Out of Left Field: ALCS Game 2

While watching last night’s ALCS game between the Red Sox and Indians, I decided to take notes and write down my thoughts as they occurred. Here they are.

• At the start of the game Joe Buck asserted that Curt Schilling was a Hall of Famer. Schilling doesn’t feel like a Hall of Famer to me, so I thought I’d do a little research before dismissing Buck as a Schilling apologist. Schilling’s raw numbers are very good. He’s 216-146 with an ERA 3.46, he’s fanned 3,116 batters, boasts a K/BB ratio of 4.38, and has an ERA+ of 126. He ranks 79th in career wins (tied with Wilbur Cooper and Charlie Hough); he’s 14th in strikeouts and needs only two more to pass Bob Gibson on the all-time list; he has the second best K/BB ratio of all-time, sitting behind only Tommy Bond; and he’s 52nd in ERA+, tied with seven other guys, including Tommy Bridges and Bret Saberhagen. He has two more “Black Ink” points and 20 more “Gray Ink” points than an average Hall of Famer and has 65 more “Hall of Fame Monitor” points than an average Hall of Famer.

Below are the average numbers for pitchers in the HOF:

	W	L	Pct.	IP	H	BB	K	ERA
AVG	248	174	.588	3735	3456	1022	1999	2.99
BBWAA	268	187	.589	4022	3629	1154	2494	3.03
VET	228	160	.587	3431	3272	882	1473	2.94
Schilling	216	146	.597	3261	2998	711	3116	3.46

Schilling’s numbers look pretty good compared to the average Hall of Famer and when you throw in his postseason accomplishments, they look even better. I’m still not convinced that Schilling is a Hall of Famer, though. Neither is Dr. Michael Hoban, who in 2006 wrote in his book, Baseball’s Best: The TRUE Hall of Famers: “Curt Schilling has pitched for nineteen seasons. With a CV of 191, he would need 367 win shares to reach a NEWS score of 235 - and that’s not going to happen. But what about 300 win shares? He needs 58 more win shares to reach 300. Over the past four seasons, he has earned 55 win shares. At the age of 40, can he earn 58 more win shares? It’s possible, but very unlikely.” (Editor’s note: Schilling earned 10.3 win shares in 2007).

• It sounded like Tim McCarver is losing his voice. Maybe we can lock him in a room with Joe Morgan so Morgan will catch what McCarver has.

• Memo to Fox: If you’re going to use a celebrity to announce a team’s lineup make sure he knows what the hell he’s talking about. When James Taylor called Kevin Youkilis the “first base player” I almost spit my beer into my lap. Are you shitting me? Couldn’t they have used Matt Damon? Michael Chiklis? Denis Leary? Couldn’t they have pried Stephen King away from his book long enough to announce the damn lineup? Fox clearly loves putting him on camera, they might as well let him speak into it.

• Reason #267 to love Dustin Pedroia: He came to the plate hacking in the first and struck out on pitches that were in the dirt, but he adjusted his approach (probably after watching the rest of Boston’s lineup) and walked on four pitches in his next at-bat. His swing-from-the-ass-on-every-pitch attitude is fun to watch from someone who stands about 4′ 9″, but it was good to see him tone it down a bit and take that free pass.

• Last night’s trivia question asked which player had appeared in the postseason for the most teams (they used the phrase “most different postseason teams”) and I figured it was Kenny Lofton, but I also thought Lonnie Smith and Don Baylor may have been the right answer. As it turned out Lofton has played for six different teams in the postseason (as has David Wells) , while Baylor played for five (Baltimore in ‘73 and ‘74, California in ‘79 and ‘82, Boston in ‘86, Minnesota in ‘87, and Oakland in ‘88) and Smith played for four (Philadelphia in ‘80 and ‘81, St. Louis in ‘82, Kansas City in ‘85, and Atlanta in ‘91 and ‘92).

• Is it just me or do Fox’s microphones make every hit ball sound like it’s going 600 feet and every fastball sound like it’s going 110 MPH?

• When a pitch just above the belt is called “up and away” (Schilling to Blake in the fifth), you know the strike zone is completely screwed. If you ever get a chance to watch a late 60s game on ESPN Classic, pay attention to the strike zone. Pitches at the letters were called strikes, just as they’re supposed to be. We can blame steroids, small parks, juiced balls, expansion, and the designated hitter for baseball’s offensive explosion, but until the umpires start calling the high strike again, batters will continue to have an advantage over pitchers.

• If Ryan Garko wasn’t a baseball player one gets the impression he’d make a great enforcer for the mob. It must be the nose (and the physique).

• Reports that George Mitchell’s investigation of baseball players’ use of performance-enhancing drugs has dug up some big-name players has me speculating about who might be on that list. I’m not about to accuse anyone at this point, but am I the only one who thinks Melvin Mora’s 2004 season looks fishy as hell? HGH usage seems to have been prevalent in 2004 before MLB pulled its head out of its ass and started paying attention to what its players were doing behind closed doors. And now that Orioles outfielder Jay Gibbons has been implicated, it’s not hard to imagine other Orioles taking performance enhancers. Of course I’m not naming names; I’m only speculating.

• Casey Blake made a nice pivot on a potential double play, then started a beautiful DP to end the fifth, but he still looks like he should be teaching chemistry somewhere (or playing the part of Alex P. Keaton’s father on “Family Ties”).

• Am I the only one who’s worried that Hideki Okajima is going to get drilled in the head by a line drive someday? Every pitcher risks getting hit by a batted ball, but Okajima’s going to get hit in the ear and he won’t even see it coming.

• Speaking of Okajima, the Red Sox should renegotiate his contract and give him the money they’re paying Daisuke Matsuzaka and give Matsuzaka what they’re paying Okajima.

• Indians reliever Rafael Betancourt is listed at 200 pounds. If Betancourt weighs only 200 pounds, I’m the pope.

• There was a time when I thought Coco Crisp might not be a very good center fielder because of the way he played the position prior to coming to Boston. What the heck was I thinking?

• J.D. Drew went 2-for-5 in Game 2 and made a difficult catch along the right field line in Game 1, but I’d still take a battered, aging Trot Nixon over Drew any day. Nixon plays like he gives a shit; Drew plays like he’d rather be home doing his taxes.

• Eric Gagne has been so bad since coming to Boston (6.75 ERA, two losses, and three blown saves) that when he was brought into last night’s game, I immediately turned to ESPN College GameDay. I’d rather watch highlights of William and Mary vs. Maine than experience the inevitable meltdown of “The Goon.”

• All this talk about Joe Torre and Tony LaRussa has me wondering why the Yankees and Cardinals don’t consummate a trade that sends Torre to St. Louis and LaRussa to New York. You scoff but on August 3, 1960 the Tigers sent manager Jimmy Dykes to Cleveland for manager Joe Gordon. The trade did nothing for either team. Under Dykes, the Tigers went 44-52 (.458) before going 26-31 (.456) under Gordon. The Indians were actually decent under Gordon, going 49-46 (.516) before winning only 26 of 58 (.448) under Dykes. The trade wasn’t made because either team thought it would actually improve their chances of winning; it was made because Gordon and Indians G.M. Frank Lane despised each other.

Torre and Yankees G.M. Brian Cashman get along well and LaRussa got along well with former Cards G.M. Walt Jocketty, so that’s not the issue. But how cool would it be to see Torre in a Cardinals uniform again and how fitting would it be for the arrogant LaRussa to end up managing in a city that has as many newspapers as citizens?