Its that time again. Spring is in the air, the weather is starting to warm up, and the 2010 Mariners season is about a week and a half away!
In episode 11 of TBL, our good friend Dan Walters joins us in discussing the biggest story lines of the spring, including Jose Lopez and Chone Figgins swapping spots on the diamond, Cliff Lee's injury woes, and the tricky situation that is Mike Sweeney.
They say three is a crowd, but we had a blast talking M's baseball with Wally, so thanks go out to him. Also, want to thank Cam Schwartz for being our producer today, helping set up mics and telling Noah to stop slamming the table.
Thanks for listening, folks.
Episode 11
Showing posts with label Jose Lopez. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Jose Lopez. Show all posts
Sunday, March 28, 2010
Monday, June 22, 2009
The Bush Leagues, now on video!
Hey everyone,
Just as Nick eluded to earlier this morning, we have in fact evolved as a Mariners news source. We are now offering video of our blogcast so all of you can see our interactions with each other and exactly what goes on when we record. Although I must admit, we do exactly what it sounds like we're doing...sitting on a chair clucking like a couple of hens about baseball. Not a bad way to pass the time.
Apologies for the sound at the end but I'm kind of new to video editing and my audio didn't quite sync with the video the way I had hoped. Please be patient as I go through the growing pains of digital video editing.
P.S. Garbs' hat says, "Chicks lay better in the morning."
Just as Nick eluded to earlier this morning, we have in fact evolved as a Mariners news source. We are now offering video of our blogcast so all of you can see our interactions with each other and exactly what goes on when we record. Although I must admit, we do exactly what it sounds like we're doing...sitting on a chair clucking like a couple of hens about baseball. Not a bad way to pass the time.
Apologies for the sound at the end but I'm kind of new to video editing and my audio didn't quite sync with the video the way I had hoped. Please be patient as I go through the growing pains of digital video editing.
P.S. Garbs' hat says, "Chicks lay better in the morning."
The Bush Leagues from Noah Banning on Vimeo.
Saturday, June 20, 2009
The Bush Leagues Blogcast, Episode 6
Hey everybody! Noah and I finally got around to recording episode 6 of TBL. Listen in as we hit on the AL West, player injuries, and Interleague play. Check it out and let us know what you think!
Garbs
Episode 6
Garbs
Episode 6
Friday, June 19, 2009
Harey Caray Agrees with me...
The Ghost of Harey Carey is on my side when it comes to the Predator playing baseball (Podcast #5), only he thinks he could cause some trouble too...
The Ghost of Harey Caray
M's take on the D-Bags, err, I mean backs tonight. Going 4-5 on the road trip didn't help our cause. Bedard is hurt, Lopez is gone due to a death in the family, and the Angels seem to be on fire. Hope this post cheers you up.
TGIF
Garbs
The Ghost of Harey Caray
M's take on the D-Bags, err, I mean backs tonight. Going 4-5 on the road trip didn't help our cause. Bedard is hurt, Lopez is gone due to a death in the family, and the Angels seem to be on fire. Hope this post cheers you up.
TGIF
Garbs
Tuesday, June 9, 2009
First the birds, then the NL...
So I haven't written a post in a bloody fort night. Since the last time I wrote a blog article I have beaten the monster of all video game conferences, in E3, and I have also gotten engaged to my lovely fiance Natasha, so its been a wild couple of weeks. But the baseball season keeps chugging along, so lets get into this.
The M's seem to be on a bit of an upswing as of late. Winners of 7 of their last 10, they currently sit one game under .500, and 5 games out behind the Rangers. Looks like Beltre is figuring some things out at the plate along with Lopez, Branyan is still sitting balls into Lake Washington, and some kid who was a throw-in player in the JJ Putz deal refuses to let any one score when he's on the bump. Justin, err, Jason Vargas is currently a 2-0 pitcher, with a 1.93 ERA. and looking more and more like a solid number 4-5 starter. A very pleasant surprise, and he goes tonight against Baltimore, who he only gave up 2 runs against last time he faced them on June 3rd, in a 3-2 win, in which he got a no decision.
Looking ahead on the calender, after we finish the series in Baltimore, we then stroll into Colorado for three and then San Diego (I believe it means 'A Whale's Vagina' in German) for three. The M's have always seemed to play very well against the NL, going 116-96 leading up to this year, so if history tells us anything, it says we might be able to make some headway and be in the black, record wise, when we get home. For our next homestand, we get AZ, San Diego, and then off to Dodger land for the start of the following road trip.
If this team wants to make the playoffs, it needs to rip through this road trip, stay hot, and get home with some confidence and momentum. I personally think anything less then 5-4 record is a disappointment, with 6-3 being the goal. The three teams we are facing are a combined 19 games under .500, so its time to make a move. Either that, or go 3-6, and Bedard, Branyan, and Washburn better not be on the flight home. Instead, they should be flying out to their new teams because they just got traded. We are starting to get down to the nitty gritty here for this team. They are making a case that with the correct guys producing, they can win games. But if I were the GM, I would be expecting them to tear through the NL in this next month. June is going to be make or break, and I really don't think it could have lined up any better for us, given our history. 15 games this month against teams we have always done pretty well against in the past can't hurt a club looking to climb back into it. So here's to hoping!
Garbs
PS. As Noah mentioned in an earlier blog post, today is the first day of the MLB Draft. Strausberg is off to the Nats, he'll to warrant 40-50 million before throwing a major league pitch, and we could have had him if the A's wouldn't have purposely thrown the last series of the year, last Sept (my conspiracy theory, not proven). Instead, we get Dustin Ackley, who I'm happy with. Sounds like a decent amount of talent with some good upside, so we'll see I guess. I'll tell you what though, if Strausberg ends up being a bust for the Nationals (which crazier things have happened), that's it for that franchise. They need a shot in the arm, and this could be it, but if not, that's a mighty big motza ball to have to cover for a team that wins approx 60 games a year and has about 4 people watch their games.
The M's seem to be on a bit of an upswing as of late. Winners of 7 of their last 10, they currently sit one game under .500, and 5 games out behind the Rangers. Looks like Beltre is figuring some things out at the plate along with Lopez, Branyan is still sitting balls into Lake Washington, and some kid who was a throw-in player in the JJ Putz deal refuses to let any one score when he's on the bump. Justin, err, Jason Vargas is currently a 2-0 pitcher, with a 1.93 ERA. and looking more and more like a solid number 4-5 starter. A very pleasant surprise, and he goes tonight against Baltimore, who he only gave up 2 runs against last time he faced them on June 3rd, in a 3-2 win, in which he got a no decision.
Looking ahead on the calender, after we finish the series in Baltimore, we then stroll into Colorado for three and then San Diego (I believe it means 'A Whale's Vagina' in German) for three. The M's have always seemed to play very well against the NL, going 116-96 leading up to this year, so if history tells us anything, it says we might be able to make some headway and be in the black, record wise, when we get home. For our next homestand, we get AZ, San Diego, and then off to Dodger land for the start of the following road trip.
If this team wants to make the playoffs, it needs to rip through this road trip, stay hot, and get home with some confidence and momentum. I personally think anything less then 5-4 record is a disappointment, with 6-3 being the goal. The three teams we are facing are a combined 19 games under .500, so its time to make a move. Either that, or go 3-6, and Bedard, Branyan, and Washburn better not be on the flight home. Instead, they should be flying out to their new teams because they just got traded. We are starting to get down to the nitty gritty here for this team. They are making a case that with the correct guys producing, they can win games. But if I were the GM, I would be expecting them to tear through the NL in this next month. June is going to be make or break, and I really don't think it could have lined up any better for us, given our history. 15 games this month against teams we have always done pretty well against in the past can't hurt a club looking to climb back into it. So here's to hoping!
Garbs
PS. As Noah mentioned in an earlier blog post, today is the first day of the MLB Draft. Strausberg is off to the Nats, he'll to warrant 40-50 million before throwing a major league pitch, and we could have had him if the A's wouldn't have purposely thrown the last series of the year, last Sept (my conspiracy theory, not proven). Instead, we get Dustin Ackley, who I'm happy with. Sounds like a decent amount of talent with some good upside, so we'll see I guess. I'll tell you what though, if Strausberg ends up being a bust for the Nationals (which crazier things have happened), that's it for that franchise. They need a shot in the arm, and this could be it, but if not, that's a mighty big motza ball to have to cover for a team that wins approx 60 games a year and has about 4 people watch their games.
Wednesday, May 13, 2009
Vargas impresses; Defense does not
Same shit story, different day, right? It's starting to become really frustrating to watch the 2009 Mariners turn close games into blow outs! It happened again last night with Jason Vargas pitching a solid 5 innings, giving up 5 hits, 1 run (on the Chris Davis homer), 2 walks and 3 strikeouts. Not too shabby for your first major league start in 2 years and frankly he exceeded all of my expectations against a dangerous Texas lineup.
I'm going to beat this defense topic into the ground yet again. Our outfield defense is amazing, our middle infield however, has become a liability. In the 7th inning of last night's game Yuni again botched another play up the middle on a ball hit by Andruw Jones. The play should have been made and the only reason he wasn't charged with an error on his off-target throw was the fact the Rangers were the home team and the bookkeeper wanted to boost Jones' average.
Let's take a look at the UZR of our two middle infielders Betancourt and Lopez courtesy of fangraphs.com. Remember, UZR is a way to measure how many runs a player contributes or gives up based on the balls they either reach or fail to get to compared to the rest of the players at that position.
Let's start with Yuni. Our shortstop has cost the Mariners -6.4 runs per game based on his defense. Shortstop, arguably the most important defensive position is not a place to be giving up 6.4 runs in 32 games. It may be time to see what Ronny Cedeno can do in the 6-hole.
Lopez, although playing not as poorly as Betancourt, has a UZR of -1.5 based on his defense. And the argument for Lopez was that he more than makes up for his lack of defense or focus with his bat. Well, looking at Jose's offensive stats you'll see he's hitting .248/.289/.360. That's a .248 average, .289 on-base percentage and a .360 slugging percentage. Not exactly setting the world on fire.
Back to defense, this means between our two starting middle infielders they have given up nearly 8 runs! It is absolutely inexcusable for a pair of professional middle infielders to give up a combined 8 runs. So, it's little wonder why when horrible defense up the middle is paired with a flailing offense we can't pull out wins in close games, or prevent close games to becoming blow-outs.
This problem has been occurring for the last three years and it's time to be addressed. How Zduriencik and Wakamatsu take care of this situation however is rather limited. You can't bench both players because the only utility infielder on the team is Cedeno. And you can't trade both of them, so the question remains, If you had to choose between keeping Yuni or Lopez, who would you keep?
I'm going to beat this defense topic into the ground yet again. Our outfield defense is amazing, our middle infield however, has become a liability. In the 7th inning of last night's game Yuni again botched another play up the middle on a ball hit by Andruw Jones. The play should have been made and the only reason he wasn't charged with an error on his off-target throw was the fact the Rangers were the home team and the bookkeeper wanted to boost Jones' average.
Let's take a look at the UZR of our two middle infielders Betancourt and Lopez courtesy of fangraphs.com. Remember, UZR is a way to measure how many runs a player contributes or gives up based on the balls they either reach or fail to get to compared to the rest of the players at that position.
Let's start with Yuni. Our shortstop has cost the Mariners -6.4 runs per game based on his defense. Shortstop, arguably the most important defensive position is not a place to be giving up 6.4 runs in 32 games. It may be time to see what Ronny Cedeno can do in the 6-hole.
Lopez, although playing not as poorly as Betancourt, has a UZR of -1.5 based on his defense. And the argument for Lopez was that he more than makes up for his lack of defense or focus with his bat. Well, looking at Jose's offensive stats you'll see he's hitting .248/.289/.360. That's a .248 average, .289 on-base percentage and a .360 slugging percentage. Not exactly setting the world on fire.
Back to defense, this means between our two starting middle infielders they have given up nearly 8 runs! It is absolutely inexcusable for a pair of professional middle infielders to give up a combined 8 runs. So, it's little wonder why when horrible defense up the middle is paired with a flailing offense we can't pull out wins in close games, or prevent close games to becoming blow-outs.
This problem has been occurring for the last three years and it's time to be addressed. How Zduriencik and Wakamatsu take care of this situation however is rather limited. You can't bench both players because the only utility infielder on the team is Cedeno. And you can't trade both of them, so the question remains, If you had to choose between keeping Yuni or Lopez, who would you keep?
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