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Features This Day in Baseball: 30 June 2005
Now its a mighty long way down the dusty trail
And the sun burns hot on the cold steel rails
And I look like a bum and I crawl like a snail

Yesterday, Kerry Wood pitched six very strong innings, striking out 9 and allowing just one run in his first game since April. Very encouraging news for the Cubs. Former closer Joe Borowski was Designated For Assignment to make room for Wood.

Long-time Jays farmhand Glenn Williams, the Australian-born third baseman who hit 23 HRs for Syracuse last year, finally got his first taste of major league action this month. He hit safely in his first 13 games, batting .425, and appeared to seize the 3B job away from Michael Cuddyer, but he dislocated a shoulder on Tuesday and will miss at last six weeks. He has gone on the 15-day DL and another former Jays farmhand, Brent Abernathy will be activated on Friday.

Byung-Hyung Kim drilled Craig Biggio in last night's game. It was the 268th time Biggio has been hit by a pitch; he moves past Don Baylor into 3rd place on the all time list, behind Tommy Tucker (272) and Hugh Jennings (287).

And in Boston, Terry Francona sent Mike Timlin out to get the save in the 9th inning: just his 4th save in his three years with Boston. Keith Foulke and Timlin had both worked the night before, and tonight Francona chose the guy with the 1.64 ERA instead of the guy with the 6.03 ERA. Question of the Day? Will this continue? Does it matter? Do we even care?

It's a light schedule today.

AL
Chicago (Garcia 7-3, 3.58) at Detroit (Maroth 5-8, 4.09) 1:05
Los Angeles (Santana 2-2, 4.71) at Texas (Young 7-4, 3.21) 2:05
Seattle (Meche 8-4, 4.79) at Oakland (Haren 6-7, 3.89) 3:35
Cleveland (Westbrook 5-9, 4.52) at Baltimore (Chen 6-5, 3.54) 7:05

NL
Pittsburgh (Wells 5-7, 4.36) at Washington (Hernandez 11-2, 3.32) 1:05
Philadelphia (Lieber 8-7, 4.93) at New York (Martinez 8-2, 2.72) 1:10
Milwaukee (Capuano 7-6, 3.22) at Chicago (Maddux 7-4, 4.56) 2:20
Atlanta (Colon 0-3, 6.38) at Florida (Olsen 1-0, 6.59) 7:05
Houston (Backe 6-6, 5.31) at Cincinnati (Milton 3-9, 7.70) 7:10
Colorado (Francis 6-5, 5.36) at St.Louis (Suppan 7-6, 4.14) 8:10
San Francisco (Lowry 4-7, 5.25) at Arizona (Estes 6-5, 3.75) 9:40

Posted by Magpie on Thursday, June 30 2005 @ 12:01 PM EDT.
This Day in Baseball: 30 June 2005 | 23 comments | Create New Account
The following comments are owned by whomever posted them. This site is not responsible for what they say.
Mick Doherty - Thursday, June 30 2005 @ 12:03 PM EDT (#121113) #
Hot rumour out of the Bronx Zoo is that this afternoon the Yankees will release Paul Quantrill and Mike Stanton to enable a "youth movement." I'd feel better about a youth movement if the entire farm system hadn't been traded in the past three years.
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Mike Green - Thursday, June 30 2005 @ 12:28 PM EDT (#121116) #
"Youth movement"? I can't think of anybody at Columbus or Trenton, who'd qualify. Colter Bean's got a great name, and he might be all right, but "youth movement" sounds like hype to me.
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Named For Hank - Thursday, June 30 2005 @ 12:46 PM EDT (#121119) #
Perhaps, in Calvin and Hobbes style, this is Opposite Day for the Yankees, and they'll start trading away superstar veterans for prospects. That would be amusing and perhaps fortuitous for the Jays -- there are at least a few players on the Yankees I'd be happy to see in a Jays uniform for the second half, though I don't know at what price.
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Mick Doherty - Thursday, June 30 2005 @ 12:55 PM EDT (#121120) #
Well, I'd think Q might look good in a Jays uniform (again).
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Named For Hank - Thursday, June 30 2005 @ 12:59 PM EDT (#121121) #
If they're actually releasing him and it's not just NY media bull, the Jays could scoop him up for the minimum, right?

Might be nice to give him a late-career sendoff, though it could end up like Hentgen's second coming.

What happened to the mighty Q this year?
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Mick Doherty - Thursday, June 30 2005 @ 01:02 PM EDT (#121122) #
What happened to Q? Good question. Last year, Torre used him in 155 games and he threw 376 innings in relief, so that may finally have caught up with him.
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Rob - Thursday, June 30 2005 @ 01:04 PM EDT (#121123) #
In a rare occurence for the non-MLB.tv, non-Extra Innings household I do currently inhabit, I am able to watch three baseball games today. And one of them features a 22 year old prospect, who -- and I did not know this until just now -- threw a complete game shutout in his second game in the majors, since his recall/purchase from Double-A. And was promptly sent down to AAA five days later. No soup for you, Ervin.

And check this out: Santana is 6-2, 160. (Baseball America listed him as 150 last year.) He's up against Chris Young: 6-10, 260. I don't know what the highest Pitcher Size Difference Index (PSDI) is between two opposing starters this year, but if I may coin that statistic, here it is for Young-Santana: difference in inches squared plus difference in pounds. In other words, 64+100 = 164. I think that might be unbeatable.

All the matchups today with the PSDI value...you can see how much of a mismatch the Texas-Angels game is:

4 (Colon-Beckett)
9 (Meche-Haren)
9 (Lowry-Estes)
10 (K.Wells-Loaiza)
14 (Westbrook-Chen)

29 (Francis-Suppan)
36 (Backe-Home Run Maker)
39 (Maddux-Capuano)

59 (Pedro-Lieber)
76 (Garcia-Maroth)

164 (Young-Santana)

So I get the most "similar" pitchers with the Atlanta game, and the "big-dog-and-little-dog-from-Looney-Tunes" game with LAA and Texas of Arlington.

And finally, a tale of two pitchers, both from 2005 and playing for the same team:
Pitcher A: 43.2 IP, 3.50 ERA, .272 BAA, 1.37 WHIP
Pitcher B: 43.2 IP, 7.21 ERA, .324 BAA, 1.88 WHIP

Anyone?
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Rob - Thursday, June 30 2005 @ 01:13 PM EDT (#121124) #
I don't remember "Opposite Day" from Calvin & Hobbes, though I'm sure Waterson did it once or twice. Genius, that man. My suggestion would be that the Yankees follow Calvinball teachings and make up the rules as they go along, but that wouldn't be outlandish, now would it?

And I did not know this either until now: Paul Quantrill has appeared in the most games in whatever league he was in every year since 2001.
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Craig B - Thursday, June 30 2005 @ 01:13 PM EDT (#121125) #
Quantrill and Stanton being gone looks pretty solid. They were seen saying goodbye to their teammates yesterday, and they didn't go with the team to Detroit. If they don't get traded today, they're supposedly going to be DFA.

I agree that Quantrill would be a nice addition to the Jays pen, if he's not suffering from an injury. But his performance over the last 11-12 months (since last year's ASB) leads me to believe that he is, in fact, injured. His strikeout rate fell through the floor at that point and he's getting hit at will - opponents have been hitting .360 off him since then.

It could be a very nasty blip in performance, or it might be real. I'm not inclined to find out at the ML level. In addition, you'd have to pick one of these RH relievers to jettison in order to bring Q in:

Chulk
Frasor
Batista
Speier
Walker

all of whom have pitched quite well. Your other option is to push Downs somewhere (into the rotation or back to Syracuse) and go with one lefty in the pen. Or send Gabe Gross back down and go back to 12 pitchers - in which case you have to wonder where Q's going to get any innings.

It's possible, though barely I suppose, that the Jays could sign Q on the understanding that he'll go to Syracuse with the guarantee that he'll be up in a month if he gets it together. Would Q accept a deal like that, in order to come home? Hard to say...
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Named For Hank - Thursday, June 30 2005 @ 01:15 PM EDT (#121126) #
Something happened that Calvin pranked Hobbes with Opposite Day, and Calvin ended up having to hide in a tree. The last panel is Hobbes at the bottom of the tree with a baseball bat and a grim look on his face, and Calvin up in the branches.

CALVIN: Opposite Day ends at midnight, right?
HOBBES: "Yes."
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Jordan - Thursday, June 30 2005 @ 01:20 PM EDT (#121127) #
It appears to be official (though I'd prefer a better source than the NY Post). Neither of these cuts would be news if they weren't big names and this weren't the Yankees. New York has been paying for fame rather than talent for a few years now, and this is only the first few trickles preceding what could be a landslide.

I wouldn't go near Quantrill. The Blue Jays lit him up earlier this year and he looked like he had nothing at the time. The overwork simply caught up with him.

I love this excerpt:

"It was shocking, it totally blindsided me," said Stanton. "I didn't see this coming. I am numb." Stanton was 1-2 with a 7.02 ERA in 28 games this season.

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Craig B - Thursday, June 30 2005 @ 01:20 PM EDT (#121128) #
But dang, you know who *I* like? If I had my druthers, I wouldn't be approaching Quantrill. I'd be approaching Mike Stanton.

Here's a lefty, used to a high workload, who hasn't been all that terrible this year (his 7.07 ERA represents a lot of bad luck) and has been extremely effective over the last four years. Best part is, he's OK against lefties but he also owns righties - making him a great late-inning guy.

Now I know the Jays' lefties are better than they've shown this year, but it's impossible to miss that they've been the two least effective members of the bullpen. I say call up the cowboy's agent and see what can be done.
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Gitz - Thursday, June 30 2005 @ 01:55 PM EDT (#121134) #
A 7.07 ERA represents bad luck? I dunno. I'm willing to debate luck vs. bad luck, and I loathe ERA as much as anyone, but that's a lot of bad luck to be at 7.07. Even accounting for the small sample size, 17 hits and six walks allowed in 14 innings is not great. He is controlling left-handed hitters, though (.479 OPS), making him a complete LOOGY. Except the Jays are paying $2.5 million for one of those already.
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Craig B - Thursday, June 30 2005 @ 01:57 PM EDT (#121135) #
My suggestion would be that the Yankees follow Calvinball teachings and make up the rules as they go along

You mean like how the Commissioner's office does with the debt service rule?

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Craig B - Thursday, June 30 2005 @ 02:00 PM EDT (#121136) #
Gitz, the 7.07 is bad luck; his performance has been more like 5.40 (coincidentally, exactly where Downs and Schoeneweis are).

He's never been this ineffective before, and it's only 64 batters, which is a miniscule sample. I think he can still pitch.
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Mick Doherty - Thursday, June 30 2005 @ 02:21 PM EDT (#121139) #
I do too and if/when he's released, it will be further evidence that Torre is losing decision-making ground to Steinbrenner, because Stanton is one of "Torre's guys." Of course, they already have Stanton on hand in the person of Buddy Groom.
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Mike Green - Thursday, June 30 2005 @ 02:27 PM EDT (#121140) #
I think the Jays should acquire Pickering so we can truly enjoy the benefits of Calvinball...No weight jokes, please!

I don't think Stanton is significantly better at this point in his career than Downs or Schoeneweis.
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BCMike - Thursday, June 30 2005 @ 05:30 PM EDT (#121157) #
If Stanton is released he would be a nice option and allow the Jays to move Schoeneweis at the deadline without having to worry about a replacement. He's given up too many walks but his K rate is very nice.

As for Quantrill, I'm not sure if he has anything left in the tank. It might make a nice story but will it help the team? I'd bet no.
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Magpie - Thursday, June 30 2005 @ 06:25 PM EDT (#121166) #
It's official, by the way - Yankees part with Quantrill, Stanton. The Yankees have 10 days to trade them or release them. Some people seem to think the Yankees can trade Q to Florida for Encarnacion. I don't quite see why anyone wouldn't just wait the 10 days, and let the Yankees pay the salaries.

I always loved the Q ("all-seeing, all-knowing") but I think he might be done. I suspect that we might have something here a little like what happened to Dizzy Dean. He tried to pitch with a leg injury (sustained in the 2004 season opener), and it messed him up permanently.

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King Ryan - Thursday, June 30 2005 @ 07:00 PM EDT (#121168) #
Poor Dizzy Dean! Suffering a leg injury while you're dead is the ultimate bad luck. :)
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Magpie - Thursday, June 30 2005 @ 07:23 PM EDT (#121169) #
Oh, King Ryan, you're messing with me! But it's my own careless prose, so it serves me right. The "He" who pitched in the 2004 season opener was of course Quantrill, not the last proper name cited in the sentence immediately preceding. That fellow hurt his leg (his toe, actually) in the 1937 All Star Game, and soon afterwards uttered the immortal diagnosis:

"Fractured? Hell, the damn thing's broken!"

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Jim - Thursday, June 30 2005 @ 07:39 PM EDT (#121172) #
Quantrill would make you long for Nakamura. Stanton would make you nostalgic for De Los Santos.
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Mick Doherty - Friday, July 01 2005 @ 11:45 AM EDT (#121227) #
This from Lee Sinins today on all-time single season appearance leaders for NYY:

RANK NAME YEAR G
1 Paul Quantrill 2004 86
2 Tom Gordon 2004 80
3 Mike Stanton 2002 79
4 Steve Karsay 2002 78
5 Jeff Nelson 1997 77
6 Mike Stanton 2001 76
T7 Mariano Rivera 2004 74
T7 Dave Righetti 1986 74
T7 Dave Righetti 1985 74
T10 Mike Stanton 1999 73
T10 Jeff Nelson 2000 73
T10 Jeff Nelson 1996 73

Here's the observation: You think Joe Torre likes going to the bullpen? Righetti is the only non-Torre-era name on the list.
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This Day in Baseball: 30 June 2005 | 23 comments | Create New Account
The following comments are owned by whomever posted them. This site is not responsible for what they say.