Posts Tagged ‘sports’

Intoxicated by the heady drug of victory…

Posted: August 28, 2009 by datechguy in baseball, gaming, hobbies, Sable Baseball
Tags: , , ,

…I find myself unready to make the last two trades that I should in the Sable Baseball league that I’m playing in.

I made a big trade at the all star break with the team in first, Picking up 5 players: Tori Hunter, Armando Galarraga, Adam Lind, Kevin Millwood and Orlando Cabrera for Jose Reyes who had an incredible card last year but will be a “fringe player” (unusable in our league) next year. (Dynasty Baseball generates cards based on the previous years performance). I also added from wavers veteran Omar Vizquel as extra defense and hit and run ability off the bench.

Since then I’ve gone 9-6 including series wins against three different playoff teams. Ironically I’ve gone 8-5 since Losing my starting first baseman and right fielder to injury (yes your players can get injured and suspended in this game). Hunter is hitting over 300 and has 5 homers in 15 games. Galarraga is 3-0 with one ND and in his first relief appearance for me came into a bases loaded no outs situation and struck out Pat Burrell and Lance Berkman before coaxing a ground out from Nick Markakis to end the inning. The team was so inspired they managed to score 7 (including a Solo Shot to start the inning and a two run triple from David Wright who won the previous game with a walkoff homer in the 12th) in the 6th to win 11-6. The team has not lost any game that Galarraga has appeared in.

Our trading deadline in in two weeks. Galarraga will not have a valuable card next year and Milton Bradley (.436 OBP last year, best on my team) is unlikely to be kept with Jason Bay in Left. Both have very high trade value. I have three teams I will need to pass in order to make the playoffs. Although next year I will not be managing this team (I’m league treasurer and took over when a player moved to Minnesota) the greatest value I can get for these players is right now…

…but looking at my remaining schedule It’s very possible that I can go 10-5 and perhaps even 12-3. I’ll be playing three of the teams I need to pass and I finish against the best team in the league that will have clinched their playoff spot long before then and resting starters to avoid injury or suspension. This team is clicking I KNOW I have a chance…

…but It is still much more likely I’ll go 8-7 or 7-8 but I just can’t bring myself to give up.

My next series is the last one before the trading deadline. If I manage win 2 of 3 I just HAVE to go for it.

Are you a fantasy baseball player? What do you think?

Oh and if you live in Central Massachusetts and are interested in taking over an up and coming team next year, let me know in comments and I’ll have our league commissioner contact you about our spot in our 22 year old tabletop league.

Forget the Cowbell More Yogi Berra please

Posted: August 10, 2009 by datechguy in baseball
Tags: ,

Via Baseball musings a collection of questions from fans and Yogi Berra’s answers. The most interesting in my opinion:

Randy asks: How you keep your legs in such good shape after all those years catching?

YB: “Well, I had a knee replacement seven or eight years ago. But I played a lot of soccer when I was a kid, a lot of running. We did anything. Our pitchers back in spring training, they did a lot of running. I talked to Tom Seaver at the Hall of Fame. Legs. Legs mean a lot. You don’t have to lift those weights. Soccer was real good.”

For me that’s the best endorsement of soccer I’ve ever read.

As a Boston person I really shouldn’t but you can’t help but love Yogi who is in my opinion the best catcher there has ever been. If you are building a team you want him on it period!

Privacy my a** Terry

Posted: July 31, 2009 by datechguy in baseball, opinion/news
Tags: , , , , ,

I just saw a clip of Terry’s press conference. I know his job is to manage the team as it is but don’t tell me something like this:

“There’s some people out there who need to have their integrity checked,” Terry Francona said.

He is talking about the guy who talked not about the cheating. Callahan is exactly right:

One of those people was inside the clubhouse with Francona. He stopped briefly to meet the media but said nothing. No courage on this day. David Ortiz [stats] was wearing dark glasses, but they didn’t help. The mask was off. The big lies exposed.

To steal Robert Stacy McCain’s favorite line via Clint.

Don’t piss on my back and tell me it’s raining.

Maybe John McGraw or Billy Martin would have gone along with it but I’m with Christy Mathewson and Hank Aaron on this:

But when it comes to Cooperstown, the site of Baseball’s National Hall of Fame, Aaron knows that there could be a division between players from his era, and those from the “steroid” era.

“I think that some way, something is going to be put on there. I hate to say it, but maybe an asterisk somewhere behind their name.”

No wonder there is talk about reinstating Pete Rose, justly banned though he is. He’s worth 5 of any of them. And if I was managing a team I’d want him on it, nobody I ever saw played harder. I’ll take him over any of the steroid boys. ANY of them.

Big Papi = Big Pharma. Say it isn’t so…

Posted: July 31, 2009 by datechguy in baseball
Tags: , ,

…one of great experiences of my life was taking my sons to the Red Sox parade and watching it pass us 4 times from our location in front of the Museum of science.

This story kills it.

David Ortiz, the greatest single-season home run hitter in Red Sox history, yesterday acknowledged testing positive for a performance-enhancing drug in 2003 as he launched his golden era as one of the game’s premier power hitters.

The side stories don’t matter, the money doesn’t matter. It kills it.

I can’t tell my kids to cheer for Ortiz, nor celebrate 2004 or 2007, not if I want to stress the idea of playing by the rules.

I don’t care if the Yankees have steroids guys, they’re not my team, I don’t care who revealed it. I expect better. I demand better.

So please don’t sell me bullshit like this:

So cheer up, Red Sox fans. Don’t bury your faces in your 2004 caps. Don’t turn off the computer when rival fans start with the Tainted Title rap.

The Red Sox championships are every bit as legit as the Cardinals’ title in ’06 or the White Sox in ’05 or the Marlins in ’03 or that seventh degree black belt Elvis was awarded in ’73.

That’s crap from people who want me to keep spending my cash and emotional attachment to this game to support them.

The Sox and MLB don’t need or deserve my money or my attention. If they want to get it back they have to earn it. Until I can point to my local team and say it is on the level why the hell should I care?

Plenty more here.

Older Entries
Newer Entries