Monthly Archives: April 2008

An expensive mistake

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Being an A’s fan, I’ve made more than a few comments about the San Francisco Giants’ decision to give Barry Zito a seven year/$126m contract prior to the 2007 season. Not many were particularly kind to our Bay area rivals; in fact when I write ‘not many’ I actually mean ‘none’.

Zito may have won the Cy Young in 2002, but in one sense that has counted against him (not in the financial sense, that’s for sure). From 2005 onwards, Zito has been a good pitcher, a guy who will take the mound every fifth day and generally give you a chance to win. That’s a worthwhile player to have on your roster and in the current free agent market, that sort of player gets very well remunerated (normally at around the 4 year/$12m per season mark). He’s not a number one starter though, not even a number two. The Giants decided to pay him as if he was one of the best pitchers in the game, despite the evidence showing that this wasn’t, and isn’t, the case and they are going to have to live with the consequences. Continue reading →

National League: welcoming back percentage baseball (and flirting with pseudo-perfection)

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The 2007 National League South regular season should hopefully be remembered for a long time to come, but not for the reasons you might think. There were very few close games: over the last five weekends of the season, there was not a single game decided by 3 or fewer runs. This was mostly due to the large proportion of games against teams from the division below that was built into the schedule. On paper, this is not necessarily a bad idea, as it should allow players from the division below (where there is more home-grown talent) to potentially benefit from facing stronger opposition. In practice, though, neither division enjoyed the experiment as there were far too many blow-outs. I am not saying that all such experiments are bound to fail, but I believe it is important for the season to be remembered as an example of why this type of idea is not guaranteed success. Continue reading →

Eleven early games this week

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Once again, we get to enjoy live games in the British evening on three of the five working days this week.   There are eleven early games in total, with Wednesday and Thursday giving you plenty of options on what to watch/listen to.  All times listed in BST.

Monday
One early game to start the week. The enigmatic Daniel Cabrera pitches for the Orioles against Javier Vazquez and the White Sox at Cellular Field. First pitch is scheduled for 19.05.

Tuesday
No early games, but several intriguing match-ups later on. The old master faces the young pretender as Greg Maddux and the Padres take on Cole Hamels and the Phillies (00.05). There are two aces are on the mound at Fenway in Roy Halladay and Daisuke Matsuzaka (00.05), while Tim Lincecum looks to continue his scoreless innings streak against the Rockies (03.15).

Wednesday
Six early games today. Starting at 18.10, the White Sox face the Twins and the Pirates take on the Mets. Five minutes later, the Reds’ Aaron Harang looks for win number two on the season against the Cardinals. At 20.40, the Astros try to stop the D-Backs juggernaut at Chase Field, while the Rockies face the Giants at AT&T Park from 20.45. Finally, the Braves clash against the Nationals (21.35) should be worth watching for European baseball fans as Jair Jurrjens is the scheduled pitcher for Atlanta. Watching his two-seam fastball moving all over the place is a real treat, unless you’re in the batter’s box trying to hit it!

Thursday
The first day of May brings us four early games and there’s a reason to watch all of them. Hiroki Kuroda starts for the Dodgers as they face the Marlins (17.10). Matt Garza makes his second start since coming off the DL for the Rays against the Orioles at 17.35. Zack Greinke takes the mound for the Royals in their match against the Rangers (19.05). Finally, the Brewers face the Cubs at Wrigley with a scheduled starting pitcher match-up of Yovani Gallardo against Carlos Zambrano (19.20).

Friday
No early games to end the working week. Those of you up at 02.40 on Saturday morning should tune in to the first game of what promises to be a great series between the Mets and the D-Backs.

Five’s game on Wednesday night (the Brewers vs the Cubs) is set to begin at 01.30, while NASN’s MLB schedule for the week can be found here 

‘Weekly’ Hit Ground Ball 2008: Week Four

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Rays dreaming of a Disney ending

Major League Baseball made a visit to Disney Land this week, but thankfully it was no Mickey Mouse affair.

The Tampa Bay Rays played a three-game series against the Blue Jays at the Disney Sports Complex in Orlando, following their series against the Rangers at the venue last season. The new environment proved to be a success on the field for the Rays as they swept Toronto and increased their Major League record at Disney Land to 6 and 0.

That success was repeated off the field as well. The Rays and Blue Jays pulled in crowds of 8,269, 8,989 and 9,540. While these are low for Major League standards, they were close to sell outs in the small stadium and sell out home crowds are something of a novelty to the Rays. Over the course of the 2007 season, the Rays’ average home gate was just over 17,000, which leaves plenty of spare seats considering Tropicana Field has room for just under 44,000 spectators. The Rays’ Disney Land experiment was an attempt to drum up some extra publicity and to reach out to the wider Florida community. Continue reading →

New writer and a new design!

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As you will have noticed, there have been a few exciting developments here at BaseballGB this weekend.

Firstly, I’m delighted to welcome Joe Gray to the site.  As well as being an excellent writer, Joe really adds a unique perspective on the British game thanks to his role as Southern Commissioner for the Great Britain Baseball Scorers Association.  It was one of my stated aims of 2008 to increase the coverage of the British scene and, as shown in his first post, Joe will be a key part of this.  Joe will be a regular contributor to BaseballGB alongside his sterling work on the GBBSA website and personally I’m delighted that he has agreed to come on board.

Secondly, one of my other main aims for 2008 was to introduce a new design to the site.  The previous one was fine, but it was very much designed as a theme for a blog written by one person.  With additional writers joining up and more ‘not strictly blog post’ features being added to the site (with the Baseball Basics for Brits series already started and several other new features in the pipeline), we needed a design more in keeping with the next stage of BaseballGB’s life.  Backed up by a year’s worth of data that showed very few visitors view the site with a screen resolution lower than 1024 in width, we’ve put together a design that utilizes the extra space to achieve our aims.  There is still a certain amount of tinkering and tweaking to be done, but I’m very pleased with the results so far and thought the time was right to launch it now.

With a new writer and a new design in place, my attention is already turning to the next wave of new features.  In the coming months, we hope to a add a section containing substantial articles to complement the ‘bread-and-butter’ blog posts as well as an MLB British fan Wiki that I’m currently devising.

Even when I first started blogging about baseball back in March 2006, my long-term objective was always to create a site that contained quality writing about baseball by a group of British writers, as well as providing additional resources that British baseball fans (whether established or newcomers) would enjoy.  After two years of hard (but very enjoyable) work, things are starting to come together.  I’m very excited about what the future holds and I hope you will enjoy all of the new features.

Thanks for your continued support.

National League: when 7 innings of baseball is 2 too few

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In the British National League, games take place on a single day each week (almost always a Sunday), and 7-inning double-headers are typically played. While there are some players who would rather have a single 9-inning game each week, others are keen for as many innings of baseball to be played as possible. I side with the latter group, with my chief reason being that the more innings that are played, the fairer the comparisons of teams and players over the course of a season. However, to go that step further and make 9-inning double-headers the norm would almost certainly be too much baseball. And, for the most part, 7-inning games are fine. Continue reading →

MLB dugouts: no water allowed

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Want an example of sponsorship lunacy?

Gatorade are the “official sports drink” of MLB; therefore no MLB player is allowed to drink anything but this product in a dugout.  Now, no doubt Gatorade pay MLB a lot of money to be their official sports drink, so you can understand why there are safe guards to stop rival brands getting a share of the spotlight for free. 

But this is taking things a bit too far.  Players aren’t even allowed to visibly drink unbranded water in the dugouts for fear that it might make a single soul question whether Gatorade is the greatest drink in the history of the universe. 

Where there’s money, there’s madness!

Krivsky Out, Jocketty in

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Witnessing an organization getting rid of a manager within the first few of weeks of a new season is almost an annual event nowadays.  What you don’t see quite so often is a team parting company with their General Manager after just twenty-one games.  Well, that’s just what the Cincinnati Reds have done.

Wayne Krivsky has been replaced today by former St Louis GM Walt Jocketty in a move that seemed on the cards (excuse the pun) as soon as the latter was brought into the Front Office over the off-season.  The timing is a surprise though.  The Reds’ owner Bob Castellini is quoted on MLB.com as saying: “We had a lousy season last year and we’re starting this season not very well … we felt it was time for a change.”  2007 was a big disappointment, but so far this season the Reds are sitting at 9-12.  While that’s not a great record, it’s hardly terrible either.  Continue reading →

Chicago Cubs: Yesterday and Today by Steve Johnson

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Chicago Cubs: Yesterday and Today by Steve Johnson, (MBI Publishing, 2008), 144 pages.

After the Boston Red Sox’s two recent World Series triumphs, the Chicago Cubs now stand alone as the team that many baseball fans have a soft spot for. With their history of great players and a wonderful old ballpark, only the most hard-hearted fan would not want to see the Curse of the Billy Goat finally being put to rest. One hundred years since the Cubs last won the World Series, it is a fitting time for Steven Johnson to write this history of the storied franchise.

Scheduled for release later this week, Chicago Cubs: Yesterday and Today is a well-proportioned (28cm by 24), hardback book which clearly has been put together with a lot of care and attention to detail. On the title page, the reader is greeted by two fantastic photos. The portrait of Cubs great Ernie Banks is an instant reminder of the calibre of player that has represented the club over the years, but it is the shot of Wrigley Field that catches the eye. Taken from ground level, the photo shows a packed-out, two-tier main grandstand set beneath a stunning early evening red sky. With the Cubs playing their arch-rivals, the St Louis Cardinals, on the field below, it is a perfect picture and immediately compels you to start flicking through the pages to search for others of similar brilliance. Thankfully, the following 250+ photos do not disappoint. Continue reading →

The week ahead

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We draw a blank on Wednesday and Friday, but there are ten early games to choose from over the rest of the working week Here’s a guide to the match-ups you can enjoy live in the British evening (all times in BST).

Monday
Two early games, more afternoon than evening. The Rangers face Clay Buchholz and the Red Sox at Fenway from 16.05. The Tigers take on the Blue Jays at 17.37.

Tuesday
Two early games again, both from the National League. Kyle Lohse gets the start for the Cardinals in Milwaukee against the Brewers (18.05), while the Mets’ unlikely hero Nelson Figueroa pitches against Ted Lilly and the Cubs from 19.20.

Wednesday
No early games today. Later on, the Angels and the Red Sox lock horns with Jon Garland and Daisuke Matsuzaka taking the mound in what should be a great contest (00.05).

Thursday
We have the luxury of six early games today. The Astros and the Reds start things off at 17.35. Half an hour later, the Phillies take on the Brewers and the Rangers face the Tigers. The Angels and the Red Sox finish off their series with Joe Saunders and Jon Lester taking the mound at 18.35. The Cubs and the Rockies start their game at Coors Field at 20.05 and at 20.35 Francisco Liriano continues his comeback with the Twins against the A’s.

Friday
No early games to end the week. Some of the series’ to look forward to over the weekend are the Yankees against the Indians, the Braves against the Mets, and the D-Backs against the Padres.

Five’s game on Wednesday night is set to begin at 01.30 (Yankees vs White Sox), while NASN’s MLB schedule for the week can be found here