Friday, March 13, 2009

Manny gets on many times in debut

It's all good for Manny Ramirez in his first outing of the spring. A single and two walks in three at bats left him with a perfect on base percentage in 2009.
Three times up, three times on. And so Ramirez, late to spring training after signing a two-year, $45-million contract, was back in action.

"I said, 'You haven't lost of any of your flair, from last year to this year,' " Dodgers Manager Joe Torre said.

Despite his perfect on-base percentage, Ramirez complained about his timing at the plate. But he said his legs -- a balky hamstring had delayed his Cactus League debut for one day -- felt fine.

"It takes time, that's why we're here in spring training, to get a lot of at-bats, make a lot of mistakes and get it out of your system and move on to the season," Ramirez said.
We'll have to wait and see if a tight hamstring costs Manny any power at the plate leading up the regular season. Most of a batter's power begins with his legs. Manny's got plenty of legs when he's healthy.

Pudge wants to play, anywhere

Pudge Rodriguez really wants to play in the Majors this year, saying he's willing to switch positions if it means getting a chance to play regularly for an MLB club. Pudge thinks he can play at first or third.
"Trust me, I would love to catch, but I can play another position, and I'm willing to play another position, because I'm a player and I love to play," Rodriguez said on Friday. "That's the most important thing for me. I'm a winner. I love playing this game. I would love to be on a team and help it win. Whatever it takes to win ballgames, I'd do anything."
It's hard to imagine this was anything more than Pudge expressing his willingness to do whatever it takes to return to MLB. I'm guessing he wasn't serious about a position switch, especially considering he's played a total of 8 games (seven at first and one at second base) in his entire 18-year career.

Furthermore, Rodriguez hit just .276 with a .394 slugging average last year, hardly corner infielder numbers. Actually, he's not even close. He's not going to be playing anywhere but behind the plate in 2009.

Goodbye, East Bay?

It's sounding more and more like the A's have a better chance at a future in San Jose than they do in Oakland. A's owner Lew Wolff sounds like he's not only disinterested in his home city, he's done with it altogether. Oakland Mayor Ron Dellums and City Council President Jane Brunner sound desperate in their efforts to woo the team back from the brink of a move.
"We have fully exhausted our time and resources over the years with the city of Oakland, dating back to previous A's ownership," (Wolff) said in the statement. "We recognize conditions have not changed. Letters to Major League Baseball offer nothing new or of any real substance. Outside stimulation to have us continue to play in an aging and shared facility may generate press and 'sound-bite' opportunities, but do not provide any tangible alterations in the circumstances we face."

Dellums and Brunner asked Selig to name a point person to work with Oakland on finding a site for a new stadium in Oakland. The letter also said city officials are putting together a team of civic leaders to advise the city on possible locations for a new ballpark, and are "prepared to do everything reasonably possible" to keep the A's in Oakland.
One of Wolff's major issues with Oakland is the erosion of the downtown corporate life of the city. Let's face it, if boxes and big-money seats go unpaid for, there's not way Wolff wants to lose money he could be making elsewhere. Things sound dire for the "Oakland" A's.

New parks, but better seats?

A very interesting read in Newsday on obstructed view seating in newer MLB parks. Yankee Stadium received criticism last month for being a state-of-the-art ballpark that still has seats with partially blocked views of the playing field. The new stadium is not the only one. In fact, it's not even one of the few.
Of the 11 major-league ballparks - including the new Yankee Stadium and the Mets' new Citi Field - that have opened since 2000, eight have obstructed-view seats. Seven teams sell those tickets to the public; most wait until the rest of the stadium is sold out, and some sell them only at the box office.

One team, the Cincinnati Reds, has about 300 obstructed-view seats at Great American Ball Park but does not sell them, according to team director of media relations Rob Butcher.

The Mets will not be marking any seats as obstructed view, according to executive vice president Dave Howard. Citi Field apparently will have spots with less than perfect looks at the field because of structures such as staircase railings. Howard said every effort was made to minimize such issues through the use of see-through materials, but he said some of those seats were not offered as part of season-ticket plans.

Of the 30 ballparks that will be used in 2009, 23 have obstructed-view seats and 22 teams sell them to fans.

Six ballparks do not have any seats that are marked as obstructed view. Aside from Citi Field, they are Nationals Park (Washington, opened in 2007), Busch Stadium (St. Louis, 2006), Turner Field (Atlanta, 1997), Dolphin Stadium ( Marlins, 1987) and Dodger Stadium (1962).
One of the perks of newly constructed stadiums is supposed to be the lack of structural obstructions with regard to viewing the field. Beams and pillars would become things of the past, and I'm guessing they are. My guess is that the new obstructions are mostly things that give the newer ballparks character. Overhanging eves, odd grandstand construction and unique outfield walls probably lend themselves to obstructed views. I'd hope the blockages are minimal.

The whirling Darvish

I'd been waiting for somebody to provide some info on Japanese ace Yu Darvish. ESPN's Keith Law finally did, and it all sounds good.
Darvish is the top pitcher in the Japanese major leagues right now. He earned the 2007 Sawamura Award (the Nippon Professional Baseball equivalent to the Cy Young Award) and the 2007 Pacific League MVP Award. He has posted ERAs less than 2.00 in each of the past two years, and struck out 418 batters in 408.1 innings over the past two years. Darvish is unusually tall for a Japanese pitcher; he's listed at 6-foot-5, and only one other pitcher on Team Japan is listed at taller than 6-1, the 6-3 Hisashi Iwakuma.
When you're just 21 years old and can command a fastball that touches the mid-nineties plus a good breaking pitch, you've got a shot to be great. I like his strange delivery, as well, as kinks in the windup can make it that much tougher for hitters to get their timing down.

Marlins Stadium troubles

The new stadium hopes of the Florida Marlins continue to take hits.
Apparently the revenue from three separate taxes the county was going to use to help finance the stadium have fallen off more then 19%. The County had projected just a 2% decrease in these three tax revenue streams.

It seems yet again that this project cannot get off the ground.
I wonder if this is significant enough an issue to scrap the whole project.

Far East fighting sleep deprivation

A thought on the second round and finals of the World Baseball Classic, which I'm sure has come up with the tournament's planners: Japan and South Korea must be at a distinct disadvantage due to playing their first round games in Tokyo.

Opening their pool on March 5th, the Asian teams got a head start in the tournament. They played three games a couple of days before the rest of the tournament field got to playing games. That allowed the Asian teams a chance to finish Pool A on March 9, a full six days before they're due to play in round two.

No, I don't believe the Japanese and South Korean teams that advanced from the pool will be rusty due to a perceived layoff (they played games against the Cubs and Dodgers respectively on Wednesday). The problem is the time change they experience in coming to play second round games in San Diego. Pacific Standard Time is 16 hours behind Japan, which means the Japanese and Korean players experience an 8-hour jet lag in flying to the west coast. Pilots say for each hour lost/gained of jet lag it takes one day to recover. That means the Japanese and South Koreans would still be feeling strong effects of sleep patter adjustment when they start playing again this weekend. The Japanese opener against Cuba on Sunday is at 1 pm in San Diego, when it's 5 am back home.

The one thing in the Far Easterners' favor? They started the 2006 tournament in Tokyo as well, and with seven days to recover, the Japanese came to the U.S. and won the whole thing.

Cuba wins Pool B

Cuba's 16-4 Pool B throttling of Mexico gives them the pool title and a consolation prize moving forward: they're forced to play Japan in the second round's Pool 1. That's a rematch of the 2006 World Baseball Classic final, a game Japan won. Mexico faces South Korea, the Pool A Champions, who lost their two game matchup with Japan with a 14-3 aggregate score. They won the pool title, however, 1-0.

Manny debuts Friday

Good thing Manny Ramirez' tight hamstring pushed his Dodger debut back to Friday. Otherwise there'd be too many debuts to write about. (See below!)