I tried to watch some of the USD – Long Beach State game on Sunday at Cunningham Stadium, but it was brutal. These kids haven’t been playing for some time, and it showed. I’ve never seen so many walks and wild pitches.
To the winter leagues…
Friday, November 2
Saguaros 11, Javelinas 5 (box | recap). Matt Antonelli, batting sixth, singled, doubled, and drew three walks in five trips to the plate. Nick Hundley, in the #8 hole, went 2-for-4 with a walk and 3 RBI. The Saguaros pounded out 15 hits on the day. Jonathan Ellis worked a 13-pitch perfect eighth, while Will Startup needed just 10 pitches to close out the victory, allowing a one-out single before inducing a game-ending double play started by Antonelli. Ex-Padre Sean Thompson couldn’t find the plate and took the loss for the Javelinas.- Azucareros 6, Licey 0 (box). Yordany Ramirez batted eighth and went 1-for-3. He played right field in this one to accommodate Felix Pie, whose name has surfaced in rumors involving the Padres. (Incidentally, Kansas City’s David DeJesus is mentioned as another possibility in the linked article. I’ve been tracking him for some time; I think his combination of on-base skills and defense would make him a good fit for Petco Park.)
- Escogido 4, Aguilas 3 (box). Vince Sinisi, batting third and playing left field, hit his second homer of the season. It came off Jose Lima. Geez, how is that guy younger than I am? Ex-Padre Bernie Castro homered for Aguilas; he has two home runs this winter after hitting one all season. A bunch of former Padres in this one: Juan Melo, Freddy Guzman. What the heck is Luis Polonia doing in the Aguilas lineup? He could break a hip or something.
- Mazatlan 5, Navojoa 3 (box). Oscar Robles doubled twice in four at-bats. Luis Cruz, playing third base, went 0-for-3 with a walk. Brian Myrow is playing first base for Mazatlan; why wasn’t I informed? Batting cleanup, Myrow went 2-for-2 with two walks. As he does everywhere, he’s hitting the tar out of the ball (.316/.469/.447). I don’t care if he’s 31 years old; someone should be able to use this guy.
- Mexicali 2, Guasave 1 (box). Jared Wells faced four batters in the eighth — one reached base on an error by the shortstop, and another, former big-leaguer Armando Rios, knocked a two-out single. Wells has been predictably inconsistent for Mexicali this winter.
Saturday, November 3
Surprise 6, Saguaros 5 (box | recap). Antonelli, batting ninth, went 1-for-3 and laid down a sacrifice bunt. Will Venable singled twice in four at-bats out of the cleanup spot; he got the start in left field. John Hudgins started and allowed one run over three innings. He gave up just one hit but walked three batters. This was Hudgins’ second start in 2007. He threw 49 pitches in the first one and 46 more on Saturday. Best to err on the side of caution after such an extended layoff.- Gigantes 4, Escogido 3 (box). Sinisi doubled and walked in five plate appearances.
- Licey 6, Estrellas 3 (box). Ramirez, again in right field, went 2-for-3.
- Mazatlan 6, Navojoa 1 (box). Robles went 1-for-3, Cruz went 1-for-2. On the other side, Myrow went 1-for-4.
- Mexicali 7, Guasave 6 (box). Wells worked an inning and two-thirds, allowing one run on one hit and one walk. He entered with runners at the corners and one out in the eighth, and a 3-0 lead. The first batter Wells faced, former big-leaguer Jolbert Cabrera, knocked both runners home with a double. A passed ball and wild pitch scored Cabrera, tying the game. Wells then walked a batter and allowed a stolen base before getting out of the inning without further damage. He then worked a perfect ninth — two grounders to short and a strikeout (looking). I guess if you’re looking for silver linings, you could point to the fact that Wells bounced back strong in his second inning of work. Eh…
- Caracas 7, Aragua 6 (box). Paul Abraham lived a pitcher’s dream. He entered with two out in the eighth and his team trailing, 6-4. Aragua third baseman Luis Maza was nailed trying to steal second. Caracas then scored three runs in the top of the ninth and won, 7-6, giving Abraham the victory without ever retiring a batter.
Sunday, November 4
- Aguilas 6, Licey 0 (box). More right field for Ramirez: 0-for-3 with a strikeout.
- Escogido 6, Estrellas 6 (box). Sinisi had himself a nice little weekend. He homered in four at-bats on Sunday. Bearing in mind the extremely small sample (40 PA), he’s putting up some solid numbers (.343/.400/.686) in the Dominican. Seriously, what can Terrmel Sledge do that Sinisi can’t? Hopefully it’s not the same thing that kept Paul McAnulty out of a job in ’07.
- Mazatlan 4, Navojoa 3 (box). Mazatlan completed the weekend sweep at home. Robles went 1-for-4 with a solo homer in a losing cause. Cruz moved up to the #3 spot and started in center field, going 0-for-4. I should mention that technically Cruz is a minor-league free agent, but since he played in the system this year, we’ll keep tracking him. (Same goes for Ramirez in the Dominican Republic and Abraham in Venezuela.)
Tunes: Joe Pass, Billie Holliday, Eric Alexander, Nat Adderly, Walter Blanding, Herbie Hancock, Winard Harper, David Hazeltine, Red Holloway, Wes Montgomery.
I wouldn’t mind Gathright either. I don’t know what happened to him, but he really turned it around last year in a part-time role – sporting a nifty 307/371/342 line and playing solid D in LF. He was primarily a CF the previous three years.
#100: Thanks, Ben. Thanks also to TW for guilting me into finishing this post. There’s a lot of ground to cover, and as I’ve said before, I’m having a heckuva time organizing my thoughts. I really hate this question, which means it’s probably worth pursuing.
Expect more thoughts on the CF issue tomorrow, and probably even more on Wednesday. Then Thursday we’re totally shifting gears because I’ve got a sweet interview (hint: it’s not entirely about baseball) that I’ve been working on for the past couple weeks — it’s a five parter, oh yeah.
More coffee, please…
77: I guess I meant now. Plus I didn’t look it up.
92: Just like there is enough bashing of Greene, there is enough bashing of Garvey. Would you rather he not have led the Padres to their first World Series.
With 24 more wins (two seasons at the rate he is going), Maddux would be third all time in wins with 374.
“The Padres win the pennant, the Padres win the pennant”…..”Barry Bonds has hit one out of Petco and the Padres will win the National League on a monumental blast ….and listen to the Padres fans boo….a sparse crowd voices their displeasure (sparse because Bonds is a Padre and many have boycotted the team) and boo’s loudly because it was Bonds who won the Padres the pennant”……Boo….Boo…….
Yeah right. Bring in Bond’s and all this hatred will subside if the guy performs.
92 … DON’T GET ME STARTED!!!
Actually, thanks for this info … if I ever get off my butt and do something, this will be added fuel / evidence … Steve Garvey is NOT my Padre …
btw, what does “Joe Torre PC” mean? … and do you have a link to this quote?
103 … there can never be enough Garvey-bashing … hey, I respect what he did on the field for the Padres … and I certainly respect what he did on the field for the Dodgers … he just didn’t do nearly enough to earn his number to be on OUR wall for ever! The 1984 NL Pennant is flying … and when anyone thinks about that, a key part of that is what Garvey did in Game 4 of the NLCS … that’s enough of a legacy …
106: Joe Torre press conference. It was an Associated Press “Reaction to Torre press conference” sidebar that moved today (sorry for the newspaper jargon). It had quotes from various Dodgers-affiliated folks.
I think the PC stands for press conference.
PC=Press Conference
Speaking of Garvey, what year did they retire his number? I remember the #6 being on the wall in the Murph, but don’t exactly remember when they actually retired his number.
What should Garvey be ripped for a decision made by the franchise?
Pick your battles.
According to Baseball-fever.com: “Garvey was the first to have his number retired in 1989. Next came Randy Jones in 1997. Then Dave Winfield on April 14, 2001, and finally Tony Gwynn on August 13th, 2002.”
103
I’m with you — he hit the homer, and that’s his legacy right there.
Was that the most awesome thing ever, or what?
Right. I’m not saying his number should be retired. But does anyone really think a team is going to reverse such a thing?
To me, it’s more distressing that Joe Torre gets to wear his No. 6.
115
Yeah, that’s a little weird, but whatever. It’s the Doggers.
111: His number wasn’t really retired till the Petco move. They had hung his jersey on the wall where his HR hit at the Murph, and when Moores bought the team he thought it was retired, so that’s the way it stayed. Or so the legend goes…
I think his number should be retired btw.
I’ll have to check the old media guides. I think they listed it as a retired number. But I’m not at home right now.
I’m not sure how accurate that story is, I heard it on Leitner one day when he still had a radio show.
96: A lot of baseball sites say DeJesus is available. The Royals think Gathright is a legitimate CF, they don’t see him as a step down from DeJesus.
99: I’d do Venable + Ramos or Geer. Venable’s realistic offensive upside would seem to be DeJesus, with DeJesus a better defender. 17 million for 4 years is rock-solid, too.
I wondered about whether it was retired back in the Qualcomm days. I thought the number might have been in the outfield to commemorate where the home run was hit. But again, not sure.
120
Alright then, let’s just call Dayton Moore and get it done.
Making a trade for Dejesus makes a lot of sense for the Padres. I would love to see that guy in center next year.
120. I don’t know if I’d give up that much for DeJesus. I know his numbers are good, but he just doesn’t impress me as a difference-maker in center. Were the price a little lower, it would probably be a decent deal, but I think there are better options available around the same price. If we’re going the cheap and young route (which is probably the smart thing) I would prefer T. Gwynn Jr., but there are definitely emotions coloring that viewpoint.
120: Ramos and Geer are most likely both future swingmen or relievers, if they can even survive the majors. Pitchers with such low K rates just don’t have any history of success. We’ll be lucky if Venable is ever as good as DeJesus.
If any of those players had a lot of perceived value in trade – like other teams really thought highly of them – then it might not be smart to use them for DeJesus. But that’s not the case. The pitchers are short on stuff, so traditional scouting doesn’t value them, and they don’t have good predictive stats, so more sabremetrically-inclined teams don’t see much. Venable doesn’t have outstanding tools or numbers, either, and not many people seem to think he can play CF.
What better options for that price do you see? Gwynn Jr. isn’t better than DeJesus. He might be as good as DeJesus sometime, but we’d be trading for the latter right in his prime. That helps the 2008-2011 teams.
125: That’s the second time today I’ve replied to the post that the post I meant to reply to was itself replying to. Sorry. Meant 124.
126: that is one hellova sentence you got there!
retired numbers:
baseball-almanac.com has the same history as comment 113
http://www.baseball-almanac.com/feats/feats10n.shtml
Also, here is a discussion thread from 2003 in which Pat tells of then owner Joan Kroc having her own reasons for retiring Gavey’s number:
http://ducksnorts.com/blog/2006/03/a-tale-of-three-padres.html
OK, just looked at some of the assorted media guides I have:
No mention of retired numbers in the 1991, 1994, 1996 or 1997 guides, puncturing the theory of Garvey’s being retired in 1989.
Then in the 1998 guide, on page 173, it says:
“The Padres retired a pair of numbers in 1997, as they honored 1976 Cy Young Award winner Randy Jones (#35) and joined all of baseball in celebrating the contributions of Brooklyn Dodgers Hall of Famer Jackie Robinson (#42), who broke Major League Baseball’s color barrier in 1947.”
then three paragraphs on Jones’ career …
“Also the number 6 worn by Steve Garvey is emblazoned on the outer outfield wall in right-center field at Qualcomm Stadium, a tribute to Garvey’s 9th-inning home run to beat the Cubs in game 4 of the 1984 N.L.C.S. The 2-out blow off Lee Smith set up a decisive 5th game, which the Padres won to advance to the only World Series in franchise history.”
OK, this is interesting.
It certainly does not say Garvey’s number is retired.
But if the number is not retired, why mention it at all and why put this in a box labeled “PADRES RETIRED NUMBERS”?
It’s almost as if the franchise or whoever was assembling the media guide did not know the answer either and was playing it safe.
129: That actually supports what I posted earlier about what Leitner said on his radio show awhile back, that the number was sort of accidently retired.
On Garvey’s site he claims it was retired April 18, 1988, which looking at b-r shows that was an away game…
#130: This is my understanding as well. The situation is a bit awkward, to say the least, and one that I doubt ever gets resolved in a satisfactory manner.
I guess there are two options…
1. Leave it as it is…most Padres fans are oblivious. Only a small minority really care about it and we will just simmer and not be happy. Probably telling our grandkids about the horrible injustice of having “his” number retired.
2. Take it down…making a few of us happy, many more confused, and being in the national news for a day. Me thinks Garvey won’t care.
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In a related side note, my GF brought home an autographed Steve Garvey baseball 2 nights ago. He had come to speak at her company’s retreat. After I told her a bit about him, she looked him up, and decided that she could not support such a “slime ball” by having his autograph on her desk. “Add it to your collection or blow it up…I don’t care. Just don’t display it around me” she said.
#132: I think the issue is less whether Garvey would care and more how such a move would reflect on the organization. There are already problems of perception with the current ownership group.
Regardless of whether it’s justified, removing a token of team and civic pride that occurred under previous owners probably wouldn’t be well received by most fans.
As embarrassing as it is to have Garvey’s number retired (yes, I’m in that camp), it would be worse, IMHO, to unretire it at this point.
I don’t advocate taking it down…please don’t read into #2…I could see how it would sound that way.
I agree with you…the few of us that really care just need to sit tight and get really good at sounding put off when we talk about it.