Kazmir Released

Alex Remington relays the sad news of Scott Kazmir's release from the Angels. Kazmir has given up 35 runs in 17 innings in Triple A and the Angels are eating $9 million of his contract. Scott Kazmir is 27 years old.  Worse Remington brings up the calamity that was Scott Avery's short pitching career which fell apart almost immediately after an injury in his armpit which caused him to change his mechanics. 

Surely, some team will sign Kazmir to a minor-league deal. 

Tampa's Prospects to be Tried as Minors

Some of you may be wondering how it is that the Tampa Bay Rays got 12 picks out of the first 90 in the Major League Baseball Draft.  The short answer is that the MLB Draft is complicated. 

Free agents are divided into three types- Type A, Type B, and all others.  When a team loses a Type A free agent, who they had attempted to sign, to another club, they get the signees first round pick, plus a pick in the compensation round.  The compensation round immediately follows the first round; in the this manner, the Rays received the first round picks of the Yankees, Red Sox, and A's, for losing Raphael Soriano, Carl Crawford, and Grant Balfour. 

In addition they received compensation picks for losing Brad Hawpe, Joaquin Benoit, Randy Choate, and Chad Qualls.   

There's a lot of excitement over Tampa's domination of this draft, and how deep it is.  The Rays may have set themselves up for the future in a big way.  Three things though- one, they have to sign these guys- that's not guaranteed.  Two, some of these picks have to turn out to be good.  There's a lot of unpredictability in the Major League draft.  For every Ken Griffey, Jr. (first overall pick 1987) there's a few Andy Benes' (first pick 1988) and a Brien Taylor (first pick 1991.)   

And finally, they have to hold on to them.  Remember, the Rays are set up in this draft, because they couldn't afford to hold onto seven free agents.  If some of their picks in this draft turn out to be stars, the Rays will have to be in a better financial situation to re-sign them, than they're in now.  Or we may be talking about how the 2018 MLB Draft has set up the Rays for the future.

Did the Rays Just Win a World Series?

They didn't begin picking until late in the first round, but once they got started, things started to move very quickly. The Rays had compiled 10 picks between slots 24 and 60.

Andrew Friedman had a very busy night. And while it may seem like developing through the draft is a more economical way of creating a winning baseball team, that doesn't mean it is cheap. Tampa could end up spending close to $10 million on their 2011 draft class.

So let's name these kids:

Pick 24: Taylor Guerrieri, a RHP prospect who started lighting up the radar gun this year with his fastball, and compliments it with a curveball.

Pick 31: Mikie Mahtook, a more seasoned LSU center-fielder fit the Rays profile for drafting durable-looking athletes (think Evan Longoria).

You may want to remember these names: Jake Hager and Brandon Martin, both high-school short stops. Tyler Goedel, another California high-schooler who plays the hot corner. Jeff Ames, a stout RHP out of Lower Columbia College, Snell Blake and Grayson Garvin both left-handed pitchers. And Kes Carter, a left-handed outfielder. There could be several 2015 World Series Champions, and 2018 Yankees and Red Sox in this here field.

And if you want to feel old, James Harris, the sixtieth pick of the draft was born in October of 1993. He is still seventeen.

Order to Be Viciously Restored

Yes, we talked up the Royals. We talked up a hot Orioles start. We are still talking up the Indians. And we told Red Sox fans and Rays fans that all they could justly expect was misery. We embraced the revolution of nobodies. But now order is visciously being restored.

The Red Sox started 2-10. They've since gone 25-12. They Rays are right behind them bunched up at the top of the American League east. Kansas City has falled below .500 and will rapidly drop behind the Chicago White Sox.

Cleveland still owns the best record in baseball, but their schedule suddenly stiffens in the next month. Boston hung them 14-2 in this afternoon's matchup. And now the Tribe is about to be exposed by the Rays. We still think Cleveland can win that division by maintaining a pace just barely above .500 for the rest of the year. But with one of the smallest run differentials in the league, Clevelanders should prepare for a painful adjustment.

Price Signals

Typically, baseball watchers put excellent starting pitchers into two categories: machines and beauties. Justin Verlander is a machine. Tim Lincecum is a beauty. Price splits that difference.

Each pitch Price throws becomes a separate athletic event from the others. He collects himself. He lifts his arms up passing them from the back to the front of the shoulder socket, shaking out the last pitch out of his system. He pulls on his uniform. And takes two big open-mouthed breaths. Huge exhales, with an unncessary shoulder shrug to go along with his final breath. He could almost be yawning. There is a hypnotic quality to the routine. Most pitchers have a pre-pitch ritual, but it might be subtle. By contrast the Indians' Carlos Carasco has a quick pump of his arms forward, ball in pitching arm in glove, and he sighs before each one. It's easy to miss. Each pitch seems to disappoint him, whereas Price seems genuinely jazzed to see his own stuff snap into the mitt.

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It was an awesome experience

–outfielder Brandon Guyer, who homered in his ever major-league at-bat for the Rays on Friday night, and was promptly optioned back to Triple-A Durham on Sunday. 

Are the Rays Blinding Us?  | Sure, sure, the Rays began the season 1-8, haven't had Evan Longoria for most of the season, and lost Manny Ramirez. Then they became the only team in Major League history to start so poorly but end their cruelest month with a winning record. This weekend they got a sweep-revenge on the collapsing Baltimore Orioles.  When they play Cleveland tomorrow night they will have the best record in the league. But are they set for a fall? Some commentators are pointing out that as of today the Rays have had the fewest games against teams with above .500 records.

Well, that's true but misleading. Yes, the Rays have feasted on the White Sox and the Twins, but both those teams should improve dramatically. The Rays have also played two series against Baltimore. But they lost games to the Buck Showalters when they were an above .500 team, and the Rays themselves only this past weekend sent the O's below significantly below .500. Also, they beat up on the Red Sox when the Red Sox were terrible. The Sox will be a winning team by the middle of this week. 

Dontrelle Willis is Buried, For Now

The Reds signed Dontrelle Willis to a minor-league deal. And unfortunately for him, the Reds have seven or more starting pitchers ahead of him: Edison Volquez, Travis Wood, Bronson Arroyo, Mike Leake, and Sam LeCure are on the depth chart now, with Homer Bailey and Johnny Cueto returning from the DL soon. Willis has pitched four beauts for the Louisville Bats, going 2-0 with a 1.13 ERA.

He is allowing hits - 20 of them in 24 innings, to go with 7 walks and 19Ks. He could probably help some Major League team right now. But he has no opt-out clause in his contract, ( a feature in many minor league contracts for veterans), and so he'd have to wait for another wave of injuries or a trade. As Nathaniel Stoltz pointed out earlier this year, even when he seemed to have lost everything, he was still able to strike out left-handed batters at rates that would make any team happy to have him in their bullpen. 

My guess is that he gets tossed away as a throw-in for the Rays when Tampa inevitably deals B.J. Upton. He turns in some amazing relief or spot-start appearances during the September stretch, re-debuts his swaggering fist-pumps and cues a million stories about his "sort-of homecoming" back to Florida. Or at least I hope so. This guy is one of the most entertaining people in the game. And though it seems like his glory days are from a different generation of baseball, Willis only just turned 29.  

PHOTO BY FLICKR USER MALINGERING UNDER A CREATIVE COMMONS LICENSE

Manny Before "Manny"

Yesterday was my birthday.  I spent most of the day watching sports- Celtic’s Scottish Cup semifinal, the Mets first win in a week, a really exciting Rangers playoff win.  It was a good day.

I also spent some time reflecting on birthdays past.  Eighteen years ago, my birthday present was a trip to a minor league game.  My dad brought my brother, myself, and a couple other guys who I don’t remember to see The New Britain Red Sox play the Canton-Akron Indians.

The game itself was not terribly memorable; I think the Sox lost.  The only reason I remember who they played was because one of the players on the away team- Manny Ramirez.

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Sam Fuld is Better than a Cycle

I wonder if when Sam Fuld stepped into the batter’s box in the 9th inning Monday night, he heard Karl Ravech’s voice in his head. (Late at night, I watch TV in my living room, swinging an imaginary bat, and I hear Karl Ravech’s voice in my head, or Gary Cohen’s, so I can only imagine that actual Major Leaguers do the same thing). I wonder if he was thinking about the game recap that “Baseball Tonight” would be putting together.

“Here’s Sam Fuld, Krukie, in the second inning, and he homers to right… And here’s Fuld again the fourth, and he strokes a double… Fuld up in the sixth, already with a homer and a double, and he smacks a triple to deep centerfield…”

I wonder if he thought of something like that, and how, no matter the outcome his at bat in the 9th, the suspense would have been building to that point.

“So here it is Harold, Sam Fuld steps to the plate in the 9th, a single shy of The Cycle…”

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Upset with umps bc the 1B ump said Floyd juggled the ball and an ump 100 ft away overruled. Galarraga shud have been perfect based on that.

-@RaysJoeMaddon, on this.

Manny Retires From Cheating

If you want to read sad-faced articles under the title "Manny Being Manny", I invite you to do that elsewhere. If you want to read angry articles about Manny, I'm sure they are just a Google search away. If you want to watch a Top Ten of Manny being silly, narrated by Japanese Sportscenter anchors, I'm sure that is out there too. I'm not going to look for them, I'm not going to lift them, or filter them for the best, most devastating one-liners, and then code them for you here.

We can't say that his cheating (and Ortiz's) spoiled the 2004 World Series for the Red Sox and their fans. Without that cheating, it may never have happened. The games can't be replayed. Steroid cheating has so pervaded baseball that all the results feel slightly unreal. Barry Bonds, the Rocket, and Manny are unlikely to ever be introduced in Cooperstown, and they should have been. Are the millions they earned as baseball players somehow worth less? Manny went out as a cheater. And all that's left to ask about his time in baseball is this: When does Evan Longoria come off the DL?

Manny Ramirez has been a big part of what we've felt or hoped had been a new golden age in baseball. And he has made us feel stupid and guilty for enjoying it.

I expect to throw a complete-game shutout, that's my mindset going into every game

–David Price of the 0-6 Rays, after the Chicago White Sox's Edwin Jackson struck out 13 of his teammates.

Give Up Hope Sox and Rays Fans

As I write this, I feel like crap. My back muscles are achy, my forehead covers a furnace, and my lungs never tire of coughing. I have contracted some ungodly illness; virus has invaded my body, treating my white blood cells the way the Phillies batters treated Mike Pelfrey's offering’s last night- with open contempt and ceaseless abuse. But it could be a lot worse. I could be a Red Sox or a Rays fan.

We are five games into the season, and neither of those sorry franchises has produced a single victory. The die-hard, the eternal optimist will point out that there are 157 games left in the season, that there’s plenty of time to come back. Those same die hards believed that every year for 86 seasons, and were wrong every time.

So what kind of year is this to be? Will this be just a typical year for the old Red Sox and Rays teams? Will they mount a comeback? All seemed lost after that 19-8 debacle in Fenway. Surely this mountain isn’t as high to climb as that?

I come to tell you: time to panic folks. Perhaps even to despair. 

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Contraction Isn't the Answer

David Schoenfield of ESPN’s Sweet Spot blog, reacts to Mike Ozanian's reporting in Forbes that there’s talk in the inner circles of Major League Baseball to contract the Tampe Bay Rays. Schoenfield contends that it’s a bad idea–I agree!– but he ignores the other options besides contraction.

Schoenfield's argument winds itself around the idea that the Rays draw more than other teams, and have had more recent success than other teams, all while doing it in a smaller market, and he’s right. However, contracting the Rays isn’t a dumb idea because of the merits of the Rays. It’s bad because contraction is dumb idea period.

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