A Wacky Friday

Today is an odd day. We have a story that, honestly, I couldn’t make up because it is so odd. I also want to touch on a city who I no longer have respect for, and it shouldn’t be too hard to figure out which one I’m referring to either. I’ll also touch on a ball player who reached a milestone, highlight a waiver-wire deal, and discuss a guy who went on the DL after a week of saying he didn’t need to go on the DL. But really, this entry is more about those first two stories than anything else.

Bizarre story of the day: Adrian Beltre had to be placed on the DL due to an injury that he suffered in the most unwelcomed of places – and no I don’t mean his wallet. Beltre took a baseball of his, er, well, I don’t want to write what you all want me to write so I will be mature and say his testicle. Lucky for him he will not need surgery, but the larger question is, how can a man who plays third base in professional baseball not wear a protective cup? I wore a cup, literally, from my first season of organized baseball when I was seven years old, and I gotta tell you, it saved my life – twice – including one time where I swore that I not only would never have kids but that I would be unable ever to urinate for myself ever again. Thank goodness my parents made me where a cup when I was a kid. It was never comfortable, and on those hot days it would certainly work up quite the rash on the old inner thighs, but that is a hell of a lot better than the alternative as Mr. Beltre is now experiencing. Let’s see how stupid he is when he returns from the injury — will he be sans cup or will this brush with danger change his mind?

Reason 8,764 why you cannot trust teams when it comes to reporting on the health of their players. Nelson Cruz was placed on the DL today, retroactive to August 4th, with that sore ankle of his. The Rangers have said all along that he wouldn’t be placed on the DL and that he was day-to-day. Uh huh. At least they did activate Ian Kinsler as planned.

The Red Sox added Alex Gonzalez to help them out at shortstop with his solid glove work in exchange for Kristopher Negron in a waiver-wire deal. Apparently the Sox didn’t notice that Gonzalez is hitting all of .210 with three home runs in 243 ABs this season. Hell, Nick Green was hitting .233 with six home runs in 257 ABs. This signing pretty much assures us that Jed Lowrie won’t be a factor the rest of the way, even when his wrist heals enough for him to be activated from the DL.

It’s still early on this Friday with a whole host of games yet to be played, but I find it hard to believe that anyone at the dish will have a better outing and Derrek Lee who had three hits, including two doubles, on his way to knocking in seven runs before he was removed in the Cubs’17-3 route over the Pirates. Lee is now hitting .290 with 23 home runs and 81 RBI. Other than his injury filled 2006 campaign (175 ABs), Lee has socked at least 20 homers with 80 or more RBI in his last seven healthy seasons. For those of you keeping track, there are only two first baseman in the game that can match that run of seven of eight season since 2002 with 20/80 and they are Carlos Delgado and Mark Teixeira. Why no mention of the almighty, Albert Pujols? Don’t forget he started his big league career playing the outfield and third base.

Oh, and before I go… do I have this right?

The city of Philadelphia, the city of brotherly love, apparently doesn’t have one iota of compassion for our brethren on this planet, i.e. animals. How can I make that claim? Name another city in the country where a convicted dog murderer and a man who believes that cock fighting is perfectly fine are set to be parts of two professional teams. The Eagles signed Mike Vick to help aid the team in their quest for a Super Bowl victory while the Phillies signed Pedro Martinez to help their quest to return to the World Series. I’m all for teams trying to improve themselves, but at the same time, sometimes enough is enough. I’m not saying that people don’t deserve second chances in life, but at the same time Philly, when you are mercilessly protested by groups like P.E.T.A (People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals) you have no one to blame but yourselves. Really, could you have done a better of job putting a bull’s-eye on your backs?

By Ray Flowers

A Day in the Life

Today in my survey o’ the world of baseball, we will spend some time detailing a couple of big bats in Chicago, a speedster in Cincinnati and the plight of a first round fantasy stud whose season is teetering on the brink of irrelevance due to injury.

Let me get this straight. Jake Fox hit a blistering .424 with 17 home runs and 51 RBI in just 41 games at Triple-A this season doing his best Rogers Hornsby imitation. He was then called up to the Cubs where he went 5-for-12 (.417). His reward? He was sent back to Triple-A Iowa. With Derrek Lee finally starting to turn things around at first base – he has hit .345 with a .457 OBP in his last 15 games – the Cubs just weren’t able to find any room on the diamond for Fox since they don’t trust his glove at third base. If you are Fox, how disappointed are you right now? You’ve knocked in a run a game and are hitting better than Ted Williams ever did yet you cannot even find a way to convince your team to find a bench spot for you. Don’t know about you, but if that was me I would be calling my agent telling him I want the hell out of there immediately.

The White Sox made a distressing announcement today, though I cannot say that it wasn’t somewhat expected. Carlos Quentin, on the sidelines with plantar fasciitis in his foot, will likely be out until at least the All-Star game. For his part, Quentin stated that the injury isn’t really PF, it’s actually a torn tendon in his left foot. No matter what the actual injury, the bottom line is that Quentin will remain sidelined for at least another month. What this likely means is that potential free agent Jermaine Dye (there is a mutual option for $12 million for 2010), and his 15 home runs will not be traded, that is if the White Sox think they can still contend despite a 27-32 record. The White Sox simply need a big right-handed bat in the middle of the lineup to remain competitive, and with Quentin out, Dye is their best option though Paul Konerko hasn’t been bad at the dish with a .295-8-39 line this season.

Grady Sizemore, already on the DL due to a strained elbow, will be held out of baseball activity for another five days at which time an MRI will be performed to determine whether or not the joint has healed sufficiently to allow him to return to the diamond. Don’t know about you, but I’m thinking that he will eventually need arthroscopic surgery. What is clear is that with nine home runs and seven steals, Sizemore won’t be going 30/30 this season like he did last year, and in fact he may be hard pressed to go 20/20, a total he has reach in each of the past four seasons. Actually Sizemore has hit at least 22 home runs, with at least 22 steals and at least 100 runs in each of the last four seasons, and that is the third longest such streak in baseball history (tied with Carlos Beltran and Barry Bonds). Willie Mays is the all-time leader with six straight seasons from 1955-60 while the second man on the list is Bobby Bonds with a stretch of five-straight years from 1969-1973. As for Beltran, he has eight home runs, seven steals and 34 runs putting him on pace for about 23 home runs, 20 steals and 98 runs, so he’ll need to kick things up a notch himself is he wants to move into a second place tie on the list.

Willy Taveras is 0-for-16 and as a result his average has dropped to .250 on the season. Even worse for a leadoff hitter, his OBP is just .307 which has caused the Reds to drop him to second in the order. “Willy is my leadoff man,” manager Dusty Baker said. “It’s temporary.” Apparently the fact that Taveras is hitting .250 with a .308 OBP over his last 663 ABs dating back to the start of last season doesn’t matter to Baker and the Reds as they seem stuck on the fact that Willy T. has posted 80 steals since the start of last season. That’s great guys, but do you really need someone to tell you that steals are wonderful, but they don’t matter if you don’t get on base enough to be an effective weapon out of the leadoff spot?

By Ray Flowers

Windy City Baseball

I ended up discussing a bunch of White Sox player’s in today’s piece (and even a Cubs’ one). Don’t worry if you aren’t a fan of Chicago baseball though as I also made sure to touch on some non-Windy City events as well.

Jose Contreras was sent to the minors after looking pitiful in six starts this season during which time he went 0-5 with a 8.19 ERA and a 1.89 WHIP. He also struck out no one (5.16 K/9) while walking everyone (4.85 BB/9). The only shock here is that he wasn’t removed from the rotation sooner. If you bought in to his hot spring, well, you should have listened to your truly who told you this would happen. By the way, the other washed up returning starting pitcher for club, Bartolo Colon, has been serviceable for those of you in AL-only leagues going 2-3 with a 4.88 ERA and a 1.44 WHIP. Of course, his K/BB is awful 1.92, and his average fastball is just 89 mph (92.5 for his career). I would be worried about the bottom falling out there as well.

Bobby Jenks sent a message to the Rangers’ Ian Kinsler on Sunday when he fired a fastball behind Kinsler. “You don’t want to see anyone getting hurt. My intentions were not to hurt the guy, like I said before, but I was protecting my guys as well.” The White Sox apparently are tired of their hitters being hit as they have been plunked 16 times this season, the fifth highest total in the majors (they have been hit by a pitch 331 times since the start of 2004 while their pitchers have only hit 270 batters). I love Jenks for standing up for his guys, but really, what does it serve to say what he did to the press? The only thing he will likely be serving is a suspension being that he admitted to throwing at Kinsler. That brings up another point – since when did throwing at a guy deserve a suspension? If that was the case back when the game was played by men, how many times would Bob Gibson have been suspended? He may never have pitched a single complete game (he amazingly threw 255 in 528 starts) if today’s rules were in effect when his menacing presence was terrorizing hitters in the 1960′s and 70′s.

Watch out for the Angels who are just half a game behind the Rangers in the AL West. The club sits about in the middle of the back in the pitching categories, but they are about to get all kinds of healthy with John Lackey and Ervin Santana likely to join the club by the end of the week. Playing .533 ball without your two best starters is certainly something. If you add into that mix two of the top-20 starting pitchers in the American League, well, you’ll have to feel pretty good about things if you cheer along with the Rally Monkey and the Angels.

Derrek Lee’s neck injury isn’t career threatening. That was the report out of the Chicago Tribune. Look, any injury to someone’s neck is extremely serious, but was the club really so concerned about Lee and his bulging disc that they thought he might have to hang up his spikes? If so, they sure did a good job of making it sound like he was merely missing a few days to rest things. He should avoid the DL and be back by mid-week according to the latest reports.

Lastings Milledge suffered a broken finger at Triple-A, an injury that will obviously remove the possibility of returning to the bigs in May, not that he deserved to be considered for a promotion anyway. Milledge is hitting only .253 in 79 at-bats as he had failed to go deep once while knocking in only four runners. Lastings did steal six bags but with an OPS of .594 it was clear that he clearly hadn’t taken the demotion as a chance to prove everyone in Washington wrong. Now it looks like a return before the end of June seems unlikely.

J.R. Towles has been sent back to the minors as the Astros are ready to activate Humberto Quintero. Towles hit only .182 with the club this year, but he was only given 11 at-bats behind Ivan Rodriguez. At some point, don’t the ‘Stros need to move this guy? Towles was hitting .344 in Triple-A this year, is just 25 years old, and owns a .302 average and .866 OPS in more than 1,100 minor-league ABs. Certainly someone can find a backup job for a bat like that behind the dish can’t they?

By Ray Flowers