... and Max Scherzer has struck him out twice so far...
So, Bryce Harper is making his first appearance in Nationals Park with the Phillies, and he's getting booed pretty unmercifully. Best sign I've seen so far - "Turns out Papelbon was right". You may recall that Jonathan Papelbon got into it with Bryce Harper near the end of the 2015 season.
JBDuke
Andre Dawkins: “People ask me if I can still shoot, and I ask them if they can still breathe. That’s kind of the same thing.”
... and Max Scherzer has struck him out twice so far...
JBDuke
Andre Dawkins: “People ask me if I can still shoot, and I ask them if they can still breathe. That’s kind of the same thing.”
Well that may not have gone as well as hoped, 3/5, 1 HR, 3 RBI. But the Ks as noted.
Why are you wasting time here when you could be wasting it by listening to the latest episode of the DBR Podcast?
Resurrecting this thread from early April.
The Mets have fired pitching coach Dave Eiland. The have replaced him with a name from the past, Phil Regan. The Vulture is 82.
(Connie Mack managed until he was 87, so there’s some hope, I guess.)
Brodie should’ve made the move to replace Callaway weeks ago. This is all noise in the system.
Brodie has gotten a free pass so far on terrible off-season signings (blaming Familia on the pitching coach?) And the terrible trade for his former clients as an agent. Giving up top prospects for a lazy over the hill Cano and a ineffective (currently) reliever, Diaz.
What makes it worse is watching the Yankees smash the heck out of the Astros tonight, before Judge even returns to the lineup.
When does football season start? Oh yeah, I forgot, I’m a Jets fan. Sheesh.
Long time Braves fan here. It's been really fun and exciting to watch the team this year. Such a good young group of guys. Since moving Acuna to the lead off spot on May 10 they are 26-11. They've been the best team in baseball in the month of June, leapfrogging the Phillies to take a 4 game lead in the NL East. Lineup is solid top to bottom and tonight Keuchel makes his first start which gives the starting rotation a boost. Only chink in the armor right now is lack of a consistent bullpen but even they have stepped it up here lately.
"The future ain't what it used to be."
Figure it out and extend the netting for cripes sake.
Don't give me any guff about architecture and design and hooey please, Baseball.
Just do it and move on.
Nothing incites bodily violence quicker than a Duke fan turning in your direction and saying 'scoreboard.'
I've gotten progressively worse at fantasy baseball. Over a decade ago I was crushing Hollywood directors. These days I can't even keep up with a random number generator.
Vlad Jr. is just bombing away at the HR Derby. 29 in round 1, 29 in the semis. Pretty sure he'll have another shot at 30 in the finals...
Just be you. You is enough. - K, 4/5/10, 0:13.8 to play, 60-59 Duke.
You're all jealous hypocrites. - Titus on Laettner
You see those guys? Animals. They're animals. - SIU Coach Chris Lowery, on Duke
The Angels’ tribute game to Tyler Skaggs tonight was pretty special. 7 runs in the 1st (including a 2-run HR AND a 2-run 2B by Trout in that inning) capped off with a combined no hitter (and the longest relief performance in a combined no hitter since the famous Ernie Shore/Babe Ruth game). All after his mom threw out the first pitch. Not a lot of dry eyes in the stadium (or on this particular couch).
Somehow, I'd never heard of that Shore/Ruth game. Neat recap: https://sabr.org/latest/mcmurray-100...s-perfect-game
As for the first pitch by the mom, it was by far the best (straightest, truest) one I've ever seen (and, from the mound itself, not from in front of the mound as they often are). That alone makes it remarkable. And then considering the overwhelming emotion of the moment, just beyond rational belief to me, and the sign of something mystical.
Link: https://www.mlb.com/video/skaggs-mom...-out-1st-pitch
Bob Gibson has been diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. Chemotherapy scheduled to begin Monday:
https://www.espn.com/mlb/story/_/id/...creatic-cancer
Bob Green
Jankees may be moving in on our Marcus Stroman, many rumors he is NY-bound...
https://www.mlb.com/athletics/news/b...ess-in-al-west
The A's are really hot right now. They have moved from about 12 games back of Houston in the West to 4 games back. They are currently 14 games over .500 and seem to be on a tear, even with slugger Khris Davis in a slump. CF Ramon Laureano is blossoming into a star, both offensively (19 HRs) and defensively (home run robbery today, scary arm); best corner infielders in the league, Chapman and Olson, Semien playing SS at an all-star level and pitching seeming to come around, though still up for debate. They own the second wild card for the moment and are half a game from the first.
If they keep winning at this rate, they'll take the league. However, they are now heading into a difficult road trip with series at the Central-leading Twins and at Houston. Tough sledding. Long season.
It was an exceptionally well-thrown first pitch. No question about it. However, there is an alternative explanation that makes it quite understandable and rational. I concede, it may not be the one many people prefer in moments like these, when we contemplate life, death, and our connections to suddenly-lost loved ones. Discounting mystical forces at a moment like this probably makes some people want to reach for the nearest tomato, egg, rotten cabbage, or these days, milkshake. But consider this possibility, revealed by the audio at 0m 47s:
I have my own seemingly-mystical baseball experience with my beloved grandpa, a long-suffering Red Sox fan who died during the 2004 ALCS, with the Sox down in a hole to the Yankees.* Grandpa was old enough to have seen Babe Ruth pitch for the Sox, so one could be tempted to see the ending of his life as propitiation for the sin of selling Ruth to the Yankees, which of course resulted in The Curse of the Bambino."We worked in the backyard, all day" - Tyler's brother, Garrett
We are a pattern-seeking species. We infer agency and causation, even in the presence of randomness. It's how we work. We'd rather make a Type I error than a Type II error, given the choice.
I think it was 18 yrs earlier that the Red Sox were on the verge of beating the Mets in 6 games. I was at Duke at the time, and have a memory of the TV telecast going to a reporter in the stands prior to the last out (ha!) and interviewing a very old person, who said they had waited long to see the Red Sox win again after 1918: "I always felt the Good Lord would let me live to see the Red Sox win again someday ..." Shortly thereafter, Mookie Wilson hit a grounder up the first base line. It's hard to believe that person lived another 18 years, but I guess it's not impossible.
*My memory was that he died when they were down 0-3 and were losing late in game 4 ... but after checking, it appears he actually died between games 2 and 3. Funny how that slightly-embellished memory heightened the drama ... and sense of mystical connection.