MLB 2013 Thread

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When you read his name, its funny, but it was pronounced Koonts.


There's always Dick Pole. :wink:


Alright, it's June 13th and where are the Toronto Blue Jays? Last place! Yeah baby!

I do know how it was pronounced, but you know it was constantly pronounced by others in a see you next Tuesday fashion. I imagine taking attendance the first day of school each year or whenever a substitute teacher worked was an adventure.
 
I do know how it was pronounced, but you know it was constantly pronounced by others in a see you next Tuesday fashion. I imagine taking attendance the first day of school each year or whenever a substitute teacher worked was an adventure.

Yeah, school must have sucked at times for him. Plus, he added the "Rusty" to it making it even funnier. Wonder if they called him that in grade school or if it was a baseball nickname.


I'm sure y'all caught the video of the Met fan falling down in the stands the other day. Poor guy. It was funny, though. At least he didn't land on anybody.
 
Gump:


"It worked for a while.

The 2013 Yankees suffered a rash of injuries the likes of which the franchise had rarely seen … yet somehow made it work. New York somehow cobbled together a group of replacement killers that overachieved in a way no one thought possible. Lyle Overbay cranked eight homers and knocked in 28 runs in his first 46 games while slugging .484. Vernon Wells, the $21 million–a–year running joke who drove Angels fans to gin and despair, suddenly turned (back) into a world-beater, hitting .310/.394/.638 through his first 15 games and looking like the best and most unlikely reclamation project of the offseason. Travis Hafner owned a 1.104 OPS at the end of April. Spurred by these scrap-heap finds, along with a beefed-up bullpen, Hiroki Kuroda assuming the role of ace, and a few breaks, the Yanks blazed through the first few weeks of the season. That was long enough for the Bombers to stake their claim at or near the top of the AL East. By the time Curtis Granderson, Kevin Youkilis, and Mark Teixeira all returned to action, the Yankees' successful stand-ins figured to stand down, and a near-full-strength roster could carry forward the team's plan to surge back to the postseason.

Granderson and Youkilis are now back on the DL. Teixeira reinjured his wrist Saturday and has been ruled out for the next couple days, and maybe more. Overbay stopped hitting, as did Hafner, and Wells is hitting an unimaginably terrible .134/.141/.165 over the past month. The Yankees did snap a five-game losing streak Sunday, though just barely, turning a 6-0 ninth-inning lead into a 6-5 nail-biter. The low point came Thursday, when 5-6-7 hitters Hafner, Youkilis, and Wells combined to go 0-for-23 with nine strikeouts in an 18-inning loss to Oakland.

The Yankees are averaging just 3.9 runs per game, worse than any other AL team except the lowly Astros, Mariners, and White Sox. The last Yankees team to score fewer runs per game was the 1990 edition, a squad that averaged just 3.7 runs per contest. Much of that is related to the broader changes in the game over the past couple decades, with baseball seeing a surge in offense starting in the early-to-mid '90s that lasted about a decade and a half, leading to a significant downturn in the past few years. But even that is somewhat offset by the Yankees' move to the more hitter-friendly, new Yankee Stadium in 2009. Bottom line, this is a lineup stuffed with lousy hitters.

Fixing these kinds of mounting problems could pose a major challenge in the short term, given how many holes the lineup now has, how far the offense has sunk, and how few obvious in-house solutions exist. The latest report on Granderson has him potentially not returning until after the All-Star break as he rehabs a broken finger. Youkilis has had back problems for years and they are clearly getting worse. Even if he is healthy there's no way we should expect Youkilis to hit anywhere near as well as he did in his prime. Derek Jeter has resumed baseball activities but likely won't be back until the second half, since he'll need a while to get back up to game shape. Francisco Cervelli? Eduardo Nunez? Alex Rodriguez? They're all nowhere near returning and they might not be worth much even when they do. Cervelli and Rodriguez being named in the Biogenesis mess could complicate matters down the road, too. Per FanGraphs, the only Yankees position players on pace to post above-average seasons are Brett Gardner and Robinson Cano. And neither Wil Myers nor Oscar Taveras is walking through that door anytime soon.

What the Yankees do have is an impressive collection of young pitching, both on the major league roster and on the farm. Much of that talent is now toiling in the parent club's bullpen, which ranks fourth in baseball for Wins Above Replacement. As in any other season, many teams desperately need pitching, both now and for the future. And in an odd way, the sheer misery of the Yankees' offense works in the team's favor, since it's much easier to upgrade replacement-level talent like Wells, Overbay, or David Adams than it is to do so with actually competent talent. The gap between someone like Alex Rios and the Yankees' current offerings wouldn't be that much smaller than the difference between a just-below-elite All-Star and a league-average player.

The good news is that it could be a lot worse. With few truly elite teams in the American League this year, pitching, one or two stars, and a couple of trades could be enough to get the Yankees back to the playoffs for the 18th time in 19 years."
 
Thanks for posting this. The offense is so bad and so annoying to watch. How many sub-.300 OBP guys can a lineup have? At least they have better pitching than those early 1990s teams.

Read this today on twitter (running the risk of annoying Hewson/Headache):

Jeff Sullivan
‏@based_ball
last 30 days, Yankees position players at -0.3 WAR, worst in baseball

Just awful. It's incredible that they are still in the hunt, though.
 
This is the Yankees lineup for tonight. Vomit-inducing. Yes, that's Vernon Wells batting cleanup.

Brett Gardner CF
Jayson Nix SS
Robinson Cano 2B
Vernon Wells LF
Thomas Neal DH
Ichiro Suzuki RF
David Adams 3B
Lyle Overbay 1B
Chris Stewart C
 
Imagine Manny on the Yankees. He's left the Taiwanese team and is hoping to play in MLB again. Hafner is sinking like a stone as the Yankees' DH. Why not?
 
The thing that shocks me about how badly my team sucks, is that they're a) not in last place and b) manage to stay within 14-16 games out fairly consistently.
 
I went to the stadium to see Yankees-Dodgers last night. I now haven't seen the Yankees score a single run in the past two games I attended live. It was cool to see Puig, though. He had a pretty good game.
 
I went to the stadium to see Yankees-Dodgers last night. I now haven't seen the Yankees score a single run in the past two games I attended live. It was cool to see Puig, though. He had a pretty good game.

Too bad you didn't catch Game 1 instead. Ichiro had a vintage game.
 
I went to the stadium to see Yankees-Dodgers last night. I now haven't seen the Yankees score a single run in the past two games I attended live. It was cool to see Puig, though. He had a pretty good game.

Puig is causing a bit of a stir out here. Not much else to root for with that team outside of him and Kershaw.

Nice to see Mattingly at the Stadium. I hope he does not get shitcanned by the Dodgers but if he does, hopefully he comes back where he belongs.
 
Puig is causing a bit of a stir out here. Not much else to root for with that team outside of him and Kershaw.

Nice to see Mattingly at the Stadium. I hope he does not get shitcanned by the Dodgers but if he does, hopefully he comes back where he belongs.

It'd be nice to see Mattingly managing the Yankees, but it looks like they'll re-sign Girardi.
 
And he comes from the Joe Torre school of bullpen management. Scott Proctor would love him.
 
Girardi is a better manager than Mattingly, would love Donnie back as a hitting coach only. He's a horrid strategist.


Yes, Girardi is doing a good job. Mattingly still has some more learning to do as a skipper.

Meanwhile, Andy just let up a Yankee Stadium HR to Longoria. Ratfarts!
 
Did you guys know that FUCKING DELMON YOUNG is the starting right fielder for the Phillies? It's true: FUCKING DELMON YOUNG is the starting right fielder for the Phillies.

Also, Mike Adams is having his arm amputated and is out for the season.

P.S. Michael Young is the Phillies' three-hitter.

P.P.S The Phillies have a payroll of $160 million.
 
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