Open Thread: Mo feels good
ByThe most important groin in the history of the universe was tested today, as Mariano Rivera took to the Rogers Centre bullpen mound before this afternoon’s game for a 20-pitch bullpen session. Marc Carig reports that there were no ill effects, and Mo could be available as soon as tomorrow.
“Feels good,” Rivera said. “No problems at all.”
“I have to make sure to keep up with my things, keep up with that,” Rivera said of his treatment regimen.
Manager Joe Girardi said he will manage Rivera’s outings a little more carefully the rest of the month to make sure he’s good to go in the playoffs. With an 8.5 game lead in the division (thanks, Gavin Floyd) and the magic number sitting pretty at 19 (notice the counter in the sidebar) with just 26 games to go, that shouldn’t too tough.
Thank goodness Mo will be back soon, I don’t know how much longer I can stomach these “four batters faced, three strikeouts” performances I can handle from Phil Hughes.
* * *
Here’s your open thread for the evening. The Tigers and Rays are on MLB Network, and there’s more college football than you’d know what to do with on TV. You can also come chill with me at MLBTR. Anything goes here, just be nice.
Mo isn’t cranky anymore?
Nice to see good ol Magic Number Aaron Boone!
+19
If the magic # gets to 17, I vote we put up a picture of nick green
tomorrow that is
I love what you guys are doing with the magic #!
Excellent idea!
I was wondering who you were going to pick for #19. My initial guess was Dave Righetti, but I forgot that Boone wore 19 when he hit That Homer.
Good call!
If the magic number goes down to 17 tomorrow the division is over
As if it isn’t already?
Not yet after 04 no lead is safe in my eyes
04 was a different kind of lead.
Short series, totally different.
Totally different team too
Terrible pitching, terrible defense
Our outfield in 2004
Matsui (-21.4 UZR/150)
Bernie (-42.8 UZR/150)
Sheffield (-17.5 UZR/150)
Probably the worst defensive outfield of all time.
That magic # picture is one of my absolute favorite ever.
Cant wait till we get to Brett Gardner.
As great as it is, I kinda like the last one more, but Paullie was one of my favorite players ever, and will be always
Some of those comments on the MLBTR Kevin Cash released thread make the ESPN commenters look brilliant
My favorite was the one with Shelley Smash as our fulltime DH in ‘10.
Mine was the trade for Hamilton AND Kinsler.
And what’s wrong with that?!?!?
That was kinda…..me. *runs away screaming*
I would be very happy if they don’t use him on the turf at Rogers Centre. There is no sense risking aggrivating the groin injury. On a related matter, this bullpen is simply amazing, it might be as good as the lineup. The Michael Kay stat saying they are 14-0 when tied after 7 innings says it all.
Bullpens are combustible. All it takes is a few relievers to go the way of Brian Bruney and we are in deep trouble
So what you’re saying is…our bullpen would suck if it wasn’t filled with able and tested arms?
This made me laugh, I thought I would share.
Gammons spoke to an NL GM who said he would have given Iglesias $12MM if his team could afford it, because “Our scouts say he’s the best defensive shortstop they’ve ever seen.”
EVER !!! LOL.
Enrique Iglesias?
He said Shortstop, not Tight End.
FUTURE 15x GG WINNER!!
ESPN does a POFF stat, which means “POFF: % chance of making the Playoffs”
http://espn.go.com/mlb/standings
As you can see, the Yanks stand at 99.9%. Short of a nuclear bomb hitting Yankee stadium and killing everyone on the roster, it appears the Yanks will make the playoffs. I’m not even totally sure a nuclear bomb will derail them, since the AAA roster could probably win enough games to get them in.
We are that good.
BTW-Somehow, Nick Swisher survives the attack. I have no idea how but I can just see him right now, covered in soot, saying “Damn! I just saw a flash of light and the next thing I knew I woke up on a rooftop over by Jerome Ave. I have no idea how I got there!”
Nuclear bomb???? So you’re saying our chances are good? Is that the gist of it?
I don’t want to go out on a limb here, but yes.
102.4 Avg wins. I like that. I like that a lot.
http://www.baseballprospectus......ddspec.php
who made up those numbers? this is not a 100 win team with the way they are playing lately. who is our fifth starter.
They’ve won 8 of their last 9 games, and the one loss was to Roy Halladay, who’s sorta good. They’ve also won 36 of their last 48 games.
What more can they do?
.750 ball just isn’t good enough for some folks. These are the people who usually hate A-Rod.
BTW-The 1998 Yanks had HIDEKI IRABU as their 5th starter. Won 125 games.
114.
Playoffs, Pop.
Mike, they could win every game from here on out and that isn’t enough for people. It is never enough. They were screwed as soon as they started the season by not going on a 162-0 run.
After re-reading his post, he has to be kidding right? His comment about how they have been (poorly) playing lately, that’s what tipped it off to me that he’s clearly joking. They played .667 ball in July, .750 ball in August, and .800 so far in September. Nice one A-Gon, you punk’d us all.
He’s really Ashton Kutcher in disguise.
They’ve won 64% of their games. That is a 103.68 win pace. Is that # made up as well? You must be the all glove, no hit, no posting ability Alex Gonzalez.
Who gives a shit who our 5th starter is?
The 5th starter is no longer relevant to this team.
You make Bo look optimistic
Wow. Considering you’re in love with everything about Boston. You’d think a 4.3 ERA from our 5th starter in August wouldn’t be so bad.
Any one know whats up with the espn insider story “Yankees discussing changing dimensions”??? I dont subscribe to it..was wondering if anyone read the article??
Since nobody in this solar system can beat us, we are looking at ways to bend the time-space continuum so we can travel through space to find worthy opponents.
Personally, I can’t until we play those bastards in the Andromeda Galaxy.
lmao, ietc
It might be the cold medicine talking here but that was pretty damn lol funny.
Let’s see if we can guess the magic numbers going forward, that should be fun.
http://www.behindthebombers.com/num11-20.html
The low numbers 1-10 are easy, they’re pretty much all retired.
#11-As much as I love Gritt Gutner, I think this one is Chuck Knobloch. Although a pic of Dwight Gooden’s no-hitter would be pretty sweet.
#12-Wade Boggs on the horse.
aaaaand here it is! With the #12 clearly visible!
http://assets.nydailynews.com/....._horse.jpg
I don’t have them all picked out or anything. I just play it by ear each time it goes down. Someone sent me a real cool one for #18 that I plan on using, but after that it’s all up in the air.
Yeah, I’m just throwing ideas out there.
I demand Sojo for #14 if someone can find a picture of his game winning 2000 World Series hit.
#13 is obviously Alex, and #15 is retired for Munson.
Though Charlie Hayes wore #13, and 1996 was the sweetest championship of them all. Waited a loong time for that one. The Hayes catch would be a good call as well.
While he doesn’t wear the number, it has to be Joba for #8 right?
You lost me there.
Joba for the 8th.
Doh!
#16 is retired for Whitey Ford, and #14 is Cano.
Scott Broscius wore #18, so that’s a good one.
#14 is Cano
Hunh?
05 Cano.
Had forgotten about that
14 is most definitely Luis Sojo.
I have NO IDEA whatsoever who they’ll do for #17. I have a feeling that day will be skipped, the list is so weak.
Maybe the immortal Andy Stankiewicz?
We’d be cheating if he skipped a number. When it hits 17, there will be a 17.
OK, then I guess you’ll go with Gene Michael there. It just feels weird since he wasn’t a great player, and never won anything as a Yankee player. But ‘architect of the dynasty’ should count for something.
Gene Michael. The man who made the foundation for the last Yankee dynasty. He was an atrocious player, but look at the farm system he created.
I know, but as I just posted above that’s representing him as a player, and those were some lean years for the Yanks.
The best years produced by a player wearing that number were Vic Raschi’s. .667 Winning % albeit on some dominant Yankee teams. He won 6 World Series rings and personally was 5-3 with 2.24 ERA in the World Series.
Yeah, I thought about that one but I already Googled him and couldn’t find anything with him wearing his number.
Plus, I’ll guess about 3% of this site has ever heard of him, and that’s high for most Yankee sites. He played forever ago.
I’ve heard of him!
Allie Reynolds needs to be in the HOF.
This is actually related, they were part of the same staff.
Obviously you have. Reynolds+Raschi was the Yanks 1-2 punch in the rotation from 1948-1953.
You’re forgetting Eddie Lopat. He was 113-59 and 3.21 from 1948 through 1955, and 1955, his last year, was a disaster.
HAIRSTON!!
YES!!! LOVE IT!!
I’d put him there if he has a good picture for it, i think so… probably high fiving at home plate with Posada or Matsui.
Shelly Smash!
This team is ops’ing .863 since the break. As a freaking team. Unreal. That’s better than, among others: Ichiro, V-Mart, Kinsler, Markakis, Crawford, Abreu, Aaron Hill for the season.
james shields is not good…..but TB will have a nice rotation again next year, far outperforming what they will be paying for it
Price will get better, Garza, Shields and Niemann are horses and they have to hope Wade Davis is what they believe…
I think they have more pitching RIGHT NOW than the Red Sox do.
They’re 5.5 back and time is running out, but I still see them making a run at it. I don’t like Boston’s pitching at all with Beckett struggling.
I never thought Boston had good pitching, Beckett has only had the one solid year and Lester tends to struggle from time to time, i think the Rays do have better pitching…
Unfortunately… Upton struggled pretty much all year, Iwamura got hurt, Longoria after the hot start has not really been hot again and Pena is batting below .230, that’s just a disaster, probably should be in second place.
and despite all that
#4 Runs Scored (Boston #3)
#5 Team ERA (Boston #7)
#3 Bullpen ERA (Boston #1)
They’re right there with Boston. If they can play better, they can still make a run at it. One good week by them and a bad week by Boston and you could have a 3 way tie.
No doubt, if they won yesterday and win today (Detroit tied it up)… it’d be a different ball game.
But winning today brings them within 5 i think. 25+ games to go… it could be a tight race and i for one am not counting Tampa or Texas out of the Wild Card.
Boston’s Bullpen has not been as good as it was in the beginning of the year, not surprising.
On what planet is Shields not good? A 27 year old durable reliable pitcher with a career ERA under 4.00 in the Al East and a 115 career ERA+ and 117 or better in his 3 full years in the bigs. If he were a FA he’d get better than AJ money.
He had two great years for the division, but he’s fallen off big time this year, sub 4 era still, but leads the AL in homers given up, and over 200 hits given up in 186 innings…he’d get a nice deal as a FA, but I doubt he’d get AJ money, he may be younger, but his stuff is miles behind Burnett
His results are ahead of AJ and he’s younger, he’d get more money. And if a 118 ERA+ is bad, sign me up for some more James Shields’.
if Shields was on the Yankees we’d talk about his bad HR rate, declining K9, increasing H9, BB9 and WHIP.
And he only averages 90mph therefore he’s only a #4 starter
Or plenty of fans would want to put him in the 8th.
What’s wrong with being concerned about that? Those aren’t reassuring numbers.
And there’s no reason to compare him to Jobs. He’s outperformed Joba by light years this season and nobody brought him up.
I didnt say those werent concerns, just pointing out that he’s on another team and we see him pitch 3 times a year so we love him, but if we watched him for 33 times a year we’d pick him apart.
Where did i mention Joba?
You did not mention Joba, but Steve made a joke about the eighth inning, which is of course an indirect joke about Joba’s struggles out of the eighth inning.
But your other point stands.
A. he is good.
B. They will, Shields, Garza, Niemann, Price, and Davis/Sonnestine/Hellickson will be good.
They’re depth allowed them to trade Kazmir, which allowed them to save salary likely for Crawford.
C. Sonnanstine doesnt belong on that list
Yeah, I token included because he’s there
If the yankees keep winning, then everybody including ESPN might actually wanna break up the yankees.
any thoughts on the new ken rosenthal’s idea that the yanks might be interested in figgins this offseason?
He could in many respects fill the role many want carl crawford for if crawford’s option gets picked up. less slugging slightly less sb’s but better obp and more versatility. would allow the yanks to maybe bring damon back as primarily a dh or let him walk. i doubt we would offer damon arb and risk paying him 15 mil next year
As always comes down to cost & years, Figgins will go downhill real quick when he does.
Personally I’d say pass, not a fan
Just watched the Boone moment again. Wow. Just wow. We have not had a great playoff moment in a while. Hopefully we get a few this year.
What a great story as well, coming back from open heart surgery.
BTW-Faster than Jose Reyes came back from a pulled hamstring.
Well, if Boone was being handled by the Mets…I shudder to think.
If I’m Boone I don’t even go too close to Citi Field for fear of the Mets horrible luck somehow leaking out and infecting him.
For that matter, I wouldn’t go to close to Citi Field either.
Just my opinion, but I think the Rays are d-e-a-d DEAD.
Texas is a whole other matter.
8-6 Tigers,
With bases still loaded, Thames ALMOST hit a GS – crushed one foul, then singled in the go-ahead run. The TB pen is just not performing.
Tigers just executed the squeeze perfectly
If TB is going to make a run, they might want to start tonight
Pen is weak, should be interesting seeing what Wade Davis can do tomorrow.
Feeling cocky and comfortable with an 8.5 game lead, I just checked the standings for Sept. 6, 1998 for shits and giggles. The Yanks were 19.5 games up with 22 games to play. Holy bejeezus.
1. That’s sick.
2. Not to take away from the 1998 team but…what kind of condition was the rest of the division in that year?
Boston was a respectable 21 games over .500 (81-60) and in 2nd place. The Yanks were a – ahem – modest 60 games over .500 (100-40).
That is mind boggling. Still.
60 games over .500. How is that even possible???
This team is good…but it’s light years from 1998.
I agree, but if Hughes and Joba mature nicely next year, 2010 could be even better than 2009, at which point it would approach 1998.
Point being, I think for the Yanks and Girardi the best is yet to come.
Ah, I can’t predict that. Predicting a team like 1998 to me is like predicting a perfect game; you don’t predict them, they just happen and you sit back and enjoy the ride.
Put it this way – Robertson and Melancon should just get better.
ZMac isn’t far away… and I’m eager to see how IPK looks in spring training. So there could be some nice pitching depth in 2010.
What kind of players will Montero and AJax be? And how will Joba and Hughes pitch in the rotation?
The answers to those questions might go a long ways to determining what the future looks like.
You’re right… we’re totally not as good as the ‘98 team. But I’d say we’re at least as good as the ‘99 team and better than the ‘00 team. I’ll take that any year.
Angels and Royals locked 1-1 in extra innings. I thought to myself “Greinke must have pitched today” and, what do you know, he did through the 8th inning.
What’s the future look like for him? FA? Or a trade?
Who’s home?
Just looked it up, nice Royals are the home team.
2-1 Angels in the 11th – still batting
TB – Zaun just hit into a DP to end the 8th. Still 8-6 Tigers
I saw that on the scoreboard. Good luck to the Royals’ offense.
Don’t worry, Willie Bloomquist is up.
I’m glad I’m not a Royals fan.
Good thing KC locked up Drayton Moore – or someone would swoop in
KC with runners on 1st and 2nd, 2 out. Jacobs vs Brian Fuentes
Angels win. Bloomquist lined out. Fuentes continues to not impress.
He just signed an extension this offseason.
Do you mean in 2008? Considering his health situation and pitching struggles, that of course makes sense.
I honestly think Shawshank Redemption is his favorite movie because being on the Royals must feel like a prison. One day he too could escape!
Billy Butler is Feared.
Mike Jacobs is not.
For good reason. First pitch weak hack. Ugh.
TB with two outs in the bottom of the 9th
They need serious cowbell
Mike mentioned Chone Figgins as a FA option for left field on MLBTR. That sounds good to me.
If the money is right, sure.
His UZR does not impress though.
I like his on-base numbers, but does he really have enough pop to justify a corner OF spot?
Not sure, I’m on the fence. The more this season progresses the more I think that the Yankees probably shouldn’t even deal with the FA market. Just resign Johnny and Matsui to short term deals. If Matsui gets injured, make a midseason trade or maybe even call up Ajax.
I agree with this statement.
Yeah, I agree with that.
+28
Rays lose again
Crawford struck out – and it was ugly
Jose Contreras with 6.2 IP of 1 R ball tonight.
The NL is a joke.
That is actually kind of sad.
Sure you saw this… Heyman on how NL teams pick up players off the AL scrap-heap because the NL is so inferior:
http://sportsillustrated.cnn.c.....index.html
Some pretty funny lines in there, like: “‘You can do nothing like the Houston Astros and still compete every season in the NL,’ one AL executive pointed out. (The Astros aren’t exactly in the mix this year, though.) Another executive said he believed that the White Sox and Blue Jays, two AL teams with losing records this year, would contend in the NL.”
Take the current roster construction of the Yankees and throw them in the NL…do they then rival the 1998 W-L record?
It’s never easy to win that many games, there have been plenty of amazing teams that haven’t gotten to those heights. But this team in the NL would have to, at the least, be considered a pretty good bet for about 100 wins every year, I’d imagine.
The NL: when sending your pitchers down the minors is too much of a challenge.
Damn, Oklahoma lost.
Dont be too down Pop , your team is gonna lose on a regular basis … and i’m not talking about the Sooners.
Thunder win! One game back with two to go.
Photos from Trenton game tonight
http://www.puristbleedspinstri.....e-off.html
just got back from the texas a&m (i go there) vs New Mexico game
it was awesome to see us win tonight
I don’t want to wait til Monday for my college football. Booo Labor Day games.
GO CANES!
Canes
+1
New want: I want the mets and yanks to switch…they become AL east and we get a legit shot at winning 125 regular season games.
only if we can still have the DH, the last thing I want is our pitchers batting
Part of me wants to just skip them (8 batters is plenty), and part of me thinks Mo hits lots of doubles if they make us take Citi as part of the deal….
What do you guys think about the Yankees signing Damon AND Chone figgins next year. Figgins in Left, Damon at the DH and you can move Figgins to right field too. I think it’d be great to get him away from LAA.
I think Chone Figgins wants too many years for us to throw him in the OF. He hasn’t played there consistently in a while. For us to throw him out there in his latter years doesn’t make much sense. He’s a great player who I like a lot, I just don’t see him fitting in the everyday lineup.