On Sunday night, the Red Sox and Rays played sixteen innings and scored one total run in the process. On Monday, literally less than twenty-four hours later, the Red Sox and Orioles combined to score twenty-five runs in nine innings. And yet, after both games, the two teams consumed exactly seventy-eight doughnuts and one hundred twenty-two diet sodas. Isn't baseball a strange game?
Link time!
The undead Ken Rosenthal of Fox Sports (I mean that in the nicest way possible) assess the job situations of baseball's General Manager population. There could be some large market teams looking for new GMs soon, if Rosenthal is correct. The Yankees and Cubs figure most prominently as their GMs are, in order, possibly tired of working for the Steinbrenners (No!) and not all that good at the job. The potential openings in New York and Chicago among many other possible destinations make me fear for the Red Sox front office. It's hard to see Theo Epstein leaving unless it's for a completely different line of work, but anytime talent gets pulled from the Red Sox front office it's not a good thing. Also, the fact that Neil Huntington of the Pirates is not on the hot seat is kinda funny. OK, not Ha ha! funny, but you know.
I flipped over to Baseball Prospectus yesterday morning and found a great surprise. The excellent Sam Miller, who writes Angels for the Orange County Register, has a new gig at BP. Little known fact, Mr. Miller was the very first guest ever on the OTM Podcast and no doubt he has a giant photo of the MP3 over his mantel. Mr. Miller's first article is free to all who have computer and internet capabilities; so pretty much anyone who isn't my grandma. As for topics, Mr. Miller addresses a few starting pitchers who have increasingly focused on throwing just a single pitch during games. Contrary to what would be expected, this has improved their performance. Mixing up pitches in a vacuum is a good thing, but throwing a bad or hittable change-up after two excellent fastballs is self-defeating. I imagine that's what the pitchers in Mr. Miller's article were facing. Just because you can throw a slider doesn't mean, 1) it's a good one and, 2) that you should throw it. Sticking with your best pitch, especially if you can locate it, is oftentimes the best decision.
This interview with Keith Law of ESPN is worth hearing. It's done with a Baltimore radio station and Law, as he usually does, pulls no punches on the fading Orioles. In fact, one of the GMs who might not be back, as named in Mr. Rosenthal's earlier linked article, is the Orioles Andy MacPhail. (When you think about it, MacPhail is an unfortunate name for a GM.) This means it's likely the newest incarnation of the perpetually re-building Orioles could have to be re-re-built by someone with a less unfortunate name. Is there a Derek Van Adequate out there with any kind of resume? Horace Middling? Bob McMediocre? Tip of the ol' top hat to Camden Depot, who discussed the Law interview and the sorry state of the Orioles franchise here.
I've been on Twitter for less than a year but already it's occasional outages really get under my skin. How am I supposed to chat ball and show everyone how witty I am all at the same time when Twitter won't let me? Hardball Talk's Craig Calcaterra had the same problem yesterday and felt similarly. He pointed readers towards this article which does a great job of putting into words why I have come to love twitter and why it's great for sports.
Over at Splice Today, a site I've written for as well, Russ Smith interviews the aforementioned Mr. Calcaterra about all manner of things including the best manager in baseball (Terry Francona!), how Mickey Mantle and Willie Mays would do in today's game, the weaselly Bud Selig, and for spice, some politics as well.
The amazing Sean Foreman has created a tool at Baseball-Reference.com that lets you look up trade history between two teams. There goes your afternoon, eh?
Finally, Allan at Joy of Sox lets us know Laser Show is now Muddy Chicken. Update your bookmarks accordingly.