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Full Count for May 1 2006: What are the Tigers doing here?



  Who knew?

1. The Tigers, dominant?: The Detroit Tigers have been one of the worst teams in the majors for a while now. Their 43-119 record in 2003 was an absolute disaster to say the least. But in 2006, the Tigers have been one of the best teams in baseball. They have a 16-9 record, the second highest win total in the major leagues. And their dominance of the Minnesota Twins was hard to believe. In the Tigers’ three-game sweep of the Twins, the combined score was 33-1, one of the 5 highest margins in the past fifty years. They completed the sweep with a 6-0 victory on Sunday, in which Kenny Rogers (4-2) continued his quiet yet effective season. The other games in the series were won 9-0 and 18-1 by Detroit, who faces the Twins two more times in the next three weeks.

2. More than a blown save: We’ve seen a lot of horrendous bullpen play this year. Usual ace closers such as Brad Lidge, Francisco Cordero, and Eddie Guadardo have each blown multiple saves. But in the Dodgers’ 10-inning loss to the Padres, the bullpen had a memorably bad outing. Los Angeles was up 5-0 in the ninth with reliever Lance Carter in, but he was blasted for 3 runs without recording an out. Danys Baez, the usual closer, was put in next but allowed two runs to send the game to extras. Baez had been a reliable closer until this point for the Dodgers, as he had a 0.00 ERA coming into the game. But he blew the save, and in the 10th inning Mark Bellhorn recorded a game-winning single to end the game. The Dodgers would have swept the Padres had they won, but thanks to the relief pitching they fell to 12-13 on the year.

3. Shilling, a loser?: Coming into Sunday’s game against the Devil Rays, Curt Shilling had had a perfect season. He was 4-0, looking to become only the third Boston pitcher ever to win 5 games in April. But the Devil Rays brought out one of their best efforts of the season to defeat Shilling and the Sox 5-4. Shilling allowed 3 runs in 6 innings, far from awful but still his worse outing of the year. He was outplayed by Scott Kazmir, who struck out 10 and allowed 2 in 7 innings. With a 5-2 lead entering the 9th, Tampa was barely able to hold on to their lead as their bullpen almost blew it. The Rays are now 11-14, still last on the AL East but only three games of the Red Sox, who are still the division leaders.

4. Victory at last: The Atlanta Braves were glad to be winners again on Sunday, avoiding their second series sweep in a row (which would be their first such streak since 1985). They defeated the Mets 8-5, and Jeff Francoeur recorded 5 RBIs and a home run for the Braves. The Mets (16-8) have never swept the Braves at Turner Field since 1996. They are 22-52 all-time at the stadium. The Braves finished April 10-14, although they seem to always have a losing record in the first few months. The Mets look to end the Braves’ remarkable streak of 14 straight division titles.

5. Ridiculous on pace numbers from April: If the season continued exactly like it has:
1. Albert Pujols would finish the season with 91 homers and 207 RBIs.
2. Jonathan Papelbon would record 68 saves without allowing a run.
3. Pedro Martinez would have a 32-0 record.
4. Miguel Tejada would break the all-time batting average record with .422.
5. Barry Bonds would have a .547 on base percentage despite a .277 batting average.

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MLB Cost Index for May 1 2006

We’ve moved the Cost Index to Mondays because what better way is there to start a week at your crappy job but to see how GMs are wasting millions of dollars on your underachieving team. (For most you anyway, both on the job and on the team.)

For non-stats geeks, just look at the right hand column. The lower your team is on the list, the more inefficient your payroll is. However, the cheap ass Marlins will be at the top and the Yankees are always going to be at the bottom because of their exorbitant payroll. Either way, they still should be winning more games. Oh, and the average cost for a win right now? $955,000; which makes the Reds and Rockies the best bargains in the league.

** all $ are in millions.

Team 2006 Payroll GP Wins YTD
Payroll 		Cost/Win
Marlins $15.0 22 6 $2.04 $0.34
Rockies $41.1 25 15 $6.35 $0.42
Devil Rays $35.4 25 11 $5.47 $0.50
Reds $59.5 25 17 $9.18 $0.54
Brewers $56.8 25 14 $8.76 $0.63
Indians $56.8 25 13 $8.76 $0.67
D’backs $59.2 25 12 $9.14 $0.76
A’s $62.3 24 12 $9.23 $0.77
Rangers $65.5 25 13 $10.10 $0.78
Tigers $82.3 25 16 $12.70 $0.79
Cardinals $88.4 25 17 $13.65 $0.80
Blue Jays $71.9 23 12 $10.21 $0.85
Astros $92.6 24 16 $13.71 $0.86
Orioles $72.6 26 13 $11.65 $0.90
White Sox $102.9 24 17 $15.24 $0.90
Pirates $40.2 26 7 $6.46 $0.92
Mets $100.9 24 16 $14.95 $0.93
Giants $90.9 24 13 $13.46 $1.04
Cubs $94.8 23 13 $13.47 $1.04
Twins $63.8 24 9 $9.45 $1.05
Padres $69.7 24 9 $10.33 $1.15
Nationals $63.3 25 8 $9.76 $1.22
Dodgers $99.2 25 12 $15.31 $1.28
Royals $47.3 22 5 $6.42 $1.28
Mariners $88.3 26 11 $14.18 $1.29
Phillies $88.3 24 10 $13.08 $1.31
Red Sox $120.1 25 14 $18.53 $1.32
Angels $103.6 25 12 $15.99 $1.33
Braves $92.5 24 10 $13.70 $1.37
Yankees $198.7 23 13 $28.21 $2.17

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Full Count for Fri Apr 28 2006: Eight is Great

1. Lucky number 8: When a team’s offense is as loaded as the Cleveland Indians’ is, every once in a while it will explode in an outburst of runs. That is what happened on Thursday night when Cleveland smashed Josh Beckett and the Red Sox in a 15-3 rout. Beckett had one of his worst career outings, allowing 8 runs in 3.2 innings pitched. On the other hand, Ben Broussard had a career-best game. He went 4-5 with 2 homeruns and a MLB season high 8 RBIs. Broussard’s grand slam in the first inning opened up the scoring for the Indians, and his solo homerun later in the game reached the upper deck. Victor Martinez also homered for Cleveland, his 5th of the year. The Indians have now regained their major league lead in most runs scored, with 142 on the year. Beckett’s loss was his first of the year, and his ERA shot up from 2.54 to 4.50.

2. Santana returns to form: Johan Santana has been way off his 2004 form so far this year. Before last night, he had yet to win a game or throw 10 strikeouts in a game. On Thursday, he accomplished both in a 7-3 Twins win over the pitiful Royals. He pitched a season-high 8 innings and allowed 3 runs. Many Royals said his pitching was particularly baffling. Manager Buddy Bell said, “We weren’t able to do anything mainly because he was pitching so well.” Unfortunately for Royals fans, that is true for almost every pitcher they face. They have the lowest runs and homeruns totals in the majors.

3. Prolific Ponson?: It seems like every pitcher in a Cardinals uniform pitches better than they would elsewhere. This is true for Sidney Ponson, who, after two awful seasons, is 3-0 with St. Louis. His win last night against the Nationals sent his ERA down to 3.13, about half of last season’s total. Ponson got some help from the Cardinals offense in the 6-2 win. Jim Edmonds, who has been silent so far this year, hit a 3-run homerun in the first. That was all the support Ponson needed, as the Cards rolled to a 15-7 record.

4. Not that this implies anything…: Barry Bonds is in a lot of trouble right now, thanks to the fact that about 99.9% of America believes “Game of Shadows” instead of him. However, he about to pass Babe Ruth on the all-time homerun list, something that will require a celebration from the MLB, right? Wrong. Selig said that the MLB “will not celebrate” Bonds breaking Ruth’s mark, saying that “we don’t celebrate anybody the second or third time in.” Or maybe this has to do with the fact that Bonds is detested by about everyone besides himself. Anyway, Barry will have to pass Aaron to get any kind of celebration from the MLB.

5. Maybe he and Ron Artest will get along: Everyone knows by now about Devil Rays minor leaguer Delmon Young throwing the bat at the umpire after striking out. We said yesterday that Young “deserves to be punished for his actions.” Well, we got our wish, as AAA suspended Young indefinitely. The length of the suspension was not revealed, but it will likely be in the territory of Ron Artest’s season-long suspension after the infamous Pacers-Pistons brawl. Unfortunately for Young, he doesn’t have a rap album to promote while he is serving his suspension.

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MLB Power Rankings Roundup for Apr 28 2006

Everyone agrees that the White Sox are the best team in baseball. That is, except TSN who have the Tigers in the #1 slot. Since this isn’t a joke, we have to wonder what they’re thinking. Although last week, they were the only people to have the Reds in the top 10. This week, the rest of the crew is catching up and the Reds have moved up in most power rankings after leading the league in offense.

Rank Sportscolumn ESPN FoxSports Sportsline USA Today TSN.ca
1 White Sox White Sox White Sox White Sox White Sox Tigers
2 Astros Cardinals Red Sox Red Sox Mets White Sox
3 Red Sox Mets Mets Cardinals Astros Mets
4 Mets Indians Cardinals Astros Red Sox Astros
5 Cardinals Astros Yankees Mets Cardinals Cubs
6 Reds Yankees Tigers Angels Yankees Reds
7 Yankees Blue Jays Blue Jays Yankees Indians Red Sox
8 Cubs Red Sox Astros Giants Tigers Cardinals
9 Angels Angels Cubs Indians Blue Jays Yankees
10 Giants Reds Reds Braves Angels Blue Jays
11-30 more more more more more more

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We want… no… NEED this CD

Why pay $3.99 for TO’s rap song when you can get an entire album of Major Leaguers singing for $17.99? Good Sports Recordings has unleashed “Oh Say Can You Sing” on the American public.

Their web site says that it “is a COOL project with no cheesy or campy elements allowed!” We’re going to go ahead and ignore that marketing copy. When you have Coco Crisp rapping an “original track”, there’s something very wrong. Still, on 11 tracks, there must be some good stuff here right? Besides Matt Ginter of the Tigers playing banjo on a song we’ve never heard of, that is. Actually, what we really want to hear is Matt Ginter rapping.

It’s for a good cause so we won’t make fun of it too much. However, they missed a golden opportunity on a can’t miss song that would make this a bestseller. How do they not have a duet of Enter Sandman with Mariano Rivera and Billy Wagner? That’s gold, jerry, gold!

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Full Count for Thur Apr 27 2006: Babe-3



Getting ready to roll over

1. 7-11 closes at 11: It looks like Barry Bonds is trying to prove everyone wrong who said that he couldn’t play at a high level anymore. The former MVP (and steroid user) bashed his third homerun of the season on Wednesday, giving him 711 on his career. This was his second round-tripper in his last two games, and it left Bonds only 3 shy of Babe Ruth on the all-time home run list. However, the Giants lost to the Mets in a high-scoring 11 inning game. Carlos Delgado homered for New York in their 9-7 edging of San Francisco.

2. “There’s a first time for everything”: Those were the words of Ben Sheets after the Brewers swept the Braves for their first time in franchise history. Sheets achieved his first win of the season, striking out 9 in six innings of work. Derrick Turnbow picked up his eighth save of the year, and his 3rd of the 3-game series. Jorge Sosa, who was one of the best pitchers on the Braves’ staff last season, lost the game to decrease his record to 0-4. The four losses are more than he had all last season. The Braves dropped to 9-12, five games back of the Mets in the NL East. The Brewers are now 12-10.

3. 6 up, 6 out: Kevin Mench wasn’t expected to carry the Rangers with his bat this season. Mark Teixeria and Hank Blalock were supposed to be the power hitters for the Rangers. But after yesterday, Mench is leading the team in RBIs and is second in homeruns. His 6 game in a row with a homer set a new Texas Rangers record, and all of his 20 RBIs have come in the last 7 days. However, thanks to another blown save by Francisco Cordero, Oakland defeated Texas 6-4 in 10 innings. Cordero’s 5th blown save set a major league record for the month of April, and Cordero’s ERA ballooned to a pitiful 11.70. Both teams trail the LA Angels in the AL West.

4. They are Lackey-ing some runs: Remember when the Detroit Tigers were the hottest offensive team in the majors? Chris Shelton was hailed as the Next Big Thing, and the Tigers were the talk of the major leagues. Shelton and the rest of the team have stumbled recently on offense, and that was showcased in their 4-0 loss to the Angels. John Lackey shut them down, with only 1 hit allowed over 8 innings. His ERA dropped over a point to 3.09, and he recorded 8 strikeouts as well. Vladimir Guerrero provided some offense for LA, with his 5th homerun of the season. Tigers pitcher Mike Maroth came into the game with an unbelievable .49 ERA, but after four earned runs it rose to 1.85.

5. The Royals don’t even have to deal with this: It’s not like the Tampa Bay Devil Rays needed any more problems to deal with. They already had more rebuilding to do than Bill Parcells’ wardrobe designer. But now, one of their top minor league prospects is getting himself into behavioral issues. Delmon Young, a former #1 overall draft selection and minor league player of the year, was ejected for throwing a bat at an umpire after striking out. Behavior like this belongs in Little League, not a professional organization. Young should be fined and further punished for his actions. We almost feel sorry for the Devil Rays.

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Full Count for April 26 2006: Barry inches closer


1. Bonds on Babe: Barry Bonds is now only 4 homeruns behind the one and only Babe Ruth after his shot Tuesday night. Bonds took a pitch from Steve Trachsel into left field and even received chants of “Barry! Barry!” from the home crowd. His second home run on the season turned out to be the only San Francisco run in their 4-1 loss against the Mets. Xavier Nady and Cliff Floyd both homered for the 13-7 Mets, and Floyd’s shot reached McCovey Cove.

2. 14 innings, 14 wins: The Astros NL-leading 14th win of the season was much harder to obtain than their previous 13. Though they lead through 8 innings thanks to Preston Wilson’s run and RBI, Brad Lidge blew his second straight save for Houston, sending the game into extras. Of course, extra innings are nothing unusual at Minute Maid Park, as two playoff games there last year went at least 14 innings. Anyway, Preston Wilson proved to be the hero, with a 14th-inning sacrifice fly to end the game. The game lasted 4:41.

3. A new trend has started: On Monday night, Nomar Garciaparra hit a game winning grand slam in his second game off the DL. Last night, in his first game off the DL, Atlanta’s Chipper Jones hit a 2-run homer against the Brewers. However, those proved to be the Braves only runs of the night in a 4-2 loss. Geoff Jenkins homered for the host Brewers, and Prince Fielder hit a go-ahead RBI in the 6th inning. The Braves fell to 9-11, four games behind the division-leading Mets. The two teams will play at Turner Field over the weekend.

4. A baseball shootout: In a matchup of two of the best offenses in the majors, the Red Sox prevailed over the Indians by a score of 8-6. The Indians had a 4-2 lead after 3 innings thanks to Travis Hafner’s RBI double. But the Red Sox big bats proved to be too much, as both David Ortiz and Manny Ramirez homered. Ramirez’s 3-run blast in the 8th gave Boston a lead they wouldn’t give up. Curt Shilling was hit with his first non-win of the season, with 5 allowed in 6 innings. Keith Foulke was the one who picked up the win, and Jonathan Papelbon got the save.

5. Show us the money!: Minor league umpires have begun a strike, and major league umpires are protesting with them. These umpires are upset because AAA umps only make around $15,000 a year, while major league umpires make from $92,000 to $375,000, according to USA Today.com. The strike, which began March 24, has resulted in college and some high school umpires calling minor league games.

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Full Count for April 25, 2006: Rick Monday is the man

1. God Bless America: 30 years ago today, Rick Monday made the “greatest heroic act that’s ever happened on a baseball field”. After a man and his son jumped onto the field at Dodger Stadium and spread a flag out so they could burn it, Monday ran over, grabbed the flag and ran off with it. The crowd was shocked but then broke into a spontaneous rendition of God Bless America. Major League Baseball and the NFL try to manufacture this kind of patriotism all the time post-9/11 but nothing will ever come close to that one night in 1976. Monday has been offered $1M for the flag; “But the flag is not for sale. What this flag represents, you can’t buy.” (from USA Today)

2. The streak is over: Coming into last night’s White Sox-Mariners matchup, the game just didn’t seem fair. The White Sox had won 8 in a row, and the Mariners were a four-game slide. Both streaks are now over and done with, because the Mariners bested the Sox in an 11 inning brawl. Both teams had excellent games from their pitchers. Chicago starter Jon Garland allowed 3 runs over 8 innings, while Seattle’s Jamie Moyer gave up just 1 in 7 innings work. With the game tied 3-3 in the 11th, unheard of Mariners pinch hitter Yuniesky Betancourt hit a bloop single to left to score the winning run for Seattle. Chicago’s streak was the highest in the majors so far this year, and if they had won this game it would have been the team’s longest streak since 1977. They still share the MLB-best 13-5 record with the Astros.

3. The surprise of the season: Just about everyone wrote off the Reds coming into this year. Some said they had no pitching, others that they played in a murderous division. Well, they don’t, and they do, but they are still getting the job done so far this year. Last night, they scored 4 runs in the first two innings against the Nationals in a winning effort, and starter Elizardo Ramirez picked up his first career victory. This improved the Reds to a hard-to-believe 13-7 record on the year. They are tied with Houston and Chicago as the teams with the most wins in the MLB, though the Reds have one more loss than those teams.

4. And the team right below them…: St. Louis, one of the top five teams in the majors on anyone’s list, has suffered through a semi-slow start so far this year. Their record is a decent 12-7, but that puts them in 3rd place in the riotous NL Central division. Anyway, they have showed signs of their usual excellence, including in yesterday’s 7-2 win over the Pirates. Guess who homered for the Cardinals? Albert Pujols, what a surprise! It was his league-leading 12th slam of the year. Chris Carpenter continued his dominance against the Pirates as he pitched 6 strong innings to get the win. Pittsburgh has the worst record in the NL at 5-16.

5. Mr. DL wins the game: Nomar Garciaparra has joined Ken Griffey Jr. and Jeff Bagwell as players who are more often on the DL than off of it. Well, Nomar’s back, and in his 2nd game for the Dodgers, he won the game for them. With a 2-2 game coming into the 9th, the Dodgers loaded up the bases against usual stud closer Brad Lidge. Then Nomar came up, and hit a big-time grand slam off Lidge to win the game. These were his first RBIs as a Dodger. Lidge was hit with his first blown save and loss of the season.

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Full Count for April 24, 2006: Wake us up for the fight



Alou gets tossed

1. ‘Extracurricular activities’: The Giants and the Rockies aren’t exactly heated rivals, but they played like they were on Sunday. Ejections started piling up in the first inning, when Giants pitcher Matt Morris was tossed after hitting his second batter of the inning. Manager Felipe Alou was ejected automatically, and pitching coach Dave Righetti was thrown out as well after arguing. Jose Mesa was ejected for the Rockies for hitting Omar Vizquel, who in 2002 wrote a book which included a criticism of Mesa for blowing a save in the ’97 World Series. The Rockies won in 10 innings, 3-2.

2. Un-Uribe-able: Juan Uribe powered the White Sox to their eighth win in a row on Sunday. He hit 2 homeruns and 4 RBIs in the 7-3 win by the Sox, who completed a series sweep of the Twins. However, Jim Thome failed to score a run for the first time this year, snapping a record 17 game streak. The White Sox are now a major league best 13-5.

3. Yanks improve to .500: Jason Giambi is probably off the juice right now, but he’s still pretty powerful. The slugger crushed Orioles pitching for 2 homers and 5 RBIs, both season highs. Yanks starter Randy Johnson rebounded from a terrible loss last week with only 3 hits allowed over 8 innings. New York is finally above .500 on the year at 9-8.

4. The big 4-0: Greg Maddux’s best years may be behind him, but he’s sure forgotten that so far this year. At 40 years old, he has a 4-0 record so far this year, supplying nearly half of the Cubs 10 wins. After shutting down Albert Pujols and the Cardinals to no runs over 7 innings, Maddux’s ERA dropped to 0.99, best in the National League. The Cubs became the 4th team to reach 10 wins in what will be a crowded NL Central division this year.

5. Victory…at last: The Royals have been an absolute disaster this year. They have the worst record in the majors, have terrible pitching problems, and their most expensive player is hitting .173. Adding to that, they had yet to have a starter win a game all season. Until last night, when starter Jeremy Affeldt picked up the win against high-powered Cleveland. Overall, the Tribe was held to only 1 run and 7 hits in the 5-1 loss.

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MLB Power Rankings Roundup for Apr 21 2006

As expected, this early in the season, the rankings between sites are all over the place. However, most agree that the Red Sox, Mets, and White Sox are the top three teams in the league.

We’ll be tracking them every week on Fridays, folks, so come back to see where your team is ranked.

Here are the MLB Power Rankings by top sites this week.

Rank Sportscolumn ESPN FoxSports Sportsline USA Today TSN.ca
1 Red Sox White Sox Red Sox Red Sox Mets Mets
2 Mets Mets White Sox Mets Red Sox Indians
3 White Sox Red Sox Mets White Sox Indians Astros
4 Astros Indians Indians Indians Astros Cardinals
5 Cardinals Yankees Cardinals Astros Cardinals Red Sox
6 Yankees Cardinals Yankees Cardinals White Sox Giants
7 Cubs Blue Jays Braves Giants Yankees Reds
8 Indians Astros A’s Cubs Cubs White Sox
9 Giants Angels Angels A’s Brewers Cubs
10 Reds Braves Tigers Angels A’s Tigers
11-30 more more more more more more