Category: MLB (Page 93 of 448)

      Padres’ Bud Black well deserving of a contract extension

      July 19, 2010 /
      May 19, 2010; Los Angeles, CA, USA; San Diego Padres manager Bud Black (20) before the game against the Los Angeles Dodgers at Dodger Stadium. Photo via Newscom

      MLB.com is reporting that the Padres are on the verge of giving manager Bud Black a three-year contract extension. If that’s the case, then yahoo for Bud Black, yahoo for the Padres and most importantly, yahoo for school.

      In case you haven’t seen many San Diego games this year (and if you rely on ESPN for games or highlights, then you haven’t), then you may not fully grasp how important Black has become to the first place Padres. This isn’t a club that puts a lot of runs on the board on a nightly basis (they’re 21st in the league in that category), nor can they wait for one of their big poppers to save them with a home run (they’re 23rd in MLB in dingers) late in games.

      But this is a club that relies on pitching, defense and fundamentals. They grasp the idea of the hit and run and more importantly, they know how to execute it. They know how to steal to put themselves in position to score and unlike so many teams in Major League Baseball these days, they’re not afraid to play their younger prospects. (As opposed to signing past-their-prime veterans, watching them hit .220, keeping them in the lineup for three-fourths of the season anyway and then allowing youngsters to play when there’s only a month left in the year.)

      And because of Black, they do all of the things mentioned above well and that’s the main reason they find themselves up four games above the Rockies in the NL West. Is that to say that another manager wouldn’t be having the same success? No, but no matter how the young Padres finish this season, Black has put them in the best position to win not only now, but also in the future.

      Also, don’t forget that many people thought the Padres would be gearing up to hold a fire sale at this point in the season. But thanks to the Padres’ strong play so far, it’s almost assured that players like Adrian Gonzalez will have the opportunity to make a postseason run in San Diego this season. Thus, in some ways, Black has played a role in keeping Gonzo in San Diego and that alone should have Padre fans elated that the club is keeping the skipper around for next few years. (Even if Gonzo is dealt this offseason after the Padres make a postseason run this year.)

      External Sports, MLB

      Tim McCarver compares Joe Torre situation with Yankees to WWII

      July 18, 2010 /

      During FOX’s broadcast of the Yankees-Rays game on Saturday, announcer Tim McCarver broke into a tirade over the way the Bombers handled former manager Joe Torre’s exit from New York.

      Here’s the video.

      McCarver has always loved to hear himself talk and this is evidence of such. He says that Yankees have essentially scrubbed themselves clean of all things Joe Torre in their new stadium, but there’s zero truth to that. There might not be a statue of Torre outside of the stadium, but there is at least one photo of him on the field level concourse and I’m sure there are others.

      Some announcers love to compare situations in sports to historical events like World War II. In most instances, they go overboard in these comparisons and I think that’s what McCarver did here. What does he want the Yankees to do? Have a Joe Torre day at the stadium while he’s the manager of the Dodgers? It isn’t going to happen. Given all he accomplished in New York, it’s unfortunate that Torre didn’t end his career with the Yankees, but things happen. Times change, people move on – everything eventually comes to an end.

      External Sports, MLB, Video

      Mikey’s MLB power rankings

      July 17, 2010 /

      The all-star game is behind us now, which means pennant races are about to heat up for real. And there are so many teams in contention this season, it really promises to be a wild rest of the summer. Here is a look at our post-all-star-game power rankings…..

      1. New York Yankees (57-32)—Playing with heavy hearts this week after the passing of George Steinbrenner, but nothing else has changed. They just keep winning, and for the Yankees, that’s just what they do.

      2. Tampa Bay Rays (54-35)—David Price is the real deal, and one of many reasons this young Rays team is battling the Yankees for AL East supremacy. They’re one of a handful of teams that can compete with the boys from Gotham, but they’d better not get swept this weekend.

      3. Atlanta Braves (53-37)—They suddenly have a 5-game lead over the slumping Mets (and 5.5 over the Phils), and have the look of a team that wants to send Bobby Cox out on top.

      4. Texas Rangers (52-38)—Cliff Lee and that lineup? The Rangers can start printing playoff tickets now.

      5. San Diego Padres (52-37)—At this point, you can’t call it smoke and mirrors. Just like the Rays, this young team plays hard, manufactures runs and keeps games close with solid pitching.

      6. Boston Red Sox (51-39)—Someone has awoken the beast that is David Ortiz. Home run derby was just a tease of what’s to come at Fenway this summer.

      7. Chicago White Sox (50-39)—A 9-game winning streak was snapped yesterday, but the south side of Chicago is beaming. Too bad Jake Peavy is out for the year, but that doesn’t seem to matter much right now.

      8. Cincinnati Reds (50-41)—See Padres, San Diego. Dusty Baker is one heck of a manager, and that is showing again now. Of course, when you have Joey Votto, Brandon Phillips and Scott Rolen in the middle of your lineup, all is right with the world.

      9. Colorado Rockies (49-40)—This year, the Rockies won’t wait to make their move until September. They have already started making it, and the Padres had better watch their collective back

      10. Detroit Tigers (48-39)—They have quietly kept right up with the White Sox, just one game back and now 2.5 ahead of the Twins. And Jim Leyland is still one of the best managers in the game.

      External Sports, MLB

      The softer side of George Steinbrenner

      July 16, 2010 /
      July 12, 2010 - Bronx, NEW YORK, UNITED STATES - epa02247395 A sign commemorating the death of Yankees owner George Steinbrenner is seen outside of Yankees Stadium in the Bronx, New York, USA, on 13 July 2010. Steinbrenner died of a heart attack this morning in Tampa, Florida at the age of 80.

      Whether you love or hate the Yankees, or whether you came to respect or loathe George Steinbrenner, it’s hard not to appreciate the kind of man he was after you read the story below from the New York Daily News.

      According to the paper, Steinbrenner once donated $13,000 to the family of a second-grader named Lorraine Blakely (now 40), who almost died after a freak accident in 1977. Steinbrenner only had one condition if he were to help: That the family could not discuss what he had gave them.

      “It just shows what a good man he was,” Blakely said Wednesday at her Lake Ronkonkoma, L.I., home. “He didn’t want any notoriety for it. He was just doing it out of the goodness of his heart.”

      Steinbrenner, despite a deserved reputation for bluster and bullying, often hid his softer side and philanthropic works: helping the kids of slain cops, funding hospitals, aiding terminally ill children.

      And rescuing 7-year-old Lorraine after her skull was fractured by a flying chunk of wood in a botched Fire Department demonstration on Oct. 12, 1977.

      Three hours of emergency surgery saved her life, but a chunk of the bone protecting her brain was gone – forcing her to don a hockey helmet around the clock.

      A delicate four-hour operation was needed to implant a plastic plate across her skull.

      That’s when Steinbrenner stepped to the plate, sending a limousine to bring the little girl and her parents to a meeting, where he handed over the check.

      “It was a bit of an intimidating situation for me,” she recalled. “But when I got there he was so kind – one of the nicest people you could ever meet.”

      The May 1978 surgery was a success, the Steinbrenner money helped pay the bills and the little girl grew up with her secret – a promise held so tightly that she never even called The Boss to say thank you.

      But she never forgot his generosity or gentle demeanor.

      “It gave me a chance in life,” she said. “It means a lot. Especially now, as a mother with children, to know what that must mean.”

      Some people often say that wealthy athletes or people in sports don’t do enough for the underprivileged. But here’s a perfect example that there are a lot of good people in this world who are willing and able to do something out of the kindness of their hearts. Steinbrenner clearly didn’t want any notoriety for this and he couldn’t have known that after he died, Blakely was going to share her secret.

      He may have pissed you off when the Yankees signed a free agent that your team was going after, or you may always root against the Bombers because they “buy all of their players.” But sports mean nothing in the grand scheme of things and when you push baseball and the Yankees to the side for a moment, George Steinbrenner was a good person.

      And stories like the one above are what he should be remembered for.

      External Sports, MLB

      Will the Red Sox be hamstrung by the luxury tax at the trade deadline?

      July 16, 2010 /
      July 10, 2010 - Toronto, Ontario, Canada - 10 July 2010: Red Sox designated hitter David Ortiz.

      According to Senior MLB Writer Ed Price at AOL Fanhouse, the Red Sox could be limited at the trade deadline this year because of the luxury tax.

      That tax, which in the Red Sox’ case would be 22.5 percent of every dollar over $170 million in payroll, is based on the so-called “actual club payroll,” not the Opening Day payroll. So the pro-rated salaries of any players acquired in a trade would count toward that figure.

      The Associated Press listed Boston’s Opening Day payroll as $162.7 million, although the luxury-tax figure will also include players on the 40-man roster and players’ benefit.

      Thus, the Red Sox are about tapped out. The source said the front office would have to “jump through hoops” — make a strong case to ownership — just to add $500,000 in salary over the rest of the season. That’s the equivalent of a player making $1.1 million for the year.

      Paying luxury tax this year would make Boston liable to a 30 percent luxury tax on payroll over $178 million in 2011, when Beckett, Kevin Youkilis, Dustin Pedroia and Jon Lester are due for raises.

      If the Red Sox are having financial issues, nobody tell David Ortiz, who recently said that he wants a multi-year contract extension.

      Even though Boston is still very much in the playoff hunt, it’s been an uphill battle for them in 2010. As Price notes in his article, roughly $45 million worth of Red Sox players are on the disabled list, including Josh Beckett ($12 million), Dustin Pedroia ($3.5) million, Victor Martinez ($7 million), Jason Varietk ($5 million), Clay Buchholz ($440,000), Mike Lowell ($12 million) and Jacoby Ellsbury ($500,000).

      With their growing list of injuries, the Red Sox probably won’t be able to stay in contention in the second half at their current state. They could stand to add a reliever, an outfielder or perhaps even another starter, but if Price is right and Theo Epstein will be limited at the deadline, then we might be looking at a Boston-less postseason in a couple of months.

      If their 7-2 loss to the Rangers on Thursday night was a taste of things to come, then the BoSox are in store for a long second half.

      External Sports, MLB

      « Older posts Newer posts »

      © 2026 The Scores Report – The National Sports Blog

      Theme by Anders Noren — Up ↑