Sunday evening linkage..
- Dave Cameron of U.S.S. Mariner takes a look at the newest member of the Mariners, John Jaso. The M's traded pitcher Josh Lueke to the Rays for Jaso earlier this evening, and Cameron likes the move for Seattle.
- The Orioles have hired Gary Rajsich of the Blue Jays to be the club's new amateur scouting director, an industry source told Dan Connolly of The Baltimore Sun. Rajsich, 57, has been with the Blue Jays since 2009 but spent most of his scouting career with Boston, where he worked with O's GM Dan Duquette.
- Don Norcross of the San Diego Union-Tribune spent some time with Josh Byrnes and found that the recently-appointed Padres GM is extremely optimistic about the club's future. When speaking to Norcross in his Petco Park office, Byrnes had one of his computer screens locked to MLBTradeRumors.
- Yankees skipper Joe Girardi says that he isn't so sure that this will be Mariano Rivera's final season, writes Nick Friedell of ESPNChicago.com. The closer will celebrate his 42nd birthday on Tuesday.
- Bud Selig, the same commissioner who canceled the World Series in 1994 in order to crush the union, deserves props for seeing the error of his ways and dramatically changing them, writes Ken Davidoff of Newsday. However, Davidoff isn't a fan of the limits on amateur spending and doesn't see the point of HGH testing.
- On the other hand, Michael Silverman of the Boston Herald argues that the newly-implemented HGH testing is a striking example of how far the sport has come in recognizing its issues with performance-enhancing drugs.
- Paul Hoynes of The Plain Dealer likes that MLB will be adding an additional wild card team in each league. The new system, he writes, puts an emphasis on winning the division, which only brings integrity to the 162-game season.
Mo’s 42 and wears #42
Like a boss
I have this strange feeling I’ll be seeing a quote in 2020 from the yankee skipper saying “I’m not so sure 2021 will be Rivera’s last season.”
“….Rivera just turned 51 on Sunday.”
I agree he can easily close for another 2-3 years then move to either set up or middle relief he could easily pitch into his 50’s
why not keep closing as long as his arm is fine and he can continue to throw a cutter id like to see him there till he retires
It’s funny, I was about to write that Mo seemed more “hittable” last year and then I checked his stats. His BaBIP was higher than his career avg and about .50 points more than last year but across the board he pretty much had a better K%, BB%, LOB%, FIP and xFIP than last year. Amazing. I just hope that when he does start to decline that it’s not abrupt and comes crashing down. I hope he can ease out gracefully.
He’ll never decline. It’s just not possible. The guy is made of steel and rubber.
He was “more hittable” this past season…..balls were squared up a lot more then normal which is why his GB% decreased and LD% increased…that is why you thought that….
Rivera’s standard is so high and it’s been going on for so long that any bad week the media assumes it’s over, and then he comes right back. I can look at his stats every year and I can find one number that could lead me to believe it’s the beginning of the end, and then the following year that number returns to normal.
The end will come. It does for all. Wouldn’t surprise if it was a rapid and ugly end, or if he pitches effectively for several more years. He’s as outlier as an outlier can be.
I don’t disagree w/ you….I was just pointing out that he did appear “more hittable” this season b/c when actually WATCHING the games he was hit harder then normal(balls squared up) and that shows in the stats I posted…I was not posting on his efficiency….
i dont think that happens
mo has nothing left to prove, as soon as he cant close anymore, he retires. He’s a class act, i cant see him hanging around
He is going to move out to RF and win a batting title, just to prove us all wrong.
Uhm… you forget one thing: he fits perfectly in the classic stereotype of the hispanoamerican baseball player, one that doesn’t give his everything because he has something to prove, but because he enjoys playing, be it for money of for free. When these guys retire is because they don’t enjoy the game and not because they can’t play anymore.There was a story back in 1995 or 1996 featured in a Baseball America magazine with either Jeter or Ruven Rivera in the front page, where both Mariano and his cousin Rubén Rivera were interviewed, and they talked about their beginnings, how when they were kids they would play baseball with a piece of stick and rocks. And how Rubén with a kid’s smile in his face teared a piece of cardboard and said “this would make a great glove for kids in Panamá… here, like this”, and the teary eyed Baseball America columnist saw how Rubén fitted in his hand to simulate a glove, “this would last you for a few games” he said… smiling. And, that reality still happens in the most poor sections of hispanoamerica, and that’s part of the reason why they play with all their heart for the most part.PS
Yeah, that was before he stole Derek Jeter’s glove to impress a girl (heck it was even before he enjoyed a brief succesful stint with the Yankees before Torre decided to send him to AAA, and way before he was traded in exchange of Hideki Irabu).
I am sincerely convinced that The Sandman is not human. How can he be? Can anyone say the best closer/reliever in major league history?
its not even debatable, its not even close thats the scary part
Since ’96, he has been SPOT on, every season. It is scary.
I just hope he’s around for the next CBA when they start to test if players are androids.
I’d say he’s the best closer ever, although I’ve been watching baseball long enough to remember how closers were used differently. I can’t really compare what Rivera does to Gossage, for example. I mean, if Gossage only had to pitch mostly one inning at a clip he would have been racking up 50+ saves at his peak and would have been posting many sub-2.00 ERA seasons. So Gossage could “easily” do what most of the closers today are doing, and do it better than most but Rivera, yet I also have no doubt that Rivera is one of the few closers today who could have been a multi-inning closer for a decade plus like Gossage. He would have gotten fewer saves, but had more innings.
He still gets my vote for the best ever, but there is an unknown element here as the role has changed so much (and for the worse) over the past thirty years.
There was a pretty famous caribbean pitcher, who was still enjoying success in the winter leagues and the Caribbean Series at age 47, I am talking about Puertorican Luis “El Mambo” DeLeón.
“El Mambo” pitched in the majors during the 1980’s with the Cardinals, the Padres, Orioles and Mariners. Having a couple of pretty good seasons with San Diego.
He holds the record of 12 Caribbean Series played, and almost at 50 years of old, he still have great movement and speed in his pitches… BUT he is not the oldest player to have success in competitive leagues, curiously enough
most of the guys who have continued to play at a later age, most are from the Caribbean and Centroamerica, and from northamerica are mostly from México, I guess that it has to do with the ‘flavour’ baseball still has in hispanoamerica, a flavour so characteristic that has been lost in most of the MLB cities, and that is, of a party and not of millionaires’ game.
I used to be totally in the Division winners only category back before the wild card was implemented in 1994. I had been hoping to see more expansion all the way to 32 teams and eight four team divisions.
But once the wild card arrived I changed my mind.
In more recent times, I had leaned towards favoring the wild card teams which sometimes have the second best record in the league over weaker division winners.
So what I would have liked to see is the fourth and fifth best records (or if a division winner is actually 6th or lower they make it in) play a one game.
Instead of the integrity of the division winners. Reward the best team which wins their division for sure anyways and the next top two. And the “Fourth” team whether it be the wild card or a division winner has to play the fifth best record or any division winner that actuallly skids lower. I find more integrity in that. Ties in W/L records go to division winners.
No matter how you do it, the system is not without flaws. Most teams (not all, injuries happen and players who had surprise good seasons early on can regress) that make the playoffs are better teams in the end than they were at the begining.
Trades and minor league call ups can result in that. And teams that go extended periods without one or more key players due to injuries and get those players back and performing late are obviously better than their final W/L record suggests.
But imperfection happens.
i like that setup. i also think this would be a neat setup:
5 teams (3 division, 2 wild cards). 3 rounds (1st round 3 games, second round 5 games, 3rd round seven games)
best team in the league gets 1st and 2nd round byes (automatically plays best of 7 games to win pennant and go to world series)
wild card teams have to play ALL of their games on the road, except for the 3rd round.
thus, 162 game season means much more, and makes it more difficult to get in as wild card team
That article by Davidoff was a big waste of time and completely moronic. lets wait 10 years and ruin the sport once again so we can find out whether HGH works or not. I mean can you be that stupid.
Again with the emphasis on winning your division! Why on Earth are we saying “Win your division” instead of “Win as many games as possible”? It makes absolutely no sense to me.
Can’t they just win the game they’re playing?
If you mean the one-game playoff, yeah I guess.
But I stand by the fact that it’s bull that the possibility exists that a team with the second most wins in the AL or NL has to go into the one-game playoff because their division winner was the best team in the league, and a crappier team gets a bye because they were in a crappier division and STILL ended up with fewer wins.
I meant more on the lines of, why should ballplayers be focusing on win loss record? They should just try to win game by game. It was a corny sentiment, nothing more.
I like the additional Wild Card team. It makes it even more important to play out the regular season so that you can win your division. Because of this new system teams will not want to get involved with that one game playoff. Let’s say your on the Yankees and you already clinched a playoff berth, but the second place team is only 1 Game Behind. Joe Giradri is not going to sit players because he’ll be content with the division or wild card. He’s going to want to win the division because they don’t wanna risk having a bad game and having their season being over. Anything can happen in a one game playoff. It’s similar to a Game 7, “anything can happen”-Kevin Millar, 2004 ALCS.
I knew byrnes was smart
The O’s were determined to get somebody from the Jays… no matter who it was!
Someone on an another blog explained that Gary Rajsich was the 17 ranked Cross Checker in the MLB. I beg to differ. I don’t think he was even the 17th ranked Scout within the Blue Jay Organization.
Peter Angelos Sell the Team Now!
John Jaso Jingleheimer Schmidt his name is my name too! There goes John Jaso Jingleheimer Schmidt na na na na na na.
I want him to throw a change-up one time to a batter, just to completely mess with his mind.