For Everyone’s Reference: Evan Scribner’s Curveball
October 3, 2012
For everyone’s reference — like, for those people who aren’t currently watching the Texas-Oakland game (live) — this is Oakland reliever Evan Scribner’s curveball.
Archive for October, 2012
I had an entirely pleasant evening in Seattle and all I have to prove it is this silly picture of me trying to look like Drunken Dale Thayer
I’ve been visiting my best friend Matt, who now lives in in Spokane, Washington, for the last few days. Yesterday, we drove through the Cascades and into Seattle. We ate at a cheap and delicious noodle place for lunch, then wandered around downtown, eventually making our way down First Avenue to the “famous” Triangle Pub. Before we got to the pub, we ran into my fellow NotGraphs-er Patrick Dubuque, and then, in the pub, the young and dapper Kyle Davis, whom some of you might know as one of FanGraphs most supportive readers, and whom you should know as baseball blogger if you do not already, was waiting for us in the sun-drenched triangle part of the Triangle, which we monopolized for the next two hours, drinking, alternately, local IPAs and cheap happy-hour Rainiers.
We talked about Seattle, how the city has changed since Patrick was a kid, neighborhoods to avoid (based on density of douchebags — not based on crime or anything like that), the shittiness of The Killing (one of the few television shows set in Seattle).
What Won’t Pedro Ciriaco Swing At?
As noted in our parent pages a while back, Red Sox infielder Pedro Ciriaco never met a pitch he didn’t like. But are his wild-swinging tendencies limited to just baseballs?
It’s time to play the game show sensation that’s sweeping the nation:
Phillies Pull Plug on Chase Utley
The first in a new series:
What happens if you only read the first half of a headline?
In this case… poor Chase Utley.
Much-consolidated excerpt from actual article:
MIAMI – In the end, there was too much risk and too little time. [For] one month… the Phillies staved off formal elimination. [But] before the Phillies dropped a 2-1 decision to the Miami Marlins that ended their postseason chances, GM Ruben Amaro Jr. and manager Charlie Manuel informed Utley… [h]is work [on Earth]… was done.
“I don’t know if it’s a matter whether or not he can [recover],” Amaro said. “I think it’s more a matter of practicality and what’s really best for the team overall.”
Amaro, for one, said [Utley] was… “dead.” … [I]t appears the team is fully headed in another direction.
“It’s tough to put the guy in that position right now,” Amaro said.
Podcast Preview: Dayn Perry Donkey Noise, Yes
October 3, 2012
The author will refrain from explaining under what circumstances, or in which context, the following occurred. What he (i.e. the author) will state is that the audio clip embedded here is from the very recently concluded recording of Dayn Perry’s weekly appearance on FanGraphs Audio.
The Red Sox-Yankees Game Recap in Comic Sans
October 3, 2012
The writeup for the BOS/NYY should be done in Comic Sans #mlb #yankees #redsox
— dianagram (@dianagram) October 3, 2012
Resident of the internet @dianagram has requested — for reasons as beautiful as they are mysterious — has requested that the recap for Tuesday night’s Red Sox-Yankees game (box) be reproduced in what the students of Rundlett Junior High School named the Most Stirring Typeface of 1993, Comic Sans.
In his perpetual quest never to disappoint anyone, anywhere, the author has executed the aforementioned demands, from the Associated Press’s able recap of the game in question.
To wit:
NEW YORK (AP) — Raul Ibanez tied it with a pinch-hit homer in the ninth inning, then had an RBI single in the 12th, helping the Yankees remain a game up on Baltimore in the AL East with one game to go by beating the Boston Red Sox 4-3 on Tuesday night.
With a second comeback spurred by Ibanez in the last 10 days, the Yankees need a win or Orioles loss on the final day of the season to secure their 13th division title since 1996. The Orioles beat Tampa Bay 1-0 earlier.
If the teams end up even after Wednesday’s games, they’ll play a tiebreaker Thursday in Baltimore.
Commemorative GIFs from R.A. Dickey’s Final Start
October 3, 2012
All surfers of the internet receive three free GIFs from R.A. Dickey’s final start of the season tonight in Miami (box).
Below are the three knuckleballs Dickey threw tonight that both (a) moved the most (calculated Pythagoreanly, that is) and that (b) were also strikes.
3. Turner, Fifth Inning
This knuckleball to opposing pitcher Jacob Turner features 4.1 inches of gloveside run and 11.1 inches of “rise” (vertical movement that is, relative to a ball unaffected by air current or drag):
A Brief and Fictional Account of Meeting Bob Uecker
October 2, 2012
I was trying to listen to the game, but turned to the station and heard only silence. “Must be a rain delay,” I told my wife, except — and, please note, this is where events skew decidedly fantastic — except it wasn’t my wife in the next room, but radio voice of baseball’s Milwaukee Brewers, Bob Uecker, instead.
“This is clearly absurd,” I said. “You’re supposed to be in Milwaukee, not in my affordable apartment in Madison.” To which sentiment he responded: “Supposed to? I’m 77 years old, man. My only obligation now is to greet the abyss with something not unlike dignity.”
That was a great moment between us — probably one of my top-five as an adult so far, were I to make a list.
In conclusion:
Introducing: FAME
“Unless you think you can do better than Tolstoy, we don’t need you.”
– James Michener, advice to aspiring writers
You may have noticed, dear readers, that nowhere in the previous quotation does our historical novelist friend mention statistics. Indeed, it’s a well-known rite of passage for each intrepid, young baseball writer to craft his or her own statistic, much as the children of olden times smithed silver goblets or shot bears.
My quest began, as all sources of intellectual thought and debate in our modern times, with the AL MVP debate. My target was neither the loathsome RBI-proponents who back Miguel Cabrera nor the equally loathsome trigonometry professors who support Mike Trout. Instead, my target was those lofty journalists and philosophers who preferred to stay above the fray by positing that the AL MVP race didn’t really matter anyway. It’s not cool to care about awards, after all. Winning and process reign supreme; nationwide validation for one’s achievements is meaningless if not conceited.
But it does mean something. Look at Detroit’s own Alan Trammell: if he had won the 1987 AL MVP over RBI-machine George Bell, it would have changed the face of his Hall of Fame candidacy. He wouldn’t have been plagued by the consistent, good-but-not-great label that wore the creases into his face and killed his chance at immortality. Not even learning that Wade Boggs took the WAR crown in ’87 could quench my newfound thirst for justice.
And so it is with both pleasure and light self-satisfaction that I present, with my colleague Joel (twitter: @CajoleJuiceEsq), FanGraphs’ newest statistic: FAME, or the Fanfare and Acclaim Metric Extraordinaire.