Jay Can’t Root

I was watching the Notre Dame-North Carolina game today.

It was basically the only sport on after the Oklahoma-Texas game, which was pretty good, and I can always enjoy watching ND and Charlie Weis go down.

On a fourth down, ND was forced to punt and a Carolina player pulled the old running-into-the-kicker maneuver. The player in question was Richie Rich.

What the?

I have absolutely nothing against UNC cornerback and special teams guy Richie Rich, but why is someone naming someone Richie Rich? I doubt this is some kind of loving tribute to Harvey Comics, but rather someone not considering the life-long consequences that are attached to one’s legal name.

This is not a happy coincidence because Richie Rich (the character) first appeared in a comic book in 1953, Hanna Barbera created a popular Saturday morning cartoon based on the Richie Rich character that debuted in 1981 and the Carolina football player was born in 1987.

You might as well name your kid Quick Draw McGraw or Frankenstein Jr. or Fluid Man.

Well, at least it was seven years before this catastrophe.

Until I did a little Yahoo! searching (I don’t trust Google) I didn’t even know this guy existed. He looks cooler than comic book Richie Rich, but I don’t see any super-powered robot maid and I think Gloria from the cartoon is hotter than any bitches on his site.

I probably strayed way off track on this one by now, but the lesson is: don’t name your kids after cartoon characters.

Recently, Yahoo featured on its homepage a Kevin Love YouTube video as its video post of the day. The Web user was enticed by this sparkling headline:

“By now you’ve probably seen this video of Timberwolves rookie Kevin Love throwing in trick shot after trick shot. Is it real? You be the judge.”

Well as long as they’re inviting me to judge. Let’s have a look.

Here is the horrible Kevin Love King of the Trick Shots YouTube video Yahoo chose to feature:

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1GFGPqdpEAk

This is not tricky. I have made all of these shots before.

This line is fantastic: “What hasn’t been discussed is why, exactly, Love keeps making these crazy things? Now it’s time for you, the reader, to tell us why.”

I’ll tell you why: Because those shots are not very crazy – and the tape is edited. There are clear cut scenes despite the fact the teaser declares he makes “trick shot after trick shot” – I guess that doesn’t count all the missed attempts in between that were cut out.

Freakishly proficient? According to whom exactly?

I know whom. That moron with the microphone. That dude is out of control. He almost loses it when Love kicks the ball in the basket … he’s hopping around the place like his parents are on fire. He looks like that famous geek Star Wars lightsaber video with Kevin Love making H-O-R-S-E shot in the background.

If you’re looking for some impressive Kevin Love stuff, look no further than his UCLA warmups during the NCAA Tournament. Oh look I found some.

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mKye3sOif9Y

That full court flick of the wrist is probably a more difficult shot than any of the phony “tricks” he did in the first video. And it doesn’t have a ranting rejected WWF announcer.

On my way home today I heard WFAN bring up the “Mike Mussina Hall of Fame?” discussion, which I believe is one of the more interesting names of this baseball era to debate.

I wasn’t going to write about the subject until I heard Mike throw out names like Jack Morris and then he said, “Get me the book.”

Is Mussina Hall of Fame bound if he retires after this season?

Somehow I knew he wasn’t talking about Baseball Prospectus 2008: The Essential Guide to the 2008 Season, so I immediately prepared myself for a discussion based on pitcher win totals and straight ERA comparisons across generations.

And I couldn’t be more horrifyingly right.

My initial impulse is to say Mussina is in, for a long and consistent career as a top pitcher in an otherwise offensively dominated era.

For our reference point, Mike from WFAN brought up some HOF outsiders: Louis Tiant, Tommy John, Bert Blyleven, Jack Morris.

For in-the-Hall comparisons they threw out Don Sutton and Catfish Hunter

and …

The baseball reference “Similar Pitchers” comparison gives you Juan Marichal, Curt Schilling, Kevin Brown, David Wells, Carl Hubbell, Clark Griffith, Bob Welch, Charlie Buffinton, Catfish and Joe McGinnity.

Hunter, Marichal, Hubbell, Griffith and McGinnity are all HOFs. We can argue the credibility of Schilling and Kevin Brown another day – and we will never argue about Bob Welch. So, overall, that’s pretty good company. Read the rest of this entry »

NEW YORK (JCR EXCLUSIVE) — After a second straight dismal September, JayBock.com/jaycantroot has learned that the New York Mets will send a petition to the office of Major League Baseball commissioner Bud Selig, requesting that the baseball season be permanently shortened to a 145-game slate.

“I’ve done everything I can think of,” said Mets GM Omar Minaya. “From signing an always-hurt, ancient left-fielder before the season (Moises Alou), then replacing him mid-season with another old guy who’d never played the outfield and would never make it through the end of the season (Fernando Tatis), to giving a washed-up second baseman with surgically reconstructed knees a four-year deal (Luis Castillo) to firing my manager and leaving my interim manager with no viable bullpen options. What else can we do?”

“First thing in the morning, I’m going to meet with Jeff Wilpon, Fred Wilpon, Jerry Manuel and Mr. Met and we’re going to send commissioner Selig a request for a shorter season,” said Minaya. “It’s really the only option we have left if we are to have any hope in 2009.”

Minaya said that Mr. Met would likely construct the wording of the petition, as he has the higest IQ of the five.

Perhaps the reasoning for the petiton is that, in 2007, the Mets held a seven-game lead in the National League’s East Division after 145 games, but failed to make the playoffs. On Sunday, the 2008 Mets completed a second collapse, losing for the sixth time in the last nine games of the season after they held a 3.5 game lead after game number 145.

While the petition would be unprecedented, it certainly would make things easier on the Mets. Inept bullpen pitching and Alex Rodriguez-esque at-bats in clutch situations once again befell them over the final 17 games.

“It’s almost unfair to think we should have to play all those games,” said third baseman David Wright. “I constantly hear about the NFL and how they should subtract a preseason game. Well, this is the same thing, really. Except these are regular season games. What’s the big deal?”

“It can’t be my fault,” said reliever Scott Schoeneweis, who gave up a go ahead home run to the only batter he faced in that pesky old game 162. ‘Why would they pay me so much over the last two seasons if I couldn’t get anyone out? They’d just cut me, right? Think about it logically. The Mets are the stupid ones, not me.”

Schoeneweis’ bold words about the decision-making within the Mets organization are a clear indication that he will not be brought back next season, or possibly left inside Shea Stadium while it is demolished.

“(Inaudible high-pitch Spanglish),” said Jose Reyes.

The not-as-awful-Milwaukee Brewers won the National League Wild Card, despite losing 16 times in the month of September.

The petition may not be taken very seriously, as even in the days of Gehrig and Ruth, an MLB season was never shorter than 154 games.

“I have not heard of such a petition, but when it comes to my desk I will review it,” said Selig. “However, I can’t see any scenario in which we would shorten the season.”

“Off the record, honestly, when we saw how horribly that both the Mets and Brewers were playing, we thought about going without a wild card,” added Selig. “We would’ve given the Cubs a first round bye. Hell, I know we’re not supposed to root, but we’re pulling for the Cubbies around here. Think of the ratings!”

—possibly fabricated report

I heard some rumblings today – on talk radio, and read some varying opinions online – about the actions by the Patriot fans in Sunday’s miserable loss to Miami.

During the Patriots 38-13 loss to the Dolphins, the team’s worst defeat since the 2003 season-opener against the Buffalo Bills, the New Engalnd fans made their disappointment known to the players on the field.

I’ll freely admit I can be wishy-washy on a lot of subjects, but whenever this issue comes up, I cannot believe the amount of individuals in the sports world that side against the fans.

A paying customer has the right to boo anyone they want whenever they want. There is no such thing as lifetime immunity in the mind of a fan.

I am aware that the Patriots have had a tremendous run, four Super Bowls in the last seven years, and for the most part, its not the Patriots fault that Tom Brady got clipped at the ankles and is done for the season, but when the team stinks on ice – they get booed.

Alex Rodriguez won two MVPs for the Yankees, but he can still get booed. Even Mariano Rivera can get booed when he starts a season blowing games against the Red Sox – there is no lifetime pass.

The Eagles fans can boo Santa Claus if they want, Baltimore had every right to boo Tony Batista when Cal Ripken’s streak came to an end, Joe Paterno can get booed if he doesn’t know what he’s doing anymore …

Apparantly the only people that can’t boo are St. Louis Cardinal fans, who gave Larry Walker a standing ovation after he struck out in his first at bat with the team. In fact, the fans still go on message boards to talk about how awesome it was.

Sounds like a few Cardinals fans need to make their way to some Rams games. They’ll learn how to boo soon enough.

I’m going to reserve judgement on this ceremony until the end by right now, it’s not going so well.

7:10
John Sterling just has this smug dope look on his face – like he’s some kind of advanced calculus teacher or dumb movie critic that only likes artsy films.
I want to punch him.

7:15
They are announcing the starting lineup from 1922 or 1923 Yankee teams for some reason and then running out people with old uniforms on. What is the point of this?
Some guy just tipped his hat like he was really Babe Ruth.

7:19
They are still just announcing old baseball players and having people run out pretending to be them. Again, what is the point of all this?

7:24
There is the first of what I’m sure will be about 100 “De-rek Je-ter” chants.

7:33
My cousin just texted me to say she is listening to the Yankees on the radio and she thinks she is going to vomit.
I feel liek I can’t blame her.
Just how many dead players were we planning on introducing here? The two players to play for the Yankees that they don’t announce tonight are going to be very insulted.

7:43
His name is Tino. Who the hell says Constentino Martinez!

7:57
David Wells gets a rousing ovation. Talk about selective memory from the Stadium crowd.

It’s a tremendous matchup I see becoming a frequent installment to this space.

It’s the same games, the same subjects, the same storylines – very close to being the same studios – who can possible screw up NFL discussion more on a weekly basis.

Curt Menefee, Terry Bradshaw, Howie Long, Jimmie Johnson, Michael Strahan and company

vs.

Chris Berman, Chris Carter, Tom Jackson, Steve Young, Michael Irvin and company

vs.

James Brown, Boomer, Dan Marino, Shannon Sharpe, Bill Cower and company

FOX NFL Sunday should incorporate a lot more weather segments.

For my money, it’s a pick ’em. Unless, of course, Jillian Barberie is still doing the weather on FOX, then that team wins automatically.

Today’s greatest gem come from former great, Vikings wide receiver Chris Carter, whose glasses make him look smart, until he opens his mouth.

When discussing the Dallas Cowboys weapons in the passing game:

“I ain’t seen no defensive secondary that can…”

uggh … groan

But Carter fires back with a classic on the subject of Brett Favre and Aaron Rodgers. Chris Berman is bumbling on and on about whether the Packers thought they would have to take two steps back to take three forward, but now maybe they are only taking one step back before taking enough steps forward to get back to where they were with Favre …

Someone adds that Rodgers has never played a full season before. Everyone agrees that Favre’s consecutive games started streak is his greatest record.

Chris Carter summarizes: “You can’t help the club, if you’re in the tub.”

I like to include myself in that group of stat-watching persons who general consider the Yankee captain to be a little overrated.

This is not to say he has not had some exceptional offensive seasons. Take a look at 1998, 1999 and 2000, when Jeter was highly touted within that class of excellent shortstops in the AL. Even, recently, 2005, 06, 07 were another trio of great offensive seasons for Jeter.

There has been plenty written for both sides of the argument – enough that I don’t need to get into into it here – including this article in which the coding apparantly horribly broke, but I can still tell you why this last weekend jumped out at me.

Some background first:

Derek Jeter is pretty good at baseball.

He has been honored for his ability to perform in the spotlight. Mr. November, postseason superstar, captain clutch, etc. His career playoff splits go .309/.377/.469 – and in the meaningless All-Star game, which I’ll throw in just because it is considered a big stage, world is watching thing – .500/.500/.750.

He always seems to be in the thick of big moments, and whether it is his ability to always say the right thing, when prompted, or to – as cliche as this sounds – perform on a big stage … whatever it is – he has earned a level of infallibility in baseball circles. His professional status is so elevated among players and the media, I almost wish he does something one day to ruin his reputation. Not that I wish ill of Derek, but I don’t think I could even dream the horrendous act that he would have to commit to spoil his reputation, and I would love to see what that would be.

I could see tax evasion, spousal abuse, gambling losses and steriod use headlines just rolling off the back page for this guy because Alex Rodriguez gets spotted at a club with Miley Cyrus.

In 2008, as of Aug. 5, Jeter wes experiencing a very less than mediocre offensive season, batting .279/.342/.390 – that’s right, he was slugging .390! There is still a good chance he will finish this year with the lowest statistical numbers of his career for a full season in every single offensive category  – but in a stretch run where the Yankees have had exhibited no baseball skill whatsoever, Jeter has found an occasion to rise to.

With a 10-game homestand, the final homestand in Yankee Stadium history starting, Jeter needed 10 hits to overtake the record for the most career hits in the Stadium’s history.

In the first three games, Derek went 3-4, 3-3 and 3-4. Nine hits.

As if there was any way in history he would actually go into a slump at this point.

And, aside from yesterday’s HR into the right-field bleachers, he wasn’t smoking balls all over the place. There were about three or four infield hits in that package and a bloop to right, a soft liner to left … and I don’t know what all that means.  I don’t know what that means and if it makes him awesome or overrated or lucky or a “true Yankee” or if it makes him anything more than the guy who is gonna have the most hits in the history of a stadium.

But, this weekend, he passed Babe Ruth and tied Lou Gehrig on that list. Anytime your numbers get in the company of those two guys – it’s good. If I passed Lou Gehrig for most stones passed I’d be looking for “high fives” from my friends.

He’s Derek Jeter; so there is no doubt in my mind he gets the one hit he needs in the next seven home games.

With four or five more good seasons, he has a chance to have the most hits, runs, doubles and stolen bases in Yankee history. And no matter how overrated that makes him – those will still be some awesome Yankee milestones to own.

Every Patriots fan in the world got the same text message sometime on Sunday night.

It probably came from a non-Patriots fan and it probably read something like this: “Brady torn ACL. Out for the year. Hope you enjoyed the 2008 Patriots season. Let the Matt Cassel era begin!”

That was probably followed by an expletive or two, especially if it came from a Giants fan.

Since 2001, Brady and his Patriots have gone from lovable underdog who upset the powerful St. Louis Rams to football’s version of the Evil Empire.

Everybody hates them. And why not? They are easy to hate.

You take a no-good quitter like Randy Moss and all of a sudden, he has the best season a wideout has ever had in the NFL? They remind me of the 90s Yankees.

And now, after the Giants upset them in The Greatest Super Bowl Ever Played, a little more karma comes the Pats way in Brady’s injury.

You see, their J.O. of a coach has listed Brady on the injury report every game for the past two-plus years. He does this to try to “throw off” opposing teams or “have fun” with media types who take the injury report too seriously, even though everyone knows Brady will be playing. Every week.

In fact, the last time Belichick left The Golden Boy off the injury report, it was Super Bowl XXXVI, whichever f-ing Super Bowl that was.

Until Sunday.

The Coach To End All Coaches — The Genius Among Geniuses (is that correct pluralization?) — decided to leave him off the injury report in Week 1 of 2008.

And he blows out his ACL.

Karma, baby. It comes knocking for everybody eventually.

Enjoy the Matt Cassel era jerks.

Although reports are that the Pats are working out Chris Simms and Tim Rattay this week… wait, what’s the opposite of a silver lining?

There are still a few more weeks left in the season, but it looks very possible that the Yankees will miss the postseason this year, for the first time since the 1994 strike year.

In the last 12 seasons the Yankees have been to six World Series, but five of those came in the first six years of their magical run, and no WS appearances have been sniffed by the Bombers since 2003.

The Yanks are on pace for their worst regular-season finish since 2000, when they finished 87-74. That percentage was the fifth best in the AL, but the Yanks benefitted from a down division to finish first in the East and made a playoff run to beat the Mets in the Subway Series.

From 2005 on, the Yankees have sweated out late-season races to reach the playoffs. This season is closer to being the bullet the Yanks were finally unable to dodge, rather than a flash in a pan.

Instead of blaming individual personnel, whose seasons can be fleeting and whose situational hitting numbers can be impacted by luck, I decided to take a look at some overall team stats to see if there is a more over-arching pattern that shows why this year is going down the tubes.

As is the case with any team, injuries can be a factor, and I am not ignoring the number of injuries the Yankees have suffered in any season. It’s true they were hit hard this year, but I think the impact of significant player loss will be reflected in the team statistics.

For each season, I chose to use that Yankee team’s winning percentage to rank the finish that season, but I did list the differential from each season’s Pythagorean winning percentage for a balancer. I also have the teams OPS+ and ERA+ for each season along with the rank among the American League’s 14 teams.

The Games Started column is being used to reflect a point that the Yanks have suffered from an inconsistency in their pitching staff over the last few seasons. GS represents the number of games started by the top five pitchers in the Yankee rotation.

And finally, the Yankees playoff finish that season. The italicized rows indicate the seasons in which the Yankees had the best record in the Major Leagues.

One of the first things to notice is that the Yankees outperformed their Pythagorean win percentage in almost every season since 1996. Certainly they have been a fortunate team in many ways.

Quite uncoincidentally, in the years the Yankees had their best team ERA+, they also had the most percentage of games started by their top five starters. The Yankees five-man rotation made a ridiculous 152 of 162 starts in 1999 – a World Series Championships year – and 151 of 162 in 2003, when the Yankees had a Major-League high win total of 101 and lost as heavy favorites to the Florida Marlins and a super-human Josh Beckett in the WS.

Barring injury down the stretch, in 2008, the Yankees will have two pitchers with more than 30 starts (Mike Mussina and Andy Pettitte), one pitcher with at least 20 starts (Darrell Rasner) and the next man on the games started leader board will be Chien-Ming Wang, who has not pitched since June 15.

In every season the Yankees ranked in the top four in the AL in ERA+, their top five starters took the ball in at least 135 games.

The only discrepancy to this link between ERA+ and Games Started is the 2006 season, in which the Yankees had 136 games started by their top five rotation members – a high number – but finished in the middle of the pack in the AL as far as ERA+ is concerned. In that year, Randy Johnson, Shawn Chacon and Cory Lidle each had sub-average ERA+ numbers and combined for 53 starts. That 2006 season also happens to be the highest ERA+ number by a Yankee pitching staff in the last five years.

In 2008, with ranks of 6th in the AL in OPS+ and 9th in ERA+, the Yankees have their worst combined ranking in the league out of any of the seasons sampled. They are also on pace for the lowest number of games started by top five starters since 2005 – a season in which eight pitchers made 10 or more starts and Aaron Small was a ludicrous 10-0 in nine starts.

Basically, if you believe in OPS+ and ERA+, the Yankees are having their fourth worst offensive season and third worst pitching season since their run of consecutive playoff appearances began in 1996. The key difference being, in the seasons their offense faltered worse than 2008, the pitching picked up the slack and vice versa.

It’s not one man’s lack of clutch hitting or one pitchers disappointing season. Quite simply, the Yankees are having their worst collective batting and pitching season in terms of their AL ranking in both categories since Stump Merrill managed the team.