AJC > Sports > Braves > Blog > Archives > 2007 > October
October 2007
There’s only one October — please let it end
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Here’s one positive aspect to having another short, one-sided World Series: We won’t have another four days of Dane Cook telling us how many Octobers there are (if I’m not mistaken, he claims there’s only one).
But really, what’s the deal with the long, beautiful grind that is the baseball season, from spring training to October, ending in such anticlimactic fashion as it has so frequently in the past decade?
If the Red Sox win tonight here in Denver, it will be the fifth World Series sweep in 10 years, and the third in four years. We haven’t had a seven-game World Series since Anaheim beat Barry and the Giants in the 2002 series.
Much as I was looking forward to the atmosphere of covering a World Series in Boston and the first ever in Colorado, hasn’t this series been rather lame, unless you’re a card-carrying member of Red Sox Nation?
Glad we’ve at least had this forum here to exchange pleasantries, opinions … and personal attacks. God bless the Braves/MIB blog. Without it, I’d have actually had to write a lot of inches about these games.
Anyway, am I just being jaded? Or do you agree about this series (actually, about this entire postseason, with almost every series entirely one-sided)?
To me, this World Series has been one of uninspiring performances, from Josh Fogg to Boyz II Men, from Willy Tavares to the aforementioned (and inexplicably popular) Dane Cook, from vanilla Kelly Clarkson to Brian Fuentes and balding James Taylor (J.T. was in fine voice, but made us feel old thinking of erstwhile Sweet Baby James).
Oh, maybe I just need more sleep to be able to properly evaluate this. Maybe I’ll look back in a couple of days and realize what a treat it was to see the Mighty Red Sox, who’ve become the ascendant giant Apple Inc. of baseball to the Yankees’ stagnant monolith IBM.
But I doubt it. I doubt I’ll view this as anything more than it was, a mismatch between an almost perfectly constructed Red Sox machine and a good-not-great Colorado team that played out of its collective mind for 3-1/2 weeks, winning 21 of 22 games to go from fourth place team to NL pennant winner.
Clearly, the Red Sox have shed their “loveable underdog” label they wore for most of a century, transforming themselves into a unit with all engines humming, and they’ve torn through the NL champions on the way to a seemingly inevitable second World Series title in four seasons — both sweeps, if they win tonight.
The Yankees are the Evil Empire? Give me a break. The Yankees haven’t won a World Series in seven years. Spending more money than everyone else just doesn’t make them seem very evil if it doesn’t permit the Yankees to beat the Red Sox.
Meanwhile, Red Sox Nation can no longer cling to angst like a security blanket. Sorry, Sawx fans, you just can’t. It doesn’t legitimately apply to a team that, entering tonight, had won seven consecutive World Series games dating to October 2004.
A team that was batting .352 in this World Series, and had outscored the Rockies 25-7 in three games, and scored 95 runs in 13 games this postseason.
Hey, the Rockies are good. They really are. But they had an eight-day layoff that robbed them of their edge. And besides, the Red Sox aren’t good; they’re pretty great.
This series has played out the way it probably would at least seven times if you had these teams play 10 series.
Rookies take center stage: Red Sox rookies Jacoby Ellsbury and Dustin Pedroia were the story of Saturday’s 10-5 Boston win, the two combining for seven hits, three runs and four RBIs while serving as the first rookie duo to hit 1-2 in a batting order for any team in World Series history.
Since last night, a few Braves fans have asked me if Atlanta might have a rookie or two who could have a similar impact next season. And my first reaction is, you can’t honestly predict such a huge impact from any rookie.
But after giving it some thought, I’ll go out on a limb and suggest Brent Lillibridge could end up having a very big impact for the Braves, who should contend for a playoff spot if they make the right moves this winter to strengthen the starting rotation and bench, and obviously fill their center-field void.
Lillibridge, 23, is a top prospect and strong defensive shortstop who excelled after his midseason promotion to Triple-A Richmond, where he .287 with 10 homers, 41 RBIs and 28 stolen bases (in 33 attempts) in 87 games.
But he also played center field as a freshman at the University of Washington in 2003, when he hit .388 with 13 homers, a .451 OBP and a whopping 1.150 OPS in 54 games, the best of his three college seasons.
When you hear the Braves indicate that they have options in the system to replace Andruw Jones if they can’t sign or trade for a veteran center fielder, they are ostensibly referring to Lillibridge and 21-year-old Jordan Schafer, who was selected as the top prospect in the Class-A Carolina League.
I really don’t believe the Braves view either as most-desirable options, not this soon, not to start the season.
But to say they have options can help in possible negotiations with other teams with tradeable center fielders, or with free-agent center fielders who might want to play for the Braves and would consider signing at a discount, if they believed the Braves had other options. And in Lillibridge, they do have a reasonable option.
Schafer is the future center fielder, I really believe. But I’d be very surprised if he’s on the team before late next season, and probably not until at least 2009. He just turned 21 and hasn’t played above A-ball.
Yes, I know Rafael Furcal made the jump directly to the majors from Class A. So what? Furcal was very much an exception, a kid with blazing speed and a cannon who’d hit .330 with 96 stolen bases — yes, 96 — in his final minor league season.
Which brings us back to Lillibridge. He’s supposed to play the second half of the winter-ball season, provided the left wrist he injured at the end of the season is healed. If the Braves have him play center field in winter ball, we’ll know they’re quite serious about him being an option for the position.
After all, if Kelly Johnson can make the conversion from outfield to second base in one offseason, without any previous experience on the right side of the infield, with less than one season of experience in the majors, and after missing the entire 2006 season for elbow surgery, well, then Lillibridge could make the transition back to the position he played four years ago.
He’d have part of the winter-ball season and all of spring training to do it, if that’s the direction the Braves decide to go. I don’t know if they’re seriously considering it, but we’ll know soon enough.
OK, let’s get ready to watch some ball. Still got nearly an hour until the first pitch, so we’ll have Waylon, Johnny, Willie and Kris sing us a song.
”HIGHWAYMAN” by Jimmy Webb
I was a highwayman. Along the coach roads I did ride
With sword and pistol by my side
Many a young maid lost her baubles to my trade
Many a soldier shed his lifeblood on my blade
The bastards hung me in the spring of twenty-five
But I am still alive.
I was a sailor. I was born upon the tide
And with the sea I did abide.
I sailed a schooner round the Horn to Mexico
I went aloft and furled the mainsail in a blow
And when the yards broke off they said that I got killed
But I am living still.
I was a dam builder across the river deep and wide
Where steel and water did collide
A place called Boulder on the wild Colorado
I slipped and fell into the wet concrete below
They buried me in that great tomb that knows no sound
But I am still around..I’ll always be around…and around and around and around and around
I fly a starship across the Universe divide
And when I reach the other side
I’ll find a place to rest my spirit if I can
Perhaps I may become a highwayman again
Or I may simply be a single drop of rain
But I will remain
And I’ll be back again, and again and again and again and again…
What’s that, still got a half-hour to go? Then let’s turn it over to an old rocker.
“ROCKY MOUNTAIN WAY” by Joe Walsh
Spent the last year/Rocky Mountain Way
Couldn’t get much higher
Out to pasture/Think it’s safe to say
Time to open fire
And we don’t need the ladies/Crying ‘cuz the story’s sad
‘Cuz the Rocky Mountain Way/Is better than the way we had
Well he’s tellin’ us this/And he’s tellin’ us that
Changes it every day
Says it doesn’t matter
Bases are loaded and Casey’s at bat/Playin’ it play by play
Time to change the batter
And we don’t need the ladies/Crying ‘cuz the storie’s sad, uh huh
Rocky Mountain Way
Is better than the way we had
Hey, hey, hey, hey
World Series gets a mile high
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
It’s not the cozy confines of Boston’s self-proclaimed “America’s Most Beloved Ballpark,” but Coors Field is a pretty special place to watch a ballgame, too. And it’s not cramped like Fenway Park.
Of course, any place is a good place to see a World Series game, which the good folks of Colorado are going to finally get to do tonight, when the Fall Classic gets high — about 5,200 feet, the elevation of Denver.
And just for the record, the highest previous altitude for a World Series game was 1,117 feet at Phoenix in 2001. This fact brought to you by (imagine your company name here, then give us a call and maybe we can work something out).
I remember covering the 1997 World Series when I was a Marlins beat writer, and even that huge football stadium in Miami had great atmosphere when nearly 80,000 people were packed in there to watch the World Series.
(And speaking of contrasts, Boston-Denver is nothing compared to Cleveland-Florida in that series, when we went from snow during batting practice before Game 3 in Cleveland, to temps in the 80s with high humidity in Miami).
Anyway, it’s beautiful here today in Colorado, though the temperature’s supposed to drop quickly. It was 50 and sunny this afternoon, which in Colorado qualifies as balmy (I saw plenty of locals wearing shorts on the 16th Street Mall downtown).
The Rockies are down 0-2 in the Series, but the atmosphere outside the ballpark was festive and upbeat this afternoon - maybe these folks believe their team can overcome that deficit to win, or maybe they’re just having a great time.
If you’ve never been out here, the streets around Coors Field in LoDo (Lower Downtown) are just lined with cool bars and restaurants, and the people are friendly. I’d recommend a visit to Denver during baseball season for any seamhead, especially now that the Rockies are good and should be for the next few seasons, with all the homegrown young talent they’ve got on their roster.
“Out in the city, everywhere you go, people are on fire,” manager Clint Hurdle said this afternoon, when someone asked about how the response from Denver during the Rockies’ “Miracle on Blake Street” run to the World series.
By on fire, he meant pumped up, thrilled, caught up in this ride.
But if they don’t win tonight, that ride might end abruptly Sunday. If the Rockies go down three-games-to-none, this thing’s not even going to go to a fifth game Monday in Denver, much less go back to Boston for six or seven.
Speaking of tomorrow, I’m still scratching my head a bit over Hurdle’s decision to start Aaron Cook, who hasn’t pitched in a major league game since Aug. 10 because of a strained side. Nothing like pitching in a game for the first time in 10 weeks and having it be against this Boston lineup. Yikes.
His name is Paul Brown, and he’s an idiot. OK, maybe he’s not an idiot. Maybe he’s just a passionate fan taking the extra step to show his allegiance to his team. That’s something we all can appreciate.
However … this is a bit much. More than a bit much.
Brown, a 31-year-old dude from Denver, has a tattoo of Coors Field. But it’s not just a little tat on his shoulder or calf or whatever. Paul Brown this week got an exterior depiction of Coors Field tattooed across his entire back.
This according to a story in today’s Rocky Mountain News. I was so impressed, or horrified, that I spent part of my Saturday morning trying to find Paul Brown’s phone number so I could call him and do a story. Seriously.
But as you can imagine, there are plenty of Paul Browns in most metro areas, Denver included. And I wasn’t even sure if this Paul Brown’s number was one of those listed.
Plus, I was hungry and really wanted to go get some huevos rancheros for breakfast, which I did. So we’re going to have to go with a mental imagery of Paul Brown’s massive Coors Field tattoo on his back, since the story wasn’t accompanied by a picture (can’t believe they didn’t get a picture, since they did talk to the guy).
He told the newspaper, “I love the place. I’ll still be going to Coors Field when I’m in my 60s and 70s. I take my kids now; I’ll be taking my grandkids then. So I’ll never regret this.”
Let’s hope not, Paul. Let’s hope not.
By the way, it cost $500 and took about six hours for the tattoo artist at Freaky’s Tattoo and Body Piercing to do the work.
The story in the Rocky Mountain News did have a couple other pictures of guys getting Rockies-themed tattoos, including one groovy-looking fella getting a purple-and-black design with a Rockies logo inside a bleached-skull Grateful Dead symbol.
Hey, like we said, it is the highest-ever World Series.
Marcus released again: You’ve all read that Marcus Giles was released by the Padres yesterday, I’m assuming. That’s twice in about 10 months that the former Braves second baseman has been dropped from a roster.
When the Braves failed to tender him a contract last winter because they didn’t want to pay anywhere near the $5 million-or-more salary he would have commanded in his final year of arbitration, the Padres signed him to a free-agent contract with a $3.25 million salary in 2007 and a $4 million option for 2008 with a $500,000 buyout.
They went with the buyout, pulling the plug on the Giles brothers reunion after one season. They’re from suburban San Diego (El Cajon) and the Giles boys had always wanted to play on the same team, but this feel-good story didn’t work out, simply because Marcus Giles is a shell of the player he once was.
He’s only 29, but this season he hit .229 with four homers, 39 RBIs and a .304 OBP, losing first his leadoff job, then his starting second-base job.
It’s been a steady slide for Giles, who went from being one of, if not the, best-hitting second basemen in baseball in 2003 to being released by the Braves and the Padres.
Giles was terrific in 2003, when he hit .316 with 49 doubles, 21 homers, a .390 OBP and a .526 slugging percentage, for a stunning .916 OPS. He had still-solid OPS totals of .821 in 2004 and .826 in 2005, but in 2006 for the Braves he hit .262 with 11 homers and a .728 OBP in his first season as a leadoff man.
For whatever reason, the Padres decided to use him at leadoff again this season, even though Giles made it pretty clear throughout the 2006 season that he didn’t like hitting leadoff and never felt comfortable there.
He started out strong for the Padres, hitting .327 with a .376 OBP in April. But soon after, the bottom fell out.
From May 7 until the end of the season, he hit .191 with 16 extra-base hits and a .276 OBP in 304 at-bats (88 games).
Since Sept. 5, 2005, Giles has hit .244 with 55 doubles and 20 homers in 1,056 at-bats. Think about those numbers — in 2003 alone, he hit .316 with 49 doubles and 21 homers in 551 at-bats.
Unless he’s able to have a bounce-back season for someone, there are going to be suspicions about Giles, fair or unfair, simply because his performance declined after the arrival of steroid testing in baseball, then declined further after the subsequent ban on amphetamines, or “greenies.”
For his sake, I hope he rejuvenate shis career with some team. Giles was a hard-working, hard-nosed player, a little man who played a very big role for some strong Braves teams.
With Glenn Hubbard’s assistance, he transformed himself from a stone-handed minor-leaguer into a solid defensive player and an NL All-Star.
It’d be a shame if it’s over this soon, if he’s done before 30, if his career becomes little more than a footnote in Braves history, clouded by suspicions. It really would.
“YOU WILD COLORADO” by Johnny Cash
Oh you wild raging river like my woman’s lips you lure me
Pied piper of the desert roll on to the sea
You’re the same at noon or midnight and I follow where you go
But you’re planning no returning you wild Colorado
If I had no love of life I’d become part of your flow
But I fear the place you’d take me you wild Colorado
Oh you wild raging river from the fountains of the mountains
You ripple down the valleys growing wide and swift and deep
With what power you cut your canyons how long ago
You’re as wayward as my woman you wild Colorado
If I had no love of life I’d become part of your flow
But I fear the place you’d take me you wild Colorado
Who’s the Empire now? And no K.J. for Coco
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
I was standing on the corner Lansdowne and Brookline (which is better than standing on a corner in Winslow, Ariz.), just behind the Green Monster, chatting with Sam Morton, a 19-year-old college kid wearing paint-spattered Vans, a black Red Sox hat, and a red shirt with “AGAIN” across the chest in blue letters of the font used in the Red Sox logo.
It was Thursday afternoon and he’d been here, oh, 27 hours, and was going to be out here a few more until the Red Sox released 200 or 300 tickets they sell two hours before every game.
The Massachusetts College of Art and Design student and his buddy passed on standing-room only seats to Game 1 on Wednesday, believing they’d get good seats if they stayed overnight and moved up to the front of the line, which, by the way, was about 600 strong, all the way down the block, four or five across, by Thursday afternoon.
Sam, who’s from Eliot, Maine, had slept in a tent overnight, and was wearing the same clothes he wore when he got here at 1 p.m. Wednesday. He was haggard and rumpled and, frankly, funky. He looked like he could use a shower and shave. In other words, he looked like I did most morning during college.
But Sam was just thrilled that he was 15th in line, certain to get decent seats to the second game of the World Series.
“I’ve done this before, for a couple of Red Sox-Yankee games this year,” said the sophomore who was “absolutely” skipping some classes at Mass Art (that’s what they call it here) to be in this line.
He’s a native of Eliot, Maine, a Red Sox fan all his life, like just about everyone else he knows in New England.
“It’s sinful not to be,” he said, and then I told him that I couldn’t remember people sleeping on the sidewalk overnight to get tickets to a Braves game. “It’s a whole different atmosphere here,” he said.
Then I had to ask him: Was it better to be the luckless underdogs the Red Sox had been for most of a century, or the big-spending franchise going for a second World Series title in four years? After all, it’s hard to call the Yankees the Evil Empire when the Red Sox are spending more than anyone but the Yankees, and when the Red Sox are the team going for their second ring in four years while the Yankees haven’t won one in seven years.
“That’s a great question,” Morton said. “Growing up we were always underdogs, always in the Yankees’ shadow. Now we’ve got this powerhouse team. We really pounded the Rockies last night.”
He didn’t answer my question, but that was OK. Scruffy Sam seemed like a cool kid. It’d been a long night. And he was about to get good seats to see his beloved Sawx. Carry on, Sam.
Kelly Johnson for Coco Crisp? That rumor’s been hot-and-heavy on the ol’ Man In Black blog here today. But after speaking with a person who should know, I can tell you it sounds unlikely the Braves would trade for Crisp to be their new center fielder, and extremely unlikely that they’d trade Kelly Johnson for Crisp.
In other words, if the Braves can’t do better in finding a replacement for Andruw Jones than Crisp, then maybe they’d consider trading for the no-longer-starting Red Sox center fielder. But they wouldn’t trade Kelly Johnson in a straight-up deal for Crisp, who would kill to have an offensive season like the one K.J. just had in his first full season.
Johnson, after missing all of 2006 and after moving to a new position (second base), hit .276 with 26 doubles, 10 triples, 16 homers and 68 RBIs in 521 at-bats, with a .375 OBP and .457 slugging percentage.
Crisp, 27, has had five major league seasons with at least 400 at-bats, and has career highs of 16 homers, 71 RBIs and 50 walks. In the past two seasons, he’s gone .264-8-36 with a .317 OBP and .385 slugging in 2006, and .268-6-60 with a .330 OBP and .382 slugging in 2007.
Things are going to get interesting this winter as the pieces start to come together, but right now I don’t have a good read on who’s going to be at second base or center field, and not certain about shortstop. I don’t know that the Braves do, either, until they really start to get into trade talks.
Gotta love the creativity: Walking to Kenmore Station after last night’s game, saw a guy selling T-shirts with these slogans on the front — Derek Jeter Drinks Wine Coolers and A-Rod, Mr. April/Miss October.
And at a Boston University bookstore they were selling T-shirts in Red Sox blue and red with a superhero-looking guy in a baseball uniform on front and this in comic-book lettering: Fighting Evil for the Good of the Game.
Great night from you all on the blog last night. So what do you say we do it again? Let’s roll.
First, some stats and facts:
_ The Game 1 winner has won all six playoff series this year and nine of the past 10 World Series.
— Red Sox have outscored opponents 43-6 in their last four games in this postseason, and also have won five consecutive World Series games.
— Josh Beckett is 5-0 with a 0.93 ERA in his past five postseason starts, including four in this postseason. He could get the chance to become only the third pitcher to win five games in one postseason.
— After five innings in Game 1, the Sox already had tied a World Series record with eight doubles, and had scored nine runs with two outs on the board. They went 11-for-15 with two outs in those first five innings.
— The Sox have scored 36 runs in their last 21 innings before tonight.
— David Ortiz has had a sore knee for a while now, and might not play much first base during the two or three games at Colorado when the series shifts and the DH is dropped in the NL park. If Big Papi doesn’t play first base for the Sox, Kevin Youklis will.
— Dunkin’ Donuts is a huge Red Sox sponsor. Guess who was in the Dunkin’ Donuts suite for Game 1? According the Boston Globe, it was a motley assemblage including an actor/comedian named Mike O’Malley (never heard of him), Bruins NHL Hall of Famer Ray Bourque, Fox baseball folks Jeanne Zelasko and Kevin Kennedy Arizona center fielder Eric Byrnes and … Darth Vader intro, please … Scott Boras.
OK, that’s all. Let’s do this.
But before we get going, a tune. I’m sure there are plenty of people who don’t feel or act like those in this song by the bard Greg Brown. But I can’t say I’m one of them. Don’t know about you all, but always feel like I’m just another fella “at pink slip’s mercy in a paper universe.”
“JUST A BUM” by Greg Brown
I saw a man, he’s a well-dressed man
He had a tan from the Yucatan
He had a car, he looked like a star
I said, Hey, don’t I know who you are
But when he glanced into my eyes
I saw yes I saw was such a big surprise
He was afraid that he’s just a bum
Someday when all his stuff is gone and he’s left without a dime
Time ain’t money when all ya got is time
And you can see him standin on the corner with a nine-day beard and bright red eyes
I know a guy, he’s a pal of mine
I say, hey. He say, I’m doin fine
I’m movin up the ladder, rung rung rung
I’m gonna get my million while I am still young
But at night when he’s had a few
His eyes say different than his tongue
They say I’m afraid that I’m just a bum
Someday when all my stuff is gone and I’m left without a dime
Time ain’t money when all ya got is time
And I can see me standin’ on the corner with my nine-day beard and my bright red eyes
Goin hey, hey hey hey hey, come on and listen to my story, hey, hey hey hey hey, ah hey
Some people live to work, work to live
Any little tremble and the earth might give
Ya can’t hide it in a Volvo or a London Fog
Can’t hide it in a mansion with an imported dog
No matter how we plan and rehearse, we’re at pink slip’s mercy in a paper universe
And we’re afraid that we’re just a bum
Someday when all our stuff is gone and we’re left without a dime
Time ain’t money when all ya got is time
And we can see us standin on the corner with our nine-day beards and our bright red eyes
Goin, hey hey hey hey hey hey hey
Hey hey hey hey, come on and listen to my story man hey, hey hey hey hey, ah hey
The man of sorrow’s acquainted with grief
Stands in line waiting for relief
He will tell ya it wasn’t always this way
One bad little thing happened one bad little day
Heartbreak has bad teeth and a sour smell and lives when he can in a cheap hotel
And he’s afraid that he’s just a bum
Someday when all his stuff is gone and he’s left without a dime
Time ain’t money when all ya got is time
And you can see him standin on the corner with a nine-day beard and bright red eyes
Goin, hey hey hey hey hey hey hey
Hey hey hey hey, come on and listen to my story man hey, hey hey hey hey, ah hey
Cramped, but baseball bliss. Let’s do this.
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Just when you’re about to complain about the obnoxiously overcrowded pressbox at this World Series in Fenway Park, you feel like a whiny idiot when your hear that Dave Justice lost his San Diego home in the wildfires.
So I’ll not complain about the pressbox. But I can’t type without bumping elbows with Tom Haudricourt of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel on my left and a Japanese reporter on my right, who I might add is using a very small laptop with “Bluetooth” capabilities, which I’m pretty sure is really high-tech. (But I bet he’s never heard George Jones’ “High-Tech Redneck,” so I do have that on my Asian seatmate … or at least it feels like he’s my seatmate — my God, this makes a coach seat on Delta feel spacious. But I’m not gonna complain.)
Besides, it’s a minor inconvenience. Nothing could spoil this day, this atmosphere.
I’m watching the Red Sox take batting practice, with the Prudential building and Boston skyline beyond right field, while folks who paid scalpers $1,500 for cheap seats are waiting for the gates to be opened so they can enter the stadium.
(Why do the Red Sox not open the gates in time for Red Sox Nation to watch their heroes take batting practice? Seems odd to me).
And I have a full belly after chowing on one of the best hamburgers I’ve had the pleasure of consuming. Thanks to the blogger here yesterday who recommended Uburger near Kenmore Station — the “Boom Burger” with fried jalapenos and cheddar was out of this world, and the fries stupendous.
Who says you’ve got to spend a fortune to eat well in Boston? Long as you don’t mind ordering at a counter and eating off a tray, you can get a mighty fine meal for under $10.
You cannot, however, get a sweatshirt for under $50. Not this week. Not with Red Sox on it.
I went to a souvenir shop on Yawkey Way across from Fenway Park, to get a sweatshirt for my girlfriend. And I was astounded to see the $75 price tag on seemingly ordinary Red Sox hooded sweatshirts. And $125 for “vintage” hoodies (hey, they’re cool, but not $125 cool).
I settled on the one that didn’t have the familiar swoosh logo and cost $25 less — a mere $50 for a sweatshirt!
And speaking of exorbitant costs, the scalpers out in Denver are getting $400 for those Rockpile seats in the funky section high above center field. The Rockies sell those seats for $4 during the regular season - and $65 during the World Series. Talk about gouging the customer.
Then again, would you rather pay $65 for a Rockpile seat (if you were fortunate enough to pay face value, rather than buy from a scalper), or $50 to pahk ya cah a quarter-mile or more from Fenway?
So will the Series be back in Boston next week? In other words, do you folks believe it’ll go more than five games?
I think we could know a lot more a few hours from now, because if the Rockies come out smokin’ hot against Josh Beckett, well, then I’ll take the Rockies in five games.
But I’m not expecting that, for two reasons: The Rockies have won 21 of 22 games, but they’ve not played in more than a week. And Beckett has been as close to unhittable this postseason as you’re going to get.
So if the Rockies come out flat against Beckett and lose tonight, does it really mean a lot? Probably not. We’ll know a lot more, in that case, after they face Curt Schilling in Game 2 on Thursday.
Because, as Schilling himself said in the interview room an hour ago, he ain’t what he used to be.
“I’m a different pitcher now,” said Schilling, in a moment of humility that we’re not accustomed to. “Whereas I used to be able to exploit with one pitch, now I’ve got to use different pitches to different spots.”
As for Beckett, Schilling said: “We’ve got the best pitcher in the planet going for us tonight.”
Tough to argue against that assessment, considering Beckett was the only 20-game winner in the majors this season, and has been even more dominant in the postseason. In three starts in these playoffs, Beckett is 3-0 with a 1.17 ERA, .160 opponents’ average, and a stunning 26 strikeouts with only one walk in 23 innings.
My old Fort Lauderdale Sun-Sentinel colleague Gordon Edes, who now covers the Red Sox for the Boston Globe, wrote a story today that compared Beckett’s postseason to the great Bob Gibson’s three wins against the Red Sox in the 1967 World Series, when Gibson went 3-0 with a 1.00 ERA, with 26 strikeouts and five walks in 27 innings.
Of course, Gibson did that in one series/ Then again, he also did it off a raised mound. Different era, deeper lineups, so perhaps Beckett’s postseason is on a similar level as Gibson’s.
But I’ll reserve judgment until after this World Series.
There can be no disputing Beckett’s “big game” reputation, however, which is entirely deserved. He’s now 5-2 with a 1.78 ERA in nine career postseason games, including eight starts and one memorable four-inning, one-hit relief appearance against for Florida against the Cubs in Game 7 of the 2003 NLCS.
He got three wins in that NLCS, and just over a week later in the World Series, Beckett threw a five-hit shutout in the clinching Game 6 win against the Yankees.
I remember how John Smoltz sounded a bit perturbed when so many people raved about Beckett’s performance that offseason, like it had never been done in recent times or something, when in fact Smoltz had done similar work in several postseasons.
And Smoltz was right. It’s a what-have-you-done-for-me-lately society that always wants to make the most recent performance by so-and-so the best performance in history, where sports writers and ESPN guys always want to say this guy’s the best or that team was the best, discounting the person or team they’d said or written that about just a few years earlier.
But if Beckett has a great World Series, he will have certainly earned a spot in that pantheon of great postgame pitchers of the modern era, of the three-tiered playoff era, if he hasn’t already.
For Rockies fans, there’s plenty of reason to believe your boys can handle him. Because they have before. He was 4-0 with a 2.81 ERA in five starts against them for the Marlins from 2002 to 2005.
But with Boston, he faced them June 14 at Fenway and gave up six runs and 10 hits in five innings of a 7-1 loss to the Rockies. Matt Holliday is 6-for-14 against him, Todd Helton 4-for-12, and Garrett Atkins 6-for-10.
Then again, this is October, and Beckett’s been one tough cuss this time of year.
So I’m talking with one of the veteran ESPN guys in the Fenway Park pressbox a few minutes ago, and out of the blue he says he thinks the Braves could be playing in the World Series a year from now if a couple of things go their way.
(It wasn’t Jon Sciambi I was talking to, but I did see “Boog” just a while ago, as he was about to enter a radio booth. He’s doing pre- and post-game shows on ESPN’s radio broadcast. And he got a short haircut, looks ready for business.)
Anyway, this other ESPN guy, more a behind-the-scenes guy who does research and a lot of the real legwork for the broadcasters, mentions how much he likes the Braves’ rotation if they add Glavine and some other decent starter this winter.
He said he’s a bit concerned about Soriano in the closer role, but then I reminded him that Mike Gonzalez should be back by July, and that Soriano really looked great in the first third and last third of the season.
Then he agreed with me that getting Gonzalez back was huge, that his injury was a big blow last season. And I say, yes, and so was losing Hampton in the spring. And he says, “Oh yeah, they get Hampton back this season, too, don’t they?”
Well, I said, they hope they do. They’re paying him $15 mill, so they better get something out of him this season. Because I don’t know how much, if any, that insurance would pay if he were to miss a third consecutive season.
Then again, if Hampton can’t pitch again this season, Braves might be able to claim he had a career-ending injury last spring and perhaps get a settlement that covers part of his salary this season, too. I don’t know, honestly. I’ll have to ask about all that later, after we find out about Hampton this winter and/or in spring training, whether he’s going to be ready and all for the final season of his contract.
I asked Frank Wren about it today via an e-mail, whether he knew if Hampton had a winter-ball assignment yet, or if he knew anything more about his health than we knew at end of season, which really wasn’t much.
Here’s his e-mail reply, which I just received and am adding during the top half of the first inning: “Hampton is progressing and if all goes well, will try to pitch winter ball the second half starting in late November. We are working towards that.”
So there you have it. Straight from the GM to you, with me simply a relay man.
Wren digs “The Office”: I did, however, get a list of Frank’s five favorite shows, which I’d asked him about last week for the Gimme 5 thing we run on Page 2. Gotta like a man who’ll take a few minutes away from a very busy schedule to humor me with my request for his five favorite TV shows.
And gotta like him even more when you see the list.
He called it “Five shows I Tivo” and here they are: 24, The Office, House, SportsCenter, and The Today Show.
OK, so I’m not up to watch The Today Show, but I’ll assume it’s solid entertainment. The others on his list, I watch religiously (yes, even SportsCenter, I must admit, though I turn the channel quickly or mute sometimes when Stuart Scott is talking or Chris Berman does his painful “The Schwam” segment.
I don’t want to give away Frank’s lines about each shows, but since some of you won’t see the Gimme 5 list in the paper, I’ll share these two: of 24, he said, “We all need a cellphone like Jack Bauer.” And of The Office, he said, “Hope I’m a better leader than Michael.”
Couple quick items: Carl Yastrzemski is throwing out the first pitch tonight. You kiddies might not remember, but Yaz won the Triple Crown in 1967…. Composer/conductor John Williams leads the Boston Pops in The Star Spangled Banner” before tonight’s game, and Ashanti will do “God Bless America” during the seventh-inning stretch. And how cool is this — James Taylor will do “Carolina In My Mind” before Game 2. Kidding. He’ll do the national anthem.
Ok, this is a mellow sort of soft-rock song, but I always liked it, and it’s the only song I know where the first two cities mentioned are Boston and Denver.
”PLEASE COME TO BOSTON” by Dave Loggins
Please come to Boston for the springtime
I’m stayin’ here with some friends and they’ve got lots of room
You can sell your paintings on the sidewalk
By a cafe where I hope to be workin’ soon
Please come to Boston
She said, “No, would you come home to me?”
And she said, “Hey ramblin’ boy now won’t cha settle down?
Boston ain’t your kinda town
There ain’t no gold and there ain’t nobody like me
I’m the number one fan of the man from Tennessee.”
Please come to Denver with the snowfall
We’ll move up into the mountains so far that we can’t be found
And throw “I love you” echoes down the canyon
And then lie awake at night till they come back around
Please come to Denver
She said, “No, Boy, would you come home to me?”
And she said, “Hey ramblin’ boy why don’t cha settle down
Denver ain’t your kinda town
There ain’t no gold and there ain’t nobody like me
‘Cause I’m the number one fan of the man from Tennessee.”
Now this drifter’s world goes ‘round and ‘round
And I doubt that it’s ever gonna stop
But of all the dreams I’ve lost or found
And all that I ain’t got
I still need to lean to
Somebody I can sing to
Please come to LA to live forever
California life alone is just too hard to build
I live in a house that looks out over the ocean
And there’s some stars that fell from the sky
Livin’ up on the hill
Please come to LA
She just said “no, Boy, won’t you come home to me?”
And she said, “Hey ramblin’ boy why don’t cha settle down
LA can’t be your kinda town
There ain’t no gold and there ain’t nobody like me
No, no, I’m the number one fan of the man from Tennessee.”
“I’m the number one fan of the man from Tennessee.”
Rockies in six … No, wait. Sox in five
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
I’m walking a couple blocks from Boston’s Kenmore Station to Fenway Park after riding in from Waltham, Mass., on the “T”, on an a unseasonably warm New England October afternoon — is there such a concept as unseasonably warm anymore?
Saw a gym with a hand-written sign in the window that said, “Wear the Sox ‘B’ and work out free.” And a government building of some sort with a Red Sox flag flying beneath the American flag.
Saw cars and houses adorned with “Go Sox” sentiments for miles and miles along the Green Line. Saw boys and girls, men and women everywhere wearing ballcaps with the familar “B.”
Now approaching the grandest old ballpark in the world, I’m looking down Landsdowne Street, behind the Green Monster in left field, and it takes me a moment to grasp the fact that there are more than a dozen tents on the sidewalk.
Folks have camped out for a couple days, waiting to buy a very limited number of seats for Wednesday’s World Series Game 1 between their beloved Sawx and the upstart Colorado Rockies. The Red Sox sell those last tix two hours before gametime.
I’ve seen this queing up and camping out thing plenty of times in college basketball; it happened before every big game at my alma mater, the University of Kansas.
But this isn’t college hoops. And these seats aren’t cheap. Far from cheap. And there middle-aged folks in some of those tents, folks who presumably have jobs. Folks you don’t expect to see sleeping on urban sidewalks.
It’s not like the Red Sox are new to this World Series thing, having won it in 2004 to shake their curse and all that. And it’s not like there are no diversions here in Boston, which is the anti-Atlanta in terms of current championship-caliber sports teams (even my Celtics have finally surrounded Paul Pierce with the talent to make a serious run).
But there they are, all disheveled and waiting for a chance to pay big dollars for the opportunity to watch the Red Sox.
Gotta love it.
Unless you’re the Rockies, perhaps.
Just took my seat in a very cramped Fenway pressbox. I’m listening to Rockies being interviewed while I watch Red Sox working out on the field.
And now, I’d like to waffle on my World Series pick before I’ve even officially made it.
I’ll confess: I was going to pick the Rockies to win in six games. Now, I’m going to pick the Red Sox to win in five. Yes, that’s serious waffling.
Don’t know how exactly to explain the change in my pick, other than the look in some Colorado players’ eyes and the tone of their statements, which have quite a bit of awe and don’t-know-how-we-did-it.
(Before I forget, I stopped at a large corporate blue-and-yellow electronics store on the way here today, to pick up new CDs by Neil Young and Shooter Jennings. Much as I prefer to give my business to my man Don at his indie record store in Toco Hills in Atlanta, it’s hard to pass up those loss-leader prices on just-released CDs at the huge chain stores — damn them, he says, shaking his fist.)
And for a musical transition … I’m hoping the Red Sox will have the Irish-American rock band Dropkick Murphys play again at some point in the World Series, like they did when they played before Game 7 of the ALCS, on the field on the dirt cutout warning-track corner in right-center field.
Some folks said once the Dropkick Murphys played a rousing couple of songs before that game, complete with accompanying Irish step-dancers, the Indians didn’t stand a chance. The place was charged up beyond belief.
OK, back to the Rockies.
Folks, as much as I’d like to see the Senior Circuit pick up its second consecutive World Series championship, I’m afraid the spectacularly surging Rockies are in a whole different theatre here, and I’ve got a feeling their 21-1 run is about to end abruptly at the hands of Josh Beckett, Big Papi, Manny (and his incessant Being Manny) and the Red Sox before their passionate fans at the Fens.
The Rockies will face Beckett and Schilling in Games 1-2 with passionate Red Sox fans breathing down their backs, and the Rockies had best not expect another of their miraculous comebacks if they want to get out of here without being down 2-0 in the series.
Yes, the Rockies won two of three here at Fenway in June. But that was June.
Jeff Francis, their baby-faced and well-spoken ace pitcher, described what it was like pulling into Fenway on the team bus Tuesday and seeing the plethora of satellite dishes and TV trucks, not to mention all the fans mulling around outside on a workout day that wasn’t even open to the public.
There were hundreds of microphone and notepad-wielding reporters at the park when the Rockies arrived in the early afternoon.
“I’m sure the Red Sox are used to this every day, but we’ve never seen anything like this,” Francis said.
None of us have seen anything quite like this run the Rockies are on. From a fourth-place, near-.500 team in mid-September, to 21 wins in 22 games, including sweeps in each of their first two postseason series.
But how many of you believe they can keep it going through the World Series? It’d be a remarkable story, one that I believe most of us who aren’t denizens of Red Sox Nation would probably like to see reach a new climax.
But can they pick up where they left off after eight days of watching and waiting for the World Series to begin? Maybe they were too good for their own good in the NLCS, when they convinced seemingly everyone but Arizona’s Eric Byrnes that they were the better team (Uh, Byrnesy, they were the better team. Oh, and stop wearing skin-tight red undershirts that go to your wrists with matching red tights if you’re going to pull your pants up to the knees. That’s just wrong).
“If you would have told us we had to win 13 out of 14 to get in [the postseason], we probably would have thought it was impossible,” Francis said.
If they keep that run going after more than a week of rest, they should get super-sized World Series rings. All that time off, and now the Red Sox go up against Beckett, who’s 3-0 with a 1.17 ERA in this postseason. Tough task, lads.
By the way, Francis will be pitching on 12 days rest, Beckett on five (one more than normal).
While I’m thinking about it: You’ll hear and read more about it later, but if you haven’t heard already: Red Sox knucklerballer Tim Wakefield (sore shoulder) isn’t going to be on the World Series roster.
Terry Francona said he’ll start Beckett, then Schilling and Dice-K in Games 2 & 3. Hasn’t committed to a Game 4 starter, but I’m betting it’s Beckett if the Sox are either behind in the series or have a chance to close it out.
Rockies plan to start Francis in the opener, followed by rookie Ubaldo Jimenez (rookie facing Schilling in the World Series at Fenway — yikes), then Josh Fogg (what’s gotten into him, by the way?) and — here’s a bit of a surprise — Aaron Cook in Game 4.
Cook, the opening day starter who hasn’t pitched since Aug. 10 because of an oblique strain.
Rosters don’t have to be set until Wednesday morning, and that’s when both teams will make their final choices known.
Oh, and for all those Hahira- and Valdosta-based Red Sox fans: South Georgia favorite son (and former Brave) J.D. Drew, coming off his grand slam and five RBIs in game 7 of the ALCS, will get the start in right field Wednesday the lefty Francis. Drew didn’t play against many lefties down the stretch.
The mother of all late-season surges: Remember when the Braves beat the Rockies in back-to-back games Aug. 4-5 at Turner Field? No? They did. Trust us.
That began a road skid that saw the Rockies post a 5-10 record in 15 road games through Sept. 10.
Since Sept. 11, the Rockies are 12-1 on the road, holding opponents to two runs or fewer in eight of them.
They hit .296 and scored 60 runs while posting a 3.18 ERA during their 8-1 road stretch to finish the regular season, and they are 4-0 despite a .234 batting average in postseason road games. Their pitchers have a 2.13 road ERA in the postseason, in two road wins apiece against the Phillies and Diamondbacks.
But now they get the Red Sox, and something has to give. Boston has hit .323 and scored 49 runs in six postseason games at Fenway, including six or more runs in five games and 10 or more in three.
They outscored the Indians 23-4 in the last two games of the ALCS at Fenway.
One last thing: The Oxford American is a really good magazine to begin with. But the annual music issue (and accompanying CD) alone is worth the price of a subscription.
I’m telling you, I eagerly await this thing in my mailbox every year, and this year’s might be the best they’ve done. It’s 26 songs that span generations and every genre imaginable, all by performers with Southern roots.
This rich, eclectic set ranges from country and rock to folk and blues, from Eldridge Holmes’ beautiful R&B cover of “If I Were a Carpenter” to Dwight Yoakam’s “Yet to Succeed” and Zakary Thaks’ garage-rock “Bad Girl,” from Thelonious Monk’s sublime “Trinkle, Tinkle” to Iris Dement’s “Sweet is the Melody.”
You can get it on the newsstands.
I lied. Still one more thing: Anyone wonder if it’s total coincidence that Chipper Jones complained loudly this summer about the Braves having to play Boston every year in interleague play, and now, for the first time since interleague play began, the Braves don’t play the Red Sox in 2008?
Instead, the Phillies will face the Red Sox in interleague play in ’08. For his next act, Hoss should address the starting times of Braves home games. Then maybe the playoff schedule.
“COLD COLD HEART” by Hank Williams
I tried so hard my dear to show that you’re my every dream.
Yet you’re afraid each thing I do is just some evil scheme
A memory from your lonesome past keeps us so far apart
Why can’t I free your doubtful mind and melt your cold cold heart
Another love before my time made your heart sad and blue
And so my heart is paying now for things I didn’t do
In anger unkind words are said that make the teardrops start
Why can’t I free your doubtful mind, and melt your cold cold heart
You’ll never know how much it hurts to see you sit and cry
You know you need and want my love yet you’re afraid to try
Why do you run and hide from life, to try it just ain’t smart
Why can’t I free your doubtful mind and melt your cold cold heart
There was a time when I believed that you belonged to me
But now I know your heart is shackled to a memory
The more I learn to care for you, the more we drift apart
Why can’t I free your doubtful mind and melt your cold cold heart
Torre down, Cox still standing
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
It’s Friday afternoon, and I just finished a phone call with Bobby Cox about Joe Torre, just as Torre was beginning his why-he-rejected-the-Yankee-offer press conference before a packed room of reporters and TV and radio people in New York.
While Torre was stepping in front of the hot lights with his notes in hand, Bobby was in his old truck, driving to his farm in Adairsville and listening to Charley Steiner talk about Torre on XM radio.
The fourth-winningest regular-season manager in history (Cox) is talking about the eighth-winningest manager (Torre), whom Cox has the utmost respect for, and you can tell he has a few things he’ll keep to himself, perhaps out of his relationship with the Yankees, the team Cox played for, but probably just out of general style.
Like matters that occur in the clubhouse, Cox will always keep this stuff private.
So for the record, here’s what the current longest-tenured manager in baseball said about Torre.
(By the way, I should point out that Torre’s $7.5 million salary this year was more than double what Cox makes annually. But I should be pointed out, Torre had all the leverage when he negotiated his last contract - winning multiple World Series titles will give you that. Lou Piniella makes $3.5 mill, which is also ahead of Cox, but not by a lot; Bobby’s exact salary is tough to pin down, but I’m pretty certain it’s between $2.5 mill and $3 mill. For some comparison, Terry Francona is in the first year of a two-year, $4.5 million deal.)
Anyway, enough about managerial salaries.
Oh, wait, one more thing: Torre turned down a one-year, $5 million offer to return in 2008, which also included incentives. And while some might say he should’ve accepted a pay cut because the Yankees haven’t won a World Series in seven years, I can certainly see where Torre would see it as a slap in the face and unacceptable. After all, the man’s taken that team to the postseason 12 consecutive seasons while dealing with more pressure than anyone else in his profession on a daily basis.
OK, so Cox said about Torre: “Quite honestly, I thought he did as good job a job as you could humanly do this year. Having no pitching early on, with all the injuries they had, having to go to the bullpen in the first inning in back-to-back games….
“And he kept the team right there. I know they’re good, but I thought they had a remarkable comeback this season. They could have died easily, but Joe kept them right there. Joe’s still top-notch. I don’t know about the money and all that. It’s hard to understand all that right now.
“He’s been in an incredible situation. The last few years haven’t been as tough [in terms of pressure from the top] because George [Steinbrenner] is away from the team. But always before, Joe was the perfect guy for that job because of the demands George put on his people. George puts the same demands on his manager as everyone else; he doesn’t separate them.”
Lastly, Cox said of Torre: “He’s nothing but high-class. He’s got a great personality and character.”
Hey, like I said, it’s not Bobby’s style to throw folks under the bus, to burn bridges, to take critical shots at how any other team is doing business. He’s never done that, not that I can remember. Ever.
If you listened to the tone of players who spoke on ESPN today, past Yankees most of them, you heard the universal respect they had for Torre and their disappointment in how this transpired. I forgot which one of them said he thought Torre had earned the right to go out on his own terms, to manage as long as he wants to.
Can you imagine if a similar situation occurred in Atlanta with Cox? I can’t imagine that it would, that he’d be treated in a similar way by ownership, but then I don’t know the new owners, either. So I won’t say it’s impossible.
But let’s just say you’d have a similar outcry from past - and current - players if it did happen. Even though Bobby hasn’t had anything close to Torre’s postseason success, he’s got the same level of universal respect around the industry as Torre.
There are plenty who believe Cox should be able to manage the Braves as long as he wants. I’ll let you folks debate that if you want. I’ll keep my thoughts on that to myself.
Speaking of long tenures: Some were surprised by the unusual timing of the announcement that Andruw Jones would not be re-signed, coming as it did in the week after the season ended, long before the free agent filing period and the decision whether to offer arbitration had to be made, etc.
Some were also surprised by the timing of John Schuerholz’s move from the GM chair to the president’s office, just a couple weeks after the season ended.
But in retrospect, it all seems pretty obvious to me now, and well thought-out.
By making the Andruw announcement right away after the season, Schuerholz could clear that from the plate of his hand-picked successor, Frank Wren. That’s not something Schuerholz and the Braves wanted Wren to have to do as his first order of business, or his first press conference: “Hi folks, as my first act as GM I’d like to announce that we’re unceremoniously showing Andruw the door.”
And by then moving to the president’s role a week later, Schuerholz allows Wren to get to work and have an entire offseason to make the moves he wants to make, including one that I think is close to a sure thing: Tom Glavine.
I feel almost certain that the Braves are going to sign him now. I can’t see them possibly dropping the ball on this again. If they had no interest in Glavine this winter, they could have said so all along, not been coy about it or offered the “no comments” they have for the past couple of months.
That means they certainly do have interest, at least that’s how I see it. And I just can’t see them failing to sign Glavine for the second consecutive winter, them being outbid for his services for the third time as a free agent. Just can’t see that.
And I also don’t believe Glavine is going to rake them for every last time he can. Not at this point. He wants to be here, doesn’t want his career to end like it did with those last three starts, and certainly doesn’t want to go pitch somewhere else and leave his wife and kids back in Atlanta another season.
It’s going to happen. If it doesn’t, it means one side or the other just failed miserably in the art of compromise. And I can’t see the Braves doing that in Wren’s first offseason.
Now, if he comes out and says they’re just not interested in Glavine, that’s one thing. I’d be surprised, but at least it’d be a reason. If they say they’re just not willing to pay Glavine what he wants to be paid, to me that’s unacceptable. Both sides must compromise, and I think they will.
And then the Braves should be able to spend most of their offseason filling their other two main needs: Center fielder and one more starter. They won’t need a highly paid No. 1-caliber starter, not with Smoltz, Hudson, Glavine and possibly Hampton already in the rotation (Braves aren’t counting on Hampton, not this time, but they are hoping he’ll be ready to pitch).
Add Glavine and one more quality starter, perhaps a Blanton or Lowry or Bonderman, and the Braves have the best rotation in the National League, without question.
And with that rotation, it won’t be essential to replace Andruw’s bat with a big-power guy, just someone who can play solid defense and perhaps hit you 20-25 homers, perhaps a veteran who’d take less to play in Atlanta (I’m not gonna mention the guy from LaGrange’s name, but you know it).
To get that last starting pitcher, the Braves would probably have to do it via trade, perhaps for shortstop Edgar Renteria. Much as I know the Braves would prefer to keep him, a team like Detroit might target Renteria, and the Braves have Yunel Escobar ready to step in.
There will still be other decisions to make, including the bench. Will Willy Aybar be ready and can they count on him to stay healthy and clean? Do they want to pay the arbitration salary of Matt Diaz, who’ll probably qualify as a Super-2 guy (the guys with the most major league service just short of three years), or try to trade him if they believe Brandon Jones is ready to handle left field?
So many ways to go, so much interesting stuff to come this winter.
Big weekend of music: Bunch of good shows this weekend, including Govt’ Mule at Tabernacle tonight, and two great ones on Saturday — Vic Chesnutt at the Earl, and Jason Isbell at Variety Playhouse with the Whigs opening. Also, Over the Rhine at Eddie’s Attick on Monday.
And then there’s the Johnny Cash tribute show tonight at Star Bar. Bunch of bands playing three Cash songs apiece, no repeats allowed. “Hello, I’m Johnny Cash.”
Oh, and do yourselves a favor and try to see “Eastern Promises” while it’s still in the theatres. Great movie, overshadowed by some lesser ones recently.
”BETTY LONELY” by Vic Chesnutt
Betty Lonely
lives in a duplex of stucco
on the north bank of a brackish river
her ears omit the noise from a nearby airstrip
her mind floats beyond the snapper boats
Betty Lonely
her eyes are roughly staring
at a point through her sliding glass door
her heart lives over a drawbridge
her brain is wet like a thrownet
Betty Lonely
she will always think in Spanish
though I know
her Spanish black hair will start to fade
she sunk her past
out in the surrounding salt flats
her maidenhood was lost
beneath the Spanish moss
Betty Lonely
just talks to her grandbaby
everybody else she blots them out
but her words stick
like a flounder gig
her dry laugh is like a gaff
Braves’ CF prospect starts fast in Fall League
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
While some of us chug coffee to stay awake for LCS games and wonder what the weather’s going to be like when we get to Denver next week for the World Series — still wrapping my brain around that concept, World Series in Denver — there is day baseball being played, good people.
And one of those fellas playing it out in the prospect-filled Arizona Fall League is a name that’s quickly found its way into the collective consciousness of Braves/MIB denizens and hardcore Braves fans everywhere.
Jordan Schafer.
Let me be the first to give you a Fall League update on the future (as in 2009 or 2010) Braves CF: After four games with the Peoria Javelinas, the kid’s hitting .412 (7-for-17) with two doubles, a homer, league-high eight runs, four RBIs and two stolen bases in two attempts. With one walk and two strikeouts.
He was named AFL Player of the Week for the first week of the season, but the week ended abruptly: He sustained a minor concussion Saturday when he ran into the outfield wall while attempting to catch a fly ball.
“It won’t be the last time he runs into a wall, trust me,” Braves player-development director Kurt Kemp said. “Some kids back off, and some kids don’t. To him, the ball’s more important. That’s the way he plays. He’s an awful lot of fun to watch.”
(UPDATE: It’s Tuesday afternoon, I just talked to Kemp, and he told me Schafter took batting practice Monday and is in the lineup Tuesday.)
The Javelinas led the league in hitting during their 4-1 start, and it’s not uncommon for top hitters to hit .350 or better out there. So keep it in perspective.
That said, this kid’s going to make everyone forget Andruw Jones within a year….
(I’m kidding. Just wanted to see if you’re reading closely.)
Every year or two a prospect captures the imagination of the team’s fans, doesn’t it? Last year it was Yunel Escobar, who had the whole super-talented Cuban thing going along with the stories of his whistling throughout minor league games, which supposedly upset some opponents and Braves officials and blah blah blah.
His notoriety and popularity really began to take off when he blazed in the Arizona Fall League last year, winning the AFL batting title (.407). Braves fans wanted to see him, read more about him when he continued to shine in spring training, then got to see for themselves what all the fuss was about when he was called up to the big club in June and had a clutch hit in his debut at Wrigley Field.
It was quickly apparent that Escobar was much more than hype. He’s the real thing, as evident by his .326 average with 30 extra-base hits and .385 OBP in 319 at-bats and 94 games for the Braves this season, including a .333 average with runners in scoring position, a .355 average against lefties, and his .336 average and .876 OPS in 64 games after the All-Star break.
It’s going to be interesting to see where he fits in next season, what moves the Braves might make this season to open a spot for him, or whether they’ll bring him back in a “super-utility” capacity to back up two or three positions.
But while we wait for that to play out, and for the Tom Glavine thing to play out after the World Series, this seems like a good time to continue obsessing over Schafer, the Braves’ future center fielder.
Let me be clear: I don’t believe Schafer is over-hyped.
I do believe he’ll be the Braves’ starting center fielder at some point during the 2009 season or no later than 2010, and that there’s always an outside shot we could see him in some capacity late next season (hey, it happened sooner than expected with Francoeur).
Schafer is, by all accounts, the real deal. When I asked roving instructor Joe Breeden about him in September (I’ve known Joe since he was on the Marlins’ coaching staff in the 1990s; he was brought up for a couple of weeks this September), he raved about the kid.
Schafer’s stock has soared since a year ago. Let’s put it this way: He was only rated the Braves’ No. 27 prospect by Baseball America last winter, behind the likes of Brayan Pena and Clint Sammons.
I’d be shocked if he’s not rated among their top five prospects when the new lists come out this winter, and perhaps as high as the top three.
After batting .228 over his first two seasons in the minors, Schafer, a 21-year-old former third-round draft pick from Winter Haven, Fla., began to put it all together this winter in A-ball, hitting a combined .312 with a .374 OBP and .513 slugging percentage between stops at low-A Rome and high-A Myrtle Beach.
The left-handed hitter scorched at Rome with a .372 average, five homers, 20 RBIs and a .441 OBP in 30 games.
He led the minors with 176 combined hits at both stops, and ranked third with 49 combined doubles and sixth with 76 extra-base hits.
Perhaps most importantly, and made impressive adjustments after the jump to Myrtle, struggling some early before finishing with a .294 average in 436 at-bats, with 52 extra-base hits (8 triples, 10 homers) and 19 steals in 30 tries.
He was impressive enough there to be named the No. 1 overall prospect in the Carolina League in Baseball America’s year-end review. “A left-handed hitter with a line-drive stroke that generates above-average loft power,” said the BA synopsis.
“An above-average runner with outstanding range and a plus-plus arm in center field, though he needs to improve his instincts to become a more effective basestealer.”
Here’s the part that some of you might like: “Think Grady Sizemore meets Steve Finley,” one American League scout said. “All five tools profile, and he’s a gamer with tremendous work ethic.”
Folks, I can tell you that “plus-plus” grades are rarely given out by scouts, so you can be assure this kid’s got a cannon comparable to Francoeur’s.
I just got off the phone with Kelly Johnson this afternoon, and he added to the chorus of praise I’ve heard about Schafer. Kelly saw him in 2006 at Rome (Kelly was rehabbing early in the season), when Schafter was still trying to figure things out at the plate, etc.
But he made a big impression, especially with a catch he made in right field in a rainy game.
“He made one of the best catches I’ve ever seen,” Kelly told me. “He was going back in right, the field was slippery, wet, swampy. He somehow lost his glove, I can’t remember if he kicked it off his hand as he was backpedaling or what, but he fell backward and caught the ball barehanded. It was unbelievable.”
Kelly also confirmed the arm strength, said the kid’s got a gun.
OK, that’s it. We’ll keep you informed and try to give you a scouting update from a Braves official in coming weeks, someone who’s seen him out in Arizona or whatever.
I wish the World Series was going to be held in Arizona, because I’d go see him play myself. Alas, I’ll be chilly in Colorado. Oh, well. Maybe we can get out to Arizona at the end of the Fall League. If not, I’ve got a feeling we’ll see him plenty in spring training.
Oh, by the way: Kelly Johnson hasn’t been told to work on his outfield play or anything like that this winter. Frank Wren called around to all the players last week after Wren took over as GM, and his message to Kelly was something along the lines of, he liked how things worked out at 2B last season.
Not saying that means he’ll be back there, won’t be traded, etc. Just saying, the Braves haven’t instructed him to refresh his outfield play or anything like that.
Of course, he’s played out there before, so it wouldn’t require the type of crash course that he took last winter in learning to play second base. So probably best not to try to figure out anything just yet.
Neil Young out next week: Read some reviews of the new Neil album “Chrome Dreams II,” due out next Tuesday, and all agree it’s fantastic. It’s a sequel of sorts to the often-bootlegged but never released “Chrome” album from the 1970s….
I’m listening to a new band called Alberta Cross, at least I think they’re new. It’s a six- or seven-song CD I got at Criminal Records for some absurdly low price, $2.99 or something, and it’s really, really good. Those of you who did My Morning Jacket and/or The Band, imagine a cross between them….
Also highly recommended by me: New CDs by Shout Out Louds; the unfortunately named but nevertheless strong band Tigers and Monkeys; Atlanta’s own Black Lips’ latest “Good Bad, Not Evil;” and the just-released “Scene of the Crime” by Bettye LaVette with Drive-By Truckers backing the 61-year-old soul legend. It’s more LaVette and Muscle Shoals-soul than DBTs. It’s pretty great.
Oh, and Rock Chalk, Jayhawk.
“SOLSBURY HILL” by Peter Gabriel
Climbing up on Solsbury Hill
I could see the city light
Wind was blowing, time stood still
Eagle flew out of the night
He was something to observe
Came in close, I heard a voice
Standing stretching every nerve
I had to listen had no choice
I did not believe the information
Just had to trust imagination
My heart going boom boom boom
“Son,” he said “Grab your things,
I’ve come to take you home.”
To keep in silence I resigned
My friends would think I was a nut
Turning water into wine
Open doors would soon be shut
So I went from day to day
Tho’ my life was in a rut
“Till I thought of what I’d say
Which connection I should cut
I was feeling part of the scenery
I walked right out of the machinery
My heart going boom boom boom
“Hey” he said “Grab your things
I’ve come to take you home.”
Yeah, back home.
When illusion spin her net
I’m never where I want to be
And liberty she pirouette
When I think that I am free
Watched by empty silhouettes
Who close their eyes but still can see
No one taught them etiquette
I will show another me
Today I don’t need a replacement
I’ll tell them what the smile on my face meant
My heart going boom boom boom
“Hey” I said “You can keep my things,
they’ve come to take me home.”
Can Wren fill Schuerholz’s suspenders?
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
A few thoughts after spending part of the morning/afternoon sifting through the various stories written around the country about the end of the John Schuerholz GM era. Sounds like this fella has a whole lot of admirers in his industry.
Reminded me of an old quote from George Brett, who said, “John Schuerholz is the luckiest general manager I know. Everywhere he goes, his teams always win.”
Anyway, read Bradley’s column about Schuerholz. Agree with most of it, except I’ve never found Schuerholz to be a guy easy to dislike. Yeah, he’s a arrogant and a dapper dresser who wears suspenders to the ballpark, but so what?
I like a guy who’s brash, not afraid to make a sartorial statement or say what’s on his mind, and doesn’t dabble in false modesty. A guy who is damn good at what he does, and acts like it.
And believe it or not, he’s got a great sense of humor.
I’ve always enjoyed talking to the man, and I know I’ll get ripped by a few here on the blog for saying that, because apparently to them, saying something nice about a person you’re assigned to cover means you’re sucking up to them. Whatever.
I said he’s full of himself. I’d never wear the suspenders. I’ll tell you he seems to like telling folks what book he just finished reading (he reads a LOT), or the fine restaurant he ate in last night ( that most of you and I probably can’t afford). Not particularly flattering things to say about someone. No way to suck up.
But if he or someone else were to dissect me in print or on a blog or whatever, I can assure you, there’d be more flaws and annoying tendencies to point out than the ones I attributed to him. And if I read as much as him (which I should, but don’t), I’d probably tell people about it, too. (I do the same with music, with CDs I’ve heard. I know it. I know it annoys some people. Too bad.)
We all have our moments, and most of us can be royal pains in the butt at times; some of us more than others. So what?
The man’s great at what he does, or did, or whatever. Deal with it. Or do you think the Braves not winning another World Series or two is somehow a big mark against the general manager who assembled the teams that made it to 14 consecutive postseasons? If so, hey, you’re entitled to your opinion.
As for the Bradley column, I do think Bobby Cox was at least equally as important as Schuerholz for the Braves’ long run of success, probably more. And you can’t overlook scouting guru Paul Snyder and the player development staff.
But Schuerholz … anyone who doesn’t recognize he’s one of the best general managers of the modern era, if not the best, is simply ignoring the evidence — the nearly 1,600 wins in 17 seasons in Atlanta, the division titles, the success with Kansas City before the Braves — while also declaring the overwhelming consensus of his peers and others in the industry is flawed.
Nevermind us ink-stained wretches, just listen to the folks he competed against, those who’ve tried to measure up against him in his own profession. I’ve looked, and the only negative comment I can find over the years, the only person in baseball — player, manager, GM, scout, anyone — I can find that was criticial of Schuerholz, on or off record, was John Rocker, who said last year that he was overrated and had a little man’s complex, or something to that effect.
If you can find someone else who’s said anything dismissive of Schuerholz’s body of work, who has said anything that can be construed as less than glowing praise, please let me know. Otherwise, we’ve got Rocker and Angry Joe from Smyrna.
Because I can tell you, even the agents he’s butted heads with in recent years, at least to me, have never said Schuerholz is anything less than a fine GM.
And most everyone I talk to, either in interviews or simply casual conversation around batting cages, etc., says the man is the best in the business.
I won’t be so bold as to suggest I know more about judging GMs than do other GMs, scouts, coaches, managers and players. Maybe a few of you do. But I don’t.
Wren’s got big shoes to fill: To say the least, he’s got a tough assignment. Not only is Frank Wren following a GM that presided over a worst-to-first team that went on to win 14 consecutive division titles, but he’s taking over at a time when their payroll ranks in the middle of the pack, unlike the top-tier payrolls that most of Schuerholz’s Braves teams enjoyed.
And Wren doesn’t have Dayton Moore heading up the minor league system, though the replacements have done a sound job according to most experts who’ve judged the Braves’ last couple of drafts and their minor league system. I don’t know; I think it’s too early to tell on that front.
Anyway, Wren. I’ve known him since my first year covering baseball in Florida in 1995, when he was a Marlins executive working under Dave Dombrowski. And I’ve always been impressed by his baseball acumen and his knowledge of the myriad rules regarding free agency, arbitration, options, Rule 5 drafts, etc.
He knows that stuff far better than anyone else I know, and I mean anyone.
But that’s only a small part of being a GM. Schuerholz didn’t seem to know much more about that stuff than I do, to be honest. But he didn’t need to — most of that stuff has become much more complicated in the past 10 years, and by then Schuerholz had reached such a stature and surrounded himself with such baseball minds, he delegated most of that technical stuff to Wren and others.
Frank told me yesterday that he knows he’ll have to get an assistant soon and delegate a lot of the very stuff he specialized in, because the GM simply has too many responsibilities to get caught up in all that on a daily basis.
“This is a big job,” he said. “It’s a daunting task to be a general manager of a baseball franchise.”
Frank knows that now he’s got to try to come up with the “big deal” ideas, something that Frank said he always marveled at John’s ability to do. “All of a sudden he’d say, ‘Why don’t we get Gary Sheffield?’” Wren said yesterday, speaking of Schuerholz. “When we hadn’t even talked about Gary Sheffield.”
Jim Leyland was Florida’s manager in 1997-98, Wren’s last two years there before he took the doomed-to-fail Orioles GM job.
(I say doomed to fail, because everyone I’ve talked to who was privy to the goings-on there said owner Peter Angelos and his sons were meddlesome and involved themselves in every situation. No question Frank made some personnel moves that backfired there, but again, I’m told that his hands were tied on many fronts, and that a toxic atmosphere was created by all the backstabbing and second-guessing from the top when anything went wrong.)
Here’s what Leyland told me yesterday when I called him to ask about Frank: “I’m happy for him. He’s a good man. He knows the game. He knows players. He knows what he’s doing. After working with Dave and John Schuerholz, two Hall of Fame general managers, and Bobby Cox, a Hall of Fame manager … that’s pretty good.”
Dombrowski told me Wren was as qualified as you could possibly be, and pointed out that other organizations had pursued him but that Wren liked Atlanta and turned down some opportunities.
Wren did turn down the Pittsburgh Pirates GM job. That’s the only GM job he was offered since Baltimore, but he also took himself out of consideration for two or three others.
He didn’t get the Cincinnati Reds job he interviewed for a year ago. Sometimes, things happen for a reason. Today, Wren couldn’t be happier than he was bypassed for that post. Because now he’s got the one he wanted most.
Will he do a good job? I’m confident he will, though I don’t know his approach behind-the-scenes well enough to say it with absolute confidence. I do know he’s a good guy, with three kids he didn’t want to move from Atlanta, including a couple of athletic twin sons who are 13, the age you don’t like to move them.
He’s learned lessons since his Baltimore experience, and says he’s developed as a manager of people, something that’s absolutely critical for success as a GM. It was perhaps’ Schuerholz’ greatest strength, his ability to motivate and lead the staff that worked so hard for him.
Whether Wren can fill those shoes, and have the great working relationship with Bobby Cox that Schuerholz did, we’ll soon find out.
I do know he won’t be intimidated, another big strength of Schuerholz’s. Let me give you one example from his only GM experience, both used against him when Angelos fired him in Baltimore:
Cal Ripken Jr. was an absolute living legend still playing for Baltimore when Wren was the O’s GM. One day late in the ‘99, the team’s chartered jet was waiting to take off for a West Coast road trip at 8 a.m.
Ripken, who could be a bit, uh, well, high-maintenance, called saying he was stuck in traffic and would be arriving in the next five to 10 minutes.
“At Wren’s order, the plan[e] took off without Cal, who arrived at the gate a few minutes later. Cal was then forced to make his own cross-country travel arrangements,” the Orioles said in a release when they fired Wren.
” … In the opinion of management, there was no need for such an arbitrary and inflexible decision…. The Orioles management cannot and will not abide having a general manager operate in such an unreasonable, authoritarian manner and treat anyone in this way, especially someone such as Cal who has done so much for the Orioles and for baseball.”
Hey, say what you will about the decision, but making the call to leave Ripken at the airport? That’s someone with stones.
And I can pretty well assure you of this: He wouldn’t be the one having to make that call with the Braves anyway, not while Bobby Cox is the manager and chain-smoking, old-school, gravel-voiced Bill Acree is the no-b.s. travel director.
What a job. What a life.
Baseball.
You gotta love it.
“CRIMSON DRAGON TATTOO by Ray Wylie Hubbard
I have a crimson dragon tattoo
It burns on my arm like the truth
The red ink is in my skin, it’s on my soul too
I have a crimson dragon tattoo.
Twenty-one silver dollars is what it cost
Drawn by a fast left hand when I was lost
I did not choose a heart, a rose or a cross
Twenty-one silver dollars is what it cost.
Sometimes it whispers my name
And tells me that this life is just a game
Whom the gods wish to destroy, first they drive insane
Sometimes it whispers my name.
I have a crimson dragon tattoo
It burns on my arm like the truth
The red ink is in my skin its on my soul too
I have a crimson dragon tattoo.
I have a crimson dragon tattoo…
Ready, set … start your Braves rumors
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
This could be a slow couple of weeks for Braves fans, since the free-agent and trade markets won’t heat up until after the postseason and the Braves and Tom Glavine seem determined not to screw up and let slip any sort of earlier-than-permitted negotiations that may or may not take place between their sides.
And let’s be clear: I don’t think it’s a given that Glavine is coming back to the Braves, as much as he wants to and as much as the Braves could use him in the middle of their rotation. Again, as it has before, I’m guessing this will come down to money.
He’ll take a discount, I have it on good authority, but how much of a discount? And will the Braves be willing to pay $8 mill, $9 mill? That seems a reasonable amount for a pitcher you could pencil in for 12-14 wins and 200 innings.
But we’ll see. Braves need more than just Glavine added to their rotation, and can’t count on Mike Hampton, at least until they see how Hampton does in winter ball (still don’t know where that’s going to be yet; I just checked with team today) and maybe not until they see how he does in the spring.
They need to get a younger starter whose contract they could control for several years. Someone, as we mentioned last week, like Oakland’s Dan Haren or Joe Blanton, if the A’s decide they need to move one of them in order to restock with young players/prospects they’d get in return. Either would be a huge addition for the Braves, and arguably make them the NL East favorite, with or without Glavine.
But Oakland might not be ready to deal one of those young pitchers yet, and the Braves might they have to settle for a lesser light, say lefty Noah Lowry of the Giants, who’s expected to be trade bait this winter and is coming off a 14-8 season in which he posted a 3.92 ERA but also had exactly as many walks (87) as strikeouts in 155 innings.
Lowry’s WHIP has risen in each of his four seasons in the majors, and jumped from 1.393 in 2006 to 1.551 this season. He had a bone spur late in the season, but was expected to recover without surgery. Still, it’s a red flag, perhaps a reason the 26-year-old old might be had for relatively little in a trade.
In 2005, Lowry had a 3.78 ERA and 172 strikeouts (76 walks) in 204 innings. Something to keep in mind as we move forward. There are other guys like that out there, too, guys you might not be focused on because of the attention given more glamorous but not-very-realistic targets, as far as the Braves are concerned.
We’ll update as we hear anything. But it’s still too early for the good trade rumors to start. Non-playoff teams are just beginning to gather for their organizational meetings, like the Braves are this week in Orlando.
No shaking hands at the Ted: Looks like I’ll have to be rude and not offer a hand upon greeting strangers at Turner Field from now on.
This after I read something alarming in The Week magazine: The American Society of Microbiology did a study in which they spied on 6,000 people in public bathrooms and found that nearly one in three guys didn’t bother to wash hands before exiting.
The study found that 12 percent of woman failed to wash their hands.
And here’s the scary part: “The study discovered strong regional differences in hand-washing habits - 79 percent of male New Yorkers washed up, as did 81 percent of Chicagoans. But at Atlanta’s Turner Field, just 57 percent of guys stopped at the sink.”
Folks, I’m just repeating what I read.
And now, I’m packing an extra bottle of hand sanitizer in my computer bag.
Speaking of home games…. As I wrote within a blog last week, Braves are scheduled to open the 2008 season at home, against Pittsburgh. I think they’re going to play on the first day of the season, Monday, then have an off day Tuesday, the day that some teams will open. But not certain about that.
Also, as I mentioned, Braves don’t play Boston at all next season. Their interleague schedule, from what I can gather, includes road games at Anaheim, Texas and Toronto, and home games with Seattle and Oakland.
I think the Braves are planning to release their schedule this week.
Pendleton, Snitker on Royals’ radar: The Kansas City Royals and GM Dayton Moore are having their organizational meetings this week in Surprise, Ariz., and a major topic of conversation is their managerial search. Braves hitting coach Terry Pendleton’s name has been mentioned prominently, which comes as no surprise. But also mentioned by members of the Kansas City media has been Brian Snitker, the Braves’ third-base coach and a minor league lifer until he was brought up to the bigs to join the Braves’ staff last winter.
(Believe me, if Snitker’s name has been mentioned by K.C. reporters, then it was leaked to them by someone in the organization. Because you don’t go through the coaching staffs of major league teams and go, ‘Ahh, here’s one candidate. Brian Snitker in Atlanta.’ We do know Dayton always liked Snitker, so it does make some sense, especially given Dayton’s background in player development.)
(By the way, the Royals are having their winter meetings in a place called Surprise. The Braves are having theirs in a place that could be called Predictable. Families go to Dark Star outside Orlando with kids and with wallets full of credits cards and cash, and leave with no money and severely strained credit cards, having consumed many bland meals in overcrowded chain restaurants and spent obscene amounts on all-day tickets to Fun, Inc. Very predictable. But we digress….)
Where were we? Oh, Pendleton. Can’t see him taking the K.C. job, if offered it. See him staying in Atlanta and waiting to see if Bobby Cox steps down after the 2008 season, because Pendleton would have to be a primary candidate to replace him, I’d guess.
One potential job opening that might appeal to Pendleton: St. Louis. If Tony La Russa were to move on, I could definitely see T.P. interested in that position, and them interested in him. Otherwise, I believe he’s staying here until Bobby steps aside, which might be next winter, but also might not be.
Whither Andruw? Gentlemen, start your rumors. I’m hearing Dodgers, Rangers, Giants and White Sox as potentially interested teams outside the NL East.
And within the division? Folks, don’t be surprised if Andruw lands with a team that plays the Braves 18-19 times a year, which would be strange, wouldn’t it, at least initially?
There’s the Stan Kasten connection in Washington, where Andruw could be appealing as a marquee player for a team moving into a new ballpark with big revenue streams that go with that.
And there’s Philadelphia, where Andruw’s hit an awful lot of homers and stolen an awful lot of extra-base hits over the years. If the Phillies don’t re-sign Aaron Rowand, they might take a run at Andruw. Seriously.
And then there’s one that hasn’t been mentioned, but that I was told by someone close to the situation that it could be a possibility: The Mets. Yes, the Mets.
I know, I know, they have Carlos Beltran, who’s in the middle of a $119 million contract and quite solid afield himself. But the Mets also have a ton of money, with more coming when their new ballpark opens in 2009. So who’s to say that one of those guys, and I’m guessing Beltran, couldn’t be moved to right field?
Hey, stranger things have happened. I gotta admit, my first reaction when told this possibility was, “C’mon, makes no sense.” But the person who told me seemed serious and quite sincere, at least that it could be a possibility.
Me, I’m leaning toward Dodgers or White Sox in the Andruw chase. But it’s way, way early. Actually, the process has barely even begun. Players haven’t even filed for free agency yet, and won’t until after the World Series.
So stay tuned. Gonna be an interesting offseason. And we didn’t even discuss the possibilities for Andruw’s replacement, primarily because we wore the topic out last week and there’s been nothing new, not yet, to add to the conversation.
Andruw or Torii? By the way, thought I’d share this from the Boston Globe, which asked former A’s manager Ken Macha and former Blue Jays manager Buck Martinez who’d they’d select between CFs Torii Hunter and Andruw Jones (hey, I wish they’d asked a recent NL manager, too, but since I’m just stealing the note I really can’t be too picky. If I go to cover the World Series, I’ll try to ask a few folks there the same question.):
Anyway, here’s the responses to the Globe:
Macha: “A little bit of an unfair question only because I think I’ve only seen Andruw Jones play about six times live, but I certainly know that he’s an outstanding player and know of his reputation for being a great defensive outfielder. But I’ll take Torii Hunter. I think he’s great for a team. I love the way he imparts his wisdom on younger players and takes them under his belt. He learned how to play the game from Kirby Puckett. He’s a guy who can beat you in many different ways. He can throw you out. He can make a great catch to rob you. He can come up with a key hit, a key home run, and every time he takes that field, you know how much he respects the game of baseball.”
Martinez: “A lot of people you talk to don’t think it’s close; they’d say Torii. But for me, I think it would be Andruw. Don’t get me wrong, I love Torii and the enthusiasm and the defense he brings to a team. I know Andruw had a tough year, but I’ll guarantee you that there’ll be a lot of clubs who are going to line up for him because he’s a special player. He’s got a little more power than Torii, he drives in runs, and he’s more of a leader than people think. He’s quieter than Torii, but I know that Andruw is a true leader who loves playing the game. I know in the offseason a lot of players congregate around Andruw and work out with him. He’s been a huge leader in Atlanta for a long time. A lot of people in Atlanta believe that Andruw’s shoulder was bothering him all year and that’s what caused the downward year with his batting average. But he’s such a talent.”
Music, music:We’re going to the Kings of Leon/Black Rebel Motorcycle Club show tomorrow at the Fox, and was pleasantly surprised to hear that local band Manchester Orchestra’s also on the bill. Those young kids can play, for sure.
The new Thurston Moore solo CD is great. Springsteen’s new one is even better every time I listen to it. And if you’re looking for a great CD you’ve never heard of, try the new one by the Shout Out Louds, called “Our Ill Wills”. You’ll be glad you did.
Been enjoying another brilliant record from Atlanta’s ascendant punkers, The Black Lips. Their new album “Good Bad, Not Evil” will get you revved up.
Had a good visit to Wax ‘n’ Facts record store yesterday, found nearly mint-condition copies of a two-record Bobby Bare album from the early 70s, plus Fabulous Thunderbirds’ classic “Girls Go Wild” and an old Tom T. Hall record. All on vinyl, complete with pops and other noises. Outstanding.
OK, Steve, take us out.
”HOMETOWN BLUES” by Steve Earle
I wish I’d never come back home
It don’t feel right since I’ve been grown
I can’t find any of my old friends hangin’ ‘round
Won’t nothin’ bring you down like your hometown
I spent some time in New Orleans
I had to live on rice and beans
I hitched through Texas when the sun was beatin’ down
Won’t nothin’ bring you down like your hometown
Home is where the heart is
Ain’t that what they always say
My heart lies in broken pieces
Scattered along the way
So don’t think about me when I’m gone
I don’t mind travelin’ alone
You are the sweetest little thing I ever found
Won’t nothin’ bring you down like your hometown
Braves, Glavine to dance again?
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
He will decline his $13 million option with the Mets sometime this afternoon, at which point begins with the Braves the Tom Glavine Ultimatum, Part 2 (or is it Part 3?)
The Braves want him, and he definitely wants the Braves. So please, for all that is Holy (and for the vacation and comp time I’d like to take in November) can GM John Schuerholz and agent Gregg Clifton please settle this negotiation early, this time around?
There’s no need for it to drag out to early December like it did last year, when Glavine finally said “enough” and returned to the Mets after the Braves dragged their feet on making him an offer, with the explanation that they were scrambling to clear up payroll before they could make him an offer, and that it might have come in a day or two if he hadn’t called off the process before the annual baseball winter meetings.
No excuses for the Braves this time, unless it’s just, they don’t want to pay Glavine as much as he wants to be paid. There’s no question he’ll take a hometown discount, compared to the $13 mill he would make from the Mets if he returned to them. I’d guess he’d take less than $10 mill to return to the Braves, and that it will only take a one-year commitment to get it done.
He’s 41, wants to be around his family in Alpharetta instead of flying his wife and kids to New York or some other place on weekends during the school year, and wants to finish his career with Bobby Cox, John Smoltz and the Braves.
Make it happen. Not because Glavine’s an ace at the peak of his career, but because he’s still a very good middle-rotation-quality starter who’ll pitch like a No. 1 or No. 2 many nights, who’ll probably give you 200 innings and 34-45 starts like he has every season, and be a great influence on young pitchers such as lefties Jo-Jo Reyes and Chuck James, assuming they’re still here.
If you can get him for $9 mill, give or take a mill, in this market that’s a bargain. And also - this is important - because it’s only a one-year commitment, it should permit the Braves to go hard after a trade for a younger quality starter, a guy like Oakland’s Dan Haren or Joe Blanton, who could be available only because perpetually tight-budgeted Oakland needs to reload with prospects and knows it might have to dump one of its quality young arms to get a few young players in return.
I’m not for cleaning out the minor league system, especially after the Braves already traded several top prospects to get Mark Teixeira, but if you could get Dan Haren, a potential top-of-rotation guy who’s got three seasons left on a very reasonable four-year, $12.65 mill contract that includes salaries of $2.2 mill in 2007, $4 mill in 2008, $5.5 mill in 2009 and a $6.75 mill club option for 2010, then you do it, even if it costs you a good young prospect or two such as Brent Lillibridge and/or Reyes, or perhaps a couple of prospects and a Kelly Johnson.
Haren’s a young ace with an affordable contract. Nothing is more valuable or important to most teams. The A’s would only be trading him because they know that and know they have other pitching and could fill a couple of holes. Again, not certain they would trade him now, but it’s possible.
Blanton has won 14, 14 and 15 games the past three seasons, averaged over 220 innings in that stretch, and had 192 strikeouts in 222 innings this season with a 3.07 ERA in the AL. He’s 6-foot-5, solidly put together, and only 26 years old. He could be a durable rotation leader for a long time, or co-leader (while Hudson’s here).
Don’t know if they can get him, but they can sure try. I hear from reliable sources out West that Haren and/or Blanton will be available this winter or next. If they couldn’t get Haren, Braves could probably pry Blanton away this winter. He’s not nearly as good, but he’s solid, especially as a No. 3-4 guy.
And Blanton wouldn’t require as much in trade, and has three seasons to go before he’s eligible for free agency. He’s a first-time arbitration guy, has won 30 games the past two seasons (14-10 this year), and pitched 230 innings this season with a 3.95 ERA.
You would pay Glavine and either one of these guys less combined in 2008 and than you’d pay any of the few good free-agent pitchers on the market, and about $5-7 million or more less than you’d have to pay a Johan Santana in 2008 (not that he’s a Braves option; too rich for this payroll).
Imagine, if you will, a Braves rotation with Smoltz, Hudson, Haren (or Blanton), Glavine, and Hampton (if healthy, he has to be in it because of salary). If Hampton’s not healthy, then you go Chuck James, Jo-Jo Reyes or Jeff Bennett, or maybe even Manny Acosta (he’s going to work as a starter this winter, see if that role might fit him; Braves already know he can be a real good reliever).
Folks, you win the NL East with that rotation, regardless of who you get to replace Andruw (and we can cover that later, though I think Mike Cameron is a serious candidate, more so by the day. Randy Winn would also be a good option).
Oh, and one more obvious reason to bring back Glavine: It would be a great story for the Braves, who’d have Smoltz and Glavine back together for what could be Bobby Cox’s final season.
I know Glavine has detractors for things he said more than a decade ago, for his union leadership, and for going to the Mets as a free agent five years ago.
And I certainly respect those views. I really do.
But consider that there are going to be no better bargains (or ones requiring only one-year commitments) among pitching free agents than Glavine, who was 13-6 with a 3.88 ERA in his first 31 starts this season, before stumbling big-time at 0-2 with a 14.81 ERA in his last three starts.
John Smoltz and Tim Hudson were 30-16 with a 3.15 ERA this season and combined for 430 innings. But of the eight others who started games for the Braves, only Chuck James (11-10, 161-1/3 innings) and Buddy Carlyle (8-7, 104 innings) had as many as five wins or 90 innings.
Add Glavine and a Haren or Blanton (or a lesser-but-durable pitcher from elsewhere), and without spending a ton in 2008 you’ve transformed a rotation that went just 58-58 this season and pitched only 917 innings, with a 4.45 ERA that ranked 7th in the NL.
The only NL rotations that produced fewer innings were the injury-riddled units with the Cardinals, Nationals and Marlins, who had the three worst starters’ ERAs in the league.
Glavine can’t file for free agency until after the World Series, like everyone else. And the Braves aren’t permitted to talk to him or other free agents, at least not officially, before then.
But if the Braves aren’t ready with an offer in early November, as soon as its permitted, or if they low-ball Glavine by asking him to take $6-7 mill, then they have no one to blame but themselves and should expect no sympathy.
If they don’t want him because they believe he doesn’t have enough left, well, then say it. But Bobby Cox has said repeatedly that Glavine has plenty left, and Smoltz has said he’s still as good as ever (I don’t buy that, but Smoltz knows a hell of a lot more about pitching than I do, so I’ll assume Glavine at least is still good).
It’ll get done this time, I’m pretty sure. But Glavine’s agent is another one that Schuerholz doesn’t have on his Christmas card list, so you never know.
By the way, if not Glavine, how about a one-year offer for Curt Schilling? Would his personality be a good fit for the Braves? I don’t think so, at all. But for one year….
Hey, just tossing it out there.
And while I’m tossing stuff out there, how’ bout the Braves’ supposed reasoning for not signing Andruw, part of which was that they didn’t believe Boras or Andruw would consider a one-year deal based on Boras’ quotes in my story?
Come on. If you don’t want Andruw back, say it. But you gotta at least call Boras and go, we’ll make him a one-year offer at [low salary figure here].”
If you don’t do that, you should just say, “We weren’t interested in bringing him back because we want to spend his salary on pitching.” Folks would understand that. Just don’t tell us you didn’t think Boras and Andruw would consider a cheaper, short-term deal when you never actually proposed one.
Boss and other new tunes: Spent too much at my buddy Don’s CD store at Toco Hill shopping center couple days ago, but got some great stuff including the new Okkervil River and Iron And Wine CDs, both really, really good.
If you haven’t got it yet (and I’m sure all Boss fans have), I’d highly recommend the new Springsteen album, “Magic,” which I think is his best since “Tunnel of Love.” It’s not up to standards of, say, “The River,” but it’s really, really good.
And I hadn’t heard of this “About a Son” Kurt Cobain movie that’s coming out, but I got the soundtrack with tuns by everyone from David Bowie (“The Man Who Sold the World”) and Mark Lanegan to REM, the Melvins and Arlo Guthrie. Good stuff.
Also got new solo discs by Thurston Moore (from Sonic Youth) and Black Francis (aka Frank Black, from Pixies). Both are very strong, and the Black Francis CD is the closest thing he’s done to hard, raw Pixies rock.
One more thing: if you haven’t heard Mary Gauthier, check her out online. Really dark, bluesy folk, has two albums out, the latest just released couple weeks ago produced by brilliant Joe Henry.
OK, that’s it. Gonna go see “Into The Wild” tonight after watching some baseball, hopefully. Great reviews for it, everywhere I’ve seen it reviewed.
”I’M A LONESOME FUGITIVE” by Liz Anderson (sung by Merle Haggard)”
Down every road there’s always one more city
I’m on the run, the highway is my home
I raised a lot of cane back in my younger days
While Mama used to pray my crops would fail
I’m a hunted fugitive with just two ways:
Outrun the law or spend my life in jail
I’d like to settle down but they won’t let me
A fugitive must be a rolling stone
Down every road there’s always one more city
I’m on the run, the highway is my home
I’m lonely but I can’t afford the luxury
Of having one I love to come along
She’d only slow me down and they’d catch up with me
For he who travels fastest goes alone
I’d like to settle down but they won’t let me
A fugitive must be a rolling stone
Down every road there’s always one more city
I’m on the run, the highway is my home
I’m on the run, the highway is my home
Cleaning out Braves lockers, shutting ‘er down
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Just got back from the cleaning-out-the-lockers ritual at Turner Field, talked to Bobby Cox and a couple other coaches, etc.
But no players were there this time — since they got home so early last night, short flight and day game and all that, many went ahead and cleaned out lockers and packed up their stuff last night. The many who live around leave a lot of stuff in their lockers for winter workouts.
Really didn’t seem to be any of the depressing mood around the team in the past couple of days that there was after the division series losses in 2004 and 2005, or after last year’s season finale, when Braves were so far out of it and wondering about the sale of the team, direction payroll was heading, all that kind of thing.
There really seems to be a very positive mood in the clubhouse this time around, regarding the future and the Braves’ outlook for next season.
Chipper seems to be about the only one who believes there’s a good chance Andruw will return. Most others seem to have accepted that it’s probably not going to happen (which leads me to wonder if there might be a better chance than we believe, since when everyone’s in such agreement over something, it often goes the other way, right?)
But in this one, I’m just having a hard time seeing a scenario where he returns. I haven’t reported this before now, because I didn’t want to go on one unnamed source’s word, but Cox confirmed today what another Braves person told me last week — that Andruw’s agent, Scott Boras, told the Braves at beginning of the year, before season began, what they were looking for in a contract, and it was way, way above what the Braves would consider giving him.
So we’ll see if his poor season will affect that asking price. Boras has indicated it won’t, but we’ll see. Haven’t heard anything yet from other teams, as to what they might offer. But a team like Washington wants to fill seats, and might believe Andruw, who did hit those 92 homers in 2005-06 and will surely win his 10th consecutuve Gold Glove, might be the guy to do it. Stan Kasten’s the Nats president, remember.
I still believe the Angels might make a big offer, maybe the White Sox. Who knows. Too early. Haven’t heard yet. I’m probably covering World Series, and I should be able to get some good info there, if I haven’t heard anything by then.
Cox on Jo-Jo: In his last four starts, Jo-Jo Reyes was 2-1 with a 3.09 ERA, including 2-0 in his last three. He’s put himself in position to compete for a spot in the spring, it sounds like.
“He’s so close to being a No. 2 [starter],” Cox said today. “He still needs some work, but maybe we can handle that up here [in the majors].”
And Cox on Braves’ interest in Tom Glavine: “Tom has a decision to make with the Mets. He’s still got plenty left in that left shoulder. He’s like Smoltz — he can still pitch.”
Glavine was 13-6 with a 3.88 ERA in his first 31 starts for the Mets this season, but 0-2 with a hideous 14.81 ERA and .472 opponents’ average in his last three, including Sunday’s one-out, seven-run debacle in the final game of the Mets’ epic collapse. He gave up 25 hits in 10-1/3 innings over his last three starts.
NL batting title: As we wrote yesterday after Chipper Jones went 0-for-3 to drop his average to .337, it’s going to take an 0-for-5 or worse in tonight wild-card tiebreaker game for Colorado slugger Matt Holliday’s average to drop enough from .340 to give Chipper the batting title. An 0-for-4 would still give Holliday the edge, by the fourth number behind the decimal point.
So what’s the likelihood that Holliday, who’s been on fire down the stretch, would go 0-for-5 tonight against San Diego? Well, consider that Padres ace Jake Peavy will toe the slab. And consider that of Holliday’s three 0-for-5 or worse (he had one 0-for-6) performances this season, the most recent was just 10 days ago against the Padres and … Jake Peavy.
Peavy allowed three hits in seven innings of that Sept. 21 game at San Diego. So maybe Peavy, an Alabama boy and a big Braves fans growing up, will deliver the batting title to Chipper.
But I doubt it.
Holliday is 6-for-15 with a homer in his career against the right-hander.
Chipper will win the OPS title, if there is such a thing. Maybe a mythical title? Anyway, it’s a pretty good indicator of hitting prowess, better than batting average many would contend.
Chipper’s on-base plus slugging percentage (OPS) is 1.029, ahead of Prince Fielder (1.013) and Holliday (1.011). Sir Cranium from San Francisco doesn’t have enough plate appearances to qualify on the Stats Inc leader board.
Albert Pujols beat out Chipper for the road batting “title” by finishing at .358 to Jones’ .353. Jorge Posada (.344) was the AL leader.
Chipper and Edgar Renteri (.336) were second and third in the NL in road average, and Francoeur (.316) tied David Wright for ninth.
By the way, Chipper hit .353 with 15 homer and 55 RBIs in 66 road games, and .320 with 14 homers and 47 RBIs in 68 home games.
Holliday has hit .301 with 11 homers and 55 RBIs in 76 road games, and .377 with 25 homers and 80 RBIs in 80 games at Coors Field.
Leading off, cleaning up: Yunel Escobar finished his stellar rookie season with a .326 average, 30 extra-base hits and an .870 OPS in 319 at-bats, including a .409 on-base percentage.
He hit .355 against lefties, .303 vs. righties, and he hit .336 with a .406 OBP after the break, after hitting .304 with a .339 OBP before the break.
As a leadoff man he hit .351 (53-for-150) with a .400 OBP, the second-highest leadoff OBP in the NL behind Florida’s budding superstar Hanley Ramirez (.405).
Kelly Johnson had a .372 OBP as a leadoff man, giving the Braves two of the top five leadoff OBPs in the league.
Meanwhile, here are the final results for Atlanta’s two primary cleanup hitters in 2007: Andruw Jones hit .220 with 19 homers, 64 RBIs, 85 strikeouts and a .774 OPS in 323 cleanup at-bats.
Mark Teixeira hit .317 with 17 homers, 56 RBIs, 46 strikeouts and a 1.019 OPS in 208 cleanup at-bats.
Pitching matches hitting: Statistically, at least, Braves pitching ranked even with their hitting in the NL. Hey, just telling you what the numbers say.
The Braves ranked third in the NL with a 4.11 ERA, behind the Padres and Cubs. Braves hitters finished in a three-way tie for second with a .275 average and ranked third with 810 runs and fourth with a .339 OBP.
The once-maligned bullpen, by the way, finished with a 3.54 ERA that trailed only the Padres (3.00 before tonight). And in close-and-late situations, Braves pitchers (starters and relievers) held opponents to a .227 average, tied with St. Louis for the league low).
Braves hitters, meanwhile, ranked eighth with a .257 average in late-and-close situations, and a mediocre .330 OBP and .381 slugging percentage.
”BRILLIANT DISGUISE” by Bruce Springsteen
I hold you in my arms
as the band plays
What are those words whispered baby
just as you turn away
I saw you last night
out on the edge of town
I wanna read your mind
To know just what I’ve got in this new thing I’ve found
So tell me what I see
when I look in your eyes
Is that you baby
or just a brilliant disguise
I heard somebody call your name
from underneath our willow
I saw something tucked in shame
underneath your pillow
Well I’ve tried so hard baby
but I just can’t see
What a woman like you
is doing with me
So tell me who I see
when I look in your eyes
Is that you baby
or just a brilliant disguise
Now look at me baby
struggling to do everything right
And then it all falls apart
when out go the lights
I’m just a lonely pilgrim
I walk this world in wealth
I want to know if it’s you I don’t trust
‘cause I damn sure don’t trust myself
Now you play the loving woman
I’ll play the faithful man
But just don’t look too close
into the palm of my hand
We stood at the alter
the gypsy swore our future was right
But come the wee wee hours
Well maybe baby the gypsy lied
So when you look at me
you better look hard and look twice
Is that me baby
or just a brilliant disguise
Tonight our bed is cold
I’m lost in the darkness of our love
God have mercy on the man
Who doubts what he’s sure of
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