In case you haven't noticed, Barry Bonds is Black.  Now that that elephant is out in the open, here's another thing: people in this country are racially polarised.  And for my last earth-shattering new discovery: 74 percent of black baseball fans want Barry Bonds to break the all-time home run record. 

I know what you are thinking, and you are absolutely right: well, DUH!!

I am so happy to see this poll come out, and reinforce the obvious.  Really, I am.  I am relieved that there is some shred of scientific analysis to point out that by and large, Black baseball fans simply don't share the vitriol about Barry Bonds like their white counterparts. 

Oh, don't look so shocked...

We African Americans tend to see shades of gray better than white folks do.  Think Mayor Marion Barry, OJ Simpson and even President Clinton.  Our entire history is predicated on the notion that what you see isn't always what you get, and that the measure of a man's character and accomplishments cannot always be tempered by how he is percieved in public. Fifty years ago, all a man had to do was 'be black' in public and he was a target.

Barry was perceived as a colossal egomaniac who had a strained relationship with the media.  In the pages and sports blogs, Barry became the most hated man to ever hold a bat.  The sports media business waited long and patiently for their time to get him back. 

Then along came steroids...you know the rest.

So here's a question: when was the last time Barry failed a drug test? How is it that he is labeled a cheater without a shred of objective proof? 

Here's another question: How many Black citizens have been accused of some trumped up issues purely because he/she is African American?

So Barry is egocentric; perhaps he didn't "Yassuh Boss" his way thru a career in Major League Baseball.  So do you think there may be other forces at play here?

We African Americans think so. 

Recently, a close friend prodded me to confess that deep down in my heart, under a blinding coat of Dodger blue, there's a hint of love for the Giants.  Yes, I have a smidgen, a splash--just a splash--of affection for our mortal enemies.  Maybe it was that veteran squad last year that had the talent to take the Division, that band of old guys that would have defied all odds. But it just wasn't to be.  But just the same, the love is there, like a splinter in my soul.

Go ahead, call me a traitor.  But my good Karma helped them destroy the Padres in  2006. The only time I didn't root for the Giants was when they'd venture into Dodger Stadium.  But here's the real clincher: part of that Karmic vision has me hoping that Barry Bonds can find a way to put history first, for once, and cap his career with the Home Run record...in San Francisco.

Let's get a couple of givens out of the way first:

1) In Barry's eyes, his entire career has been 'All About Barry'

2) Unless he lands in jail, he is a lock for First Ballot, so personally he has nothing to prove with respect to his ability to carry a team and "get his".

3) EVERYONE who he has torqued-off and offended during the course of his entire career is simply DYING to see him fail.

He could squash all the nay-saying, obliterate two-decades of vitriol in one fell swoop. How?  Take $10-15 million, stay in San Francisco, lose the diva-esque demands and solidify his place in baseball history by catching and passing Hammerin' Hank.

Let's face it: Barry has been an insufferable jerk for much of his career. The media has shared in the venom with respect to its dealings with Bonds, so the ire and it's repercussions have been mutually attained. And there is much that Barry could have done in the past to defuse this tenuous relationship.  Now that his status for next season appears to be on the ropes, folks are salivating at the mere hint that Barry will be in his living room on Opening Day 2007.  Not likely, but they can dream, can't they? 

Barry can shut the entire press corps down by putting his ego second--for once--taking the pay and incentives cut and do it for the Baseball history books.  He would probably say that the game only has love for him if he can produce, and that he's going to "get his" no matter what, and to hell with some "record".

But hey, I can dream, can't I?

Did you know that if a 40-year-old man is brought up on legal charges for a crime he committed at age 15, he will be charged based on the laws at the time the crime was committed?

 If that rationale is good enough for the legal system, then why isn't it good enough for the Baseball Writers Association of America?

 In all of the posturing rhetoric and sanctimonious whining surrounding Mark McGwire's induction into the Baseball Hall of Fame, one very significant dynamic is being ignored: that Mark McGwire has become the scapegoat for Major League Baseball's molasses-slow response to the use of performance-enhancing substances by its players.

 A bit of trivia: back in the 90s, Mark McGwire used a then-legal androstenedione supplement.  The key words here are "THEN-LEGAL".  Andro was not banned by the USFDA until 2004, and was not considered illegal until 2005. 

 That may seem like some judicious bean-counting, but consider this:  the home run race of 1998 was long-touted as the event that saved baseball in America.  When McGwire sent that 62nd home run into the stands--ironically against Sammy Sosa's Cubs in Busch--NOBODY dared to second-guess McGwire's use of a legal dietary supplement.  To do so would have amounted to heresy.  No one remembers that--not even the holier-than-thou sportswriters who have jumped on the moral flagpole and forgotten that eight years ago, McGwire was not rumored to have done anything underhanded, and used discipline, a renewed sense of purpose, an improved workout regimen and a bit of "dietary help"  to poise his body to make history.

 Where was all of this bible-thumping back then?  Drowned out by cheers, I suppose.

 The bottom line is this: Baseball was slow on the uptake in establishing a cogent policy regarding performance enhancing drug use by players.  And now, the BBWAA wants to parse McGwire's then-legal supplement choices based on knowledge--and laws--that we have now.   Why don't we go back and remove Babe Ruth because he cheated on his wife, and NOW we have discovered that his moral character was not befitting of the HOF. 

 Vote on McGwire based on his numbers, and not on what you think you perceive in the 21st century as 'cheating'.  Because while we know more about steroids and their dangers today, to deny Mark McGwire a place in Cooperstown will prove that you still haven't learned anything.

In a recent post, I challenged the intensity--or lack thereof--of Padres pitching (yes, I realise Dodger pitching is abysmal and castrated, but that's a different post).  I mentioned how SD's pitching staff boasts a low bullpen ERA, knows how to get a clutch performance, and are SO thankful that Cla Meredith was jettisoned by the Red Sox.  

In reply to that post, another faithful blogger brought up the role of Trevor Hoffman, and alluded to Hoffy's high-profile chokes--most notably in the All Star Game and of course the collapse in Chavez Ravine.   I find that blogger a most insighful chap, but I respectully disagree with Hoffman being a "choke job".  He's had 45 save opportunities with 40 saves, and although he's 0-2, his ERA so far this season is 2.05 in 57.0 innings played.  Compare that with an immature crybaby like the Giants' Armando Benitez (17/25 in saves, 4-2 with a 3.52 ERA in 38.1 IP) and the old Padre doesn't look bad at all.  Plus, he's closing in on Lee Smith's all-time saves record with only two more to tie the 478 mark.  On paper, in contrast to the good blogger's comments, Trevor Time looks pretty ok.  Yet the comments made me think. In light of all the cool numbers I just spouted, I have but one question:

So what?

So Trevor is about to overtake Lee Smith in the all-time number of career saves.  Is that the stuff of a future Hall of Famer when the Good Mr Smith isn't even in the Great Hall yet?  More on that in a moment.

I did some checking, and from what I can see, Lee Smith was a pretty ok pitcher with flashes of brilliance; a career 71-92, with a 3.03 ERA and of course 478 saves; 7-time All-Star with a number of awards for relief and closing--the Rolaids award comes to mind.  And almost won a Cy Young.  Compared to that, Trevor is in good company with establishing his legacy.

Again, I ask...so what?

I hear a lot of discourse on the difficulty of being a closer; how getting those last three or six outs is very tough, especially when facing a team with a 'damn-the-torpedoes' desire to come from behind.  I hear that there's an art to closing, and that only a mentally tough guy can perfect that role and "bring in on in" for the team. 

In other words: Closers ride the momentum of a team lead into the ninth inning, and provide a rested arm to capitalise on the energy generated from eight previous innings of hardscrabble play.  Is this the stuff of a Hall of Famer?  Bruce Sutter made it in as a pure reliever, which is a slightly different entity from the closer.

The question will get answered eventually.  Because the good Padres fans--arguably some of the most faithful I've ever seen--are very excited at the prospect of Trevor hitting this milestone.  Could they be setting themselves up for colossal disappointment? The number one closer isn't a Hall of Famer yet, so that doesn't bode well for Hoffy to leapfrog his way into Cooperstown. 

As I mentioned, only Trevor Time will tell.

All weekend long, I've been trying to find a good reason to tell my wife and my boss that I needed to go to Los Angeles.  No matter how hard I thought about it, I just knew that the truth wouldn't fly:

"Well, honey (or sir), see...the Dodgers and Padres are within 1.5 games of first place, see, and..."

My gut told me that "You're Fired", or "I Want A Divorce" were the next things I'd hear, so I settled for watching on HD...and for a while I was glad I stayed home.  After watching the Dodgers get shelled on Saturday, then seeing them creep to a loss on Sunday, I donned my cap and jersey with full knowledge that the boys in blue NEED this Monday game.  How right I was!!

Seeing Jon Adkins and Trevor Hoffman get hammered for four home runs in a row was almost surreal.  Mark Grant, a local Padres announcer who called the game, said that if a screenwriter wrote that into a script for a baseball movie, he'd get fired for penning something so contrived, yet here we were watching it unfold in real time.  Four in a row; THEN my man Nomar lives up to his Mr Clutch reputation, replete with gimpy legs.  It was almost too much to conceive. Epic! Magnanimous!

But let's not kid ourselves...

THE most important element in this game was the momentum that my Dodgers have hopefully generated by such an historical--and histrionic--victory.    Once again, the dreadful Dodger bullpen allowed the less-than-potent Padres offense to stay in this game, after Penny lifted himself from the depths of a first-inning Hades to hold the Padres scoreless thru the rest of his five innings. 

This momentum could be the deciding factor in how the Dodgers attack not only the remainder of the season--which treads dangerously thru the Bay Area--but also the post-season. Hey, Houston did it last year, right?

But on a high note for Dodgerfan, San Diego's bullpen doesn't leave THAT much to envy, either.  Sure, they boast a pretty low bullpen ERA--something like 3.24.  But let's face it: if it wasn't for Cla Meredith, this team would have been dead a long time ago. Trevor uses good momentum to his advantage, and carries that energy into the ninth to fast-ball you to death.  But being sandwiched between Adkins and Seanez?  That was a recipe for drama...the good kind for Dodger Nation.

I was at Petco Park in April when the Padres smacked us for five runs in the bottom of the ninth to eventually win in 5-6 in the 10th.  Payback is indeed very sweet.  Now if we can just take the NL West, because the path to the Pennant takes us thru San Francisco...

On this sunny SoCal morning, I woke up to a bit of marine-layer fog, knowing that later the sun would come out and warm my heart over again at the thought of the Yankees losing a series in Los Angeles.  Mind you, my heart lies with the Dodgers, but I have MUCH love for the Angels.  And to see the Yankees LOSE there...well, the only way to beat that is to see an NL team win the World Series, especially if that NL team is you-know-who...but I digress.

My joy in seeing the Yankees lose is evidenced in the very fabric that holds the Yankee Nation together: this elitist, pompous bourgeois sense of entitlement that engulfs any discussion around the Yankees actually having a losing streak.  But in this case, "losing" is a very fluid term.

See, not only are the Yankees SEVEN games up on the Red Sox in the AL East (count them: 7.0), but Boston may also lose David Ortiz for the season if it turns out that he needs further treatment for the irregular heartbeat--good luck Papi.  The Yankees could literally obliterate the division, despite the haphazard play out West.  And then there's A-Rod.

Yes, A-Rod, the $250M-man.  There's all this discourse regarding the slump: 1 for 15 with 10 Ks in Anaheim; 1 for 5 in Seattle, blah blah blah! 

Since baseball revolves around its numbers, let's look at a few more of A-Rod's. As of August 29: .380 OBP, .492 SLG, 26 HR, 93 RBI, .279 AVG.  From outside of New York, that looks like MORE than respectable numbers.  Maybe they do New Math in the Bronx, because it appears that nothing but a 1.000 across the board will yield any love from the Yankee nation.

Ahhh, yes, there's that word: love.  Make no mistake, folks: in the Bronx they don't know the meaning of that word.  A-Rod may look mortal now , but maybe y'all should have thought about that before you displaced a natural shortstop and planted him at 3rd base just so you could shout to the rest of us "We've got A-Rod"; maybe you Yankee boo-birds ought to hurl some of that vitriol toward your hurlers, because Yankee pitching is nothing short of LOUSY, unless you count the last #42 in the league; maybe New York could take a lesson from their archrival Red Sox, who show us ALL how to love a team, and love the game.

So leave A-Rod alone.  Show the man that the way out of the slump is via the love of the game, and the love of the fans, and not by JEALOUSY of his paycheck.  Because the view from the West is that as long as you hate, you lose...and when YOU lose, WE WIN!

This is going to sound like a horrible cliché, but there has been a tremendous amount of discussion of steroids in Major League Baseball.  And just when we thought the drama couldn't get any more deafening, Jose Canseco comes out of retirement to play Minor League ball with the San Diego Surf Dawgs. 

There's no question that Canseco is an opportunist, dropping names of other MLB players as having a relationship with performance enhancing drugs just to further his own "interests". But maybe we should've listened more to his blabbering because no sooner had he dropped a dime on Palmeiro did old Raffy pop positive.  Maybe MLB's decades-long deaf ear to drugs gives rise to the whole 'mafia' motif.  Answers to all of these "maybes" can be silenced if we as fans stop demonising fools who pop positive for doping.

Major League Baseball's Johnny-Come-Lately stance on doping, while way overdue, is still the law of the diamond: 1st offense 50 games, 2nd offense 100 games, and then a lifetime ban.  But we in the real world know that the penalty lasts much longer in the court of public opinion.  You can bet diamonds to doughnuts that a player returning from a 50-game suspension will be boo'ed out of the park for perhaps the rest of the season.  Why?  Because we as a stupid public leave no room for MLB players to be stupid, too.

It is our venomous response to steroids that empowers a publicity-hog like Canseco.  If we would just accept that a busted player bricked, gets hammered, and then just plays ball, then there would be NO drama with respect to Canseco's posturing.  But Jose banks on our hatred of the very word; he feeds like a vampire off the blood we want from Barry (who really hasn't done anything besides be a sourpuss) or Raffy (who lied to our faces with a wagging finger.)  

Maybe if we just discipline and punish, and put some faith in the rehabilitation of a wayward knucklehead who decides to juice, we can get back to the love of the game.  I thought that's what it was all supposed to be about.  But perhaps that's another horrible cliché.

Padres fans ought to count their blessings...their disloyalty and ingratitude is almost as bad as their driving.

Reason: I took a break from watching the DISMAL play of the Dodgers to check out the Giants-Padres game Sunday (July 2) at Petco Park.  Despite the fact that my blood always runs Dodger blue, I do have love for both the Giants-if you can believe that--and the Padres as well.  In this game, I wanted to see the old-guys pull one out, so it was GO GIANTS  for me.

Both teams played a GREAT game.  The Giants simply played better, lighting up the Padres for 5 runs in the 7th; Randy Winn fouled off SEVEN times, and eventually got a walk--it was about an 11-pitch at-bat.  Just some great baseball with two solid teams, and the better team won that day. 

I have much love for the Padres, with a good balance of veterans and new talent able to play and back-up in the outfield, at catcher, third base, and a bit at shortstop.  And that's not even mentioning a pitching staff with Young, Peavy, Woody, Trevor, and a pretty deep bullpen.  This is one very solid team, and if they get more of a killer instinct with puting teams away in late innings, they can beat just about ANY team on any given day.

With that said...

...Padres fans by-and-large do NOT like Bruce Bochy.  On the way home, I listened to the buzz-kill fans' comments on the radio, and I really got pissed.  Fans were saying that by starting Josh Bard instead of Mike Piazza, Geoff Blum instead of Khalil Greene, and Mark Bellhorn in place of Vinny Castilla, Bochy is not trying to win.  This one guy said something to the effect of "Bochy needs to man-up and play some real baseball, and really try to beat some of these teams and win."

In a different time in my life, I would have wanted to SMACK the hell out of that caller.  First of all, Josh Bard is batting .373; Khalil was sore from being hit by a pitch; and Vinny Castilla is not a spring chicken and could use the day off.  What San Diego fans collectively fail to realise is that this is a game of strategy as well as execution and numbers.  Bochy needs to rotate his players based on their ability to execute, their injury status, and their ages, since the veterans don't recover nearly as quickly as they used to.

That's why that guy is called a 'Manager' in baseball and not a 'Coach'. 

Yes, this may seem like some basic info, but apparently San Diego fans need the refresher.  This team does not have the mighty historical market value like my beloved Dodgers; yet ironically the Padres don't have to cross their fingers and toes and rub a rabbit's foot like Grady Little does every time a reliever trots out of the bullpen.  Moreover, the Padres backups players are very consistent in their execution and don't do a sign of the cross when a groundball rolls to shortstop like we do with Furcal this season.  I could go on...

...but the Padres fans need to give Bochy a break.  The guy is in first place in the NL West with a team that requires him to 'make do with what he's got'.  This Sunday, the better team just played better baseball, and perhaps the fans in San Diego should remember that sometimes that's just how baseball works.  There...another refresher.

Ok, the logic of my beloved Dodgers is starting to wear on my nerves.  Apparently, turning a Gold Glove shortstop into a utilityman isn't bad enough.  Now, Grady Little is adding 'insult' to 'injury' yet again.

Dioner Navarro is being sent down, coughing up his starting job to Russell Martin.  Now I have become a big Russell Martin fan. This guy is not only running the offense, but he's batting to the tune of .361 and patiently bearing witness to some abysmal fielding by his compatriots. Not bad for a young 'un, right?  So instead of bringing back Navarro, who was batting a blistering .429 in his last 10 games before going to the DL, and forming a potentially rock-solid rotation of catchers, Grady is demoting him.  That's gratitude for ya.

Oh, by the way: what has Grandpa Moses--AKA Sandy Alomar, Jr--done for us lately?  Oh, let's see: Averaging .286 in his last 10 games with only 21 ABs--no doubt a part-timer.  I suppose his .360 in 50 ABs is respectable, but is Grady telling us that there isn't room for Dioner in his Catchers' Corps??  His hard-line brass-balls management had BETTER carry us thru 1st place in the NL West for the better part of the season.  If it doesn't, he won't end up the steely take-no-prisoners Captain of the ship...he'll just end up a ####.

Today, I sent a question to MLB.com's Ken Gurnick, asking his opinion of the shortstop bottleneck that is quickly approaching in the Dodgers clubhouse.  Gold-glover Cesar Izturis is about to take a cleat to the backside, in one form or another:

My question:

All indicators are pointing to Cesar Izturis being trade-fodder as the Dodgers gear up to make more mid-season changes.  But given [Rafael] Furcal's sloppy infielding, why isn't Izturis being considered more as the long haul option?

Mr Gurnick's reply:

because colletti likes furcal

Who says getting in the boss's good graces isn't a beautiful thing??

I have always been a Rafael Furcal fan while he was with the Braves. He played hard, and always seemed to know how to make a difficult play work.  But watching the meltdown against the Padres last night--two first-inning errors leading to FOUR unearned runs--it just makes the whole Cesar Izturis thing worse.

See, it doesn't seem like the Dodgers are doing the right thing with respect to Izturis. He goes away for Tommy John surgery and returns to find his position "outsourced" to the tune of $39 million to Furcal's normally more-than-capable glove.  What's more, Izturis will be bludgeoned--excuse me, reassigned to another infield position with no plans to "make room" for him.  Gold Gloves just don't buy corporate loyalty like they used to.

Somehow, from the beginning this whole transaction just didn't seem right. 

The Dodgers exhibit virtually NO patience with injured players--there's already talk of demoting Dioner Navarro in place of Russell Martin full-time.  It just seems hard to #### that Izturis gets so little loyalty after playing so well.  And speaking of "swallowing"...

...let's hope that Colletti's love-affair with Furcal can see past his rising error total, and the $39 milliion those errors will cost him.

Greetings, all--

My first blog post, so I suppose I should make it count...

...as you can see I'm an LA sports fan, so the Dodgers are my way to go. However, as the NBA season draws to a close, my lamentations throb in the absence of the Lakers in the Finals.  As such, the bane of my NBA vibe would be to see Shaq get a ring in Miami.  Yes, I'm one of the few who purport that we Angelinos got the better of the deal in the Shaq/Kobe war.  Recent events in the NBA post-season work to prove my point: that while Kobe got most of the blame for being a crybaby during the Shaq/Kobe years, the true teary-eyed whiner here is none other than Shaq (Bio-) Diesel. 

Two things...

First, the famous Ben Wallace block.  Ben got better position, a better hop on the ball, and better leverage in catching Shaq's shot attempt.  The net result? Shaq literally crumpled to the deck, and a jump ball resulted.  The block was as clean as the Board of Health.  Shaq's reply?  "That was a foul, young lady...don't ask stupid questions."  No, actually, Shaq got pimped and couldn't deflate his ego enough to give Ben Wallace props for a great defensive play.

Now, Shaq gets fined $10K for not wanting to face the press for a DISMAL performance in the Heat's second loss in the Finals.  Why?  Since he didn't talk to the press, I can only speculate, but let's try...Shaq got pimped again, and couldn't deflate his ego enough to admit it.  Can anyone see a pattern?

No doubt Shaq is THE preeminent center in the game.  But let's be real: The Heat would not be in the Finals were it not for the dazzling play from Dwayne Wade. Sounds familiar; just like a three-peat in Los Angeles while Shaq was paired with another dazzling guard named Kobe.  But perhaps more to the point is that Shaq has supplanted himself as the leader of that team.  True leadership means stepping to the mic and admitting it, even when you and/or your team has bricked, lost or just simply got punked.  The Heat certainly want to win this; and as the self-appointed Big Daddy, Shaq is the vessel thru which that winning attitude will arise.  

 It doesn't look good right now for the Heat...and as a self-appointed LA fan, I say Thank Goodness.