Rocket Science

Last night my friend and co-worker Lillie (and her husband) treated me (and my girlfriend) to Field Box seats at Shea Stadium for a Mets-Giants game. Thus I finally got to see Barry Bonds play in person. Bonds had a pretty quiet night, walking unintentionally on four straight pitches in the first, popping out to lead off the third, walking intentionally with men on second and third in the fourth. If he could have taken the Fifth in the sixth, we might all have been on a roll, but as it was, he flew out to leftfield instead. Reliever Kane Davis struck him out to end the eighth, one of four consecutive strikeouts Davis recorded (David Bell, Rich Aurilia, Bonds, and Jeff Kent, a pretty decent bunch) as the brightest spot for the Mets this night as they lost 5-1. Once again, I seem to be jinxing the home team.

Mo Vaughn had the other big Mets highlight, making a diving stop of a Tsuyoshi Shinjo smash in the fifth inning. I didn't know the big fella could move like that. But either Vaughn's in better shape than I thought or Barry Bonds is bigger than advertised; seeing the two of them standing side-by-side at relatively close range (as when Bonds walked) they looked alarmingly similar despite a listed difference of 40-50 lbs (Bonds is listed at 190 lbs on baseball-reference.com, 228 on ESPN.com; Vaughn is 230 on baseball-reference.com, 275 on ESPN).

Speaking of Vaughn, Nick and I spent the last couple of days laughing at his expense. The New York Times beat writer for the Mets, Rafael Hermoso, made a big issue of how Vaughn has discovered his new bats were heavier than their usual 36 ounces; apparently he switched from ash bats to maple, a denser wood. Hermoso, every bit the rocket scientist as the rusty slugger, broke the same startling revelation in three... diffferent... articles... spread out over three days. What follows is our email exchange:

Jay: Man, it took Mo Vaughn a month to figure out his bats were too heavy, and since changing back he's gone an astounding 1-for-6? That guy's some kind of genius. When the Over/Under on his HR output gets down to 17, put me down for 2 Large on the Over, and throw in another dime for Sideshow Mel...

Nick: Funnier still is the fact that...
"Vaughn said he planned to weigh each of his bats this week to determine which ones were 36 ounces."
Which doesn't make much sense, considering....
"It included two dozen 36-ounce bats and four batting practice bats, which weighed 38 to 40 ounces and which Moyer said were labeled MV42BP."
..and this...
"Vaughn's model, named the MV42 for his initials and uniform number, is a 36-inch, 36-ounce bat. Old Hickory gave it a special ebony finish."

Jay: Clearly he's got the whole department working on this one.

Nick: You'd think that at his age, he's want to avoid pulling a George Scott, and move to something lighter than a 36 oz bat.

Jay: I don't think he's gotten around to reading The Big Book of Big-Assed Sluggers, specifically the George Scott chapter about bat speed. Probably left it at the Foxy Lady a few years ago...

Now, I'm not a professional athlete. But I am a professional graphic designer, and I'm on an intimate basis with the tools of my trade: computer, monitor, keyboard, mouse, printer, etc. Having done this for more or less ten years, I'm fairly attuned to even the most minute variations in my equipment's performance. I can tell you which keys stick on which keyboard of the four computers I spend significant time at each day, when my mouse has a coat of gunk on the rollers, when two graphic items on a page are misaligned by one half a point (1/144th of an inch), and when our Fiery color printer is printing 5% too much magenta. Granted, I don't do all of this in front of 50,000 screaming fans a night, but it seems astounding to me that Mo Vaughn isn't as in tune with his instruments as I am with mine. Isn't that why they pay him the big bucks?

• • • • •

Caught a bit of the Yanks-Devil Rays game tonight. For the fourth time this season, Alfonso Soriano led off the game with a home run, putting him only 76 behind Rickey Henderson for his career. Right now Soriano is not only the Yanks most exciting player, but also their leader in batting average, home runs, runs, RBI, hits, doubles, total bases (about 50% more than his next closest teammate, Jason Giambi), slugging percentage, and OPS. He's at .349 AVG / 8 HR / 24 RBI and .377 OBP / .630 SLG / 1007 OPS. This just in: he's good. Yes, he's walked only 6 times, and that's up against 36 strikeouts, but if he's on pace to walk only 29 times, that also means he's on pace to hit 19 leadoff homers and 38 overall. You can go complain to the sabermetric police, but I'll take that ratio.

Taking a closer look at Soriano's splits reveals some pretty amazing stuff (yes, these are only 20 AB samples in most cases, but so what):

             AVG    OBP     SLG    OPS
0-0 count:  .600 / .600 / 1.100 / 1700  (connecting on the first pitch)
0-1 count:  .400 / .400 /  .750 / 1250  (wow!)
After 0-1:  .256 / .274 /  .476 /  750  (this is still pretty good)
1-0 count:  .500 / .462 / 1.083 / 1545  (pow!)
After 1-0:  .409 / .460 /  .705 / 1165

Adding them up, if he's connecting on 0-0, 0-1, or 1-0, he's 26-for-52 with 6 doubles and 6 homers, giving him a line of .500/.491/.962 (higher AVG than OBP due to one sac). Anybody still thinking of messing with his approach right now is nuts, because whatever he's doing is clearly working. Wow.

• • • • •

As the Yanks were beating the hapless Rays (handing them their 13th straight loss), Roger Clemens earned his 285th win, passing Ferguson Jenkins on the all-time list and moving into a tie with the original switch-pitcher, Tony Mullane (see below). When Ken Singleton was talking about Mullane, I felt like he could have been reading off of this page; he mentioned that Mullane didn't wear a glove and talked about the American Association as a major league, and he also referred to Greg Harris and Cal McLish. Seems like I anticiapted a timely topic.

By the way, I cited Mullane with 284 wins via baseball-reference, but my MacMillan Baseball Encyclopedia lists him at 285, as did the YES broadcast, and CNN/SI pegs him at 287. Weird. Regardless of how long the late Mullane is able to hang with Clemens, the Rocket will be passing a few more pretty good names over the next three wins: Robin Roberts (286), Bert Blyleven (287), and Tommy John (288). WIth his six Cy Youngs, Clemens has the hardware on those three, but I wouldn't object to any of them in my rotation.

--posted by Jay Jaffe at 11:54 PM Link

A Rough Week at the Ballpark

You know something's been a long time a-coming when you have to summon up the glory days of Mike Jerzembeck (lifetime ERA: 12.79) to date it. But this past week was the first since the dog days of the 1998 season--after the Yanks had already clinched the AL East--that I've been to Yankee Stadium twice in one week and watched the Yanks lose both games.

That's three full seasons (and change) of 10-15 games a year without having to endure a double dose of frustration. I know, I know, you're weeping for me, just like you did after Game Seven; it's so hard being a Yankee fan sometimes. But let's face it: none of us who pays hard-earned cash to go to a ballgame want to see our team lose in our presence; twice in one week is enough to start asking some hard questions. Hey, for $80 bucks in New York City, you can probably find torture that's a lot more fun.

On Wednesday, May 1, in the company of a co-worker, my pal Nick, and my girlfriend Andra, I watched the Yanks lose to the A's, 4-1. Listless Mike Mussina gave up three early runs to the A's, including Jermaine Dye's first homer of the year. Meanwhile, Erik Hiljus and--yaaaaaawn--five other A's pitchers confounded the Yankee hitters, limiting them to five hits and one run while striking out eleven Yanks. Drag.

The following Saturday, May 4, out with my brother for our sixth annual Mariners-Yanks epic slugfest (17 runs per game, averaging 3:52), I suffered through a much more torturous afternoon. The Yanks staked themselves to an early 5-0 lead on the strength of a three-run jack by Jorge Posada and a two-run shot by Alfonso Soriano. The Mariners chipped away one run at a time, launching four solo homers off of Orlando Hernandez during his sevn-inning stint. But it was the Yankee bullpen which really let things get out of hand.

Mike Stanton and Steve "Belly-Itcher" Karsay joined forces to allow the tying run in the eighth inning, thanks to Karsay's wild pitch during a long at bat by Jeff Cirillo. Mariano Rivera delivered the coup de grâce. In a performance eerily reminiscent of Game Seven of last year's World Series, Rivera made two glaring mental mistakes which left him no margin for error, and a bloop single into centerfield destroyed an otherwise pleasant day.

With the game tied 5-5, Joe Torre elected not to open the ninth inning with Rivera on the mound. But when Karsay allowed a single to Desi Relaford, Torre changed his mind and summoned his closer. Mariner catcher Ben Davis then went right at Rivera's Achilles heel; he bunted. Mariano fielded the ball cleanly, but instead of throwing to first to get the easy out, he dubiously elected to try nabbing the speedy Relaford. His throw pulled Derek Jeter off the bag, and all runners were safe. I started to get a sick feeling in my stomach that had nothing to do with the hot dog and beer I'd consumed. Hadn't we seen this before?

Luis Ugueto followed Davis by bunting as well, down the third base line. Robin Ventura barehanded the ball and boldly fired to second to force Davis, with Relaford advancing to third and Ugueto safe at first. With one out now, the Yanks elected to intenionally walk Ichiro Suzuki, loading the bases for the hot Cirillo, who had homered earlier in the day as well as the night before. Cirillo broke the tie with a bloop single, keeping the bases loaded. Bad enough, but then came Ruben Sierra, the M's hottest hitter.

Swinging mightily but coming up nearly empty, Sierra topped a ball which sputtered down the third base line, when Rivera was hit with yet another brain cramp. The Yankee pitcher, who with every fielding attempt looks less like a star athlete and more like a deer caught in the headlights, pointed to Posada to field the bunt. Posada, dutifully covering home because the force play was on, pointed right back at Rivera. By the time this ugly exchange ended, Ugueto had slid past the befuddled battery and the bases were still loaded.

John Olerud then ended all suspense by singling in two more runs to make the score 9-5. At that point, I dropped my scorebook and threw my hands in the air in disgust. If I hadn't considered the five-year-old boy dressed head-to-toe in Yankee garb sitting next to me, I'd have made Redd Foxx blush with the blue streak I ached to curse (I'm not exactly kid-friendly in these moments). Instead I slammed my cap to the ground, picked it up, and beat a hasty retreat out of the Stadium.

These Yanks have disappointed me on occasion before, but they've never disgusted me the way they did on Saturday. Somebody better start drilling Rivera's fielding responsibilities into his thick head, or the whispers that the Yankee closer is still reeling from the World Series will become a roar.

As for Mike Jerzembeck, there's a story worth telling, and not just because he was Saturday's spelling bee question ("G-E-R...") on the Jumbotron. The 1998 season was the first in which my little group of friends got together on a partial season ticket package--15 games, two seats, split between five people. Lacking the foresight to see that the Yanks would tear up the AL, we spread our tickets out rather evenly, reserving some for late-season games with division rivals. When the Yanks clinched at an absurdly early date (September 9), we took it as one more mark of a great team, but some of the starch was taken out of the rest of our scheduled games. With no recourse to trade in the tickets, we soldiered onward.

September 13, 1998, like most weekend games at Yankee Stadium, came with a giveaway, in this case a useful one--a Yankees backpack, courstesy of Modell's Sporting Goods. Reasonable compensation for Nick and I having to watch a rather lackadaisical team lose to the Toronto Blue Jays on this afternoon, at least. Our seats were next to a pair of bearded gentlemen wearing yarmulkes--Orthodox Jews, by my measure. Sometime after the seventh-inning stretch, the two men took leave of their seats, gathering all of their belongings except for their backpacks and disappearing, seemingly for the afternoon. About a half-hour later, a sunburned, middle-aged man with a moustache inquired about the ownership of said backpacks.

"They're not ours," I told the guy, eying my own. "I think they're up for grabs."

The man was delighted. "Great! I got two little nephews who're gonna be real happy. Thanks, guy!" I waved my hand and told him not to mention it.

Of course a short while later, our neighbors returned. Instantly noticing the backpacks were missing, they queried us. As I started to open my mouth, Nick gave me a sharp elbow jab. "We didn't see anything," he said, and I authenticated Nick's explanation with my own shake of the head. "Didn't see," I echoed dutifully. The shorter of the two men turned to the other and said, "Aw man, I had my phone book in there and everything..."

I bit my lip and concealed my complicity in the matter for the rest of the afternoon, saving a guilty laugh for the subway home. Hey, if they'd asked us to watch their stuff, this never would have happened. Besides, who disappears for a half-hour AFTER the seventh-inning stretch?

On Tuesday, September 15, Nick and I returned to the ballpark for a game against the Red Sox. I was proudly sporting my brand-new Yankee backpack. Ironically enough, we spotted the two Orthodox Jews a few rows away (sans backpack, of course); they did us the favor of not noticing our presence. But we were all party to another lousy performance by the Yanks. On this day, Jerzembeck, a 26-year-old righty who'd spent most of the season at Columbus, made his first major-league start and was rocked by the Red Sox, giving up five runs in 2.1 innings; they ended up losing 9-4. Searching for an explanation for even the most inconsequential defeat, Nick and I determined that as a result of or our misdeeds, my backpack was full of bad mojo and would bring misfortune to the Yanks if I ever brought it to the Stadium again.

I still have that backpack, and I use it regularly. But I wouldn't be caught dead at the ballpark with it. I know a curse when I see one.

•••

Speaking of ballparks and backpacks, the current security policy at Yankee Stadium leaves something to be desired, particularly with regards to umbrellas. On Tuesday, Nick and his stepfather, Dr. Stuart Rose, attended a wet game at Yankee Stadium. Dr. Rose asked me to pass this along to publicize the Stadium's idiocy:

We went to the Yanks-Oakland game last night, with our umbrellas in case of rain. We were told no umbrellas allowed inside the stadium because of "security." I am all for increasing the public's safety, but this policy is absurd. There is no terrorist, or other threat from an umbrella. Of course, I could have been carrying a gun or a knife, but nobody checked for those, just took away our death-dealing brollies. Of course it did rain, giving the Yankee concessions a great market for their ponchos, and inconvenience and discomfort for us. When we left the stadium, it only got worse. In an incredible display of arrogance and disdain for the fans, we had to search for our umbrellas among piles of them left in heaps on the floor. This is intolerable. No business, except perhaps a monopoly, would treat its customers this way! The Yankee organization should be ashamed!

I agree with Dr. Rose; this is pretty ridiculous. Unfortunately, I couldn't find any link on the Yanks' website to register a complaint or even to find a written explanation of their security policy. I do know, based on my experience, that coolers, backpacks, and large bags aren't permitted in Yankee Stadium--your best bet is a purse or an easily-searched (or ditched) plastic bag. On the positive side, I did read that ticketholders for that rain-delayed game are entitled to redeem their tickets for those to any game with the Tampa Bay Devil Rays from May 14-16. Now that I think of it, that's not very nice either...

--posted by Jay Jaffe at 7:48 PM Link