This is an article that was originally published on HardRockSports.com.
HardRock sports columnist Scott A. Ham examines how the return of Darryl Strawberry will effect the New York Yankees roster.
Sometime before September 1st, the Yankees are expected to place Darryl Strawberry on their major league roster, just in time to qualify him for post-season play. Strawberry has missed the entire season to date after being arrested in April in Tampa, Florida for cocaine possession and solicitation of a prostitute. This was another in a long line of career setbacks, the previous being a cancerous tumor found in Darryl’s colon before the ’98 playoffs.
I’m not going to delve into the rights and wrongs of what Darryl did and didn’t do because frankly, I don’t think it’s relevant at this point in time. People can argue for weeks about third and fourth chances for repeat drug offenders in sports and what a crime it is for these players to be allowed to continue playing. Each argument has their side and I do have an opinion on the matter, but I feel no need to dissect the topic. It’s been discussed ad nauseam and to review it further would make me, well, nauseous.
What I do want to look at is how the return of Darryl Strawberry will effect the Yankees. This September, it will be roughly eleven months since the Straw last faced major league pitching. Granted, major league pitching isn’t quite what it used to be, but it’s a far cry from batting practice and triple-A ball. Is it reasonable to think that Strawberry can make a worthy contribution to the Yanks after having a tumor removed from his colon, undergoing over a dozen chemotherapy sessions, dealing with an arrest and the legal affairs surrounding it, and not playing organized baseball for the four months following? At 37 years of age?
That’s an important question unto itself, but there’s more to Darryl’s return than just his performance. If Darryl is to be placed on the major league roster before September 1st, someone has to be removed from the roster in order to make room. The Yankees are carrying a 11-man pitching staff, 8 starting position players including the DH, 2 backup infielders in Sojo and Leyritz, and a backup/part-time catcher in Girardi. That’s 22 players, none of which are going anywhere because they’re mostly veterans and have no options for the minors.
That leaves the left-field tandem of Chad Curtis, Shane Spencer, and Ricky Ledee. Darryl will supposedly be playing a decent amount of left field upon his return, rendering one of the resident three excess baggage. A lot of speculation has flown around about the status of Chad Curtis who, you might remember, made quite a stink following the recent brawl between the Yankees and Mariners because Derek Jeter was joking with his buddy Alex Rodriguez after the festivities had calmed. In essence, Curtis was right to be mad, but very wrong to confront Jeter about it publicly. Some people have wondered if there is a chemistry problem following the clash.
Forget about it. Curtis isn’t going anywhere. He’s a favorite of George Steinbrenner’s, is one of the fastest guys on the bench, plays a better than average outfield, and has a good on base percentage (.382). He’s also making $2 mill a year which doesn’t make him attractive to most clubs and he can’t be demoted. Curtis stays.
That leaves Ledee and Spencer. If you’ve watched the Yanks last two games against Eric Milton and Jose Rosada, you know they don’t hit lefties very well. Shane Spencer is right-handed and hits with power while Ledee and Darryl are both left-handers. The Yanks are loaded with left-handed power (O’Neill, Martinez, switch hitters Bernie Williams, Chili Davis, and Jorge Posada) so the most expendable bat would have to be from the left side. That means Ledee gets the heave-ho.
The irony of the situation is, Ledee has proved to be the best hitter of the three. Leading into Tuesday night’s game, Ledee was hitting .289 with an OPS (OBP + SLG) of .815, .969 since the All-Star break. Curtis is hitting .242 with an OPS of .750 and Spencer’s at .236/.687. Spencer has had a lot of health problems this season, most notably an irregular heart beat that surfaced just as he was getting hot at the plate. He hasn’t been able to find his groove since he returned from rehabilitation.
The man who will be replacing him, Darryl Strawberry, posted .247/.896 last season, but that was before spending a year away from the game. I don’t think it’s reasonable to expect those numbers from Darryl again. Going into Tuesday night, in 13 minor league games, the Straw was hitting .255 with 1 home run and 6 RBI. It may still be early to tell exactly how well he’ll perform, but those numbers do not make the outlook good.
The Yankees, hopefully, will handle this situation correctly and bring Darryl up on August 31st, the day before the playoff roster freeze. If Ledee is not on the roster on September 1st and the Yanks add Darryl the night before, Ledee won’t need to make the trip to Columbus because the rosters expand to 40 players in September opening another spot for him. Ledee should have enough time logged in the majors this season that he would still be available for post-season play if he weren’t on the roster September 1st. This little piece of maneuvering hopefully would keep the situation from creating a problem with Ledee who has battled the minor-league red-eye flights the last two years of his career. He’s finally showing what he can do on the major league level and he deserves the opportunity to expand on it.
This and That
Roger Clemens continued to be an enigma Monday after throwing 8 2/3’s of shutout ball against the Twins. Yeah, I know, it’s only the Twins, but keep in mind that the Yanks two best starters, Cone and Irabu, lost the two previous games to those same Twins. Eric Milton, the former Yankee prospect who was traded to the Twins in the Knoblauch deal, took the mound against the Yanks and pitched well, giving up 1 earned run over 8 innings . . . Since the July 31st trading deadline, former trade-bait Andy Pettitte has gone 3 – 0, allowing 2 earned runs over 23 innings, giving 14 hits and striking out 18 . . . Since David Cone’s perfect game, he’s gone 1 – 3, 11 ER, 28 2/3 IP, 31 H, 31 SO . . . Jim Leyritz hit his first triple Tuesday night since his rookie year of 1990. The King’s leadoff triple in the seventh inning sparked a 4 run rally that lead to the Yanks 5 – 2 win over the Twins . . . With Tuesday’s win, the Yanks move 1 game ahead of the Cleveland Indians for the best record in the majors. They also moved 7.5 games ahead of Boston and 10 games ahead of Toronto in the East.
Wednesday, August 18, 1999
Monday, August 16, 1999
Stats, Stats, Stats...
This is an article that was originally published on HardRockSports.com.
HardRock sports columnist Scott A. Ham takes a look at the most common statistics used in baseball and why they don't tell the whole story.
About a week ago, Mark Smith, a fellow columnist here on HardRock Sports, wrote about a statistic called Offensive Winning Percentage (OW%) and it’s relative unimportance. Mark made some good points in his article, notably the uselessness of extravagant statistics like OW% to the common fan. After trading an e-mail or two with Mark, I got to thinking: while Offensive Winning Percentage is indeed pretty worthless to the everyday fan, how do the everyday statistics stack up for the stat lovers such as myself? More importantly, are the statistics that Major League Baseball broadcasts and other media sources ram down our throats as the most vital statistics in judging a pitcher really the best?
The main statistics I am referring to, offensively anyway, are batting average, home runs, and RBI’s – The Big Three. Home runs speak for themselves. There is no way to manipulate a statistic like home runs because it is simply a count of how many home runs a player has hit and in the world of offensive production, there is no feat larger or more effective in a single at-bat. Batting average follows a close second in the relative importance given to The Big Three. Everyone remembers the home run hitter before the scrappy guy who hits for a high average, evidenced by the relative silence Tony Gwynn has played in San Diego, amassing a certain Hall of Fame career. The batting champion is considered a dubious achievement, as it should be, especially in this offensive age. But simple average doesn’t tell the whole story in deciding what makes a good hitter.
More on that later. First, let’s take a deeper look at home runs. There is no doubt as to the importance of the home run in the game of baseball. Babe Ruth’s raw ability to hit home runs in an era where it was a minor factor in the game single-handedly propelled baseball into a major economical force. Fans loved it and marveled at Ruth and his ability to hit Mr. Spalding so darn far. The most hallowed records in baseball have been so appointed because of the fan’s fascination: 70 home runs in a single season and 755 career home runs.
As impressive as it is, the simple ability to crush the long-ball does not make the complete player. There was a long period in baseball where the prototypical power hitter clubbed 30 home runs a season but batted in the mid .200’s. Maybe the best example of this is Hall of Famer Reggie Jackson. Mr. October hit 563 home runs over a career spanned seasons that never featured the type of offense we’re seeing today. Reggie’s homers paid a price, though. Over 21 seasons, Jackson batted .262 and struck out 2597 times in 9864 career at-bats, or 1 every 3.8 at-bats. That number is so high that no one in the history of baseball has struck out more than Reggie has.
Still, he hit 563 home runs, right? That is a great number but was he getting the most offense out of his plate appearances? For the sake of comparison, take a look at Joe DiMaggio’s stats. Some of you may be thinking, “DiMaggio played in an offensive era,” which he did, but many of the years Joe put up solid numbers were very similar in league ERA to the era in which Reggie played. DiMaggio, over 8 less seasons and 3,043 less at-bats belted 361 home runs and hit for a career .325 average. That’s pretty good. If DiMaggio had the same number of at-bats as Reggie, he probably would have hit 500 plus home runs. But here’s where the two really separate. Reggie, in 3000 more at-bats, drove in 1702 runs, while DiMaggio drove in 1537. 3000 less at-bats, 165 less RBI’s. That’s quite a difference. True, DiMaggio played on the historical Yankees which scored a lot of runs, but if you look at a seasonal breakdown of the teams Reggie played on, they scored a lot of runs, too.
I love to see home runs as much as anyone, but simply hitting them isn’t enough. The modern baseball player has made this pretty apparent. Sluggers like Griffey, Bonds, and more recently Sosa have combined power with average to put together some truly dominating seasons that produce more for a team over the long haul. A better statistic for judging a player’s overall power is slugging percentage. Slugging percentage takes home runs into account, but also factors double, triples, etc., but places the most weight on home runs. What it gives you is a more balanced determination of how effective a player’s power is used. For instance, Mark McGwire’s slugging percentage in 1998 was .752, an extraordinarily high number. Conversely, this season Nomar Garciaparra and Derek Jeter are posting great percentages without tremendous home run totals at .609 and .584 respectively.
That leads us into batting average. Batting average is a great way of judging how many hits a player will get over a period of time but it doesn’t always tell you if a player is a good hitter. On the surface, that doesn’t seem to make much sense, but I’ll explain.
A hitter has a number of different jobs, all of them depending on their placement in the order and the situation in the game. If you hit in the third spot, your job is to drive in runs and hopefully keep the rally going. If you’re a lead-off or number two hitter, your job is to get on base and give the guys behind you a chance to drive you in. But for almost every given situation, the main purpose of the batter is to get on base. Driving in runs at the expense of an out is sometimes necessary, but it is the least efficient way to win a ball game. Ideally, you want as many players to reach base as possible to maximize your chances to score.
Batting average doesn’t give you all of the details in deciding who gets on base. A great example of this is Rickey Henderson in 1996. Rickey hit a mere .241 in 148 games that season, which would impress nobody. That fact alone would prevent most people from allowing him to bat in the lead-off spot. However, Rickey’s OBP was .410, a very good number for a lead-off man. He wasn’t hitting great, but Rickey was getting the job done and that’s all that matters.
Likewise, a good batting average can be somewhat deceiving as well. Blue Jay fans have been singing the praises of second baseman Homer Bush this season and his .328 batting average. What they don’t mention or fail to notice is Bush’s OBP is a mere .358, very weak for hitter with that average. This, of course, is the result of Bush’s 12 walks in 317 plate appearances. Yes, Bush does get the bat on the ball, but he’s not hitting for power and therefore not positioned to be a power hitter, so his OBP is very important to his overall success. In Bush’s defense, he’s 26 years old and is playing his first full season in the majors so it will take him some time to adjust. When he does, with his speed he could become a valuable lead-off hitter.
The On Base Percentage discussion segues perfectly into our talk on Runs Batted In for the simple reason that the two are directly related. Outside of the solo home run, there is no way to drive in a run without having a runner on base. It’s impossible, which makes RBI’s the least effective statistic in judging the individual because it relies so much on the performance of the team. Yes, you do need to be a good hitter to drive in runners, but being a good hitter isn’t enough. A good example of this is Vladimir Guerrero last year with the Expos. Guerrero batted .324 with 38 home runs, but he “only” drove in 109 RBI’s. I say “only” because that is the lowest total of RBI for a player who batted at least .250 and hit 37 home runs. Why? Montreal scored 584 runs in 1998 with Guerrero driving in 109 and scoring 108. Vlads was responsible, in one form or another, for 37 percent of the Expos offense. Imagine what he would have done surrounded by players with high OBP.
Don Zminda created the most convincing argument regarding important individual stats in STAT’S Baseball Scoreboard 1998. Zminda compiled the statistics of every single game played between 1993 and 1997 and compared the numbers of the opposing teams. By comparing who led in each category over the course of 1000 plus games, Zminda was able to calculate a winning percentage for each statistic.
For example, the team that led each game in On Base Percentage won at a percentage rate of .824. Tops on the list was a statistic I swear by called OPS, which is simply On Base Percentage plus Slugging Percentage. The team that led in OPS won .852 of their games. Next came OBP (.824), then slugging percentage (.820), batting average (.804), and fewest errors (.669). RBI’s were purposefully left off this list because the team that drives in the most runs will obviously win the game. The interesting thing about these statistics is the lower placement of batting average compared to slugging percentage and on base percentage, and the huge gap between batting average and the first non-offensive statistic, fewest errors. If there is any determining factor over what statistics are important, it is what leads your team to the most victories.
Does all this mean that batting average, home runs, and RBI’s are worthless stats? Hardly. All three are great determiners of the skill of a player. But like almost everything, they have their flaws and benefit from the help of other stats like On Base Percentage and Slugging Percentage to round out their overall impact.
HardRock sports columnist Scott A. Ham takes a look at the most common statistics used in baseball and why they don't tell the whole story.
About a week ago, Mark Smith, a fellow columnist here on HardRock Sports, wrote about a statistic called Offensive Winning Percentage (OW%) and it’s relative unimportance. Mark made some good points in his article, notably the uselessness of extravagant statistics like OW% to the common fan. After trading an e-mail or two with Mark, I got to thinking: while Offensive Winning Percentage is indeed pretty worthless to the everyday fan, how do the everyday statistics stack up for the stat lovers such as myself? More importantly, are the statistics that Major League Baseball broadcasts and other media sources ram down our throats as the most vital statistics in judging a pitcher really the best?
The main statistics I am referring to, offensively anyway, are batting average, home runs, and RBI’s – The Big Three. Home runs speak for themselves. There is no way to manipulate a statistic like home runs because it is simply a count of how many home runs a player has hit and in the world of offensive production, there is no feat larger or more effective in a single at-bat. Batting average follows a close second in the relative importance given to The Big Three. Everyone remembers the home run hitter before the scrappy guy who hits for a high average, evidenced by the relative silence Tony Gwynn has played in San Diego, amassing a certain Hall of Fame career. The batting champion is considered a dubious achievement, as it should be, especially in this offensive age. But simple average doesn’t tell the whole story in deciding what makes a good hitter.
More on that later. First, let’s take a deeper look at home runs. There is no doubt as to the importance of the home run in the game of baseball. Babe Ruth’s raw ability to hit home runs in an era where it was a minor factor in the game single-handedly propelled baseball into a major economical force. Fans loved it and marveled at Ruth and his ability to hit Mr. Spalding so darn far. The most hallowed records in baseball have been so appointed because of the fan’s fascination: 70 home runs in a single season and 755 career home runs.
As impressive as it is, the simple ability to crush the long-ball does not make the complete player. There was a long period in baseball where the prototypical power hitter clubbed 30 home runs a season but batted in the mid .200’s. Maybe the best example of this is Hall of Famer Reggie Jackson. Mr. October hit 563 home runs over a career spanned seasons that never featured the type of offense we’re seeing today. Reggie’s homers paid a price, though. Over 21 seasons, Jackson batted .262 and struck out 2597 times in 9864 career at-bats, or 1 every 3.8 at-bats. That number is so high that no one in the history of baseball has struck out more than Reggie has.
Still, he hit 563 home runs, right? That is a great number but was he getting the most offense out of his plate appearances? For the sake of comparison, take a look at Joe DiMaggio’s stats. Some of you may be thinking, “DiMaggio played in an offensive era,” which he did, but many of the years Joe put up solid numbers were very similar in league ERA to the era in which Reggie played. DiMaggio, over 8 less seasons and 3,043 less at-bats belted 361 home runs and hit for a career .325 average. That’s pretty good. If DiMaggio had the same number of at-bats as Reggie, he probably would have hit 500 plus home runs. But here’s where the two really separate. Reggie, in 3000 more at-bats, drove in 1702 runs, while DiMaggio drove in 1537. 3000 less at-bats, 165 less RBI’s. That’s quite a difference. True, DiMaggio played on the historical Yankees which scored a lot of runs, but if you look at a seasonal breakdown of the teams Reggie played on, they scored a lot of runs, too.
I love to see home runs as much as anyone, but simply hitting them isn’t enough. The modern baseball player has made this pretty apparent. Sluggers like Griffey, Bonds, and more recently Sosa have combined power with average to put together some truly dominating seasons that produce more for a team over the long haul. A better statistic for judging a player’s overall power is slugging percentage. Slugging percentage takes home runs into account, but also factors double, triples, etc., but places the most weight on home runs. What it gives you is a more balanced determination of how effective a player’s power is used. For instance, Mark McGwire’s slugging percentage in 1998 was .752, an extraordinarily high number. Conversely, this season Nomar Garciaparra and Derek Jeter are posting great percentages without tremendous home run totals at .609 and .584 respectively.
That leads us into batting average. Batting average is a great way of judging how many hits a player will get over a period of time but it doesn’t always tell you if a player is a good hitter. On the surface, that doesn’t seem to make much sense, but I’ll explain.
A hitter has a number of different jobs, all of them depending on their placement in the order and the situation in the game. If you hit in the third spot, your job is to drive in runs and hopefully keep the rally going. If you’re a lead-off or number two hitter, your job is to get on base and give the guys behind you a chance to drive you in. But for almost every given situation, the main purpose of the batter is to get on base. Driving in runs at the expense of an out is sometimes necessary, but it is the least efficient way to win a ball game. Ideally, you want as many players to reach base as possible to maximize your chances to score.
Batting average doesn’t give you all of the details in deciding who gets on base. A great example of this is Rickey Henderson in 1996. Rickey hit a mere .241 in 148 games that season, which would impress nobody. That fact alone would prevent most people from allowing him to bat in the lead-off spot. However, Rickey’s OBP was .410, a very good number for a lead-off man. He wasn’t hitting great, but Rickey was getting the job done and that’s all that matters.
Likewise, a good batting average can be somewhat deceiving as well. Blue Jay fans have been singing the praises of second baseman Homer Bush this season and his .328 batting average. What they don’t mention or fail to notice is Bush’s OBP is a mere .358, very weak for hitter with that average. This, of course, is the result of Bush’s 12 walks in 317 plate appearances. Yes, Bush does get the bat on the ball, but he’s not hitting for power and therefore not positioned to be a power hitter, so his OBP is very important to his overall success. In Bush’s defense, he’s 26 years old and is playing his first full season in the majors so it will take him some time to adjust. When he does, with his speed he could become a valuable lead-off hitter.
The On Base Percentage discussion segues perfectly into our talk on Runs Batted In for the simple reason that the two are directly related. Outside of the solo home run, there is no way to drive in a run without having a runner on base. It’s impossible, which makes RBI’s the least effective statistic in judging the individual because it relies so much on the performance of the team. Yes, you do need to be a good hitter to drive in runners, but being a good hitter isn’t enough. A good example of this is Vladimir Guerrero last year with the Expos. Guerrero batted .324 with 38 home runs, but he “only” drove in 109 RBI’s. I say “only” because that is the lowest total of RBI for a player who batted at least .250 and hit 37 home runs. Why? Montreal scored 584 runs in 1998 with Guerrero driving in 109 and scoring 108. Vlads was responsible, in one form or another, for 37 percent of the Expos offense. Imagine what he would have done surrounded by players with high OBP.
Don Zminda created the most convincing argument regarding important individual stats in STAT’S Baseball Scoreboard 1998. Zminda compiled the statistics of every single game played between 1993 and 1997 and compared the numbers of the opposing teams. By comparing who led in each category over the course of 1000 plus games, Zminda was able to calculate a winning percentage for each statistic.
For example, the team that led each game in On Base Percentage won at a percentage rate of .824. Tops on the list was a statistic I swear by called OPS, which is simply On Base Percentage plus Slugging Percentage. The team that led in OPS won .852 of their games. Next came OBP (.824), then slugging percentage (.820), batting average (.804), and fewest errors (.669). RBI’s were purposefully left off this list because the team that drives in the most runs will obviously win the game. The interesting thing about these statistics is the lower placement of batting average compared to slugging percentage and on base percentage, and the huge gap between batting average and the first non-offensive statistic, fewest errors. If there is any determining factor over what statistics are important, it is what leads your team to the most victories.
Does all this mean that batting average, home runs, and RBI’s are worthless stats? Hardly. All three are great determiners of the skill of a player. But like almost everything, they have their flaws and benefit from the help of other stats like On Base Percentage and Slugging Percentage to round out their overall impact.
Sunday, August 8, 1999
Are You Ready to Rumble?
This is an article that was originally published on HardRockSports.com.
In light of the skirmish in Seattle, HardRock Sports columnist Scott A. Ham takes a look at the ethics of baseball and the sometimes harrowing results.
Friday night saw yet another Major League Base-brawl break out, this time between the New York Yankees and the Seattle Mariners. The fight was billed as Yanks-Mariners III: The Battle in Seattle, with Don King over-looking the umpires and cable revenues. The proceedings took on a bit of a festive demeanor when it was realized this was the first brawl in Safeco Field’s history, prompting a mid-inning ceremony and the distribution of little patches for the player’s uniforms.
In all seriousness, the fight that broke out in the eighth inning was as ridiculous as it was familiar. The scuffle started when Yankee pitcher Jason Grimsley gave up a three-run tater to ARod, cutting the Yankees’ lead to three, 11 – 8. Edgar Martinez stepped to the plate and Grimley immediately let one fly under his chin. Martinez backed out of the way and was promptly plunked on the left bicep with the next pitch. Home plate umpire Gary Cederstrom, the senior umpire on duty with a whopping 3 years service under his belt, wasted no time in ejecting Grimsley from the game without a warning. Standard procedure for this situation says that Cederstrom should have then issued a warning to both teams, stating any intentional beanings would result in an automatic ejection. Cederstrom didn’t do that.
Cut to the top of the ninth. Chuck Knoblauch steps to the plate with Frankie Rodriguez on the mound. Rodriguez, the pitcher that started another bench-clearing brawl in L.A. on July 11th, hits Knoblauch on the hip. Knobby walked off to first as Cederstrom approached the mound, asking Rodriguez if he was throwing at Knoblauch. Frankie obviously answered no, prompting the Yankee bench to yell at the ump for not taking the proper steps and ejecting Rodriguez for the obvious retaliation. Frankie didn’t appreciate this, charged Joe Girardi who stood on the on-deck circle, and Friday Night at the Fights kicked into high gear.
Does any of this sound familiar? This same exact scenario has spurred hundreds of brawls, most of them violent looking and later coined “bad for baseball” by some late night sports anchor. There’s no doubting these incidents are ugly, but you have to wonder just how bad they are for baseball. Fans love the big brawl, players actively participate in them, and pitchers constantly put themselves in the position to start them. If bench-clearing brawls are so bad for baseball, why does everyone seem to be such willing participants? Are people worried that the mass of messy, uncontrolled, and often ineffective violence witnessed on a ball field during one of these impromptu Wrestlemanias is going to have an adverse effect on the young viewer at home?
Baseball is rather unique in the realm of team sports in that it is truly “no contact.” Basketball isn’t supposed to be a contact sport in the way football is, but it is very physical and features such interesting terms as “flagrant fouls.” Hockey is a sport that allows two individuals to openly fight until someone either hits the ice or is incapable of defending themselves. Your punishment? You get to sit in a box and lick your wounds for five minutes then go out and pay the guy back who decked you. Football is just football, a sport designed on physical clashes where the main goal of the defense is to put people on the ground.
Not baseball. In baseball, it’s possible to play a complete game without two players ever coming into contact with each other. The entire interaction revolves around a little leather and thread ball that’s thrown, caught, and beaten with long pieces of lumber. Since it is the only connection between a pitcher and batter, the ball also serves as a weapon that can be wielded unexpectedly and with very dangerous results. The ethics of baseball have been so refined that there are times when it is actually acceptable to strike a player with a baseball and they have to accept it.
Does this make any sense? Can you truly call it “baseball ethics” when it involves striking someone with a hard ball thrown at 90 miles per hour? For a sport that has built itself on the lack of contact and violence between it’s participants, baseball has found a strange and dangerous method to invoke the social ethics that underlie the game, so much so that to violate these ethics can lead to bench-clearing brawls between teams.
Ballplayers will tell you that these “ethics” are necessary to the game. After all, the possibility is there for a pitcher to take a shot at injuring anyone on the opposing team and with the designated hitter in the American League, that same pitcher is guaranteed to never receive the same treatment. Oftentimes, as in the Mariners game detailed above, when a pitcher retaliates against the other team, he is said to be protecting his players. If a pitcher doesn’t stand up and retaliate, players become irate and claim they’re not being defended and are somehow weaker to the other team. To take abuse from an opposing pitcher without retaliation denotes a lack of respect from the opposition and a frail, less competitive attitude from the victims. This in turn, I assume, leads to more losses or else nobody would care, right?
Who knows. These ethics do have their place in baseball but there are instances when the dangerous nature of their implementation have to make you wonder.
Take the case of Ben Christensen, the Wichita State pitcher who was chosen first in the draft this year by the Chicago Cubs. Christensen is a top-flight right-handed prospect who throws really hard and was ranked among the top collegiate pitchers. He is also responsible for ending another player’s career.
On April 23rd of this year, Christensen was warming up on the mound, preparing to face the University of Evansville. Anthony Molina waited on the on-deck circle to lead off the game. Apparently, Christensen felt Molina was too close to home plate and was timing his pitches, so he let a ball fly thirty feet away from home plate towards Molina. The ball struck Molina above the left eye, giving him a one-inch gash and permanent vision damage. All of this before the game even started.
After the game, Christensen and his coaches were confrontational and even accusatory, saying Christensen had acted correctly. The coaches later rescinded these remarks and Christensen has repeatedly apologized to Molina, but to no avail. In the end, Christensen has himself a contract with the Chicago Cubs and Molina is left with a weakened eye and the thoughts of a baseball career that could have been, all because of the supposed ethics of the game. I also find it hard to believe that if Molina actually was timing the pitches, he wouldn’t have seen the ball approaching him before he was hit. Molina would have to be watching Christensen throw in order to time him, yet when he gets hit, he never sees the ball coming.
Players and people within baseball have actually stated that what Christensen did, in theory, was in line with the proper ethical actions. According to them, if Molina was timing pitches, that was a big no-no and Christensen had every right to brush him back. The fact that he lost control of the ball and permanently injured another player is simply a terrible accident.
Terrible accidents shouldn’t be given the opportunity to occur. Any action, regardless of the ethical or moral standards it is used to uphold, should not be so extreme that it can end a player’s career. I think it’s time to take a long hard look at the way the personal side of the game of baseball is handled, especially with the effects trickling down to the college game.
In light of the skirmish in Seattle, HardRock Sports columnist Scott A. Ham takes a look at the ethics of baseball and the sometimes harrowing results.
Friday night saw yet another Major League Base-brawl break out, this time between the New York Yankees and the Seattle Mariners. The fight was billed as Yanks-Mariners III: The Battle in Seattle, with Don King over-looking the umpires and cable revenues. The proceedings took on a bit of a festive demeanor when it was realized this was the first brawl in Safeco Field’s history, prompting a mid-inning ceremony and the distribution of little patches for the player’s uniforms.
In all seriousness, the fight that broke out in the eighth inning was as ridiculous as it was familiar. The scuffle started when Yankee pitcher Jason Grimsley gave up a three-run tater to ARod, cutting the Yankees’ lead to three, 11 – 8. Edgar Martinez stepped to the plate and Grimley immediately let one fly under his chin. Martinez backed out of the way and was promptly plunked on the left bicep with the next pitch. Home plate umpire Gary Cederstrom, the senior umpire on duty with a whopping 3 years service under his belt, wasted no time in ejecting Grimsley from the game without a warning. Standard procedure for this situation says that Cederstrom should have then issued a warning to both teams, stating any intentional beanings would result in an automatic ejection. Cederstrom didn’t do that.
Cut to the top of the ninth. Chuck Knoblauch steps to the plate with Frankie Rodriguez on the mound. Rodriguez, the pitcher that started another bench-clearing brawl in L.A. on July 11th, hits Knoblauch on the hip. Knobby walked off to first as Cederstrom approached the mound, asking Rodriguez if he was throwing at Knoblauch. Frankie obviously answered no, prompting the Yankee bench to yell at the ump for not taking the proper steps and ejecting Rodriguez for the obvious retaliation. Frankie didn’t appreciate this, charged Joe Girardi who stood on the on-deck circle, and Friday Night at the Fights kicked into high gear.
Does any of this sound familiar? This same exact scenario has spurred hundreds of brawls, most of them violent looking and later coined “bad for baseball” by some late night sports anchor. There’s no doubting these incidents are ugly, but you have to wonder just how bad they are for baseball. Fans love the big brawl, players actively participate in them, and pitchers constantly put themselves in the position to start them. If bench-clearing brawls are so bad for baseball, why does everyone seem to be such willing participants? Are people worried that the mass of messy, uncontrolled, and often ineffective violence witnessed on a ball field during one of these impromptu Wrestlemanias is going to have an adverse effect on the young viewer at home?
Baseball is rather unique in the realm of team sports in that it is truly “no contact.” Basketball isn’t supposed to be a contact sport in the way football is, but it is very physical and features such interesting terms as “flagrant fouls.” Hockey is a sport that allows two individuals to openly fight until someone either hits the ice or is incapable of defending themselves. Your punishment? You get to sit in a box and lick your wounds for five minutes then go out and pay the guy back who decked you. Football is just football, a sport designed on physical clashes where the main goal of the defense is to put people on the ground.
Not baseball. In baseball, it’s possible to play a complete game without two players ever coming into contact with each other. The entire interaction revolves around a little leather and thread ball that’s thrown, caught, and beaten with long pieces of lumber. Since it is the only connection between a pitcher and batter, the ball also serves as a weapon that can be wielded unexpectedly and with very dangerous results. The ethics of baseball have been so refined that there are times when it is actually acceptable to strike a player with a baseball and they have to accept it.
Does this make any sense? Can you truly call it “baseball ethics” when it involves striking someone with a hard ball thrown at 90 miles per hour? For a sport that has built itself on the lack of contact and violence between it’s participants, baseball has found a strange and dangerous method to invoke the social ethics that underlie the game, so much so that to violate these ethics can lead to bench-clearing brawls between teams.
Ballplayers will tell you that these “ethics” are necessary to the game. After all, the possibility is there for a pitcher to take a shot at injuring anyone on the opposing team and with the designated hitter in the American League, that same pitcher is guaranteed to never receive the same treatment. Oftentimes, as in the Mariners game detailed above, when a pitcher retaliates against the other team, he is said to be protecting his players. If a pitcher doesn’t stand up and retaliate, players become irate and claim they’re not being defended and are somehow weaker to the other team. To take abuse from an opposing pitcher without retaliation denotes a lack of respect from the opposition and a frail, less competitive attitude from the victims. This in turn, I assume, leads to more losses or else nobody would care, right?
Who knows. These ethics do have their place in baseball but there are instances when the dangerous nature of their implementation have to make you wonder.
Take the case of Ben Christensen, the Wichita State pitcher who was chosen first in the draft this year by the Chicago Cubs. Christensen is a top-flight right-handed prospect who throws really hard and was ranked among the top collegiate pitchers. He is also responsible for ending another player’s career.
On April 23rd of this year, Christensen was warming up on the mound, preparing to face the University of Evansville. Anthony Molina waited on the on-deck circle to lead off the game. Apparently, Christensen felt Molina was too close to home plate and was timing his pitches, so he let a ball fly thirty feet away from home plate towards Molina. The ball struck Molina above the left eye, giving him a one-inch gash and permanent vision damage. All of this before the game even started.
After the game, Christensen and his coaches were confrontational and even accusatory, saying Christensen had acted correctly. The coaches later rescinded these remarks and Christensen has repeatedly apologized to Molina, but to no avail. In the end, Christensen has himself a contract with the Chicago Cubs and Molina is left with a weakened eye and the thoughts of a baseball career that could have been, all because of the supposed ethics of the game. I also find it hard to believe that if Molina actually was timing the pitches, he wouldn’t have seen the ball approaching him before he was hit. Molina would have to be watching Christensen throw in order to time him, yet when he gets hit, he never sees the ball coming.
Players and people within baseball have actually stated that what Christensen did, in theory, was in line with the proper ethical actions. According to them, if Molina was timing pitches, that was a big no-no and Christensen had every right to brush him back. The fact that he lost control of the ball and permanently injured another player is simply a terrible accident.
Terrible accidents shouldn’t be given the opportunity to occur. Any action, regardless of the ethical or moral standards it is used to uphold, should not be so extreme that it can end a player’s career. I think it’s time to take a long hard look at the way the personal side of the game of baseball is handled, especially with the effects trickling down to the college game.
Friday, August 6, 1999
There's No "I" in Leyritz
This is an article that was originally published on HardRockSports.com.
HardRock Sports columnist Scott A. Ham takes a look at the return to New York of the man who would be King.
Newspapers. We read them every day. Some are tabloid, like the New York Post, and some smell of prestige like the New York Times or the Washington Post. It has been said, and probably accurately, that the standards of journalism decreased as more publications became available, making the all-important “scoop” an even larger financial enterprise. Clever as they are, the media has averted the conflicts that come with printing unproven stories by labeling them “rumors.” How often do you see the words “allegedly,” “ostensibly,” or “possibly” in today’s media when “supposedly” covering a story? It used to be rags like the National Enquirer that stooped to that level, but as this summer proved once again, every paper is susceptible to the rumor at the trade deadline in hopes of being the first to report the big trade.
Unfortunately, trying to predict trades at the end of July is about as easy as tying your shoes with your toes. Practically none of the major rumors that were floating around until the deadline ever turned into reality. The major players available, Chuck Finley, Andy Pettitte, Jeff Fassero, Vinny Castilla, Darryl Kile, Fred McGriff, and Roberto Hernandez all stayed exactly where they were despite weeks of media speculation and debate. The only major names to move were Jose Hernandez and Juan Guzman, and they didn’t even go to their supposed suitors, the Braves and the Rangers.
Where were the Yankees in all of this? Well, the rumor-mill had the Yanks going after the Devil Ray’s Roberto Hernandez, a hard throwing reliever with a huge contract. The Yanks were also supposedly in the hunt for Chuck Finley simply to block the Indians from getting the Yankee killer. As it turned out, their “interest” spawned from a planted story in the New York Post by members of the Angels organization in an attempt to drive up the offer from Cleveland for the pitcher.
The one move the Yankees did make in all this madness was bringing back Jim Leyritz for 22-year-old pitcher Geraldo Padua. Leyritz was a longtime member of the New York Yankees before being traded to the Angels in the winter of ’96. The move, while unexpected, certainly wasn’t surprising as Leyritz was one of owner George Steinbrenner’s favorite players, mostly for his strong post season performance. There aren’t many Yankee fans that will forget Jim’s three-run homer against Mark Wohlers in Game Four of the 1996 World Series, a shot that many regard as the turning point of the series.
The move makes a lot of sense for the Yanks. Leyritz isn’t playing at the level he was when he left, but he is still a legitimate power threat and a versatile infielder. He doesn’t truly excel at any one position, but he is capable of playing first, third, outfield (corners), and catcher. His strong right-handed bat will be a welcome addition to a weak Yankee bench that has carried the likes of Jeff Manto and Clay Bellinger. With the return of Daryl Strawberry later this month and the probably demotion of Ricky Ledee, the Yanks bench will have Luis Sojo and Jim Leyritz covering the infield, Strawberry or Spencer/Curtis for the outfield with one of them starting, and either Girardi or Posada at catcher. Five of those seven players are legitimate power threats and Curtis has been known to hit with some pop as well. This is the kind of depth the Yankees have been lacking most of the season and they have two months of the season to fine-tune it for the playoffs.
The return of Leyritz also spawned another interesting question: would he be able to right the sinking ship that is Andy Pettitte? In case you didn’t know, Leyritz was Pettitte’s personal catcher during the 1996 season when Dandy Andy was runner-up to Pat Hentgen for the AL Cy Young award. Personally, I would be very surprised if the mere presence of Leyritz could help Pettitte mentally. Leyritz won’t be doing much catching with the team, at least not this season, with Girardi and Posada already covering duties and manager Joe Torre not wanting to rock the ship. There is a chance, however, that with Girardi’s option year ending after this season, the Yanks may tie-up Leyritz for a couple seasons and make him the backup catcher behind Posada next season. Further ammunition lies in Pettitte’s performance in 1997 after Leyritz left. Andy’s ERA was a full run less in ’97, giving up 16 less home runs in 19 more innings. Clearly, Leyritz’s departure had little effect on Pettitte’s performance and can’t be expected to improve it now.
In the meantime, Leyritz will have to accept the role of bench player, a position he should be familiar with in a Yankee uniform. During his first tour of duty in pinstripes, Leyritz made waves publicly complaining about his playing-time and driving his managers nuts. The outbursts became such an issue, it lead a member of the squad to post a sign on Leyritz’s locker that said, “There’s no ‘I’ in team.” The Yanks weren’t convinced the message was fully received, trading him in ’96 to get him the playing time he felt he deserved.
Torre is obviously concerned about Leyritz taking the same attitude upon his return, but Jimmy has seemed to be more than cooperative. He was happy to tell reporters he had no plans on trying to become a starter on the Yanks and was happy to fill any role Torre felt him suitable for.
Goodbye Rumors, Hello Andy
After weeks and weeks of trade rumors surrounding Andy Pettitte, the Yankees made the right decision and held onto Andy at the deadline. Pettitte’s had a difficult season, but the idea of trading the 27 year-old left-hander was simply ridiculous. Pettitte has shown flashes of his old self throughout the season and clearly hasn’t lost any of the movement on his pitches. He’s won 67 games over the last four years and is the only lefty in the Yanks rotation. If they had traded him, the Yanks would have found themselves looking for a left-handed starter this winter with probably less of a future than Pettitte has.
HardRock Sports columnist Scott A. Ham takes a look at the return to New York of the man who would be King.
Newspapers. We read them every day. Some are tabloid, like the New York Post, and some smell of prestige like the New York Times or the Washington Post. It has been said, and probably accurately, that the standards of journalism decreased as more publications became available, making the all-important “scoop” an even larger financial enterprise. Clever as they are, the media has averted the conflicts that come with printing unproven stories by labeling them “rumors.” How often do you see the words “allegedly,” “ostensibly,” or “possibly” in today’s media when “supposedly” covering a story? It used to be rags like the National Enquirer that stooped to that level, but as this summer proved once again, every paper is susceptible to the rumor at the trade deadline in hopes of being the first to report the big trade.
Unfortunately, trying to predict trades at the end of July is about as easy as tying your shoes with your toes. Practically none of the major rumors that were floating around until the deadline ever turned into reality. The major players available, Chuck Finley, Andy Pettitte, Jeff Fassero, Vinny Castilla, Darryl Kile, Fred McGriff, and Roberto Hernandez all stayed exactly where they were despite weeks of media speculation and debate. The only major names to move were Jose Hernandez and Juan Guzman, and they didn’t even go to their supposed suitors, the Braves and the Rangers.
Where were the Yankees in all of this? Well, the rumor-mill had the Yanks going after the Devil Ray’s Roberto Hernandez, a hard throwing reliever with a huge contract. The Yanks were also supposedly in the hunt for Chuck Finley simply to block the Indians from getting the Yankee killer. As it turned out, their “interest” spawned from a planted story in the New York Post by members of the Angels organization in an attempt to drive up the offer from Cleveland for the pitcher.
The one move the Yankees did make in all this madness was bringing back Jim Leyritz for 22-year-old pitcher Geraldo Padua. Leyritz was a longtime member of the New York Yankees before being traded to the Angels in the winter of ’96. The move, while unexpected, certainly wasn’t surprising as Leyritz was one of owner George Steinbrenner’s favorite players, mostly for his strong post season performance. There aren’t many Yankee fans that will forget Jim’s three-run homer against Mark Wohlers in Game Four of the 1996 World Series, a shot that many regard as the turning point of the series.
The move makes a lot of sense for the Yanks. Leyritz isn’t playing at the level he was when he left, but he is still a legitimate power threat and a versatile infielder. He doesn’t truly excel at any one position, but he is capable of playing first, third, outfield (corners), and catcher. His strong right-handed bat will be a welcome addition to a weak Yankee bench that has carried the likes of Jeff Manto and Clay Bellinger. With the return of Daryl Strawberry later this month and the probably demotion of Ricky Ledee, the Yanks bench will have Luis Sojo and Jim Leyritz covering the infield, Strawberry or Spencer/Curtis for the outfield with one of them starting, and either Girardi or Posada at catcher. Five of those seven players are legitimate power threats and Curtis has been known to hit with some pop as well. This is the kind of depth the Yankees have been lacking most of the season and they have two months of the season to fine-tune it for the playoffs.
The return of Leyritz also spawned another interesting question: would he be able to right the sinking ship that is Andy Pettitte? In case you didn’t know, Leyritz was Pettitte’s personal catcher during the 1996 season when Dandy Andy was runner-up to Pat Hentgen for the AL Cy Young award. Personally, I would be very surprised if the mere presence of Leyritz could help Pettitte mentally. Leyritz won’t be doing much catching with the team, at least not this season, with Girardi and Posada already covering duties and manager Joe Torre not wanting to rock the ship. There is a chance, however, that with Girardi’s option year ending after this season, the Yanks may tie-up Leyritz for a couple seasons and make him the backup catcher behind Posada next season. Further ammunition lies in Pettitte’s performance in 1997 after Leyritz left. Andy’s ERA was a full run less in ’97, giving up 16 less home runs in 19 more innings. Clearly, Leyritz’s departure had little effect on Pettitte’s performance and can’t be expected to improve it now.
In the meantime, Leyritz will have to accept the role of bench player, a position he should be familiar with in a Yankee uniform. During his first tour of duty in pinstripes, Leyritz made waves publicly complaining about his playing-time and driving his managers nuts. The outbursts became such an issue, it lead a member of the squad to post a sign on Leyritz’s locker that said, “There’s no ‘I’ in team.” The Yanks weren’t convinced the message was fully received, trading him in ’96 to get him the playing time he felt he deserved.
Torre is obviously concerned about Leyritz taking the same attitude upon his return, but Jimmy has seemed to be more than cooperative. He was happy to tell reporters he had no plans on trying to become a starter on the Yanks and was happy to fill any role Torre felt him suitable for.
Goodbye Rumors, Hello Andy
After weeks and weeks of trade rumors surrounding Andy Pettitte, the Yankees made the right decision and held onto Andy at the deadline. Pettitte’s had a difficult season, but the idea of trading the 27 year-old left-hander was simply ridiculous. Pettitte has shown flashes of his old self throughout the season and clearly hasn’t lost any of the movement on his pitches. He’s won 67 games over the last four years and is the only lefty in the Yanks rotation. If they had traded him, the Yanks would have found themselves looking for a left-handed starter this winter with probably less of a future than Pettitte has.
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