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The Nub



August 2008 Archive

(Posted:  8/28/08)

 

Have you noticed how baseball brings out the best in us - all of us, even politicians?

 

John McCain never seemed more regular than when he professed to be a Diamondbacks fan.  Of course, the D-backs are his home state’s only team, so he didn’t risk anything with the straight talk.  Barack Obama, on the other hand, has two hometown teams, the Cubs and White Sox.  To express divided loyalty would be the conventional political thing to do.  But that’s not the risk-free way Barack, a true baseball fan, chooses to go.  Here is the provocative comment he made on the subject in an interview on ESPN:

 

Q: “If the Cubs and the White Sox both make it to the World Series?

O:  “I would be going.”

Q: “Who would you root for?

O: “Oh, that's easy.  White Sox.  I'm not one of these fair weather fans.  You go to Wrigley Field, you have a beer, beautiful people up there.  People aren't watching the game.  It's not serious.  White Sox, that's baseball.  Southside.”

 

A lefty slant on Barack’s honest-if-impolitic fan’s views:  They sound like words the candid Obama would use before he became the compromiser as presidential nominee.  A little-publicized but typical example of his checked swings:  Last November, underdog candidate Obama suggested that a way to guarantee the long-term solvency of Social Security would be to increase the payroll tax for wage-earners making more than $250,000 a year.  Now, he’s revised his plan so it wouldn’t take effect until 2018 that is, after completion of both terms of a possible Obama presidency.  

A more dramatic change in Barack’s stance has occurred on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.  A decade ago he called for an even-handed approach to the dispute; a year-and-a-half ago, he said “Nobody’s suffering more than the Palestinian people.” Now he’s expressing little sympathy for the hardships imposed on the people of Gaza, and has called on the UN to stop Hamas from fighting violence with violence in its standoff with Israel.    

 

If only political choices were as easy to make as those having to do with the Cubs and Chisox.          

                                 -     -     -

A Red Sox victory at the Stadium this afternoon will shoo the Yankees away from their rear-view window, enabling the Bostonians to concentrate on the Rays and Twins.  The Sox’s pickup of Mark Kotsay reinforces the sense they’ll be around at playoff time, in one slot or another.  Radio broadcasters John Sterling and Suzyn Waldman have been especially good at expressing the frustration of Yankee fans at the team’s inability to come through in the clutch.

 

The Mets came through last night, propelled by Carlos Delgado’s two home runs and Daniel Murphy’s tie-breaking hit in the eighth inning.  It was a night in which Johan Santana was not his usual overpowering self.  The victory partially erased what happened Tuesday night at Citizens Bank Park.  That debacle was like a one-game retrospective of the Mets’ epic 2007 collapse.  Nervous fans watching SNY knew an early 7-0 lead over the Phils was not safe – not with oft-pathetic Pedro pitching, backed by the disaster area that is the Mets bullpen.  Some fans surely went the avoidance route, switching to the Red Sox-Yanks game.  When YES’s out-of-town scoreboard showed the Mets lead down to two in the sixth, it was turn-out-the-lights time on hopes of beating a Phillies team that still has its ’07 bounce.

 

The next time the Mets and Phils meet will be a week from tomorrow at Shea.  By then, one or the other may be first in the NL East to stay.  Starting tomorrow, the Mets will be playing three games each away with the tough Marlins and the even tougher Brewers.  The Phils will play four with the Cubs starting tonight in Wrigley Field, and three with the Nationals in DC.   The schedule favors the Phils, who should finish the trip no worse than 4-3 while the Maine-and-Wagner-less Mets will have to battle to split their six games.   

 

Don’t look now, but the Colorado Rockies have snuck back into the NL West race.  The Rockies lost to the Giants last night.  But the resilient defending NL champions have moved to within six games of the lead; they’ve won eight of 11, receiving a big assist from the first- and second-place D-backs and Dodgers, who’ve lost four and six straight, respectively.       

              - o -

(More  of The Nub, a team effort skippered by Dick Starkey, can be found at perfectpitcher.org) 

 

 

 

(Posted 8/26/08)

 

Just as five baseball tools make the ideal position player, so five equivalent political tools  make the ideal vice-presidential candidate.  The baseball tools, we know, are hitting for average, hitting for power, running speed, arm strength, and fielding ability.  A bat rack of political tools appears in “Counselor”, a recently published memoir by Theodore Sorensen, senior advisor to JFK and early supporter of Barack Obama.  Sorensen laid out these selection guidelines long before Obama picked Joe Biden as his bench backup: 

 

1. Stats show person can serve as national team leader

2. Deep dugout loyalty to the man in charge

3. Ability to rally hesitant fans to support team

4. Willingness to serve as team’s attack dog

5. Is safe from disclosure of embarrassing past errors

 

Based on the Sorensen test, how many tools can Biden be given credit for?  Our scorecard says four-and-a-half.   Although he has been praised as a “serious foreign policy thinker” on the NY Times op-page, he strikes out often in that field.  Biden reaffirmed a reputation for a hawkish stance and wild rhetorical swings just the other day.  He called Russia’s intervention in Georgia possibly “the most significant event… to occur in Europe since the end of communism.”  He promised to seek a billion dollars in aid for Georgia, a good way to resuscitate moribund tension with Moscow.  Biden also, of course, voted to give Bush war powers, and, before that, urged Bill Clinton to launch an attack on Kosovo. 

 

The new VP nominee thus risks alienating anti-war voters while attracting working class Catholic support to the ticket.  But on the unambiguously positive side, Biden will certainly alienate Team McCain as the Dems’ offensive force.  On balance, although Team Obama may not have added a five-tooler, they’ve picked up someone they can safely signal to hit away.

                                                  -     -     -

Who are the five-tool players in the majors today?  Hitting and fielding stats suggest that Ichiro Suzuki of the Mariners and Orlando Cabrera of the White Sox belong near the top of the short list.  Neither is a home run threat, but they are the only two players in the top five grouping of both MLB hitters and fielders.  Two others whom the stats say probably belong in that elite company:  Boston’s Dustin Pedroia and Arizona’s Chris Young.

 

A week ago, a Mets fan e-mailed that his team “may have the best starting rotation in the league.”  Those were the days.  With the real possibility that both John Maine and Billy Wagner are gone for the season, the ’08 edition of the team will earn the label “Miracle Mets Redux” if they manage to win the NL East.

 

The sweep of the low-flying Orioles means the Yankees have earned the adjective “crucial” to describe the three-game Red Sox series starting tonight at the Stadium.

Two wins should be enough to re-energize the team’s fans.  Even that is a big order.

                                    

After a tough long weekend in Philadelphia, the Dodgers need re-energizing. On ESPN last night, Steve Phillips and Orel Hersheiser talked of the persistent lack of rapport between LA’s young players and veterans.  “The situation has improved under Joe Torre,” said Phillips, “but it’s still not good.”

                                                   - o -

(Posted 8/23/08)

 

The Lugo boys - Fernando, the new president of Paraguay, and Julio of the Red Sox - are in the news in their respective fields.  Fernando hopes to rally his South American country in a leftward direction.  The Dominican Julio’s hopes of returning to a central position with the Sox are all but dashed.

 

Fernando Lugo, a former Catholic cleric, known in his country as the “Bishop of the poor,” was inaugurated last week, ending 60 years of dictatorship and one-party rule in Paraguay.   He made common cause with eight left-leaning, democratically elected presidents of other South American nations who were in attendance.  He was careful, however, not to criticize the U.S., except to say the days of Washington’s domination of the region are over. “I don’t think the United States has any choice but to accept these changes (in political direction),” he said.

 

Lugo has joined a presidential team that includes Venezuela’s Hugo Chavez, Bolivia’s Evo Morales, Ecuador’s Rafael Correa, Brazil’s Luis Lula da Silva, Chile’s Michelle Bachelet, Argentina’s Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner, Uruguay’s Tabare Vazquez and Nicaragua’s Daniel Ortega.  Not all are openly anti-U.S. as are Chavez, Morales and Correa, but each has made clear that he or she will go to bat against Team Bush, if it takes the field competitively.  And where does Lugo’s election fit in the picture?  Greg Grandin, Latin American history professor at NYU, put it this way on Pacifica Radio’s Democracy Now program:

 

“It’s enormously significant…Lugo completes the set.  Latin America is governed by a series of leftist or center-left presidents…each one representing different currents…You have indigenous rights organizers. You have social democrats. You have trade unionists. You have nationalist military populists.  And now you have a liberation theologian…He completes the ascension of the return of the Latin American left.”  

                            

Julio Lugo, meanwhile, has descended on the Red Sox depth chart for two reasons: he’s been on the DL since July 12, and his call-up replacement Jed Lowrie has excelled at shortstop since taking over.  Lugo had made 16 errors and hit into 13 double plays in 82 games while batting .268 and getting 22 RBIs.  Lowrie has already driven in 24 runs in 31 games and is batting .313.  He has not made an error. 

 

Whether Tito Francona goes with Lugo or Lowrie in September, the Red Sox look as though they’ll be spared the worry this year that the Yankees are about to pounce.  Fernando Lugo and his leftist teammates have similar breathing room on the political field:  the Yanquis are too overstretched elsewhere to make major trouble in Latin America.

                                     -     -     - 

Credit where it’s due:  “The Yankee system got the praise, yet the Mets had enough pieces not only to land (Johan) Santana, but to sprinkle their roster with youngsters thriving in late August.

 

“There are thirtysomething games left in the season, and the Mets are winning the battle of New York because - surprisingly - their twentysomethings have been more impressive.” – Joel Sherman, NY Post

 

The most seismic deal of the summer could be the one Arizona made on August 11 in response to the Dodgers getting Manny Ramirez.  Going into last night’s games, new

D-back Adam Dunn had matched up well enough with Manny to neutralize the decisive edge Ramirez appeared to give LA in NL West race.  Dunn was batting .298 (8-27) after nine games with Arizona, compared to Manny’s .310 (9-29) over the same period with the Dodgers.  Both had two home runs and eight RBIs.  The biggest difference was in bases on balls: Dunn had a remarkable 14 over nine games compared to Manny’s six. 

 

 

(Posted 8/21/08)

 

The eve of the Democratic convention, like the cusp of meaningful MLB games, is a time for scoreboard watching.  Here is a rundown of the electoral college score, as of two-and-a-half months before the day of the final tally:

 

With 270 electoral votes needed – out of the total 538 – Team Obama is estimated to have a 322-216 lead nationally by MoveOn, the progressive advocacy group. Consensus poll numbers say Obama is ahead 228-163, with 147 votes a toss-up.   In any event, we know that the political contest, like the baseball crunch period, will only begin in earnest after Labor Day, so the Obama margin must be considered very tentative.

 

Furthermore, expert scouts in the political game have identified 12 swing states, where the presidential contest will likely be decided.  And McCain has a commanding 110-27 lead in those swing-state votes.  Here is the way their allotted electoral-vote tallies break down, according to a polling consensus (two states – Nevada and New Mexico are toss-ups): 

 

Florida 27   (M)

Ohio 20       (M)

Michigan 17   (O)

North Carolina 15   (M)

Virginia 13   (M)

Indiana 11    (M)

Missouri 11   (M)

Minnesota 10   (O)

Colorado 9   (M)

Nevada 5   (T-U)

New Mexico 5   (T-U)

New Hampshire 4   (M)

 

McCain is less than 1 percent ahead in Colorado and Virginia, Obama less than 1 ahead in New Hampshire.  The scoreboard on those three near-toss-up, and the two actual toss-up states – and their total 35 electoral votes – will bear particularly close watching.  Whichever candidate gets most of the 35 could find those votes have provided him with his victory margin. 

                                               -     -     -

With the closer matchup Brad Lidge versus Bullpen by Committee, the Phils clearly have a major advantage over the Mets as the homestretch approaches in the NL East.  Lidge has been perfect this year, closing 31 of 31, while the Mets have had six of 14 save situations blown in the past month.  The Cardinals, with a better record than either the Mets or the Phils, are at a similar disadvantage in the wild card race, having lost closer Jason Isringhausen for the rest of the season.

 

While Manny Ramirez has been getting big media play for his exploits with the Dodgers, Jason Bay, who replaced him in Boston, has not done badly for the Red Sox.  After last night’s game, Bay was batting .347, with four home runs and 18 RBIs in 18 games.  Here is how an NL scout – quoted by the Globe’s Nick Cafardo - compared Bay to Yankees newcomer Xavier Nady: "Bay is more versatile." He's a solid player with good skills in every aspect of the game.  I would much rather have Bay than Nady, who is too inconsistent for me.”

 

Turns out the deal sending Greg Maddux from San Diego to the Dodgers has an impact on the NL East as well as the NL West.  The Phillies offered more for Maddux than did did the LAD’s, but the future Hall of Famer vetoed that trade because he wanted to stay on the West Coast.  Maddux would have bolstered the Phils’ starting rotation in their race to the wire with the Mets. His addition may well afford the Dodgers enough of an edge to outlast the D-backs in their two-team race for their division title.

 

(Posted 8/19/08)

 

Baseball fans who see in the Olympics a space-eating orgy of nationalistic self-congratulation have added reason for resentment of the Games.  Former Mets manager Davey Johnson, now skipper of the U.S. Olympic baseball team, provided a perfect embodiment of how boorish Americans can appear at super-hyped international events.  Johnson accused a Cuban pitcher of deliberately hitting a U.S. batter in the head even though the batter was injured after bunting at the ball and making contact.   

 

“I’m sure the game plan was to throw right at his head,” Johnson said, astonishing both the Cubans and members of the media.  Some observers attributed Johnson’s own wild pitch to frustration over the strong possibility the U.S. team will not get a medal this year.  By game’s end, the American nine had lost to Cuba for the fifth time in six Olympic competitions. 

 

The U.S. is familiar with political defeat vis-à-vis Cuba on the international playing field.  For 16 straight years, members of the United Nations have voted against the U.S. embargo of Havana by scores like 184-4 (in the most recent test), with Israel the only major supporter of the anti-Cuban trade policy. 

 

That policy, which dates from the early ‘60’s when Cuba became part of the Soviet Union’s farm system, now serves only to cause hardship on the island long after the Castro regime ended relations with Moscow and ceased to constitute a threat of any kind to the U.S.  It is a petty policy, driven by domestic politics, that denies the Cubans even our food and medicine.  It demeans us in the eyes of the world, much as does our Olympian jingoism.
                                          -     -     -

The rule here with six weeks left of the season is that any team out of first place by a double-digit margin has taken itself out of playoff contention.  The Tigers have newly fallen into that category, as have the Yankees after the Rays’ victory over the Angels last night.  Sorry about that, Jim Leyland and Joe Girardi. 

 

Newsday’s Ken Davidoff was the first columnist to second-guess Omar Minaya’s decision to give Luis Castillo a four-year contract.  The Mets seem to be looking for ways to keep Castillo on the DL lest he short-circuit the team’s present electricity.  That Omar has become sensitive about Castillo became clear the other day when he said Luis was getting a bad rap; his good on-base percentage, said Minaya, was under-appreciated.  Which raises the question how much less appreciated will Castillo be during the three years left on his contract after ‘08? 

 

A few optimism-dampening Mets stats:  The best the team could do against the lowly Pirates over the past week was to split four games.  Yesterday, Gary Cohen, on SNY, noted that the Mets are batting .056 – three for 42 – with bases loaded.  There are no Mets in the NL’s top 20 hitters with men in scoring position or with men on base.  On the six-game road trip, once-hot Carlos Delgado batted a cold .167, four for 24.   

 

 

 

(Posted 8/16/08)

 

The serious, still-simmering conflict abroad in Georgia, and the comparatively insignificant diamond war here at home:  they both have rules of engagement.  The most important rules in baseball - having to do with “location, location, location” - are for pitchers:

 

Rule number 1:  Throw strikes

Number 2:  Work the corners

Number 3: Avoid bases on balls

 

The rules of warfare, laid out by British Field Marshal Bernard Montgomery (and

quoted by International Herald Tribune columnist William Pfaff) are location-oriented, as well:

 

Rule number 1:  Do not invade Russia

Rule number 2:  Do not invade Russia

Rule number 3:  Do not invade Russia

 

Team Bush has been content to nibble at the corners against the Bear while pitching from a blustery stance.  The U.S. media has generally cheered the pro-Georgian slants.  The game action – Russia intervening when Georgia sent its military against a Bear-backed breakaway province – is seen differently in the opposite dugout.  Pfaff reports the difference this way:  

 

“The Russian version…is that (Georgia) ‘was forced to start this war by [U.S. Vice President] Dick Cheney to support the campaign of John McCain.  The only possibility for John McCain to win is to have some kind of war’.”

 

TruthDig’s Robert Scheer believes the Russian version makes sense: “(Why would) Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili…order…an invasion of the breakaway region of South Ossetia, an invasion that clearly was expected to produce a Russian counterreaction?  It is inconceivable that Saakashvili would have triggered this dangerous escalation without some assurance from influential Americans he trusted.”  Scheer and others see a prime additional culprit as McCain’s senior foreign policy advisor Randy Scheunemann, a former lobbyist for the Georgian government.

 

If there is some truth to the McCain-related thesis, says Pfaff, there ought to be another precautionary warfare rule, one that Georgia learned the hard way:   “Don’t let your friends in Washington…convince you that if you attack Russia, the United States and NATO will rescue you.”

 

As for Bush’s and McCain’s bleating about the intolerability of one country invading another in the 21^st century, right-wing maverick Pat Buchanan said it best:  “Isn’t the West’s hypocrisy astonishing?”

                                               -     -     -

In what is now the final quarter of the regular baseball season, key player injuries may well determine which teams make the playoffs.  In the two-team NL West battle, for example, Arizona has a slight edge because the Dodgers have lost Brad Penny for at least two weeks with a shoulder injury.  The D-backs lost second baseman Orlando Hudson for the season long ago, but, like the Yanks with Jorge Posada, they have adjusted to his absence.  In the NL Central, the Cubs are in the clear, injury-wise, and so are the Brewers, who are on track for the wild card.  The Cardinals have to hope that Chris Carpenter shakes off his muscle strain.  Without him, St.Louis has little chance of catching the Brewers or Cubs.  In the NL East, the Mets, Phils and Marlins are all, more or less, in the same boat (or will be, when Billy Wagner returns Monday).  The Mets have been getting along without Ryan Church and, especially unmissed is Luis Castillo. Victory in the division may depend on which of the three teams avoids serious injury the rest of the way.

 

The AL East is the most injury-sensitive division.  The first-place Rays are trying to get by without three important players - Carl Crawford, who will be gone until playoff-time,  third baseman Evan Longoria, out for two to three weeks, and closer Troy Percival, day-to-day with a knee sprain.  The Red Sox can make a move, but they’ll have to do it over the next 10 days or so without Tim Wakefield and Mike Lowell.  The Yanks apparently won’t have Joba Chamberlain back until around Labor Day, and have the biggest hill to climb.  Hideki Matsui is due back in the next few days.  His bat will certainly help; how much of a plus the return of Phil Hughes can be is a pitching puzzlement.  The White Sox and Twins can fight it out on even, injury-free terms in the AL Central.  Detroit, hurting both in the standings and DL-wise (Joel Zumaya), may not be even a remote factor for long.  The AL West race, of course, is over.

 

 

(Posted 8/14/08)

 

Snap quiz:  Why can the LA Angels be seen as a model for the presidential candidates?

 

Answer:  They have shown a willingness to do whatever it takes to win.

 

A baseball-suggestive word for such a willingness is “ruthlessness”: acting brashly because – in the Angels’ case - of a felt need to add a post-Babe-like slugger to the lineup…and thereby possibly assuring that the team goes all the way.  We know that the Angels were cinches to win the AL West when they traded for Mark Teixeira.  The deal with Atlanta told the baseball world they wouldn’t be satisfied with a division or a league title or even earning a World Series spot.  They’re determined to finish at the very top.

 

The Republicans showed a determination to win, and, yes, a ruthlessness, in their successful presidential campaigns of 2000 and 2004.  In the first, they mobilized to help foil a Florida recount that could have shown Al Gore the winner in that pivotal state; in 2004, they “swift-boated” John Kerry, challenging his status as a Vietnam war hero.  The tactic kept questions about the validity of Kerry’s credentials hanging through much of the campaign.

 

Out-toughing the opposition paid off in those campaigns.  NY Times columnist David Brooks thinks that type of strategy will be prominent again this year.  Here is how he put it on The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer: “There's an ethos that…ruthless is good…the more ruthless you are, the more macho you are, that proves you're a tough customer and you're the best thing.”

 

John McCain has already embraced the attacking strategy.  On the stump and in TV spots he has linked Barack Obama to high gas prices, said Obama wants to raise taxes on people making more than $40,000, and charged that his opponent passed up a scheduled visit to wounded U.S. troops because TV cameras wouldn’t be present.  He’s also done some effective book- and bench-jockeying: Obama is not a “real American”. McCain has benefited in the polls.   The question now is whether Obama will - or should - respond in kind?  Attacking a 71-year-old authentic war hero is tawdry.  Yet, if he’s content to field the low line drives launched by the McCain team, Barack would be like the Mets instead of the Angels or the Yankees or the Dodgers.  Maintaining his integrity, but possibly going the way of Gore and Kerry.  The choice may be decisive. 

                                          -     -     -

A decisive time has arrived for the Tampa Bay Rays, who were swimming along smoothly at the top of the AL East only a few days ago.  Then two of their top players, outfielder Carl Crawford and rookie third baseman Evan Longoria suffered finger and wrist injuries that will shelve Crawford close to the rest of the season, and Longoria for two to three weeks.  At least until the end of the month, the remaining Rays will have to raise their games to keep from sinking.  Since the double injuries, they’re margin over the Red Sox has shrunk to three. 

 

The near-concession of Hank Steinbrenner notwithstanding, the Yankees are clearly, if barely, still in the chase.  Although they finished the road trip to Texas, Anaheim and Minnesota, 3-7, they are a do-able six games behind in the wild card race.  Reasons for hope: the close-to-imminent return of Hideki Matsui and, not-too-much later, that of Joba Chamberlain. 

 

Thanks to the Manny-spurred Dodgers, LAD and the Mets are now tied for first in their respective divisions.  Milwaukee probably won’t catch the Cubs, but the Brewers are making a statement: they won’t be denied the NL wild card.  The Tigers, like the Yanks, can’t be counted out in their division.  But the White Sox and Twins are putting on a persuasive show that they’ll be hard to overtake in the AL Central. 

 

The gallows gag concerning the Mets:  the best thing that’s happened to the team in the past week – the postponement “for personal reasons” of the return of Luis Castillo.  

                             

 

(Posted 8/12/08)

 Steve Blass, Steve Sax, Chuck Knoblauch, Rich Ankiel. 

 

Baseball fans recognize the names of players who mysteriously lost their focus and stopped throwing with accuracy.  Blass and Ankiel had to give up pitching, the latter is now a Cardinal outfielder.  Sax and Knoblauch were infielders; the Yankees were forced to move Knoblauch to the outfield in 2000.  Sax played for the Dodgers in the ‘80’s.  “I hope they don’t hit to me,” a teammate in an unfamiliar position was quoted as saying at the time.  His second thought: “I hope they don’t hit it to Sax.”

 

It may be more calculated than mysterious, but Barack Obama seems to have lost focus as the pre-convention part of his campaign winds down.  The progressive-sounding candidate of the Democratic primaries has begun pitching erratically as the party’s nominee.   In an open letter to Obama, The Nation magazine and hundreds of its readers asked him to get back on the ball:

 

“Since your historic victory in the primary, there have been troubling signs that you are moving away from the core commitments shared by many who have supported your campaign, toward a more cautious and centrist stance--including, most notably, your vote for the FISA legislation granting telecom companies immunity from prosecution for illegal wiretapping, which angered and dismayed so many of your supporters.

 

“We recognize that compromise is necessary in any democracy.  We understand that the pressures brought to bear on those seeking the highest office are intense.  But retreating from the stands that have been the signature of your campaign will weaken the movement whose vigorous backing you need in order to win and then deliver the change you have promised.”

 

The Nation and its fans asked that several positions - including a fixed time for Iraq withdrawal, universal health care, an end to a regime of torture, meaningful enforcement of labor laws, and campaign finance reform - be put into Team Obama’s starting lineup.   They also urged that Obama positions behind military escalation in Afghanistan, a one-sided approach to the Israeli-Palestine conflict, and enforcement of the death penalty be cut from the roster.  Although they set no deadline for action, The Nation fan base clearly hopes that an Obama return to earlier form comes soon.

                                           -     -     -

Savvy Mets fans braced for what was coming in the ninth inning yesterday.  Mets ahead of the Pirates, 5-4, relievers having already blown a three-run lead in the previous two innings.  Aaron Heilman, the fill-in closer, now pitching.  The Agita-surfeited among them surely turned off the game then to avoid suffering through what happened - another last-minute loss of a game that should have been won.  It will take the coming of a miracle late-inning savior to keep the Mets in the race much beyond Labor Day.

 

In November 2005, the Mets’ new GM Omar Minaya swapped Mike Cameron for a comparatively obscure San Diego outfielder-first baseman named Xavier Nady.  Minaya took a lot of heat for the deal – “We didn’t get enough for Cameron,” was the consensus sentiment.  Shuffled off to Pittsburgh before the 2006 season was half-over (and after Duaner Sanchez was banged up in a taxi accident), Nady slowly blossomed into a player coveted by many teams but obtained last month by the Yankees.  How good is Nady?  Here is what an NL scout, asked by the Globe’s Nick Cafardo to compare Nady to Boston’s Jason Bay, had to say:

 

"Nady is far more talented. He has the potential to be an impact player while Bay is a good, solid, everyday player, but I just don't see any more upside in him.  He is what he is, which is a good player, but Nady could make a greater impact."   

 

“The Yankees are going to have to start winning games,” said radio play-by-play announcer John Sterling last night.  It’s something that, despite the addition of  Nady and Ivan Rodriguez, they can’t do with regularity.  The two newcomers can’t seem to fill the offensive holes left by the absence of Hideki Matsui and Jorge Posada.  The Yanks are now nine games behind the first-place Rays in the AL East and five games behind Boston in the wild card race.  Yes, it’s time for every serious playoff competitor to start winning. 

 

(Posted 8/9/08)

 

Baseball knows about tradeoffs: you give up a Manny Ramirez and get a Jason Bay; a great hitter and trouble-causer subtracted, a good, multi-tooled younger player added.  You hope that, on balance, you have helped, rather than hurt yourself.  “You have to give up value to get value,” says the dealmaker, whoever he is.  The Yankees are exulting over the addition of Xavier Nady; the Pirates couldn’t be happier with Jeff Karstens, one of the batch of pinstripers received in the trade for Nady and Damaso Marte.   Many, if not most MLB deals end up being beneficial to teams involved.  

 

Not so with political tradeoffs:  where millions may be at stake in baseball deals, the value of what is exchanged when elected officials give up one way government works to gain another can’t be calculated.   The Washington Post’s Pulitzer-winning economic writer Steven Pearlstein says that, unlike mostly acquiescent baseball fans, the American public is unhappy with the way political deals are working out, beginning - appropriately enough - with the issue of trade:    

 

“The blame (for the popular discontent with trade policy) lies squarely with a business community that continues to support Republican politicians who refuse to raise the taxes and spend the money necessary to provide the economic safety net for American workers that a free-market economy has not, and will not, provide.

 “Trade (Pearlstein continues) is hardly the only area in which open, unregulated and lightly-taxed markets have failed to deliver economic and social outcomes that Americans consider acceptable.  Despite the fact that the U.S. health-care system is the most privatized and market-driven of any in the industrialized world, it has become one of least efficient and effective, with extraordinarily high costs, mediocre results and a large and growing pool of working families with little or no insurance and inadequate care.”

 

To retrieve societal value lost in the one-sided policy exchanges of the last few decades, Pearlstein says givebacks from the advantaged side in those deals is an urgent national need: 

 “For the past 25 years, the United States has put its faith in open, unregulated and lightly taxed markets, and there's little doubt that, over time, that model has expanded economic output and improved economic efficiency. But what Americans have also come to realize is that the same model is less adept at providing other things that we value highly -- things like safety, fairness, economic security and environmental sustainability.  And more often than not, these are ’goods’ that can be had only by giving up some of that output and some of that efficiency.”

                                                 -     -     -

Red Sox Nation is feeling the loss of Manny Ramirez’s offensive output.  Boston Globe columnist Dan Shaughnessy says the events leading to Manny’s departure suggest tawdry collusion between the player and his agent, Scott Boras:

 

“The Red Sox had an option to retain Ramirez in 2009 (and 2010) for $20 million (per).  Ramirez…wanted to be a free agent at the end of this season.  His agent wanted the same thing.  Boras inherited Ramirez’s old contract and stood to earn nothing until Manny signed a new one.  It was in the interest of the player and the agent to have the options dropped.

 

“Manny’s only leverage was withholding services and playing at half speed.  So that’s what he did.  Sitting out games against Seattle and the Yankees,  jogging down the first base line…he sent the message that he wanted out.  He made sure the Sox knew he could not be trusted to play hard if they kept him until the end of the season with the options intact.”

 

Commissioner Bud Selig has ordered an investigation into what exactly happened. Whatever the probe uncovers,, Manny may well have burned his bridges to the Boston-based Nation that idolized him for eight years.

(Posted 8/6/08)

What do the Mets and the mortgage credit crisis have in common?  In 2005, most of us remember, new GM Omar Minaya invested Fred Wilpon’s multi-millions in the acquisitions of Pedro Martinez and Carlos Beltran,  adding Carlos Delgado and Billy Wagner a year later.  That year, 2006, the big-ticket investments paid off: the Mets made it to within an inning of the World Series. 

Furthermore, the Mets had gained an aura, a swagger: they felt their formula - stock the lineup with expensive big names - was sure-fire.  Weren’t they odds-on favorites to make the playoffs and beyond in 2007?  Until last September, who could blame Wilpon and Minaya from thinking the team could dissipate through dollars the risk inherent in trying to build a successful team?

 

The banking industry was seduced by a similar trend of stellar returns on mortgage related investments.  Like the Mets, financial outfits assumed they had made a sensible, safe gamble that could support hefty financial leverage.  “An idea took hold,” writes editor/analyst James Grant in a recent WSJ article, “risk was yesteryear’s problem.”  But instead of spending their way to illusory safety, as the Mets did, the financial people made a crucial error: the major banks, despite lowering lending standards, thought they could - in the words of The Financial Times - “sell the risk on.”  After those standards collapsed, however, the fallout signaled the risk-avoidance game was over.

 

We know the taxpayers are footing much of the bill for the big-time blundering. “Where Is the Outrage?” asks the Wall Street Journal.  How about this cutting response from independent presidential candidate Ralph Nader: “Financial capitalism is crashing.  So the lights are on late in Washington’s Federal Reserve, SEC and Treasury Department trying to figure out how socialism (your tax dollars and credits) can once again bail out these big time gamblers with our money. … Reckless, self-enriching capitalists get on your knees and thank the rescuing Washington socialists, for without them, you would surely be in chains.”

 

The Mets’ Minaya finds himself in a parallel pickle.  The fans are growing restless.  He pleads with boss Fred to bankroll one more major deal.  But unlike the banks, Wilpon has shown there is a limit to how much leverage he will tolerate.  The Mets, like the rest of the market, will have to learn to live within more modest means.                                                       

                                                -     -     -    

Joba Chamberlain going to the DL with rotator cuff tendinitis means the Yanks will be living under more modest means for much of the rest of the season.  Joba’s injury sets in motion second-guessing about the decision to move him from relieving to starting.  The Yanks had been congratulating themselves on a promotion they are now surely regretting.  

 

Asked on SNY what advice he can give to the Mets and manager Jerry Manuel in their present straitened circumstances, ex-Met and former Orioles manager Lee Mazzilli offered this easier-said-than-done counsel:  “Try to stay above water.”

 

(Posted: 8/5/08)

 

The Yankees have long been successful practitioners of the football axiom "a good offense is the best defense."  Last year, for example, they led the majors with a .290 team batting average and scored just under six runs a game, an MLB high.  After last night’s game (not a good one for the team nor the injured Joba Chamberlain) six of the nine regulars were batting .281 or better.  Newcomers Ivan Rodriguez and Xavier Nady were at 292 and .400, (the latter adjusting nicely to AL pitching after only a few games.)  What works in sports - the offense-generated Yanks may not go all the way every year, but they do make it into the post-season - has become a frequent tactic on the political field.

 

We know that in the 2004 presidential race, the Republicans offended many by "swift-boating" John Kerry into a defensive stance, challenging his hero’s credentials.  That the attack lacked substance did not diminish its effectiveness; Team Kerry never had a chance to bring out its big anti-Bush bats.  This year the GOP has gotten the race ball rolling in the first inning with its complaint about Barack saying he was different-looking from previous presidents.  Team Obama surely knew race would appear at some point in the game, if not so soon.  If three of 10 people surveyed (by the Pew Research Center) said they have a problem voting for an African-American, race was not only inevitable as an issue, it had to be irresistible to Team McCain.

 

Pollster Peter Hart has estimated that 10 percent of Democrats and independents refuse to admit their reluctance to vote for a (half-)black man. That stat, however imprecise, reinforces the likelihood that race will be THE decisive presidential issue, obscuring candidate differences on the economy, war and peace, etc.  Last Thursday, for example, Obama had hoped to connect by hitting McCain hard on energy issues; instead, the media played up his campaign’s response to the flap over race. 

 

It’s clear that both teams would like the game to hinge on how voters feel about their opponent.  Team Obama wants the focus to be John McCain's support of George Bush's policies, enabling the Obama-ites to warn of what, in effect, would be a third Bush term.  Team McCain understands its handicaps - the widespread dismay with the present administration, their candidate’s age, etc.  Seemingly, the McCain people further understand that his best bet is to be perceived, not as what he represents - a sometimes straight talker - but as the anti-Obama.  Many observers believe McCain’s brush-back-Barack responses are shaping up as the media’s preferred campaign narrative.  If that happens, with Barack’s race the pervasive sub-text, the offense-minded GOP may score the next commander-in-chief:  President Anti-Obama.

                               -     -     -

It may be that this year’s Mets collapse has come a month-and-a-half early.  The team is reeling from a perfect storm of setbacks: Billy Wagner and John Maine hurting; Duaner Sanchez velocity-challenged; Ryan Church continuously unavailable; Luis Castillo a dubious factor as imminent returnee; no help imminent from Orlando Hernandez.  All that, and Fred Wilpon apparently vetoing any more big-ticket dealing by Omar Minaya.  One can imagine Wilpon saying to his GM:  “I sprang for Santana, whom you thought would be enough to get us into the playoffs, at least.  Now make do with what you have…and let’s not disappoint our fans again.”   

 

The Daily News’ Adam Rubin provides an added reason why Metsian disappointment may be in store:  “It’s hard to feel great about Pedro Martinez’s outing Friday, but at least he said he felt healthy afterward. Martinez made it through five innings, tossing 87 pitches while surrendering three solo homers. He acknowledged feeling rusty, which is understandable since he hadn’t been in a game in 20 days. Martinez’s velocity did steadily creep upward as his outing went on, from 86 to 91 mph. The three homers allowed give Martinez 11 in 49 2/3 innings. In Martinez’s last 20-win season, in 2002 with Boston, he allowed 13 homers in 199 1/3 innings. Martinez’s ERA now stands at 6.16.”

 

Best story lines as games become mini-meaningful:  Can the Rays keep fending off the Red Sox and Yanks in the AL East?  Can the Twins stay afloat atop the AL Central?  Can the Manny-sparked Dodgers show they’re for real in the series starting tonight against the Cardinals?  Can the Cards continue to challenge temperamental Milwaukee for the NL wild card?

 

Stat City:  The MLB’s best team by far in one-run games: Brewers, 22-10.  The best in extra-inning games: Pirates, 10-3, Red Sox, 6-2.

 

 

(Posted 8/2/08)

 

The appeal of baseball, of games in general, has to do with the democratic ideal: we’re all playing by the same rules.  To be sure, the wealthier teams have a personnel advantage but they can’t cut corners to gain an edge; umpires check to see if bases have been touched, tags have been made, etc.

 

From a broader perspective, it’s interesting that rules, so basic to baseball’s popularity, are deplored by America’s financial players.  A political edge that money gave them late last century led to the scrapping of many regs that governed their investment games.  One catastrophic consequence: the sub-prime mortgage credit crisis, a meltdown much like the Mets’ collapse of last September.

 

The International Herald Tribune’s William Pfaff has the best primer of what happened on that free-range financial field:

 

“(The crisis stemmed from) short-sighted self-interest, since regulation limits what businessmen and bankers can do and creates burdensome institutions of oversight.  The resistance is short-sighted since regulation could have prevented the irresponsible or culpable conduct that caused the present credit collapse.  Greed and irresponsibility contaminated the supply of credit essential to business by introducing into the supply deliberately counterfeited credits.

”Business has always looked for a theoretical basis for its anti-regulation position in the classical liberal economic case for the efficiency of markets…The believers in business deregulation said that perfect freedom of enterprise would produce the highest efficiencies of production and the highest standards of living, while business self-regulation and self-interest would prevent profiteering, swindles, cheating of clients and customers, distortion of markets, market manipulation and speculation, and exploitation of labor and of the poor.

”This, like Marxism and anarchism, has not worked out as expected.  The lesson learned once more is that human nature is not suspended by progressive theory.”

 

                                              -     -     -

                                          

Taking presumptuous stock of the post-July 31 MLB alignment:  Angels, Brewers, Dodgers, Yanks – winners (in alpha order) of the reinforcements game.  The Yanks and  Angels share the prize for key last-minute AL acquisitions.  The Angels, long a heavenly lock in AL West, now (with Mark Teixeira) have a legitimate opening into the WS.  The Yanks should get one of two playoff slots that will come from the AL East.  The Manny-less Sox and Rays, of course, will have something to say about the division outcome.  It should be the most fun.  The White Sox/Twins/Tigers scramble in AL Central will have its moments, too; but only one will make the playoffs.

 

The Dodgers seem to have paid little for rental of Manny-the-Man who makes them favorites to win in the NL West.  The Mets had to upgrade to compete successfully with the Phillies, and didn’t.  Jerry (“Good Soldier”) Manuel hinted at the need for offensive help but now - echoing boss Omar - says the team is fine, as is.  It isn’t.  The NL East is the Phils to lose. The  D-backs still have an outside chance in the NL West, and, more remotely, the Rockies could repeat their ’07 miracle.  Cubs in NL Central, with Brewers and Cards battling for the wild card.   As the oracular Walter Cronkite used to say “That’s the way it is.”

 

 

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