A few weeks back I read an interesting story on Hardball Times that analyzed Bartolo Colon’s bounceback capability. In it, author Josh Kalk discussed the possibility that Colon’s 2007 stats — 6.34 ERA, a 1.62 WHIP, and a .320 batting average against — were the result of an inordinately high BABIP (.364), which is batting average on balls in play. In short, Colon was more unlucky in 2007 that he’d been in the past, when he was a Cy Young winner and weighed less than a Mini Cooper. Given this stat (and many others I didn’t comprehend), Kalk said Colon would be a great risk-reward option for teams like the Rangers and Royals in 2008, because Colon (according to Kalk, anyway) projected to a 4.40 ERA and 120 innings pitched this season. Considering what Julian Tavarez provided in relief of Curt Schilling and Tim Wakefield last year — 23 starts, 6 wins, 11 losses, 5.22 ERA — doesn’t Colon sound like a nice option now that Schilling has gone down again?
Given the dearth of quality pitching in MLB, I can’t believe no team offered him a major-league deal. Then again, if I were Bartolo Colon, who’s never won a World Series and probably doesn’t need the money, I’d prefer signing a minor-league deal with the Sox — with the opportunity to pitch your way onto a playoff-caliber team — than ink a major-league deal with Kansas City or Texas, where quality pitchers go to die.
The four great teams in the American League Central will beat the snot out of each other all season long and the Red Sox will lick up the scraps in October. The Sox will cruise through the AL East, resting players for October, when the Yankees will be watching from home because their owner is a drunk and they still have no #1 starters.
Order of finish:
AL East: Red Sox, Blue Jays, Yankees, Devil Rays, Orioles
AL Central: Fe, Fi, Fo, Fum, and the Royals
AL West: Not the Rangers.
Awards:
MVP: Vernon Wells
Cy Young: Dice-K Matsuzaka
Rookie of the Year: Probably some overrated hump from a crappy team like the Royals, who'll amount to somewhere between Bob Hamelin and Angel Berroa in three years.
Comeback Player of the Year: Zack Grienke.
Batting champion: Manny Ramirez
Home run champion: David Ortiz
RBI champion: David Ortiz
Singles champion: Derek Jeter
Best cologne: "Driven" by the singles champion
Doubles champion: Wade Boggs
Triples champion: Wahoo Sam Crawford
Wins leader: Konichiwa, Dice-K!
Ks leader: Ibid
Saves leader: Some guy who'll be his crappy team's lone rep in the All-Star game in San Francisco
ERA champ: Kyle Lohse. He in the AL these days, right? Well, he should be.
Football: For the first time in Super Bowl history, two teams with five-letter names will be squaring off, and the combined totals of those two names, 10 (yeah, that’s 5 + 5), is tied for the second-lowest total ever, with the Rams/Titans in 2000. The lowest total? Super Bowl III, when the Jets beat the Colts....and that’s a 9-letter game. Reporters are working hard to come up with arcane stories for Super Bowl XLI, but none of them will come up with anything as useless as that.
Horseracing: Just wondering…what ever happened to that horse named Barbarossa, the one that won the Kentucky Derby last year? He wasn’t kidding when he said he was retired, because I haven’t heard a damn thing about him. They must have put him out to stud alongside Barry Sanders.
MLB: So the Red Sox and Rockies are supposedly hashing out a deal to lower Todd Helton’s career average average (.333), hoping to bring the Colorado first baseman to Boston in a trade of prospects. That’s great, because the Red Sox don’t have nearly enough firepower in their lineup, and if we’ve learned anything from the Yankees in the last six years, it’s that hitting always trumps good pitching, especially in October. Psst: Ya still need a closer, Theo, and Joel Pineiro isn’t the answer, unless the question is, “Who’s got the most feminine-sounding name in Major League Baseball?”
By the way, I commend Sammy Sosa’s willingness to come back and prove that MLB’s testing standards remain inadequate.
College football: Notre Dame football coach Charlie Weis, who nearly died during gastric bypass surgery several years ago, is planning to sue the surgeons, claiming they acted so negligently that they left Weis close to death. Acting negligently because they left him close to death? How about acting negligently because they left him fat?
Cameron Martin. Finalist in Fox Sports Next Great Sportswriter contest. I cover the Red Sox for Comcast SportsNet New England and Major League Baseball for
Bugs & Cranks
