Sunday, July 25, 2021

Series Wrap-up


After battling and scuffling for four games.

After great pitching and laughable failure:

1.  They stole two games

2.  We stole one game

3.  They won another that wasn't stolen.

So we took 1 of 4.  About par for the course.

30 comments:

  1. I don’t think this bullpen can close the door on car, let alone on a MLB team

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  2. Bring in Tanyon Sturtze, Kyle Farnsworth and Scott Proctor. Even in their late 30s/ early 40s I have more confidence in those two than I do With our current pen.

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  3. I'd take Nick Swisher in the bullpen about now.

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  4. Cheer up, guys. A sweep by the Rays and the percentage likelihood of a mid-season Cashman sacking will top 50 percent on Fangraphs.

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  5. We need them to bottom out before real change happens.

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  6. The Yankee Propaganda machine will tell you the Yanks are 4 behind in the Wild Card but 3 behind in the all important loss column. That's their spin on this. Judge and Higgy come back on Tuesday and life is almost normal again.

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  7. So glad that I spent time outside with my grandsons instead of watching. Got two messages on my phone. One was to tell me to tune into YES because German was pitching a no-hitter after 7 and the next was that they lost 5-4.
    I will leave the rest for you all to fill me in on.
    I'm guessing that somewhere in that debacle BOONIIE left a relief pitcher in too long.
    Just guessing.

    I once actually saw dumpster fires in the mountains and it can't look or smell any worse than this.
    [It was legal during back in 1971, just so you know. Not many garbage days in the hill then.]

    The Archangel

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  8. Some of my thoughts on the dismal state of affairs in Yankee land:

    1. Cashman reportedly likes his minor leaguers to be "finished" before they come up to the majors. But oddly, he likes his managers and coaches to be raw rookies and upstarts. He likes his players old and his managers/coaches super young. Seems to be back-ass-wards to me. I would want my players super young and my managers/coaches to be old, experienced hacks. But perhaps he does this because the managers and coaches are nothing more than marionette puppets on strings dancing to the orders of Cashman's number crunchers. I did worry about bringing in Matt Blake as the pitching coach of this team. Would he be able to guide a struggling young pitcher through tough innings in the heat of a pennant race? I guess we all know the answer now.

    2. Even if Matt Blake goes out there and says "gobble-gobble/gobble-gobble-gobble/gobble-gobble", I think pitchers like Luiasiga and Green have got to pull themselves together and get the job done. Blowing four or five run leads without getting an out is simply unacceptable. Our arson squad has simply out-done themselves this year. Give 'em all a platinum medal for incompetence.

    3. Whoever said that it's no longer possible to string together four or five consecutive hits should have his damned lips sutured shut. Boston put on a freaking clinic in this series of putting together professional at-bats, not giving away outs, and wearing pitchers down. The Cole game at Fenway was a classic exhibition of good hitting beating good pitching. The kind of thing we used to do to guys like Pedro Martinez. And it's now Boston doing to us in reverse. I don't blame Cole for that one. He didn't have his best off speed stuff and did a decent job of hanging in, until the roof collapsed.

    4. The biggest difference b/w these teams is actually just one player, Rafael Devers. And yeah, he happens to be a lefty hitter. David Cone talked about how balanced the Boston lineup is, how many lefty hitters they have, and how he found it much more difficult to pitch to a balanced lineup when he was pitching. I'm sure Gerrit Cole agrees. What a concept, left handed hitting. It's a shame that our GM believes that lefty hitters don't matter in this new age of modern baseball. If Toronto and Detroit couldn't win with all right handed lineups in recent years, when they had better hitters and better pitchers than us, why should we expect championships with this group of over-hyped and over-paid players?

    5. The seven games with Boston turned out pretty much the way I expected. Except that we won a couple more than I thought we would. The couple more wins came about as a result of bringing in some new blood.

    6. It's on to Tampa now. And I fully expect a sweep by the Tampons. But this season was already ka-put even before this most recent dreadful performance in Boston.

    7. I heard that Cashman was in on the negotiations for 41 year old Nelson Cruz and almost snapped my neck from whiplash. I guess the Brain thinks that we don't have enough right handed DH types, or enough experienced hitters. Yeah, this team needs more forty-five year old right handed hitters. Way to go, Brian! Keep them coming and why not bring back A-Rod, Frank Thomas, Gary Sheffield, Cecil Fielder, Juan Gonzalez, Mark McGwire, and Jose Canseco. What a Hall of Fame lineup that would be. So much experience too. Man, I can't wait to see these games turn into three true outcome home run derby. World Series, here we come! Modern baseball, according to Brian.

    The Hammer of God

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  9. nope - actually he took out German too soon, an replaced him with a guy just back from Covid, after pitching a rough inning yesterday - Loisaga.

    You see - Boone is an innovative manager - he continually comes up with new ways to screw the team

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  10. The JuJu gods may be doing for us what we cannot do for ourselves

    We need to suck to the high heavens so hard that rotten fish in the gutter will smell better.

    Only then is there the slight chance that things will change.

    That being said, it'll be Boone who goes under the bus.

    Cashman will remain and will only be asked to retire - to save face - if this happens another few times in coming years.

    The LAST thing we want is another wild card/one game nightmare.

    I also want everybody healthy again so Brain can't blame it on that.

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  11. John cracks me up. He said this was the fifth worst game of the season! Not the fifth worst, but the fifth that was the worst. You can’t predict baseball, but there will be a sixth worst before we’re through.

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  12. Man, Boone looks like he's been living on reds, vitamin c, and cocaine. His skin is ashen. Considering his heart history, Hal should pay him to take a sick leave. I'm sure that it happens to all teams in any given year, but after all the money spent on the farm system the lack of even one player who could make a quality contribution this year is staggering. And the same could be said going back to'17. If I was Hal, the carpenters would be assembling the gallows right now. And he should be dropping a couple of dozen more through the trapdoor.

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  13. ...and all a friend can say is ain't it a shame.

    The Dead reference is particularly appropriate, Kevin.

    Hammer, I think you're quite right about this. Yes, obviously the pitching coach is awful, and everybody's got Covid, and maybe some guys are tipping their pitches, and Chapo's nail hurts.

    But c'mon. I've been following the Yankees for 55 years, and I've never seen them blow this many leads, of this size, in so short a time. Or even a season.

    Yankees, hell: I've never seen any team in the majors do it.

    At a certain point, it just becomes about character. You've got too many guys out there with no confidence in themselves, just looking not to lose. If their catcher—and their pitching coach, and their manager—can't do a thing about that, well then, they shouldn't be on a major-league team.

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  14. Your typical city involved in a typical daydream
    Hang it up and see what tomorrow brings.

    and wasn't there a lost verse about someone getting thrown under a magic bus?

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  15. @13bit, lol! Maybe from a Who song, or Lou Reed?

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  16. Every day you'll see the dust
    As I drive my baby in the Magic Bus.

    Actually, that will be the dust of the Red Sox. And the Rays.

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  17. A Garcia ditty about a down-on-his luck gambler who just KNOWS his luck is due to change is also appropriate for Boone (and us). The song is titled “Loser.”

    -Mesquiades

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  18. I told Jeter the Yankees lost, they were lacking in some direction
    Derek Jeter told me upon scrutiny
    Cashman needs more humiliation
    I told Jeter mediocrity was preventing win after win
    Derek Jeter told me it brings him joy
    Every Stanton strikeout makes him grin

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  19. From the sour grapes dept. All the whining from the hysterics on the this blog regarding trading the budding superstar, Mike Tauchman. Currently his slash line: .173/.283/.280/.563 WAR=0.0. And for all that youthful "athleticism" and speed, he has 1sb/3cs. We got crazy lucky that his moment coincided with the year of the rocket ball. Lesson to be learned, don't fall in love with unheralded post 25 year old players, and beware of prospect hugging. Just go back twenty years with our team. Hell go back and look at all teams. And if you are not a talent evaluator at the pro level, try not to listen to ESPN, take the word of the print median to seriously. Naturally I don't practice what I preach, but that is what makes me a "fanatic". 🤓

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  20. Genius Kevin opines, "Lesson to be learned, don't fall in love with unheralded post 25 year old players, and beware of prospect hugging," ON THE BASIS OF EXACTLY ONE EXAMPLE. Kevin, moronic king of anecdotal evidence--and all-around asshole to boot. Want more isolated anecdotes? Mariano Rivera was once a prospect. So was Bernie Williams. And Derek Jeter. And Jorge Posada. And Andy Pettitte. And Aaron Judge. And what do all those isolated anecdotes prove? Exactly FUCKING NOTHING, IMBECILE. How's your kiddie porn collection coming, Kev?

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  21. "At some point it becomes about character," opines HC66. This is just nasty CHARACTER ASSASSINATION, which doesn't speak very well of YOUR character, HC66. These are all hard-working professionals striving to perform to the best of their abilities--and most of them are better and more accomplished ballplayers than you ever were as a writer. What does that say about YOUR character, ya' nasty pompous blowhard? The problem is precisely limitations of talent, not deficiency of character--and that's down to Cashman, not the players, as the Yankee management and their toadies in the daily press would have you believe. The lack of character applies to you alone.

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  22. Who would a thunk that the San Diego Padres, of those hideous brown and yellow unis, would become the NY Yankees and we would become them.
    Alice Thru The Looking Glass- Somebody cue Gracie Slick

    The Archangel

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  23. Things that make you throw up in your mouth;

    Stanton has struck out 21 times in 42 ABs against Boston this season. [total of 49 plate app.]

    Why is he still even playing?
    Cashman should be forced to swim the English Channel with him on his back.

    'I traded for Stanton" should be on his tombstone

    The Tactiturn Archangel

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  24. I was on call this weekend. I'm so happy I missed most of the games.

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  25. Bertha, don't you come around here anymore.

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  26. But I'll get back on my feet again someday
    The good Lord willin'
    If He says I may
    I know that the life I'm livin's no good
    I'll get a new start, live the life I should

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  27. Kevin, it's certainly true that Tauchman has not done great things in SF. On the other hand, Estrada has been playing great—so far.

    But all of us fans are like Plato's cave-dwellers, looking at shadows through the fire and trying to guess what is reality. That is why we rely on people with more baseball knowledge than we have.

    For instance, in 1996, one of George's "baseball people"—I think it was Clyde King—decided that Derek Jeter was not ready. He wanted to trade Mariano Rivera for Seattle's Felix Fermin. Gene Michael said no. Gene Michael said no, and he said it so emphatically, he put his job on the line.

    That same off-season, the Yanks traded a promising young starter (with a boffo name), Sterling Hitchcock, and a great-looking third baseman, Russ Davis, to the same Mariners for Tino Martinez and Jeff Nelson.

    A lot of knowledgeable people thought Michael was making a big mistake. They said Davis had the fastest hands they had ever seen.

    Well, the rest is history. Stick Michael could look at these players and KNOW which would work, and which would not. Not to say he never made a mistake. But he knew more than we did. He knew more than most baseball people.

    The trouble with the current Yankees is that Brian Cashman is no Gene Michael. Hell, I'm not even sure he's Clyde King.

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  28. Cashman is not even worth the crap that came out of Clyde King's ass. But about Gene Michael, it's all about finding the next Gene Michael. I know he's out there somewhere. How to find him and get him in here is the biggest quandary. With Cashman at the helm, we're not winning anything except maybe a wild card berth once every five years. One game and out.

    The Hammer of God

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  29. Horace, a true Gentleman AND a scholar! What a great use of Plato to make a point. And you are right, it's the certitude that so many bring that raises me hackles. To add to your nineties example, I remember the Father of SABR, Bill James writing how that trading rising centerfielder Roberto Kelly for an "older" corner outfielder Paul O'Neil was folly (they did have a rising Bernie Williams, but many weren't sold on him). I know damned well and good that
    Cashman would NOT have rolled the dice on that one. Look at his drafting history over the last twenty years. He goes for athletic, up the middle players, and pitching. I don't follow the draft That closely, but I can see him passing up corner players who can actually smoke the ball, who have "contact" skills first and foremost. We have a farm system filled with athletic power bats who are lacking in only one skill, "contact skills". Our pitchers can throw a ball around CERN, but they lack a skill, "command". And it's a philosophy which repeats itself over and over. Like the old joke, 'well I bounced out because I couldn't hit the curve'. 'Oh, I bounced out because I didn't have a big fastball'. Not perfect, but you've heard it. There was a time when it seemed that Cashman made good deals, totally under the radar. Either I just didn't "get it" at the time, or Cashman has turned too many brother GMs off by his crowing. Billy Beane's IQ seemed to have dropped when he started writing books and telling the world about "market inefficiencies". Why would any businessman tell the world his secrets? I need to go and find a cave now.

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