Now I really have to have faith in Bob Melvin. Blake Snell is a Giant. He will probably pitch for them this year. I have always hated watching him pitch. Of all the pitchers I have watched pitch,he gets top prize for looking as though the world was coming to an end while he worked and he seldom goes more than five innings. In my mind, that describes a reliever. But no, old school idiot, a reliever is a guy who goes all out for one inning. In many cases, if a reliever gets three guys out before three runs score, he gets a “save”. As we slip and slide through life, it’s important to remember that the meaning of many words changes over time.

Okay, everybody, tell your sons and daughters to get off their butts right now and start throwing. Take your time learning how to break those muscles and other body parts in to the grind of doing that. Tell them to put half of their early paychecks into a fund that will help them during rehab or perhaps when the contract isn’t guaranteed. There’s big money in goose eggs. But Bob Melvin managed Snell three seasons and together they almost got somewhere. So I guess I’m over my hissy fit about how MLB shafted the baseball fans of Oakland California, who were many and faithful. I’m back to raise Hell again. Maybe, when I wake up tomorrow, I will read about Rob Manfred retiring.

Old John was right. Major League Baseball is a business, not a game, not a sport. If any of us had any doubt of the truth of that statement, the signs have been numerous and obvious. Support your chosen team by spending hundreds of dollars on caps, shirts, and other “gear”.Disfigure the uniforms worn by the players with patches on the sleeves advertising businesses that have nothing to do with the game. Drive the prices of tickets and concessions up so high that only the well to do can afford to see games in person, and then make them pay even more to park their cars. Owners, executives, and players now make so much money that it is hard for them to relate to common folks. We all know the shameful practice of building stadiums with unearned shiploads of taxpayer dollars. The latest example is the sadistic treatment of the human beings in Oakland, California who happen to like baseball by, not only the hopelessly clueless billionaire who never worked a day in his life but owns the Oakland Athletics, but also the entire roster of other super rich major league baseball owners. It’s no wonder that gambling , which once threatened the viability of the game, is welcomed and fully endorsed by these blood sucking vermin: none of them apparently knows the difference between right and wrong.

John Fisher is the owner who is , with the blessing of his fellow vampires, moving the Athletics to Las Vegas, the same desert crime scene where the son of Al Davis moved the Oakland professional football team a while back. Why anyone would want to move a thriving business with a large following to a tiny sand trap that has been previewing global warming for us for years is a question that I really don’t think I want to know the answer to but I’m sure it’s not good.

If you think I’m annoyed, let me assure you that I am not the only one. Here is part of what Scott Ostler, the venerable sports writer for the San Francisco Chronicle, wrote,” Oakland is no longer held captive by the worst owner in baseball, if not in all sports…Oakland is no longer exposed to the massive risk of entering into a partnership with a guy who has the business acumen of a pair of Gap blue jeans.”

Then there is Ann Killion, also of the S.F. Chronicle. “The owners waived their own chance at a massive relocation fee, accepted and parroted lies from Fisher and his minions, ignored the reality of the situation, all to protect one of their own. The most dysfunctional of their own. A man who has deliberately ruined his own franchise. Which sends a pretty clear message. The people who run baseball do not care about you, the fan…they care only about circling their gold-plated wagons and taking another sip of Macallan single malt while stuffing public tax money in their pockets”

Here are the names of players who not long ago played for the Oakland A’s but were visible among playoff teams this season: Marcus Semien,Matt Chapman , Matt Olson,Chris Bassitt,Sonny Gray, Max Muncy, and Sean Murphy. If you combine them with others who didn’t make the playoffs, you would have a pretty damn good team, wouldn’t you.? Fisher ditched it all for more free money. Welfare for billionaires, apparently the American way.

From now on, Baseball Anarchy will continue reporting on baseball, but not these schmucks.

 

The season has ended. People are sick of the repetition, but I’ll say it again: every year it goes faster. No bats are hitting baseballs, neither are they swinging and missing. The television stays cool now except for night time streaming or maybe some futbol. Baseball in 2023 was pretty interesting and the post season, as we call it, was a lot of fun. Some of us like to poke fun at Texas but the state produced two of the the best this year and they both might stay that way for a while.

There were names prominent near the end that were new to the big stage: Adolis Garcia, Zac Gallen,Ketel Marte, Corbin Carroll, Kevin Ginkel, Merrill Kelly, Gabriel Moreno, Mitch Garver,Leody Taveras, Jon Gray, Jonah Heim, Josh Jung all became familiar to us as Halloween drew near. Other names were more familiar in the spotlight, like Corey Seager, Max Scherzer, Marcus Semien, Nathan Eovoldi, and Aroldis Chapman.

The best “new” name in the World Series was Bruce Bochy. After he was dumped as New York Yankees manager when they lost the 1960 World Series to a slightly better Pittsburgh Pirates team, Casey Stengel remarked that he had made the mistake of becoming 70 years old and many of us who were quite a bit younger at the time felt like it was time for senior citizens to step aside. Bochy won the World Series for the fourth time as a manager at the age of 68 after taking three years off from the game. Coupled with rule changes that invigorated the game and got games moving at a faster pace and resurrected “small ball” by increasing the use of sacrifice bunts and stolen bases and eliminating defensive shifts, the success of senior citizen managers like Bochy and Dusty Baker may have started a new trend that, while accepting what is called analytics, recognizes as well the value of veteran experience and human instincts. Now the Santa Ana Angels have hired 71 year old Ron Washington to try to right that floundering ship and it will be interesting to see how that works out as the career of Mike Trout enters its final phase and Shohei Ohtani decides whose checks he will cash next.

So it is time to rest the weary eyeballs and the worn eardrums that absorbed endless, repetitive commercials for insurance, new cars, and countless ads for pharmaceutical remedies for previously unmentionable ailments. That’s not to mention the ceaseless analysis of each and every pitch by John Smoltz, who is a good guy and was a great pitcher but still needs help in using the English language paired with non stop yakking by Joe Davis, who apparently thinks we like hearing the same stories over and over. The TBS coverage was so much better. But no more complaints, it’s great to be able to witness good ball, and we had a great lot of that. Thanks to the Baltimore Orioles, Arizona Diamondbacks, Houston Astros ,Philadelphia Phillies and the Minnesota Twins for a really fun adventure. Okay, Los Angeles Dodgers too.

 

Summer is long gone. Juncos and sparrows have displaced the grosbeaks at the bird feeders and the winnowing of contenders for the Major League Baseball championship has left us with two very interesting teams to compete in the World Series. Just like you all guessed back in March, it will be the Texas Rangers versus the Arizona Diamondbacks after a lively and challenging set of playoff matches. These teams are led by managers who have proven their leadership skills and baseball intelligence, Torey Lovullo and Bruce Bochy. As happy as it made us to see Bochy back in the game and succeeding, as has become his habit, it was truly sad to witness the sorrowful end of Dusty Baker‘s managing career. And the gracious and capable manager of the Philadelphia Phillies, Rob Thomson,once again led his team to a thumping of yours truly’s pick to win it all, the Atlanta Braves for the City of Brotherly Shove. I cleverly chose to favor Baltimore and Atlanta to meet in the 2023 series not long after the All Star Game, but , if nothing else, I have become well acquainted with being wrong.

There were even more teams involved in the post season this year with two wild card teams in each league having a three game series to start the show and the new format proved good. For one thing, the noticeable absence of any New York teams made it easy to , if not root for, at least accept all of the teams involved, especially after The Dodgers disappeared.

The Minnesota Twins had won the “easy” division in the American League and that made them just about everyone’s favorite to be the early dropout, although the Diamondbacks no doubt got lots of votes as well. Carlos Correa and company proved themselves as formidable, however, as they eliminated a very good Toronto Blue Jays team. Jhoan Duran may have been the best relief pitcher out of all the ones we witnessed. Miami was dispatched quickly but one gets the feeling that the Marlins will be back. The days of Yankees and Red Sox dominating the A.L. are surely not gone forever but it’s good to see some competition.

Not having seen much of the Orioles all season, I had mostly a box score reader’s impression before the Rangers swept them, but they definitely appear to be strong and getting stronger. Adley Rutschman, Gunnar Henderson and company are for real, and the most important observation is that this organization knows how to build a team. The loss to injury of Felix Bautista hurt, but we all have learned that Texas was not to be denied.

The Atlanta Braves dominated all season but the same Phillies team that finished far behind them in the division got hot at the right time and blew right by them. Philadelphia’s only weak link was the former Brave Craig Kimbrel. For any team to face Kyle Schwarber, Trea Turner, and Bryce Harper to start their day requires courage and tenacity. Next year Harper will either have more experience at first base or he can return to right field and give the inconsistent Nick Castellanos a break. Their pitching was much stronger than I had anticipated. Relief dudes need to get better at holding base runners than burning holes in catchers’ mitts all around both leagues.

Houston battled all the way against the Rangers, Seattle, and even the Angels before slipping into first place at the end. We loved the way Dusty Baker worked Mauricio Dubon into just about an every day player and the continuing story of Jose Altuve‘s greatness. Jeremy Pena slipped a bit offensively after his big rookie season but is solid at shortstop, Martin Maldonado is an excellent player coach, and Alex Bregman is a player any manager would love to have . It is a roster full of stars, especially Yordan Alvarez, but the steady, nurturing hand of Baker will be missed. Don’t bet against them next year, though. In fact, despite the urging of Fan Dual and all of those other vampires, don’t bet.

What we liked best about the 2023 season was the emergence of the Arizona team. They are a bit old fashioned but in the best sense of the word. They run hard, steal bases, and chase down fly balls. They bunt effectively. They have youthful exuberance. They play defense well. They gave up a very good fundamental player in Daulton Varsho but got back in trade two gems in Lourdes Gurriel Jr. and Gabriel Moreno. In other words, they have built a very good team and now the whole country has seen them at work. Corbin Carroll took a couple of games to get going in the LCS but watch out, he is rolling now.

Texas has power, starting pitching, and very good defense. Max Scherzer is a good addition and could, one way or the other, make the difference. They need a six run lead going to the seventh inning, but guess what? A lot of times they have it. Adolis Garcia, Jonah Heim, and Josh Jung have all become nationally known names now. We already knew about Marcus Semien, Nathan Eovaldi, and Jordan Montgomery.

This World Series could be one of the best.

What has been learned from watching major league baseball on television for the past six months? For one thing,we are reminded again that predictions made in April are almost always proven wrong by now. With a week and a half left in the regular season one merely has to look at the standings to affirm that. For another, I have learned that I should stay as far as possible away from Jim Beam bourbon whiskey or else I might find myself crooning “Sweet Caroline” with a room full of ugly people and thinking it was fun. So good, so good, so good.

Congratulations to fans of the Baltimore Orioles and Tampa Bay Rays who have watched their favorites climb to the top of the American League East. Here’s hoping that the Toronto Blue Jays can get in on the fun as well. Don’t worry, Yankees and Red Sox, ESPN and Fox still love you. It’s probably a safe assumption that Aaron Boone and Alex Cora will continue in their jobs as managers, but will they really want to?

Also, I have finally discovered an excellent way to keep my weight down. Just keep watching all of those fast food restaurant ads featuring unhealthy looking items of questionable nutrition. Also,I have learned that no matter what we are eating, there needs to be a dip of some sort to go with it.

Minnesota will be in the playoffs by not being as awful as the rest of the A.L. Central. They do have a reasonable facsimile of Carlos Correa.

It has really been fun following the A.L. West. Texas, Houston, and Seattle all have great rosters somewhat hampered by injuries and the competition has been exciting. A real race to the finish. I want all three teams to win it. The injuries to Mike Trout and Shohei Ohtani have helped make the Bellflower Angels a sad story but Arte Moreno should have kept his word about selling the team. The Oakland story is the biggest bummer in baseball and it may get even worse before it gets better

Don’t you want to drive in a car commercial so that you can really be allowed to drive as fast as possible with no other cars on the road?

The National League East certainly did not go the way New York Mets fans and a number of experts planned, did it? We need to recognize the fact that the Atlanta Braves organization has been really good at assembling talent and brains. Philadelphia is plucky and strong but it’s hard to picture another strong finish like last year’s. Miami is up and coming but I really wish they would move to Havana. While we’re at it,let’s send the Rays to Puerto Rico. That would be really fun, and then we could change the the division name to the Roberto Clemente Division. Wait a minute, they are in different divisions. Bit of a geography lapse there.

The N.L. Central had a good race for most of the year. Milwaukee’s pitching helped them pull away as did the return of Willy Adames. Cincinnati, Chicago, and Pittsburgh all gave glimpses of how good things can happen if you develop young ballplayers as opposed to gambling on free agents.

In the N.L. West, the Dodgers proved again that money walks while BS talks, or is it the other way around? Mookie Betts, Freddie Freeman and Max Muncy almost do it all by themselves. The Arizona Diamondbacks are looming in the very near future however. They have put together a real team with speed,defense, and pitching. The Giants are confused and stumbling toward ineptitude. The Padres lost the contest to the Mets and Cardinals to see who would be the most disappointing team in 2023. The Rockies don’t seem to care.

Here’s an October prediction:the playoffs are going to be very interesting and will include no games in New York. Also, a lot of bad pizza and beer will be consumed.

Do not trust a man with half of a beard. Such people tend to spend too much time thinking, particularly about themselves. Also, that’s a lot of mirror time over the course of an adult lifetime. San Francisco manager Gabe Kapler is a good example. The stupid patches that the Giants now display on their uniform jerseys are advertisements for taxis without drivers, which is about as anti-union short of physical violence as you can get. Kapler not only sports the patch but also took time from analyzing his roster to make a video commercial for the company. The company’s taxis, meanwhile, continue to clog the streets of San Francisco by breaking down. In true 21st century spirit, company executives blame other things. Acts of God you know. For this reason alone, I will henceforth have a very difficult time believing anything Gabe Kapler has to say. His managing success cannot be denied: the 2021 Giants won 107 games to the surprise of many, and when teams win more than they are expected to, the manager tends to get some of the credit. Nevertheless, it should be noted that the Giants have not fared well since that ’21 season and , while some of the fault for that can be directly aimed st injuries and the retirement of Buster Posey, management has been confusing to their fans and , one has to suspect, to the players.

Platooning can be a good thing . Casey Stengel worked for a ball club, the Yankees, that had more money to spend on players than most other teams were either willing or able to spend. If the Yanks needed a lefty for the bullpen or a right handed hitting outfielder to bolster the attack against southpaws they could, and did, find what they needed on another team’s roster and exchange some cash to secure one. Stengel, who was wildly successful between 1949 and 1960, could use, for example, Bobby Brown at third base and Gene Woodling in left field against right handed hurlers and then Billy Johnson at third and Hank Bauer in the outfield against lefties. However, there is a difference between using that strategy with veteran players who are secure in their roles and just massively doing the automatic switcheroo with young players just up from the minors or out of college. The way Kapler does it, he in effect is saying “I know you can’t do this. You are not good enough and I can’t afford to let you develop your skills.” Some of the players who have faced this crisis of confidence are David Villar, Joey Bart, Mauricio Dubon, and Brett Wisely. Kapler is showing how smart he thinks he is by the way he also jerks around his pitching staff. Would a free agent starting pitcher want to sign with a team that uses him for one, two, maybe three innings two or three times a week? I know, this is the New Age but if I was an agent, I would advise going elsewhere.

As for those Yankees, they continue to do their best to keep barbers employed. Facial hair has been banned ever since the felonious boss, George Steinbrenner, ruled . It’s kind of embarrassing to see grown men have to toe that silly line. It reminds me how, back in the day (as they say) defense lawyers would strongly advise their clients to be sure to show up in court with a suit on or at least a tie and be well groomed so as not to offend the judge or jurors. It serves no other real purpose. So the Bronx Bongers sit in last place with a 62-68 record as we head toward the finish line.

The race to that line is looking like fun in several places. Arizona has a pulse again, Seattle and Toronto are really interesting, and Tampa Bay is alive and well. I don’t bet, but, if I did, Baltimore and Atlanta would be my choices.

Since the All Star Game has been played, we can still wear white for another few weeks but it really is now universally considered to be the second half of the major league baseball season and it looks like we are definitely in for some thrills and chills along the way. Such as: Will the Baltimore Orioles or the Toronto Blue Jays or the New York Yankees be able to catch the suddenly faltering Tampa Bay Rays? Yes, the Bronx Zombies have a shot. Can Aaron Judge pitch? That might help. No reason for Shohei Ohtani to get all the attention. Boston has a winning streak going but that’s what happens when you play Oakland/Vegas. Baltimore is looking more legitimate all the time. I favor the Jays because they have Brandon Belt and my favorite announcers outside of San Francisco, Dan Shulman and Buck Martinez. That’s a good reason, right? Like the Rays, all that is lacking for the Jays is a good yard to play in with. like, grass. How can we get rid of Rob Manfred, man? I mean, what a piece of work this guy is! The mayor of Oakland,Sheng Thao, responded to his Snidely Whiplash remarks about her fine city by asking for and receiving a private meeting with the commissioner last Sunday in Seattle. She presented A’s owner John Fisher’s mouthpiece, I mean Manfred, with bound copies of a report on all of the hoops that Oakland officials had agreed to jump through in order for the A’s to stay where they belong–for him and all 30 team owners to see as proof that serious attention was being paid to the heir to the jeans fortune’s demands. Two days later, he went right back to the same blatantly dishonest gripes about Oakland not wanting the A’s. That behavior gave me a great idea. Manfred could be made Donald Grump’s running mate (Mike Pence is busy)! Grump and John Fisher are so alike! They are of the I was born rich so why can’t I get more?ilk. And Manfred is on television a lot. Perfect! The pants on fire ticket.

It really is a bummer that Mike Trout has joined Aaron Judge and Edwin Diaz on the nasty injury list and with Anthony Rendon hurt again too What will happen with Ohtani now that the Angels’ goose is in the oven? Every team wants him and he needs a solid contender to play for. He would look good in a Giants uniform but it’s more likely that the Dodgers, Yankees, or Mets will win the auction. Then all it will take is for the Saudis to buy the A’s and move them to Qatar and I can stop caring altogether and take up pickleball.

The Cincinnati Reds have become another fun story and we wish them and their capable manager David Bell continued success. Somebody has to win that division. The American League Central has the same issue but my money ($1.38) remains on Cleveland.

We have been liking the faster pace of the games but it would help even more if they eliminated the replay review. Sorry, it’s good to “get it right” but maple syrup in January is quicker. Put a clock on that stuff too.

Two more gripes and then I’ll hose down the infield. One is those “city connect” uniforms. Some are okay, but, other than yet another bid for money from sales of ‘gear” I can’t figure out why they’ve done this. And have you noticed the advertising patches on uniforms? Yuck, pretty soon they will catch up to pro soccer. Two, attention ESPN, Fox and everybody else broadcasting baseball: I’m looking for an athletic contest, not a talk show. Most of these are great athletes. I really don’t give a damn what they have to say, especially while they are playing. Can you imagine Bob Gibson or Will Clark wearing a microphone on the field? Nope, but Yogi might have been fun. In the slow pitch league I once played in, one guy had a great shirt. On the back of the shirt were these words: SHUT UP AND PLAY BALL.

What are the big news items as we head for Memorial Day? Once upon a time it was set aside as a day to honor those who were killed in wars before it became the opening day of barbecue season and what the retailers, especially automobile dealers, call the beginning of the Summer season. Scientists say that Summer is almost a month away, but what the hell do they know?

One item that has Major League Baseball followers somewhat excited is the effect of all of those new rules on the game. Games are faster, no doubt about it. Pitchers who were once labelled “deliberate”, like Camilo Doval, have been making their catchers and managers nervous as they yin with high speed fastballs and yang with syrupy deliveries. Left sided batters have much less trouble keeping their batting averages above the Mendoza line without the vaunted/hated infield shifts. Base stealers dig the diminishing number of tosses that are meant to keep them closer to the bag. Beer guzzlers watching at home have less time to run to the bathroom as batters stay in the box. One thing that hasn’t changed for the better is the number of strikeouts. As of May 21,there have been 12,063 strikeouts for an average of 25.6 per game whereas last season the average was 25.2 per game. So the average hurler is still Sandy Koufax. The “automatic” runner at second base is , to this observer, about as useful as hoop earrings on a basset hound but the rest of the stuff is okay. If the shifts were not enough incentive to get more batters to learn to put the ball in play somewhere then I guess we should just give up.

Noteworthy items in the first quarter of the season include strong starts by the Tampa Bay Rays and the Baltimore orioles and surprisingly slow starts by the St. Louis cardinals, Philadelphia Phillies, and San Diego Padres. The Cardinals seem to have snapped out of their funk (where’s Yadi?) and look ready to contend in that mysterious National League Central except that Adam Wainwright has been looking more like Donovan Osborne this season so far. Paul DeJong is hitting again, though. Pittsburgh lost their promising young shortstop, Oneil Cruz, to injury but they have become interesting with old man Andrew McCutchen helping the youngsters along with another old man, Carlos Santana.

Luis Arraez is having fun reminding everybody of Tony Gwynn and helping Miami Marlins fans stay awake. The Houston Astros appear to have some competition this year, perhaps even including the Santa Ana Angels, but we have said that before. Texas has to be taken seriously, especially if Jacob degrom actually pitches. Atlanta has become a strong favorite to win their division but rumor has it that Steve Cohen is in negotiations to purchase half of the tampa Bay Rays roster, which might help the Mets. It has been delightful to see the Arizona Diamondbacks in the chase in the National league West with their new brand of old school baseball. Zac Gallen and Merill Kelly help them not miss Madison Bumgarner on the mound and Geraldo Perdomo and Corbin Carroll have talent,youth, and speed. Were the Padres better without Fernando Tatis, Jr.? Probably not, but something is wrong and it’s not Bob Melvin.

Since we have no stock in pharmaceuticals and venture capitalists are not feeding bloggers the way middle class folks are instructed to feed their lawns by that pushy Scot guy, we can’t afford to attend games in person much. Consequently, we have become more and more dependent on the television to see games and are thankful for the opportunity to see many games at a pretty low cost. it also affords us the opportunity to see and hear the work of the best comedy writers in the land who have, more and more in the last few years, worked for the various insurance companies that help us all in our times of need. After all, if you are in the loathsome business of extracting wealth from folks fearful of losing everything they have and thus becoming a passive observer of commercials, it helps to have an emu or duck or gecko comic character to get people grinning. Also, we’ve been able to keep our weight down by looking at large images of greasy fast food items as they jump or are dumped onto a sturdy paper plate that holds large portions. Plus we get to see all of the smiling faces of people taking drugs for their often serious health issues . They all seem to be thriving despite the possibilities of serious side effects. After Memorial Day, it’s never too soon to get ready for the 4th of July. Have fun!