David's Baltimore Orioles fan blog

I’ve been in Denver all week and was able to attend two Rockies games at Coors Field.

Among the highlights:

I saw Evan Longoria hit home runs – his 15th and 16th - on back-to-back nights.  The first shot got the Rays on the board in the first inning on Tuesday en route to their 12-4 win over the Rockies, whose 11-game winning streak came to an end.

I watched Rays’ phenom David Price pitch against Aaron Cook, who in my opinion should have been the MVP of last year’s All-Star Game.  (People have a hard time voting for a player from the losing team, but Cook was more valuable to the N.L. than J.D. Drew was to the A.L.)  Price got knocked around for four runs in the second inning, but recovered to last seven innings while allowing five runs.  He was outpitched by Cook, however, who went seven innings and gave up just three runs.  Each surrendered two home runs, but the ones hit off Cook were both solo shots (including Longoria’s).  In addition to a solo homer, Price served up a three-run bomb.

Continue reading "Mile High Baseball"

Big Unit wins a big game

Randy Johnson won his 300th career game Thursday against the Nationals.  In a dominant performance, Johnson surrendered two hits, two walks and an unearned run, and needed just 78 pitches to get through six innings.  At the age of 45, the Big Unit became the second-oldest – and at 6’10” without a doubt the tallest – pitcher to reach the milestone.  Congratulations, Mr. Johnson.

Braves bid farewell to one of their own

Johnson is not the only active pitcher with 300 career wins, but he is now the only one under contract.  Unfortunately, the last great pitcher to accomplish the feat got some bad news this week.  In a surprise move, the Atlanta Braves released 43-year-old Tom Glavine on Wednesday.  The veteran southpaw has been around so long he was actually drafted the year before I was born, and outside of his five-year affair with the Mets (2003-2007), Glavine has been a Brave his entire professional career.

Continue reading "Big Unit wins a big game"

What is going on with all these position players pitching in big-league games this year?  Usually a phenomenon that, as I recall, occurs once or twice a season, in 2009 there have already been five such instances.  Nick Swisher (Yankees), Cody Ross (Marlins), Jonathan Van Every (Red Sox), Josh Wilson (Diamondbacks), and Paul Janish (Reds) have taken the hill with their teams down late in the game.

Just three position players were called on to pitch in 2008, but the 2009 season is well on its way to witnessing double-digits.

It’s worth noting that infielder Josh Wilson has now pitched for two teams (Tampa Bay in ’07 and Arizona in ’09), but Wilson, who was recently picked up by the Padres, has a chance to separate himself even further from the rest of the pack.  Wouldn’t it be cool to see a position player pitch for two different teams in one season?

Continue reading "Put me in, Coach! I’m ready to…pitch?"

I usually stick to MLB news, but I’d like to share this anecdote about college ball.

Williams College and Amherst College – both Division III schools located in Massachusetts – played each other in the 150th anniversary of college baseball this past weekend.  The very first college baseball game took place on July 1, 1859, and was played between the same two schools.

Among those in attendance – in addition to yours truly – were Pittsburgh Pirates owner Robert Nutting (Williams ‘84) and former Red Sox (and Expos) GM Dan Duquette (Amherst ’80).  Williams won 8-5.

How ‘bout that?

How about Yovani Gallardo?  On April 29th, the Mexican-born right-hander threw eight shutout innings while striking out 11, surrendering just two hits and one walk, and hitting a homerun in the bottom of the 7th inning to account for all the scoring in the Brewers 1-0 victory over the Pirates.

Continue reading "150th anniversary of college baseball"

Someone at MLB must have read my blog post from 5/9/08 and decided that All-Star voting needed to start even earlier this season just to see my reaction.  Keep in mind that the 2009 season began later than the 2008 season.

The one good thing about early voting is that maybe the fans will show some support for Evan Longoria over the injured Alex Rodriguez and vote the reigning Rookie of the Year starting third baseman for the American League.

Longoria is hitting .415 and has already hit five home runs and seven doubles – good for a slugging percentage of .830.

How ‘bout that?

How about the Cleveland Indians?  On Tuesday against the Royals the Tribe infield turned six double-plays.  Still not impressed?  How about when I tell you they did it in SIX CONSECUTIVE INNINGS (3rd-8th)?

Continue reading "All-Star balloting reminds me of the Iowa Caucus"

Tragedy struck the baseball world Thursday morning, as Angels 22-year-old rookie Nick Adenhart, hours removed from making his season debut, died in a car crash.  In just his fourth-ever big-league start, Adenhart threw six shutout innings against the Athletics and left with his team leading 3-0, only to see the Angels’ bullpen surrender the lead and lose 6-4.

Sadly, Adenhart is not the first active player in recent memory to lose his life prematurely.

Darryl Kile was found dead in his Chicago hotel room in 2002.

Cory Lidle crashed a small plane into a New York apartment building in 2006.

Josh Hancock crashed a car into a tow truck in 2007.

Joe Kennedy died suddenly of hypertensive heart disease in 2007.

All five players, coincidentally, were pitchers.

Continue reading "A sad day for baseball"

I don’t know what the players on most of the World Baseball Classic teams were thinking during the tournament, but the players on Team Italy really wanted to win.  The WBC wasn’t spring training for most of them, like it was for the United States.  I’m not suggesting the Americans did not try as hard as everyone else, but each of Team U.S.’s players knew he had a great job to go back to when the WBC was over.  Some of the players on the Italian roster, by contrast, were auditioning for big-league or even minor league jobs.

One of the purposes of the WBC is to generate interest in baseball in other countries where the game is not as popular in the hopes of developing young athletes into major league ballplayers.  The biggest success stories in this regard were the victories by the Italians and the Dutch.  While Italy stunned (and eliminated) Canada in their first round matchup, the Netherlands shocked the entire baseball world by beating the Dominican Republic not once but twice, and nearly beating Puerto Rico as well.  The Dominicans clearly did not play their best baseball, but the Dutch deserve a lot of credit.  Even after falling behind in the top of the 11th inning of their elimination game, the Netherlands came back to score two runs in the bottom of the 11th to move on to Round 2 of the WBC.

Continue reading "WBC thoughts from an inside perspective"

After spending a week and a half with Team Italy, I am home again and am beginning to collect my thoughts on the World Baseball Classic. Highlights from my trip include meeting Curtis Granderson (one of my favorite players), watching Italy beat Canada in Toronto, and being in the press box to hear Peter Gammons leave a voicemail for Scott Boras.

Other baseball people I met include Mike Piazza, Mike Hargrove, Tom Trebelhorn, Jeff Conine, Omar Minaya, and Jeremy Guthrie. I rode an elevator at the Rogers Centre with Larry Walker and Justin Morneau, who were heading to a Toronto Maple Leafs game after Team Canada’s loss to the United States in the opening game. At various points I found myself just a few feet away from Derek Jeter, Dustin Pedroia, Chipper Jones, and Andres Galarraga.

Continue reading "Back from the WBC; first thoughts"

Big baseball news in my life: I recently found out that I will be working as the Press Liaison for Team Italy at the 2009 World Baseball Classic, set to begin next week.

In the second-ever WBC, 16 teams representing countries in all continents other than Antarctica – from the 2006 WBC champion Japan to Australia to the Republic of South Africa – will vie to be crowned true World Champions of the game of baseball.  (One could argue that the World Series is something of a misnomer.)  With baseball not scheduled as one of the events at the 2012 Olympics in London, the WBC is an opportunity for players to represent their countries on the big stage.

Among players participating in the WBC are Derek Jeter and Dustin Pedroia (USA), Alex Rodriguez and David Ortiz (Dominican Republic), Ichiro Suzuki and Daisuke Matsuzaka (Japan), Russell Martin and Justin Morneau (Canada), Carlos Delgado and Carlos Beltran (Puerto Rico), and Miguel Cabrera and Carlos Zambrano (Venezuela).

Continue reading "WBC-bound"

Alex Rodriguez doesn’t regret taking steroids; he regrets getting caught.  If he were truly sorry for taking steroids, why didn’t he come clean before he was outed?  I’m pleased the truth came out because I don’t like Rodriguez and don’t want him to get a free pass to the top of the record books. He’s a greedy sell-out, is full of himself, and thinks he’s above the game he plays.

What I hope is that A-Rod’s confession after the fact will finally get fans to quit thinking he is a god.  There’s never a race in the All-Star balloting for American League third basemen; perhaps this will change in 2009 because people are ashamed to vote for a cheater (though the time he cheated on national television – when he slapped the ball out of Bronson Arroyo’s glove in the 2004 ALCS – didn’t change a thing).

Continue reading "The truth comes out: A-Rod’s past isn’t so clean"