October 2007 Archives

As a kid you just had to love Halloween. What could be better than dressing up as a favorite character and go door-to-door and have people give you free candy? When we were kids we started trick-or-treating almost as soon as school let out and didn’t get home until nearly 10 PM. Our diet for the night consisted of whatever we got at the house we just visited. It was an innocent time filled with childhood dreams. As I have gotten older Halloween has lost some of its magic and luster. Now you have to worry about your kids leaving the neighborhood or if you have enough candy at the house for all the kids that will be coming to trick-or-treat. All this reminiscing about the past had me longing for my childhood. Of course at my age I have to worry about cavities and tooth decay so I wondered what if fans could trick-or-treat around Major League Baseball.

I am not much of a Boston Red Sox fan. In fact the only team I like less than the Red Sox is the Colorado Rockies and their new mouthpiece, the “great Troy Tulowitzki”. That is why this year’s World Series was such a struggle for me. Asking me to choose a winner was like asking which side of Satan’s profile do you prefer. If I would have had my way it would have begun to snow in Boston and Denver on October 24 and not stopped until sometime in mid-March 2008. It would have been the perfect symbolization that it would be a cold day in baseball before either of these teams were world champions. That didn’t happen though so I just had to deal with it. With this match-up it was going to take more than just a game to get me involved. Fortunately Taco Bell had the answer.

For the past week I have been attempting to piece together the Arizona Diamondbacks 2008 schedule. It’s like trying to discover the lost continent of Atlantis or something. You think there should be another continent but there are more superstitions and urban myths than there are hard facts as to where it is located. In the case of the Diamondbacks schedule, you have to follow the trail of bread crumbs then see if they all match up to make a complete loaf of bread. That all changed today when the Diamondbacks not only released an updated version of their home schedule but they also announced the away schedule including all game times. Finally the picture is starting to clear up and we can start to make plans for 2008.

You would like to look back over the 2007 World Series and point to one or two plays that were a turning point to a closely matched series. Instead history will show a hot team that cooled in the high mountain air waiting 8 days to meet their opponent. Their opponent on the other hand battled back from a huge deficit to win their League Championship series in a tough seven game series and with momentum on their side they were able to take advantage and win the World Series in decisive fashion. This is the second year in a row where the hot team took advantage of their counterparts who had more rest and dominated a series. It makes you stop to ponder what it takes to be a world champion.

Today marked Game 3 of the 2007 World Series. For the first time in the history of Major League Baseball it was being played a mile above sea level. This was indeed a “high point” for this World Series. (I’m sorry; I just could not resist that.) Playing at altitude is not without its challenges. First, the air is much thinner. That has positive and negative implications. For those players who have not had the opportunity of experiencing that, there are times when you just don’t seem to be able to catch your breath. The thinner air also is much drier than at sea level making it much easier for players to become dehydrated. From a pitching perspective, the thinner air means less resistance to pitches which in turn equates to less break. This is especially troublesome to those pitchers whose primary pitch is a breaking ball. I’ve seen enough hanging breaking balls in my time to know that Coors Field is definitely not a pitching friendly park. It has become more neutral since the installation and usage of the humidor for baseball storage.

With today being a travel day for the World Series you would have expected me to be a little off my game. Normally on days where there is no baseball I could best be compared to one of the polar bears at the zoo. Every time I ever go to a zoo I have to stop by the polar bear exhibit. There the magnificent white bear can be found pacing back and forth. They attempt to climb out but cannot seem to find a way to plot their escape. They try swimming in the moat that surrounds the exhibit but it too blocks any and all exit points. Now wet and cold the bear sits and stares out at the world not exactly sure what to do with himself. If you put a Sedona Red jersey and an official New Era Diamondbacks hat on the bear we could probably be twins. Well except for the fact that I don’t have a coat of white fir covering my body and I really don’t appreciate it when my handler (in this case Trina) throws raw fish in my direction thinking that I will pick it up and eat it with my bare (or is that bear?) paws. So the question becomes, what exactly is a bear to do when baseball season has gone into hibernation?

As an Arizona Diamondbacks fan it was hard to watch last night’s debacle of Game 1 of the World Series and not say to yourself, “wow the Diamondbacks could have done better than that.” There was probably a few Little League coaches around the world who had similar thoughts pass through their heads as well. It was not so much that the Rockies had lost game 1 it was the manner in which they lost game 1. They were completely outplayed in pretty much every aspect of the game. The most telling sign was the 12 strike-outs recorded by Red Sox pitchers. Seven of the nine batters in the Rockies lineup struck out being led by Brad Hawpe who fanned 4 times in an 0-4 night. This was definitely one of those games that you just left the ballpark and went back to the hotel and crawled in bed pulling the blankets over your head and waited for morning to arrive. Perhaps Game 2 would be more favorable to the visiting team.

In most years this is a date that I anxiously look forward to. It is the first game of the World Series. This is the epitome of what all baseball players hope to obtain. Some players play their whole career and never get any closer to the World Series than what I do as a fan. There are literally hundreds of ballplayers who like me will be glued to their television sets watching each inning unfold evaluating the performances of the players and the umpires. The World Series is filled with pomp and circumstance. The bunting will be out in full force. There is just something about that red, white, and blue fabric draped along the stands that makes the game feel special. The World Series is the time when Major League Baseball plays on the national stage and they take every opportunity they can to put on the best “show” for the people. Most times I don’t mind all the frills although there are some that seem more staged and contrived than others. I am especially lenient during those times when the Diamondbacks are playing. I want each moment to last as long as possible so if MLB wants to wheel out former greats from the game or bring out another up-and-coming musical act to play before first pitch I’ll gladly watch if it means a few extra moments at the stadium.

When the baseball season began in April, weather was a major story. In Cleveland fans filed in to Jacob’s Field to watch the Indians host the Seattle Mariners. The game was called due to inclement weather. That usually means that rain showers caused the game to be rescheduled. In this case it was snow that postponed the game. The teams attempted again to play only to be thwarted by the weather. The extended forecast did not look promising either causing the Indians to move one series to Milwaukee where they could play under the cover of a retractable dome. Many people questioned what the schedulers at Major League Baseball were thinking when they proposed that Cleveland host a series in early April. Now we fast forward to Sunday October 21, 2007 and the Boston Red Sox are hosting the Cleveland Indians in game 7 of the American League Championship Series. This is one of the latest dates scheduled for the ALCS and with the format of the World Series it would place game 7 into November for only the second time in Major League Baseball history. The only other time baseball has been played in November was in 2001 and this was due to the delay in the season as a result of the tragedy on 9/11. So really, this season is the first time that Major League Baseball willingly chose to play baseball in November. The question is, whether weather will play a role in this year’s Fall Classic.

This is one of those days when you just don’t really know what to do with yourself. There are no baseball games being played at the Major League level. The match-up has been set for the World Series and now you are in a waiting game watching the clock wondering when game time is ever going to begin. For the fans of the twenty-eight teams who didn’t make the World Series it is a time to wonder about what could have been had your team been able to put the pieces together to make a run like the Boston Red Sox and the Colorado Rockies. Sometimes baseball is like a big puzzle made up of literally thousands of pieces and depending on how they are put together they can make a picture that looks like the front of the puzzle box or they can be a menagerie of ill-fitting parts that looks like the floor of a truck stop men’s room. This of course was not a mental image I wanted to dwell on today so I tried to put it out of my mind.

At the conclusion of Game 5 of the American League Championship Series I made a comment that this series had an eerie feeling of déjà vu hearkening back to 2004 when the Boston Red Sox fell to an 0-3 deficit against the New York Yankees only to reel off 4 straight wins to put them into the World Series where they demolished the St. Louis Cardinals in a sweep to win their first World Championship in 86 years. Rowdy and unruly players wandered the club house with the mantra of “Cowboy up” and claimed themselves a team of destiny. There was drama at every turn from close plays on the base paths to a gutsy performance by a pitcher complete with a “bloody sock”. These were the stories of 2004 that finally ended the curse of the Bambino. You could turn the clock ahead three years and feel many of the same things. The bloody sock is long gone although Curt Schilling remains a staple of the Boston rotation. Johnny Damon went to the dark side and now plays outfield for the “evil empire” yet the Red Sox continued to move forward.

I don’t deal well with death, I never have. I’d like to blame my parents (what kid doesn’t?) since they went out of their way to shield me from having to deal with the traumatic effects of losing a loved one. Even when we had to put our dog to sleep my mother took her to the vet while we were in school. When we arrived home she simply stated that the family pet had gone on a trip to a wonderful place where she would never experience pain. That was a lovely thought and helped us overcome the fact that we would never see the dog again but it really didn’t do much to prepare me for when I had to deal with a loss first hand. As I’ve gotten older I have had my share of opportunities to be introduced to the effects of losing a loved one. Each time seems to be harder and harder to try and understand why death is necessary. I promised myself that when I became a father I would not make the same mistake my parents did. I would find a way to teach my children about how death was a natural progression and that we must at some point face the realization of our mortality. Granted that is a little deep for a child to understand and I knew I would need to find a way to explain it in terms that they could understand without resorting to the analogy that my mother used on me when I lost my first pet.

Almost as soon as the Arizona Diamondbacks had clinched a play-off spot people began talking about how the team was ahead of schedule with the development of their young players and that this would be the first of many years when the Diamondbacks would be competing for a spot to represent the National League in the World Series. Even I have been guilty of looking blissfully into the future imagining a run similar to that of the Atlanta Braves where the Diamondbacks make the play-offs every season and expectations are similar to those of the New York Yankees where anything less than a World Championship would be considered a failure for the season. But now that I have had an opportunity to stop and reflect upon this season I am starting to question the wisdom in looking too far into the future.

Ever since the last out was recorded in the National League Championship Series I have been in sort of a baseball funk. Instead of my usual baseball-obsessed self I have tended to shy away for any and all news regarding the baseball front. Part of it was just that I didn’t want to be reminded that the Diamondbacks had been eliminated from the post season. About the last thing I needed was to hear yet another story of how the Colorado Rockies are the hottest team on the planet and that this year is a year of destiny. Sure it’s a feel good story especially the part where the Rockies are going to donate a full team share to the family of minor league coach Mike Coolbaugh who was killed earlier this year when he was hit in the head by a foul ball while coaching first base for the Tulsa Drillers the Double-A affiliate for the Colorado Rockies but that doesn’t mean I’m ready to be reminded that my favorite team missed an opportunity to be in the World Series. But today I decided that I needed to return to the land of the living and see what was happening in the world of Major League Baseball.

I awoke this morning, the first rays of the rising sun made their way through the window giving the room a warm Sedona Red glow. Ok maybe it wasn’t exactly Sedona Red but it was close. It’s funny; after Monday night’s game in Denver I wasn’t sure the sun would ever rise again a sentiment that I think was shared by a large contingent of Arizona Diamondbacks fans. No matter how much the 2007 Arizona Diamondbacks exceeded everyone’s expectations to make their way not only to the play-offs but all the way to the National League Championship Series there was still the painful realization that the home team had been eliminated and would not be playing any more baseball in 2007; or would they? Could it have been that I had just had a horrible nightmare and the four game sweep at the hands of the Colorado Rockies was just a bad dream brought upon by eating Dryers Cookie Dough ice cream with maraschino cherries right before bed?

I’m still trying to digest the fact that Arizona Diamondbacks baseball is over for the 2007 season. I know I shouldn’t be disappointed with the outcome of this season but in the back of my mind I still feel slighted because I believe that the Diamondbacks had the better ball club in the NLCS. They just didn’t get the breaks they needed to show that. But I can’t sit here and dwell on the past. It’s also a little premature to begin planning for the 2008 season. Although I can hardly wait for Spring Training to begin, if I start talking about that now I am going to drive myself and more importantly Trina crazy well before Christmas. She is usually accustomed to be driven crazy around the last week in January so if I push the timetable up to December she is likely to go postal on me before I ever get a chance to buy Cactus League tickets. So that leaves me in a slight quandary as to what I can and cannot think about. I know there is still baseball going but watching the remaining ALCS games is kind of like pouring salt in an open wound. Hopefully I’ll heal enough to watch the World Series when in begins next week. If not I have at least got my Tivo set to record the games for when I am ready to watch. So please don’t anyone tell me the outcome of any of the games.

With the Arizona Diamondbacks down 0-3 in this series it would take quite an effort for them to come back especially against a team who has lost only once in the past month. It was even more of a reach considering that the Arizona Diamondbacks would send a rookie to the mound who has not pitched in a game situation for nearly 2 weeks. There was just no telling what would happen. At the end of the evening the story would go one of two ways. Either the headlines would read that the Diamondbacks still had life and had forced a game 5 or we would be reading how the Rockies were a team of destiny heading to their first World Series in franchise history. Diamondbacks fans everywhere were hoping for the former rather than the latter.

You just have to love Eric Byrnes. Whether it is his all-out play running into walls chasing down fly balls or his head first slides into the bases where he comes up with his uniform a complete mess. The guy is just a fun dude to watch. He is one of those players who wears his heart on his sleeve. You always know exactly how Eric is doing based upon his mannerisms and actions. Some people resent that like the lovable Milton Bradley (the crummy outfielder for the San Diego Padres not the maker of fun board games) who thinks Byrnes practices “fake hussle” which is a Milton-ism for being a “show boat”. Of course no one puts much credence into anything that Milton Bradley says except maybe umpire Mike Winters.

Game 1 of the National League Championship was still very fresh on everyone’s mind when the gates to Chase Field opened for Game 2. The Diamondbacks fans were still steaming over the questionable call by Larry “the lizard” Vanover on the slide by Justin Upton. No one is arguing that Upton was out, he clearly was. The frustrating part remains that Vanover made a judgment call that Upton’s intent was to take out the player. I challenge Larry “the lizard” to find me one base runner going from first base to second base who is not intent on breaking up the double play. Normally the umpire whips out Major League Baseball Rules 7.09 (e) and 7.09 (f) when a base runner goes out of his way not going near the base to take out the runner. The problem with this call was that Upton was on the bag when the call was made. It makes you wonder what Larry “the lizard” was daydreaming about when he made that call. That play was just a minor part of the conversation though. The majority of news outlets chose instead to dwell on the few fans that tested their pitching prowess by throwing debris onto the field.

Yesterday I wrote about the dream of being in the National League Championship Series; what I should have said was that it was more of a nightmare. The most troubling part was that the nightmare was not so much about the Diamondbacks losing 5-1 but rather the events that took place in the seventh inning of the game. The bottom half of the seventh inning of this game may just turn out to be the defining moment of this series and could become the “Big Bang” origin of true baseball fans in Arizona. In the ten years of being an Arizona Diamondbacks fan I have never seen events like I saw during that half inning. It all started innocently enough.

It’s 4 AM; I have been tossing and turning for two hours and have finally realized that I am just not going to be able to sleep. You would have thought that I would have crashed right out after not getting to bed until nearly 1 AM but that just has not been the case. My head is filled with thoughts and excitement over the events that will take place in approximately 13 hours. I have been waiting since 2001 for the Arizona Diamondbacks to return to the National League Championship Series and that day has finally arrived. I still remember how excited I was when the 2001 team made it this far. It was like a dream watching Randy Johnson and Curt Schilling dominate the Atlanta Braves taking that series in 5 games and setting up one of the greatest World Series in history. This is definitely not the 2001 team though I am still dreaming.

Before each round of the play-offs teams are allowed to adjust their active roster. I wrote about this on October 2 and gave my predictions of what I thought Bob Melvin and Josh Byrnes would do. In a short 5 game series I thought it would be best for the Diamondbacks to carry an extra position player rather than a pitcher. I also expressed that in a 7 game series that might not make sense and therefore could be changed to eliminate one roster spot for a position player to bolster the bullpen. With the Diamondbacks making it out of the first round and into the NLCS, they have the opportunity to re-assess their roster and make changes to it. The finalized roster is due to Major League Baseball by 10 AM tomorrow. My predictions of who I would put on the roster for the first round were fairly close to what the Diamondbacks actually did. I had a disagreement on two players. I had chosen Brandon Medders over Dustin Nippert in the bullpen and I had selected Carlos Quentin over Robby Hammock for position players. What changes would I make (if any) for this round of the play-offs?

Sunday September 16 seemed like an ordinary day by all accounts. The Arizona Diamondbacks were in Los Angeles playing the Dodgers. The Diamondbacks had been struggling as always against the Dodgers and had dropped the first two games of the series. The Dodgers were breathing down the Diamondbacks neck in the standings and it looked plausible that Los Angeles or San Diego could overtake Arizona. Northeast of Los Angeles the Colorado Rockies were playing host to the Florida Marlins. Like the Diamondbacks the Rockies too were struggling in their series having lost the first two games to the scrappy Marlins. I don’t think anyone could have imagined that on this fall Sunday afternoon two franchises would take a step forward that would lead them to meet in the play-offs for the right to represent the National League in the World Series.

The National League Championship Series is set with the Arizona Diamondbacks hosting the Colorado Rockies beginning on Thursday. The American League Championship Series had one team identified when the Boston Red Sox swept the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim in California. The remaining entry into the ALCS was still yet to be decided. The Cleveland Indians who were the American League Central Division champion played host to the New York Yankees. In the first two games of that series the Indians pretty much had their way with the Yankees. Alex Rodriguez continued to struggle in the post season during the first two games hitting a paltry .200 through the first 3 games. Sadly, that batting average was in the middle of the pack of Yankee hitters which is why going into Game 4 the Yankees were in a must win situation or their season was over. As if that were not enough pressure on this star-studded team Yankees owner George Steinbrenner decided to up the ante a little.

So far in the post season the Arizona Diamondbacks have gotten very little respect from the baseball establishment. They have been cast as the underdogs and the talking heads have all fervently stated that the Diamondbacks have no right to be in the position they are in. They are too young and do not have the offense to be successful in the play-offs. The answer to these critics was a three game sweep of the Chicago Cubs and a berth in the National League Championship Series. The only question remained was who would be their next opponent. The answer to that question appeared a few short hours after the Diamondbacks had beaten the Chicago Cubs. A mile above sea level another underdog team demolished the most prolific offense in the National League to earn a spot in the NLCS. That underdog team was the Colorado Rockies who with their latest win stretched their record to 17-1 over the past 3 weeks. So in a strange twist of fate the Arizona Diamondbacks would play host to the Colorado Rockies in a seven game series to determine who will represent the National League in the World Series.

The pitching match-up for game 3 of the National League Divisional Series definitely favored the Chicago Cubs. It’s not that I had no confidence in Livan Hernandez. No wait, it is that I had no confidence in Livan Hernandez. Livan Hernandez is like the Diamondbacks personal Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. You never quite know what you are going to get from a Livo outing on the mound. Will it be the guy who was the most valuable player from the 1997 Florida Marlins World Series team or will it be the guy that couldn’t find the strike zone with a GPS? Lately it has been more of the latter than the former and that scared me just a little. My theory was that the Diamondbacks would need to score early and score often if they hoped to have any chance at winning this game.

I never quite could understand the scheduling of the baseball play-offs. How is it that teams are expected to play a full month of baseball during the regular season with perhaps two or three days off for the entire month yet when the post season comes there must be a travel day between cities to give the players a rest? When a team has the momentum like the Diamondbacks do, about the last thing they want to do is have an off day. I’m sure most of these guys would much prefer getting back on the field to try and finish this series out. As you can probably surmise I am not much of a fan of the travel day. I’m not much of a fan of any day that doesn’t have a Diamondbacks game scheduled. I’m probably one of the few people in America that think 162 games in a season is too short. It’s not that I don’t believe the players deserve a day off, I think everyone is entitled to a day of rest. But there are 25 guys on the roster so you almost have enough players for three teams. Just give some of the other guys a chance to play. From the looks of the Chicago Cubs during the first two games of this series it might not be such a bad idea to let someone else play since the starters from Game 1 and Game 2 didn’t do much.

From the moment that the Arizona Diamondbacks clinched a play-off berth all the talk outside of Arizona was how quickly the Diamondbacks would be eliminated. There was no way a team as young as this one could possibly do well in the post season. Arizona had no business being in the play-offs. They had no experience and their run differential statistics showed that this team was overachieving. It was only a matter of time before these young kids would wake up and realize that they weren’t that good. When the Colorado Rockies became the Wild Card team the Diamondbacks were christened the least likely team to be in the play-offs. That statement resonated throughout the airwaves on radio stations, television, and the printed media. It didn’t seem to matter that this team had the best record in the National League that had to be just a fluke. But not only were the Diamondbacks players being disrespected, so were their fans.

Post season baseball is just so different than during the regular season. That statement confuses a lot of people who do not follow baseball. How can the game be different? It is the same rules and mostly the same players. It doesn’t make sense that it would be different. Some of the difference may be the impending doom of the play-offs. Every decision and every juncture within the game takes on greater importance and is magnified. During the regular season if you happen to make a mistake there is always tomorrow. You just brush yourself off, shrug off the mistake and move on as if it didn’t happen. With a 162-game schedule it is easy and often times advantageous to think that way. In the play-offs the number of tomorrows is greatly condensed making each play seem like it is the most important thing in the world. This importance gets even greater as a series goes on. Prior to tonight’s game the pressure was spread evenly. With the Diamondbacks taking game 1 the pressure increases on the Cubs. They do not want to go back to Chicago facing an elimination game so each play in tomorrow night’s game will be magnified as to whether it helps or hurts the Cubs chances. It’s not just the on the field action that is different between the regular season and the post season. There are differences outside the foul lines as well. Take tonight for example.

For the past month the Arizona Diamondbacks like all other teams in Major League Baseball have had the luxury of playing with an expanded roster after the September call-ups. The expanded roster is an interesting concept. For the first 5 months of the season baseball plays with a set of rules that state that a team may have only 25 active players on their roster. Beginning on September 1 the rules change and teams can have up to 40 players available on their active roster. It always struck me as strange that baseball would change the rules when the games matter the most. Adding to the confusion is the fact that once a team enters the post season the rules revert back to allowing only 25 active players on the roster. Teams are required to submit their rosters prior to the first game and this roster remains in effect until that round of the play-offs have completed. A team has the opportunity to change their roster prior to the beginning of each round of the play-offs. For the Arizona Diamondbacks, they must decide which players to identify on their active roster by 10 AM Wednesday October 3. The question becomes, who should the Diamondbacks have active for the five game series with the Chicago Cubs?

For the first time since 2002 the Arizona Diamondbacks find themselves as one of eight play-off teams. A few things have changed since the last time the Diamondbacks played meaningful baseball in October. One of those changes was the introduction of Rally Monday by Major League Baseball. What exactly is “Rally Monday”? It sounds an awful lot like a cross between a rally monkey and Rally Sally which is a pretty scary thought if you ask me. It’s like baseball’s version of the H.G. Wells novel The Island of Dr. Moreau. For those of you who may have missed this classic and the later two pathetic attempts of making this into a movie (how could it go wrong when you have a movie starring Marlon Brando and Val Kilmer?) let me explain the plot. A man becomes shipwrecked on an island where he finds a mad scientist who is experimenting with men and animals playing God by turning them into monstrosities of living creatures. I can just see Rally Sally leading the other humanimals in a revolt by waving her flags as the creatures scream, “WHAT IS THE LAW!” Fortunately that is not what Rally Monday is. At least that is not what Rally Monday is while the sun is up. During the witching hours under the watch of a full moon things are not always as they appear. So the question remains, what exactly is Rally Monday?