One of my stranger quirks is a fondness for seeing things pushed into disarray, for speculating about the answer to the question, "What happens if…?" Not in a dangerous way, mind you, but in real simple, basic, harmless ways. So the plan to have the Yankees and Mets make up Sunday’s rainout as part of…
ANAHEIM ANGELS Placed RHP Kent Bottenfield on the 15-day DL (shoulder tendinitis); recalled RHP Lou Pote from Edmonton. [6/8] Kent Bottenfield isn’t expected to miss more than two weeks. While he hasn’t pitched like the "18-game winner" the Angels claimed they’d gotten for Jim Edmonds, he also hasn’t pitched much differently from how he pitched…
The performance from last night that really caught my eye was Eric Milton‘s win over the Oakland A’s. Milton allowed two runs and struck out 11 over seven innings. Since a disastrous outing May 15 against the Mariners, Milton has an ERA of 1.13 in five starts and 32 innings, with 35 strikeouts and just…
Two years ago, when we first introduced Pitcher Abuse Points, pitch counts were still shrouded in a veil of mystery. They were available, mind you, but they were squirreled away at the bottom of box scores, and rarely ventured from their hiding place to appear in game summaries or in televised accounts of the game….
Without getting into a diatribe about the post-1993 setup of major league baseball, it’s not unreasonable to say that the seasons since the 1994 strike have lacked a certain tension. In most years, there have been just a few even moderately close races, and the wild-card berth has sapped the drama from a couple of…
OK, so "Daily" Prospectus has been a bit of a misnomer lately, as a variety of technical and staffing glitches have cropped up. Fret not: today brings four new articles to your browser of choice, and we’ll be back next week with some great new features, a couple of divisional Notebooks and, if we can…
The Yankees and The Red Sox In your most recent AL East Notebook you compared the Wiltons of the Yankees lineup to their current Equivalent Average. The overall Yankee lineup is 125 points of EqA behind what was expected, and this may indicate some more run production in the future. Have you checked the Red…
Not as Close as it Looks The entire AL West is separated by one-and-a-half games, with the A’s currently at the top and the Rangers at the bottom. A recent ten-game stretch of intradivisional play didn’t separate the teams, nor did nine games of interleague play. While the division looks like it could provide significant…
ANAHEIM ANGELS Outrighted 2B Keith Luuloa to Edmonton. [6/6] ARIZONA DIAMONDBACKS Recalled IF Danny Klassen from Tucson; optioned RHP Nelson Figueroa to Tucson. [6/5] Nelson Figueroa was only up for a single start as the Snakes jumbled their rotation to compensate for Todd Stottlemyre’s trip to the DL and Randy Johnson’s need to skip a…
Reggie Jackson is way ahead of #2 Willie Stargell, 2,597 to 1,936, but some major leaguers are closing fast. Mike Schmidt has 1,883 and Tony Perez‘s election to the Hall of Fame with 1,867 strikeouts means that now-#5 Dave Kingman‘s 1,816 whiffs are the most by any eligible player not in the Hall. Perhaps someday,…
If major league baseball is shut down for the 2002 season as the owners wage their fiercest war ever to break the Players Association and turn back 30 years of advances, this Monday’s First-Year Player Draft will be regarded as one of the events that laid the foundation for the owners’ assault. Riding the wave…
Byung-Hyun Kim arrived on American soil last spring and brought a new pitch, the submarine slider, with him. This year, he’s proving that his cup of coffee last season–just 20 hits allowed in 28 innings while striking out 31–was no fluke. Though he lost the Diamondbacks’ game on Sunday, allowing his first home run of…
ANAHEIM ANGELS Transferred SS Gary DiSarcina from the 15- to the 60-day DL; added SS Kevin Stocker to the active roster; optioned 2B Keith Luuloa to Edmonton. [6/2] Kevin Stocker is an improvement on Benji Gil; neither shortstop is much with the glove, but Stocker provides some OBP to a team that can always use…
It’s good to be back, now that we have all regained consciousness. As many of you know, ESPN.com columnist Peter Gammons referenced Clay Davenport’s EqA rankings here at Baseball Prospectus in his June 3 column. For Gammons, long a target of our barbs over the years, to reference Clay’s work represents a significant step forward…
Some people are up in arms over Scott Boras’s comment, made during an ESPN.com chat session, that he has talked with Cardinals’ GM Walt Jocketty about Rick Ankiel‘s pitch counts. The idea that an agent–The Evil One, no less–would have a say in how a player is used in a game is anathema to many…
The Muser Extension The Kansas City Royals gave manager Tony Muser a two-year contract extension last week. Judging from the reaction of the many passionate Royals fans I’ve heard from, the team’s chances of reaching the postseason any time this decade officially expired with the move. That may be overstating the situation, but when a…