| Jump to bottom |
Most popular joiseys
Skipper, I assume your 14 was John Wockenfuss.
It Was A Combined Effort
I have come to know Ernie Harwell a bit; I suppose it makes me one of the thousands of friends he has acquired over the course of his life. I e-mailed him last year after reading Michael Rosenberg's book about the rivalry between Bo Schembechler and Woody Hayes, which touched upon Bo's firing of Ernie. I had not recalled that the management of WJR was so deeply involved in the decision. Here is what he wrote me back:
" rosenberg essentially is correct. nobody (including me) knows the truth about my firing. probably odenwald,tiger marketing director, and WJR's mgr., Jim Long, felt I was too old and talked Bo into doing the actual firing. Certainly, he could have stopped the idea in its tracks. It turn out to be the best thing to happen in my career. I have no hard feelings about the incident."
will s--kirk/curtis
That is a very interesting comparison, Will. I'm not sure I agree, though. Kirk in '83 was a couple of years younger than Curtis in '09; more to the point he was a very young 26 in baseball terms. He had never had 300 at bats in the majors before that year, and had nothing to compare to Curtis's apprenticeship, having spent most of his sporting life on the gridiron. His upside was much higher--while Curtis is a wonderful athlete, he cannot begin to match Gibson's raw speed and power. In addition, the TEAM was in a very different place. We had all these great young players coming into their own--Lou, Trammel, Parrish, Morris, Petry... We could reasonably expect to have a pennant contender within a season. Not so now; I think it is a defensible strategy (although I hope they don't) to trade Curtis for highly talented younger players. We have very little young talent in the field, and not a lot on the farm. I wouldn't mind seeing us hunker down and get a lot more talent in the pipeline, looking three or even five years down the road.
Players Heading Downhill, Early
"But "Old Double X", "The Beast", Jimmie Foxx was on his way downhill at a fairly young age and was literally out of baseball by the time he was 34"
Jimmy Foxx was a notorious alcoholic, the model for the manager in "A League of Their Own". Maybe a cautionary tale for Cabrera if he can't master his demons, but not a particularly relevant case study for most players.
Polanco
C Mo and Marcus were a terrible idea for the 2 slot. They never get on base--that is the issue, not contact or bunting or all the other things that people think. Maggs and Evans had (have) high OBPs, which more than compensates for their lack of speed.
Polanco
"The Tigers don't HAVE to have a second baseman that hits in the 2 slot, but they have GOT to have someone to hit there..."The conventional wisdom is to have a Polanco type batting second. I remember the '87 Tigers, who, after the first month or so of the season in which the offense was completely moribund, put about the least Polanco-like guy imaginable in the slot--Darrel Evans. I consider it Sparky's most inspired move. From that point on, with Evans forcing the pitcher to throw eight or nine pitches each at-bat and walking constantly, the offense blew the league apart. I personally would put another highly unlikely candidate in the two spot--Maggs. His strongest point at this stage of life is his OBP. and he is no slower than Evans was 23 years ago--nobody is.
Polanco
"..hitting in the No. 2 slot. His slugging pct is irrelevant." Strongly disagree. No matter where you are hitting, extra base hits (which slugging pct. measures) will create runs. Do you really believe that all of A Trammel's doubles and home runs were of no value added during all those years in which he held down the second spot in the order?
slightly off topic
"Prosecutors in Clark County, Washington have agreed to drop marijuana possession charges in exchange for Tim Lincecum paying $377 in fines."
Robert Parish was another pot smoker. Wow, what a dangerous drug! It certainly devastated the lives of these incredibly high achieving durable athletes, who by all accounts are wonderful teammates (Full disclosure: I personally do not use the drug). What a wise use of our time and money to incarcerate those who use it, in a futile effort to eradicate its use! Too bad Willie Nelson escaped prison; that would have been an excellent use of our tax dollars as well.
being a Yankee fan...
It's like you're the richest kid at school. Your dad buys you a Ferrari and hires a Daytona pit crew to service it, and then you are very pleased with yourself when you beat all the other kids at drag racing. The GNP of Belgium would barely cover their salary costs. They should be ashamed every year they DON'T blow away the rest of MLB.
singledigit
"I don't believe in luck over 162 games." I don't think there is any question that luck (or random chance, if you prefer) can play a role over the course of a season. 162 is a rather small sample size in something as subtle and (at least in the short term) random as baseball. I don't think that Maggs suddenly became a far better hitter than he had ever been in his life the year he hit over .360, for example. An awful lot of hits fell in for him that year.
Avila
If he is not a grade A or B defensive catcher, all the better, perhaps. Catchers tend to have shortish careers, unless they a freaks like Pudge or Fisk. It is awfully hard on your body, and even good, durable catchers tend to pay a price offensively because the are often dinged up. We need help basically all over the diamond; very few good young position players. Lets find a spot for him and commit to it. I think of guys like Brian Downing and Craig Biggio, who broke in as catchers and won lots and lots of major league ballgames as professional hitters installed in LF and 2B, respectively.
Brian D4
"Outfielders: Granderson, Raburn, Ordonez, Guillen, Thomas
DH: (Cast of characters reduced to one)"
I see two DH's here--Maggs and Guillen. At least I wouldn't care to pitch with either of them in the outfield. Rather than a lefthanded DH type (with Thomas, Guillen, Granderson, and Avila, our lefthanded hitting is far from our weakest point), I think what we need is a good defensive corner outfielder who can get on base from either side of the plate. Maybe a young Tim Raines, if I may dream.
umpiring
I don't think I have ever seen so many crucial blown calls in the postseason. It seems like no game has been immune from some awful calls. It started with at least four in the Tigers/Twins game, and then at least three more tonight. I wonder if umps have slumps just as players do. If others in your crew start blowing calls, does it undermines your confidence and concentration? Maybe it is the same phenomenon as the way errors, loss of control, and poor at-bats sometimes are contagious on a struggling ball club.
Inge
"I pray the tigers don't resign Inge."
Better pray for a better third baseman while you're at it. (Aren't there far more important things to pray for--world peace, averting catastrophic climate change, a revival of our economy?...but I digress.) The reason Inge played all season is very simple--we had no plausible alternative. Maybe you should pray for a farm system that coughs up a championship-caliber position player more than once a decade.
Red Wing Norm
Ohhh, I get it...You don't like Obama. There are a lot of message boards where your insights along these lines will be most welcome. This isn't one of them. You may have noticed that this one is called "Tiger Talk"...as in the Detroit Tigers. OK?
| Jump to top |
