonzalez get the axe.  This was something that people bitched about at the World Cup 2010, and once the USA was eliminated, everyone bitched about everything related to the World Cup.  And the Marlins decide it's a good idea to hand out half-assed vuvuzelas to fans for a game versus in-state rival Tampa Bay?  Give it a rest.  That goes against everything a traditional baseball fan stands for.  At least give out cowbells or something like that, everyone needs to have more cowbell.  Vuvuzela Night?  Never going to a Marlins game, on principle alone.

   4.  Marco...Polo...Teixeira?  He's hitting an eye-popping .254, but surprisingly has 17 HR and 60 RBI.  He seems to be AL version of Adam Dunn - HR's and right around a .250 BA (Dunn is at 22 HR and .288 in 2010).  He went into the break on fire, hitting .419 in July.  I mean he did virtually nothing in April (.136, 2 HR, 9 RBI) and the Yankees still managed to go 15-7.  They have a two game lead over the Rays and a five game lead over the Red Sox and they haven't even had the best record in the AL East in any given month (TB - Apr., TOR - May, BOS - June, TB - July).  Not to mention the heading to this paragraph - Mark Teixeira is having a mediocre season at best.  If they played the White Sox, Twins, and Mariners every series, he'd be hitting .450 for the year (.545 vs. CWS, .400 vs. MIN, .448 vs. SEA).  If he can stay hot after the break, watch out baseball!  Good time to be a Yankee fan.

   That's all I have time for.  Gotta go work on a few things.  We just got a new GTee in, may go take a few hacks off that, get some frustration out.

   HR Derby tonight at 8 pm Eastern (5 pm Pacific) - Swisher looking to bring the trophy back to the Bronx with him.

   Be well people.

Shut out and Shutouts

I sincerely apologize to my loyal legion of followers (the three of you) for my lack of posting recently.  I have been busy with work and trying to find a new look for my blog spot.  I hope you can bear with me, I will be sure to make it up to you.

Heading over to the diamond, there has been an awful lot of shutouts lately in the MLB.  Thursday featured three (CWS 2 ATL 0 // MIL 5 MIN 0 // TOR 5 STL 0).  Wednesday night there were four (CIN 3 OAK 0 // KC 1 WSH 0 // STL 1 TOR 0 // NYM 5 DET 0).  Tuesday saw only one shutout (SEA 2 CHC 0).  That's eight shutouts in three days.  There have been 127 shutouts in the big leagues this year already, and we still have just over two weeks before the 2010 Midsummer Classic in Anaheim.

It is shaping up to be the "Year of the Pitcher".  More specifically, it's the year the NL West's pitching staffs are dominating baseball.  Four teams rank in the top 6 in shutouts - Padres and Rockies (9) lead the majors, and the Dodgers and Giants (6) are both tied for 3th. 

Breaking it down, 2009 and 2010, 1st Half statistics:
--2009 - 14 SP's with 80+ IP with ERA < 3.00
--2010 - 23 SP's with 80+ IP with ERA < 3.00

--2009 - 12 pitchers with 10+ wins pre-All-Star break.
--2010 - 23 with 8+ wins (2+ weeks before All-Star break)

--2009 - 24 pitchers with 80+ IP with WHIP < 1.20
--2010 - 30 pitchers with 80+ IP with WHIP < 1.20

--2009 - 32 hitters with 17+ HR (Albert Pujols, 32)
--2010 - 8 hitters with 17+ HR (Jose Bautista, 20)

--2009 - 16 hitters with 60+ RBI (Albert Pujols, 87)
--2010 - 1 hitter with 60+ RBI (Miguel Cabrera, 61)

Call 2010 the "Year of the Pitcher", I know it's still early, but I see no end to this dominance in sight.  The proof is in the numbers.  And with Stephen Strasburg on the scene tearing up opposing lineups like Nathan tears apart napkins, look out.

You think there's a coincidence that HR numbers are down since the Steroid Squad (McGwire, Canseco, Bonds, Sosa) stopped playing?  I think not.  Those guys are dirtbags - and not in a good way.  They ruined the way casual fans look at the game - me, I'm a professional fan.  (If there's such a thing)  These guys should get shut out of the Hall of Fame.  They're losers.  Scumbags.


Time for some dinner, gonna whip something up for LMD, Julia, and myself.  LMD is cleaning, I'm banned because all I do is get in the way.  Gonna go get some prosecco to mix with elder flower for the women, and some beers for myself.  The ladies can pretend they're high class.

Later!

((((parentheses))))


MLB:  Former teammate of mine (with the NECBL's Manchester Silkworms) Chris Denorfia had the only hit (a double to right field) for the Padres (in the top of the third inning) as the Mets staved off a double-header sweep with a 3-0 win (Padres won 4-2 in game one).  Mets starter Jonathan Niese faced only one batter over the minimum and poured it in with an 0-0 count (19/28 first pitch strikes).  The game took a neat two hours and eighteen minutes (almost a half hour quicker than the first game).  The Padres did have one bright spot (or two, Denorfia saved them from falling victim to a no-no).  They rolled a 5-4-3 TRIPLE PLAY!!  Jon Garland got Ruben Tejada to hit a one-hopper to 3B Chase Headley, who stepped on the bag, threw to second base (Lance Zawadzki) who then completed the triple play by getting Tejada at first (by a step)

It was the eighth triple play turned by the Padres, and the tenth the Mets have hit into (not this year, obviously).

NBA:  Lakers lead the Celtics at the half (45-42) and are looking to go up three games to one (I hate Boston).  Pau Gasol is displaying his dominance (13 pts., 3 reb., 2 blk.).  Ray Allen (0-13, 0-8 3pt. FG in Game 3) finally hit a jumper (at the 11:00 mark of the 1st quarter) to give the Celtics the early lead (3-2).  He still only has one FG (1-6, 0-2 3pt. FG).

How in the hell did these Jersey Shore idiots make it on the CMT awards??  I'm watching a repeat of the show last night - Snooki is a little troll, The Situation is kind of funny, and Paula Deal uses way too much butter, but is awesome (she just said she could grate cheese on The Situation's abs).  I'm glad she got TKO'd at the bar.  She reminds me of one of those little good luck trolls (minus the luck).

Sorry my Paint skills are (severely) lacking.
I need a better program to edit pictures (maybe that'll be a gift to me, from me).

(Later world!!)
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