Game 3: Angels at Mariners
To paraphrase Bill Bavasi at the most recent USSM feed, “free agent pitchers scare the hell out of me.”
Today’s thrill ride features the respective debuts of Jarrod Washburn and Jeff Weaver with their new clubs. Watch closely to be sure they don’t try to swap in Jered Weaver for his richer brother, since the resulting confluence of misspelled names could cause headaches for years to come. In me, anyway.
And in case you weren’t already frightened by Washburn’s contract, beware — he’s out for revenge on the Angels, who let him go without so much as a phone call.
Revenge of the Wash. This time, it’s personal.
Winning two out of three before the A’s come to town would be an inspiring, nerve-calming way to start the season. Game time is 3:35.
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Had great seats for the game today, 1st row behind the Angels dugout. Some impressions from there…Vlad is a monster. He’s much larger than I ever thought he was. Salmon is huge too.
Lopez showed speed and quickness today. He made a nice run to catch a pop foul behind 1st. Richie was in the process of corkscrewing himself into the ground and never would have made it close to the ball. Jose also showed some nice speed on his triple.
Washburn looked good. If he continues to bring a 90 mph fastball and complement it with the 80 mph changeup and spot the curve he’ll do just fine. Great outing today. Mateo looked like…well Mateo. WHen he mixes up his pitches he’s fine, he’s never going to throw the ball past anyone with his easy to pick up delivery and lack of omph. Same thing with Sherrill.
LAA looks really old. Players and coaches both. They’re going to need to address some issues if they want to contend.
It was great to win the first series of the year.
We got the Good Washburn today, but remember he’s been a may to veer to extremes of performance. The comment by the LA-LAs GM that “he just walked away laughing” when asked whether he’d re-sign Washburn last year would motivate a fireplug, and facing that team in his first (new) home start we’ve seen the best game that Good Washburn can throw—which was pretty damn solid, yeah. I’ll clap and say hey for J-Rod whenever he throws a game like this one. 25+ more o’ the same would be great.
I know its crazy early but that is the J-Wash I expect to see all season long….at least in Safeco…if Moyer and Sele thrived here I don’t see why J-Wash wouldn’t….check out that prediction i made early, as I pat myself on the back
I know its crazy early but that is the J-Wash I expect to see all season long….at least in Safeco…if Moyer and Sele thrived here I don’t see why J-Wash wouldn’t….check out that prediction i made early, as I pat myself on the back
Washburn K’d 7 men, induced 8 groundballs, and walked nobody, in 7 strong innings. 15 of the 21 outs were the direct result of positive peripheral skills. It wouldn’t have mattered what ball park he was in, he pitched just flat out above his norm. I don’t think he can keep this up. Last season, if you look at Washburn’s starts from July to the end of the season, they’re mostly okay in the strikeouts department, and few runs given up, but he walked way too many guys.
So the onus really is on Washburn to maintain his control. If he can do that, he should be a reliable starter.
Mediocre pitcher – nice outing.
So if, as Baseball Between the Numbers illustrates, there is actually some statistical backing to the contract year phenomenon, how wildly outrageous is it to hypothesize that there may be something to the “laughed out of town by former team and then resigned within same division” phenomenon? And how likely is that to last for four years? And how tainted would that question be by a fan’s desire to look for a silver lining in his team’s big-name FA signing, no matter how ridiculous it may seem from any objective standing?
In the “who would have ever believed it” category, after 3 games:
Team Quality Starts
SEA 3
TEX 2
OAK 0
LAA 0