Baseball Etcetera...Matsuzaka 5 no-hit innngs..Todd Walker released
| 10
|
by user Niteowl049
Baseball Notebook
5 Days, 13 hours, 56 minutes and 40 seconds till Opening Day!!!!!!!
Spring Training News Daisuke Matsuzaka pitched 5 innings of no-hit ball yesterday striking out 6 and walking 5. His ERA now stands at 2.04 for the spring. Another new Japanese pitcher Kei Igawa pitched well for the Yankees pitching 5 innings in their 5-1 win over the Phillies. Igawa gave up 1 run and 3 hits in his 5 inning stint and is almost a sure thing to start the season in the starting rotation....Woody Williams who was being counted on to fill one of the vacant spots left by Andy Pettitte and Roger Clemens has not had a good spring losing all three of his decisions and posting a 9.92 ERA.
Former LSU player Brad Hawpe hit his 5th homer of the spring in the Rockies loss to the A's....Nick Swisher and Mike Piazza both drove in their 16th run of the spring while Milton Bradley, Eric Chavez and Swisher homered in their win....Adam Wainwright and Kip Wells have both had excellent spring for the Cardinals combining to pitch 44 innings and only allowing 5 earned runs. Chris Carpenter who should start first game of season next Sunday night against the Mets has the highest earned run average of Cardinals starters this spring and it is a respectable 3.48. Most impressive stat for Cardinals starters is that in 99 innings they have only given up 2 homers.
Barry Bonds struck out twice as his average falls to .286 yesterday....Teams are sending down some of their better prospects as Felix Pie of the Cubs is sent down but will be back by end of the year....Among veteran players returned to minor league camps yesterday were Mark Bellhorn, Tomas Perez, Bobby Seay and Timo Perez. Elmer Dessens was traded to Brewers by Dodgers who received Brady Clark. Dodgers evidently wanted an outfielder with experience and the Brewers wanted another starting pitcher who can help this year. With the logjam in the Brewers outfield the trade reduced the outfield by one but they still have a plethora of outfielders with Kevin Mench, Bill Hall, Geoff Jenkins the only outfielders likely to start the season so manager Ned Yost will have to decide which two outfielders he will keep out of Laynce Nix, Corey Hart, Anthony Gwynn and Gabe Gross. Chris Shelton who started last season with 10 homers in April won't have the chance to open the season with Tigers since he was sent down to Toledo yesterday.
Rangers lead AL standings by percentage points and Reds who have led the NL standings most of the spring have a half game lead over the Braves....Devil Rays and White Sox have the worst winning percentages this spring with White Sox at .321 and Devil Rays at .320....Tigers need 2 wins to become the first team to post 20 wins this spring.
Nice Work If You Can Get It Department....Jorge Sosa was sent to the minors but will still make $1.25 million for the Mets minor league organization....Todd Walker slated to be released today by Padres will draw termination pay of $971,311 which pays him for about 45 days of spring training. His termination pay is about twice as much as I made working for 44 years.
Derrek Lee showing he is all the way back after missing a lot of the 2006 season is leading all hitters this spring in hits with 28 and in runs batted in with 17 and is hitting .500. If the Cubs can get Alfonso Soriano, Aramis Ramirez and Lee hitting well at the same time they could contend for the NL Central title....Lee's has 11 doubles which is 3 more than any other player this spring....Ryan Howard is struggling this spring hitting only .218 and has struck out in almost forty percent of his at bats striking out 20 times in 55 at bats....Jon Garland and Javier Vasquez of the White Sox have combined to give up 71 hits in 38 innings this spring.
Relievers and Stress
While attending an Astros-Braves game many years ago I watched the Braves reliever Duane Ward warming up in the bullpen and was wondering what it would be like to be warming up in the bullpen one minute then a minute later be on the mound and in the middle of the battle. The game was in the Astrodome and the sound was deafening when Ward entered the game because the dome kept all the sound inside.
Starters come into the game in the low key part of the game with the crowd not into it like they are in the later innings when the visiting team has the lead run on base in the ninth inning so a reliever always has more pressure because if they fail their team will more than likely lose the game. It takes a special person to be a major league closer. They have to have nerves of steel and be able to shut out the crowd noise whether it be at home or on the road because the noise in itself can be distracting.
Some people think baseball is boring but to me in the later innings of a game when the manager starts to use more strategy about the sixth inning inserting pinch hitters for pitchers if needed and bringing in relievers it is like a chess match with each manager trying to outthink the other and anticipate the moves of the other manager and be ready to counteract those moves before they are made.
Knowing when to remove starting pitchers is a science in itself. Starting pitchers will beg and plead to stay in a game when manager visits the mound but managers have to be able to disregard all that phoney baloney and take a pitcher out if he is struggling. Today another factor that has become very important is the pitch count. When a starting pitcher throws his 100th pitch of the game he is likely to be replaced very soon. In the old days starting pitchers were expected to pitch the entire game but in this day of relying on closers to shut down the other team and hold on to a win in the 8th or 9th inning shutouts are very uncommon due to closers finishing up games.
Back to the main point is that relievers are essential to teams these days because starting with the seventh inning for example the Braves will use a setup man like Rafael Soriano and Mike Gonzalez to pitch the seventh and eighth innings then call in the closer Bob Wickman to close out the game in the ninth inning.
While watching a game in the late innings and you see a rookie pitcher who has just flown in to make their first appearance you have to wonder what is going on in his mind when he is suddenly thrust into a game with 40 or 50 thousand people after pitching in minors in front of a crowd of 8 to 10 thousand. I have a world of respect for pitchers in general for relievers in particular because any time they come into a game it will be a stressful situation.
One of the biggest fear of a young relief pitcher is to blow a save for a pitcher like Nolan Ryan. Blown saves are part of the life of a reliever because no reliever will have their best stuff everyday. Unlike a starter though they may have a chance to redeem themselves the next game with a better game.
So when I see a reliever enter a game I can feel the pressure they are under to pitch well but only a major league reliever can fully understand the stress they are under upon entering a game with the game on the line.
| This user is a Tampa Bay Devil Rays fan. |
