Wait, what?

– Belliard is at shortstop? Is this a good idea?

- Who is Joel Hanrahan? (25 year old minor league free agent apparently.)

Red Sox 7-16-07: New Double Plays!

The showing of HP5 was sold-out when I tried to get tickets, so I went home and watched the game instead. Not a bad substitute – Kason Gabbard, our number 6 starter, pitched a 3 hit, complete-game shutout. Just over 100 pitches, 3 DPs, very efficient. And fun to watch. Nobody expected this of him, to say the least. Also, there was an excellent double-play that went 4-3-6, which I’ve never seen before. (High chop to Pedroia, who couldn’t tag the advancing runner. So he threw to first for the force-out, and Youks threw to Lugo who applied the tag to the runner [who headed for second once he saw the throw to first.] Very nifty.)

An analysis of backup catchers, part two: the NL backups

I’m pleased to say that Mirabelli got two RBIs in his game on the 4th. Hurrah for the backup catcher. (Didn’t do much on the 12th or 15th, but I digress) To continue with the NL:

Because I know my audience

Since I do know who’s reading this, and I’m not sure if they know all the numbers I’m using, I thought I might provide a quick explanation of some of the numbers I’m using. They’re the basic baseball numbers – it reads like this:

The first number is the batting average. Pretty basic, used a lot, not as respected by the statisticians these days because it leaves some stuff out (all it covers is hits.)

The next number is OBP. That stands for on-base percentage. To get this number, take the hits a player has, add the walks, and add the hit-by-pitches. That’s the numerator. The denominator is the at-bats plus the walks plus the hit-by-pitches plus the sacrifice flys. Divide the numerator by the denominator* and that is the OBP. It’s a better indication because it doesn’t leave out walks. You don’t want to leave out walks because if the pitcher can’t throw strikes, you don’t want to swing.

The last number is the slugging average. To get that, multiply the number of doubles the player has by two, his triples by three, and his HRs by 4. Add them together then add his singles, and there’s the slugging average.

Anyone who reads baseball blogs already knows this. So why am I posting this? Really, this is just a long and involved way of saying: Hi Mom. (And Hi Dad. And my siblings, hello! And Julius too – such a good dog.)

*My math teachers would be so proud. I’ve retained useful knowledge. Sort of (thanks editor).

An analysis of backup catchers, part one: The AL backups

It’s almost time for another Wakefield start. Now one of the most prevalent complaints I’ve seen on the Red Sox blogsphere is that with Wake comes Doug Mirabelli. And Dougie…ain’t what he used to be. He can catch the knuckleball (and sometimes fix Wake’s mechanics if he’s running into difficulty,) but he can’t do much else anymore. By much else, I mean hit, run, throw out basestealers, and did I mention hit? (He’s .174/.230/.275 at the moment. Not good, to say the least.)

So we’ve acknowledged that Mirabelli’s bad. I’ll ignore the associated questioning of Wake’s value because that gets my irrationality up*. What I will do is address two questions: 1) Who are the other 29 teams’ backup catchers, and 2) How are they hitting? This will happen in three parts; part one addressing the AL, part two addressing the NL, part three for analysis. So starting with the AL, in alphabetical order:

NESN’s a great channel, but…

Many of the commercials sap my will to function. The ones that are volume controlled to VERY LOUD LEVELS are bad enough, but WB Mason has a new commercial out that is causing me to grind my teeth back to baby-tooth levels. It’s supposed to be a musical theatre setting that leads into the theme song (“I want my double-youu-beee-ee”. Annoying by itself.) I’m supposed to like this sort of thing? The lead in tune sounds like an unholy combination of “There is Nothing Like a Dame” from South Pacific and “Not by Might and Not by Power” by Debbie Friedman, Jewish folk guitarist. This combination works about as well as you’d expect. I’ve started to twitch at the sight of WB Mason, which I suspect is not their goal.

Oh, the game? I missed the best parts because I had to buy a new cat carrier.* But isn’t it nice that we managed to split the series with the Rangers. I mean, they’re only one of the worst teams in the MLB while we’re one of the best, so we shouldn’t have had any expectations or anything like that.

*Long story. Short version: neurotic, neurotic cat.

John Patterson and the quacks of the north.

John P is going to Canada.
He’s going to get treatment from “chiropractors, be in a hyperbaric chamber, have homeopathic injections, lasers and frequency-specific microcurrents. These type of treatments are not approved in the United States.”
No! Imagine my total and utter surprise that these treatments aren’t approved in the US!
Homeopathic injections? Might as well ask for your humours to be adjusted John – maybe your problem is too much yellow bile. This is sounding like another surgery is in the near future. More scarily, it’s sounding like Matt Clement. The diagnostics couldn’t find what was wrong with him, until they opened his shoulder during surgery and found three tears that didn’t show up on the MRI.
Tavarez this afternoon. (Let’s go Yo-yo.) We had (again) the reverse lock this weekend: Wake (who usually looks bad against the Rangers) won a pitcher’s duel while Beckett lost it in the 4th for whatever reason. On the plus side, Nomar finally hit his 2nd HR. Let’s bring that OPS up babe!