well well

6/27/2012 11:53:14 AM

Still got it

6/27/2012 2:54:11 PM

hahaha that's funny - I can't believe he's still around. Hell of a player... it stuns me that he began his ML career when I was 10.

6/27/2012 3:09:29 PM

mike trout's insane catch:
http://mlb.mlb.com/video/play.jsp?content_id=22644539&topic_id=&c_id=mlb&tcid=vpp_copy_22644539&v=3

[Edited on June 28, 2012 at 1:29 PM. Reason : dv]

6/28/2012 1:28:18 PM

ESPN loved that one.

6/28/2012 1:39:26 PM

so when are they going to institute replay in MLB?

It seems like every week it's another blown call

6/29/2012 10:56:23 AM

I bet Cliff Lee gets his first win of the season tonight

6/29/2012 4:59:54 PM

or not, left the game down 6-1

in other news, a day after Jeter tied Ripken for 14th(?) all time on the career hits list, Beltran hits his 2000th

6/29/2012 9:21:00 PM

http://www.sportsgrid.com/mlb/the-twins-brian-dozier-defied-physics-with-the-craziest-rbi-single-weve-ever-seen/

6/30/2012 4:19:01 PM

looking forward to seeing Stanton win the HR Derby this year

also this NYM/LAD game is full of all sorts of shitty fielding

7/1/2012 9:36:02 PM

dee gordon could be a beast if he could figure out the whole hitting and defense thing

7/1/2012 10:55:49 PM

Anyone keeping up with the Pirates? From 2003-2010, they were above .500 for a total of 71 games. They have already eclipsed that from 2011-2012. Progress, finally. If they just had enough money to hang on to people for a while...

They gave up Jose Bautista mid-2008

7/2/2012 10:28:25 PM

god damn matt moore throws a good looking baseball.

7/3/2012 12:25:22 AM

7/3/2012 12:54:20 AM

Quote :

"They gave up Jose Bautista mid-2008"

That had everything to do with poor talent evaluation and nothing to do with money. Still, they have provided a virtual farm system for contenders over the past two decades.

7/3/2012 9:07:11 AM

I'd argue that the Pirates front office is actually pretty great at talent evaluation and has been for a while. Giving up on Batista isn't on them at all. He was in his age 27 season, averaging like 9 homers a year and hitting .230. He was playing like a AAAA guy, not an MVP.

7/3/2012 9:18:46 AM

I guess. Have you guys ever heard of Billy Hamilton? Reds SS prospect stole his 100th bases of the season last night

7/3/2012 9:21:17 AM

Who cares?

7/3/2012 9:25:10 AM

Omar Epps and Wesley Snipes

7/3/2012 9:31:42 AM

That is pretty ridiculous that the dude has 100 SBs at this point in the season even if it is only in the minors.

As for the Pirates, they've sucked for a variety of reasons. The Pirates drafted Bautista, but he did not play for them until bouncing around with multiple other teams. I read a story about how Bautista finally learned to hit in the MLB and all it said was they he was told to start swinging earlier. It was an interesting read.

Also the curse of Julio Lugo now reigns over the Pirates replacing the curse of Sid Bream:

7/3/2012 9:55:08 AM

Peter Gammons

http://mlb.mlb.com/news/article.jsp?ymd=20120630&content_id=34242340&vkey=news_mlb&c_id=mlb

7/3/2012 9:58:31 AM

There's no doubt that Bautista is a monster. If he played just about anywhere but Toronto we would hear so much more about him.

On a completely unrelated note, here's an article by Rick Reily about baseball's pace issue.

http://espn.go.com/espn/story/_/id/8126341/mlb-pace-play-problem

Baseball is fine if you're at the park with some friends, but it's painful on TV. The only redeeming feature is that you can keep it on in the background and not miss anything while you do something else.

7/5/2012 4:38:21 AM

lol Rick Reilly

7/5/2012 8:44:29 AM

^^ i didn't read the rick reilly article because i refuse to, but there's a chapter about bullpen usage in a book i've been reading, and they said games started getting a lot longer in the 90s with all the specialized relievers and stuff and that they're 30 minutes longer on average than they were like 30 years ago. thanks, tony la russa

7/5/2012 9:51:59 AM

Even as a grumpy old curmudgeon who never wants to see anything in baseball change, I'd be open to revising the rules around pitching changes.

7/5/2012 9:55:31 AM

I've never understood why they give relievers so many warm-up pitches when they are called in from the pen. I understand for situation when a pitcher gets hurt, but why does a guy need 10-12 pitches after warming up in the pen. It should only take 2-3 pitches to get the adjustments to the mound made. That would cut a couple minutes off each pitching change.

7/5/2012 10:01:25 AM

Im more concerend with the assholes that step out of the batters box every pitch to adjust their batting gloves.

7/5/2012 10:05:03 AM

^ I agree with that too. Cue Nomar gif. Also pitchers that step off the mound repeatedly should be issued a balk.

7/5/2012 10:15:07 AM

At least baseball isn't as slow paced as [commercial break] a typical [commercial break] NFL game.

7/5/2012 10:19:32 AM

I think virtually everyone in the US would disagree. Both take up about the same amount of time on the air (3 hours) but football has way, way, way more actual activity going on in that time span.

7/5/2012 12:46:29 PM

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704281204575002852055561406.html

7/5/2012 1:00:38 PM

So I guess soccer does it better than anyone.

7/5/2012 1:02:33 PM

No doubt

50 minutes between commercial breaks

I'm for it

7/5/2012 1:03:34 PM

Football is always going to be more entertaining to watch for the simple reason that you only play once a week, giving every play significant value. With baseball, its oversaturation. No singular act is of much importance, at least until October.

[Edited on July 5, 2012 at 2:02 PM. Reason : x]

7/5/2012 2:02:20 PM

Quote :

"I think virtually everyone in the US would disagree. Both take up about the same amount of time on the air (3 hours) but football has way, way, way more actual activity going on in that time span."

This argument again? Anyway, everyone? Not even close. Northeast from NYC to Maine is far more into baseball. Majority of country? Yes, I'd agree.

^ and this

[Edited on July 5, 2012 at 2:14 PM. Reason : X]

7/5/2012 2:14:12 PM

Quote :

"I understand for situation when a pitcher gets hurt, but why does a guy need 10-12 pitches after warming up in the pen. It should only take 2-3 pitches to get the adjustments to the mound made. That would cut a couple minutes off each pitching change."

first of all, they take eight.
second, that you are familiar enough w/ pitching that you are able to figure out how many pitches it should take a major league reliever to get used to the mound accurately enough to distinguish between 3 and 8 is very impressive.

7/5/2012 2:22:57 PM

Quote :

"Football is always going to be more entertaining to watch for the simple reason that you only play once a week, giving every play significant value. With baseball, its oversaturation. No singular act is of much importance, at least until October. "

tldr; Americans are idiots with short attention spans

7/5/2012 2:28:14 PM

Quote :

"Americans are idiots with short attention spans"

While this is true, the fact that baseball has done such a piss poor job of translating their game to TV has more to do with it. Football lends itself naturally to TV, baseball does not. However, that's not to say that it couldn't be entertaining on television if they put in some work. Hell, one of the reasons that NASCAR is now a national sport as opposed to the regional sport it used to be 20 years ago is because of what they did with their television broadcasts. They made racing accessible and full of action even though the majority of the time it is just driving around in circles.

Baseball, for one stupid reason or another has refused to embrace technology. I would argue one of the reasons it loses fans every generation is because of things like refusing to utilize replay. How many people really want to bother with a game that is so entrenched in tradition that they would rather allow blown call after blown call rather than get the call right? It's a game that is better suited to radio and newspapers than it is to TV.

[Edited on July 5, 2012 at 4:48 PM. Reason : asdf]

7/5/2012 4:47:42 PM

Lots of facts ITT

[Edited on July 5, 2012 at 4:50 PM. Reason : Explains why you're a Rick Reilly fan]

7/5/2012 4:50:14 PM

Baseball should instigate a replay system that allows a manager to throw a flag towards the pitcher two times a game if they feel a strike is missed. Even though the technology is there to look at every play (maybe in the form of a system in which someone replays every call and buzzes down to the homeplate umpire when an error is made??), they need to restrict it to those two only in a game with hundreds of calls.

This is why fans don't like baseball!@!!!!!

[Edited on July 5, 2012 at 6:02 PM. Reason : x]

7/5/2012 6:01:35 PM

Quote :

"Football lends itself naturally to TV, baseball does not."

how did you arrive at this conclusion? you miss every aspect of a football game watching it on tv except for how much time the quarterback has to throw. meanwhile you can see the pitch very well on tv, the swing very well, and the play in the field very well.

7/5/2012 6:11:36 PM

Do I really need to explain why football works so well on TV? Really?

Telestrators, replay, multiple cameras that capture a play from every angle, etc. How about the fact that because football is played in short bursts you have the ability to take advantage of this between the plays? TV broadcasts have gotten so good that in terms of actually seeing what happened on each play you're better off watching at home than sitting in the stands. You miss out on the gameday atmosphere, but you trade that for a superior viewing experience.

The only TV innovation that really enhances baseball viewing is K-zone.

PS - I'm not really a Rick Reilly fan, just seemed like a relevant article.

7/5/2012 6:27:19 PM

Quote :

"Telestrators, replay, multiple cameras that capture a play from every angle, etc. How about the fact that because football is played in short bursts you have the ability to take advantage of this between the plays? TV broadcasts have gotten so good that in terms of actually seeing what happened on each play you're better off watching at home than sitting in the stands. You miss out on the gameday atmosphere, but you trade that for a superior viewing experience."

every single one of these applies to baseball, dude. like literally not a single one of those points is football-specific.

7/5/2012 6:51:19 PM

Football is great for TV

Like the part where you can't see the defensive secondary on TV

Who cares what's happening down field!! TELESTRATOR!!!

7/5/2012 6:57:50 PM

Look, football is the most popular sport in the country for the same reasons that CBS sitcoms and and Justin Bieber are popular. It's all mindless lowest common denominator entertainment that any meathead can follow. Don't fool yourself into thinking it's a superior product.

Now let's talk about Michael Bourn getting robbed.

7/5/2012 7:04:03 PM

Yes, there's no strategy or thought involved in football. Clearly baseball is the thinking man's game, which is why a baseball manager being ejected is so devastating to a team's in game play.

Yeah, Michael Bourn got screwed, but that's what happens when you have to have a representative from every team on the All-Star roster like it's fucking little league. Then you have the problem of the fans voting, the players voting, and then the manager's making selections.


[Edited on July 5, 2012 at 7:22 PM. Reason : sfsd]

7/5/2012 7:19:56 PM

I'll assume that someone else was already selected, as it would be very unErnielike to make that plea four days after the initial rosters were announced.

[Edited on July 5, 2012 at 7:25 PM. Reason : YOU CORRECTED YOURSELF BUT I WANT IT ON THE RECORD THAT YOU ORIGINALLY FUCKED UP.]

7/5/2012 7:23:35 PM

La Russa picked Chipper because he was leading the fan vote and Freese was in second. Picking Bourn to replace Kemp was the obvious choice, but La Russa is a cunt.

7/5/2012 7:25:47 PM

Yup, sure did. Didn't realize that they had announced the final fan vote like an hour ago. It was however sort of a foregone conclusion that Bourn wasn't going to make it in over Freese and Harper even though he was probably more deserving than either.

7/5/2012 8:23:16 PM

set em up

7/5/2012 8:46:04 PM