The question and the answer.

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I guess Sidney Ponson was not interested.

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If the Mets win 85+ games this season, and Wright continues the pace he’s on this year – which, granted, would be very tough – he has to become the first Mets player ever to win a MVP award, right?  (No pun intended.)

Who else would get it? Michael Bourn? There’s no way that Ryan Braun would ever win it again – no matter what kind of numbers he puts up. Maybe someone on the Dodgers?

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I did not see the Yankees game last night.  How the heck did Will Smith’s family get such great seats?

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When you wake up on the morning of June 25th and look at the Yankees won-loss record, New York will be 36-35 (at best, and maybe worse).

Yes, I am saying that, 71 games into this season, the Yankees will be just about a .500 team. 

Don’t think so?  Look at the Yankees next 28 games.  And, tell me where they are going to get more than 14 wins on that schedule given the way the team has played so far this year.

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I wonder who will get more money and years as a Free Agent after the season?

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An instant classic.

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Close to ten thousand more a game – so far this season.  That Prince Fielder move is paying for itself this year…

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Some story.

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Great stuff on the Yankees today via Bob Klap -

That tense, surreal final out still was vivid in the Yankees’ memory, which went a long way toward explaining the expression on Brian Cashman’s face. It wasn’t a celebratory look as much as relief, or, closer to the truth, pure exhaustion.

The general manager is the first to admit the Bombers aren’t a very good team these days. The Yankees squeaked by the anemic Royals, 3-2, on a night that could’ve dropped them into dead last in the East. Only the Red Sox’ loss to the Orioles spared the Yankees, along with Alex Rodriguez’s ability to quickly negotiate Alcides Escobar’s grounder with two outs in the ninth and the tying run on third base.

Had A-Rod not fired a perfect, across-the-infield missile, and had Mark Teixeira not made the perfect stretch, the Yankees’ slump might’ve mushroomed into a full-blown crisis. The sense of unease about the Bombers’ decline is that great. Even Cashman said, “We’re bad right now.”

The core of the problem is A-Rod, who simply can’t hit home runs any more; he’s gone 52 at-bats without clearing the wall. And without his power threat, the Yankees don’t have the resources to dominate as they once did. Not when their rotation, ranked 11th in the AL, continues its journey toward mediocrity.

Think of it: CC Sabathia no longer is the blow-away ace of his first three years in pinstripes. Hiroki Kuroda may never make a full transition to American League excellence. Ivan Nova’s WHIP has ballooned from 1.33 in 2011 to 1.65 this year; he’s always in trouble. And Phil Hughes, who pitched relatively well over six innings Tuesday, can’t finish off hitters. Of his 104 pitches to the Royals, 26 were fouled off, including 14 with two strikes.

Point is, the Yankees need more runs if their pitching isn’t going to match, say, the Rays or the O’s. But how can any of that happen if A-Rod continues to deteriorate into a $29 million singles hitter? He’s lifting 10 percent fewer fly balls this year than in 2011. His ground-ball ratio is at 51.3 percent, the highest of his career.

Girardi continues to say all the right things about A-Rod, how he believes in the slugger’s track record. “He’s done it before,” is the manager’s favorite line of defense, which technically is true. But Rodriguez never has been an almost 37-year-old, either.

The age issue is a sensitive one for Girardi and Cashman, because they know the Yankees have no other options available.

The GM dismisses the warning signs that others see, saying instead, “I hear the same thing every year. It’s like déjà vu. We’re going to get through this.”

Yet Cashman knows there are no can’t-miss prospects waiting in the farm system.

There are no trades likely to happen, not if it’s going to cost the team younger players and increase payroll.

This is the roster Cashman and his bosses have hand-picked, or as the GM said, “We’re like a ship that’s set sail across the ocean. We’re out to sea.”

O.K., I’ll just hang up now and listen to your reaction…

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Alex Rodriguez is off to a rough start this season. He appears to be a shell of what he once was – in terms of his offensive production. And, this downturn has been a trend for him over the last five years or so.

At this point, assuming that his days as a star player are indeed over, A-Rod could create a new and special legacy for himself (in the history of the game) if he would just pull a “Gil Meche” and say “You know, I’ve made over a quarter-billion dollars in my baseball career, to date. Money is not an issue for me. Rather than perform at a level below my expectations, I am going to retire from the game now and give up the last five years of my contract with the Yankees.”

If Alex Rodriguez made a move like this, then people would forget all the stupid stuff that’s he done and said in the past. He would not be remembered for being a self-absorbed prima donna. Even his PED history would take back seat to this news. A-Rod would be known as “The Guy Who Walked Away From $114 Million Rather Than Milk The Yankees.”

I know, I know…”Walk away from $114 million?” Yes, it seems insane. But, what could that money possible buy you, in your lifetime, that you could not already buy with the quarter-billion dollars that you already made? Seriously, a quarter-billion. I mean, come on…

But, you know this will never happen. And, it’s too bad. It could be the best $114 million that A-Rod ever spent….if he cares about his place in baseball history.

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Check it out –

Scott Proctor picked up his league leading 12th save tonight by pitching 2 scoreless innings. He has a 0.61 ERA, 0.89 WHIP, and BAA of .160

Everyday Scottie Proctor is just killing it in the Korean baseball league. Good for him.

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Here’s what their record was after their first 42 games in the twenty five years prior to this season:

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There’s a good chance that the Yankees will win less than 90 games this season…if you go by the feel of their season so far.  Just like they did in 2008.

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It’s on, baby!

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I’m a little late on this one. But, man, as a dad, it’s hard to watch this and keep a dry eye.

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A saw a comment left by Sean Forman over at BBTF that said, according to B-R.com’s SRS ratings – which consider strength of schedule and margin of victory – the AL top six are: Texas, Toronto, Baltimore, Tampa, Red Sox, and the Yankees (in that order).

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And,  the White Sox are right behing the Yankees.

I wonder if Brian Cashman is smoking this in his objective pipe today?

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Harty Seely is a very, very, funny dude. An awesome video clip.

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It’s the Curse of Elliot’s Bovine Loudmouth Bimbo Ex-Wife.

Seriously, ever since this woman was on TV, the Yankees went into the tank. Go west and get glammed up, Janice Soprano? (Then again, you can put a pig in a party dress, but, it’s still just a pig.)

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Curtis Granderson has 180 career homeruns through yesterday. Of these, 120 have come with the bases empty. Yes, one-twenty.

Picking up on what I mentioned two years ago on this, 68 of those 120 have come with no outs.

So, two-thirds of Granderson’s career homeruns are solo homeruns and half of those have come with no outs. What does that tell you?

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Via C. Trent Rosecrans -

Major League Baseball has suspended Bob Davidson one game for “repeated violations of the Office of the Commissioner’s stanards for situation handling.”

While MLB says this is a culmination of several incidents (and they’re not wrong) it would appear Tuesday’s incident with Phillies manager Charlie Manuel put it over the top. Manuel was also suspended a game, but for just the one incident, not repeated violations.

Against the Astros, Davidson obstructed Philadelphia catcher Brian Schneider’s attempts to pick up a dropped third strike from Cliff Lee and then when he was confronted by Manuel, he had several choice words for the Phillies manager that any amateur lip-reader could easily make out.

Davidson has the reputation as one of the game’s worst umpires and has earned the nickname Balkin’ Bob because of his penchant for calling balks. Last season he ranked fourth on a players’ poll of worst umpires by Sports Illustrated.

While one game isn’t as much as we’d like to see Davidson get for his lack of professional behavior, it’s at least a start for what many fans see as the rising arrogance of Major League Baseball umpires. Sure, some will yell that he should be fired, but it’s at least a start.

Is this the first of more to come?

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Have the Yankees ever had a dynasty run without a home-grown All-Star caliber catcher?

In any event, Russell Martin is trending towards Girardi or Molina territory with the bat this season.

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Can the Yankees afford that?

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He’s knocking on the door in Yankeeland.

El Cañón de Juguete?

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Via the Daily News –

An off-duty NYPD cop ended up arrested Wednesday night for moving to a better seat at Citi Field, then refusing to budge when security cried foul.

Officer Eduardo Cornejo had a legit ticket to the Mets’ sad 6-3 drubbing by the Cincinnati Reds, but ballpark management confronted him once they realized he was stretched out in a seat better than the one he had purchased.

“He was in a section he wasn’t supposed to be,” Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly said. “They asked him to leave. He wouldn’t. [A] supervisor asked him to leave. He wouldn’t. The uniformed police sergeant asked him to leave. He wouldn’t, and he was arrested as a result.”

The obstinate 30-year-old was arraigned on criminal trespass charges Thursday and released.

When Cornejo and a woman arrived at his Staten Island home afterward, he was sporting a Mets cap.

“I’m sorry but I have no comment,” Cornejo said.

He works within the 67th Precinct in Brooklyn and has been with the NYPD since 2005.

Pretty stupid. This all could have been avoided if he just went back to his seat when asked.

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Club Diamond Nation is set to launch an online instructional website. More details will come later, but for now the site is offering a “sneak peek” with a friendly competition between the online instructors, who include Kevin Long, new Hall of Famer Barry Larkin, future HOFer Tom Glavine, softball legend Jennie Finch, and Jack Cust (who founded Diamond Nation with his father Jack Cust Sr.). Click here to check it out.

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Great stuff from Ed Marks on A-Rod today:

From the time [Alex Rodriguez] broke in as a major leaguer in 1994 through the 2007 season, Rodriguez averaged one home run for every 14.2 at-bats, good enough to make the career top 10 list in that category. But since 2008 he has been merely a good power hitter, not a great one, and the dropoff since the start of last season has been startling.

Since the start of the 2008 season, when [A-Rod's] hip “irregularity” was detected, Rodriguez has been averaging one home run for every 17.1 at-bats. His 1994-to-2007 average translated to 42.3 home runs for a 600 at-bat season; his average since then yields 35.1 home runs per 600 at-bats, a decline of 17 percent. He hit 35 homers in 2008, and 30 in 2009 and 2010. In his first four seasons with the Yankees he averaged 43.3.

And it’s getting worse. Much worse. Last season he averaged one home run for every 23.3 at-bats; so far this year, with a total of five home runs in the Yankees’ first 37 games (two fewer than Raul Ibanez), he is averaging one for every 27.2 at-bats — a rate that would give him 22 homers if he has 600 at-bats this season.

And he ranks only eighth on the team in slugging percentage (.412); even Eric Chavez (.523) and Andruw Jones (.472) are ahead of him.

If you think that sounds ominous, consider this: After this season there are still five more years left on his contract. Five more years. If his current trend continues, Rodriguez might finish that contract as the best-paid player ever to appear in an Old-Timers’ Game.

If A-Rod gets 600 At Bats this season and hits less than 25 HR, playing half his games at Yankee Stadium, then he is, indeed, cooked as a power hitter. But, we have to wait for the season to play out to see what his final numbers will be this year.

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The vanilla Milton Bradley?

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He has not pitched in the major leagues since 2006.  But, he’s still kicking around in an Indy League at the age of 40 this season:

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How’s that for love of the game?

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The story here, via the AP/WFAN -

David Wright was ready to take one for the team. Terry Collins was not going to let that happen.

So the Mets manager pulled his star third baseman.

“In this game there are unwritten rules and one of the unwritten rules is you hit my guy, I’m hitting your guy. They’re not hitting my guy tonight,” Collins said following the Mets’ 8-0 loss to the Milwaukee Brewers on Tuesday night. “He said, ‘If somebody should be hit, I want it to be me.’ I said it’s not going to be you.”

Wright was set to lead off the bottom of the seventh. One problem: Reliever D.J. Carrasco had just hit NL MVP Ryan Braun a pitch after Rickie Weeks homered.

Carrasco was immediately ejected by plate umpire Gary Darling.

“I didn’t like it. I don’t understand it,” Brewers manager Ron Roenicke said.

Collins knew what might happen next and he pinch hit for Wright. The star slugger had two of the Mets’ five hits off Zack Greinke (4-1), a double and a broken-bat single in the fourth inning — a shard of wood whirling past the pitcher.

Wright and Collins had a heated discussion in the dugout over whether he would bat.

“Terry is the manager, and I’ve got all the respect in the world for Terry,” Wright said. “Whether I agree with it or disagree with it, I respect him. I love playing for him. I’ve got all the respect in the world for Terry specifically. You get caught up in the moment.”

Wright didn’t intend to become so animated, where others could see.

“I probably should have picked a better spot for it, but in the heat of the moment I got my stuff on and Terry kind of got me at a moment where I was upset with the situation and got me at a moment that I was pretty hot,” Wright said. “It wasn’t directed at Terry at all.”

Braun, who had a pink welt on his left triceps, understood both sides of the argument.

“I respect the fact that he wanted to stay in the game,” Braun said. “I don’t fault them for making that decision at all.”

Wright had an interesting response when asked about Carrasco’s beanball, and added he wasn’t surprised when the pitcher was ejected.

“I’m not sure why (Braun) got hit,” Wright said. “I don’t know. I’m not sure if you talked to D.J. yet, but I’m not sure what the purpose was behind that.”

I guess your opinion on this depends on what  you think of the player? 

I’m a Yankees fan.  If Joe Girardi did this with A-Rod, then I would probably say that he was babying Rodriguez.  But, if he did it with someone like Brett Gardner, with it being late in a blowout loss, then I would probably say that I was OK with it – him protecting the player.  Is that inconsistent?  Hey, I’m just being honest here.  Call it what you want…

In any event, it does send a message to the team, in a way.  Suppose, later in the season, the same thing happens – and, then, coming up to bat for the Mets is someone other than Wright…and Collins decides to let him bat and then he gets wacked with a pitch.  How do you think that Mets player is going to feel then…as loved and respected in Metsville as Wright?  I don’t think so…

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This was in the Chicago Sun Times about a month ago -

The roster of professional baseball players who either suffered or are still sidelined by oblique or core muscle strains suffered in spring training or early in the regular season could fill two starting lineups.

And the obliques, a broad, flat band of muscle that connects to the pelvis and helps to rotate the hips, have claimed some high-profile players including Tampa Bay Rays third baseman Evan Longoria, Milwaukee Brewers outfielder Corey Hart and San Francisco Giants closer Brian Wilson.

According to research by Stan Conte, head trainer for the Los Angeles Dodgers who had three players affected by the injury this spring, 14 players have gone on the disabled list with core or oblique injuries this season.

“One theory I have is that players are transferring more quickly from the offseason to spring training games and to more competitive regular-season games, and the muscles aren’t holding up to the increased strain and force the players are putting on them in competition,” Conte told The New York Times.

The oblique problems are not isolated to players swinging a bat. After all, Hart injured his oblique in a throwing drill.

Washington Nationals team physician Dr. Bruce Thomas of Melbourne, Fla., who also has worked with Olympic and collegiate athletes, attributes the injuries to several factors.

“You’re sure to see it early in the year quite a bit,” said Thomas . “You see it a lot too with guys coming off other injuries, they’re just resuming play. Cooler weather, a lot of times when guys go north we’ll see sort of a rash of obliques when they go from spring training … it’s quite a bit cooler.

“You’ve got a violent acceleration rotational force and the obliques on the one side will sort of help get that motion going. On the other side, you’re the brakes. What winds up happening almost universally the brakes get a little tear, or a little a strain, a pull, whatever you want to call it, a stretch.

“It happens with throwing and batting.”

What makes the injuries so vital in baseball is they involve the one area of the body a player must have in working order to function.

“Virtually everything you do on a baseball field involves trunk rotation,” Thomas said. “What’s happening is that’s where it initiates and where it stops. They (obliques) are sort of like the pulley system. They move the whole torso. I tell the guys right away: ‘No. 1 is it’s going to be a long time. No. 2, you’re not going to get much sympathy. It’s not like you have a cast on your arm. You’re walking around, you can do 90 percent of things just fine but the things you can’t do without pain are the things you need to do which is high-speed acceleration and de-acceleration of the rotation of your trunk.’ “

And while today’s baseball players arrive for spring training fit and believing they are ready to play, just the fact that they are in shape might be betraying them in the end.

“Guys are, in general, bigger and stronger and it’s just more force against the same old bony structure,” Thomas said. “So those muscles are going to peel off or pull in the mid portion of the muscle.”

Rehabilitating an oblique injury through rest, various forms of therapy such as ultrasound, ice and stimulation, and later strengthening, takes time and care since the consequences of coming back too soon can be costly.

“They’re generally pretty frustrating,” Thomas said. “I can think of some pitchers in the past with these early in the season and they didn’t really get them back for six, eight, 10 weeks. Sometimes it’s one of the things where more is not better and if you try to come back fast you wind up missing a lot more time.”

Jeff Tam, who appeared in 251 Major League games over six seasons as a right-handed pitcher, knows that first hand.

“If it’s not 100 percent healed, you’re going to do it again for sure,” said Tam, who suffered three oblique injuries while pitching for the New York Mets, Toronto Blue Jays and Oakland A’s.

Throw another rib on the barbie today.

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Looks like it’s more than just a game to Gibby. Via mlb –

The Dodgers are honoring legend Orel Hershiser on Tuesday night.

The team will be giving away bobbleheads in the likeness of the former Dodgers right-hander, and he will throw out the ceremonial first pitch.

Hershiser apparently asked D-backs manager Kirk Gibson, who was a teammate of Hershiser’s on the 1988 World Series-winning Dodgers, to catch the pitch.

Gibson, who hit the game-winning homer in Game 1 of the World Series, said he politely declined.

“I’m a Diamondback,” Gibson said. “I’m the manager of the team. I respect Orel tremendously. He knows that. It’s not disrespect towards him. If I was out of baseball I would have done it, but I’m in baseball and I’ve got different colors on tonight and tomorrow.”

The Dodgers will honor Gibson on July 31 with a Gibson bobblehead giveaway. The D-backs are scheduled to be in Los Angeles to play the Dodgers that night.

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