pitchleague

yeah, the youtube homage was kinda of cheesy and unnecessary but otherwise, it was probably one of the best episodes of that show in quite a few seasons. I was rolling for most of the episode. Kevin was just priceless. I was shocked that Creed didn't really have any lines. Andy was kind of funny for once. And Dwight left me wondering what his motives were. I think I may have to watch this one again. Great episode!

BWAH, HA, HA, HA, HA, HA!!!!!! Okay, that's my one cackle from Arizona for the month.

which means for us 20-gamers, it will be a meet-and-greet with a random member of the groundscrew plus an autographed piece of tarp. Wonder what the 10-game pack people will get?

Twins Win! Twins Win! Good for them! Bad for Detroit! Hey, look! It's RODNEY!!!! I would not have went with him for a third inning. That was nuts.

Lopez/Weeks goes for the 4-6-3 double play in that situation . . . and fails. Our guys just would not have the common sense to throw home on that.

oh, come on. He just lost the ball in the turf. Happens all the time at the dome. Oh. wait. that's the roof. Never mind. This game has been great. Hope the rest of the post-season is as exciting as this. These play-in games always seem to be great and then the rest of the games can be a bit of a let down.

Twins 7 Tigers 2 tomorrow afternoon Yankees over Twins 3 games to 1. Angels over Red Sox 3 games to 2. Dodgers over Cardinals 3 games to 1. (Suck on that, LaRussa!) Phillies over Rockies 3 games to 0. Angels over Yankees 4 games to 3. Dodgers over Phillies 4 games to 3. Angels vs. Dodgers is cancelled due to California sinking into the sea. (Okay, really I think Angels over Dodgers 4 games to 2.)

okay, so my post above is useless. I typed it out, not knowing that Macha would be back. Maybe Prince will do this during pre-game down in the tunnel or something.

I'd love to be a fly on the wall on the first day of spring training 2010 IF the Brewers would get LaRussa instead of Macha (as has been discussed elsewhere on the board): Tony: "Hey, big guy. Nice to have you on my side this year." Prince: "Um . . yeah. What are you doing walking me me last time up last year?" [shoves LaRussa into the wall] Tony: "Hey now, I had to do it in that situation." Prince: "Oh, come on! I coulda had the RBI title." [another shove into the wall, which is showing signs of crumbling.] Tony: "Man, you're strong. I had to keep it a 2-run game and hope to get out of the inning." Prince: "I coulda been a .300 hitter!" [Prince shoves him through the wall.] Tony: "Okay . . . . we're not speaking anymore. I did it to Rolen and I can do it to you." Prince: "Ah, whatever, I'm just joking around. Or am I?"

the NFL Hall of Fame does have a player "painting/lithograph" above his HOF bust, so, I suppose it is possible that a Viking version could be put in, but, you know, I'd put the odds on that happening at about 1,000,000:1 or so.

this game has been quite sloppy from both teams ends of the barrel. I wonder if this Pagnozzi guy doing the catching late in the game is the son of Tom Pagnozzi, former Cardinals catcher from the late 80s-early 90s.

I believe Uecker or Cory said that Suppan will go about 2 innings or so and then Narveson will take over from there. They said this during today's broadcast.

Congrats, Ryan! 200 hits and a long home run in the first. Gotta like that kid! edit: by the way, really sucks to not get to see this game (stupid FOX laws) but at least Uecker comes in loud and clear on MLB audio.

it was okay. Jim and Michael as co-manager is a pretty poor idea, I think, but I'll give it a chance because I'm unsure where it is going to come to a head. Now last night's "Parks and Recreation" was hilarious, especially Tom. Brilliant! It was the first time I laughed out loud with big billowing "ha's" since that show started. I hope they can make more episodes like that.

I would call him a "starts eater" as he is, over his career, a guy that can be depended on to make just about every start and finish with 30+ over each season.

yep, I know Russ. Sam asked for feedback of the metric, quoting: "Anyway, comments definitely welcome! I want to hear why this metric sucks! (Or how it can be bettered, of course.)" So I gave my comments. I am absolutely not saying that I am correct. I'm just giving my 2 pennies worth of feedback and stating how I think it could be bettered. Frankly, I thought I would be ripped to shreds in this thread for stating my opinions and not stating facts and statistics. It's probably the number one reason that I rarely post in this sub-forum.

I kind of feel that it's similar to reading the defense in football/basketball/hockey/soccer/etc. If you're smart enough to out-smart your team and figure out their audibles, play calls, etc. more power to you. If you're the team that is pitching and you're not changing your signals up every other inning or so, you're not a smart pitching team.

yep, I completely understand the logic behind the metric. Completely. I'm just don't feel that just because a metric says that X player has Y value as most valuable to his team at the end of the season is an end all be all metric for most valuable to a team at any point in the season. Sure, the metric has complete value to "voters" that determine that an MVP candidate must be a playoff contender. What about the "voter" who doesn't think this way. Robin Yount won his 2nd MVP on a non-contending team. So did Andre Dawson. According to the metric, who should have won instead of those guys? I'm guessing Ruben Sierra in Yount's case (don't remember off the top of my head in Dawson's). I think the metric has good, but not great, value to a "voter." In the Brewers case, Prince was pretty darn valuable than 0.5% to the playoff odds. In my opinion, without a Prince Fielder on this year's team, the Brewers would be lucky to win 70 games. That even includes having a Ryan Braun on the team and a "Lyle Overbay" or "Sean Casey" type of player as the replacement first baseman. I understand that Prince's "Most Valuable-ness" at the end of the season only adds 0.5% to the playoff odds. I just don't believe that that number is a constant throughout the season. And that's what I think the metric needs to improve on. I'd like to say, "Well, duh, no kidding that Prince adds only 0.5% to the playoff odds at the end of the season but Pujols adds almost 75%." And I would say this because my 5th grade students that are into baseball could figure that out here at the end of the season and they don't need a metric to tell them that. But give them a metric that charts and tracks this "most valuable" metric over the course of the season and they will begin to understand how, over the course of an entire season, that Pujols is more valuable than a Fielder. And metric or no metric, Prince would most definitely have a much higher share of the actual MVP vote if his teammates played up to expections (or, in the case of those that did play up to them, better than expectations). Prince played at an MVP caliber-level the entire season. There were hardly any cold streaks (the only one that really comes to mind was when he was "stuck" at 126 RBI a few weeks ago.) Pujols also had just a handful of cold streaks. But Pujols' teammates (particularly the pitchers--again) played at or above their expectations. Anyways, I'm not selling the metric short. I think it is a good tool . . . . for the end of the season. Just not all year. Which is really what the voters are supposed to be looking at in the first place. (yeah, yeah, I know. Several writers place special emphasis on the month of September for their MVP vote.)

the Prince homer was "historic," though, since it allowed Prince to score his 100th run of the season. Otherwise, despite what one might or might not think of the guy, let's not discuss the catch by the fan anymore. That was not an enjoyable thread back in the spring and I don't care to re-live it.

Oh. My. Kendall. Wow! Couldn't have come at a better time!

the bluetooth users are the ones that bug me. they start talking (in an elevator or wherever) and I think they're talking to me. Then they turn their head and I see the dongle on their head.

I know what your numbers say and I completely understand it. However, it still boggles my mind that Prince Fielder would only change the Brewers playoff odds 0.5 percent. I understand that you did this research (good job, by the way) based on the standings right now, so with the Brewers "out of it", Prince doesn't make much difference. You kind of need to do this same thing a couple of times during the season (Opening Day [based on what? I don't know], Memorial Day, All-Star Break, and maybe August 31st) to see how it changes throughout the season. Because, again, in our minds (those of us that watched the games) we all know that Prince Fielder was pretty darn important to the team in 2009 but you metric seems to show that he was pretty replaceable. And this is only shown because the metric was done with the current standings. Obviously, all the teams that are in your "most valuable" top 10 are going to be playoff contenders. It's the only "flaw (if you even want to call it that) that I can see. But that's just what I would look for, probably not others.

no, she hasn't taken the cats in at all. And the cats aren't all that old--9 or 10 years, I think. But the "dying" cat has a twin brother and he's just as fine as can be. It just surprised me that it came on so suddenly, as if it's an illness rather than old age. That cat was spry and running around not 4 weeks ago and now can hardly move.

I read this off a football injury list a few minutes ago. Kind of cracked me up: "New Orleans TE Darnell Dinkins was out yet against with a fractured left football. No word on his return date."

your grades look pretty good. I probably would have given Weeks a grade, however, rather than and Incomplete. For the 7-8 weeks that he played with the team, he was probably an A-/B+ kind of guy. If you wanted to "weigh" his grade down due to the injury, I could see dropping his grade one whole letter (B-/C+).