“The pessimist complains about the wind;

The optimist expects it to change;

The realist adjusts the sails.”

 -William Arthur Ward

Wednesday night I attended the Rays/Yankees baseball game at Tropicana Field in St. Petersburg with my good friend Doc Spero. I didn’t really want to go but Spero wanted to do something nice for me so I relented and went with him. Now I generally like to go to Rays games but I have this long tenured hatred of anything Yankee (from a baseball point of view) and rarely will go see them play in person and I certainly would never shell out my own money to do it.

Those of you who have followed my blogs will recall that I have gone to many, many Rays’ games in the past and have thoroughly enjoyed most of them. Last night was different. Outside of the tepid hot dog and Spero’s company, I found this game to be nothing more than an unpleasant experience that I had to endure until one of us finally said “lets go home”.

I have finally come to the absolute conclusion the Rays’ 2009 baseball season is over as far as the playoffs are concerned. This team simply does not have the same intangibles as last years team had. It was always my contention that the 2008 team had enough of the intangible ingredients and character in it to overcome the deficiencies in Joe Maddon’s management style. This year’s edition simply doesn’t have it.

Last night in the bottom of the first inning, B.J. Upton and Carl Crawford both hit infield grounders. Neither of these guys made any serious effort to beat out the throws from Jeter and Arod, knowing that in the previous game they both threw tosses to first away. Their performance in the first two at bats mirrored the intensity of the Rays for the rest of the game. This is not the same attitude that last year’s team had. Even Maddon was different last year. He actually pulled Upton out of a game for loafing on the base paths. But this time he said and did nothing. As a matter of fact, he has done almost nothing all year to adjust to the inadequacies of the team.

For all intent and purpose he has had the same line up since opening day. A week or so ago he finally moved Carlos Pena out of the cleanup spot and into the fifth or sixth spot (depending on the pitcher). Pena has been hitting no better than .230 all year and leads the league in strikeouts. It’s no surprise that Longoria hasn’t seen a pitch to hit all year. His accomplishments have to be considered magnificent for that reason. B.J. Upton has hit lead off all year while Jason Bartlett has languished in the eighth or ninth spot even after having the third highest batting average in the American League and a minimal number of strikeouts. I am so tired of hearing Maddon’s claim that it is a good idea to have a good, fast hitter batting ninth because later in the game it gives you two leadoff hitters together. I submit that that hypothesis makes sense. However, does it not make sense to have the guy who is performing better have more at bats than the other? If Bartlett was leading off and Upton was batting ninth, Maddon would still have the same situation except that the guy who hits better gets more at bats. Maybe it’s me who thinks funny.

Sometimes you make mistakes and just have to suck it up. In the Rays case Pat Burrell falls into that category. I didn’t like the signing over the winter and I like it less now. Burrell might be a great guy but it doesn’t appear to me he can hit at the Triple A level anymore. I am tired of hearing about how he is a streak hitter who can carry a team for a month all by himself. At this writing, he is the worst statistical DH in the league, can’t run and sold his glove at a yard sale when he signed his $16 million contract. The Blue Jays may catch the Rays before he finally performs well enough to carry this team. He continues to be in the line up while Willy Aybar gets splinters in his butt riding the bench. Aybar can hit; from both sides and he has proven it. Man do I miss Rocco Baldelli.

It is my humble opinion that Maddon has mismanaged the pitching staff since the spring. I don’t think that any of the starting pitchers had more than 10 innings of throwing in anger during spring training. The results should have been obvious. None of them were ready to start the season and the Rays’ record was dismal in April. The comment back then was that it is a long season and they didn’t want to burn out the arms for the playoff run. I’ve got news for them. There will be no playoff run but at least the arms will still be strong. And why the hell is David Price still up with the big club and starting every fifth day? There is no doubt that he has all the tools but nobody has been able to teach him how to use those tools yet. If one is serious about winning this year, does it not make sense that the best place for him to learn how to pitch is in the minors?

I remember a line from the movie “Heartbreak Ridge”. Gunnery Sergeant Thomas Highway (Clint Eastwood) was training his recon platoon on how to do their job more effectively. He said, “You adapt, you overcome, you improvise”. I think this might be a great slogan for Maddon and Andrew Friedman to adopt. Their plan of doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results just ain’t getting’ it done. As a matter of fact, it is pure insanity to think that it will change after four months.

One of the most unfortunate things that have happened to the Rays this year was Akinori Iwamura going down for most of the season with a knee injury. It looks like he will be back with the club before the season is over and that is a good thing for Aki fans. It will give them a chance to say goodbye. The Rays have a $4.25 million option on Aki for 2010 with a cheap buy out. With the financial situation the way it is for next year, they will never exercise the option. We can thank Friedman’s signing of Pat Burrell for that along with the contracts he signed with Kazmir and Pena. Those three contracts represent about 40% of what the Rays spent this year. Anybody who thinks that the Rays will spend next year what they spent this year is just not dealing with reality. The solution would be to deal two of the three over the winter but who would take them? Or even more important, what would you get for them?

I could continue this rant but then it would be putting salt on the wound. The Rays management’s lack of experience is starting to show. This is a team that cannot afford mistakes like the Yankees, Red Sox or Dodgers can. They can’t afford to just dump Burrell like the Red Sox did with Julio Lugo. I fear we will have to live with him like we did with Greg Vaughan and Vinnie Castillo. It’s not looking good.

The solution to a number of the problems I’ve mentioned is revenue. But revenue increases are not going to happen if the status quo in maintained. Sure they need a new ballpark. I love going to the Trop when there are 25,000 fans or less. But when there are 30, 000 plus it becomes very uncomfortable. It takes a whole inning to get a hot dog. It takes a lady almost two innings to go to the bathroom. I have figured out that if I am going to watch the whole game I am going to go without the amenities that I love during a game. I also believe that when you put a product on the field like the one they put on the field last night, it is going to discourage a lot of folks from going to the next game. It has been discouraging me all year. And they have put that product on the field far too many times this year. Maddon could change that if he would only take Gunny Highway’s advice and adapt, overcome and improvise.

LEADING WITH MY CHIN:

All is right in my world today. I just watched my beloved Red Sox beat the snot out of the Yankees on television during the past two nights and realized for the first time in about fifteen years, there is not one Yankee player that I have any sentimental feelings for. I am free to hate on them without any second thoughts.

Back in '95 the Yankees weren't doing so well. But they signed Tony Fernandez to play shortstop and I was a big Tony Fernandez fan. It was during that year that I became aware that there were a few Yankees that I actually liked. For some strange reason I liked Paul O'Neill; I liked Tino Martinez; I liked Bernie Williams. I began to wonder if I was getting soft in my advancing years.

I have spent my whole life hating the Yankees, and this was a good thing. I can't recall a person that has been in my life that I can truly say that I hated. But I hated the Yankees. Maybe those ill feelings towards the men in pinstripes has been the vent I needed to protect the people in my life from the venom that I'm sure exists in me. It has gone so far that I wanted to like teams like the Brewers and the Cubs and the Mets and the Twins but found it difficult because they wore pinstripes. I have gone as far as to be proud of the fact that I have never hired anyone who wore Yankee gear on his or her job interview.

I hated the way that Casey Stengel used to adjust his lineup and pitching rotation on a daily basis. I hated Bill Skowron, Hank Bauer, Tom Tresh, Tony Kubek, Hector Lopez, Mickey Rivers, Thurman Munson, Clete Boyer, Bob Turley and so many more. I especially hated Ryne Duren. The problem in the old days was the Yanks had guys like Mickey, Yogi, Elston Howard and Johnny Blanchard. You couldn't hate those guys. They were too good.

That is why the feelings of the past fifteen years have been so disturbing to me. I actually liked some of these guys and it didn't feel right. I always liked Dave Justice and was disappointed when he went to the Bronx but I couldn't hate him. Even as late as '05 they had guys on the team I liked. They had Tom "Flash" Gordon, John Flaherty, Randy Johnson and Alan Embree, and I liked these guys.

I got so excited during the past two days when I came to the realization that there is not even one member of the 2009 New York Yankees that I have even the slightest sentimental feeling about. I am free to hate the Yankees again with no second thoughts. That is even more exciting to me than the fact that the Red Sox kicked the snot out of them. That's not really correct. The fact that they haven't done so well in Boston has kept Jerseyankee from posting his Yankee crap.

When I was ten years old, I joined a Little League sponsored by my parish church in the Dorchester section of Boston. I had no idea what position I wanted to play when I was asked so the Manager put me in the outfield. We began the first practice with him hitting fly balls to us in the outfield. I couldn't catch anything and the twelve year olds started ragging on me. I was so embarrassed that I threw my glove on the ground and ran off the field and all the way home. 

Later that day the Manager of the team showed up at my house with my glove. My Mom invited him in and we all sat in the kitchen and talked about my playing baseball on his team. He never said anything (in front of me) about what happened at the field that day but my Mom decided to walk me to the park on the next scheduled practice. She did it a few more times after that and even attended my first Little League game. It was the only baseball game she ever saw me play; and I played on at least two teams every year until I graduated from High School. 

That story is what came to my mind when my sister called to tell me that Mom had passed away around 8 o'clock this evening. She was 28 days short of her 96th birthday and up until about 2 months ago, was still a funny, intelligent and vital person. It was about that time that her illness started to take control of her mind and she started slipping quickly. 

I was visiting with her during September of 2004 and was shocked when she asked me to put the Red Sox game on the TV. She didn't really have a clue as to what went on during a baseball game but she was excited about how happy her family and her friends were because the Sox were doing so well. She became a fan for that season anyway and developed a little interest again in 2007. 

I lost my oldest friend tonight. I knew it was coming and thought I was prepared for the end but discovered that I wasn't quite as prepared as I thought. I could put down an easy 2,000 more words telling you what a wonderful person she was and how much I already miss her, but this short blog will have to do. 

I thank all who read this for indulging me.

About 35 years ago, in what seems like another lifetime, I was living in upstate New York. I had this friend who I'll call Jack Daniels (because that was his name) who very suddenly came into a bunch of money. From my point of view Jack dealt with this influx of cash in a very responsible manor; except for one thing. He bought a brand new 1972 Lincoln Continental Mark IV and promptly put the car in storage. Jack believed that this pure Mark IV would increase in value over the years and would reap a fortune for him at some later date.

Every year he would take the car off its blocks and take it to the local dealer and have it serviced. Once that task was completed he would bring it back to his garage and put it back on its blocks and let it stand until the next year. 

As it happens, our lives took different paths a short while later and I kind of lost touch with Jack. It was maybe about 8 years later when I contacted him and discovered that the Lincoln was still in his garage on blocks and his plans for it hadn't changed.  Now this whole thing never made any sense to me. I could understand the logic behind the endeavor, but I couldn't buy into the practicality of it. This was a machine and unless one uses a machine, it has no pupose. 

This morning I was reading the St. Pete Times on line. There was an article concerning the last 3 or 4 roster players who would make the Rays for opening day. The top of the discussion was who was going to be the 5th starter in the rotation. Edwin Jackson was traded to the Tigers over the winter for a kid who is injured and wasn't going to make the big club anyway, so the Rays needed a 5th starter. 

All spring long; there has been this competition between Jason Hammel and Jeff Niemann as to who that would be. The pitcher who didn't get the nod would then be relegated to the much coveted designated long reliever role. Now you must understand that neither of these guys has been the reincarnation of Bob Gibson this spring and there is someone on the staff who just might be that, only from the left side. David Price has shown the same skills he exhibited at the end of last season all through spring training yet according to this article, he is expected to start the season in Durham. Hammel and Niemann don't have any options left which means they can't be sent down without risk of losing them off waivers. The Rays can do whatever they please with Price.  

I had this vision of Jack Daniels beautiful Mark IV Continental sitting up on blocks contributing nothing to the quality of life of the Daniels family. Sending Price to the minors to start the season contributes nothing to the quality of life for the '09 edition of the Tampa Bay Rays; especially using the logic that they would be doing so to protect 2 pitchers who, after years in the organization, have yet to prove to anyone that they belong in the majors.  

I find it hard to question the decisions of Andrew Friedman and Joe Maddon after what they have accomplished in the last couple of years, but having David Price's number 14 on the back of a Durham Bulls jersey makes no sense to me at all.

Is It Over Yet?

"I hate this time of year. I watch every baseball game with a level of anxiety that makes no sense to me. Each game is a reminder that there are only a few more left. I find myself rearranging my schedule to watch games late in the season that I couldn't be bothered with in July. I keep my Devil Rays tickets and go to every game in the last home stand."

I wrote this passage in a blog in October of 2007 and it pretty much echoed my feelings about the end of every baseball season since I was a boy. The last game of the World Series marks a time of sadness in me. It is over!    

It's just not the same this year. This year I just can't seem to want it to be over soon enough. I have even started to study the NFL stats. I have learned about all the new players on the Lightning roster (and there are a lot of them). I have tried to determine how the Celts will do without James Posey. This is completely different than it has been for the past fifty years. Last year, it wasn't until the World Series was over that I realized that the Patriots were undefeated.   

I started asking myself why this season is so different. After all, I have a team in the World Series. I have followed the Tampa Bay Rays since they were playing catch before the first pre season game. I have witnessed one of the most incredible turnarounds in the history of sports and it happened in a sport that I have loved all my life; and I saw a lot of it first hand. Why do I feel so indifferent about the final outcome of the World Series and just want it over so I can move on?  

1.      I think that there are a number of reasons for my feelings. First, was the series the Rays played with my beloved Red Sox in the ALCS. Even though I wanted the Rays to win, it was extremely difficult to root against the Red Sox.   

2.      I was disgusted with the coverage Manny Ramirez and (although not so much) the Dodgers were getting in the playoffs. Many were making a hero out of a guy that quit on his team and that goes totally against my sense of sensibility.   

3.      Not knowing who was covering the games and what channel they were going to be on was a pain in the ass. Having to listen to broadcasters who were learning on the fly about the teams that were playing was distracting as hell. I never heard so much bad information over the air as I heard in the first two series of the playoffs.    

4.      Not having Kalas, Remy and Staats to the TV broadcasts sucked. These were the guys who escorted us through the regular season and come playoff time they are just discarded.    

5.      Having to listen to Chip Carey, Tim McCarver, Joe Morgan, and all these other yahoos call the games was distracting with their incessant ramblings about things that just don't matter. And the fact that they were talking to me, the viewer, like I didn't have a clue as to what was going on was insulting. I felt as though I was listening to a democratic politician telling me that I just didn't understand and that what they were doing was for my own good. 

6.      Coming to the realization that the game doesn't matter nearly as much as the Networks wishes. For God's sakes, it is snowing in Philly today! Why are we still playing baseball? I have already started taking down my Christmas decorations from the rafters and we are still playing baseball.   

7.      The umpiring has been absolutely atrocious in all the series that have been played. I have now become an advocate of replay. It has become obvious to me that the umpires are not qualified to have the final decision at any point in a baseball game. It appears to me that tenure in the umpiring profession is stronger than tenure in education. It doesn't seem to matter how well an umpire does his job, just how long he has been doing it. Maybe that is why I still have to listen to Tim McCarver.

8.      If this Ball/strike box that the networks keep showing us              accurate, why do I need an "opinion" from an umpire to make the final call? Why should he do anything more than hold the ball/strike counter in his hand and look for obstruction calls?

Major League Baseball needs to take a look at this stuff. The World Series is going on and this should be the pinnacle of the baseball season. This should be the greatest show on Earth. This should be the "can't miss" event of the year. But what it seems to be turning into is something to click onto during the commercials of Two and A Half Men just to catch the score.