Hot Ham Water

Today's opportunity to mount the soapbox

2008-05-09T19:20:00.001-07:00

This article is yet another great example of why the unearned/earned run distinction is ridiculous.

An Analysis of the Padres' Current Situation

2008-05-07T15:51:00.000-07:00

It's the end of the first week in May, and as a fan I am ready to concede the season. I'll still watch every game I can and root for them, and I still think this is a team as talented as the Dodgers and D-Backs. Unfortunately, the reality of the situation is that the Padres are 10 games back of the D-Backs and 6.5 games back of the Dodgers. That is a ton of ground to make up, even if the Padres are actually a better team.

I wouldn't advocate blowing up the team yet, as miracles do happen in sports, and players are probably not going to lose significant trade value. Holding onto tradeable assets like Brian Giles, Randy Wolf, or Tadahito Iguchi until June still would allow them to be moved before the trading deadline for a decent return. The focus should gradually start shifting from winning this year to evaluating the team for next year. They are set at catcher, first, probably second, short, third, and probably left for next year. They desperately need a solution at center field; to that end they should probably give Scott Hairston the majority of the playing time in center from here on out to see if he can handle it defensively and if he can hit at all. My personal preferred solution is to shift Matt Antonelli to center and sign Mark Ellis as a free agent next year, but it looks like the ship has sailed on moving Antonelli. Venable is another internal candidate, but he'd have to destroy AAA this year to merit consideration as a starting option. Headley looks like the left fielder next year, but McAnulty should be given most of the playing time this year to either establish some trade value, establish himself as a viable starting option, or establish that he'll never be more than a fourth outfielder. Pitching-wise, it makes sense to try out Ledezma on the off chance he can harness his stuff enough to be a back end starter. LeBlanc should be ready for next season, and maybe Inman or Carrillo will be as well. Maybe LeBlanc will get a look in September, but those guys don't really factor into plans for this year.

As for what to do with guys with possible value to a contender: for Wolf and Iguchi, you would need to get something of actual value back, because these guys will likely qualify as type B free agents and can be offered arbitration to get draft picks. I'd guess Brian Giles will likely qualify as a B free agent too, but he'd probably accept arbitration since he'd make a lot more than that way than in free agency. Many teams could use a starter like Randy Wolf, particularly if he can mostly maintain his hot start for another month. The Braves come to mind as a team with a desperate need, and Brent Lillibridge could be an interesting return for him. Lillibridge could be a long term replacement for Khalil Greene at shortstop, or he could shift to center and be the answer there. Or he could suck and be the answer nowhere. Giles seems like a fit with the Indians, who could use some more offense from their corner outfielders. I don't really know who they could ask for in return, but that's ok, I also don't know if he has a no trade clause, if the Padres are interested in exercising his option for next year, and any other possibly right field external right field candidates that could be better than him. So this is all wild speculation. I'm not sure who would have a need for Iguchi. Him starting to hit better might help create a better market for his services, but teams aren't so wild about giving up lots for a second baseman.

When a team gets into a position like the Padres are, in last place despite expectations of contention, fans like to criticize someone, usually the front office. Sometimes it's not errors by the front office. Sometimes it's just randomness. Last year Mark Kotsay had a 57 OPS+. The two years before that he was at 88 and 97. He's never been as good as Edmonds at any point in his career. Yet here he is putting up a 122 OPS+ this year in the early going. Maybe the Braves scouts are better than the Padres' scouts; that's quite possible in the overall scheme of things - they did a ridiculous amount of winning over the past decade and a half. Maybe in this case the Braves got lucky and the Padres did not. The Padres nearly won the division last year with basically the same team as the one this year. Mike Cameron and Milton Bradley have proven to be key losses, but Wolf has been a key gain, and Iguchi should have been an improvement at second. This could have been a division winning team this year, and the difference between leading the division and owning a 12-21 record is not Aaron Rowand in center instead of Jim Edmonds. It's not Kyle Lohse or Hiroki Kuroda in the fifth spot instead of Justin Germano. The slow start this year has been caused by the breakdown of almost every player on the roster, including most of those players that were instrumental in winning the division last year. For that reason, there is basically nothing the front office could have done to stop this from happening. Sometimes you just get unlucky.

Fun Factoid of the Day

2008-05-03T03:27:00.001-07:00

The third place team in the NL West is farther behind the Diamondbacks than any other last place team is behind it's respective division leader. The NL West also has baseball's best record, the Diamondbacks, and it's worst, the Padres (a mere half game behind the Rockies, baseball's second worst record). Way to represent, NL West.

Fun Factoid of the Day

2008-04-30T14:01:00.000-07:00

Last year on the first of May Mike Cameron was hitting .192/.267/.240 in 116 PA, with 29 K's. From May 1 to the end of the season, Cameron hit .253/.341/.473 (with half his games at Petco). Sometimes good players have slow starts. Sometimes people on the wrong side of 30 have bad starts and bounce back. Sometimes, they don't bounce back.

Fun Factoid of the Day

2008-04-28T11:20:00.001-07:00

From 1994 to 1995, Greg Maddux made 53 starts and threw 411 2/3 innings (7.77 IP/start). During this time period, he had a 1.60 ERA (265 ERA+), a 0.854 WHIP, and a 35-8 record.

Power Rankings - Week 4

2008-04-24T10:37:00.000-07:00

Annnd we're back for Week 4 of the power rankings. The MLB season has settled down somewhat, Chase Utley on pace for 73 HR's and 154 RBI's aside, and we're starting to get a small feel for how things might be progressing for the rest of the first half. So without any further ado, here's Week 4 of the Major League Baseball Power Rankings.

1. Arizona Diamondbacks: The D-backs are off to an MLB best 15-6 start, and if the hitters continue to perform this well, they might stick around at the top.

2. Chicago Cubs: The Cubs have just kept on winning, also starting 15-6, and winning nine of their last ten.

3. Boston Red Sox: The Red Sox have won eight of their last ten, and seem to have realized Jacoby Ellsbury is a vastly superior player to Coco Crisp.

4. Anaheim of Orange County Los Angeles Angels: The Halos are playing pretty good baseball of late, and Casey Kotchman, after having 11 HR's in 443 AB's has 6 HR's in 76 AB's this year.

5. Milwaukee Brewers: The Brew Crew is looking pretty good so far, Eric Gagne has been pretty shaky so far, and Ben Sheets is already hurt.

6. Florida Marlins: First place in the NL East is not the Mets, Phillies, or the Braves, it's the Florida Marlins.

7. Oakland Athletics: They continue to surprise, and if Rich Harden comes back, they very well may compete.

8. Baltimore Orioles: I'm putting them here based solely on the fact that they're still above .500 this late into the season.

9. St. Louis Cardinals: The redbirds have been struggling a little bit, but they appear to not be as bad as I had expected.

10. New York Yankees: Phil Hughes and Ian Kennedy have been flat out terrible. Which bodes well for the Yankees if they can turn it around.

11. New York Mets: The Mets have been playing somewhat better recently, but I continue to worry about their pitching.

12. Chicago White Sox: Still in first place!

13. Philadelphia Phillies: Chase Utley is an absolute beast.

14. Seattle Mariners: Felix Hernandez looks like he finally is starting to fulfill some of his vast potential. Because I said this, his next start will be 3 innings with 7 ER's.

15. Tampa Bay Rays: Evan Longoria has made a very solid entry into the majors, another in the line of uber-prospects for the Rays.

16. Houston Astros: The 'Stros have won four in a row, although with Miguel Tejada certain to need geritol or some other old age product, you wonder how long it can last.

17. Atlanta Braves: Yunel Escobar has been excellent so far, as everyone who owned him in 20 team keeper leagues could have predicted.

18. Minnesota Twins: Francisco Liriano's start hasn't been particularly encouraging, but it's early.

19. Detroit Tigers: The offense is finally starting to come around...they're not going to be under .500 for much longer.

20. Toronto Blue Jays: The Jays have lost seven of their last ten, but with good pitching, losing streaks don't stay around very long.

21. Los Angeles Dodgers: They've shown flashes of brilliance along with long periods of stupidity, but Andruw Jones has looked terrible.

22. Kansas City Royals: The Royals have cooled off considerably, but I still like the direction of the team.

23. Pittsburgh Pirates: Hey, at least they've won two in a row.

24. Cleveland Indians: They can't be in last forever, can they?

25. Colorado Rockies: They've lost four in a row and are still tied for second.

26. San Diego Padres: The Fathers are not playing particularly good baseball. Jake Peavy and Chris Young both pitched in what were eventually double digit games, not a good thing.

27. Cincinnati Reds: Edison Volquez has been excellent so far.

28. San Francisco Giants: I have a man crush on Tim Lincecum.

29. Texas Rangers: Wow.

30. Washington Nationals: They suck.

Floundering Friars, Surging Snakes, and Down in the Dumps Dodgers

2008-04-23T00:19:00.000-07:00

I'd like to write something analyzing the events of the first part of the season that's occurred. Unfortunately, for almost every potential topic, I come back to the same refrain: small sample size. Padre bullpen getting torched: small sample size. Padre offense not being worth a darn: small sample size. The Diamondbacks being awesome and firing on all cylinders: small sample size. Andruw Jones looks like the worst kid on a little league team with his flailing attempts at sliders: small sample size. The Dodgers in general can't really hit: small sample size. You get the picture.

Thus, my outlook on what has transpired to this point, specifically the D-Backs' dominating lead over the rest of the division, is significantly more optimistic than the average Padre, Rockie, or Dodgers' fan. Sure, the Diamondbacks are crushing the ball this year, but I still remember their terrible offense from last year, when they tied for the third worst team OPS+ in baseball with an 89.* ** So I remember that terrible offense from last year, and I realize they have almost the exact same players contributing this year, so I am optimistic the offense is in for some serious regression. Sure, young players, which they have a lot of, generally improve as they age, but they don't generally magically transform overnight from a .683 OPS to an .838 OPS like Stephen Drew is doing thus far this year.

* Trivia question: which three offenses last year were at or below the 89 OPS+ mark? Answer at the bottom of this post.
** Yes, I'm totally trying out the Pozterisk style of annotating my posts. Scroll down to the bottom of this post here to see this term used by its inventor. Also, just read all of Posnanski's blog because Joe Posnanski is the best sportswriter in the world today.

I also think the Diamondbacks' bullpen will struggle this year, given that their two most highly leveraged relievers have terrible peripherals (that would be Tony Pena and Brandon Lyon, and yes, those are terrible as in worse-than-Trevor-Hoffman bad peripherals).

Given this possibly optimistic view that the Snakes are in for a fall back to earth, and my general unwillingness to accept the Padres' and Dodgers' offensive struggles as anything more than a small sample size blip, it is no wonder I consider this division far from decided. That 6 game lead certainly helps the D-Backs, though. Last year's AL West race, generally considered a cakewalk for the Angels in the final month of the season after the M's collapsed, was decided by 6 games. 6 games is a large deficit to make up, and requires the Padres, Dodgers, or Rockies to significantly outplay the Snakes to overcome it. To sum up, I'm not worried about what this start says about the relevant talent levels of the Diamondbacks and the Padres, but I am worried about the practical result of it, which is a 5 game lead for Arizona.

Despite the small sample size, there are a couple of Padres I am very much worried about. Jim Edmonds and Scott Hairston have started very slowly, which just adds to the evidence existing before the season that the former is pretty much done and the latter just can't hit major league pitching. If these suspicions continue to be confirmed by their play, the Padres are without a viable centerfielder, which could be a problem. Maybe. Maybe Chris Young can just work on getting everything hit to either left or right field. Dodger fans, if I were a Dodger fan this means I would also be worried about Andruw Jones. I was expecting a bounceback close to pre-2007 form, but his performance to this point in the season suggests that last year was not a fluke, and this might be his true talent level now.

The main player I am concerned about based solely on his 2008 performance is Heath Bell. Yes, the Heath Bell with a 3.55 ERA, which was below 1 before today. Looking at the numbers, his strikeout rate has fallen apart, with 5 in 12 2/3 innings, and his groundball rate has collapsed from 59% to 36%. These are numbers from a very small sample size, but from observing him pitch it appears his stuff has slipped too. From fangraphs (scroll to the bottom of that link), his fastball velocity is down 3 mph from last year's, and he's throwing the fastball a lot more this year 80% this year versus 64% last year. These numbers aren't a reversion back to his old New York struggles; even while he was struggling there he was throwing hard, striking large bunches of guys out, and getting lots of ground balls, so this appears to be an entirely new development. I have no idea what the problem is, if there really is a problem; it could just be he needs a little time to find his command or get fully loosened up or whatever. I'm guessing the Padres know better than me what's going on here, so I hope they have a good solution in mind. Or maybe this is still a case of overreacting to a small sample size.

Trivia Answer: The Royals were the worst last year, with a team OPS+ of 85, thanks to one person on the team with over 100 PA compiling an OPS+ over 100 - Billy Butler, who eeked out a 105. The White Sox were the second worst despite a 150 from Jim Thome. And everyone's favorite horrific offensive team, the San Francisco Giants, tied with the Diamondbacks with an 89 OPS+.

College Sports

2008-04-21T02:55:00.000-07:00

You know what separates collegiate sports from professional sports? Well besides the multi-million dollar contracts and endorsement deals...

It's recruiting.

I played competitive baseball most of the time from ages 8-13, and then off and on from 13-16. However, since I didn't really take it seriously from 13-16, and consequently never played for a high school team, I missed out on any possibility of being recruited. Now granted, I had vague ideas of what the recruiting process was like, i.e., coach comes to player's house, tells him/her about the wonders of State University, makes promises that have about a 35% chance of being fulfilled, and then proceeds to send text messages and e-mails until the recruit commits. I thought I had a relatively good grip on how recruiting goes.

Until tonight.

I discovered tonight that recruiting goes above and beyond just coaches you barely know, making promises they can't keep, and generally falling all over themselves for you. Nay, recruiting involves family members making subtle, (and not so subtle) remarks and/or doing subtle, (and not so subtle) things to convince you to attend said school. For your consideration, I submit to you the case of one Ian Miller. He is a strapping young lad, roguishly handsome, disarmingly charming, and yes, he always smells good. This man, ladies and gentlemen, applied to two major universities in the Los Angeles area, the University of Southern California, and the University of California at Los Angeles. These schools are more commonly known as USC, and UCLA. Here's where we introduce our supporting character, and inevitably, our recruiter, a respected chief of family practice medicine at six Kaiser Permanente Hospitals in the Orange County and Los Angeles County region, a graduate of the University of California at San Diego medical school and most importantly, a Phi Beta Kappa graduate of UCLA. His name is John Karapetian, and he happens to be our hero's uncle.

Now, lest ye be confused, this recruiting of our hero is not necessarily a bad, or even an unwelcome act, it is merely an interesting case study in the recruitment process.

Example 1: Said Uncle takes recruitee (?) to a UCLA-Oregon football game at the Rose Bowl in Pasadena knowing full well that the history and tradition of the stadium and the massive UCLA crowds would instill in our hero a desire to take part in the majesty of UCLA athletics. On a scale of 1 to 10, this is a solid 9 in effectiveness.

Example 2: When discussing school possibilities for the fall, said Uncle does never acknowledge the presence of USC as a possible option, opting instead to recognize only UCLA when discussing acceptance, or rejection letter notifications. This rates a solid 5 on the scale, as it belittles the very existence of USC as a contender.

Example 3: While the entire family is gathered together in front of a television, said Uncle, instead of allowing us to watch Sports Center, or something equally as neutral, puts on a DVD showcasing the UCLA Men's Basketball Dynasty during the John Wooden era. This hour long presentation showcases the University and the athletic program, and creates a feeling of nostalgia and pride in our potential recruitee. While not as emotionally investing as the Rose Bowl football game, the DVD still manages to echo our recruiter's message, that UCLA is clearly superior to any university that could possibly exist. Thus, it receives a 8 on our 1-10 scale.

So you see, that while these acts taken separately seem to be innocuous and in the best of intentions, they are in fact, subconsciously, inserting UCLA propaganda into our hero's psyche. This indeed, is a most impressive recruitment tool, and something that should be utilized at every opportunity.

While our hero's mind has not been made, whether by him, or by USC and UCLA, he has certainly been affected by the expertly maneuvered recruiting of a most talented UCLA graduate. I will take it upon myself to inform you all any further developments in this highly interesting case.

Elimination Number

2008-04-18T02:08:00.000-07:00

The San Francisco Giants are a mere 142 games from being eliminated from playoff contention! Brian Bocock, start making your October travel reservations...

Power Rankings - Week 3

2008-04-16T01:10:00.000-07:00

Well, amazingly enough, we're already in Week 3 of the 2008 Major League Baseball season. And relatedly, isn't it convenient in baseball that we get to say it's just the "2008" season? In basketball you have the troubling "2005-06" deal, and football will say simply "2007" but in reality, the playoffs and Super Bowl are in 2008. So way to go MLB for simplifying our lives with your one year system. Of course, it might have something to do with the fact that baseball is a primarily outside game requiring good weather outside of temperature and precipitation extremes. But I like to think it's so us aspiring sportswriters can easily refer to a season and know exactly which one we mean. With that blisteringly brilliant introduction, let me continue to the 2008 Major League Baseball Season Week 3 Power Rankings. As always, these are simply one man's relatively humble opinion of how the baseball season has transpired to this point, not necessarily a predictor of how the season will finish.

1. Arizona Diamondbacks: The D-backs are 8-2 in their last 10, and are getting a ton of hitting from their young stars. The question for them will be if their bullpen can make it through the year.

2. St. Louis Cardinals: The Cardinals have Braden Looper at 3-0, and apparently have someone in the rotation named Todd Wellemeyer, who may in fact set the record for most "e's" in one name.

3. Boston Red Sox: The Red Sox have won four in a row with David Ortiz hitting .104. That's worrisome for when he inevitably starts hitting. Coco Crisp desperately needs to be traded to open up CF for Jacoby Ellsbury.

4. Milwaukee Brewers: The Brewers are 8-5 without Ryan Braun and Prince Fielder playing well, and without the services of young phenom Yovani Gallardo. If Gagne proves consistent, they could be one of the best teams in the NL.

5. Los Angeles Angels of Orange (not LA) County: The OC (don't call it that) Angels are continuing to play well without John Lackey and Kelvim Escobar. Joe Saunders has had a great start, Casey Kotchman seems to have turned the corner offensively, and K-Rod is dominant as always. Times are good in Anaheim (which is in Orange County).

6. Oakland Athletics: Even with Dana Eveland's first so-so start, and Rich Harden once again on the DL, the A's seem to be ok. They won't be for very long without Harden, but as I said before, they might not be as bad as I thought they would be.

7. Toronto Blue Jays: With a few breaks in their favor, and a successful Adam Lind callup, they could very well challenge in the AL East. The Killer M's (Marcum, McGowan), are the true anchors of the rotation at this point.

8. Chicago White Sox: I really like Carlos Quentin as a breakout candidate this year, and John Danks has been dominant to start the season. They do have some young players with upside, the two just mentioned, and Nick Swisher as well. However, Pablo Ozuna seems to be getting playing time, which is unacceptable.

9. Florida Marlins: Their highest paid player is Kevin Gregg. Someone 80% of non-fantasy playing baseball fans would never have heard of. The starting rotation ERA is 7.17. How are they winning? Raise your hand if you think Hanley Ramirez is actually superman.

10. Chicago Cubs: Losing Soriano for any extended period of time would really hurt. Fukudome, Soto, and Lee have all had very solid starts, but I still remain firmly unimpressed with the starting rotation.

11. San Diego Padres: Returned the favor in LA, taking 2 of 3, despite being outscored 16-9. Bullpen seems to have settled down, and the starting pitching continues to be dominant at home. There's no surer thing in baseball than Jake Peavy going 7+ innings with 2 or fewer runs and 7-10 strikeouts at Petco.

12. Kansas City Royals: Billy Butler and Alex Gordon have gotten off to great starts, and already are giving Royals fans a glimpse of that "organizational savior" talent. Brian Bannister and Zack Greinke have been excellent, and with a return to form by Gil Meche, the Royals should be a lot closer to .500 than they have been recently.

13. Baltimore Orioles: How much money could you have made betting that George Sherrill would have 6 saves in the first two weeks? Still don't see the Orioles going anywhere soon, but Adam Jones and Nick Markakis form a solid core around which to build a team.

14. New York Yankees: Phil Hughes and Ian Kennedy have a combined ERA of over 17 to this point. Obviously, they'll need to improve on that. Believe it or not, I could see the Yankees finishing behind Toronto in the East if the pitching fails to hold up.

15. New York Mets: Reyes finally had a good night, going 4-5, and Wright looks like he'll again put up MVP-quality numbers. The question for this year will once again be with the starting pitching.

16. Philadelphia Phillies: Scoring 4 in the 9th off Valverde has to feel good. The Fighting Phils will be best remembered this season for challenging the Royals for best uniforms.

17. Seattle Mariners: Erik Bedard is already on the DL, which is not a good sign. They need him and J.J. Putz to be back quickly. Meanwhile, Adam Jones hits his first homer, and George Sherrill has 6 saves.

18. Los Angeles Dodgers: The Dodgers have been struggling recently, losing 1-0 to San Diego, having the bases loaded in the 9th in their 7-5 loss, also to San Diego, and then having their star closer blow a save with 2 outs in the 9th inning and lose 6-4. Those three games go differently, and they're 9-5. However you spin it though, the Dodgers are 3-7 in their last ten. Andruw Jones showing some life is a good sign, and there are positive indications that the offense is beginning to wake up. Now it's time to make sure the bullpen is awake too.

19. Pittsburgh Pirates: Nate McLouth and Xavier Nady are tearing the cover off the ball. If Zach Duke and Paul Maholm can step it up and slot in with Gorzelanny and Snell, the Pirates will only be bad, not terrible.

20. Minneosta Twins: The Twins have blown leads against the Tigers two consecutive nights, contributing to a three game losing streak. But Nick Blackburn and Boof Bonser starting well has to be encouraging.

21. Detroit Tigers: The Tigers have shown signs of life, coming from behind two nights in a row, running their record to, well, 4-10. 5 homers tonight shows the offense is close to getting untracked. They desperately need Francisco Rodney and Joel Zumaya back though.

22. Cincinnati Reds: After starting 6-4, they've lost 4 in a row. Johnny Cueto was dominant through 2 starts, then gave up 5 runs in 6 innings. Still, him, Harang, and Arroyo form a solid rotation to go with the offense.

23. Tampa Bay Rays: The Rays are 3-7 in their last 10, namely due to losing 2 close games against the Yankees. That'll likely be the story for the season, close, but not quite there. Evan Longoria already contributing is a great sign for the future of the franchise, however.

24. Cleveland Indians: Joe Borowski is on the DL, a massive blessing for the Indians, and a chance to try out Rafael Betancourt as the closer. However, he never even had a chance tonight as the bullpen allowed Boston to break a tie.

25. Atlanta Braves: Chipper Jones, Yunel Escobar, Brian McCann, Tim Hudson, and John Smoltz have all had great starts to the season, which is why it's surprising they're only 5-8. If they can weather the bullpen injuries, they should be fine.

26. Colorado Rockies: The Rockies sweep Atlanta, then get absolutely dismantled by Arizona for 2 games before winning 13-5, then almost get no-hit by Randy Wolf. Huh? I guess we're in for a year of ups and downs in Denver.

27. Houston Astros: Another week goes by in Houston and I still don't care about the Astros.

28. San Francisco Giants: After I ranked them last, last week, the Giants went out to prove me wrong. Way to go guys! 28th this week! Somebody named John Bowker has provided a spark, and Lincecum and Cain are awesome. There's a small glimmer of hope in the mine shaft of the Giants organization.

29. Texas Rangers: They've lost 5 in a row. How long is Salty going to be in the minor leagues? They have some good young players, Ian Kinsler, Hank Blalock, Josh Hamilton, even David Murphy has some potential. Why not let Salty develop with them? Help is on the way though, with a stacked farm system.

30. Washington Nationals: After winning 3 straight to open the year, they lost 9 in a row to start 4-10. The rotation is awful, but at least Christian Guzman and Lastings Milledge are playing well.

Well that does it for Week 3's power rankings. Thanks for reading. Also, in sports related movie news, check out "Leatherheads" starring George Clooney and John Krasinski, very good overall movie, and definitely a fun football flick as well.

The Padres' Bullpen

2008-04-09T16:19:00.000-07:00

Last night against the Giants the Padres' bullpen again allowed the opposition to score the winning runs. Ok, so that was after holding them scoreless for the previous four innings, so last night's game is probably the wrong one to use to demonstrate the pen's struggles. Still, the Padre relievers as a group have the second worst ERA in baseball this season. What does this tell us about the Padres' pen and their prospects for the rest of the season? Should they be seeking reinforcements, and should we be re-evaluating the team's true strengths?

In a word, no. In three words, small sample size. In many more words that reiterate those four words, the combined twenty innings the relievers have thrown adds almost no information for us about their individual abilities. Cla Meredith is still a great groundball pitcher with excellent control who dominates righties. Joe Thatcher is still a groundballing sidearmer better against lefties but who can get righties out. Heath Bell is still overall awesome. Trevor Hoffman still has a great changeup and the same stuff he's used to get by with a sub 3 ERA for six years in a row. Enrique Gonzalez, Glendon Rusch, and Wil Ledezma probably aren't going to be very good, but Kevin Cameron and Carlos "Che" Guevara both look solid and available to be called up/activated from the DL.

More on Trevor Hoffman: according to Gameday, Hoffman's velocity is right where it was last year, his changeup still looks as nasty as ever, and he's used his slider effectively at times (he struck out Matt Kemp on three straight sliders). He had a terrible outing against Houston where he struggled with his control, but still almost escaped without allowing a run. Against the Dodgers, he gave up one run on a walk and a single. It's been four innings, two of them excellent. He's given up one extra base hit, so it's not like every ball put in play has been a rocket. It is extremely premature to conclude he's done.

Power Rankings

2008-04-07T19:46:00.000-07:00

The extended first week of the Major League Baseball season is now over, and we've already had some surprises. Nate McLouth of the Pirates turning into Babe Ruth Jr., the Baltimore Orioles defying the experts (myself included) by starting in first place with a 5-1 record, and the Detroit Tigers are winless in their first six games. So while I would like to make these power rankings reflective of how I think things will actually turn out, at this point I will temper my expectations in deference as to how the season is currently playing out. A word of caution however, as is often said this is a marathon, not a trip to the kitchen for some midnight snacks. Ok that's not exactly the saying, but you get the idea.

So here are my power rankings for Week 2...

1. Toronto Blue Jays: I know what you're thinking. The Toronto Blue Jays? But, I say to you, do not judge lest ye be judged. The Blue Jays just swept the Red Sox, granted at home, but that's still impressive. Their rotation has four very, very good pitchers in Halladay, Burnett, McGowan, and Marcum, and Jesse Litsch also has some potential. While the Red Sox saw Josh Beckett and Clay Buchholz struggle, Marcum and McGowan looked dominant. With a Vernon Wells return to form, the Blue Jays very well could contend in the Al East.

2. Anaheim Angels: Even without Lackey and Escobar, their pitching seems to be ok. So with them, they should be even better.

3. New York Yankees: How long can they keep Joba Chamberlain out of the rotation? Relatedly, how long can Mike Mussina stay in the rotation?

4. Milwaukee Brewers: They started hot last year too, but as it is always is, with a healthy Ben Sheets they should be good. Now they also need a healthy Gallardo as well.

5. Baltimore Orioles: Well. They swept the Mariners. That's a good sign. They're also still the Baltimore Orioles. That's a bad sign.

6. Chicago White Sox: They've won five in a row, including a sweep of Detroit. Still don't see them winning this year.

7. Arizona Diamondbacks: If Justin Upton continues to hit this well, they will be very dangerous. Mark Reynolds, Upton, and Chris Young are all at the top of the HR leaderboard.

8. Los Angeles Dodgers: The Dodgers were 3-6 against the Pads in Petco last year, so taking 2 of 3 is a step forward. They're battling through facing Matt Cain, Tim Lincecum, Jake Peavy, Chris Young, and Dan Haren, they're 2-2 so far.

9. San Diego Padres: The starting rotation has been excellent, but the bullpen has really struggled, Hoffman has not looked good so far this year. The hitting has also been solid so far.

10. St. Louis Cardinals: Pujols still hasn't hit a homer, and yet the team is 5-2. We'll see how long that lasts, though.

11. Kansas City Royals: The Royals certainly have some talent, so with some lucky breaks they could stay up towards the top of the Central for a few more weeks probably.

12. Atlanta Braves: They won the two games they played against the Mets, but they lost Mike Hampton again. Did they really expect to have him around?

13. Cleveland Indians: C.C. Sabathia was rocked at Oakland, but Cliff Lee pitched well. Go figure.

14. Boston Red Sox: They were 3-1 until they ran into a buzzsaw in Toronto, but Beckett and Buchholz struggling is worrisome.

15. Chicago Cubs: Perhaps a little low, but I am unexcited by their rotation at this point. Fukudome has been great so far.

16. Tampa Bay Rays: When David Price, Reid Brignac, Wade Davis, and Jake McGee are ready, this team will be dangerous.

17. Cincinnati Reds: Johnny Cueto's debut was dazzling, and so was Edison Volquez.

18. Florida Marlins: Would you trade the entire team for A-Rod and $7 million? These are the tough questions.

19. Texas Rangers: Josh Hamilton has started well, but Volquez was excellent. Only time will tell on that one.

20. Philadelphia Phillies: The bats were silenced by Tim Redding, but I don't see that being a long term problem here.

21. Oakland Athletics: I actually don't know that they will be as bad as I previously thought. Assuming of course the obvious, Rich Harden's arm bones not exploding into shards of shattered hopes.

22. Pittsburgh Pirates: Nate McLouth and Xavier Nady are the best players in baseball. Let's just get it out now. You heard it here first.

23. Minnesota Twins: Really not much going on here until Francisco Liriano comes back. Can't wait for that.

24. New York Mets: I really don't like Oliver Perez, and Pedro's already hurt, so we'll have to see if Santana and John Maine are enough to get by.

25. Houston Astros: It's hard to care less about a team than I do about the Astros.

26. Colorado Rockies: They certainly are struggling. But they're not THIS bad.

27. Seattle Mariners: With Putz out, we'll see how the bullpen fares. They already blew one win for Felix Hernandez.

28. Washington Nationals: I'm not sure which is their number one starter, Odalis Perez or Matt Chico.

29. Detroit Tigers: My preseason pick to win the World Series, the Tigers have really not done anything well so far. Obviously not time to panic, but definitely puzzling.

30. San Francisco Giants: Possibly the worst lineup in baseball history. This team is Matt Cain and Tim Lincecum and a black hole.

Well there ya have it. Stay tuned to baseball, and if I'm not too lazy, I'll do this again for Week 3.

2008 Season Preview and Predictions

2008-03-30T18:31:00.000-07:00

This is two baseball fans' take on the start of the season. Keep in mind Filliam is a Dodgers fan, Carl is a Padres fan, and, all things being equal, we root for the NL over the AL. Unlike other predictions, you can rest assured these will be dragged out and reviewed after the season, if only so the better predictor can celebrate his victory. With that in mind, on to the preview:

NL West

Filliam: As a Dodgers fan I would be remiss if I didn't pick the boys in blue to return to the top of the division. I like their lineup top to bottom, and a healthy Schmidt would give them a very solid 1-5 to go with a solid bullpen.

Carl: Shockingly enough, I like the Padres. I see a team that had a very good season last year (89 wins) and did enough in the offseason to maintain that level of performance. Much as it pains to admit me, the Dodgers do look very good, especially now that it looks like they're going to pick Ethier to start in left over Pierre.

Filliam: For the same reason my esteemed colleague Carl likes the Padres to win the division, I like the D-backs to finish in second. They won 90 games last year, and while they were outscored, I believe their hitters will progress enough and the rotation will benefit from the addition of Dan Haren. The Padres as I've said previously, are too reliant on one-year players, injury risks, and are starting Scott Hairston and Jody Gerut in the outfield to open the year. But, the rotation should be good, the bullpen always is, which is why I still think they'll finish over .500.

Carl: Ah, see people rag on the Padres for starting Hairston in center and McAnulty/Gerut in left, but the Dodgers are throwing out Blake DeWitt at third. I think people are overestimating how much Arizona's young players are going to improve. A modest improvement for a lot of those guys still makes their lineup below average. And their bullpen pitched way, way over its head last year, both in terms of season versus career performance and relative to their peripherals. For some reason, the Rockies just don't do it for me, probably because it's hard for me to get a handle on the magnitude of their park effects. They have 5 really good hitters in their lineup and three really bad ones, and their lineup isn't as great as it's cracked up to be. Last year, it was a little above average, slightly better than the Padres'. As a side note, the Dodgers, D-backs, and Giants all had really terrible hitting teams last year. Getting back to this year, the Giants' lineup is going to be horrific. They had a 89 OPS+ last year and subtracted the 170 OPS+ from left. Brian Bocock, who put up a .656 OPS in A-ball last year, starts the year at short for them.

Filliam: The Rockies to me were good, but fluky last year, and I think they'll be closer to 80 wins than 90. The Giants have promising young pitching but disastrously awful hitting and are clearly the bottom feeder in the division.

Filliam's Prediction:

Los Angeles Dodgers 88-74
Arizona Diamondbacks 86-76
San Diego Padres 83-79
Colorado Rockies 82-80
San Francisco Giants 67-95

Carl's Prediction:
1. San Diego Padres 91-71
2. Los Angeles Dodgers 89-73 *wild card
3. Arizona Diamondbacks 84-78
4. Colorado Rockies 83-81
5. San Fransisco Giants 65-97

NL Central

Carl: Looks like a two team race between the Cubs and Brewers. The Brewers hugely improved their defense by signing Cameron, moving Hall to third, and moving Braun to left. That change alone could give them 3 wins over last year. The Cubs look like a very solid team top to bottom, and I think they'll edge out the Brewers at the end of the season.

Filliam: I had the Cubs winning the division before I remembered Lou Pinella is their manager. He's terrible. If Gallardo and Sheets return healthy the Brewers will definitely challenge for the division. The Reds have some exciting young players, but in general the rest of the division is pretty weak and unexciting.

Carl: Agree with you there. If everything breaks the Reds way, they could contend, but they're probably too focused more on the future to take some risks trying to win now. Man how the Astros and the Cardinals have fallen. As for the Pirates, well, at least they probably won't use their top draft pick on a reliever this year.

Filliam's Prediction:

Milwaukee Brewers 86-76
Chicago Cubs 85-77
Cincinnati Reds 80-82
Houston Astros 76-86
St. Louis Cardinals 74-88
Pittsburgh Pirates 71-91

Carl's Prediction:
1. Cubs
2. Brewers
------.500----
3. Reds
4. Cardinals
5. Astros
6. Pirates
(Note: I'm not predicting records anymore because that's a ridiculous implication of precision that I don't want to make. Ok, no, mainly I just don't want to tally up all the wins and losses to make sure the league as a whole isn't winning more games than it's losing. I'll draw in a .500 line in the standings; that's about as precise as I can predict.)

NL East

Filliam: The Mets are the best team in the National League this year, mainly due to Johan Santana. The Mets have always had pitching problems, and although Santana won't completely solve all of their issues, he'll certainly help. The Braves should have a great offense, and Hudson, Smoltz, and Glavine in the rotation, which will be enough to compete. The Phillies have pitching issues, the Nats have well, issues, and the Marlins are rebuilding.

Carl: Yes, the Mets are good. Very shallow, but good. I think they'll avoid enough injuries to be the best team in the NL. I agree with your other assessments, and would like to throw in a compliment of Jim Bowden, who has made some solid high upside acquisitions in his quest to rebuild the Nationals.

Filliam's Predictions:

New York Mets 91-71
Atlanta Braves 87-75
Philadelphia Phillies 84-78
Washington Nationals 75-87
Florida Marlins 68-94

Carl's Predictions:
1. Mets
2. Braves
3. Phillies
------.500-------
4. Nats
5. Marlins

AL West

Carl: I'm really down on this division in general now that Escobar is out for the year and Lackey is missing a month. The Angels should still have enough to win the division, but they're not a particularly strong team anymore.

Filliam: I liked the Angels to win more games until the severity of Kelvim Escobar's injury was revealed, and before John Lackey got hurt. The Mariners will challenge them with Bedard and King Felix, but the Angels offense should be enough to get them through.

Carl: I'm not very impressed with the Mariners, who outperformed their runs scored/runs allowed last year, but they could have enough to push the weakened Angels. I was surprised to see they had a 104 OPS+ last year, so they found some offense from somewhere. Oakland could regret punting on this year if Rich Harden and Bobby Crosby somehow avoid injury. Ok, so that's not going to happen. Oh well. Good job by Beane acknowledging the improbability of everyone in the division suffering massive injuries while Harden and Crosby avoid them.

Filliam: Yeah, the Rangers and A's have a lot of prospects but neither should be contenders this year.

Filliam's Predictions:

Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim of Los Angeles no wait, Orange County 89-73
Seattle Mariners 86-76
Texas Rangers 75-87
Oakland A's 71-91

Carl's Predictions:
1. The Angels Angels of Anaheim
2. Mariners
------.500--------
3. A's
4. Rangers

AL Central

Filliam: The Tigers made one of the biggest acquisitions of the offseason by getting Miguel Cabrera and Dontrelle Willis. Add those two to an already very good team, and you have a great team. The Indians too have a playoff caliber team, and a return to form by Cliff Lee would go a long way in helping them return. If the Tigers get Joel Zumaya and Francisco Rodney back healthy they should have a good enough bullpen to get by the Indians.

Carl: My bold prediction for this year: the Tigers are not going to score 1000 runs. Cabrera and Renteria are great upgrades, but the Tigers are going to see a lot of regression from Polanco, Granderson, and Ordonez. I like the Indians to sneak by the Tigers mainly due to better pitching and pitching depth. As for the rest of the division, got anything relevant or interesting to say about them, because I certainly don't.

Filliam: The Royals are up and coming, the White Sox are, uh, a baseball team, and the Twins are rebuilding.

Carl: Nicely done.

Filliam's Predictions:

Detroit Tigers 96-66
Cleveland Indians 92-70
Kansas City Royals 77-85
Chicago White Sox 74-88
Minnesota Twins 68-94

Carl's Predictions:
1. Indians
2. Tigers
-------.500------
3. White Sox
4. Royals
5. Twins

AL East

Carl: Ooh, finally time for the only division that matters. That's right, it's the home of the storied Jays-Rays rambunctious rhyming rivalry. The Rays have taken it on the chin from their northern rivals, but they've done an excellent job building up their team from within. Picking first every year certainly helps with that. I don't think this is the year they pass the Jays though. My favorite part about the Blue Jays is their awesome, awesome defense. Until they cut Reed Johnson, they had a legitimate gold glove caliber defender at every position except catcher. It looks like the Rays actually adopted some of the Jays' defensive emphasis this year, adding Bartlett at short and keeping Upton in center for good. That, the addition of Matt Garza, and the continued development of their top minor league arms should greatly decrease their RA this year. I think both teams will be right around .500, with the Blue Jays a couple games up on their Floridian nemesis. Can you think of any other interesting teams that call this division home? I guess we could theoretically talk about the two best teams in baseball.

Filliam: The Red Sox have some interesting questions right now, namely can Jon Lester become a top flight starter, is Josh Beckett healthy, and can Clay Buchholz and/or Bartolo Colon be good enough to get them the division? That's more questions than you'd like from a defending world champion, but if they get satisfactory answers they will probably win the division. The Yankees are for the first time that I can remember, relying on young players on the starting staff, Phil Hughes, Joba Chamberlain, and Ian Kennedy will all be a major part of the team. While this is a good thing for the future, I'm not entirely sure how their rotation will look this year. Mike Mussina was awful last year, Pettitte was good last year, but has injury issues, and has steroids drama to deal with now. So again, questions for a contending team.

Carl: I actually think the Yankees will take the division and the Red Sox the wildcard. Better offense, just enough pitching. Thoughts on the rest of the division?

Filliam: The Blue Jays have some good young players, and continue to get better, but I don't think they have enough to get over the hump. If they bring up Adam Lind and he fulfills his considerable potential, they'll have a good offense to go along with what appears to be a good rotation. The Devil...err, Rays have a ton of young talent, a ton of prospects, some more ready to contribute than others, and with some luck, will be contenders within a few years. But losing Rocco Baldelli hurts, and Scott Kazmir needs to get healthy as well. The Orioles are a solid 5 years away from being a decent team.

Carl: Oh yes, the Orioles, now more than ever complete afterthoughts. At least they're going in the right direction in rebuilding now, though.

Filliam's Predictions:

Boston Red Sox 95-67
New York Yankees 91-71
Toronto Blue Jays 86-76
Tampa Bay Rays 82-80
Baltimore Orioles 65-97

Carl's Predictions:
1. Yankees
2. Red Sox *wild card
3. Blue Jays
4. Rays
----.500-----
5. Orioles

Postseason

Filliam's Predictions:

AL-Detroit over Anaheim, Boston over Cleveland; Detroit over Boston

NL-New York over Milwaukee, Los Angeles over Atlanta; Los Angeles over New York

World Series-Detroit over Los Angeles

Carl's Predictions:
NL - Dodgers over Mets, Padres over Cubs, Padres over Dodgers
AL - Indians over Red Sox, Yankees over Angels, Indians over Yankees

World Series - Padres over Indians
(I'm being a homer in picking the Padres to win their division, I'm not going to just stop there and pick someone else to win the World Series.)

Awards

AL Cy Young: Erik Bedard, Seattle Mariners

NL Cy Young: Johan Santana, New York Mets

AL MVP: Grady Sizemore, CF, Cleveland Indians

NL MVP: David Wright, 3B, New York Mets

AL ROY: Evan Longoria, 3B, Tampa Bay Rays

NL ROY: Kosuke Fukodome, CF, Chicago Cubs

Random other predictions:

Filliam: It seems to me that there are a few really good teams, a few really bad teams, and a lot in the middle. Should make for quite an interesting season. Players I tossed out for consideration in the awards categories: Prince Fielder for NL MVP, and Miguel Cabrera for AL MVP. I like our selections, but both of those guys could be close.

Carl: Randy Wolf has a huge year for the Padres. Brad Penny has a terrible year for the Dodgers. Matt Kemp takes a step back, Andruw Jones has a very good bounceback year. Pedro Martinez throws 50 innings this year and signs with the Padres next offseason. C.C. Sabathia signs an extension with Cleveland in the middle of the season. Justin Verlander disappoints. Jose Guillen disappoints, Zach Greinke has a huge year. Cole Hamels throws a no-hitter, the Mariners and A's get into a brawl, and Shane Victorino hits for the cycle.

Ouch

2008-03-30T00:38:00.001-07:00

While perusing Oliver Perez's PECOTA card at Baseball Prospectus, I found this comment on him from the 2003 annual:

"I had seen notes that showed Perez’s fastball at 90 mph, but it sure looked better than that to me. He supports it with a tremendous changeup and tight curveball, giving him three quality pitches to work with. Perez is mature beyond his years in terms of working hitters with speed changes; somewhere, his changeup against Reggie Sanders just hit the glove. San Diego might be the only club with better and younger front-line starting pitching than Oakland. These guys are that good."

Ouch. At least Peavy's good...

Some of these young arms that were better and younger than Barry Zito, Mark Mulder, Tim Hudson, Aaron Harang, and Rich Harden:

Jake Peavy - Hey, a success. Let's just stop here.
Oliver Perez
Brian Lawrence
Dennis Tankersley
Adam Eaton
Mark Phillips
Ben Howard
Eric Cyr
Mike Bynum

Glance at this article and think about what might have been.

So what does this tell us? Never count your minor league pitching prospects until they are hatched as fully formed big league starters. Actually, if you think about this list, Peavy is one of the best pitchers in baseball, Perez was traded for a great player (coming of a 177 OPS+ year), and Eaton was used to acquire Chris Young and Adrian Gonzalez. I guess that's about as good as you can hope for when dealing with minor league arms and potential. I think I would have preferred a rotation of Hudson, Zito, Mulder, Harden, Harang in their primes, though.

Padres Opening Day Roster Analysis

2008-03-27T20:22:00.000-07:00

The Padres came into spring training with a number of questions to resolve about the roster. The left field starter and fifth rotation member were TBD, three of the five bench spots were up in the air, and the last three bullpen slots remained unclaimed. With five days to the opener, these questions have been answered and the Opening Day roster seems to be set, barring further injury or a change of heart. Here's a look through how those questions were answered and if they came up with the correct answer, in my (obviously infallible) opinion.

Disclaimer: I was really cheesed off when the Padres released Russell Branyan, so I tend to overreact to small roster moves that make no sense to my way of thinking about the team. Most of the bench and back of the bullpen spots are all about small sample size theater, so the true impact of the back of the roster construction is very small. We're not choosing between Juan Pierre and Matt Kemp for 700 PA here. Still, in the NL West, every game counts.

5th Starter's Spot: Justin Germano has been declared the victor in this battle after everything worked out in the Padres' interests nicely in spring training. Germano had a very good camp; the second best option, Glendon Rusch, had a very good camp and is ready to help if Germano falters or Wolf is injured; the inexplicable front runner entering camp, Shawn Estes, who is an inferior pitcher to Germano and Rusch, had a terrible camp and will start with Portland to work on stuff. Germano is the fifth starter until/unless Prior returns. Rusch can step in if Germano falters or Wolf goes down and hopefully not embarrass himself (PECOTA has him at an above replacement level 4.95 ERA, and presumably he could be better if he's healthier, which the Padres seem to think he is). Ideally LeBlanc will be ready to help in the second half if anyone goes down beyond that; he held his own in major league camp this spring.

Left Field Starter: Deciding to delay Headley's service clock to control him for another year and the injury to Edmonds left Gerut and McAnulty the left fielders by default. The addition of Huber should create a passable left field platoon. I'm not particularly excited about any of these guys, but maybe one of them will catch fire and keep Headley down for a while. When Edmonds comes back, Hairston moves back to left and probably platoons with the hotter of Gerut or McAnulty.

Bullpen spots: Hoffman, Bell, Thatcher, and Meredith were guaranteed spots. Hampson and Guevara (who I really like and hope is on the team when he's healthy) start the year on the DL, and Ledezma, Rusch, and Gonzalez get the last three spots. Rusch is the necessary long man, but I don't get the inclusion of Ledezma and Gonzalez. Ledezma has good stuff but needs to refine his control. He had a superficially good spring ERA-wise, but in 13 IP he's had 8 BBs and 6 K's. Gonzalez also has a mediocre track record and wasn't impressive this spring. Oh well. Neither of them is going to pitch in many high leverage situations, and if they aren't very good they'll get booted in favor of Cameron, Hampson, and Guevara quickly enough.

Bench Spots: I think the club did an solid job picking their bench players. Crabbe is the obligatory light hitting fast scrappy guy, who will mainly be used as a middle infielder and center fielder. Clark and Gerut provide good lefty bats off the bench, and the trade for Huber fills the need for a righty pinch hitter. Barrett is the backup catcher, and with a 12 man pitching staff that's all you get on the bench. It looks like they picked the best hitters that have the necessary versatility.

In summary, a solid job filling out the team. I think when Headley gets called back up he'll be mostly the starter in left, with Hairston spelling Giles and Edmonds regularly. I'd also expect Hampson, Guevara, and Cameron to cycle into the back three spots in the bullpen as Ledezma and Gonzalez struggle or other guys get hurt.

The best news of all about the roster this year: Geoff Blum is not the first right handed pinch hitter off of the bench.

March Madness

2008-03-27T15:22:00.000-07:00

March is a time for madness. This much we know. Madness as in, 48 college basketball games in four days. Madness as in playing two regular season baseball games in Japan at 3am Pacific time, then having both teams return to playing exhibition games for a few days, then back to regular season games. With all of that over, however, I'm going to be your guide to the upcoming madness the last few remaining days of March will provide. So, pack your bags and come with me on a journey.

With the NCAA Men's Division 1 Basketball Championship breaking records for longest name and attendance, the tournament will move into regional action. The most interesting matchups include Washington State-North Carolina, Louisville-Tennessee, Stanford-Texas, and Wisconsin-Davidson. That last game features probably the best story of the tournament so far, embodied by Stephen Curry of Davidson. Curry is averaging 35 points through his first two games, and there's no reason to expect he won't be around that total again on Friday. In addition to the rather interesting pronunciation of his first name, Curry also could be the first one man team to advance to the Elite 8. If you saw his performances against Gonzaga and Georgetown, you'd have noticed that his teammates valuable services exist mainly to support his heroic efforts. As an "underdog" fan, I'll be pulling hard for Davidson to continue its run, in the fleeting hope that they knock off North Carolina in the Final Four.

Baseball is back! And by back, I mean the Red Sox and A's are back and the rest of the teams are still basing their decisions on statistics racked up against pitchers like Byung-Hyun Kim.

In any case, while the return of America's pastime to the forefront of television consciousness is most welcome, I can't help but feel that some teams still think they're in spring training. For your consideration, I submit the Florida Marlins. While teams not expected to compete such as the A's, Giants, and Pirates are at least throwing out promising starters such as Joe Blanton, Barry Zito and Ian Snell for opening day duty, the Marlins are starting...Mark Hendrickson. The same Mark Hendrickson that last season was beat out for starts by Brett Tomko. With Miami-Dade County committed to building a new stadium, the team rewards this development by starting Mark Hendrickson. Good luck creating excitement for baseball in South Florida.

All that being said, we're hurtling towards exciting finishes in both college basketball and professional basketball, with classic matchups possible in both championships. North Carolina and UCLA are both favored to return to the championship game, and while not necessarily rivals, they are two of the most storied programs in college basketball history. Meanwhile in the NBA, the Celtics and Lakers are at the top of their respective conferences. Even though the Eastern Conference looks more and more like North Dakota High School Basketball each day. Both of these matchups have as much intrigue and excitement as the "Lost"-"CSI" battle on Thursday nights.

So as you navigate through the raging waters of March sports, look for Stephen Curry, Mark Hendrickson, and the entire Western Conference to add more madness to an already crazy month. In closing, I'll give you my Fantasy Baseball tip of the week, pick up Willy Aybar, the starting third baseman for the Tampa Bay Rays. I feel like he'll be entrenched in that spot for a long, long time.

How I Learned to Stop Worrying (about ERA) and Love RA

2008-03-26T00:25:00.000-07:00

I hate unearned runs. More specifically, I hate their arbitrary separation from earned runs. In the humble opinion of this excellent actor, they are the worst stat in baseball today. Sure, a stat like wins is terrible and often very misleading, but anyone that has ever thought about wins for more than a second realizes their inherent flaws. When arguing about pitcher quality, anyone who wants to make an intelligent comparison focuses on runs allowed, innings pitched, strikeouts, things of this nature. But everyone uses ERA as their quick and easy pitcher comparison stat. It's universally accepted. In comparing pitchers, you look at ERA, adjust it for the home park and/or league, account for innings pitched, and voila, you know which pitcher is better. Except the decision to use ERA instead of RA (runs allowed, which includes earned and unearned runs) could create a serious flaw in the conclusion.

First, the case against separating earned and unearned runs. As anyone who has ever watched a baseball game knows, errors are very arbitrary. Hometown scorekeeping frequently skews the awarding of errors, so that home team is more likely to get hits than errors. Plays where a fielder gets a terrible jump on the ball and doesn't come close to it are scored as hits, while a harder play where the fielder gets a great jump and ranges very far but bobbles a ball is scored an error. Fielding mistakes by outfielders are rarely scored as errors, while most mistakes by infielders are ruled errors, at least those that aren't a result of a lack of range. This unfairly penalizes fly ball pitchers, as they're deemed to be responsible for more of their runs than ground ball pitchers. Finally, pitchers are actually responsible for most of the unearned runs they allow. That an error helped prolong the rally doesn't excuse the other hits allowed by the pitcher that allow the rally to continue. Attempting to adjust ERA for the quality of the defense is a good idea, but the simple use of errors is a very flawed way to do this, in the same way that the use of errors is a very flawed way to evaluate defense.

So, how does this affect our evaluation of pitchers? Well, the comparison that sent me off on this kick is that of Brandon Webb versus Jake Peavy. They've had extremely similar careers to this point: Webb has 1089 IP with 390 ER, for a 3.22 ERA, Peavy has 1087 IP with 400 ER, for a 3.31 ERA. So even before adjusting for ballpark, Webb appears to be the superior pitcher. Once you adjust for park, Webb ends up with a 144 ERA+ and Peavy with a 119 ERA+. It's apparently not even close. But wait, Webb is an extreme groundball pitcher, and as such gives up many more unearned runs than Peavy. That's not a function of Webb's defense, that is a result of the inherent pitching ability of Brandon Webb and the way he attacks hitters. Regardless of how good his defense is, he's going to allow more unearned runs than Jake Peavy over the long haul. As such, the unearned runs must be included in any analysis of his pitching. So if you include those, suddenly Webb has allowed 456 total runs, versus 427 total runs allowed for Peavy. After adjusting for park, Webb is still better, but it's certainly closer than it appears from a cursory glance at ERA or park adjusted ERA.

Use of unearned runs in a pitching analysis makes a big difference in looking at the NL Cy Young race last year. Myron at Friar Forecast took a look at the value of Peavy and Webb last year and concluded that if we ignore unearned runs, Webb was actually slightly more valuable than Peavy last year (the extra innings and more difficult ballpark to pitch in outweigh Peavy's more impressive raw ERA). However, if you re-run in the analysis as Myron does in the comments section (prompted by me, actually) to account for the unearned runs, it tilts the scales definitively in Peavy's favor. Campaigning for Peavy in this context was actually what set me off on my anti-earned/unearned runs crusade.

There are some other interesting comparisons to look at through the lens or earned vs. total runs allowed. Last year Greg Maddux put up a 4.14 ERA in the cavernous Petco Park, while Derek Lowe compiled a 3.88 ERA in the neutral Dodger Stadium (yes, Dodger Stadium is basically neutral, perhaps even slightly favoring hitters). They pitched 198 and 199 1/3 innings, respectively. Lowe threw slightly more innings with a lower ERA in a more hitter friendly park; it seems like a slam dunk that he would have been more valuable. So why does VORP (a measure of a pitchers value compared to a generic freely available replacement, which adjusts for park, league, and yes, uses total runs instead of earned ones specifically) say Maddux was worth 5 runs more last year than Lowe? I'll give you a hint: it's the subject of this entire post, and the last comment in my parenthetical explanation of VORP was something of a spoiler. Yes, that's right, Maddux allowed only a single unearned run last year, while Lowe allowed a whopping fourteen. It's funny how the earned/unearned run split colors our perception. Lowe is viewed as a very good number three pitcher, while Maddux is considered more of a number four guy and considerably shakier. And yet, Maddux was better than Lowe last year.

One final comparison, just for fun. Matsuzaka had a 4.40 ERA last year in a season considered mostly a disappointment. However, he didn't allow a single unearned run. Oliver Perez posted an excellent 3.56 ERA, but he allowed twenty (!) unearned runs. That is definitely an indication the Mets defense was shaky behind him but Perez certainly bears some portion of the blame for those runs. If 20 of Matsuzaka's runs were converted to unearned runs, perhaps by moving 8 errors committed by the Red Sox into 8 of Matsuzaka's bad innings, suddenly he's got a 3.52 ERA and is celebrated as a huge success story. If all of Oliver Perez's unearned runs were earned, maybe the Mets' scorekeeper doesn't like to award errors ever, then he's got a questionable 4.58 ERA. Suddenly the Pirates organization doesn't look like quite such an epic failure for trading Perez back away for peanuts. Sorry, Pirates, most of your other epic failures can't be explained away by looking at unearned runs. The point of this hypothetical is that small changes that have little to do with how Matsuzaka or Perez pitched would cause massive changes in their ERAs and in how they're perceived.

The moral of this story: errors are arbitrary, and bad defense happens to everyone, regardless of their ERA/RA split (RA is ERA but with all runs allowed included). When evaluating past performance of pitchers, RA is a better tool than ERA.

As a postscript, this is an interesting article by David Gassko looking at ground ball pitchers. He confirms that groundball pitchers do allow more unearned runs than other pitchers. 85% of errors occur on groundballs. This article by Michael Wolverton makes the same case I'm trying to make here, only using actual numbers to back it up: that preventing unearned runs is a skill just like preventing earned runs. Wolverton summarizes it succinctly, "Errors will happen. Good pitchers will minimize the damage caused by them. That is, a good pitcher will allow fewer runners on base before the errors happen (so there aren't runners to score on the errors), and will allow fewer hits and walks after errors happen (so the runners who reached on errors won't score)." He finds that, yes, pitchers good at preventing earned runs are also good at preventing unearned runs in general. If he had adjusted for groundball rate, presumably this correlation would have been even stronger.

2008-03-10T19:53:00.000-07:00

Why do we love? What is it about an individual that makes us feel very strongly about them? Is it that we share common goals and aspirations? Or is it that they possess a singularly intangible quality that a limited amount of people notice. These are some of life's biggest questions.

But they're not about relationships.

No, ladies and gentlemen, when I ask those questions I'm not asking from the relationship perspective, I'm asking about fantasy baseball. Why is it that those of us among the Hot Ham Water community are fans of specific players, for example, Tim Lincecum? In this case, I think Lincecum is a combination of goals and aspirations, and intangibles. Which, in turn, makes him even more "desirable." He has the cold, hard statistics that bear out his talent, and he has that certain something, that intangible quality that leads one to believe he will be an incredible major league talent. Another example of a player who just seems to "have it" is Jake Peavy. When you watch him pitch, he has ridiculous talent, and he has the intensity and competitive spirit that leads to greatness. And in another example, this one outside of the world of sports, George Clooney comes to mind as someone who fits that description. He has acting chops, as shown by his excellent performance in "O Brother, Where Art Thou?" and someone who can make any movie better with his charm and suaveness. Tim Lincecum has that kind of ability. Unfortunately, it appears he will continue to toil for a poor quality team in San Francisco, instead of going to pitch for a contender.

One of the best parts about fantasy baseball is the ability to lock in on your favorite players and follow their careers from the minors to the majors. Somehow, I managed to not get Lincecum on any of my three teams this fantasy baseball season. As depressing as that is, a few of the other plays that I feel this way about are currently residing on rosters at least in part controlled by me. While I know that these gut feelings of mine do not conclusively lead to hall of fame careers, it does provide for much more enjoyment and satisfaction. Again, to put things into entertainment terms, having players on your team you consistently root for is like seeing a movie where the plot doesn't necessarily interest you, but the actors do. I'm not a Giants fan, in fact, I despise the Giants, but Lincecum is one of my favorite fantasy players.

So someday soon hopefully I'll be able to acquire Lincecum on one of my teams, and happiness will prevail across the land. Or, I could just win my three leagues and the $1500-ish that goes along with that. Happiness would definitely prevail across the land then too.

Until then I'll keep wondering about just why I love Tim Lincecum.

Mailbag

2008-03-05T13:31:00.000-08:00

Well! Ladies and gentlemen, it has been far too long between posts here at Hot Ham Water. I personally apologize for this as I (and I believe my co-bloggers too) have been wrapped up in the madness that is fantasy baseball drafting season. While the season is not nearly over, today has provided somewhat of a lull in the action, an eye of the storm, if you will. Today, I would like to lovingly take a page from the Bill Simmons playbook and create my own mail bag from which to respond. As always, these are completely fake e-mails sent by non-existant readers...

Q: Ian, you know I'm completely and madly in love with you, why won't you run away with me?

--Becky Smith, Pittsburgh, PA

A: Because you live in Pittsburgh. Move to California.

oops, sorry wrong mailbag...MOVING ON...

Q: Can Randy Moss have the same impact for the New England Patriots this upcoming year as he did last year?

--Alvin Chipmunk, Rancho Cucamonga, CA

A: Well Alvin, I don't think so. And I'll tell you why. Moss came into New England with no expectations other than possibly negative ones, which took off most of the pressure he had on him in Oakland. While he had previously handled himself like an upset 12 year old girl, the lack of pressure and possibly the calming influence of Bill Belichick allowed him to ease into the season without an undue amount of stress. Whether this is a permanent maturation, we won't know until the season starts, but my gut tells me with the now high expectations, Moss will start to revert back to his old ways. Another possible reason for the record breaking season he had last year was the fact he was playing for a contract. In fact, today Moss signed a 3 year $27 million dollar contract. With that out of the way, one would think he would possibly decline somewhat. Kind of like an Adrian Beltre decline from possibly an artificially high, high, to say a very solid level of production. Maybe something like 12 touchdowns and 1,200 yards, which would still put him among the best wide receivers, just not the end all be all at the position like he was last year.

Q: Will Asante Samuel push the Eagles into contention in the NFC?

--Becky Smith, Pittsburgh, PA

A: Wow Becky you sure are sending in a lot of questions. Well I hope so because an Eagles-Chargers Super Bowl matchup would be fantastic for my betting career.

Q: Will Chris Carpenter make a full and complete recovery from Tommy John surgery and be the dominant ace he once was?

--Ron Burgundy, San Diego, CA

A: Yes Ron, yes he will. Without a doubt. Carpenter is barely older than Derek Jeter and although he has a history of injuries, he clearly will regain the form that made him a Cy Young winner. And when he does I will return to this post and point out to all of you just how right I was.

Q: Did you know the Dodgers experimented with vest uniforms in 1999?

--Steve Carrell, Holmby Hills, California

A: I did know that Steve, but thanks for bringing it up. While I am as big a fan of the vest uniform as the next guy, and arguably more so, that was a terrible mistake. When you have a classically identifiable, traditional uniform, the best thing to do is NOT play around with it. Do you hear that Cubs, Yankees, Red Sox, UCLA, USC, Notre Dame, and Marlins?

Q: What do you think of the hit NBC show, "Chuck?" Starring Zachary Levi as the endearingly nerdy eponymous lead?

--Zachary Levi, Los Feliz, California

A: I love it, Zach. Love it. For some reason it makes me really enjoy seeing Los Angeles, and also I am a big fan of the characters and the overall tone of the show. Spy "stuff" has always interested me, and the show mixes humor, action, and emotion quite well. Keep up the good work.

Q: Ian, is it just me or does John Travolta look startlingly good in "Hairspray?"

--David Bergstedt, Carlsbad, California

A: Yup, these are my readers...

I know this has been painfully short for a mail bag, but duty calls. Keep sending in those e-mails and I'll get to more of them next time.

My First Baseball Game

2008-02-21T19:17:00.000-08:00

Inspired by a somewhat recent post at the great Padres blog Ducksnorts, I'd like to write about the first baseball game I remember attending. I remember it mainly because I remember Tony Gwynn nearing 2,000 hits for his career, and there was an outside chance he'd reach that milestone at the game I was at. He needed four to make it. The game was August 6, 1993, and I was five years old. A doubleheader was scheduled, but it was unlikely we'd be able to stay for both games, so we wanted a vintage Gwynn, 4-4 performance in the early game so we could witness history.

Baseball-Reference's box score tells me the game started at 5:06 PM. That seems to match my memory of an evening-ish start; it certainly wasn't a day-night doubleheader. The first game ran a little over three hours, meaning the night game wasn't starting until almost 9. Almost 9 was a little late-ish for 5 year old Ben (er, carl), so the first game of the double-header was all he would see.

My main memories of the game are only of a lot of cheering. I can recall some sense of the Padres' best pitcher throwing for them that night. That was the case, as Andy Benes toed the rubber for the Friars that night. For a long time I would have guessed that Andy Ashby was the starter, so some part of the starting pitcher's identity (namely, his first name) stayed with me. Benes posted a 109 ERA+ in 230 IP that year, good numbers undoubtedly, yet probably not up to the ace level hoped for when the Padres took him with the first overall pick of the 1988 draft.

I think I can remember Tony Gwynn having a good game. The box score certainly confirms this: he was 3-3 on the day with two intentional walks, leaving him one shy of his historic hit at the end of the first game. In the bottom of the first he singled home the first run of the game. Baseball-reference's description of the play has it as a line drive single to short left-center field. It came on the second pitch of the at bat; it was probably one of Gwynn's masterpieces, taking an unhittable pitch on the outside corner and flicking it the other way. He singled again in the third, this time on a line drive to right. He worked the pitcher for five pitches, before getting a good pitch and turning on it to smack it to right (or so I imagine from the box score description). His hit helped fuel a 3 run outburst, putting the Padres up 4-0. He came up again in the fourth with runners on second and third, but the Rockies made the wise decision to intentionally walk him, possibly denying me the opportunity to witness his 2,000 hit later in the game. In the sixth he singled again, knocking the second pitch up middle on the ground. This put runners on first and second with no outs, yet the Padres failed to capitalize, ending the inning up 4-1.

In the top of the seventh, Benes ran into some trouble, giving up a leadoff homer, loading the bases, and giving up one run while recording only one out. In from the bullpen trotted a young, unproven reliever with two career saves to his name, unaccompanied by any peeling bells. Yes, Trevor Hoffman would look to preserve the narrow 4-3 lead in the seventh inning. He struck out his first batter faced, presumably relying upon his fastball in the 90s, his change-up undeveloped until the next year. He induced a groundout from the next batter to end the threat and maintain the lead, and Hoffman was well on the way to the first of 522 saves as a Padre.

The bottom of the seventh brought Gwynn to the plate at 1,999 hits. I can vaguely remember the cheering for Gwynn as he approached the plate for this at bat, followed quickly by disappointment as Gwynn accepted another intentional free pass. If only Don Baylor, the Rockies' manager at the time, has opted to pitch to Tony. If only the previous batter hadn't bunted into a double play, turning runners on first and second into a single runner at second with two outs. If he had just popped out, maybe I could have seen the milestone hit. But it was not to be. Hoffman notched his first save by retiring the Rockies in the 8th and 9th, the lone blemish against him a two out single. The Padres went down 1-2-3 in the bottom of the 8th, and Tony would have to wait for later that night to reach his milestone.

In the later game, Gwynn went hitless in his first three plate appearances before singling through the middle in the sixth. It was his mom's 58th birthday, and it was exactly six years before his 3,000 hit in Olympic Stadium in Montreal.

So that's what happened in the first trip to the ballpark I made that I can remember. With such an auspicious beginning, how could I possibly resist becoming a huge baseball fan?

Fantasy Baseball Part III

2008-02-20T15:35:00.001-08:00

Well, the baseball season is knocking on the figurative door, spring training games next week, and then it's all a downhill slope on the road to the flatlands of the regular season. And yes, I just used two metaphors in the same sentence. Since we are so close to the start of spring training games and my favorite time of year, fantasy baseball season, I'm going to continue my series of rankings. Last time around, I posted Second Base and Shortstops, and now I'm going to post Third Base, Outfielders, and Designated Hitters. Since this is another relatively long post; I'm once again going to have to omit my tribute to Philadelphia sports and the University of Pittsburgh. Sorry, guys. So without any further ado, here's my continuing fantasy baseball rankings.

Third Basemen

Alex Rodriguez NYY
David Wright NYM
Miguel Cabrera DET
Ryan J. Braun MIL
Garrett Atkins COL
Aramis Ramirez CHI
Chipper Jones ATL
Ryan Zimmerman WAS
Chone Figgins LAA
Alex Gordon KC
Adrian Beltre SEA
Mike Lowell BOS
Josh Fields CHW
Hank Blalock TEX
Kevin Kouzmanoff SD
Mark Reynolds ARI
Eric Chavez OAK
Troy Glaus STL
Edwin Encarnacion CIN
Casey Blake CLE
Scott Rolen TOR
Evan Longoria TB
Jose Bautista PIT
Melvin Mora BAL
Andy LaRoche LAD

Outfielders

Matt Holliday COL
Grady Sizemore CLE
Vladimir Guerrero LAA
Carlos Beltran NYM
Alfonso Soriano CHI
Carl Crawford TB
Alex Rios TOR
Manny Ramirez BOS
Ichiro Suzuki SEA
Nick Markakis BAL
Carlos Lee HOU
Curtis Granderson DET
Magglio Ordonez DET
Adam Dunn CIN
Chris B. Young ARI
Hunter Pence HOU
Torri Hunter LAA
Vernon Wells TOR
Eric Byrnes ARI
Jeff Francouer ATL
Brad Hawpe COL
Delmon Young TB
Bobby Abreu NYY
Corey Hart MIL
Hideki Matsui NYY
Andruw Jones LAD
Jason Bay PIT
Aaron Rowand SF
Shane Victorino PHI
Matt Kemp LAD
Ken Griffey CIN
Johnny Damon NYY
Juan Pierre LAD
Jeremy Hermida FLA
Jermaine Dye CHW
Raul Ibanez SEA
Pat Burrell PHI
Josh Willingham FLA
Josh Hamilton TEX
Rocco Baldelli TB
Kosuke Fukodome CHI
Willy Tavares HOU
Jose Guillen KC
Michael Cuddyer MIN
Jacoby Ellsbury BOS
J.D. Drew BOS
Cameron Maybin FLA
Chris Duncan STL
Mark Teahen KC
Justin Upton ARI
Andre Ethier LAD
Melky Cabrera NYY
Bill Hall MIL
Xavier Nady PIT
Michael Bourn PHI
Austin Kearns WAS
Luke Scott BAL
Adam Jones BAL
Travis Buck OAK
Randy Winn SF
David DeJesus KC
Gary Matthews LAA
Rick Ankiel STL
Lastings Milledge WAS
Milton Bradley TEX
Carlos Quentin CHW
Felix Pie CHI
Adam Lind TOR
Corey Patterson BAL
Mike Cameron MIL
Ryan Church NYM
Brian Giles SD
Juan Rivera LAA
Coco Crisp BOS
Garrett Anderson LAA

Designated Hitters

David Ortiz BOS
Travis Hafner CLE
Jim Thome CHW
Gary Sheffield DET
Jason Giambi NYY
Billy Butler KC
Frank Thomas TOR
Shelley Duncan NYY

Well there ya have it. Enjoy. And get ready for baseball!

Dodgermania

2008-02-17T20:25:00.000-08:00

In the vein of the my good friend Carl's recent post on the chances of his beloved Padres, I'm going to take this opportunity to examine my beloved Dodgers chances in the upcoming baseball season. I'm going to break it down first by position for the men in blue and then we'll go from there...

Catcher: Russell Martin last year proved that his rookie season was no fluke, going .293/.374/.469 with 19 HR's, 87 RBI's, 87 Runs, and 21 SB's. There's no reason to expect a downturn from those numbers, and in fact with some more rest, he might be able to improve on some, as he did falter somewhat down the stretch as the workload caught up with him. Martin should have a lock on the catcher position for the Dodgers for the next 5-8 years.

First Base: What started out as position of weakness for the Dodgers eventually became a position of strength with the advent of James Loney as the full time starter. In 344 at bats Loney went .331/.381/.538 with an OPS+ of 131. Now obviously that's not a full season, but in his major league career he has 446 at bats and has gone .321/.372/.543 with a career OPS+ of 130. Combine that with 19 career home runs and 85 RBI's and again it looks like the Dodgers have the position locked up for the next 5-8 years as well.

Second Base: Jeff Kent currently holds down the spot, and while he is clearly on the decline, his numbers last year give hope for another relatively productive season, most likely his last with the Dodgers. In 494 at bats last year he went .302/.375/.500 for an OPS+ of 121, above average production in those categories to go along with 20 home runs and 79 rbi's. While his defense is very shaky to say the least, his offensive production is such that he continues to be valuable to the team. The Dodgers seem to believe Tony Abreu is the mid-term solution to 2B after Kent is finished, although he seems like a lower-echelon prospect as his career minor league OPS is .781, despite a .916 audition in triple-A last season. Seems to me the best long term solution is to go after a second baseman in free agency, or pursue one in the draft.

Third Base: Third base is somewhat of a question mark for the Dodgers, though mainly through their own stupidity. We'll see what Joe Torre has in store for the hot corner, but if he was as smart as say, a 20 year old blogger from Carlsbad, he'd start Andy LaRoche over Nomar Garciaparra, and give the Dodgers another high upside, high OPS player in the lineup. LaRoche in '05 went a combined .305/.374/.553 for a .927 OPS with 30 HRs and 94 RBIs. In '06 he went .315/.410/.514 for a .924 OPS and in '07 in only 265 at bats in triple-A he went .309/.399/.589 for a .988 OPS and 18 HR's and 48 RBIs. In 265 at bats! Clearly he has infinitely more upside than the oft-injured Garciaparra. As a Dodgers fan, I can only hope they realize this and make LaRoche the full time starter, give him a chance, and see if he becomes the next Miguel Cabrera.

Shortstop: Rafael Furcal had a down year last year as he was bothered by injuries for a significant portion of the season. As he'll play the entire season at 30, there's no reason to expect a complete deterioration, however, I would not expect him to return to 15 HR's and 37 steals. Something in between last season and 2006 seems most likely, with 10-12 HR's and 25-30 steals, adequate production for a player in the last year of his contract. The Dodgers have Chin-Lung Hu, who after being a below average hitter and above average defender added some power to his statistics, hitting 14 hr's and having a .507 slugging percentage in the minor leagues, which gives hope for a chance at being a productive major leaguer. If Furcal again succumbs to injuries, Hu would seem to be the replacement, as of now there is no young up and coming shortstop on the free agent market for 2009, which leads me to believe the Dodgers will either re-sign Furcal or give Hu a chance. Of course, this all depends on what happens next year, and there is always the possibility of trades.

Left Field: Last year, Left Field was patrolled mainly by Luis Gonzalez, who has since moved on to warmer pastures in Florida. With the signing of Andruw Jones, this would conceivably push Juan Pierre into the position, however rumor has it he is not assured of the starting job, and will have to compete mainly with Andre Ethier. Pierre is always a defensive liability, and makes a tremendous amount of outs at the plate. Ethier does not seem to have 30 HR power which will make him a decent starter, his career OPS+ is 108, and he plays pretty good defense as well. Starting Pierre is clearly not the right move, as his only real value is in stealing bases, which could make him more suited to come off the bench in the late innings than to eat up at bats.

Center Field: The Dodgers signed Andruw Jones in the offseason to provide some much needed power in the middle of the lineup and to bring his best in class defense to Chavez Ravine. While the signing has been greeted with mixed reviews, I am generally in favor of the deal as it's only a two year commitment, and Jones is a massive upgrade over Pierre. However, he will need to get his batting average up towards .260-.270 and keep his homers to 35+ to really be a force for the Dodgers.

Right Field: It appears Matt Kemp is going to be the full-time starter in right field for the Dodgers, and he showed flashes of brilliance last year which leads many Dodgers fans to believe he could be a great outfielder in the years to come. While his .342 average last year was definitely inflated, it's not out of the realm of reason to expect him to hit between .285-.300 with 20-25 home runs and 10-15 steals. Obviously, the team would love for him to exceed those expectations seeing as he was perceived to be a component in the Dodgers offers for the big name available players during the offseason; none of which the Dodgers actually pulled the trigger on.

Starting Pitching: After being forced to start Mark Hendrickson and Brett Tomko for extended periods of time last year, the Dodgers decided to bring more depth to the rotation, and they added Hiroki Kuroda and Estaban Loiaza to the mix for this season. The rotation will likely pan out to be Brad Penny, Derek Lowe, Chad Billingsley, Hiroki Kuroda, and Jason Schmidt. If Schmidt does make a healthy return from his lost season last year, the rotation could be relatively formidable, as Penny was very good last year, and Billingsley showed he has fantastic potential, with 141 K's in 147 innings, and a 138 ERA+. At the very least, it appears the Dodgers prospectively have a very solid 1-5 rotation, with more help on the way soon in the form of James McDonald, he of the 168 K's in 134 innings, with a 3.07 ERA and 1.17 WHIP. Not to be forgotten is former top prospect Scott Elbert, and phenom Clayton Kershaw. Those three, along with Billingsley will hopefully form the rotation for years to come, with Chris Withrow much farther away but with seemingly high potential.

Relief Pitching: The Dodgers return Everyday Scott Proctor, Rudy Seanez, Jonathon Broxton, Takashi Saito, Joe Beimel, Hong-Chih Kuo, and Yhency Brazoban, which would give them a solid bullpen, not mind-boggling, but definitely solid enough to compete. Jonathon Meloan, another top prospect could beat out someone for a spot, and hopefully prove to be a great young commodity.

In summary, the Dodgers lineup will *hopefully* stack up like this:

Rafael Furcal SS
Russell Martin C
Andruw Jones CF
Jeff Kent 2B
James Loney 1B
Matt Kemp RF
Andre Ethier LF
Andy LaRoche 3B

That, along with the solid rotation, would seem to give them a very good chance at competing for the division title. None of those players is a "weak link," most have some stolen base ability, and all, save Furcal and to a lesser extent, Ethier, have power or power potential.

Joe Torre was brought in to be the manager, and he certainly can't be worse than Grady Little, which gives me more hope for the upcoming season. I see the Dodgers winning between 85-91 games this year, which would appear to put them squarely in contention for the NL West, and a date with the winner of the NL Central.

Ian Miller is an aspiring Journalist, frequent contributor to Hot Ham Water, and generally enjoys long walks on the beach and drinking hot chocolate.

A Brief Paws

2008-02-16T10:28:00.000-08:00

I want to take a timeout from my predictions to address Weathers, Padres post. First let me commend my youthful friend on his prose and stats. Weathers is one erudite engineering student. The rare combination of English and Math SAT scores, that evokes this type of post. HOWEVER my niceness ends RIGHT HERE! The Padres have over achieved for years. That is a testament to the most crooked park in Baseball. Babe Ruth would have hit 16 HR'S at Petco Galaxy, and 40 on the road. One cannot use stats to justify the mystifying performance, that has been Padres Baseball. Weathers quotes chapter and verse. I use heart.... My heart tells me the run is over. The Padres will not be in contention this year... More later in my predictions.

As promised a vocabulary word: Delusional

Weathers is _______ regarding the Padres chances in 2008.

A Case for the Padres

2008-02-16T01:01:00.000-08:00

Baseball creeps nearer. Pitchers and catchers report in less than a week. We are inundated by stories of ballplayers in the best shape of their lives, who have magically dropped twenty pounds, and who are working on a new pitch. (Thanks to Roto Authority for tracking these important spring training cliches.)

The NL West looks to this unbiased observer to be home to the best division race in baseball next year. Sure, the top two teams in the AL Central are better, but now that the Twins have finished their Santana action, and despite the White Sox's best delusions of contention, that is a two team race. The AL East features the always intriguing and never stale Yankees-Red Sox titanic, monumental, historic, epic, intense, and fierce rivalry that everyone in the countries loves to follow 24/7 (see, ESPN, I can totally do this, hire me). The NL East is full of offensive firepower and possibly the greatest troika of shortstops ever assembled in one division (not to mention a probable 7 first round fantasy draft picks), and the injection of Johan Santana into it certainly made it more compelling. (increased the compellingness? Hmm, I don't think that's a word.) But the NL East also has a clear cut favorite now (the Mets) and contains two really bad teams. The NL West is wide open, with four teams with a legitimate shot at a division title and four teams with a legitimate shot at finishing fourth. Sure, the Giants are terrible, but even they have the incredible 1-2 punch of Cain and Lincecum to fear when facing them.

But wait, you say, the Padres are a terrible franchise with the worst fans in all of pro sports that rely on fluke performances from AAAA players every year. This is the year their luck finally runs out, and there's no possible way they could finish ahead of the much higher salaried Dodgers for the fourth straight year. Well, this post is designed to allay your fears and present the compelling case that the Padres have this chance to win the division. The Padres can win the division, and in fact have a solid shot at it. Here's why/how:

1. Starting from a high base: Last season the Padres won 89 games against 74 losses. Based on their runs scored/runs allowed, their expected record was ... 89-74. So unlike a certain major rival, they were not extremely lucky to have the record they had at the end of the season. The Diamondbacks were outscored on the season and expected to have a 79-83 record. The Dodgers finished at 82-80, right in line with their expected win-loss record. The Padres, Dodgers, and Diamondbacks all return most of their rosters from last year, so the advantage there is to the Padres. Sure, the Diamondbacks and Dodgers made a couple of upgrades, but they needed the upgrade to reach the level of the Padres.

2. The outfield is not as bad as is commonly perceived: Brian Giles continues to be phenomenally underrated in his decline phase. He posted a 109 OPS+ weighted toward OBP (more valuable than weighted toward slugging) despite playing on a bum knee for most of the final months of the season. A healthier year from him will improve his stats further. Right field is not a problem. Center field is manned by the injury prone Jim Edmonds. Edmonds likely is not washed up with the bat. Two years ago, he posted a 110 OPS+ despite battling injuries. Last year he fell to an 88 OPS+, but now he claims to be healthier than he has been since his 137 OPS+ year in 2005 and seems like a good bet for a bounceback. He's still only going to play 130 games in a best case scenario, but if he plays those and hits enough for a 110 OPS+, he probably approximately replicates Mike Cameron's value from last year. Scott Hairston and Jeff DaVanon are actually solid fallback options, as both seem to have the defensive skill to play a slightly below average center and hit at the positional average. Callix Crabbe has the speed and OBP chops to be a solid offensive and defensive fill in as well. Left field is a bit of a mystery, but keep in mind Jose Cruz and Termel Sledge were the left fielders for the first half of the year last year. It's a low target to exceed. One of Hairston or Headley seems like a good bet for solid production; ZIPS likes Chase Headley, PECOTA likes Scott Hairston. Either way works for me.

Conclusion: the Padres outfield is not a blackhole and should probably match or exceed the production from last year.

3. All the key players from last year are young: The Padres's best players last year were Jake Peavy, Chris Young, Adrian Gonzalez, Khalil Greene, Kevin Kouzmanoff, Josh Bard, Milton Bradley, and Heath Bell. All of them except Bradley return this year, in the prime of their careers, all solid best to improve on or match last year's output. Kouzmanoff in particular could greatly exceed his production from last year if his line from May 1 onward (after his adjustment to the majors) of .303/.355/.504 is carried over to this year.

Based on this, I think the Padres have a solid chance at winning the division this year. I have no idea who will take it. It should be another close, exciting race between the Diamondbacks, Dodgers, Padres, and Rockies. Pecota's simulation of the season from its projections has the D-Backs and Dodgers tied at the top with 86 wins, with the Padres at 83 and the Rockies at 82. This is with Pecota being pessimistic on Greg Maddux (130 IP forecast), Chris Young (150 IP with a 3.73 ERA compared to 173 IP, 3.12 ERA this year), Jim Edmonds, Randy Wolf, and Mark Prior (very limited playing time/production due to injuries). If the Padres get a couple of breaks with those players staying healthy and productive, they'll have a very good chance to win the division. It should be a great race.

Baseball American League Central

2008-02-14T13:45:00.000-08:00

So for all you centrists (this is an election year) let me give you my vote for the American League Central standings.

No one, I REPEAT, NO ONE, WILL BEAT THE TIGERS....

Tigers 97-65

Cleveland 91-71

White Sox 76-86

Kansas City 70-92

The Twins 67-95

OK, why is it that the Tigers cannot be tamed? Messrs: Miguel, Maglio,Granderson Guillen, Chef, Renteria, Polanco, Jacque and Pudge. Add in Verlander, Bonderman, Willis, The Gambler, and the mid season comeback of Zumaya and you get big time victory. Sprinkle the frosting with Bazardo. Any team with a guy named Bazardo cannot possible lose.

Next The Tribe; This is one talented team in it's own right. Victor, Hafner, Sizemore, Garko,and Jhonny can bring some real heavy Smoke Signals. However any team that plans on starting Dellucci cannot win. They have solid arms in Fausto and CC, but Westbrook, Byrd and Laffey just do not excite. Plus their closer is 200 years old. This time The Tribe fall short.

The drop off is precipitous to the White Sox. The darlings of 2005 have fallen on hard times recently and the fall will continue. They have a few bright spots in Quentin, Konerko, Swisher and Richar. However these guys just do not match up with the fangs of The Tigers and the power of The Tribe. Plus the Sox arms are um.....mediocre at best. Vazquez, Buehrle and Gavin Floyd are not very good.

As with TB in the East KC here in the Central is the exciting young team. Gordon, Butler, Buck, along with veterans, Gristleponick and Guillen will bring some good offensive results to KC. The pitching is remarkable good. Better then The White Sox. Messrs: Meche, Bannister and Greinke are a very good Trio. They also have Soria. Has anyone seen this kid? His motion, ball movement and demeanor remind me of Mariano Rivera. I like KC to improve, making noise in the Central.

Finally The Twinkies. Oh how they have fallen. Giving away Santana for some basic prospects and not much more will aid in their poor showing in 2008. I do like Gomez, I think he is a poor man's Carlos Beltran. However, he is 2-3 years away from making a major impact. Morneau and Mauer are great players. Also the Garza deal netted Delmon Young, who is very talented. But after these few guys there is not much more to talk about. I know, I know Cuddyer. Now don't be funny, he will have a pedestrian year at best. The pitching......has more Swiss Flags then Zürich. For those that do not understand the metaphor, the Swiss Flag is a Red Cross. The sign on the CBS Sportsline Fantasy website for an injured player, is a Red Cross. Liriano could be really good or really bad, Livan Hernandez...bad, then a gaggle of prospects that may or may not pan out. Throw all into the pan shake and stir and last place is the final product.

More on the American League West later.

Today vocabulary word is: precipitous

The Grand Canyon has a ________ change in terrain.

Baseball

2008-02-09T09:10:00.000-08:00

All of my peeps know I am a Baseball lover. The season is drawing near, and I for one could not be happier. I have had enough of pads, helmets and face guards. Give me a good dose of leather pills, vaulting off sweet smelling, massive Hickory clubs. With that intro I am almost ready to release my predictions for the upcoming season. First I want to take a deep breath and confirm everyones fears.....The Yanks will be competitive. The Bosox will be in there. Finally, watch the Tigers, their bite is really worse then their roar.

American League East:

1 - Red Sox 95-57

2 - Yankess 94-58

3 - The Rays yes Rays not Jays 84-78

4 - The Jays 76-86

5 - The Orioles 66-96

Comments:

Yes the Chowds win again. Bolstered by tremendous pitching, solid defense and good hitting the bean town boys squeak out a win. The Yankees are finally looking to youth as a way to better their team. The Steinbrenner group refused to trade away their future for veterans that may or may not put them over the top. The Yanks have got a good mix, but in the end they still have too many questionable older players. Can Posada and Jeter keep playing at this level? Can A-Rod duplicate one of(perhaps the )greatest offensive seasons in history? Will their young pitching get them to the big dance. My answer is they fall just short.

My surprise pick of the year is the Rays....yep you herd it first here friends. The most exciting team in the AL. The Rays have this great lineup, young, quickly improving pitching and enough veteran presence to keep them in control.

Look at this line up: Iwamura, Crawford, Pena, B.J. Upton, Baldelli, Gomes, Longoria, Navarro, Bartlett.

Pitching: Kazmir, Shields, Garza, Jackson, Sonnenstein, Hammel, Niemann, Davis.... Need I say more. Tampa has 3 great arms, Two improving with flashes of brilliance arms and at least 3 close to ready AAA arms. Their Bullpen has holes, but if they are really in it they actually could make a move to improve. They won't win the division, but I like them as last years Brewers.

The Blue Jays......Yawn....Rios, Wells and the rest will make a good showing in 2008. That is their limit. The goal in the last bastion of Baseball north of the border, is to be competitive, but lets not REALLY TRY TO WIN.

Finally The Orioles.....UMM... I was generous giving them less then 100 losses. The Birds have Markakis, Roberts (MAYBE), and a group of suspects and prospects. The Cal Ripkenite's will have to wait 2-3 years before they reach 80 wins.

Since your brains are limited (like mine) I will tackle the other divisions in later posts.

Todays Vocabulary word is: pusillanimous

Hint:

The_________GM refused to pull the trigger on the right deal for Santana.

Fantasy Baseball Part II

2008-02-05T21:23:00.000-08:00

Before I get to the main focus of my post, I'd like to saw a few words on last weekend's Super Bowl...

Let me first stand up and say: "I was wrong." Eli, you proved all the doubters wrong, and though I still don't believe you are an elite quarterback, you definitely did not hurt your team as I thought you would. Congratulations. Relatedly, congratulations to the Giants and the city of New York for taking down the Boston empire. I can't believe we actually had to worry about a Boston empire, but with the Red Sox already winning the World Series and the Celtics the clear frontrunner in the Eastern conference of the NBA, there was a very real possibility of Boston teams holding all three major sports championships at once. As insufferable as they have been recently, giving Boston fans another Super Bowl, and a possible Holy Trinity of sports dominance was simply unacceptable. So thank you, Eli and Usi, although your reign at the top will be short lived as Norval and the Chargers will win Super Bowl XLIII. You heard it here first.

Now as the football season is completed, it's time for us to look forward to the baseball season! I know all of you are tremendously excited about that, as am I. Later on, I'll be making my predictions for the upcoming season, but as of now I'd like to continue to share with you all my positional fantasy baseball rankings. Last time around, if you'll remember, I posted Catchers and First Base. In this edition, I'm going to post Second Base and Shortstops, and as always, don't hesitate to express extreme hatred or supreme love. Also keep in mind these are subject to change as spring training moves along.

Second Basemen

Chase Utley PHI
Brandon Phillips CIN
B.J. Upton TB
Robinson Cano NYY
Brian Roberts BAL
Ian Kinsler TEX
Dan Uggla FLA
Kelly Johnson ATL
Howie Kendrick LAA
Rickie Weeks MIL
Jeff Kent LAD
Orlando Hudson ARI
Placido Polanco DET
Aaron Hill TOR
Dustin Pedroia BOS
Tadahito Iguchi SD
Freddy Sanchez PIT
Kaz Matsui HOU
Felipe Lopez WAS
Ty Wiggington HOU
Alexi Casilla MIN
Ryan Theriot CHI
Asdrubal Cabrera CLE
Jose Lopez SEA
Luis Castillo NYM

Shortstops

Hanley Ramirez FLA
Jose Reyes NYM
Jimmy Rollins PHI
Troy Tulowitzki COL
Derek Jeter NYY
Carlos Guillen DET
Michael Young TEX
J.J. Hardy MIL
Miguel Tejada HOU
Rafael Furcal LAD
Orlando Cabrera CHW
Stephen Drew ARI
Edgar Renteria DET
Jhonny Peralta CLE
Khalil Greene SD
Yunel Escobar ATL
Julio Lugo BOS
Bobby Crosby OAK
Jason Bartlett TB
Yuniesky Betancourt SEA
Brendan Harris MIN
Alex Gonzalez CIN
David Eckstein TOR
Jack Wilson PIT
Juan Uribe CHW

Well there ya have it...always more to come on Hot Ham Water! Today's Eagles tribute is to Lincoln Financial Field. What a great name, huh? And in such a beautiful area of Philadelphia too. Great great stadium, with an even more amazing team playing in it. Way to be guys.

Next time: a college basketball update.

Ian Miller is an aspiring Journalist, frequent contributor to Hot Ham Water, and generally enjoys long walks on the beach and drinking hot chocolate.

The Mind Of "Sage" Miller

2008-02-02T11:30:00.000-08:00

Everyone expects me to spout off some incredible wisdom regarding tomorrow's Stupor-bowl. Well you can just keep right on waiting. This Sage is speechless regarding the outcome of tomorrow's game. I know this, The Chowder Heads need to be put down a notch or two. After all The Sox waited 1,000 years to win. Now they have won twice in the space of 4 years. I can tell you that makes them a little to puffed up for my taste. I say we get together and have a Boston Clam Bake. The next best(WORST)thing to an arrogant Yankees fan, is a puffed up, Lobster Eating, Sam Adams chugging, lost in the malaise that is Boston driving, Big Dig crumbling, Sox/Pats fan. Bring back the curse of the Bambino and the 6-10 Pats of old. Maybe not permanently but for a few years. I will be mildly rooting for The Giants. That being said enjoy the game,enjoy the ads, but most of all enjoy Tom Petty.

Today's Vocabulary word is: http://www.slanguage.com/boston.html

Instead of a word we are going with a veritable dictionary of words.

Here are a couple of clips:

Bellicheat: Coach of our video-stealing New England Patriots

Pete Sir: Most say pizza

Brady vs. Manning

2008-01-30T01:06:00.000-08:00

If you'll forgive my indulgence for a moment, I'd like to do a brief compare and contrast of New England Patriots star quaterback Tom Brady to New York Giants quaterback Eli Manning. This should show us what we can expect from Sunday's big game.

   Tom Brady       Eli Manning
Supermodel girlfriend ?   Yes    No

Chosen for cologne ad
due to masculinity?    Yes    No

Super Bowl Rings    3       0

Mouth Breather?       No      Yes

Career QB Rating      92.9    73.4

In a clearly jinxed ad
claiming to be

"unstoppable?" No Yes

Offseason

hobbies? Sees Gisele in Paris "Antiquing with his mom and fiance"

People surprised

at success? No Yes

Fashionable facial hair

and cleft chin? Yes No

So as much as I'd like it if the Giants were to pull out an incredible, earth shattering victory over the heavy favorite, God's team, The New England Patriots, when you look at the facts, it just doesn't look good for Eli and the Giants. Here's my prediction for Super Bowl XLII from University of Phoenix Stadium in Glendale, Arizona:

New England Patriots 28 New York Giants 17

And lastly, before I go, here is today's tribute to the Philadelphia Eagles, and probably the greatest running back to ever play in the NFL, Brian Westbrook. He went to two schools with awesome names, DeMatha Catholic High School in Hyattsville, Maryland, and Villanova University. How cool is that. Not only were the school names cool, but how sweet must it be to grow up in a town named after a hotel chain? I'd want to live in a Hyatt for my formative years, wouldn't you? So thank you, Hyattsville, Maryland, for giving us a true American gem.

Wikipedia was used for both the Eli Manning quote, and the Brian Westbrook information.

Ideal Super Bowl

2008-01-27T20:29:00.000-08:00

As a San Diego sports fan, I don't particularly care for the New England Patriots or the New York Giants (to put it diplomatically). For two straight years, the Patriots have ended the Chargers' season; last year it was the most gut-wrenching loss I have ever witnessed (at least until October of this year). This year it was just a garden variety, your quarterback has no ACL, your star running back can't play, your best receiving threat can barely jog, close loss. Tom Brady is one of the most overrated players in the game today. He is not the best quarterback in the league; Peyton Manning is. When Brady puts up Manning-esque numbers for more than one year, then we can have a discussion. Brady gets a ton of credit for winning Super Bowls because he had a better defense than Manning did. Apparently a handful of good drives, leveraged in the proper place, outweigh the hundreds or thousands of drive that give a much better measure of talent. The Patriots also have an annoying habit of claiming to be the underdog and like most champions have been crowned as morally superior (you know, they're the only team to really buy into the concept of team, it's not about any one player, etc., etc.).

The Giants' starting quarterback is one Eli Manning, who refused to play for the Chargers when they drafted him first overall in 2004. Fortunately, everything worked out beautifully for the Chargers, but I will still root against the guy who was too good to come play for my favorite team. Plus, Tom Coughlin gets a few celebratory articles for being a disciplinarian, yet the Giants have perpetually been among the most penalized teams in the league. Plus, they're not very good this year. It sends a bad message when not very good teams win championships. Tangent: that's one of the good features of the BCS: the tenth best team in the game will never win the championship. Ok, well maybe it will because of the difficulty in comparing results against such disparate schedules, but the point is, if the BCS were applied to football, the fifth best team in the weaker conference would never have a shot at winning the title.

So I don't particularly care for either team. This was probably the Super Bowl matchup I would have liked the least out of all possible matchups at the start of the playoffs. Yet here are two scenarios that would make me happy, the first in a Giant victory, the second in a Patriot victory.

Pleasant Giant Victory Scenario
Eli Manning, world's greatest mouth breather, develops frostbite in his teeth while in New York because he refuses to just breath through his nose. He'll be completely fine, but he is in no condition to compete in the Super Bowl. Anthony Wright misses Plaxico Burress by 20 yards to the left in warmups, hitting Vince Wilfork who's warming up on the Patriot sideline. Wilfork comes over and pokes Wright in the eye through his facemask. Tom Coughlin is worried that Wright will be intimidated, and also realizes that Wright sucks, so he puts in 6'4'', 285 lb. Jared Lorenzen to start the game. The Pillsbury Throwboy compiles 300 yards passing in a high scoring shootout. Tom Brady is terrible, but Brandon Jacobs keeps fumbling the ball and Junior Seau keeps returning the fumbles for touchdowns. With 4 seconds left and down by 4, the Giants have the ball on the Patriots 40 yard line. Lorenzen drops back for the Hail Mary pass, but the pocket collapses immediately, and he's forced to run for his life. He gets 10 yards before bulldozing Rodney Harrison. Wilfork and Seymour converge on him, but he pinballs off both of them, and they collide with each other. Lorenzen stumbles on. He reaches the 5, where Vrabel and Bruschi both dive at him. Lorenzen takes an epic leap, diving for the end zone. He lands at the 4. But then he starts rolling and doesn't stop until the ball has crossed the plane of the end zone, right before he's touched down by Vrabel. Touchdown, Giants! Giants win! Jared Lorenzen is the hero.

Pleasant Patriot Victory Scenario
As Tom Brady warms up for the Super Bowl, he gets a desperate call from Gisele saying that she is breaking up with him to be with Peyton Manning. Brady immediately sprints out of the stadium, chartering a private jet to fly him to Gisele to see if he can persuade her to change her mind. He gets to her, but discovers it was all just a plot by Peyton to help his brother win the Super Bowl. While Brady is gone, Matt Cassel admirably steps in and leads the Patriots to a 55-0 victory. Cassel is named Super Bowl MVP and is lauded across the land for his cool, clutch play. He is named People's Sexiest Man Alive and does photo shoots with a goat. Girls everywhere swoon over him. When Brady is relegated to second string, Gisele dumps him and goes after Peyton Manning.

And in either scenario, everyone lives happily ever after.

I Feel Obligated

2008-01-25T08:27:00.000-08:00

The very definition of Sage is:

"A wise man; a man of gravity and wisdom; especially, a man venerable for years, and of sound judgment and prudence; a grave philosopher".

This is a difficult title to live up to. But here goes. Has anyone noticed the loud, silence in San Diego Sports this week. The Chargers are off to their winter escapes and the Padres are still packing their unmentionables for Spring Training. There is no time like to present, to wax poetic regarding the hopes and dreams of this Sage.

Hope: Dodgers actually perform to their talent level.

Dream: Dodgers win it all!

Hope: The Dodgers finish ahead of The Padres

Dream: Weathers is actually intellectually honest about The Padres.

Hope: Steroids are finally weeded out of Baseball!

Dream: Baseball stats from the mid 90's to the mid 00's have an *

Hope: Clemens and Bonds finally retire to whatever cow pasture they came from.

Dream: The Yankees payroll dips to under 1 Trillion.

And finally for now:

Hope: A great, competitive, fun, Baseball season on the field and in Fantasy Cyberspace.

Dream: Play in 200 leagues and have every player, on every team, on at least one of my Fantasy Teams.

Today's Vocabulary word is: Cerumen

Hint: ________ would make it very hard to hear a Baseball game.

Out for now!

Switching Gears

2008-01-23T12:26:00.001-08:00

First of all, I would like to welcome you all to the newly redesigned Hot Ham Water. Let us know what you think, any constructive criticism, or adoring praise is always welcome.

Secondly, after the Chargers devastating loss to the Patriots, I have now become the biggest New York Giants fan in the western United States. Eli Manning is without a doubt going to be much better than Peyton. And he won't make any crucial mistakes against the Patriots that will most likely cost the Giants the Super Bowl. Definitely not. Anyway, enough football for now.

As the upcoming baseball season is rapidly approaching, I have decided to post my rankings of fantasy baseball players by position. As this is very early in the process, I reserve the right to change or otherwise update these rankings as we progress through spring training. Seeing as the entire list all at once is massive and most likely ultimately confusing, I'm going to break it up into segments. Today will be Catchers and First Basemen, followed by Second Basemen and Shortstops at a later date, and so on. So without any further ado, Hot Ham Water is proud to present a Filliam H. Muffman production of an Ian Miller film,

The 2008 Fantasy Baseball Rankings

Catchers

Victor Martinez
Russell Martin
Brian McCann
Joe Mauer
Jorge Posada
Kenji Johjima
Benji Molina
Jarod Saltalamacchia
Ivan Rodriguez
Ryan Doumit
Ramon Hernandez
Jason Varitek
Chris Snyder
A.J. Pierzynksi
Paul LoDuca
Ronny Paulino
Geovany Soto
Kurt Suzuki
John Buck
Miguel Montero
Michael Barrett
Mike Napoli
Josh Bard
Yadier Molina
Dioner Navarro

First Basemen

Albert Pujols
Ryan Howard
Prince Fielder
Mark Teixeira
Lance Berkman
Adrian Gonzalez
Justin Morneau
Derrek Lee
Paul Konerko
Carlos Pena
James Loney
Nick Swisher
Todd Helton
Kevin Youkilis
Casey Kotchman
Conor Jackson
Ryan Garko
Adam LaRoche
Carlos Delgado
Lyle Overbay
Mike Jacobs
Aubrey Huff
Richie Sexson
Ben Broussard
Joey Votto

Well there ya have it folks, it begins. As I said, constructive criticism and adoring praise are always welcome. Hopefully using my rankings you'll win your fantasy leagues, unless of course you're playing me, and then you can finish a close second. Mazaltov.

If I Had A Nickle For Every Blown Call

2008-01-22T06:45:00.000-08:00

Weathers has made some valid points regarding the poor officiating in the Chargers playoff games. Blown calls, no calls, phantom calls were rampant. Here is the problem, this type of horrible officiating has gone on since the dawn of sports. The Chargers played a valiant game. Injuries and poor coaching had as much, or more to do with the loss then myopic officiating. If one wishes to view a case study of bad calls look at the, REFEREE FIXED, Suns VS San Antonio playoff series. What a joke! Major sports are truly on the edge of ruin. Steroids, overpaid mediocre players, cheating officials, ridiculous seat prices, and a general mentality of "WE ARE ABOVE THE LAW" spell big trouble. Add the stock market, with more blood then Johnny Depp spills in Sweeney Todd, and you have big, negative, economic potential for sports. I love Baseball, enjoy Football and tolerate Basketball and I for one am very worried about the future of "the game".

Back to San Diego and lighter notes. Watch as spring training unfolds. I predict The Padres will sign a partial, or full retread to fill a gaping hole on the team. Said retread will do a yeoman's job of leading the "Pads" in OBP, when a lefty is pitching, after the 6th inning, in weather of less then 69 degrees, on the road, east of the Mississippi. Another meaningless stat brought to you by your San Diego Padres.

Enough for now, I do not want to tax your gray matter so early in the day.

Today's Vocabulary word is: Vulcanization.

Now you Star Trek fans relax I am not disparaging Spock.

__________has revolutionized Hockey.

Another complaint

2008-01-21T19:53:00.000-08:00

On Rivers' first interception, he was falling down as he threw because Mike Vrabel whipped his leg into Rivers as he was falling down past him. This is in fact a penalty. That would have been nice to get it called, as it would have negated the pick and given the Chargers a first down. Go to www.nfl.com/videos and find the Asante Samuel pick to see it. (Alternately, go here, watch the video where they highlight the leg whip at 3:45 in.) So, yes, a correct call would have been a pleasant surprise, because it was definitely that leg whip that caused the interception and fundamentally altered the game.

Further Musings

2008-01-21T14:12:00.000-08:00

As an addendum to Ben's post, I would like to submit for your review the following post game quote from Norv "I am terrible" Turner regarding his game ending decision to punt from the New England 37 yard line with 9 minutes left to play: "Fourth and 10? Because, again, as I said, they had a pressure package, they came off the edge, they got us on third-and-10, we made the decision with nine minutes - we had the ball against Tennessee (during the regular season) down 14 points with 10 minutes and scored twice."1 This, folks, is why Norvall will not win our Bolts a Super Bowl. I'd like to break this down for a few minutes, if I may...

Now I don't pretend to be a football play calling expert, but I believe I've watched enough to know a few things. Norvall said that the Patriots were bringing pressure, and coming off the edge. Now if you knew this, then there should have been a readily apparent play call there. A screen. When the defense brings pressure, you call a screen. Not that hard to figure out. The Chargers are lucky enough to have one of the faster players in the NFL in Darren Sproles. Give him the ball in space, and let him run. Now the argument could be made, "well, on fourth down you shouldn't throw a pass shorter than 10 yards." Fair enough. Send Vincent Jackson and Chris Chambers on 12 yard out routes and Antonio Gates 12 yards down the middle of the field. It takes them what, 3 seconds to go 12 yards? If you can't protect your quarterback for 3 seconds, you don't deserve to win the game. Now you have three options beyond the first down line. Instead Norvall (if you'll permit a blackjack reference) stayed on 16 with the dealer showing 10, and punted.

Now for the second part of his multi-faceted idiocy-laced quote. "...we had the ball against Tennessee (during the regular season) down 14 points with 10 minutes and scored twice." First of all, Norvy compared the AFC Championship game against the New England Patriots, God's Team, possibly the greatest team in NFL history, to a regular season contest against the Tennessee Titans and their 21st ranked offense. There's so much wrong with this, I don't even know where to start. To coach the AFC Championship game the same way you would coach a regular season game is funny to begin with, and then to compare the Titans (!!!!111!!!) to the Patriots is pure hilarity. As the people who I watched the game with can attest to, as soon as I saw the punt I said "they're not going to get the ball back." And what do you know, they didn't. The Patriots are a professional football team. They know how to do everything well. They are well coached, they execute well, and with the punt they had all the momentum. How did Norvall think they were going to give the ball back to the Chargers not once, but twice, in a 9 minute span?

When you combine the obvious stupidity of his quote with the two blown red-zone timeouts that Ben mentioned, and the other wasted timeout late in the 4th quarter when the Chargers defense was caught out of position even after the Patriots went into a huddle (another mark of bad coaching...), you can see how Norv Turner is not a Super Bowl caliber head coach. His tenure is already reminiscent of Steve Lavin's years as UCLA Men's Basketball coach. High quality, extremely talented players, baffling losses, shocking wins, and the ability to get close (sweet 16 every year for Lavin, AFC Championship game for Norv) and then have all of the coaching mistakes show themselves in a disappointing loss. But of course, Norv, like Lavin did for quite a few years, did enough to save his job. For now. As a Chargers fan, one can only hope he decides to spend more time with his family, because as long as he continues to have teams be good and not great, his buddy A.J. will never fire him. And the less-informed of the Chargers fan base won't care.

1 North County Times -1/21/08

Musings on the game

2008-01-21T01:21:00.000-08:00

I suppose if the Chargers had to lose today, that was a good way to go. Brady had a bad game; Rivers valiantly battled on his injured knees; the Bolts played the Pats very evenly. The Chargers were outgained by 36 yards but got one more turnover, and the Patriots also had the only fumble of the game, which they recovered. The Chargers had too many 40 yard drives with field goals or short punts, while the Patriots wisely had either short drives or long touchdown drives. Health was probably the difference in the game. A healthy Rivers could have moved around a little better in the pocket on some of those red zone pass attempts, and a healthy Gates would have been a great red zone target. A completely healthy Jamal Williams maybe limits the Patriots' rushing success in the second half. It was a good game played by both sides, particularly both defenses, and the Patriots did deserve to advance (unlike last year, when the Chargers roundly outplayed them). A great day was had by Quentin Jammer bumping receivers at the line, making the great interception, and deflecting at least one key third down pass attempt. The secondary in general played very well, and the pass rush was solid as well. Rivers played well considering the extent of his injury, and Chris Chambers and Vincent Jackson were both excellent again (with the notable exception of Chambers' play on the first interception).

On less optimistic, more whiny note, Norv Turner continues to not be a very good head coach. In both halves, an early timeout was burned in the red zone, and the resulting play was unsuccessful and ugly. The decision to punt with 9 minutes left inside the Patriot 40 yard line effectively ended the game, even before the Patriots ran the remaining time off the clock. He called a few too many runs right up the gut on first down for minimal gain and not enough short passes designed to put the team in favorable second and short situations. At least there weren't any delay of game, false start, or too many men in the huddle penalties today.

Continuing the whining theme, officials need to start calling holding. I wasn't watching the Chargers' line as intently as I was watching the Patriots', so I can't tell whether or not the Chargers were taking advantage of the officials' leniency as much as the Patriots were, but the number of uncalled holds was ridiculous. Several 10+ gains on wide receiver screens and an end around were set up by holding or blocks in the back by the wide receivers. This issue isn't specific to this particular game though, as throughout the playoffs the refs have been ignoring holds. David Garrard's long run to set up the game winning field goal in Pittsburgh was set up by an obvious hold. So, yes, refs should start calling holds. That would have been helpful for the Chargers' defense today. Whether it would have been the same amount helpful to the Patriots' defense, I cannot say.

Overall, it was a good game. There's always next year. Hopefully next year they can reach the playoffs and face the best teams in the league with their three best players (Rivers, Tomlinson, Gates) healthy.

A postscript: I blame myself for the loss, as I forgot to compose tv network signs for this game. They clearly were the good luck charm that carried them to the win over Indianapolis.

Death of the Glow

2008-01-18T21:09:00.000-08:00

It's Friday now, so I can move on past the glow and acknowledge the inevitable: the Chargers are in serious trouble against New England. With a completely healthy offense and excellent play-calling, they could engage in a shootout and maybe win with a couple of sacks of Brady and generated turnovers. But Rivers, Tomlinson, and Gates were going to be beat up when they played, in a best case scenario. Now Rivers is listed as doubtful, and the Union Tribune is reporting that Rivers has a partially torn ACL. Gates is also listed as doubtful. The Chargers can't hope to come out throwing and outgun the Patriots with Billy Volek running the show, throwing to Brandon Manumaleuna (as awesome as he is).

It's not looking good. It's going to take a miracle.

Evidence of Productivity

2008-01-17T18:26:00.000-08:00

So here's me and Ben's evidence of productivity from being in Big Bear. The list of top 100 fantasy baseball players. Well mostly my list, seeing as Ben may disagree on some points. But I digress. ANYWAY! Enjoy! Win your fantasy baseball leagues!

1. Alex Rodriguez

2. Hanley Ramirez

3. Jose Reyes

4. David Wright

5. Albert Pujols

6. Chase Utley

7. Miguel Cabrera

8. Jimmy Rollins

9. Matt Holliday

10. Ryan Howard

11. Jake Peavy

12. Prince Fielder

13. Grady Sizemore

14. David Ortiz

15. Johan Santana

16. Ryan Braun

17. Mark Teixeira

18. Carl Crawford

19. Alfonso Soriano

20. B.J. Upton

21. Vladimir Guerrero

22. Carlos Beltran

23. Alex Rios

24. Brandon Phillips

25. Jonathon Papelbon

26. Josh Beckett

27. Brandon Webb

28. Lance Berkman

29. Manny Ramirez

30. C.C. Sabathia

31. Erik Bedard

32. Ichiro Suzuki

33. Magglio Ordonez

34. Justin Verlander

35. Robinson Cano

36. Carlos Lee

37. Francisco Rodriguez

38. J.J. Putz

39. Victor Martinez

40. Curtis Granderson

41. Lance Berkman

42. Travis Hafner

43. Cole Hamels

44. Adrian Gonzalez

45. Garrett Atkins

46. Troy Tulowitzki

47. Roy Halladay

48. Dan Haren

49. Justin Morneau

50. Felix Hernandez

51. Chris B. Young

52. Nick Markakis

53. Derek Jeter

54. Derek Lee

55. Adam Dunn

56. Russell Martin

57. Aramis Ramirez

58. Brian Roberts

59. Carlos Zambrano

60. Joe Nathan

61. Hunter Pance

62. Roy Oswalt

63. John Lackey

64. Torii Hunter

65. Eric Byrnes

66. Ryan Zimmerman

67. Ian Kinsler

68. Fausto Carmona

69. Scott Kazmir

70. Joe Mauer

71. Takashi Saito

72. Mariano Rivera

73. Dan Uggla

74. Vernon Wells

75. Brad Penny

76. Brett Myers

77. Jeff Francouer

78. Paul Konerko

79. Aaron Harang

80. Kelvim Escobar

81. Brad Hawpe

82. Huston Street

83. Rickie Weeks

84. Jose Valverde

85. Carlos Pena

86. Michael Young

87. Daisuke Matsuzaka

88. Jered Weaver

89. Ben Sheets

90. Carlos Guillen

91. Delmon Young

92. Bobby Abreu

93. Corey Hart

94. TIm Lincecum

95. Chad Billingsley

96. Matt Cain

97. James Loney

98. Brian McCann

99. Francisco Liriano

100. Miguel Tejada

More to come later...

So to you, "Sage," I say, trade me Nathan for Bonderman and Escobar. He's not even in the top 50.

The San Diego Phenomenon

2008-01-16T12:36:00.000-08:00

San Diego is so blessed, great weather, great scenery and a great amount of recreation available. So what is the problem? The surf enhanced, Ear filled with water populous, just can't seem to WIN ANYTHING! San Diego has what zero championships. Now this writer is not a San Diego sports fan, but I am an erudite observer of the obvious. San Diego just stinks at Sports. Oh The Padres get to the playoffs here and there and even a World Series twice, but zero results! The Chargers have made it to the big dance once. However they were up against a team that CLOSELY resembles the Cheating Billichecks. So again the Chargers face a juggernaut next week. A video enhanced, behemoth of a team. San Diego will of course lose, because Rivers, LT and Gates are gimpy at best. A new off season will begin, one filled with hope and promise.

At least Baseball is nigh. My Dodgers are coming soon! I just can't wait for the beautiful sky blue boys of summer, to start buzz sawing through, the inferior, poor, step child which are the Padres. Torre's crew should make short work of the National League West. I do feel bad for the so oft disappointed San Diego Sports fan. However feelings cannot pollute my inner Dodger Fan being. Anyway I am sure there will be much banter from Weathers and his ilk regarding the Dodgers-Padres Baseball Battles this season. To Weathers I say bring it on, I am ready!

Today's vocabulary word is: Prestidigitation

Hint!

Joe Torre has much ________ up his sleeve.

Even I will wish the Bolts much electricity this weekend.

Still basking in the glow - and basking in the glow of all the previous failures

2008-01-14T17:32:00.000-08:00

It's far too early to look ahead to the upcoming steamrolling the Chargers are going to receive from the Patriots. Wednesday through Saturday will bring plenty of time for that. For now, I'd like to continue to bask in the glow of the Chargers victory over the Colts yesterday. I still cannot believe they pulled it out. San Diego sports teams have a glorious history of choking in the clutch, of getting screwed by the officials and lady luck but failing to rise above those challenges and persevere to victory. Ok, maybe they don't have a particularly glorious history of that, but the last few years have been pretty brutal in those regards. To recap:

A (recent) history of violent failure
In 1998, the Padres reached the World Series. In Game 1, they reached the bottom of the seventh in Yankee Stadium with a 5-2 lead. A Knoblauch homer tied the game, and with two outs and the bases loaded in the 5-5 game, Tino Martinez stepped to the plate against Mark Langston. They reached a 2-2 count, and Langston threw a fastball over the outside corner. It was clearly a strike. Langston knew it was a strike. The NY Times describes the Yankees bench as having gone quiet because they knew it was a strike. And yet somehow, it was a ball to Rich Garcia. Martinez homered on the next pitch, and the World Series was over for the Padres.

Time elapsed, and the Padres and Chargers mainly sucked too much to choke in key situations. Finally, in 2004 the Chargers returned to the playoffs. Drew Brees led a great fourth quarter comeback that ended in a touchdown to tie the game. It was aided by a roughing the quarterback call on the Jets on a fourth down failure that would have ended the game, but that was pretty clearly the correct call. The defender had driven his arm into Brees' helmet; you're not allowed to do that. In overtime, the Chargers got the ball and drove down the field for what should have been a routine field goal. Nate Kaeding pushed his 40 yard attempt wide right, and the Jets responded to their second chance by driving down the field to make their own game winning field goal.

The Padres made the playoffs in 2005 and 2006, yet did nothing either time. At least they finally managed to win a game in 2006 against a bad Cardinals team that they should have easily taken the series against. Instead, they lost in four games. The Chargers also made the playoffs in 2006 after a dominating season in which they finished 14-2. In one of history's all time epic choke jobs, they lost to a clearly inferior Patriots team 24-21 after: five fumbles in the game, all recovered by the Patriots; one solid drive by the Patriots all game, occurring right before half time when Wade Phillips made the incredible decision to play a prevent defense with plenty of time left on the clock; an interception of Brady late in the fourth quarter with an 8 point lead; a subsequent fumble back to the Patriots on the return of that interception; numerous dropped passes throughout; going for it on fourth and 11 instead of kicking a long but very makeable field goal; a stupid personal foul penalty committed by Drayton Florence, giving the Patriots an easy field goal when a sack had pushed them back out of range; a 54 yard field goal attempted with 8 seconds left (plenty of time left to run a play to gain 5 more yards to make the field goal much easier). Yes, that was a bad game.

In 2007, the Padres put together a good season and were a win or a Rockies loss away from clinching a playoff spot with two games to go. They were one strike away from beating the Brewers, but Tony Gwynn, Jr. tripled off of a Trevor Hoffman changeup and the Brewers ultimately won the game. They defeated the Padres the next day, and the D-Backs rolled over and gave their final two games to the Rockies, leading to a one game playoff in Colorado for the wild card. The Padres and Rockies played the best baseball game I've seen, a back and forth battle that lasted 13 innings. Special commendation should be given to Heath Bell, who pitched a season high 2 2/3 innings with 5 k's and no hits allowed. He entered with runners on first and second and one out in the seventh innning and struck out Ryan Spilborghs and Yorvit Torrealba to end the threat. In the 13th, Scott Hairston struck a two run homer, scoring Brian Giles (who had worked a walk), and the Padres looked headed to the playoffs yet again. They just needed three outs from the second greatest closer of all time. Yeah, those outs never came, though. Well, one of them did. A second one should have. But instead, the umpire ruled Holliday safe, despite him never touching home plate, and instead of a tie game with two outs and a runner of first, the game was over and the Rockies had won. So yeah, that was kind of a tough loss to take.

The Chargers game Sunday seemed to be imitating the Padres game against the Rockies. San Diego's best player (Peavy, Tomlinson) had a so-so game and was out of it at about the halfway mark. Their most important player down the stretch (Bradley, Rivers) was hurt for the most important part of the season (the last week of it for Bradley, the fourth quarter for Rivers). A huge call went against them (the play at the plate for the Padres, the interception return for a touchdown called back on a phantom hold for the Chargers). The backup to the most important player (Hairston, Rivers) accounted for the go-ahead scores (Hairston's homer, Volek's qb sneak). I was fully expecting David Binn (the longest tenured Charger) to snap the ball over Mike Scifres' head on the Chargers' last punt of the game, mirroring how Hoffman (the longest tenured Padre) had blown the Rockies game. Instead, Binn was clutch, delivering a beautiful snap, allowing Scifres to get off a booming kick, and sprinting down the field to make the tackle on the returner.

So somehow the Chargers held on and won, defying 10 years of San Diego postseason tradition. And it was glorious. If only previous San Diego athletes had been more like David Binn.

Disclaimer: I'm not really as bitter about these moments as I appear, except perhaps at Rich Garcia. I also don't believe in clutch as an ability - studies have shown that in baseball performing better in the clutch is a very small and unimportant skill. The best clutch players are the best players in every other situation.

Playoff Scenarios

2008-01-13T22:01:00.000-08:00

Alright, since it's 10:45pm on a Sunday, I decided to do a little analyzation of the challenge facing the Chargers.

Sunday: The Patriots. Without Philip Rivers, the Chargers have absolutely no chance. Billy Volek had a pretty good second half of a season with the Titans a few years back, but he is clearly a backup, and he deserves to remain one. He did lead the Chargers game winning drive against the Colts, but the best case for Volek is a game manager, and the worst case is well, a complete and utter disaster possibly involving his death at the hands of a very upset Chargers fan from National City. Believe it or not, Rivers is the key to the Chargers chances against the Pats, they need him even more than they need LT. (Side Note: Everyone else see Rivers trash talking with a fan? How awesome would it be to be a random guy who gets an NFL Quarterback worth multi-millions of dollars to argue with them? God I wish I was rich and could sit down on the field...) They can win playing Michael Turner and Darren Sproles, but not with Billy Volek. And if LT, Gates, AND Rivers are all out against the Pats, this could be possibly the biggest blowout in playoff history. Let's hope that doesn't happen. Since it is only Sunday night and we will not be sure about the Chargers three headed monster until later in the week, I have to make two predictions for the Chargers-Pats game on Sunday.

With LT-Gates-Rivers: Chargers 24 Patriots 34

Without LT-Gates-Rivers: Chargers 7 Patriots 41

As for the NFC, we have a match up of the AARP and the Baby Gap. Brett "I eat cheese three meals a day" Favre, and Eli "I'm a mouth breather" Manning. Packers-Giants. There is almost no chance the Packers lose this game in Lambeau. Not only is Eli on the road once again, but the high temperature in Green Bay on Sunday is supposed to be 13 degrees. 13. At kickoff the temperature is supposed to be 7. With 9mph winds. I'm guessing there will be a focus on the running game for both teams. As evidenced by Ryan Grant's 207 yard performance against the Seahawks, the Packers seem to have an advantage over the Giants. Throw in home field advantage, massive amounts of emotion, and Eli on the road (he can't keep winning, he just can't), it seems destiny that Favre will be back in the Super Bowl.

Giants: 21 Packers 28

So by my count, the Super Bowl should wind up being Packers-Patriots, which will inevitably end in a Patriots blowout victory. However, in the hopes that the Chargers win, I will not make my Super Bowl prediction yet. Let's hope the Lampost Pizza crowd noise has as big of an effect on the offense as it did tonight against Peyton "You Feel Me" Manning. Raise your hand if you think Norvall Turner can lead us to victory!

And in closing, ladies and gents, I'd like to point out just how awesome a player Donovan McNabb is. First of all, he was born in November. And in Chicago. You have to be crazy to be born in Chicago that time of year...It's cold. Second of all, he attended Mt. Carmel High School in Chicago. That's crazy, cause there is a Mt. Carmel High School in San Diego! He also played football at Syracuse University, how many great football players went to Syracuse? He has the Big East record for touchdown passes, touchdowns responsible for, passing yards, total offensive yards and total offensive plays. In 2004 he had 31 touchdowns and 8 interceptions, a 104.7 passer rating, and led the Eagles to the Super Bowl against the Evil Bellicheck's. But more importantly, he married his college sweetheart, had a child in 2004 and lives in Chandler, Arizona, my place of residence from 2005-2007. Way to be Donovan McNabb. I'm going to have to buy your jersey.

(P.S. I have an ulterior motive for doing this. Trust me.)

What A Day For The NFL

2008-01-13T19:04:00.000-08:00

Hello faithful. Can you believe that Charger game today? The Chargers were reminiscent of the Superbowl bound 1994 squad. Could it be possible that the Bolts will defeat the Cheating Billichecks? Perhaps! I spent the day with friends and family watching 200 hours of 300 lb men hit each other, what utter joy. Weathers of this blog was amazed by Billy (who are you) Volek, pulling a Tom Brady in the 4Th Quarter. Good times. Now on to the Gigantes vs America's team. Choke, choke, choke for the Cowgirls today. What is the over under on JJ firing Wade Phillips, maybe 6 days? Looking at Saturdays games, The Pack is BACK BIG TIME!!! favre looks like he is 25 and just hitting his stride. What can I say about the Cheating Billichecks win yesterday.......YAWN, YAWN another billicheck Spawn. Has anyone noticed the rhymes in the last two lines? Really fine! Well back to earth, next week we will be down to two teams, you heard it here first friends: The Stupor Bowl will be Chargers vs Green Bay.

Today's vocabulary word is: Oxymoron

Hint: An________would be Microsoft Works

This link is too funny not to post: http://www.oxymorons.com/oxymorons.html

Carl Weathers Withers

2008-01-12T08:51:00.000-08:00

Now when and old, experienced, knowledgeable, quality, intelligent, learned, sage, makes a statement you yungins need to heed his words! I notice no retort from Mr. Weathers regarding the average Padre fans persona. Cat got your tongue? I agree on Pierre. Shout out to any GM: Pierre for your #4 outfielder and an option on 100 hours of Bonds "Community Service". The Padres will finish behind the Dodgers this year. Yep you heard it here first friends. The Padres win 77-80 games.

The reason the KOOOOOOOOOOOOZZZZZZZZZZZZ trade worked out for the Kirin Ichiban-California Rolls is that Barfield regressed BIG TIME. Why I do not know, perhaps he was a Balco boy too. As to the Bucholtz trade offer: The deal was very close. It came down to my belief that you do not trade a guy who hit .344 and has 25 HR and 15 SB ability for a SS that is a Dustin Pedroia clone. Great on field but so-so for Fantasy. In addition a guy that hits in the .230's has to show me that he can hit MLB Pitching for at least a .260 Ave before I jump on his train(see Dave Kingman with a few SB and less power). Tullo is the Bomb! regarding Garza, he escapes one of the worst offenses in history, for a decent, young, upstart TB team. True Bucholtz seems to be the better arm and talent. But that + nowhere, in any world, equals the gulf created by Yuniel-Kemp. Enough Said.

Today's vocabulary word is: Gunite

Hint: _______ will be poured this week by a Padres fan who will not wear a shirt, BUT SHOULD!

Great poster ideas for the Colts-Chargers game

2008-01-11T23:43:00.000-08:00

Everyone loves the people that come to games with their hand-made signs spelling out the station that the game is on in a clever acronym. It's apparently a great way to get yourself on tv, because tv loves creative original works like these signs. Here are some good ones to employ this week for the Chargers-Colts game.

Chargers
Be
Superbowl bound (or just generally super)

Manning
Never
Beats the
Chargers - or at least he doesn't most of the time

can't Escape
Shaun
Phillips
caN you, peyton manning

Freaking chargers
Outrunning
X-rays

Chargers
Never lose to
Nobody!

America
Melts
at the sight of the Chargers

Superbowl
Under
Neath
Dead
Apples
Near
Chargers
Excellence

Every
conteSt
Pitting the chargers against the colts
eNds with the chargers winning by
2

Tomlinson
Lurks,
Colts beware

Tomlinson
Eats
Love
Every
Morning
Unless
Nobody
Does
Origami

Thanks to Justin for the idea and to David for some great sign ideas.

Baseball!!!!1!one!

2008-01-11T21:41:00.001-08:00

It would be highly presumptuous of me to think anyone would actually wade through the War and Peace-esque (in length only, of course) post I just submitted, so I'm going to contribute something readable. Plus I'm really bored on a Friday night because somebody doesn't want to go see There Will Be Blood. So: 5 things that will happen in baseball this year, a rebuttal.

1. Juan Pierre will contribute 700 glorious plate appearances to the Los Angeles Dodgers while playing a wonderfully decent left field. He'll make an out in 476 of them. Matt Kemp and Andre Ethier will start the season platooning in right field, until they get off to a slow start in their first two games. They're given to the Marlins, along with $8 million; in return the Dodgers get Luis Gonzalez back.

2. For the fourth straight year, the Padres and their penny pinchin' ways will finish ahead of the Dodgers, fueled by a healthy Randy Wolf (cut loose from the Dodgers last year) and Mark Prior. Kevin Kouzmanoff will continue to prove anyone who judged the trade a win for the Indians last year in May (cough, Emerson, cough) completely wrong by hitting .300 with 25 homers. Something good will finally happen in the postseason for San Diego fans for the first time since Sterling Hitchcock roamed the Qualcomm Stadium mound.

3. Sorry, Cubs, next year became this year 11 days ago. Except that the Cubs are actually the best team in a terrible NL Central, so they'll reach October with a 1 in 8 chance at making their fans 1000 times more annoying.

4. The Boston Yankees and New York Red Sox (or is it the other way around, I don't really know anymore because they're basically the same team - oh snap!) will both miss the playoffs as Toronto will rally by them on the backs of an incredible pitching staff. In all seriousness, look at the Jays staff, it's really, really good. The Rays claim the wildcard when their Wade Davis and Jake McGee and David Price and Evan Longoria and Desmond Jennings (ok, he's too much of a stretch even if he is a great prospect) and Jeff Niemann are all ready much sooner than expected. A 6 year Tampa Bay dynasty is begun. Even in defeat, Buchholz wins 18 games with a 3.2 ERA, proving that yes, he is way better than Matt Garza (who is mostly just average, in contrast to all the other great young Tampa pitchers), and yes, Buchholz, Chris Young (the short one), and Yunel Escobar is a better package than Tulowitzki, Kemp, and Garza.

5. Barry Bonds signs with the Oakland A's to "mentor" their young players. Carlos Gonzalez suddenly develops 60 homer power, Brett Anderson breaks Mike Piazza's bat tossing him BP, then picks it up and throws it at him, and Eric Chavez actually stays healthy for the entire year.

Looks like it's going to be an exciting year in baseball.

Fantasy Fantasy Team

2008-01-10T20:25:00.000-08:00

I know one of the cardinal rules of sports discussion, whether online or in the flesh, is "don't talk about your fantasy team". No one besides you cares. Presumably this rule would hold even more true for fake fantasy teams, where you participate in a mock draft in January because football is only played once a week and you are bored out of your skull, near tears begging for it to be April again, because, darn it, you miss baseball. Ahem. Yes, fantasy baseball, and the no-no about talking about it. However, since no one reads this blog anyway, and I'm just writing it for fun and to give myself a place to ramble on for thousands of words without any consequences, I am going to subject you non-existent readers to an excruciating analysis of my fantasy fantasy team.

To begin with, some background on the fake league. 12 teams, standard 5x5 roto categories, 4 SPs, 4 RPs, one generic P spot, no bench. This is the team I assembled.

C Joe Mauer R5 P4
1B Lance Berkman R3 P4
1B Carlos Pena R6 P9
SS J.J. Hardy R14 P9
3B David Wright R1 P4
OF B.J. Upton R2 P9
OF Corey Hart R7 P4
OF Juan Pierre R12 P9
OF Josh Hamilton R18 P9
SP Erik Bedard R4 P9
SP Tim Lincecum R8 P9
SP Chad Billingsley R13 P4
SP Dustin McGowan R15 P4
SP Andy Pettitte R17 P4
RP Huston Street R9 P4
RP Manuel Corpas R10 P9
RP Carlos Marmol R11 P4
RP Rafael Betancourt R16 P9

As you can see simply by glancing at it, my fake fantasy team is awesome. But no, forcing you to glance at my team and admire its glory is not enough. I must take you through my selections and thoughts for said selections for each and every one of these contributors to my fake fantasy team (which is not only awesome by itself, but draws strength from being named Carl Weathers as well; I pondered naming them Chuck Norris' spawn, but that was a little too much power for them to handle.) Let's begin at the beginning, a very good place to start.

David Wright, 3B
As expected, A-Rod, Hanley Ramirez, and Jose Reyes went 1-2-3. Good work by the people in front of me sticking to the book and making the intelligent selections (sidenote: in the future I resolve to get a top three pick so I can get Ramirez or Reyes; I think the top three is the sweet spot this year because those two are so studly). I made my own by the book, obvious selection here. Wright's awesome, I love getting to pick him here, and I think there's actually another big dropoff after Wright, so maybe the fourth pick isn't so bad after all.

B.J. Upton, 2B
This was a much more difficult pick. Upton had a great year last year without playing full time, so if we could just extrapolate his numbers to 650 PA and upgrade them a tick due to him getting closer to his prime, he would be a great steal here. Unfortunately, he struck out a ton, requiring a .400 BABIP to sustain his .300 average. I don't think there's any way he hits .400 on balls in play again, so I'm expecting a .270 average, best case. He's still got some nice, developing power and great speed, so a 30-30 type year is quite possible. Johan Santana was inexplicably still available here, but I'm convinced I can build a great pitching staff with only midround picks, so I focused on hitting early.

Lance Berkman, OF
I am definitely expecting a bounce back year from Berkman, which will put him back up there with the mid second round power hitters. Upton and Wright both have speed, so I wanted mostly power here. Berkman has that and should hit for a good average. Peavy and Santana were finally taken before here; if either were still available I would have pounced.

Erik Bedard, SP
Bedard struck out an obscene amount of hitters last year, leading the league in K/9 by a sizeable margin. This huge K-rate leaves him only a little behind Santana and Peavy in my mind, with the upside to easily pass either one. It gives him the edge over Brandon Webb, who was taken with the next pick. Had Carlos Guillen, Derek Jeter, or Troy Tulowitzki (the second tier of shortstops) made it to me here, I would have considered taking one of them (in that order).

Joe Mauer, C
This is probably a pick I would like to have back. I really like McCann and Mauer at catcher in some rounds around here, and I think both of them are great candidates for rebound years. But in this draft, Jorge Posada wasn't picked until the end of the tenth round and offers close to the same production, and Geovany Soto wasn't taken until the fifteenth round. Soto hit .349/.418/.648 at AAA last year in close to a full season and then hit .389/.433/.667 in 60 major league PA (small sample size here obviously). So he's my sleeper du jour, and he and Posada offer much better value in their rounds than Mauer here. Oh well.

Carlos Pena, 1B
My team still could use some power, and Pena here supplies it, even though he probably won't hit 46 homers again. 35 with a .270ish batting average is all I'm looking for here. First base is actually something of a shallow position this year, so it's good to get a big bat like Pena there. Otherwise I'd be left hoping Kotchman develops some power this year, which is not a position I want to be in in a 12 team league. (Note: this is very different than being in a 20 team keeper league, where owning Kotchman is nothing to be ashamed of. Do you hear that, Filliam? You can walk with pride, even owning Kotchman.)

Corey Hart, OF
Have to give Emerson some props, here, he extolled Hart's virtues to me a long time ago and I blew him off. But he's definitely a very good fantasy player. Good work, Emerson. Hart went 20-20 this year while hitting .295. He's in a good Brewers offense, and barring injury he'll get more at bats this year than he did last. He has a good minor league track record. One possible cause for concern is his terrible strikeout to walk ratio (3-1 last year) being exploited by pitchers who have faced him more now.

Tim Lincecum, P
Tim Lincecum's arm is going to come flying off this season. He's a terrible injury risk. The Giants suck, he's never going to get any wins. Major league hitters are going to figure out his delivery and motion. If you pick Lincecum, he'll pollute your fantasy team with his bad attitude. In sum, avoid picking Lincecum at all costs. As Bill Simmons would say, let's just move on now.

Huston Street, P
Street is a very solid closer for the A's. He's got good strikeout and walk numbers, a low ERA, and as long as he's still on the A's, he'll have a solid number of save opportunities. He has some health concerns, but I think he's as good a bet as any random closer to stay healthy. Him getting traded to a team where he wouldn't be the closer is of concern, but Beane will probably look to maximize the return on Street. Maximum return would come from a contending team (lots of save opps) desperate for someone to close, which would be a situation better than or equal to Street's current one.

Manuel Corpas, P
Having four relief pitcher spots forces me to take another closer here. Corpas has great groundball ratios, which is important for success in Colorado. Seems solid enough to me.

Carlos Marmol, P
Marmol is being given the closer's job in Chicago through Dempster's switch back to starting. He had 96 K's in 69 innings last year. Enough said. (Except that, yeah, closers were going fast so I needed to draft another to be in good shape.)

Juan Pierre, OF
If Juan Pierre plays leftfield for the Dodgers next year, he'll probably be the worst everday player in baseball. I feel guilty that I'm supporting someone this terrible at real baseball by drafting him to my fantasy team. But Pierre stole 64 bases last year with a good batting average, and this is the twelfth round. At this point he's a steal (pun most definitely intended, as it always is with me). If I end up with Pierre on my real fantasy team, it'll give me a second reason to root for him playing everyday in left for the Dodgers. The first is that Juan Pierre is terrible and will kill the Dodgers out in left.

Chad Billingsley, P
Another hated Dodger on my squad. He really mows down the Padres, too. He's pitched 31 2/3 innings against them with 43 K's, limiting them to a .563 OPS. In the second half last year (as a starter) he had a 3.12 ERA with 83 k's in 92 1/3 innings.

J.J. Hardy, SS
I needed a shortstop and Hardy was the best available. I'm not really sold on the power development, but then, Hardy's ISO (SLG-avg) wasn't particularly out of line for his career. Maybe he'll lose some homers to doubles, and I wouldn't be surprised if his average fell some more, although his BABIP is low for his line drive rates. Expected BABIP is line drive% +.12, but Hardy's BABIP was .280 despite a 20% line drive rate. Plus, as Emerson has noted in the past, he doesn't really strike out all that often. So perhaps there is hope for him to keep hitting .270 yet.

Dustin McGowan, P
See the rationale for Lincecum. Nothing to see here, nothing at all.

Except I do feel like I should explain a little with McGowan. He's got really nasty stuff, an above average K-rate, and he has a great groundball percentage of 55%. More groundballs means less power for opposing batters and fewer home runs allowed.

All right, I suppose this post has dragged on long enough, and my final picks of Rafael Betancourt, Andy Pettitte, and Josh Hamilton were mostly filler. Betancourt is awesome (even if he's a steroids user, which he is, having been suspended for them earlier in his career) and Borowski is not, so it seems likely he'll become the closer at some point. Pettitte is solid, if unspectacular. And Hamilton has a lot of upside.

So that was my fantasy fantasy draft. It was a lot of fun and gave me a good hour of enjoyment, plus all this time I have spent recounting it you. It has been an oasis of baseball in the midst of the desert of the current sports scene, which does not have much baseball going on. Check out mockdraftcentral.com for these excellent fake drafts. Thanks to baseballmusings, baseball-reference, and firstinning for being so awesome with the baseball stats they have.

Basabol Been Berry, Berry, Good To Me, Hane

2008-01-10T15:49:00.000-08:00

So as we roll into the 2008 Baseball season, I the resident Sage, decided to pull a Rabbit out of the hat and bring up Saturday Night Live. For you youngins, Garret Morris had a reoccurring character named: Chico Esquela (School Boy En Espanol). Said Character was a good natured muse to Jane Curtain (Hence the name Hane) during the Weekend News update portion of the show. The Baseball season cannot come fast enough for me. The sweet smell of freshly cut grass wafting up to the hot dog infested stands. Ahh yes! Baseball really does make glad the heart of childhood! Along with the start of the season some things to consider:

1 - The Cubs will not be eliminated, as this is "next year".

2- The Padres will have a host of retreads and AAAA players that somehow manage to win just enough games to tease their sushi eating, tattoo wearing, multi-pierced, beer slugging fans.

3- The Yankees and Red Sox will be over whelming favorites to "win it all". However the Yanks will some how choke! To the great joy of this commentator.

4- The Giants will have an average age of 350 years old. Their SS will have been in the cup room with Indiana Jones guarding the Holy Grail for some 305 of his 350 years.

5- My Dodgers will win it all to the great joy of the best voice in all broadcasting Vin "Vinny" Scully.

This post will continue at a later time. Now for the word of the day: Pontificate

Now friends guess the meaning! Hint The Pontiff is a big time guy with a big time hat!

http://snltranscripts.jt.org/78/78hupdate.phtml

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Recurring_Saturday_Night_Live_characters_and_sketches_(listed_chronologically)

(Links to SNL Chico)

13 Years of Mostly Futility (but ultimately one beautiful victory) Condensed into one 60 minutes

2008-01-08T21:15:00.000-08:00

It was 13 years between the Chargers' playoff victory over the Titans last Sunday and their prior postseason win, against the Steelers on Jan. 15, 1995. In that time, the Chargers have had 6 coaches and such luminaries as Craig Whelihan and Ryan Leaf as their starting quarterback. They experienced a glorious 1-15 season (but passed on drafting the dog killer with the first pick the next year, which really would have added to the ignominy). Another first overall pick refused to play for them, forcing them into a blockbuster deal that somehow still ended up as a great trade for them. And then the last four years, they have been pretty darn good. They're still getting bad breaks and choking, but at least a solid successful foundation has been laid. Maybe the playoff victory drought will only last one week. Maybe we can condense 13 years of wandering in the wilderness into one game, which will culminate in a victory. Here's what that game would look like.

Early in the game, the Chargers are shredded by an all-time great qb. They are bummed to be down Colt - 26, until they realize Colt isn't a point total like 49 is. Things continue poorly from their, until they are given second choice of whom to add to their team among anyone outside of the one particular playoff game. The Colts have first pick and add Manning (Eli), who played in college in the SEC. He's really awesome. The Chargers add Leaf (Brady), who played in college in the Pac-10. He's awful whenever he plays, is hated by teammates, and at halftime sneaks out to play flag football instead of joining in the team meeting in the locker room. Right before halftime, the Colts score 11 straight points and look like they're going to score 16 straight. However, kicker Nate Kaeding makes a 48 yard extra point to give the Chargers one point, but everyone in San Diego misses it when CBS cuts away from it to give a presidential election update. The Colts do go on to score the final 3 points before halftime.

Coming out of halftime, the Chargers still suck, so they're given a chance to add Darren McFadden to the team. They opt to keep running plays for Tomlinson instead. McFadden joins the Colts and is awesome for a few drives, but then kills a few of them with terrible turnovers. Ultimately, he's kicked out of the game for killing not drives but dogs. Still, the Chargers struggle, so they get to bring Eli Manning onto their team. Eli Manning refuses to join the Chargers, so instead the Chargers get to take Peyton Manning, Bob Sanders, and Adam Vinatieri. This seems to work out better for them than Eli would have. With Peyton Manning now on the team, Rivers suddenly starts playing much better and has a series of awesome drives. Unfortunately, Vinatieri misses a key field goal after one great drive, leading to great disappointment in San Diego. Another drive is sabotaged when the Chargers fumble several times and drop a couple of passes. On their next drive, the Colts luckily recover two fumbles and get the ball back when Marlon McCree fumbles an interception. It allows them to score a touchdown, prompting more stories on how their QB is a clutch god, even though THE CHARGERS GAVE HIM THE GAME!!!!!1ONE!1SINPI/2!1, er, I mean, drive, they gave him the drive.

At the end of the game, the Chargers have the ball on their own 20 with little time left, down 6 points. After three Tomlinson runs for -6 total yards, Rivers converts on fourth down with a long pass to Jackson. After another long completion to Chambers, Rivers hits Jackson for a 30 yard touchdown pass to ultimately win the playoff game.

Unfortunately, the victory means Norv Turner will keep his job.

My First Post

2008-01-08T11:18:00.000-08:00

As the resident sage on this blog, I must be "the sane one". Dignity and grace shall be my hallmarks. Kindness and joy my credo! That being said, has ANYONE heard the joke of a phone call made by Clemens to his "connection"? I listened for about 10 minutes this AM. My skull reverberated with confusion and bewilderment.Can anyone say Chicken! Thats what Clemens is. An out and out Chicken and traitor to his peeps. McNamee's son is on deaths door and Clemens is worried about his next $200,000,000 paycheck, and his fragile reputation. PLEASE!!!! This exemplifies what is wrong with professional sports today. Well enough said about the empty shell.....umm....Rocket.....

As an ongoing feature I will supply a vocabulary word (or phrase) with each post. Said word may be in the dictionary or made up out of my abundance of Grey Matter.

Said word for today is: Plethora! Now kids, feel free to post your opinion on the meaning of this useful vocabulary word.

Hint: Clemens has a ______ of Money! Perhaps Plethora fits in the blank.

San Diego SUPER Chargers

2008-01-07T00:03:00.000-08:00

First of all, I would like to formally announce my presence as a contributor to "Hot Ham Water," I am Ian Miller, and as my esteemed colleague Carl so eloquently opined, I am indeed generally a fan of Los Angeles based sports teams. However, as a mostly fair weather Chargers fan (and anti-Norv zealot), I was, of course, extremely interested in today's playoff game between our beloved Bolts and those heathens from Nashville. After a brief, and mostly useless jaunt to Lampost Pizza in Vista, we settled in at home to enjoy the majesty of Norv Turner's face in hi-def. I must admit, when I saw Gates go down, I was immediately worried that the Chargers would once again suffer a crushing playoff loss, as they have done ever since the 1994 season. Our hero, LaDanian Tomlinson was ineffective, and putting our hopes on the broad shoulders of Philip Rivers had not worked out too well throughout the season. That made it all the more impressive when the Chargers showed a smattering of resiliency after the loss of their second best offensive option. The combination of the offensive inconsistency in the first half, the loss of Gates, and the generally mediocre play of Rivers throughout the year, led me to believe that the Titans had legitimate hopes to win a game they should have had no chance in. It was to my surprise then that Rivers stepped up to the plate, made some quality throws, no major mistakes (the interception wasn't really his fault) and, in the words of every sportswriter ever, managed the game well. While Rivers was impressive, the most encouraging aspect of today's game was the excellent play of Vincent Jackson and Chris Chambers. Today showed the Chargers have the talent to win games when LT and Gates are almost completely non-factors. Jackson seemed to be open consistently, and made a nice move on his touchdown catch. Chambers found some holes in the defense, and though the Rivers interception was mostly his fault, was a major part of the Charger offense. Hopefully Gates will be able to play against the Colts on Sunday, but if he can't, the Bolts might need another good showing by the wide receivers to be competitive.

One cannot discuss today's rain-soaked competition without mentioning the "opportunistic" San Diego defense. One fumble caused by the incomparable Shawne Merriman, another interception and three sacks not only helped my playoff league fantasy football team, but was a major contributor to the Chargers victory. It's unlikely they will be able to repeat their regular season six interception performance against the Colts, but the combination of pressure and good coverage down field should be enough to give them a chance. Oh who am I kidding, they need to play one of their best games of the season to beat Peyton "You Feel Me" Manning.

Well, since I have this public forum in which to broadcast my expertly qualified views, I might as well take advantage of it. So here's my predictions for the 2nd round of the NFL Playoffs...

Seattle Seahawks 17 Green Bay Packers 24

N.Y. Giants 20 Dallas Cowboys 34

Jacksonville Jaguars 21 New England Patriots 38

San Diego Chargers 20 Indianapolis Colts 24

And in closing, here's tonight's random Emerson Boozer factoid: Instead of attending the University of Maryland at College Park, what most of us know as the University of Maryland, he was on the football team at the University of Maryland Eastern Shore, in Princess Anne, Maryland. Way to be different, Emerson.

Smackdown

2008-01-03T02:05:00.000-08:00

Folks, I am a scant two hours into this whole blogging thing, and already I am engaging in the time honored blog pastime of calling out writers for their inaccurate and imprecise language. Unfortunately, the writer I am calling out is myself. In my previous post I called my second round pick of Matt Holliday a sleeper. This is a barefaced lie. By definition, a legitimate second round pick, which Holliday was last year, is not a sleeper. The author responsible for this disgraceful abuse of the beautiful and sacred English language deserves to hang from the yardarms before being drawn and quartered. I apologize profusely for my monumental lapse in judgment. An example of a real sleeper I picked last year was Tom Gorzelanny, who offered a fine return on the 256th pick of the draft I utilized on him (while lying on a hospital bed recuperating from appendicitis - but that's a story for my other blog on intestinal medical problems "smack of ham in digestive organs"), or Jose Valverde, whom I claimed off of the free agent list before the start of the season.

And to conclude, the first in a sporadic series of factoids dedicated to Emerson Boozer. Today's fun fact about the predecessor to today's notable Boozers (Carlos, and um, well mainly just Carlos of the Utah Jazz):
in 1967 with the New York Jets, Emerson led the league in rushing/receiving touchdowns with 14 despite only getting 131 touches.

Find out more about Emerson Boozer here.

Obligatory Intro Post

2008-01-03T00:31:00.000-08:00

Hello and welcome to Hot Ham Water: Water with a Smack of Ham. As the title, subclause following the main title, the website address, my posting name, and most likely plenty of references to follow indicate, we're big fans of Arrested Development around here. However, this has almost no relevance to the general topics that will be presumably rambled upon on the pages of this here blog. This here blog is a sports blog, primarily. I personally am a huge fan of the San Diego pro sports teams, namely the Friars and Bolts. My partner in posting is a huge fan of Los Angeles sports teams, primarily the Dodgers and the men of Bruin but not so much the men of Troy, and also somewhat the Lakers. Being a nomadic fellow, in his traversings of the globe (mainly attending school at ASU), he has also picked up an affinity for the Sun Devils and Cardinals of Arizona. He tolerates and roots for the Chargers as his football team, but the Padres will always be the inferior, annoying little brother to the south of the Dodgers to him.

So that is us. I personally am looking forward to having a place to ramble endlessly about my favorite teams. So expect Padre and Charger posts aplenty from me (assuming I actually have some dedication and stick with this blog - which I am, because we're making this thing huge!!one!, and using it to take over the world: that's our motto, world domination one seemingly innocuous sports post and really long run-on sentence at a time). We are also big fantasy ballers (or something like that, maybe not quite as gangster sounding as ballers), playing football and baseball. We engage in epic battles when we matchup in either sport; these will quite likely be recounted to you the anonymous reader in a future post. But fantasy baseball and football will be discussed here, however, certainly not in a way that will leave you under the impression that we are anything close to professionals or skilled in these games. Our credentials for these discussions are a second place finish in fantasy football this year (by me, carl weathers) and a third place finish (by Ian) in baseball two years ago, where only a -10 start by the infamous Tim (or was it Tom) Corcoran in the semifinals stood between him and the championship. But I did pick Matt Holliday last year with the 32nd pick, so I have a keen eye for sleepers.

I believe that about wraps up the obligatory introductory post. Please keep coming back, and maybe give the ads a couple of hundred clicks while you are here. Remember, our writing may seem like the generic terrible sportswriting you are used to, like bland hot water if you will. Every once in a while, though, you will come across some phenomenal analogy, metaphor, or particularly inspired advice or analysis, and that will be that smack of ham in that hot water that we guarantee*. Or it might just be Buster's thumb. Don't choke on it like the racist old lady did.

*Offer only good in Alaska.