The good folks at SNY.tv were kind enough to have me on Monday’s edition of The Baseball Show to preview this week’s Padres/Mets series at Citi Field. My comments on Heath Bell probably sounded smarter before he helped his former team come back from a four-run deficit and kept his current team from its first five-game winning streak of the season.
If only the Padres hadn’t released Mike Baxter, who hit the ball off Chad Qualls (who replaces the departed Mike Adams as “eighth-inning guy”) that Kyle Blanks (who replaces the departed Ryan Ludwick as “left fielder”) couldn’t catch… if only they hadn’t acquired Bell from the Mets in 2006… the Padres might have held onto the lead and pulled to within a game of the fourth-place Dodgers.
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My latest at Baseball Prospectus ($) concentrates on the Giants and Diamondbacks, who find themselves within a half-game of each other headed into the season’s final quarter. The article notes that the former have an easy schedule in August, while the latter have a new first baseman in Paul “Firm Pudding” Goldschmidt.
The article also observes that the Padres, thanks to their wanton destruction of the Pirates this past weekend, own the same Pythagorean record as the first-place Giants. (In fact, between the time it was written and the time it was published, the Padres pushed ahead by a game… not that there are any prizes for Pythagorean records.)
Whenever you appear on another team’s broadcast (radio or TV) or web site/blog, two things often happen: 1. you say something that comes back to haunt you, and 2. the Padres lose the game that day. The correlation is high enough that I’m beginning to suspect causation. Being less than perfect in your comments isn’t damaging, but those losses! Maybe you should have a rabbit’s foot with you or wear your lucky underwear when you appear. Something’s gotta change.
From now on, Mr. Young will be using the name Slewfoot “Jumbles” O’Reilly when appearing in media settings to save the kingdom of Ducksnort any negative notoriety..
Wasn’t it the Mets series last year, where Geoff was interviewed by a NY site and said Eckstein was the one Padre he would want at-bat in a critical situation?
Sure enough, Eckstein singled with 2 outs in the ninth to tie the game. Padres won it in extra-innings on a Gonzalez opposite field double.
It all evens out.
As much as Bud Black shuffles the offense, he’s overly stubborn in his bullpen once again putting Qualls in there instead of going with a pitcher who wasn’t just rocked the game before. At least Qualls blowing it saved Bell from doing it again further reminding us that we traded the wrong pitcher.
GY, any chance you’ll be adding an “Ignore” feature to the site any time soon?