Curveballs for Jobu 6/16/11

Curveballs for Jobu is Offbasepercentage's daily trip around the ballparks.

Today's honorary bat boy is Melvin Dorta.

Nationals 10, Cardinals 0.
The Cardinals have some legitimate firepower in their lineup. But that means nothing when you go up against Livan Hernandez and his 73 mph fastball. Hernandez threw a 3-hit shutout and even struck out 6. Matt Morse hit his 11th and 12th homers of the season in the rout. Games like this is why Tony La Russa drinks.

Phillies 8, Marlins 1.
Phillies 5, Marlins 4 (10).
The Phils keep rolling in the East and opened up a 5 games lead over the Braves. The Marlins are headed in the other direction and actually were passed in the division by the Mets. The Mets? Shame on you Florida. Chase Utley went 2-10.

Pirates 7, Astros 3.
Charlie Morton only lasted 5 innings and gave up 8 hits and 3 runs but he got a win! And that win pushed the Pirates over .500 for the season. Human sacrifice! Dogs and cats living together! Mass hysteria!

Red Sox 3, Rays 0.
Josh Beckett did his best LIvan Hernandez impression and threw a one-hitter. Kevin Youklis hit the 3-run home run to beat the Rays. Jacoby Ellsbury was thrown out for the 9th time this year. I was thrown out of a casino Saturday night after my language was deemed unfit for public consumption.

Indians 6, Tigers 4.
Indians managed to move back into a tie with Detroit. I bet Cleveland finishes below .500 at season's end. The lineup should get better and the pitching should get worse. Brad Penny pitched a reverse Justin Verlander giving up 8 hits and 2 walks in just 3.2 innings.

Mariners 3, Angels 1.
The post Kazmir era Angels got off to a rough start.

Other games, but down here...
Reds 7, Dodgers 2.
Rockies 6, Padres 3.
Mets 4, Braves 0.
Brewers 9, Cubs 5.
Giants 5, Diamondbacks 2.
Yankees 12, Rangers 4.
Blue Jays 4, Orioles 1.
Twins 4, White Sox 1.
A's 2, Royals 1.

Curveballs for Jobu 6/15/11

Curveballs for Jobu is Offbasepercentage's daily trip around the ballparks.

Today's honorary bat boy is Kimera Bartee.

Hey kids, sorry for the long break between recaps. I've been struggling with what we in the industry call a busted up laptop and your Uncle Derwood hasn't been seen since he went on an expedition to look for a shoe he lost in 10th grade. Hopefully my laptop screen will stay lit until Fox Sports buys me a new one (so, forever). Look, baseball!

Tigers 4, Indians 0.
Justin Verlander lost the bid for his second no-hitter of the season in the 8th inning but finished with a complete game, 12 strikeout shutout. As brilliant as Verlander has been, he's still just 4th in the AL in WAR (2.9) and 6th in FIP (2.99), with two Angels and CC Sabathia ahead of him in both categories. The Indians are 2-8 in their last 10 and are a game behind Detroit in the Central now. Pull the rip cord, you're in free fall.

Angels 4, Mariners 0.
Jered Weaver wasn't as nasty as Verlander but he still threw his own shutout allowing 5 hits and striking out 6. Weaver actually got run support early and, luckily, it didn't throw him off his game. Weaver still leads the AL in WAR (3.4) and ERA (2.06) and is second in FIP (2.54) behind teammate Dan Haren. Russell Branyan got another start because Mike Scioscia wants to see if he can get me to light myself on fire.

Rays 4, Red Sox 0.
James Shields is the third pitcher who threw a shutout and won 4-0 yesterday. Coincidence or.. Yeah, probably just a coincidence. Shields also gave up 5 hits but struck out just 5. Still an impressive feat against the red hot Red Sox. The loss ended the Sox 9 game win streak and leaves them just 1.5 games up on New York and 3.5 up on Tampa. Kevin Youklis went 0-4 and remained ugly.

Phillies 9, Marlins 1.
Four different Phillies hit home runs off of Chris Volstad who was kind enough to throw 5 innings of batting practice. Ryan Howard, Chase Utley, Jimmy Rollins and Domonic Brown were the recipients of Volstad's charity and Brown added a second homer against Edward Mujica for good measure.

Nationals 8, Cardinals 6.
The Nats welcomed Ryan Zimmerman back to the lineup with a win. Zimmerman doubled for his only hit in 5 at bats. Lance Berkman hit his 17th home run of the season. Remember when I made fun of that signing? Whoops. Albert Pujols is up to 15 homers after his slow start.

Mets 4, Braves 3.
The Mets scored all 4 runs against Jair Jurrjens who saw his ERA balloon from 1.82 to 2.13 for the season. Jose Reyes continued his big cash money year going 3-5 (.346/.389/.525) with 2 stolen bases. On the other hand, Dan Uggla hit his 9th homer and is sitting at a sad .181/.252.333 line. But hey, he's only been as terrible defensively as he was last year.

Other games, but down here...
Yankees 12, Rangers 4.
Blue Jays 6, Orioles 5 (11).
White Sox, Twins PPD.
Royals 7, A's 4.
Cubs 5, Brewers 4 (10).
Pirates 1, Astros 0.
Rockies 6, Padres 3.
Giants 6, Diamondbacks 5.
Reds 3, Dodgers 2.

Sleep Patterns And Batting Average

Before I outright dismiss this as a complete waste of time (don't worry, that part is coming), let's poke around this little study while I'm between naps. It appears that baseball players are made of actual humans (just like us!) and their natural sleep cycle may have a correlation to performance. Dr. W. Christopher Winter of Sealy Mattress University Martha Jefferson Hospital Sleep Medicine Center had 16 players fill out a Morningness-Eveningness Questionnaire and compared stats...

Not surprisingly, the morning players did better (as measured by combined batting average) than their night owl counterparts in day games, outbatting them by a margin of .267 to .259, Winter found. The opposite was true for night games – the night owls outbatted the morning types, .306 to .252. For the midday games, the night owls had the edge, with a combined batting average of .261 versus .252 for the morning players.

I'm all for new studies but couldn't this guy have used a better metric than batting average or a bigger sample size? And, I'm just throwing this out there, couldn't the age of the player and the stage of their career come into play here? I guess not since Winter takes his findings a little too seriously...

“Currently, selecting a player for a game situation usually involves factors such as handedness, rest and possibly previous success against a certain team,” he said in a news release from the American Academy of Sleep Medicine. “Now the time of day in which the game is occurring and a player’s chronotype might be a wise factor to take into account.”

Easy there, turbo. Let's get managers to stop sac bunting in the first inning before we have them analyzing sleep cycles. Obviously, this means nothing to baseball. I doubt Joe Giradi is going to hold Robinson Cano out of a day game because he had to party in New York City with a bunch of insanely hot Latin women the previous night. But I hope Winter wins a nice duvet cover or whatever the top honor is in his field.

Sunday Night Liveblog: Jay Bruce Edition

MLB Draft Live Chat

I always say, if there are two things I love, it's drafts and pretending like I know what I'm talking about. Need proof? Come join me for a live chat during the MLB draft at 6:45 EST. Derwood will be here along with our friends from Diamond Hoggers and The Golden Sombrero.

Brian Sabean Is An Idiot

Nobody is happy about Scott Cousins' collision at home plate with Buster Posey which, unfortunately, ended the Giants superstar catcher's season. I'm not happy about it, Buster isn't happy about it, Cousins isn't happy about it but Giants GM Brian Sabean is being a jerk about it...

Giants general manager Brian Sabean on Thursday tore into Scott Cousins of the Florida Marlins for his devastating hit on Buster Posey, saying the Giants will have a "long memory" of the play and everyone in the organization will be happy if Cousins is through as a major-league player.

*snip*

The GM's harshest statements in the lengthy interview came when co-host Ralph Barbieri noted that Posey had no desire to hear from Cousins.

"I don't blame the kid," Sabean said of Posey. "Why not be hard-nosed? If I never hear from Cousins again, or he doesn't play another day in the big leagues, I think we'll all be happy."

Cousins wasn't much of a major leaguer to begin with but he is built like a linebacker and crushed Posey at the plate. The ensuing injury led to varying opinions ranging from it was an intention hit to rules should be changed/enforced to Posey could have had better technique. However you view the incident, the result is the same. It's a crushing blow to the Giants and one of baseball's rising stars.

But Sabean's radio rant bothered me and I'm sure some front office folk will be calling for a public apology. Cousins, by all means, seemed upset about the outcome of the play and tried reaching out to Posey. If Posey didn't/doesn't want to hear an apology, I can't fault him, he did lose his season after all, but I tend to think cooler heads will prevail. Sabean, on the other hand, flat out wished ill on a professional baseball player.

While I realize this was largely an emotional reaction, Sabean is representing a Major League franchise and should have some professional tact. That was, and will continue to be, a legal play in the eyes of Major League Baseball. Blocking the plate and charging the catcher are baseball fixtures that will take years to overcome if a change in philosophy is, and might be, warranted. It's unjust for Sabean to so harshly criticize Cousins for a play baseball taught him his whole career.

Curveballs for Jobu 6/2/11

Curveballs for Jobu is Offbasepercentage's daily trip around the ballparks.

Today's honorary bat boy is Jason Dellaero.

White Sox 7, Red Sox 3.
The White Sox finished the sweep of their Sox counterpart. Paul Konerko went 3-4 with his 12th home run of the season. He's hitting .310/.381/.516 to follow up his .312/.393/.584 2010 which are the best lines (along with 2006) of his career. Adam Dunn went another 0-4 and his OBP is now higher than his SLG. It's like Jose Bautista sucked all the hit tools out of him.

Yankees 4, A's 2.
Nick Swisher hit a home run. For as terrible as he's been, he's still 0.1 better than replacement level making Adam Dunn 0.5 jealous. The Yanks have opened up a 2 game lead over the Red Sox in the East and a 6 game lead on the Orioles.

Royals 2, Angels 0.
Billy Butler hit the walk-off home run off of Scott Downs who showed up in between DL stints. The Angels wasted 7.2 shutout innings from Tyler Chatwood who is quickly making Scott Kazmir an afterthought. Kazmir gave up 10 runs and walked 6 over 4 hours of sleep last night.

Reds 4, Brewers 3.
Finally, Jay Bruce hit a home run (17). Joey Votto hit his 7th of the season to go with his MVP-esque .338/.468/.532 line. Nyjer Morgan went 2-3 with a picked off.

Diamondbacks 6, Marlins 5.
The D-Backs got back in the win column after my boy Justin Upton hit a walk-off single. Arizona is clinging to a half game lead over the San Francisco Miguel Tejadas.

Rockies 3, Dodgers 0.
Ubaldo Jiminez threw a 4-hit shutout for his first win of the season. I'm entirely too lazy to check on his velocity but I doubt this a corner turner. He was taking on the fierce, Jay Gibbons led offense of the Dodgers.

Other games, but down here...
Rangers 3, Rays 0.
Orioles 2, Mariners 1.
Tigers 4, Twins 2.
Indians 13, Blue Jays 9.
Nationals 2, Phillies 1.
Astros 3, Cubs 1.
Braves 4, Padres 3.
Pirates 9, Mets 3.
Giants 7, Cardinals 5 (11).

Curveballs for Jobu 6/1/11

Curveballs for Jobu is Offbasepercentage's daily trip around the ballparks.

Today's honorary bat boy is Josh Booty.

Marlins 5, Diamondbacks 2.
On the back of Anibal Sanchez, the Marlins snapped the Diamondbacks 7 game win streak and moved within 2 games of the Phillies in the East. Sanchez went 8 innings gave up 2 runs and struck out 8. Justin Upton and Kelly Johnson each homered in the second straight game. The loss really is a shame for the D-Backs as they completely waste a Sean Burroughs pinch hit single.

Nationals 10, Phillies 2.
Cliff Lee got rocked by the Nats in just over 5 innings. He gave up 6 earned on 7 hits and 3 walks. Oh, and Danny Espinosa hit a pair of homers off of Lee. Yikes. There was even a Brian Bixler sighting. Not sure why though.

Brewers 7, Reds 2.
Jay Bruce went a disappointing 1-4 with zero home runs. Cold streak? Zack Grienke gave up both Reds runs and lowered his ERA to 5.29 on the season.

Indians 6, Blue Jays 3.
The Indians got back in the win column thanks to Grady Sizemore and Carlos Santana combining to go 5-7. Jose Bautista failed to homer but his 3-5 gives him an insane .363/.505/.786 line. I think I love him.

Mariners 3, Orioles 2.
Um, what the hell is going on in Seattle? The Mariners have won 11 of 13 and are half a game out of first in the West. And they're doing it with Chone Figgins working on being the worst everyday player in baseball. He did not play last night, by the way. And Ichiro is hitting under .300 along with everyone else in the lineup. Baseball is weird.

Yankees 10, Oakland 3.
Curtis Granderson hit his 17th home run of the year. It was off of Brett Anderson, another lefty. Granderson could never hit southpaws and now he's absolutely mashing them. Baseball is weird.

Other games, but down here...
Cardinals 4, Giants 3.
Padres 5, Braves 4.
Pirates 5, Mets 1.
Astros 7, Cubs 3.
Dodgers 8, Rockies 2.
Royals 7, Angels 3.
Rays 5, Rangers 4.
Tigers 8, Twins 7.
White Sox 10, Red Sox 7.