Here are some links from the National League as the Cardinals and Dodgers play baseball's only intra-league game of the night…
- Dave O'Brien of The Atlanta Journal-Constitution hears the Braves have not ruled out signing Roy Oswalt, but he assumes their interest depends on the price (Twitter link). Oswalt has begun auditioning for teams.
- The Mets, meanwhile, are not in the running for Oswalt according to Adam Rubin of ESPN New York.
- Steve Dilbeck of The Los Angeles Times praises Dodgers GM Ned Colletti for his job building the team that owns baseball's best record.
- The Reds tried to sign Kerry Wood this offseason, manager Dusty Baker told John Fay of The Cincinnati Enquirer (Twitter link). "But he loves Chicago, and Chicago loves him," said Baker.
- The Cubs will announce Wood's new position with the team tomorrow, reports Paul Sullivan of The Chicago Tribune (on Twitter). He's expected to become a special assistant.
- After Wood announced his retirement today, Baseball America compiled some old scouting reports from his days as a prospect. "Scouts say Wood is so advanced that he should be ready for the big leagues faster than all but one or two college pitchers," said the publication when Wood was a high school senior in June 1995, less than three years before he made his big league debut.
Other than the Cardinals, I’d have to think Atlanta would be Roy Oswalt’s #1 choice of city to pitch in. Would be a great signing for them, IMO… if that’s the route they go.
Still holding out hope that he can come back to Philly. I think Joe Blanton’s going to come back down to Earth a little bit (probably tomorrow/today).
Even if all that stuff about Wood and Chicago is true (which it probably is), the guy definitely would not want to be playing for Dusty Baker. I’d say he’s pretty upset with Dusty for ruining his career.
Dusty didn’t ruin his career. Wow that is so overplayed by people. Wood jsut never played for the Cardinals so Walt didn’t want him.
his mechanics ruined his career. dusty just sped it up.
i still remember in 1999 when he needed TJ, gammons broke down his poor mechanics on baseball tonight. it’s a shame he couldn’t make the necessary adjustments after that have a long career as a starter.
Making those mechanical changes are easier said than done. Sometimes you throw how you throw because it’s the only way you can make the ball do what you want. Sometimes it’s bad habits that just can’t be easily broken. Pitchers aren’t deliberately looking to injure themselves; they try to correct the problems-it isn’t an easy thing for most of them to do. I think some athletes just aren’t built to withstand the stress of pitching no matter the mechanics. You want pitchers to stop breaking down, have them throw underhand.
Oh, and abuse of Kerry Wood came long before he entered pro ball. He once pitched a complete game (146 pitches!) in a Texas high school tournament, only to come back and throw two more innings in the second game of the doubleheader. I imagine Kerry was also like a lot of young, confident pitchers-he wanted that ball no matter how his arm felt.
He already blew out his elbow and had TJ surgery before Baker had ever worn a Cub uniform. His and Prior’s mechanics were not as perfect as some might have thought.
Ned Colletti is only responsible for bad stuff, like dandruff and earthquakes. Everybody knows that.
So he’ll be responsible for the huge 2nd half collapse when the Dodgers pitching comes back down to earth? I still take the under on them making the playoffs this year.
How do you take the under on a team making the playoffs? That doesn’t make any sense. An over/under has to be a number.
i’d be more worried about their hitters. kemp is awesome but he is NOT going to slug on Bondsian levels all year, mark ellis hasn’t hit this well in years, and aj ellis has a BABIP pushing .400.
however, the hot start is already in the books, and there isn’t another NL West team that’s significantly better.
even if they fall apart to some degree, i think they still make it in.
Why can’t Kemp hit at a Bonds pace? Are you saying that nobody could manage that without the juice? Mark Ellis is not over-performing. He’s batting around career averages and only a little better than last year with Colorado. More likely he’s just underrated. AJ Ellis might slip from awesome to just great but I think the team could live with great. On the other side of the ledger we’ve been without Kemp effectively all month, along with three other key players. Loney has hardly hit a lick and Gordon has been a disaster on leadoff. And yet, the best record in baseball nearly two months in. Why some people still think it’s all an illusion beats me.
I’ll take back what I said about Mark, since he did play well with the Rockies. M.Ellis is one of those guys that you think is going to fall off a cliff in performance because of all the recurring injuries, but then never does.
as a baseball fan, I WANT Kemp to hit at a Bondsian pace, but Bonds is (arguably) a top 5 hitter in MLB history. He could, but expecting him to is going a bit too far.
I think there’ll be a little bit of regression, but the team is by absolutely no means an Orioles-esque illusion and should easily make the playoffs, especially in a weak NL West.
Why does everyone assume that the Dodgers are for real, or at least many do, and yet no one thinks that the O’s are?
They could be this year’s Cinderella story, but biggest fundamental problem with the O’s is their narrow margin of runs scored over allowed. Over the course of the season this correlates closely with wins.
I don’t think anyone believes either team is going to keep winning 2/3 of their games, but I think a lot more people believe the Dodgers have a legitimate shot at winning their division because of the difference in the level of competition between the AL East and the NL West.
The Dodgers roster is built like a Stone Temple Pilots album.
Why does everyone assume that the Dodgers are for real, or at least many do, and yet no one thinks that the O’s are?
I don’t necessarily expect it, but we get the possibility only rarely. Kemp has all the natural talents that Bonds had, and then some. What he doesn’t have is juice. The Dodgers have to give him the chance to be a true generation player by building a strong batting order around him. Otherwise he and the fans will get cheated.
Their pitchers will come back down to earth some-I still expect Lilly and Capuano and Harang. to have solid to good seasons and Kershaw to contend for the Cy Young. Billingsley has been fairly erratic-he may settle in or he may have a lost season.
Colletti has assembled one of the best starting staffs in the NL to date. I’m going to give him credit for that. The NL West appears up for grabs and I can see the Dodgers holding the top spot for the entire season.
Okie-dokie. I’m sure you’ll be back in a few months to admit your mistake.
I doubt there will be a second half collapse especially after a couple of big trades I expect to happen by July 31st. This team is playing really good even after beating the cardinals some people still don’t accept it.
For sure teams can collapse and nobody can say it absolutely won’t happen, but the raw numbers at this point support a playoff team. They can win 90 games by going only five over .500 for the balance of the season and that’s very likely going to be plenty to win the NLW. Assuming the wheels don’t completely fly off, the new owners are going to be buyers at the trade deadline.
I was actually hoping to see the Mets pursue Oswalt. Would’ve been nice to replace Pelfrey/Batista.
Hudson, Oswalt, Beachy, and Hanson… How sick is that! Having Medlen, Minor, Teheran, Delgado, and …Livan in the wing they would be filthy. Not to mention they back end of the bullpen. Now if only Heyward can stop striking out and slow chopping to second every other at bat.
The young kids aren’t getting any younger. Minor is lights out every other game and gets his lights knocked out the rest. He is insanely lucky he is left handed and has a good k%. Sooner or later, the braves need the young pitchers to take over for the older ones since the payroll isn’t getting any bigger.