Halladay Steals the Day

What a day in baseball. It starts with Indian's pitcher David Huff getting hit in the head by a line drive. Carlos Silva becomes the first Cub pitcher since 1967 to start a season 7-0. Kendry Morales hits a walk off grand slam to give the Angels the win, then breaks his leg in the House of Pain "Jump Around" celebration at home plate. But Roy Halladay stole the headlines as he pitched the 20th perfect game in Major League history...

Framing Hanley - Lollipop

He’s been one of the top shortstops since being promoted to the big leagues in 2006. A two-time NL All-Star, the winner of the 2006 NL Rookie of the Year, and the NL leader in batting average last season. The guy swings a monster stick, as evidence by his Silver Slugger awards, and puts up huge numbers from what is typically seen as a weak hitting position. I almost forgot to mention he’s a super stud in the video games. Apparently, he also thinks he is more important than his teammates. Who is this? It’s Hanley Ramirez, my friends.

What the baseball fans witnessed Ramirez do earlier this week was pathetic. The Marlins have made him the cornerstone of their franchise and he gets paid pretty descent money to perform. There isn’t any excuse for not hustling to first base or the dreaded kick save jog after the ball thing that we’re seen hundreds of times by now. Ramirez stated that his shin was sore but it wasn’t bothering him during the play. That throws out the only understandable reason. Not to be outdone, Ramirez accused some of his teammates of dogging it and ripped his manager’s decision the bench him. Ramirez wasn’t going to apologize. Then he did and said all the right words. Now he’s back in the lineup.

I have to say I totally agree with Gonzales’s decision to bench him. In fact he should have let Ramirez “rest” his ailing shin a couple of more games. The fans will surely forget about this incident quickly, especially if he has another great season, but don’t expect his teammates to be so nice. Ramirez is surely going to get the cold shoulder for awhile. Not to mention the whispers and talk behind his back. Hell, his pitchers probably won’t protect him at the plate anymore. Bring on the brushbacks. Unfortunately for Ramirez, it’s all well deserved, but he isn’t the first player to be lazy during a play and he won’t be the last. It reminds me of the locker room scene from Bull Durham. “Bunch of lollygaggers, lollygagging around.” My advise...grow up! Here's a lollipop.

Happy Mothers Day

The Oakland A's Dallas Braden threw the 19th perfect game in MLB history. What made this even sweeter? It's Mother's Day. Congrats.

Tasered!

Wow, what is going on with those Phillies’ fans this year? First, you have a drunken guy make himself vomit on a little girl and her cop dad. Then a fan runs on the field in back to back games, which the second guy did even though the culprit got nailed with a stun gun the night before. Philadelphia has always been know for having obnoxious fans, even the show “It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia” had an episode were the fans were crazy. By the way, that is a damn funny show with Danny DeVito added to the cast. Well, anyway, there has been a huge amount of scrutiny towards the peace officer that used the stun gun. Most people believe the officer used excessive force to stop what everyone perceives as a cute non threatening teenager. Being a full fledged member of the Field Runners Club, I inadvertently ran onto the field at a Northern Iowa football game against Morehead St. back in 1993; I have to say I agree with what the officer did. These irresponsible fans need to be subdued as quickly as possible. The fan is knowingly breaking the law by trespassing and it’s unpredictable what they will do in the heat of the moment. In my experience, as soon as I hit the playing field, my original plan vanished in a rush of adrenaline, and survival mode kicked in. Very rarely is there intent to hurt anyone, but we shouldn’t forget when Royals coach Tom Gamboa got attacked by two fans in 2002. Plus the footage of the guy getting tasered and doing a face plant was pretty funny.

MLB Front Office Manager

I recently upgraded to the PS3 and got the game MLB Front Office Manager by 2KSports. If you’re not familiar with the game, the premise is that you run a baseball organization from the Major Leagues all the way down through the farm system. If you need any other information, visit Google. I picked the Kansas City Royals as my first General Manager job. It seems a small market team would present more of a challenge because of payroll restrictions. As we rolled thru the arbitration and free agent periods the Royals scored a couple of big stars for the roster. We added Prince Fielder, Ben Sheets, and Chad Billingsly from the free agent market. Things looks good, the pitching rotation is stacked with Sheets and Billingsly joining Greinke, Meche, and Hochevar. That’s tough. I’m excited.

The season begins and then reality sits in. The Royals suck. Injuries added insult and decimated the team. As the season came to a close, the Royals have a strong hold on last place in the AL Central. We finished 61-101. I think the funny part was that I received an email from the owner that said my performance was very poor. Ha ha. I’m on the hot seat. Things can only get better.

Since I’m a stats guy, we named Prince Fielder the team MVP. He finished the season with some nice numbers; .303 avg., 32 HR, 109 RBI, .958 OPS; even though he missed almost of month. The Minor League Player of the Year was Ronnie Hansen. Hansen played shortstop for the AA Northwest Arkansas Naturals and racked up a .309 avg., 20 HR, 65 RBI, and an OPS of .944. Billingsly was a massive free agent bust and was demoted to setup man towards the end of the season. His 5.39 ERA led to a 6-18 record. Pathetic. He’s on the trading block over the offseason. One final note, the Tampa Bay Rays defeated the San Francisco Giants in the World Series.

Organization records:
Kansas City Royals..........61-101
Omaha Royals.................48-96
NW Arkansas Naturals....48-92
Wilmington Blue Rocks...47-93
Burlington Bees...............53-87
Burlington Royals............17-51
Idaho Falls Chukars.........29-47