And we're back...

Well, we sure faded near the end of last season, but that isn't particularly unusual here. Now we are back for the 4th season of BHGM - or The Ballhouse. Not sure what I'm going to do about the name... anyway. Here is how this season is going to play out:

Now - May 23rd: Posting will be very irregular, due to a specific test I am taking on the 23rd, has to do with Medical School. I won't go into specifics, because I don't want to think about it much either.
May 23rd - May 30th: Will not be conscious posting.
May 31st- Rest of the Season: We'll be seeing some of the better posts again. Stuff like what was going up in 2005.

Until June, we're going to have to put up with shoddy formatting, poorly researched opinions, and short posts. Oh well. Lets get started!

Those of you readers with a halfway decent memory, (or those of you handy with Google,) will know that I was not very happy with Bobby Cox's handling of Tim Hudson last year. Namely, the fact the Huddy would get pulled in the 7th inning, having pitched only 78 pitches, with the score 1-1. I believe we kept a counter going; we hit something like five in a row before I stopped keeping track. Well, Bobby Cox is out as manager, but the pulling is still going in. After retiring 19 straight batters and throwing only 78 pitches, Huddy was pulled. Now, I know it's early in the season, but you can't help but question this, as well as about 116 other things that happened tonight.

1) The Nationals opened up their new park, called "Nationals Park." Did you know? I, for one, did not. Now that I do know, I do not care. With this new park, and this being the first game played there, (and, technically speaking, 'Opening Night',) you would expect a pretty packed crowd. Sadly, that was not the case. I do not think the game was a sellout, as people were able to purchase tickets at the door. Furthermore, the Nationals did not match their season ticket purchases from 2005. That does not bode well. Apparently, the magic of seeing a terrible team lose games in your city is beginning to wear off. Maybe this is because...

2) The Nationals starter, for their first game of the season, was one Odalis Perez. You may remember him from such things as, "I struck out 128 in 2004 (ERA 3.26), but haven't kept an ERA under 4.50 since then." In fact, the details are even scarier. 2005 - 108IP - 4.56ERA; 2006 - 126 - 6.20; 2007 - 137 - 5.57. This isn't the guy I want starting opening day. In fact, this isn't the guy I want starting my pickup games. This promises to be an interesting war for the Nationals.

3) I have to go back to Hudson getting pulled. He had retired 19 straight batters. Had not allowed a man on base since the first inning. No walks. Three hits. And they pulled him. And, in typical Braves fashion, the sticks tied it, only for the 'pen to blow it. Heartbreaking.

4) What was MLB thinking? "Braves v. Nationals. That is a game people will want to watch." If someone can explain this reasoning, please let me know.

5) How about this gem from Nationals manager Manny Acta? "[The new park] is top-of-the-line. It's exciting to come to work every day here." Sure, Manny. I guess if managing a Major League baseball team doesn't do it for you, a new ballpark will.

Thanks for sticking around guys. Leave some comments if you are still reading. To those of you still reading on BHGM, I'll direct you, once again, to http://ballhouse.blogspot.com/. Because I'm not sure how much longer I am going to keep BHGM. Although if MLBlogs wants to offer me a lifetime free subscription, I will certainly listen. And I won't tell anybody. If you need some convincing about the economic viability of such a deal, just Google "Greatest Play of All Time."

A.J. Burnett keeps coming up...

We've written a few things about A.J. in the past year. They went sort of like this:

1)Why did the Jays sign this above average, but extremely injury prone guy to a 5-year, $50 million contract?
2) Like we said, A.J. starts 2006 on the DL.
3) Get ready for 2007, Jays fans, because A.J. is healthy this year.
4) Nevermind, apparently he sucks now.
5) Perhaps that early-season ERA of 7+ was just a fluke. We've got our Ace!
6) Abort, he's hurt. But they say he wont need to go on the DL.
7) So he is on the DL. But he can still outrun you. Different part of the body.
8) Now he's back... on the DL again. But we got that one start out of it between trips. And you can't take that away, as much as you would want to, having given up five runs to the Twins.

But now the drama has reached new heights. Jays' GM J.P. Ricciardi has always been a little touchy when you bring up A.J. being injured. Not sure why, J.P., since you signed the guy knowing full well he had been disabled seven times prior. So now J.P. wants A.J. to man up.

We just need to find a way to keep him out there. I don't know if it's psychological, I don't know if it's just he gets to a point where he feels something [that] he's so scarred from being hurt so many times that he just backs off. But I think he's going to have to get over that hump at some point and just maybe pitch through some pain or realize what the difference is between being hurt and really being hurt.  

Whoa there, J. Look past the run-ons for a second, if you can. Here's J.P. Ricciardi, who looks like the kind of guy who you could knock down with one punch. And he's telling a professional athlete that he's pissed because he wont tear up his shoulder pitching for a team 12 games out of first place.

And you know how this is going to end. A.J. is going to come out and say, "you know, I love this team, and I feel bad for my teammates, because the last thing I want to do is hurt them. But I need to scope out my shoulder, because it hurts like hell. See you guys in 4-6 weeks." And then J.P. is going to respond with, "we are hopeful that this will help A.J. return to form." That's scenario one. In scenario two, A.J. disappears into phantom land and pitches simulated games for a few years. Kind of like that guy Mark Prior. Remember him? How about Kerry Wood? Struck out a few hundred Astros in one game, you remember him.

And I've got news - its going to keep happening. It's not physically possible to throw a baseball 98 mph for 15 years. Medically, it just can't be done. For instance, if you lie down and rotate your shoulder towards your back - while keeping your elbow steady - you should be able to get 90-100 degrees of rotation. An MLB pitcher can do something like 130 degrees. While it's not known what relationship that has to injuries, it makes it clear that something is changing. When you throw a baseball that hard, you practically throw your elbow off. And if you don't like that approach, find me one pitcher who is pitching 100+ and older 35 years old, and I'll show you 100 guys who blew their arms out. Prior and Wood, for starters.

But, economically, what can these guys do? They can't go out there and give it 90%. You could move them to the bullpen, but that's kind of weird. So they pitch hard and fast for a few years, make millions of dollars, and then become finesse pitchers. It seems that guys that come up later are more mature and learn to dial it down to preserve the longevity of their body. They might also have the confidence necessary to do that. That last part is all speculation. But we'll see how A.J. turns out.

Homer Bailey Sucks

If there was an opposite of Player of the Week Award, this guy gets it.

2 Games, 5.1 IP, 13 hits, 8 walks, 13 ER, 3 K.

His ERA is 22.94. Good job, Homer. Way to give your cellar-dwelling team a shot. Have fun in AA ball.

First half AL MVP: Magglio Ordonez

Sure, we're not to the All Star Break quite yet, but we're halfway through. Over the next couple of days, we're going to take a look at the best players in each league thus far.

Magglio Ordonez: 13 HR, 68 RBI, .377 BA, .452 OBP

This was a tough pick. In the end, it came down to Magglio Ordonez and Alex Rodriguez. And here's where we start splitting hairs a bit. First off, it is the Most Valuable Player award. So you have to ask yourself, who does more for their team, Ordonez or Rodriguez? Rodriguez had more than twice as many HR (28 to 13,) but Ordonez has 34 doubles to Alex's 18. In the end, they have about the same extra base hits, and Alex has 77 RBI's to Ordonez's 68. The main difference, and what gave Ordonez the prize, was the average and OBP. Ordonez has struck out 33 times to Alex's 60. His batting average is 46 points higher, and his OBP is plus 23 points. There isn't a lot of difference there, but it's all we have to go on. Ordonez puts the ball in play more often, and he rarely strikes out.

In general, Alex is probably the better hitter, and the stats are barely in Magglio's favor. Both of them are above-average fielders at their position. However, Alex is not considered the leader of his team, and when his team is slumping, there's talk that he's going to leave next year. It will always be Jeter's team, and if Babe Ruth started tomorrow's game, it would still be Jeter's team. So we can't hold that against him. But you get the feeling that he's just not the most important player on the team. He'll never make a Jeterian dive into the stands. I'm not going to hold the muscled-up ladies against Alex, but it is a slight off-field distraction. And you get the feeling that Magglio seems to have more of a team motivation in him. Of course, that could all be crap. I live in Michigan, not New York, so there might be some favoritism. But the bottom line is that, when Magglio comes up to the plate, he's more likely to get on base or move the runners along than Alex is.

First half NL Cy Young Winner: Jake Peavy

Sure, we're not to the All Star Break quite yet, but we're halfway through. Over the next couple of days, we're going to take a look at the best players in each league thus far.

Jake Peavy (9-2): 105 IP, 113 K's, 2.14 ERA.

Jake Peavy has been a great pitcher for quite some time now. As a matter of fact, if it weren't for his 2006 hiccup, many would probably regard him as the greatest pitcher in the game. After all, Peavy finished 2004 with a 2.27 ERA, and '05 with a 2.88 ERA and 216 K's in 203 IP. However, pitching for a less-than-stellar Padres team, he went just 28-13 combined. In 2006, he had an 'off' year. Most of his stats were identical, except that he gave up significantly more hits, resulting in a 4.09 ERA.

In 16 games so far, Peavy has gone 9-2. He leads the NL in strikeouts with 113 - that's 9.69K/9IP, and batters are hitting a meager .216 off him. However, his most remarkable statistical improvement - and there have been many - has been his ability to keep those balls that are put in play on the ground. Previously, Peavy had been a slight fly-out pitcher, hovering around a G/F of 1.20. This year, his G/F ratio is at 1.49. The result is 1 HR allowed and 10 double plays. In comparison, he forced 10 and 13 DP's in all of 2005 and 2006, while allowing 18 and 23 HR, respectively. While 1.49 is generally the line between a ground ball and fly out pitcher, it is an 'increase' over his career average and shows that Peavy has changed something on his pitches, resulting in fewer HR and more DP's. That provides evidence that his performance this year has not been due to mere chance, but rather to a marked change. Of course, the debate of a pitcher's control over a batted ball is one for another blog entirely.

The reality is that Peavy is having a season nearly identical to that of his 2005 campaign, but while giving up fewer walks. This, along with the G/F ratio, again shows that he is not having a string of lucky starts. As such, Peavy wins out and takes away the Ballhouse's first half NL Cy Young Award.

The competition wasn't easy, and Peavy wasn't the original choice here. But after some discussion, Kevin and I decided that he deserved it. The two other finalists were teammate Chris Young and LA Dodger Brad Penny. However, the fine folks at ESPN, in all their wisdom, provided us with some pretty compelling stats that shifted the voting in Peavy's favor. One of them is a Bill James innovation called the "Game Score." Peavy's AGS, (Average Game Score,) was 63.1, while Young's was 60.7, and Penny's was 59.9. Interestingly enough, this showed that the Ballhouse's initial picks of the top three NL pitchers were correct. The next highest regular NL starter was Cub Rich Hill, with 58.6.

We'll be continuing our first half awards with our AL/NL MVP and AL/NL Rookie of the Year later this week.

First half AL Cy Young Winner: Dan Haren

Sure, we're not to the All Star Break quite yet, but we're halfway through. Over the next couple of days, we're going to take a look at the best players in each league thus far.

Dan Haren (9-2): 117.2 IP, 93 K's, 1.91 ERA.

Dan Haren has quietly become one of the most outstanding pitchers in the game. He had a good year in 2005, his first with Oakland. He finished with an ERA of 3.73 in his first full year as a starter. He followed up in 2006 with similar numbers, albeit a slightly higher (4.12) ERA. He did, however, increase his strikeouts from 163 to 176, and knocked his walks down from 53 to 45. Home Runs remained a problem, as Haren gave up 31 shots in 34 starts.

But this year, Haren is really doing special things, and he's been the model of consistency. He leads the majors with a 1.78 ERA, and at no point has his ERA been higher than 2.00. He is 9-2; however, his two loses came in the first two games of the year, where he gave up a combined 1 ER in 13 innings, (in an interesting turn of events, Haren managed to give up a 3-run HR which was wholly 'unearned.') Haren has not lost since April 7th, and has gone 6+ innings in all but one of his starts. He has only allowed 3 ER twice, and never more. His 'worst start' was his 3rd start of the year against the Yankees, where he gave up 3 ER on 4 hits and 4 BB over 5 innings. He is 7th in the AL with 89 K's and 2nd with a WHIP of 0.90. And the best part is that he's only 26 years old.

Haren, unlike some pitchers, has been remarkably consistent this year as we saw above. He keeps his team in the game every time he starts, and that's what you need from your ace. Haren, as you may recall, was acquired in a trade with the Cardinals in which the A's shipped of Mark Mulder. And, of course, we haven't seen much of him lately. For those who are curious, Mulder is currently rehabbing after rotator cuff surgery and has almost no timetable for return. Barry Zito has gone arsonist after landing the richest free agent pitching contract ever with San Francisco, and Tim Hudson has been a strange guy for the Braves as well. Has anyone ever considered the possibility that the A's burn through young arms, as they have no hope of resigning them? Note that Haren averaged 220 IP in'05 and '06 and is on pace for 243 this year.

Haren, who supposedly pitches for a 'small market team' - and by that, we mean a team that plays on the West Coast and rarely meets expectations come October - has not gotten a lot of credit for his outstanding play. So here you are Dan. And I would suggest a haircut, but apparently the birds nest is working out well, so just leave it alone.

Watch out for the White Sox meteorite

Has anybody noticed that the White Sox suck? They aren't just crashing back down to earth. They're streaking through the atmosphere, the heat shield isn't holding up, and it looks like the 'chutes aren't going to work either. They're going to make a giant-sized crater. But again, we're not just going to say things and not provide evidence to support our claims. As usual, we're going to use numbers.

The White Sox are in a 2-way tie for the fewest wins in Major League Baseball. They're 29-42.

That about says it all. Teams with better winning percentages than the White Sox include the Pirates, Orioles, Nationals, and Devil Rays. Teams with lower winning percentages consist of the Rangers, Royals, and Reds. In 2005 they won the World Series. In 2007 they're hanging out with the cellar-dwelling Royals. And GM Ken Williams is saying things like, "Something's got to happen. I'm tired of watching this."

As a result, White Sox management has begun to make some rather peculiar choices regarding player personnel. Especially when it comes to Mark Buehrle. By all accounts, he's a good guy, a clubhouse guy. Fan favorite. He did finish last year with an ERA circa 5. My opinion is that his arm is tired, as Buehrle has pitched more than 220 innings a year since 2001. He's probably lost some life on his moving fastball. He's a free agent after this year, but he was on record last year as saying he wanted to stay in Chicago. Sort of, we think. No one really knows what was being said. In any case, he is apparently trade bait. Why would you trade away a guy who you can really build something around? You know they're not going to get anything in return. But they're betting that they'll get more prospects that, five years down the line, will be worth more than Buehrle to them. I think they're underestimating Buehrle's staying power in this league, and that he will remain a great pitcher for another 10 years. The trick is signing the guy, and that's where they might be better off trading him away. Otherwise, they get nothing for him.

This string of loses was kind of predictable. Last year, Carl Everett accused GM Ken Williams of breaking up the team chemistry after he was traded away post-championship. Now, I'm certain that Carl didn't factor into the teams' chemistry as positively as he thinks. In fact, he thought the White Sox lacked leadership with him gone. Which is an interesting observation, as Carl Everett is currently a DH for the Free Agent squad, so he is now leading nobody. Everett also believes that we should implode Wrigley Field, and that even if we put every American child on 'roids, we would still lose more kids in war then to steroids. I'm not sure whether to call that Malthusian wisdom or just idiocy.

But Everett does have a point. A lot of important guys were shipped off, and nothing was really gained in return. Aaron Rowand was shipped off for Thome, who, as predicted, has been like a walking test ground for physical therapist students. And the Sox get Luis Terrero patrolling Center. McCarthy is gone, as is Cotts, as is Garcia, as is Frank Thomas. And not one single decent player has been acquired in any of these deals outside Thome. So you took a championship team, and in order to improve it, you traded away two starters, a reliever, a stand up centerfielder, a loud-mouthed DH, and an aging and oft-injured slugger for an aging and oft-injured slugger*. Probably not the best example of "if its not broke, don't fix it."

* - Jim Thome and Frank Thomas are also considered 'similar batters' according to baseball-reference.com, not just me.