To this point Rafael Medina is perhaps best known as part of the Yankees’ payment for Hideki Irabu. The two pitchers have a lot in common. Both are stocky righthanders who throw very hard. Both have trouble staying in shape. Neither speaks much, if any, English. But happily there are differences. Medina is 5 years [...]
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There’s No Crying in Baseball
I’m really glad the World Series ended the way it did. Now we hopefully won’t have to hear anymore nonsense about what a horrible series it was because (a) the best teams weren’t in it, (b) the games were sloppy, and/or (c) the pitchers couldn’t throw strikes. On the first point, if the “best” teams [...]
My Last Name Should Have Been Walker
Something is terribly wrong with me, I’m convinced of it. When most people go to a ball game, they like to see home runs, diving catches, blazing fastballs. Me, I like walks. That’s right — the good old bases on balls. I enjoy watching a batter work the pitcher, fouling off the good pitches, laying [...]
Padres Farm Report: Ben Davis
Ben Davis is a switch-hitting catcher out of a Pennsylvania high school. The Padres selected him in the first round of the 1995 amateur draft with the second pick overall, after Darin Erstad and before Jose Cruz, Jr. Many in the organization wanted to pursue Cruz, but they ended up taking Davis, which in light [...]
Be Careful What You Wish For
It was just a matter of time before Hideki Irabu and George Steinbrenner discovered what the rest of us already knew: that even under the best conditions, making the transition from the Chiba Lotte Marines to the New York Yankees would be difficult. Under the conditions that Irabu set for himself, however, it has been [...]
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