Linky Links

Stuff I found interesting or amusing and thought I'd share.

- Matt Taibbi on the protests in Columbia

- The Global Warming scare scam has been going on for a long time.

- Very Cool

- VDH: Scapegoats, Boogeymen, and Hobgoblins

-  Four arrested in Denver hotel, police feared "Las Vegas-style" shooting at All-Star game. If I were playing in the game I'd donate whatever I'm being paid to play to this maid and I'd get others to do the same. The article paints the FBI as clueless - which is probably accurate reporting.

MLB Gives Georgia the Middle Finger

MLB has announced they are moving the 2021 All-Star game from Atlanta because of their new voting law. This is a big mistake in my opinion. You can never be "woke" enough for some people and once you give in to this sort of social justice blackmail you are marked as a sucker and the woke demands will never stop.

Voting rights is also an ironic issue for MLB to tackle - especially in relation to the All-Star game. MLB allows anyone to vote for the All-Star game up to 35 TIMES. No "one person one vote" for MLB. Nosireee Bob. Also MLB was more than happy to play games n Castro's Cuba but not Atlanta? Really? How are the voting rights in Havana? 

Also when it comes to racism MLB has a lot to answer for itself before it tries to take the mote out of another's eye. When American hero Jackie Robinson was first on the Hall of Fame ballot - 22% of the Baseball Writers eligible to vote did not vote for Robinson. This was clearly racism. 100%. Yet MLB is still in bed with the Baseball Writers of America. 

Why haven't these racist baseball writers been identified and shamed? Why Rob Manfred? Why? Oh because the Baseball Writers voting is separate from MLB - but so is the voting laws of the State of Georgia but that didn't stop you there. Oh that was in the past and you're only concern is the present? Oh well then I can expect MLB to shortly denounce the human rights abuses by the Chinese and renounce MLB's partnership with the Chinese Communists - right? Why the "no comment" Mr. Manfred? You hypocritical sack of shit.   

The easiest prediction I've ever made is that this year's All-Star game will have the lowest TV ratings in history. There is also bound to be a backlash and a boycott of any sponsor who advertises during the game. Baseball used to be neutral ground but no longer. Rob Manfred has just made it political and he'll learn the hard way that there's much truth to the phrase "Go Woke Go Broke."

The only silver lining I can see is that now it is clear that all sports is open game for political stances it makes any argument against NOT boycotting the Beijing Olymics moot.  

Flotsam and Jetsam

Miscellaneous thoughts and observations.

Derek Jeter is not considered a home run hitter but he now has more than double the career HR than Wade Boggs (237 to 118). And unlike Wade Boggs - Derek Jeter does not molest collies... When I was growing up every TV show at least once a season had a major character in danger of sinking in quicksand. Didn't make a difference if it was Gilligan's Island or The Six Million Dollar Man - quicksand was lurking. Did global warming dry up all the quicksand? Did I miss that news? When's the last time you saw a character struggling in quicksand on TV? (HT Noelle Hancock)... How The All-Star Starters Were Acquired... I forget - did Craig Biggio get this sort of attention when he got his 3,000th hit?... AT&T is an official Yankees sponsor but the guy who caught and gave back Derek Jeter's 3,000th hit is a Verizon Wireless employee. Big win for Verizon... Betty Ford dead at 93. She was eaten by wolves. She was delicious. Too soon?... HBO's Talking Funny (with Jerry Seinfeld, Louis CK, Chris Rock and Ricky Gervais) is up on YouTube.

All-Star Selections

Here's who I think should be named to the 2011 All-Star teams.

Catcher: AL - Alex Avila, Detroit Tigers (though a case could be made for his teammate Victor Martinez but Victor plays more DH/1st); NL - Brian McCann, Atlanta Braves

1st Base: AL - Adrian Gonzalez, Boston Red Sox; NL - Prince Fielder, Milwaukee Brewers

2nd Base: AL - Robinson Cano, New York Yankees; NL - Richie Weeks, Milwaukee Brewers

Shortstop: AL - Asdrubal Cabrera, Cleveland Indians; NL - Jose Reyes, New York Mets

3rd Base: AL - Alex Rodriguez, New York Yankees; NL - Aramis Ramirez, Chicago Cubs (very thin position in the NL)

Outfield: AL - Curtis Granderson, New York Yankees, Jose Bautista, Toronto Blue Jays, Jacoby Ellsbury, Boston Red Sox; NL - Matt Kemp, Los Angeles Dodgers, Ryan Braun, Milwaukee Brewers, Lance Berkman, St. Louis Cardinals

DH: AL - Miguel Cabrera, Detroit Tigers; NL - Joey Votto, Cincinnati Reds

Starting Pitcher: AL- Justin Verlander, Detroit Tigers, Jered Weaver, Los Angels Angels; NL - Roy Halladay, Philadelphia Phillies, Jair Jurrjens, Atlanta Braves

Closers: AL - Mariano Rivera, New York Yankees, Sergio Santos, Chicago White Sox; NL - Craig Kimbrel, Atlanta Braves, Drew Storen, Washington Nationals

Derek Jeter will be voted in as starter at short for the AL but Asdrubal Cabrera should still make the team. Same is true at AL DH where David Ortiz (much more deserving at this position that Jeter is at his) will get voted in but hopefully the deserving Cabrera will be on the team. If Jacoby Ellsbury does not win the voting then he could lose his spot to a numbers game as each team needs a representative.

In the NL - I'm guessing that Jose Reyes hamstring problem from yesterday make make short moot with Troy Tulowitzki either being voted the starter or named the starter at short. At 3rd - Placido Polanco from the Phillies will probably get voted in while I went with Ramirez partly because the case is so close for so many players I took a Cub since they did not have many other options for an All-Star selection.

Looking at my AL selections, only Tampa Bay, Baltimore, Minnesota, Kansas City, Seattle and Oakland don't have representatives. If Josh Hamilton gets voted in (or named team representative) then the Rangers are all set. If not then starters CJ Wilson and Alexi Ogando are both worthy of being named. Also wouldn't be surprised if Adrian Beltre was named to back-up 3rd base. James Shields should be the Tampa Bay representative, JJ Hardy deserves to be the Orioles representative but I wouldn't be surprised if Matt Weiters is named because catching is so thin in the AL. Michael Cuddyer is the only one to put up decent numbers for the Twins but like Baltimore I wouldn't be surprised if Joe Mauer gets the nod because the AL needs catcher depth. Alex Gordon has to be the Royals representative, rookie Michael Pineda is the best choice for the Mariners and Gio Gonzalez is the best choice for the A's.

For the NL the following teams still need a guy; Florida, Pittsburgh, Houston, San Francisco, Arizona, and San Diego. For Florida, Josh Johnson was the best pitcher in the NL before getting hurt while Gaby Sanchez should be the second choice but 1st base is loaded in the NL. The Pirates surprisingly have a number of deserving players including Andrew McCutchen, Joel Hanrahan, and Jeff Karstens. Hunter Pence will be the Astros player. Tim Lincecum or Brian Wilson (maybe both) will represent the Giants. Likewise both Juston Upton and Ian Kennedy from the Diamondbacks deserve a spot. Heath Bell will likely get the nod for the Padres but I wonder if he gets traded in between the naming and playing of the game.

All-Star Game Ratings

This year's baseball All-Star game ratings were down 10% against the numbers from last year's game. I think there was three main reasons for the drop in ratings.

1. It was way to slow a production. The player introductions took forever. It was boring. The game didn't start until almost 9:00 EST and by that time a number of people had tuned out.

2. ESPN had new episodes of the 2007 WSOP. Don't think that a number of people (like me) didn't turn on the WSOP and just tune in to the All-Star game during commercials just to check the score. I made a conscious decision that I could check out the highlights after the game because it was moving too slow and because of reason #3.

3. TIM MCCARVER!

Paula Cole

Did you see Paula Cole sing God Bless America during the All-Star game? I shouldn't say anything because Paula Cole also happens to be from Massatucky (Rockport). However, I couldn't help but notice how long it took her to get set up and how long it took her to sing the song. I started wondering if this was some sort of Little Richard deal from the movie Mystery, Alaska. Was this part of some sort of plan by Fox Sports to break the record for the longest All-Star game broadcast in history?

This is an observation I'm going to regret making but what the heck - I'll make it anyway.

Most singers hold the microphone like they want to make love to it. Paula Cole seemed to be gripping the microphone like someone gripping a handrail during a particularly difficult crap. I dare you to watch the video again and not say that her facial expressions don't look like someone taking a dump.

Was ESPN Trying to Screw with Fox's All-Star Game Ratings?

Baseball is a slow game to begin with but Fox Sports treatment of the All-Star game made it so slow that it would make Brideshead Revisited seem like a shoot 'em up - smash 'em up excitement thrill ride in comparison. It was 8:53 by the time the game started and by that time my interest had whithered and died on the vine.

And I'm a huge baseball fan!

Luckily for me I happened to notice on the channel guide that the WSOP episodes on ESPN were brand new 2007 episodes. I ended up watching those until 10:00 and just flipping back to the game during commercials. I don't think I really missed anything.

I have to wonder if ESPN scheduled the new WSOP episodes to screw with MLB and if MLB's recent decision to keep ESPN Baseball Tonight crew out of the All-Star game (because ESPN jumped the gun in announcing the All-Star line-ups when TBS had the rights to the announcement show).

I say this because the TV schedule was updated July 7th (almost a week after ESPN jumped the gun). But upon checking it looks like ESPN was just sticking to its original schedule for airing 2007 WSOP events. I still wonder if ESPN's programming choice played a role in why MLB was so upset with ESPN for the All-Star game announcement brouhaha.

Barry Bonds Voted to Start All-Star Game - Or Was He?

So we are supposed to just accept the fact that Barry Bonds went from being 119,000 votes down to winning the final outfield position in the All-Star game for the National League by a margin of 123,000 votes. I'm sorry but I'm going to have to call shenanigans on this one.

Barry Bonds is perhaps the most disliked player in baseball. No player gets booed as badly as Barry when he plays on the road. I'm thinking that there's no way Barry got voting support from around the country. I guess we are supposed to accept that those close to a quarter-million last-minute votes came in from San Francisco.

Bonds beat out Alfonso Soriano for the final spot. Soriano plays for the Chicago Cubs - a team with a pretty rabid national fan base. Soriano was red hot in June - batting .336 for the month while hitting 11 HR. With Soriano getting this hot you would think the momentum in voting for him would increase at the end and not cool off enough to let Bonds catch and pass him so easily. Yet this is precisely what we are supposed to believe - that support for Soriano cooled off just at the time that Soriano was playing his best.

The All-Star game is in San Francisco this year and the biggest story in baseball is Barry Bonds pursuit of Hank Aaron's all-time home run record while at the same time having a huge cloud of steroids suspicion hanging over him. My guess is that the powers that be did not want to "honor" Barry Bonds by adding him to the All-Star game roster. It seems just so much more convenient to have him "voted" in by the fans - that way baseball bigwigs can say it was the fans who wanted him at the game not them. Would anyone put it past Bud Selig to manipulate the voting totals? I mean used car salesmen are known for their integrity - right?

It wouldn't be the first time that a pro league played with the All-Star game vote totals (see this year's NHL All-Star game). When you add everything together - Barry Bonds being voted in just doesn't make sense to me.

The whole situation just smells fishy.

Baseball Flotsam and Jetsam

Miscellaneous baseball thoughts and observations.

Miguel Tejada may be out with his broken wrist until August. That's bad news for the Orioles in more than one way. It will be very difficult to deal Tejeda while he's on the DL and his return date will be past the end of the trade deadline. Looks like Baltimore will be stuck with Tejada for the rest of the season. I'd look for him to be dealt after the World Series... Manny Ramirez (1,386,522) has dropped to 4th in the AL All-Star voting behind Vlade Guerrero (2,043,824), Magglio Ordonez (1,445,899) and Ichiro (1,409,762). All three are very deserving of the honor but I'd still like to see Manny get the votes... I love Baseball-reference.com for many reasons and one of them is the sponsors they get for many of their pages. Here's what it says on Mark Buerhle's page: "Goliak sponsor(s) this page. We could've kept our season tickets, gone to the world series and seen Buehrle's no hitter. I hate you, joe." I'm guessing Joe decided not to renew some tickets or something and Goliak is no longer a fan of Joe the cheapskate... Nomar Garciaparra will be moving to third base for the Dodgers to make room for hard hitting James Loney at first base. David Pinto doesn't like the move. He thinks the Dodgers should just sit Nomar. I like the move and would have 3 responses to David Pinto (who I greatly respect): 1 - yes Nomar is having a down year but he has been hitting in the "clutch" - witness his .423 BA with RISP this year which is best in the NL; 2 - Nomar has a track record that says he'll break out of his power slump whereas Betemit has no such track record and is more of a risk; finally 3 - for better or worse Nomar is currently the face of the franchise and you just don't bench the one player the fans recognize for a marginal statistical upgrade...

Baseball Flotsam and Jetsam

Miscellaneous baseball thoughts and observations.

As of this morning - if the Red Sox went just .500 the rest of the way (62-62) that would give them a total of 88 wins for the season. That would mean the Yankees would have to go 70-54 (.565 winning percentage) the rest of the way just to tie. Of course I don't think the Red Sox will be a .500 team the rest of the way out - I just wanted to illustrate the hole the Yankees have gotten themselves into... As part of the deal that transferred ownership of the Atlanta Braves to Liberty Media - they basically guaranteed to keep the Braves competitive by not reducing payroll. Supposedly payroll could stay the same or increase but not be reduced. The Braves have $6.5 million coming off the books in Bob Wickman next season. I wonder if that money could be used to bump Andruw Jones' existing $13.5 million contract enough to keep him in Atlanta? The Braves may also be able to structure the contract to take advantage of the money that will come off the books from Mike Hampton's contract after next year.... The choice for 3rd base in the NL for starter for the NL All-Star team will be interesting. Miguel Cabrera is probably the best hitter but he plays for a small market and still doesn't have the name recognition he deserves. David Wright is a great player and he has gotten as much press exposure as any player in MLB but he's not having a great season. Chipper Jones is the veteran star having a resurgent season (.301 BA 10 HR and 24 RBI) but will he get the sentimental vote? Ryan Zimmerman and Arimis Ramirez will also garner lots of votes. It will be interesting to see how the voting goes... It's tough for a Red Sox fan to admit but there will be no such drama in the AL voting for 3rd base. You can put A-Rod's name in pen on the line-up card now...