Marty; The season is close to one-third over, the Giants are one and a half games out of first, looking up at the Dodgers and Padres. They have three weeks ahead of them which may remove from consideration any hope for a post-season role or, which is more likely, they will, at the end of these three weeks be in roughly the same position they are in now, namely, a team hoping to win the crown in a very weak division.

These next few weeks will see them play two strong teams, the Red Sox three times, the A’s six times. and one of their division rivals, the Dodgers, seven times. If they survive these sixteen games with a break even record, they will consider it a job well done. They will still be in the fight.

If their record in these next sixteen days is one-sided, on either the winning or losing side, a further evaluation may be in order.

With respect to the Sox. in particular, and also the A’s, when one runs down their lineups and compares them to the Giants, one is hard put to come up with a reason why the Giants should be competing evenly. The other day, admittedly with Grissom on the bench and Bonds playing the DH role, the Giants walked out on the field with an outfield of Mohr, Tucker and Linden; an infield from first to third of Minor, Perez, Cruz and Feliz.

This, together with a rotation in dire need of two starters. does not look like a team play-off bound. With the exception of Bonds, (and that is always the caveat in these discussions) there isn’t a single interesting player in that lineup. One can run down the lineups of the weakest teams in either league and somewhere, if one looks carefully, one can find a young, interesting, ball player. This is not the case with the Giants.

This may be the measure of their failed farm system. The Giants recently decided that Hammonds wasn’t going to be of much help the rest of the year and released him. They brought up Linden from Fresno. One must assume that was the best they could do even though Linden wasn’t setting the Pacific Coast League on fire. He appears to be completely overmatched in the majors. When Snow went on the DL they brought up Minor, who showed no evidence of being a hitter when he played for part of three seasons in the majors a few years back. He hasn’t hit with any more authority since playing with SF these past few weeks.

Coupled with two starting pitchers, Rueter and Tomko, who can’t get past the fifth inning, one wonders why this team is considered to be in contention. However, they are, as evidenced by their place in the standings. Whether they will be, after these next three weeks, is the open question.

A word about Jerome Williams. Alou was quoted this morning, in describing Williams, “That kid continues to grow as a pitcher and a man…”. Williams knew that he was being called upon to give the team six innings, at least, and perhaps more, irrespective of how well he was pitching. Twenty three innings the previous day had chewed up the bullpen. There was going to be no relief there on Sunday.

Williams had a rocky first three innings. However, unlike others in the rotation, he hunkered down and pitched better as he went along. ultimately pitching into the eighth inning, giving up only three runs, and winning the game. He is rapidly maturing as a pitcher. Schmidt, of course, is always counted on for a strong performance. Williams is approaching the level where one can rely on a winning effort. And now we come to Barry.

Bonds continues to be the same unbelievable story. These days, when he is playing on foreign fields, the home town fans boo their home town favorites when they walk Barry intentionally. They want to see him be given the opportunity to pursue records which are nearly in his grasp. They seem to be expressing the thought that there is something inherently unfair about walking Bonds three and four times a game. They seem to be saying, “Give the man a chance”.

Of course, when they give him a chance, there is a strong likelihood that he will break the home town’s back.

The Giants are losing two-thirds of the games they play when Bonds isn’t a starter. If Bonds wasn’t playing for them there isn’t much reason to think they would not be losing two-thirds of the 162 game season.

If nothing else, shouldn’t this persuade managment that it must make some changes in the club’s priorities? Bonds is not going to be around forever. Why not start with next year’s draft? Be willing to spend some money on high draft choices if they are available.

One last word on Barry. It is pleasurable to see him leading the league in hitting, with an average around .375. Leading the league at year’s end, would be some consolation. Hitting around .400 would be great– and not unrealistic. After all, they can’t prevent him from getting his hits on those rare occasions when they pitch to him.

It’s going to be an interesting three weeks.

Ed

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Pittsburgh manager Lloyd McClendon personally let Saturday’s game slip back to the ever grateful Oakland Athletics. See, McClendon has been smarting for weeks about pitchers on opposing teams who have pitched too close to his batters. He is of the philosophy that payback is in order every time one of his boys gets buzzed.

Problem on Saturday he chose his best set up man to drill Damian Miller in the eighth inning with a nice 10-6 lead. Salomon Torres was kicked out of the game after throwing behind Miller twice without even hitting him. McClendon was gone too. Enter a totally unprepared Jose Mesa and the A’s were back in business. Mesa couldn’t stop Oakland and was gone after 48 excruciating pitches. So was the lead.

Pittsburgh tied it up against Arthur “all Rhodes lead to trouble” and it took another double by Marco Scutaro, the doubles machine, to win the game for Oakland in the ninth against an overmatched Mark Corey, the Pirates last pitcher.

Was it worth it Lloyd to drill Miller? Absolutely not and I think you have lost control of the game and whatever is left of your managerial career. I can’t see any other successful manager in the big leagues behaving the way you have this series.

Before trading the players, I’d trade the manager.

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After the Athletics finish with the Pirates this weekend, the team faces a twenty five game stretch against the Cards, Cubs, Angels, Giants, Red Sox, and Indians taking the team right up to the All Star break on July 12th.

By that time, general manager Billy Beane will know just where he has to tinker to strengthen the team for its annual second half run. From here it looks like a dependable hard throwing righthander will be needed in the pen.

So far, Justin Duchscherer has been terrific in spot outings in close games. Not an overpowering pitcher, the A’s run the risk of the league catching up with Duchscherer’s curves if they continue to use him every other day.

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Marty- Amaury, in his latest words of wisdom on this page, asserted that any serious observer of the baseball scene who predicted what was going to happen over the course of 162 games was starting out on a fool’s errand. As usual, he was unquestionably right.

More and more players seem to be ending up on the DL these days. The loss, for the season, of a player such as Sexson will bedevil Arizona throughout the year and may cause Brenly to lose his job and persuade Arizona to dump Johnson on the Yankees, come July. Players perform well below expectations and some do far better than anticipated. Some teams come together, unexpectedly, the Reds, for instance. Others fall by the wayside. It’s an uncertain world and the baseball world is as uncertain as the rest of it.

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I never take myself seriously
when I make a predicition in
baseball because to predict
in baseball reminds me of
Rodney Dangerfield:
“let me tell you,let me tell you
I get no respect…my wife,
my wife is such a
bad cook, in our house we pray
after we eat”!
When you predict you
get no respect.

By Amaury Pi-Gonzalez
Seattle [Read more →]

Tim Hudson, one of the best pitchers in the American League changed his delivery Saturday. Hudson has given up more hits this season than normal even though he still has enough on the ball to dominate most batters in baseball.

Lefties were hitting .331 against him and the league .274 going into Saturday’s game, well above his normal lifetime batting average by opponents of .242.

So, Hudson now taps his toe on the ground before delivering the baseball ala Robb Nen. He claims it gives him more balance and keeps his weight back.

You don’t see many big league star pitchers make these kinds of adjustments during the season. Hudson has nerve on the hill and obviously has confidence in his ability to make a radical change in one of the most successful deliveries in the game today.

Let’s see how long it lasts? Probably until he gives up some critical hits and then balmes it on the delivery. That’s the way these things usually pan out.

Pat Hentgen will not be highly sought this July as he was last summer. Hentgen is strictly a five inning guy right now without much on the ball.

I’ll say it again, Scott Hatteberg should get serious consideration for the All Star team. He is carrying this A’s offense with key hits almost every game. His numbers don’t jump off the page, but if you watch the games, he is the MVP of the team.

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Batter Up June 5th

Interleague play starts next week and it is OK by me with this proviso. I would change the number of games played between the two leagues. I’d schedule one random series, then one weekend of whichever geographical rivals I could match.

It’s bad enough for a team trying to get to the playoffs to play teams in its own league an uneven amount of times, but throw in games from the other league and it just isn’t fair.

How do you think the resurgent Mets feel playing the Yankees six times while the Marlins get to square off half a dozen times with Tampa Bay?

You can’t blame this one all on Bud because the idea for interleague play was first kicked around way back in the 1920’s.

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Marty– I ws involved in a spirited baseball discussion in the middle of last night’s game. Are the Giants for real? Was their ten game winning streak reality and not an erroneous perception? Are they in the hunt for a postseason spot? Finally, should we not have given up on them?

The gentleman’s view, despite his being, in every respect save his baseball judgment, exceedingly smart, might be somewhat colored by the fact that he is an ardent fan, has season tickets and it took a long time to convince him that Marvin Benard was an albatross around the team’s neck.

Click below for the continuation of Ed’s baseball story, it’s terrific.
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The A’s won the game last night, but Eric Chavez took a Damaso Marte pitch right on his hand leaving the game with a bruise and a trip to the X Ray machine.

More news on his condition today.

The White Sox are a much improved team and crush the ball from the right side. If they could get some high on base percentage hitters in front of their power hitters, they may have a lineup that resembles the early season Angels.

Esteban Loaiza wasn’t his sharpest last night as many balls were hit hard, then turned into long outs.

The A’s bullpen was excellent until Chad Bradford stayed in beyond what he is accustomed to. Frank Thomas took him deep to make the score 4-3 A’s. Jim Mecir hung a screwball to Jose Valentin and that tied the score with two out in the ninth.

Justin Duchsecherer who will be the closer before too much longer completely dominated the Sox until Bobby Kielty homered from the right side off of lefty Neal Cotts in the 12th to end the game.

Today it will be quick. Mark Buehrle and Mark Mulder don’t throw games that last more than two hours and change. The weather is good so expect some homers. Buehrle has gotten rocked in the Coliseum before so I expect this one will be the A’s game today.

The Angels must be concerned about Bartolo Colon and Troy Percival. Both got hit hard last night even though the Angels hung on to win the game. How much longer until Frankie Rodriguez is closing for Anaheim?

Today Pedro and Jarrod Washburn under balmy skies in Anaheim. Seems like good weather will agree with Pedro and his one or two relievers that will undoubtedly follow him.

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The Red Sox take their road show to Anaheim to face a different Angels team than the one that started the season.

With Bartolo Colon on the hill tonight the Angels will bring out the new lineup with Raul Mondesi either in centerfield or DH. Can the Angels slug their way past the AL the way they did earlier in the year? Probably not. The biggest question will be which pitchers will step up and dominate in their starts.

As June begins, starting pitching should be clicking. Colon has not been the stopper that the Angels had hoped. Without an exceptional bullpen, this Angel team would be about six games worse than their 30-20 record shows this morning.

So, the question for Anaheim will the pitching standup? They have enough hitting and play good baseball to compete, but the pitching will tell the story of where they finish this season.

Derek Lowe looked awful yesterday again. The A’s lit Bronson Arroyo up last Thursday. The Sox don’t play as well on the road, this one looks like an Anaheim win tonight.

Bob Brenly is probably going to loose his job this week. Even though management likes him, the losing is wearing everyone down. There are many reasons beyond Brenly’s control for the downturn in Arizona. With the Giants pounding the Diamondbacks every game, things don’t look good for Brenly.

The Giants are riding excellent starting pitching and of course the home run bat of Barry Bonds. No reason this shouldn’t continue until they face Randy Johnson, a pitcher they somehow beat.

If the Giants make it through Colorado, winning that series, then they should be in first place within seven days.

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