Jay’s Ditch Deja Vu

Yesterday I bailed out of work early to attend the Yankees-Diamondbacks game. Unfortunately, just like last year’s Ditch Day, Mike Mussina had less than his best stuff and made a mess of things. Mussina fell behind most of the hitters, including going 2-0 on .154-hitting backup catcher Rod Barajas, who hit a 2-run homer in the second inning. Some stellar defensive plays on hard-hit balls (including a John Vander Wal collision with the rightfield wall) kept things close for awhile, but Steve Finley took Moose over the wall (again on a 2-0 pitch) for a 3-run shot in the 5th. Ugh.

That blast made the score 6-1, and when the rain began falling in the top of the next inning, it was pretty obvious that once again, it was time to ditch Ditch Day. On our way out of Yankee Stadium, we checked in with a view from the leftfield corner as the Yanks cut the lead to 6-2, but the weather wasn’t improving, so we fled. I checked in as I got home to discover that Shane Spencer had gotten the Yanks back into the game with a 3-run homer, but it was to no avail, as Finley hit another homer in the 9th.

I won’t make the same mistake next year. Instead of picking a day game along with all of my other tickets in the winter, I’ll choose a one a couple of days in advance and walk up to buy tickets. You can be damn sure Mussina won’t be pitching that game; I’d like to make sure I enjoy my days off.

The Barry Bonds Walkathon

I had the pleasure of attending Sunday’s Yankees-Giants matchup, the one which was somewhat overbilled as Clemens vs. Bonds. It didn’t exactly live up to the hype in terms of classic showdowns, but it generated more than its share of heat, and a great ball game nonetheless. This even though Bonds never got an official at-bat despite five plate appearances. Anyway, the write-up is here.

I had very mixed emotions about the whole Clemens vs. Bonds thing. Never a card-carrying member of the Rocket’s fan club, I was disappointed when in the first inning, with two outs and nobody on, he didn’t go after Bonds with his best stuff and instead “un”-intentionally walked him. Worst case scenario, if Bonds connects it’s only 1-0. Instead, prolonging the inning bit Clemens on the ass as Santiago doubled and Barry scored on a wild pitch.

The HBP in the third, well, we all know Roger hides behind the DH anyway. But he’s 100% correct about the body-armor issue; it’s ridiculous. No way Bonds hits 73 homers with an ungodly OBP without being so protected physically that he’s got no fear regarding the inside pitch. That doesn’t mean Clemens was right to hit him, but it wasn’t surprising either. FWIW, the Giants pitcher, Russ Ortiz, essentially got two cracks at making up for it, first with a throw at Giambi that drew a warning to both sides, then later with actually hitting Jeter without any recourse. (I should add that I didn’t see either pitch from the TV angles so I don’t know how “intentional” either of those pitches were.)

In the other ABs the Yanks’ strategy made more sense:

* 5th inning, with one out, a man on 2nd and first base open (Giants leading 2-1), walking Bonds was clearly the right call

* 7th with 2 out and the same runner situation, no issue

* 9th inning, representing the tying run (the Yanks had taken the lead), Karsay going at Bonds brought a buzz to the ballpark. But after he fell behind in the count, Karsay intentionally put the tying run on, which is a measure of the respect Bonds deserves these days, and again, one that’s tough to disagree with.

Torre’s thought process (fans preferring a win to a marquee confrontation) and strategy were to do what’s best for the team. I felt a bit deprived because he let the air out of the matchup, but that’s why they pay him the big dollars. I was pretty elated to see the Yanks escape with the come-from-behind win.

A final thought: Bonds’ OBP is .569, which means that somebody’s getting the guy out. It’s down at .516 when you take out the intentional walks. As Bill James showed in the New Bill James Historical Basebal Abstract,, Babe Ruth comment (pages 784-785): “there’s no such thing as a hitter so good that he should be routinely walked.”

Mitt Fit

Earlier today, for reasons known only to the gremlins that run amok inside the Internet and the faceless automatons who supposedly man the tech support lines for addr.com, this site was down. Despite a great day at work (the boss really liked the new book I’m designing) and good news on other fronts (which I’ll get to shortly), the service outage filled my heart with murderous rage. Lose Game Seven of the World Series–that’s life. Drop two of three to the Red Sox at Yankee Stadium–big deal, it’s June. But let the 50 people looking for this site come up with “unable to find domain www.futilityinfielder.com” and deny me a live-bodied customer service rep to vent my frustration to, and that’s when I reach for my revolver. Anyway, apologies if you had trouble getting onto the site, and thanks for trying again.

I was a real piece of work for anybody who crossed my path today, particularly for the art director for one of my company’s clients. The reason was an ongoing argument regarding a photo of a catcher’s mitt. Because the cost of an archival photo was out of the question, this generic mitt was serving to illustrate a short bio of Yogi Berra in the “Notable People” section of a book (I don’t want to get too specific and embarrass my client). Back when I’d art-directed the project (prior to shifting my attentions to the other entity I protect with the ferocity of a mother rhinoceros), I’d chosen the glove photo, but absent my attention, it had been repositioned, flipped, and ultimately replaced in response to several queries form the client. Queries specifically relating to whether it was for the proper sport or the correct hand.

Well.

There are plenty of people in the universe to whom my own general baseball knowledge clearly takes a back seat. Roger Angell. Bill James. Joe Torre. Derek Jeter. Rob Neyer. Vin Scully. If they’re not on the field or in the dugout, you can find most of their names on the bookshelves of a well-stocked baseball library, or on some of the more popular baseball-related websites online. But none of those people–as I have found over the past five years–are the good folks I work with, which doesn’t lower my opinions of my co-workers one iota or detract from the work we do.

And very few of them are my clients. So I’ve made a duty out of fact-checking anything involving baseball which crosses my path at work. A mission. I even chose the two Yogi Berra quotes for the bio in question (“It ain’t over till it’s over,” and “Ninety percent of baseball is half mental”). A mission, damn it.

So after patiently answering queries through intermediaries (“yes, it’s a BASEball mitt…” “yes, it’s a left-handed glove, for a right-handed thrower…” “yes, while Berra batted lefty, he threw righthanded, as have all catchers in major league baseball for the last hundred years except for Dale Long for two games in 1958…”), I reached the final straw today. The mitt was being questioned once again, as I found out via a note taped to my monitor. This after the art director was faxed a printout of the mitt along with a photo of Berra taken from the National Baseball Hall of Fame website, with Berra’s mitt and ball in a position identical to the original glove (good work to our photo researcher on that one).

So, with the full force of three cups of coffee (and the aforementioned frustration regarding this site’s outage), my fingers pounded the telephone keypad as I called the art director. I proceeded to carry on one half of the most absurd and surreal conversation ever in my professional career as I explained my view of the issue and tried to orient this guy (and his left hand) to the faxed photos:

“Now, where it’s labelled ‘top,’ you’ve got that at the top of the page, right? Then the webbing of the glove is at 10 o’clock. And the thumb of the glove runs from six o’clock to nine… Okay, turn your LEFT hand over so that your palm faces you. Which way is your thumb pointing?”

I was slightly embarrassed at the condescending tone I heard coming out of my own mouth, but I knew I was right, so I camouflaged my outrage in the way that tactful adults do, by using phrases like “excuse me,” and “with all due respect,” and “I beg to differ.” Despite the visual aids and the verbal restraint, things still weren’t working, and so I handed the phone over to the job’s manager before I lost my temper. Safely out of range of the phone (I hoped), I proceeded to tell everybody within earshot that I was going to buy the goddamn Yogi Berra picture out of my own pocket and send it to this poor guy, along with a picture of my…

Yes, it was that kind of day. I think my point ultimately prevailed, and a humble, generic catcher’s mitt will illuminate children’s understanding of the wit and wisdom of Yogi Berra like a beacon in the fog. But it ain’t over till it’s over.

* * * * *

And in the Other Than That Mrs. Lincoln How Did You Like the Play Department… I got some great news yesterday: I have a ticket to the All-Star Game. My girlfriend Andra’s parents live in Milwaukee (where I paid a visit last summer). They entered their names in the All-Star ticket lottery several times on our behalf by sending in countless postcards; lo and behold, our card came up, and we were offered the chance to buy. The tickets are not just for the game but for all of the official festivities that weekend, including the Home Run Derby and the Old-Timer’s Game. They’re not great seats, but I’ve had worse for World Series games, and I survived just fine.

Now, I’ve got mixed emotions about this year’s All-Star Game, love it as I would to see Bud Selig publicly embarrassed by a players’ walkout in his own backyard. And I’ve got mixed emotions about the Home Run Derby mentality which seems to prevail among baseball fans as it becomes baseball’s version of the slam dunk. But I do feel for the good people of Milwaukee who ponied up the dough for their new ballpark, only to be subjected to a lousy team fielded by one of the worst-run organizations in the game. And I’m not so damn foolish that I’d pass up this opportunity (or overlook the thougthful intervention on our behalf by Andra’s parents)–it gives me something to write about.

Besides, as you probably can tell, I could use a vacation.

Yikes!

Oakland general manager Billy Beane has tried to shake up the A’s in the last couple of weeks, making some very questionable roster decisions in the process–most notably, sending down highly-touted rookie first basemen Carlos Pena and trading outfielder Jeremy Giambi. Beane’s track record in creating a viable contender out of the small-market A’s has bought him some slack (and some wishy-washy defense) regarding these puzzling moves from some of his most ardent proponents–ESPN’s Rob Neyer and several writers on Baseball Prospectus, most notably. He’s caught a bit more grief over at the discussion boards of Baseball Primer, and yours truly has spent his share of time yapping along as well.

Though the details are murky, the Giambi trade and probably the farm-outs seem to be assertions of authority related to non-baseball issues; how else to explain for getting abolutely nothing of value for Little G in the stuffed uniform of John Mabry? I’ve already hashed this deal over, so I’ll move on.

Just in case I’d started thinking about cutting Beane some slack, a quote of his in Sunday’s New York Times had me recoiling in horror. In discussing pitcher Mark Mulder’s injury troubles (a strained forearm), Beane said:

“That cost him a month of pitching. On a bigger market club, you’d send him down for some rehab starts, make sure he’s in shape and ready to go. We’re not in that position, so Mark sort of had rehab on the fly.”

I couldn’t believe my eyes. Here’s a GM talking about a pitcher who won 21 games last year, one of his three aces (along with Tim Hudson and Barry Zito), a guy he’s got locked up under contract for the next four years–in short, a pillar of the franchise’s future. And Beane is playing the “small market” card to justify rushing back Mulder from an injury (to a rocky 3-4, 6.10 ERA record) in a season that’s looking with every passing day as a harsh lesson in reality.

Look, despite my previous burial, the A’s aren’t completely dead, not even with a 27-28 record, eight games back of Seattle and a view of the Anaheim Angels’ taillights. And though they’re not the team I ultimately root for, I do have more than a passing interest in them, as a fan, an analyst, and a roto-head (with Hudson, Mecir, Hernandez, Chavez, Justice, Piatt and pre-trade Little G, my fantasy team looks like a dotcom-busted portfolio full of tech stocks). Mulder did win on Sunday, throwing 5 2/3 innings at the mighty Tampa Bay Devil Rays. But if Beane continues to follow that rationale in handling his important players, his priorities for the organization are seriously out of whack, and something will come back to bite him on the ass eventually. Riding the whip to assert his authoritah, Beane could either turn the A’s into your worst Dan Duquette I’m-in-charge-here nightmare or into a self-fulfilling (and sefl-immolating) prophecy straight out of Bud Selig’s wildest dreams.

Either one will be a sorry-ass sight.

Bobble Bobble

In addition to winning 288 games in the big leagues, Tommy John is remembered as the guinea pig for a medical procedure which changed the game of baseball. In 1974, the 31-year old John underwent an elbow reconstruction procedure which was so successful that it allowed him to pitch another 14 years in the bigs–and at a higher level than before. The procedure has become so popular among pitchers that it’s routinely referred to as “Tommy John Surgery”.

It ought to be enough for TJ to get his ticket punched to the Hall fo Fame, but John, who’s now the pitching coach for the AA Harrisburg Senators (Expos affiliate) will have to settle for a new kind of immortality. The AAA Charlotte Knights are giving away Tommy John Bobble Arm dolls to the first 1500 fans at a game tonight in Charlotte. According to the press release:

“‘The doll, sponsored by Perry and Barron Orthopedics, whose head and left arm bobble, is a one-of-a-kind unique promotion designed by the Knights. It is the first bobble head doll to have another appendage that moves. The doll was created in the likeness of former Charlotte Radio Color Commentator and major league pitcher TOMMY JOHN. The bobble doll is wearing a New York Yankees uniform and is complete with the red scar that has become synonymous with the now famous “Tommy John surgery.”

I think I’ve found my next eBay purchase. To borrow a quote from Homer Simpson: “I have two questions: how much, and give it to me.” This will have to tide me over until the Yanks brass sees fit to honor Luis Sojo with a unique doll of his own: the Bobble Chin.

* * * * *

And on the subject of completely ridiculous products you didn’t know you needed (or didn’t even know existed), here’s another one: ESPN Fantasy Fishing. I shit you not. There are not one, not two, but three different types, two for bass and one for walleye. From the description for the Fishing Challenge – B.A.S.S. Tour:

“Create your own five-man dream team from among the universe of professional anglers on the world’s largest bass fishing circuit — the CITGO BASSMASTER Tournament Trail — then track their collective performance over the course of an actual four-day tournament. Score big and you could win valuable outdoor prizes and ESPN Fantasy Uber points. But if your anglers get skunked, you risk shame and humiliation on the weigh-in stage… not to mention a litany of trash talk from other fantasy players. Play for one tournament, or for the whole season. You’re free to alter your roster as the season progresses. That way, if your franchise angler suddenly can’t buy a bite, you can unload him like last year’s Stinkbait.”

First question: WHY? Second question: does it come with a fantasy beer cooler you need to keep stocked? Fantasy beer drinking… now there’s a game some folks I know would be into…

Something for the Kids

If you’re reading this, you’ve probably noticed the relative infrequency of my posts lately as well as my bitching about how little time I’ve had to write here. As you would suspect, these two situations are not unrelated. For the past three months or so I’ve been engrossed in various phases of my two biggest projects of the year, both for the same client, the World Almanac Group. I’m the Creative Director for the World Almanac for Kids 2003 book, just as I was last year, designing and producing the cover and overseeing the production of a 336-page full-color book. I’m also designing the cover of the 2003 World Almanac and Book of Facts 2003.

This year, significant portions of both processes overlapped considerably (especially when accompanied by the various promotional items which go along with each book) somewhat to the detriment of my sanity. We’re not here to get into that; there’s a baseball angle too. But before I explain it, I’d better back up a bit.

For several years, the graphic design studio where I work (Bill SMITH STUDIO) has produced a children’s version of the World Almanac annual reference book. It’s gone from being a rather dry, pulpy knockoff of the adult book to a splashy, bouncy, colorful affair, and as it’s done so it’s increased it sales. In the three years I’ve been involved, the book’s popularity (New York Times Top Ten Bestseller) and increased competition have allowed us to spend more money, particularly on the cover. For a guy like me, that’s like handing over the keys to the candy store.

And it’s a kid-in-a-candy-store mentality I’ve taken into those covers, with regards to color, content, and even dimension. We use a special six-color printing process which lets us produce a broader range of bright colors than normal CMYK (four-color) printing–those candy oranges and greens–and we emboss it for texture. In addition to a handful of pictures which sample the book’s content, we also put a celebrity on the cover, and under my regime, the celebrities have been athletes, ones that we hope will appeal to kids. For the 2002 version, it was Venus Williams, and this year, Sammy Sosa.

Our discussion about who to put on the cover started the process off last November. Before presenting to the client, I polled my friends with a few suggestions, offering up Derek Jeter as my top choice (wide appeal to both boys and girls in the 9-12 age range, I argued), but willing to mount a case for any one of a number of ballplayers. Other names came up as well, both in our poll and in discussion with the client–A-Rod, Ichiro, and Barry Bonds, most prominently, and while I could come up with pros for each one, I could recite the snippy cons as well.

In both contexts, when the name Sammy Sosa came up the room seemingly lit up. Bonds may have been breaking records left and right last year, but Sosa’s four straight monster years and the emergence of his public persona in that time have given him a much broader appeal, particularly among kids. And while I can’t speak for my clients, fresh in my mind was the post-September 11 Major League Baseball promo with Sosa carrying the small American Flag around the bases after a home run–a resonant image from a sensitive time (the actual occasion was Sosa’s 59th homer on Sept. 28, the first home game the Cubs played after the attack). I didn’t want to refer specifically to September 11 (I already got my fill of that last time around), but I felt that a ballplayer who did his share of reaching out in the wake of such traumatic events was the kind of symbol we wanted (in that respect, Jeter, Mike Piazza, or John Franco would have made fine choices as well). It helped that I had a life-long Chicago Cubs fan sitting across the table from me when the deal went down.

So here it is, the cover of the 2003 World Almanac for Kids, starring Sammy Sosa. I’m quite proud of it and I look forward to seeing the printed product (the final pages of the book went to press last week). Sosa isn’t the only baseball player prominently featured in the book; the famous Honus Wagner T-206 baseball card will be on the book’s inside front cover and within one of the chapters, and pictures of players like Babe Ruth, Jackie Robinson, Willie Mays, Roy Campanella, Hank Aaron, Randy Johnson, and Barry Bonds are also featured. And as for Bonds, he’ll just have to settle for being on the preliminary version of the adult 2003 cover. Who knows if some other slugger will earn his way on by summer’s end?

That the Kids book went off to press means that I can breathe a huge sigh of relief, because suddenly I should get a large part of my life back, including more time to spend on this site. I’ve actually spent a fair amount of time *trying* to write here over the last three months, but short attention spans, inability to take long lunch breaks, and a fear of Monitor Tan have held me back like a sore hammy. But the one-post-a-week season ends today (and I thank my readers for checking in more often than that even in the face of my infrequency). Starting now, I’m back in the saddle again.

It’s Not a Significant Sample Size Until Bernie Williams is Hitting Above .300

You can practically set your watch by it: Yankee centerfielder Bernie Williams is a notoriously slow starter, but inevitably, he reels off a sorching month which brings his stats to the level of the guy in the catalog. With 13 hits in his last five games (including Tuesday night’s action), Williams has put himself well above the magic mark:

           PA  AVG  HR  RBI  OBP   SLG  OPS

April    108 .236   1   7  .367  .392  659

May      122 .377   9  24  .459  .725 1174

on 4/15   62 .180   0   1  .349  .200  549

on 5/14  163 .275   4  14  .384  .406  790

Total    230 .313  10  31  .416  .513  928

Williams is very consistent in the way he starts slow and heats up. Here are his month by month breakdowns by batting average and OPS:

       1999       2000        2001      3 year     Career

APR  .291/ 644  .292/ 928  .200/ 644  .270/ 694  .268/ 785

MAY  .367/ 995  .283/ 888  .264/ 757  .308/ 890  .308/ 923

JUN  .364/1109  .386/1155  .450/1330  .400/1199  .347/1052

2000 was a slight anomaly in that Williams charged out of the gate pretty quickly, but even then, he turned it up a notch during an unstoppable June, like he always seems to do. What’s also interesting is how Williams seems to go from slapping the ball around like a light-hittting shortstop (note the low OPS even with the respectable batting averages) to murdering it like a cleanup hitter. Williams’s low points aren’t completely awful, because he does tend to draw his walks even when he’s not hitting well–when he was hitting .180, his OBP was still a respectable .349.

I honestly have no idea how many players you could find who exhibit such a demonstrable pattern as Bernie, but I suspect few are as pronounced in their trends (though if we looked at all of Williams’s month-by-month breakdowns, the trend disappears). His slow starts do have their explanations. Last year, the declining health and eventual death of his father hung over his head early in the season, and this year’s turnaround was spurred by cortisone shots into his weak shoulders.

But for all of his streaky months and slow starts, the marvel of Williams is his year-to-year consistency, your classic steady-like-Eddie Murray ballplayer putting up carbon copies of the same great season. Clearly, he seems well on his way to another one. And look, it’s almost June.

* * * * *

Speaking of Williams, if you live in New York you’ve probably seen print ads of him endorsing LASIK eye surgery, the corneal procedure which enables one to shed corrective lenses. Top-flight athletes like Greg Maddux and Tiger Woods have undergone the surgery, as has Williams, and Jeff Bagwell, to name a few. Woods and Maddux have claimed that the surgery improved their already-great games, but then like Williams, how are you really going to tell?

The procedure isn’t without its risk. In yesterday’s New York Daily News, an article about professional golfer Scott Hoch sounded the alarm. Hoch, who had the surgery in January 2001 and went on to have a career year, winning two tournaments and earning $2.8 million, told reporters that during a March tournament he looked down at the ball and saw what seemed like “a TV set with bad reception” in one eye. A second operation failed to correct a ghost-like double vision, and Hoch complains that resulting depth perception problems give him trouble chipping and putting. Ugh.

As somebody who suffers from some pretty lousy vision, I’ve thought about LASIK, and I always figured I’d get around to it in a few years when the procedure became even more reliable. But right now I’m not so sure I’d even consider it, and it will be interesting to see if other professional athletes who share Hoch’s plight start to appear.

* * * * *

Postscript on Bernie: 2-for-5 with a game-tying 2-run single in the 9th inning. Dare I say en fuego?

White Flag

In the most baffling trade of the season so far, if not the decade, the Oakland A’s shipped out Jeremy Giambi to the Philadelphia Phillies for futilityman John Mabry. Predictably, the move has drawn the ire not just of A’s fans, but of statheads sympathetic to the A’s cause and cognizant of Little G’s qualities as a player. No, he’s not as good as his brother, but guys who post .390 OBPs with moderate power don’t exactly grow on trees. Over on Baseball Primer, the news spread like wildfire, generating over 270 posts in the first two and a half hours after the news broke.

This trade is so lopsided it wouldn’t pass muster in a fantasy league (such as the ESPN one I belong to, where I just lost one of my more productive hitters, which probably explains why I’m so outraged). But Major League Baseball doesn’t have a “challenge” button for trades. A’s GM Billy Beane, who has made his name by fleecing less astute GMs (read: Allard Baird) out of quality players like Jermaine Dye, Johnny Damon and–whaddaya know–Jeremy Giambi–and turning freely available talent into useful commodities, clearly got fleeced here. Mabry is a 31-year old futilityman who in 10 years has a chance to be 41. Very little power, lousy on-base skills, and a lifetime 63.00 ERA–Wade Boggs he ain’t. There’s absolutely no upside to be had here. Mabry will help the A’s most by keeping the bench planks from warping.

The A’s have officially raised the White Flag, not only with this trade but also with their actions over the last couple of days. They demoted highly-touted rookie first baseman Carlos Pena (another Mendoza Line Driver, not coincidently) based on a 4-for-37 May performance, as well as second baseman Frank Menechino and reliever Jeff Tam. They’re struggling, clearly, but even so, the team’s in no worse a hole than they were at this point last season. Of course, without a Giambi or two to lead the turnaround, they’re probably sunk. John Mabry ain’t gonna lead no second-half wild-card charge.

Much has been made over in the Primer thread about Little G being busted for carrying a considerable amount of marijuana back in December. Perhaps Beane thinks or knows that Giambi is about to have even further legal difficulties, or that he’s done something else which crossed the line. But short of Phillies GM Ed Wade possessing photos of Beane in a compromising position (how does last place in the AL West sound?), this makes no damn sense whatsoever. I’m as stumped as everybody else.

Jaywatch

The Rocky Mountain News ran a nice where-are-they-now piece on former Colorado Rockies first baseman Jay Gainer on Monday. Gainer, as you may or may not have read elsewhere on this site, homered on his first major league pitch in 1993. That was as good as it got for him in his six weeks in the bigs, but nine years later, Gainer’s still in the game, and he’s still got the bug. Having gone to Taiwan, Mexico, Italy and the independent Northern League to play professionally, the 35-year-old is headed back to the Allentown Ambassadors of the Northern League for another season as their DH. He’s taking night college classes and volunteer-coaching high-school baseball as well. Good for him.

Reading up on Gainer, I decided that it was time to catch up with the various other Jays I wrote about over the winter. So here goes…

Jay Bell–Payback for scoring the winning run in Game Seven of the World Series? I don’t have a voodoo doll, really. Bell has yet to play in the majors this season due to a torn calf muscle and a setback suffered five games into a AAA rehab assignment. The Snakes seem to be making do with Juinor Spivey (.326 AVG/.401 OBP/.515 SLG) at second base just fine. I’ve seen the wood in Bell’s future, and it’s pine.

Jay Buhner–Retirement seems to be treating Buhner well. He hammed it up as a part-time coach for for the Mariners this spring. On the second night of the regular season, the M’s held an emotional night in his honor. “Bone” has also been doing some work with the Mariners’ broadcast team and figures to stay around the game in some capacity or another.

Jay Canizaro (.237/0 HR/8 RBI/.314 OBP/.342 SLG/646 OPS)–Back from a knee injury after missing all of 2001, Canizaro is more or less holding down second base for the Twins in unspectacular fashion while Luis Rivas is hurt. His stats aren’t exactly lighting up the Metrodome, but the Twins remain in first place, so he can’t be hurting them too badly.

Jay Gibbons (.281/9 HR/16 RBI/.349 OBP/.541 SLG/890 OPS)–The Orioles clearly have an emerging star here. Gibbons ranks sixth in the league in homers, his walk rate is improving, his strikeouts are down, and he hasn’t embarassed himself in right field. A few more astute roster moves like the one which plucked him from Toronto might give the Orioles some hope at respectability. The Jays sure could sure use this Jay.

Jay Payton (.240/4 HR/12 RBI/.292 OBP/.397 SLG/689 OPS)–It’s a crying shame that my namesake in closest proximity is one of the most useless ballplayers to be found anywhere. Since a solid rookie season, he’s become only slightly less of a drag on the Met offense than having a second Rey Ordonez, but that’s only part of the problem. The guy plays ball like his head is packed with nothing but sand. I don’t think I’ve seen a player exhibit worse instincts and get by for so long. Payton’s strike zone still stretches from the Hudson River to international waters, and I swear I’ve seen him swing at pitches that bounced. Earlier this season I watched a play where he took off from first base on a deep fly ball, assuming that it wouldn’t be caught. Realizing that it was as he barrelled around second, he made a U-turn back to first without retouching second and was called out. Uh, you can’t do that, fella.

Last week, when I went to a ballgame at Shea, I kept pretty quiet except when Payton came to bat. But I gave him a few “You suck!” catcalls and the like, trying to feel at home. Payton responded to my taunts by getting three of the Mets five hits, driving in their only run and stealing a base as well. I go to one more game at Shea this year, so if he’s looking to me for good luck, well, good frickin’ luck….Over the weekend, Payton was singled out by Mets GM Steve Phillips in a team meeting for thinking more of himself than the team, so maybe he’s not long for the Big Apple. I’m not sure this guy could make it as a fourth outfielder in Kansas City, Pittsburgh, or Tampa Bay, but I can’t wait to find out.

Jay Powell – One of fifty or sixty pitchers Texas has stashed on the disabled list, Powell has yet to pitch this season due to a finger injury. He’s supposed to begin a rehab assignment next week, and will be back in the bigs in June at the earliest.

Jay Tessmer (0-0, 6.75 ERA) After getting a non-roster invitation to spring training with the Yanks, he surpised the team with a strong spring and made the Opening Day roster thanks to Ramiro Mendoza’s injury. But he pitched only twice before being sent down to Columbus, where he’s been effective in relief. Given the fragility of the Yanks’ pithcers of late, he may well be back in pinstripes before the season is over.

Jay Tibbs – Back in April, two writers for the Baltimore City Paper came up with the All-Time All-Useless Orioles team (and people said *I* was wasting *my* time…). Tibbs was named to the starting rotation, in the company of Sid Fernandez, Rocky Coppinger, Doug Drabek, and Don Larsen. “… [T]hat 5-0 year was a statistical blip. Back on the mound in ’90, he went 2-7 for the O’s, with a 5.68 ERA–running his career mark in Baltimore to 11-22. It’s tempting to say that Tibbs was never the same pitcher after he got rotator-cuff surgery. Actually, he was. Exactly the same.” Ouch.

Jay Witasick (0-0, 1.04 ERA) – Has pitched well but very sparingly (17.1 innings) for the Giants. Clearly, they are onto something.

Busy, Busy, Busy

The big project which has been keeping me from devoting very much time to this site is about two (grueling) weeks away from completion. More on that in the near future (there’s a baseball angle there, naturally). In the meantime, I did manage to write up my first game of the season. It’s here. Enjoy!