Hung for the Holidays

Mike:
Putting on my magnanimous "for the good of the game"cap for a moment, I will say the one positive takeaway from last night's game was seeing the once perennial cellah dwellah Tigahs come in with some first place swaggah.

 

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Mike:
You know, in baseball there's hope for any team to turn it around and all that, good news for the Detroit fans.

 

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Doug:
Yeah, yeah, that's great in the abstract and all, but on the solid ground of reality you have to wondah how long are we going to wait for Beckett to get his shit togethah?

 

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Mike:
No kidding, if you were only to watch Beckett in the first inning all season, you'd think this was some dirty William Hung trick.

 

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Comments

[COD]

Keeping with the seeing the bright side theme, at least he didn't extend his lead in home runs allowed.

[Dex]

Is it my imagination, or is Soxaholix getting very short...?

[Rob in CT]

Continuing the "looking at the bright side" theme, I was actually glad to see Rudy S. not suck in the 7th last night. I grant you, the Tigers are reknown for being free swingers, but he made Young look pretty silly swinging at that lollypop curve for strikes 2 and 3.

One other point - Did anyone else look at Ordonez last night and think to themselves, "He looks like the love child of Derek Jeter and Hideki Matsui!" Maybe it was just me...

[h.b.]

Yes, short. I'm on the road for the next 3 wks (started mid last week) doing Soxaholix out of a hotel suite. Not ideal to say the least.

It's either short or Lisa the Temp. :)

And don't be surprised if you see quite a bit of Lisa and or blanks entirely until after Labor Day.

Gotta pay the bills...

[Rob in CT]

I'm as taken with Lisa as the next red-blooded guy, but I think I speak for [almost] all of us in saying we'd prefer the short takes. Thanks for keeping on keepin' on, h.b.

I'm a little curious as to whether Natalie would prefer it short or with Lisa while she's away at her Girl's Gone Wild wedding weekend. Hmm.

[yazbread]

Surviving Grady refers to this week as 'Danger Week'. After last night I am convinced that the season is over. Forty-five games left, 23-22 sounds about right. How about a Reinsdorf-style 'white-flag' trade with a look to the future? I think I will be following the Pats a lot earlier than seasons pass.

[Dave S.]

Yazbread...give it a little more time before you let the air out. The big series is this weekend. There's still a lot of baseball to be squeezed out of the season, plenty of room to pick up one in the win and three in the loss column.

[Jason O.]

Ah, yes, the Tigers...yet another gaping hole in the pathetic "The high payroll teams are making baseball non-competitive" hypothesis.

[Bob]

Anybody going to the game Saturday afternoon? If so, Copperfield's (the downstairs bar), from 11:30 or so until 1:00. I'll be standing at the entry-door side of the bar.

BTW, how many of you said, "he'll be fine if he can just get through the first"?

[Dave S.]

A dual axis view of baseball team management and finances is one of my favorites:

x-axis: Management Quality
y-axis: Available Resources

Obviously, the best teams are to the right on the x and up on the y (say, the Red Sox and the Mets under Minaya). These teams have a ton of money to spend, and for the most part, spend it very effectively.

Next, you have the teams that are still great in terms of management smarts (to the right on the x), but don't have (or won't make available) major resources to spend (low on the y). I'd say that the A's and Twins are the poster teams for this extreme group.

Then you've got high-money but badly managed teams, like the Cubs, or the Orioles, or the Mets under Phillips/Duquette. They have ownership willing to spend, but none of the smarts to get it done.

Lastly, you've got the guys who suck at both, like the Royals and Pirates. Just absolute disasters.

I definitely think that money spent has a huge impact on a team's ability to field a quaility team, but believe that intelligence of team management (from drafting up through development up through injury-management up through FA signings and trades) is at least as important. The Tigers this year are definitely a great example of a well-constructed team...something that's been in the works for the last few years...coming together at the right time. They're definitely a great story.

[COD]

When I was in grad school (92ish) we did a project in a HR Mgmt class on baseball salaries. Our project was to determine the impact of a salary increase on team performance the following year. What we were looking for was a predictable change in results based on an increase in team salary.

At least in the early 90s, it simply was not there. You could not predictably buy 20 more wins the next year, as measured solely in the increase in team salary.

The most interesting part of the project was a phone interview with Phil Niekro, who was coaching the Richmond Braves at the time. We called him at a hotel in Pawtucket.

Like how I tied that back to to the Red Sox?

[Natalie]

On an unrelated note, how am I supposed to feel that the inimitable Emmitt Smith has joined this coming season's Dancing With the Stars? Should I treat this the same way I treated the Sox on Queer Eye (i.e. it's on my DVR but I pretend it's for ironic reasons)?

[da kine]

Well...that Breslow kid looked pretty good.

[COD]

I guess Jerry Rice did so well last year that the producers decided a retired black guy from the NFL is now part of the formula.

I wonder if they can drum up another hot blond professional wrestling manager...

[Rob in CT]

Hot blondes in "Professional Wrestling"? What will they think of next!

No, Jason. Hulk Hogan DOES NOT count...

[Dave S.]

...what about Greg "The Hammer" Valentine? If you'd allow for brunettes, we could always bring in Brutus Beefcake.

[Bob]

I'd actually pay to see George The Animal Steele in that dance competition.

[Bob]

In fact, here he is doing his version of the tango.

http://www.georgesteele.com/animal/george-large.jpg

[soxdownunder]

Is that Bob or imposter Bob?

[Ghengis Ortiz]

Gotta agree with Yazbread. I have this terrible feeling of 'this is just delaying the agony'. No 2004 two-out base hits, bullpen saves/holds when you lead after the 7th.

And then Damon gets clutch with the Suckees. Yuk.

The only appropriate way to handle this pending disappointment and go out as true Sox fans is to brutally haze Slappy Bluelips all weekend long, win or lose. Since I won't be there, I rely on all to band together and make his life as miserable as possible.