Baseball Mid Season Reports

[Sean Mota]

Baseball is my favorite sport and I would watch any team as long as the team is an interesting team.

In the NL East, 4 teams seem to be in the race - Phillies, Mets, Braves, & Marlins. Only reason they are all in the race for the Division is because they are 4 bad times. It does not seem that anyone of these teams has enough to pull from the rest of the pack. Everyone has been waiting for the Phillies to pull away, but their starting pitching has been mediocre. The Braves just don't have enough pitching either and chipper had a bad year so far. It looks like he is coming around but lots of problems in Atlanta. Marlins are strange team. Don't you think that they would have loved to have Ivan Rodriguez? I think they really miss him. He was a saviour for them last year. Becket's problems do not make it easy either. I do not know if they have the magic chemistry that made them World Champion last year. Now I come to the Mets. The team that I follow the most in the NL because I live in NY (not because I am a Mets fan).

The Mets really believe that they can compete with anyone but everytime you look at their record and see two games over .500 or one game under .500, you ask how. Their pitching staff (starters and bullpen) have been over achieving all year. How long can their pitching staff hold the boat from sinking remains to be seen. Worse defense in the NL and best ERA in the NL seem to contradict each other. It remains to be seen whether they can ge another bat in the lineup and get better offense. Could you imagine if they had me the move for Guerrero?


NL Central:

I want to start here with Houston. Houston's management is all to blame for the team they have right now. They are not winning the division and will probably fight till the end for the wildcard. First, they traded a left hander closer (wagner) to the Phils expecting that Dotel will make the transition from setup man to closer. It did not work. They traded Dotel for Beltran and moved another setup man to the closer roll. They traded Hidalgo to the Mets for nothing and Hidalgo comes to NY and becomes the savior of the Mets hitting in 12 consecutive games and hitting 8 home runs with the Mets.
They signed both Clements and Pettite in the off season with Dreams to the World Series. One of those signings blew up in their face with Pettite. They forgot that Biggio & Bagwell are getting old and their offense has not been quite what they expected. Now, rumors has it that Clements is not happy. He is doing a great job but when he leaves games the bullpen usually cannot do the job.

There's so much to write about. Let me hold off for now and have someone else give us some insight about the baseball midpoint season.

 

[LER]

I'm truly amazed at what Texas has done in the AL West. For a team that wasn't expected to do much, they are doing WAY more (so far) than expected.

For a team with no "SuperStars", they are doing very well.

All 5 All-Star picks are good ones, and I expect them to just keep it up.

Now, if the injury bug would go away, they'll do even better.

 

[Sean Mota]

Ler,

I agree with you about Texas. There's a team to get inspired about; The worst team in the Majors since they acquired Alex Rodriguez and trade Alex and they turned it around. With Texas, I will give credit to one Man - Buck. Buck has proven that he is one of the best managers when it comes to resurrect a franchise. He did it with the Yankees, Diamondbacks and now with the Texas Rangers. He is a great evaluator of young talent. Yet he has his problems with Veteran players and had to leave each time just to see the team that he developed go and win the WS. I hope he can stay with Texas and win a WS. He deserves it.

 

[LER]

Sean,
Yep, I like "Bucky Ball" as the local pundits have called it. No matter what part of the team is struggling, some other piece gets it going. Long Ball, short ball, we don't seem to care.

I do hope that Buck gets to stay for a while, and make it past round one of the playoffs.

 

[squicken]

As an Astros fan, I have to give my $.02.

Hidalgo: He had a great year in 2000, then got fat. He used to be a 5 tool player, but before the trade he was a 1 tool player. He is great in NY right now, and may continue to be. But you'll notice he'll never hit a RHP with a good fastball/slider combination. BTW Don Baylor's a great hitting coach.

Jimy Williams: Rob Neyer and Bill James have this guy as the worst coach in MLB history from a Sabermetric approach. He is terrible. He'll be fired the day after the All-Star game.

Bagwell & Biggio: Both of these guys are two of the most overrated players in MLB history. Astros fans are so stupid, they actually think these guys are as good as Derek Jeter. I wish I was joking. I have as many career playoff RBI as Biggio.

Ownership/Management: Hunsicker is the GM. He's actually pretty good. But owner Drayton McClane ties his hands. Drayton's priorities are PR #1, winning #2. He believes that Astros fans would rather come to the park and watch Baggy and Bidge than to watch a winner. He's actually right on this. But he should care more about winning.

Bullpen: Dotel's a loser. Wagner got traded b/c he said Drayton didn't care about winning (he was right) and he said Astros fans are the dumbest fans in baseball (they're tied for dumbest with several teams, including Miami and LA). Lidge, the current closer, is great. 97 mph fastball and best slider in game. His arm will blow out soon, though.

Clemens/Pettite/Rotation: All my friends laughed at me when I said I'd take Vasquez 8 days a week over Pettite. Pettite has had arm troubles, and his injuries are predictable occurences and not "bad luck." Clemens is an assh***, but he's good. Oswalt is rounding into form as the teams ace. 4 and 5 starters suck hard.

Lineup: Outs up and down lineup. No speed. No power except Beltran and occasionaly Berkman. No player is having a "special" year except Beltran, and he'll only be an Astro for about 2 more weeks. Biggest problem, no clutch hitting. Berkman is the most overrated current player. His stats come from blowouts or against bad pitching. He's nowhere to be found against good teams or in the clutch. Hleads the league in BA/RISP. But he does it in 6-1 games against the Pirates, not 3-2 games against the Cardinals.

Cardinals will run away with NL, but won't win pennant.

AL: Yankees still need another starter, but don't worry, they'll get it. The biggest story in sports the last 3 years is Yankees not winning WS. Spending twice as much as everyone else and losing makes them biggest losers in all of sports. When they win, it's not a success. There is no reason the should ever lose. If you let any football team besides Bengals, Chargers, Cardinals, Lions, or Saints spend 2x the salary cap, they would win the Super Bowl EVERY YEAR.

Still, Yankees will take AL pennant. But they'll probably lose to NL team. The Yankess just are now one of those teams that's less than the sum of its parts. Red Sox are in need of another pitcher and bat and bullpen help. For some reason, they're becoming cheap despite the fact they probably are top 5 revenue team.

NL: Phillies, Cardinals, Dodgers. Cubs WC.

AL: Yankees, White Sox, Oakland. Red Sox WC.

WS: Yankees lose to Cubs IF Cubs trade for another bat.

 

[Neutron]

If Texas can keep it up like they have been I see them in either 1st or 2nd place this year. Hopefully we can make the playoffs and get past the first round for once.