Castillo’s clanger costs the Mets
When I wrote about Milton Bradley’s balls-up yesterday evening (British time), I fully expected he would be the goat of the day despite there being a further fourteen games to be played later that night.
How wrong I was.
Luis Castillo’s clanger on a pop-up would have been a bad mistake if it had come in the first inning of a standard game. To do it when leading 8-7 with two outs in the bottom of the ninth against the Yankees in a subway series game, allowing them to win it 9-8, is a blunder of epic proportions.
Why didn’t he use two hands? Why did he throw to second base rather than home plate? Did he get out of Yankee Stadium alive? Those are just three of the many questions that immediately spring to mind (I’m assuming the answer to the third is ‘yes’ as I’ve not seen any ‘Mets infielder mauled by enraged fans’ news stories yet).
People often like to exaggerate the impact of a single moment in a game or to pin the outcome of an entire contest onto one person. Normally that isn’t a very accurate way to sum up a game, but in this case it’s fully justified.
Castillo’s error was the reason the Mets lost and nobody knows that better than Castillo himself.
The New York press will have a field day with this. The reaction of Mets fans on the web is predictably furious and Castillo is undoubtedly going to be mercilessly heckled (or plain verbally abused) by Yankee fans at today’s game. Professional sportsmen have to deal with such pressures on a regular basis, but this is going to be a tough day for Castillo.
Let’s see how he responds. Jerry Manuel has a decision to make on whether he sends him straight back out there. He’ll know Castillo’s character and should be able to judge if he’s the sort of person who would cope better by taking a day out of the firing line or meeting the situation head on.
It’s a day game at Yankee Stadium, so British baseball fans can join their North American counterparts (and other fans around the world) by following the action at a convenient hour. First pitch is set for 21.10 British Summer Time.
It promises to be quite an occasion.
Curse of the Bradley Goat
The Twins have just beaten the Cubs at Wrigley Field by a score of 7-4. This was a day game in Chicago, making it perfect Friday evening viewing here in Great Britain. It wasn’t perfect viewing for Cubs fans though.
They are not happy with their right-fielder.
Milton Bradley made two bad plays in the field. The first was an unfortunate case of him losing a high fly ball in the sun during the seventh inning. The fielder is always made to look completely clueless in this situation, with the ball landing several feet away, but it can happen to anyone.
The second mistake was less easy to forgive. The right-field crowd were on Bradley’s back due to his previous moment (not an ‘error’ for the purposes of the scorecard, of course) and when he easily grabbed a fly ball in the next inning, he posed to the crowd before chucking the ball into the stands.
Unfortunately for Bradley, his catch was only the second out of the inning.
The consequences weren’t huge in the context of the game. Punto tagged up and came home to score from third, something he would have done regardless of Bradley’s brainless error. Harris was able to move from first to third, but he was left stranded so no extra runs scored as a result.
However, it was a deeply embarrassing moment for Milton. He’ll have to put up with seeing it replayed countless times in the days and weeks ahead. More immediately, he’ll have to deal with the fans in right-field at Wrigley, who were not exactly holding back on telling Bradley what they thought of him.
Somehow controversy seems to follow Milton around.
MLB Draft 2009
In less than an hour, the Washington Nationals will be ‘on the clock’, ready to make the number one pick in the 2009 First-Year Player Draft. They’ve had months to prepare for this moment and by now they will have made their decision. We’re just waiting for it to be confirmed.
No doubt they will still take the full five minutes before actually announcing Stephen Strasburg. The draft isn’t exactly a quick-fire contest, although nor should it be considering how important it is for every team.
Just don’t take the full five minutes if you don’t have to. That’s all I ask.
We had the farce last year of the Rays sitting around for five minutes despite having already stated earlier in the day that Tim Beckham was their man. ESPN got some nice shots of Don Zimmer on the phone though, so I guess they were happy.
The whole concept of a player draft is intriguing to Brits as we don’t have an equivalent process in our sports. I can’t say watching it on MLB.com last year was my televisual highlight of 2008 as the whole process of waiting around for teams to pick does get a bit boring after a while. In an attempt to keep things interesting, I decided to write a live blog of the event last year.
Had I known beforehand that the first round alone would take three hours, I probably would have passed on the idea, but once I had started it I felt honour bound to finish that first round at least. Looking back over the text, it made for quite a fun evening.
I won’t be repeating it again this year because the start time of the draft has been pushed back by four hours. That means the first pick will be made at just after 11.00p.m. British time, with the first round due to be completed at two in the morning.
Nope, there’s no way I’m going to be able to keep awake all that while, particularly if Bud Selig is the Master of Ceremonies again.
I’m aiming to stick with it until the A’s first pick, lucky 13, and will be ‘tweeting’ along (remembering to use the #mlbdraft tag) instead of blogging. Follow @mattbaseballgb if you’re interested in the tired and slightly confused ramblings of a Brit with only a vague knowledge of the players involved.
Who wouldn’t want to follow after a sales pitch like that?!
MLB Teams: Minnesota Twins
Today we move from the NL Central to the AL Central to look at the Minnesota Twins.
Fellow British MLBlogger Marty has become a diehard Twins fans by following the advice of his Twins-supporting girlfriend (wise man!) and there are plenty of other reasons to make Minnesota your team as well.
Supporting a so-called big name team like the Yankees has its benefits, but for most Brits the prospect of getting behind a small-market team that has to battle against the odds to succeed is much more appealing. The Twins fit this description, to the extent that they recently had to battle just to stay in existence.
One of Bud Selig’s bright ideas of the late Nineties and early 2000s was to contract MLB to twenty-eight teams. Of course, that wouldn’t have meant two teams being relegated to a lower division; they would have simply ceased to exist.
The Twins were one of the main teams in the firing line and thankfully they avoided that fate. Well, perhaps it’s more accurate to state Minnesota avoided that fate, as the Twins’ owners didn’t exactly seem against the idea and had been trying to move the team elsewhere for years. As the team sprang back into life during the first-half of the 2000s, the threat of contraction was lifted (with the Expos being ripped away from Montreal and rebranded as the Washington Nationals) and baseball fans in Minnesota can now look ahead to the future with hope rather than the fear of their team being taken away.
That future includes a brand new ballpark. Target Field is scheduled to open next year and it will replace the unique Metrodome. I’ll miss watching games on TV being played there as it made for a very different setting, but no doubt the players and fans are looking forward to a new open-air home (subject to the wind and rain), without artificial turf and a white baggy ceiling that makes flyballs disappear like an Asprin dissolving in a glass of water.
A new ballpark means little if you haven’t got a good home team playing there (pick your own example from several contenders). The Twins have little to worry about in that respect as they have been a keen competitor in the AL Central for several years and no other team looks set to dominate the division in the near future.
Their small-market budget makes hanging on to their top players difficult and the passing of time won’t make seeing Torii Hunter and Johan Santana in Angels and Mets uniforms respectively any easier. However, smart teams are able to replace established stars with younger versions and that’s just what the Twins have done.
The Twins organization has a happy knack of spotting and developing pitchers, as shown by their current rotation containing Francisco Liriano, Scott Baker, Nick Blackburn and Kevin Slowey (along with Glenn Perkins who is currently on the disabled list). The one criticism of the Front Office in recent years has been their reluctance/inability to go out and add that one extra big bat to make the difference. Strong regular season campaigns produced five postseason visits between 2002 and 2006, yet they fell at the first hurdle on four occasions and were beaten 4-1 by the Angels in the ’02 ALCS in the only time they got any further. Just one more piece could have been enough to get them to the World Series, but a trade or big free agent signing never materialized.
Minnesota have brought through some talented position players though, not least the modern day ‘M and M’ boys: Justin Morneau and Joe Mauer. The former signed a five-year contract extension at the start of 2008 to tie him to the club until 2013 and thoughts are now turning to Mauer’s future as he will become a free agent at the end of the 2010 season. If they can keep hold of the local boy, the Twins have two excellent position players to build around for years to come.
Just to add to their appeal to Brits, the Twins also have a European link in Bert Blyleven. Blyleven was born in the Netherlands and is considered by many to be the best eligible pitcher not in the Hall of Fame. He helped the Twins win a World Series in 1987 (he also won one with the Pirates back in 1979) and now serves as the co-commentator on the Twins’ TV broadcast where he has become known for ‘circling’ fans with a telestrator (look out for all the ‘Circle me, Bert’ signs).
Oh, and their Double-A affiliate team are the New Britain Rock Cats.
Quite frankly, the Twins are one of the main teams I would recommend to a British newcomer. They are small-market underdogs with a strong recent history of bringing through home-grown players and they will have the attraction of a new ballpark to go and visit very soon. That makes for an excellent combination.
MLB Teams: Milwaukee Brewers
If you want to appeal to a British newcomer, having a name that relates to beer is as good a start as any. The Milwaukee Brewers get a tick in the box right from the off.
What’s more, the Brewers used to emphasise the link to their ale-brewing history even further through their mascot. Bernie Brewer would celebrate a home run by the home team by hurtling down a slide into a big mug of beer. Unfortunately that ‘dream-come-true’ moment was stopped when the team moved to their current ballpark, Miller Stadium, in 2001.
Apparently the sight of the kiddies’ favourite pal enjoying himself by bathing in booze wasn’t seen as being a very politically correct message to send out to impressionable youngsters. I guess they had a point, but it’s a shame nonetheless.
Bernie does still have a slide to ride down and if the absence of a beer-soaked landing means this act of entertainment doesn’t grab you, the famous sixth-inning sausage race might do instead. There’s nothing quite like watching a Bratwurst, Polish Sausage, Italian Sausage, Hot dog and Chorizo running down the warning track at Miller Park to make you forget about the worries of the world.
The Brewers do a great job of providing additional entertainment on the field, which does make you question whether these efforts are to cover up a lacklustre team.
There was a lot of merit to such a claim in the past as the Brewers haven’t been very successful over the years. The organization struggled in their 1969 debut season as the Seattle Pilots, a campaign immortalized in Jim Bouton’s ‘Ball Four‘. The team swiftly moved to Milwaukee for the following season and they’ve been there ever since.
Despite not moving location, the team has led a nomadic life for the weird and wonderful purposes of the MLB structure. First they were in the AL West, then the AL East, then the AL Central before controversially switching to the NL Central in 1998. They spent the majority of their time in the AL East (1972-1993), during which they achieved their lone World Series triumph in 1982.
That was the last time they had made the postseason until their 2008 season. The Brewers were playing well before the team’s owner did what every fan hopes for and made a blockbuster, ‘win now’ trade to acquire CC Sabathia. The team don’t have great financial resources and they knew in all likelihood they would be priced out of a longer term deal with their hired ace (and boy were they ever!), but they went for it anyway. Brewers fans enjoyed a mesmerizing three months in which Sabathia exceeded even the most outlandish expectations, finishing with an 11-2 record including seven complete games and an ERA of 1.65.
To further demonstrate their will to win, the Brewers made a stunning call by sacking manager Ned Yost with just two weeks of the season left to go. The team made it to the playoffs but couldn’t get any further than the first round and then saw Sabathia and Ben Sheets depart via free agency (although Sheets could possibly return once he regains his fitness). It made for a disappointing end to the fairytale season, yet at least the team had produced great excitement and genuine hopes of postseason success along the way.
Despite the departures, the Brewers remain as one of the better teams in the NL. Any team in the Majors would be happy to build around the likes of Ryan Braun, Prince Fielder and Yovani Gallardo and they are ably supported by other products of their farm system (J.J. Hardy, Rickie Weeks – when fit – and Manny Parra to name three examples) and some quality veterans. They look set to compete in the NL Central for the foreseeable future and the ownership and GM have proved that they will go all-out to try and bring success to the city.
Add those factors to the appealing ale links and the fact that they are not an ‘obvious’ pick (I haven’t come across many British Brewers fans) and you’ve got a team that should be a strong contender to win a Brit’s support.
And if they brought back the beer mug slide, it might not even be a contest.
An All-Star team of Major Leaguers who have played in Great Britain
British baseball fans all long for MLB teams to play a game or two on our shores in the near future. MLB has taken regular season and pre-season games out of North America in the recent past to help spread the baseball gospel and it would be incredible if it could happen.
The major obstacle to the plan is that we do not have a baseball-dedicated stadium over here. Games have been played at other types of venue, mainly cricket grounds, football/soccer stadiums and even greyhound stadiums, but the result is always something of a compromise for the players and, most importantly, the spectators.
So that dream will have to wait and we will look on with envy as NFL fans enjoy further regular season games in the UK and NBA and NHL fans hope for more games in the future (these sports can be accomodated much more easily in soccer stadiums and indoor arenas).
Yet baseball has visited the British Isles in the past, from the Big League Tour in 1874 and the famous Spalding World Tour of 1888-1889 to a Minor League game in 1993.
Josh Chetwynd (co-presenter of the much-missed MLB coverage in the UK and author of two McFarland publications: British Baseball and the West Ham Club, and Baseball in Europe) has written an article compiling an All-Star team of players who have appeared on British soil over the years. Featuring greats such as Willie Stargell, Tris Speaker, Cap Anson, Sam ‘Wahoo’ Crawford, Bob Feller and AG Spalding, it makes for an impressive team. More importantly, Josh’s article explains how every player ‘qualifies’ for the list, charting an interesting history of baseball’s visits to the UK.
The article has been written for Project Cobb (the Project for the Chronicling of British Baseball) and can be found at BaseballGB.co.uk.
MLB Teams: Los Angeles Dodgers
Today we move from the Angels to the Dodgers.
I mentioned yesterday that the Dodgers cast a bit of a shadow over their neighbours. While Angels’ fans might not agree with that, from an international point of view it is undoubtedly true. The LA Dodgers are a known name beyond baseball strongholds. Their team cap can be seen in many countries around the world, including in the UK, atop the heads of people who don’t know the first thing about Manny Ramirez (and where would you begin if you had to describe Manny to somebody who had never heard of him?).
The Dodgers are one of the most iconic sporting brands around as they combine the joys of America’s National Pastime with all the glitz and glamour that is associated with Hollywood. Stars want to be associated with the team, to the extent that even the ultimate publicity magpie Victoria Beckham could once be seen wearing a Dodgers’ jacket and ‘throwing’ out a ceremonial first pitch at Dodger Stadium (apologies on behalf of Her Majesty the Queen and the rest of us Brits for that, by the way).
Thankfully, away from the superficial side of LA, they are at heart a baseball team that has an incredibly rich history.
The franchise was formed in Brooklyn as the Atlantics in 1884 and they drifted through various names before finally sticking with ‘Dodgers’ from 1932. They were the ultimate hard luck story for many years, amassing an impressive regular season record only to be beaten by those Damn Yankees in the World Series. That particular pain began with a 4-1 series defeat in 1941, but it intensified between 1947 and 1953 when they made it to the Fall Classic four times in seven seasons, only to lose each time to the Yankees. The joy in Brooklyn when they finally beat the Yanks in 1955 must have been overwhelming for some, although it wasn’t long before the feeling of joy was replaced by the feeling of loss
One can only imagine what it must have felt like in 1958 when the team was picked up and moved to the other side of the country. Brooklyn had been left high and dry, only to see the team then go on and win a World Series in only their second year in their new home. The LA Dodgers added two more World Series triumphs during the Sixties and much of their time on the West Coast has involved trips to the postseason.
The franchise’s success was largely built on the efforts of some outstanding players that any newcomer to the sport needs to learn about. From the ‘Boys of Summer’ of Pee Wee Reese, Jackie Robinson, Roy Campanella, Duke Snider and more, to great pitchers like Sandy Koufax, Don Drysdale and Don Sutton, there are plenty of heroic feats and epic battles to discover.
The Dodgers’ role in ‘breaking the colour line’ will also forever earn them respect from a newcomer to the sport and they have proved to be more willing than most ballclubs to welcome people of different races and nationalities into their hearts. The Japanese sensation Hideo Nomo’s first season in the Majors in 1995 is another story that deserves your attention and it further highlights the part the Dodgers have played in making baseball a more global game.
As for the team’s current position, their roster is a good mix of exciting youngsters (Chad Billingsley, Russell Martin, Matt Kemp, James Loney, Clayton Kershaw etc) and quality veterans, notwithstanding Manny Ramirez’s absence at the moment. With veteran manager Joe Torre at the helm, they look like the team to beat in the National League and their early season form suggests that is the case.
Supporting the Dodgers allows you to become part of a famous franchise with a rich history and a promising present. Add in the delight of Vin Scully’s announcing and you have a very appealing package for a Brit to consider.
MLB Teams: Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim
Next on the list of MLB Teams are the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim.
Yep, fans of teams with short names need not apply. The organization began life in 1961 as the Los Angeles Angels, then became the California Angels in 1965, the Anaheim Angels in 1997 and then switched to their current mouthful of a moniker in 2005. The team is now often referred to as the Los Angeles (or LA) Angels so they are back where they started really. Think of all the headed notepaper that needlessly went to waste over those years.
The adoption of the new/old name was a commercial decision to get the ‘LA’ back into their brand, part of the battle to win fans within the local market against the Dodgers. That’s a very tough task because the Dodgers have such a well-established identity. Even sports fans in Britain would have heard of the LA Dodgers and the Angels do slightly live in the shadows of their more illustrious neighbours (a bit like the Cubs and White Sox of Chicago).
However, that could actually work in the Angels’ favour when it comes to attracting British fans. Supporting the Dodgers is a bit obvious. Going for the Angels means you get the benefits of following a big team in LA (large player budget in a mass media market – sixth highest in the Majors this season – and the holiday potential that LA provides), without picking a team that even someone with a very limited knowledge of the sport could choose as their own.
I’ve written in the past about timing having a big influence on which team you choose (or which team chooses you) and many newcomers to the sport in 2002 would have fell under the spell of the Angels’ World Series win that year. They seemed to be a team, and a city, on a roll with an infectious energy that effortlessly travelled across the Atlantic. Of course, as an A’s fan I was less excited at their success and in particular that damn Rally Monkey. Still, I’m sure it would have captured the imagination of some people.
Fans that did join the Angels family in 2002 haven’t enjoyed a repeat of that opening success. The Angels are one of the many examples that show there is no real formula to being successful in the postseason. They’ve consistently performed well in the regular season, but that hasn’t translated into numerous World Series appearances.
The Angels are known for playing a ‘small ball’ brand of baseball (stolen bases, hit-and-runs etc) that many are keen to say is key to winning in October, as opposed to the ‘three-run homer’ type of offense of teams like the A’s. In truth, few teams religiously stick to a strict method of play all the time and there is no secret to winning a short series. When you get to the playoffs, you’re looking at eight strong teams who are all capable of beating each other.
The Angels’ 2008 season made this blatantly clear. They were the only team to win 100 games during the regular season and they coasted to the AL West title. Yet the ALDS came around and they were quickly sent packing in four games by the Red Sox. The Angels’ hadn’t become a bad team overnight; they were a good team that just lost three games out of four to another good team.
No one can expect postseason success every year, so the best you can hope for as a fan is that your team puts together enjoyable regular seasons that give them a shot at the playoffs most seasons. Recent history suggests the Angels are as good a choice as any team to offer you this in the near future.
One of the things the Angels’ don’t offer you much of is the chance to follow their games live at a convenient hour in the UK. Supporting a west coast team immediately puts you at a bit of a disadvantage in this respect (they are eight hours behind British Summer Time, rather than five hours for east coast teams), but judging on 2008 the Angels play few day games during the working week compared to other teams.
Apart from that, the Angels are an attractive team for a Brit to support. Maybe they will be the team for you?
MLB Teams: Kansas City Royals
The Kansas City Royals have been one of the more anonymous teams in the Majors for several years.
The team hasn’t appeared on British TV much (if at all? I certainly can’t remember seeing them on Five) and their only claim to fame has been their run of four 100-loss seasons in five attempts between 2002 and 2006. Being good at losing isn’t much of a way to gain new fans.
This recent lull mirrored the experience of Major League baseball’s early life in Kansas City. The Philadelphia A’s were moved to KC in 1955 and they played out fifteen forgettable seasons before departing to Oakland. Here the A’s dominated the American League during the first half of the 1970s, a fact that would have been particularly galling for baseball fans in Kansas.
However, any bitterness they were left with was put to rest firstly by the creation of the Royals franchise in 1969, KC’s own team rather than the imported A’s organization, and then by a successful run of seasons to follow the A’s winning period.
Between 1976 and 1985, the Royals made it to the postseason seven times.
For all their regular season wins, it looked like they would fail to turn their success into a World Series triumph, but they finally got there in 1985. The two Bret(t)s, George Brett and Bret Saberhagen, led the Royals to a 4-3 series win over the St Louis Cardinals, with the latter earning the WS MVP.
After scaling the mountain, the Royals gradually fell back down to the bottom. They haven’t made it back to the postseason since, with the closest attempt being a 92-70 season in 1989 that saw them finish seven games behind those Oakland A’s in the AL West.
So the Royals don’t have an especially rich history, nor have they challenged for a postseason spot in many years. This makes them hard to sell to a British newcomer, but there are signs that the future in Kansas City could be bright.
Years of ineptitude do at least provide a team with the opportunity to use early draft picks to sign the best young players available. Drafting players is no exact science and the Royals have had their share of misses, but their list of recent first round picks includes some very talented players.
Top of the list has to be Zack Greinke, who the Royals picked sixth overall in the 2002 draft. If ever there was a player you could root for, it’s this guy. Greinke made it to the Majors quickly and then fell apart as he struggled with a social anxiety disorder. Brits have the example of cricketer Marcus Trescothick to appreciate how such a condition can strike the most talented of players. I compared the two last year in an article written prior to a baseball game between a Trescothick-led cricketers team and the Great Britain side.
Trescothick’s condition was brought on by being away from his family, so he has been able to continue his career with Somerset while giving up international cricket. Greinke’s circumstances were different and many questioned whether he would be able to make it back at all. Thankfully, he has gradually got his career back on track and is now having the season of his life (so far).
Aside from Greinke, Alex Gordon and Billy Butler are the main players on the Royals’ draft list who have established themselves on the Major League roster. While dazzling in the Minors, neither has quite lived up to expectations in the Big Leagues just yet. However, both are still young enough, and talented enough, to change that.
The likes of Luke Hochever, Mike Moustakas and Eric Hosmer also offer plenty of reasons for Royals fans to be excited about their team going forward, which makes the Royals a much more appealing prospect for newcomers than their last twenty-year period would suggest.
Away from the players, Kauffman Stadium has undergone extensive renovations to make it a very attractive place to watch a ballgame, allowing you to add a tick to the ‘good ballpark’ box. They won’t score so highly in the ‘popular ownership’ category though.
The Royals are owned by the phenomenally wealthy David Glass, former President and Chief Exec of Wal-Mart (the company that now owns ASDA in the UK), but he is far from being a Roman Abramovich figure. In fact he has come in for considerable criticism for his perceived meanness. The Royals won’t be bidding on any major Free Agents any time soon, but that doesn’t have to be a barrier to future success.
So think long and hard about the Royals. They have more going for them than first impressions might lead you to believe.
Matt Wieters starts – Luke Scott stars
The storybook opening to Matt Wieters’ Major League career didn’t quite materialize last night, but the Orioles still got the win. Luke Scott saw to that.
MLB.com helpfully published a list of the opening performances by several great catchers, which firmly puts Wieters’ hitless debut in perspective. Johnny Bench, Carlton Fisk, Gary Carter and Craig Biggio’s careers weren’t exactly hampered by a hitless start, so no need to panic about the Orioles’ young star living up to the hype just yet.
There was so much pressure on Wieters’ shoulders, from the expectant home crowd to the pressure the young catcher was putting on himself, that the Tigers did the sensible thing and tested him right out of the box. Wieters dashed out from behind the plate, fielded the bunted ball cleanly and threw the runner out with a minimum of fuss.
Test number one was passed with aplomb.
The home crowd would have loved to see that defensive play followed up by a big hit from their new star, but the hits came from a less-heralded player. Luke Scott has been swinging the bat well over the last few days and he briefly took the attention away from the new boy by belting two bombs, one of which went for a grand slam.
The Orioles also got a look at another part of their future thanks to a solid outing by rookie pitcher Brad Bergeson. His eight-inning effort played a significant part in Baltimore’s 7-2 win.
Yet it was still Wieters’ name that was on everyone’s lips after the game and it will be again tonight as he looks to get his first Major League hit off Justin Verlander.
There’s a contest I can’t wait to see.
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