Game 123, Mariners at Twins
Washburn vs Baker, 5:10 pm.
I’m throwing the game thread up before the line-up gets announced so that I don’t have any chance to react on the off chance that Kenji’s playing center field and hitting leadoff today or something. Because, for this thread, I want to put down my analyst hat for a second.
The Mariners are hosting something called Lolla-Blue-Za on Monday – the M’s are attempting to leverage the first playoff run we’ve seen in years into some city wide fan excitement, and are asking everyone to wear blue to to the Mariners-Angels series next Monday-Wednesday.
The name is ridiculously corny, but that doesn’t matter – I’m on board. The M’s are winning, there’s a pennant race in Seattle, and some of the best memories of my life were made at the Kingdome during the summer months of 1995. There’s something legitimately exciting about being at the ballpark in a game that means something, cheering on every two strike pitch, and demanding curtain calls from the players who hit monumental home runs.
So, if you’re going to the M’s-Angels series next week, wear blue and yell a lot. It’s been a long time since games at Safeco mattered as much as those three games will. We can talk about sustainability of performances all day long, but in the end, we all just want the team to win. So go nuts next week rooting for a sweep.
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330 Responses to “Game 123, Mariners at Twins”
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I still have a lot of issues with how our club is run, and I haven’t found a hole to be poked in any of the excellent analysis found on this most excellent site, despite the fact that (almost) none of the strategic improvements Dave points out make their way to the product on the field, but I, too, am ready to put aside my inner curmudgeon as this team makes a solid charge at the playoffs. After the last few years, this situation is a great reminder of how good the life of a baseball fan can be when the bats are working and the pitching is keeping us in games. Perhaps most of all, this growing community of passionate and knowledge-hungry M’s fans is adding a dimension to my personal experience that elevates the joy of fandom to a whole new level. Thanks to Dave, Derek and the rest of the gang for providing us with an awesome place on the web to call our Mariner home. Thanks, too, to all of the excellent regulars, people I’ve never met but that I feel a growing kinship with. When this team finally brings home that first World Series trophy, we are going to have a party for the ages! Huzzah, W00T, and all that!
10 RBIs for Garrett Anderson tonight?! If he were ever going to accomplish that, I would have bet it would have come against us. Against the Yanks, it’s oh-so-sweet!
279 – I don’t think so. 7.09 (d):
d) Any batter or runner who has just been put out hinders or impedes any following play being made on a runner. Such runner shall be declared out for the interference of his teammate
Ibanez could have been called out for Guillen’s interference had it been ruled as such, and no runs would have scored.
The M’s had more hits than the Angels tonight… and Anderson increased his RBI total by 25% in one game! Hard to do in August……
Anderson had a chance to break the RBI record. He came up with 2 out and runners at the corners in the 8th and grounded out. A homerun would’ve given him 13 RBI! Had there not been 2 out, he probably would’ve gotten one more RBI…
Figgens is listed as day-to-day and will be examined on Weds. Unfortunately, Colon is throwing simulated games and is working up to getting off the DL.
Coolstandings:
M’s win expectancy is 90.9
Yankees win expectancy is 90.6
M’s playoff percentage 53.5% (14.9/38.6)
Yankees 49.8% (6.0/43.8)
Nothing like losing 18-9 to bring down your pythag.
303- I’ve been wrong before, but If you just applied part (d) a runner could NEVER break up a double play. I don’t think that’s possible. At MLB.com they add a comment to part (d):
“7.09(d) Any batter or runner who has just been put out hinders or impedes any following play being made on a runner. Such runner shall be declared out for the interference of his teammate;
Rule 7.09(d) Comment: If the batter or a runner continues to advance after he has been put out, he shall not by that act alone be considered as confusing, hindering or impeding the fielders.” I think that means a runner sliding into a fielder and whacking the ball away or getting up from the ground and chasing a fielder would be guilty of interference. I think it also means that if the runner is continuing to advance [within the 3 feet allowed on either side of the direct line] that act alone isn’t considered “confusing, hindering, or impeding.”
Baseball Almanac.com has a little more detail but they refer to the subsection as part (f)
Thanks for the respectful discussion.
OK…Lutherans can be a pretty dry bunch. However, speaking for myself only, my draw to to Luther is not the fundamentalism but rather the richness of the theology. There is a rightousness (think funk, not religion) to the whole thing Martin Luther started.
He saw a terrible thing that the church was proprogating, i.e. paying for salvation and edited discernment of scripture, so he spoke out to say we all deserve to decide for ourselves and the only way to decide was to be knowledgeable. He began to translate scripture so that everyone could read the words of the bible for themselves vs. the church’s editied education. What followed was his proclamation that the catholic church was not the only way. He felt that a person’s relationship with Jesus triumphed over any ‘organized’ church.
Woo.
The game’s been over for hours, and I just now got a chance to scroll through all the remarks; you people are FUNNY. My wife had to come check on me: I was laughing so hard she thought I was choking.
“Sexson runs like one of those trees in ‘Lord of the Rings'” was the one that really set me off.
It’s like watching the game with a hundred or so friends who all pay attention. You guys rock.
As for the starting pitching, I’m kind of mystified. Weaver has gone through an Oedipus-like fall and rise here, HoRam says he’s fixed his mechanics (and here I thought mechanics fixed things), Felix is, if not overpowering, at least pretty darn good, and Jarrod is doing okay. So is it good? Shaky? Bad? Or what?
Regardless, I don’t think I’d want to be a team with the Mariners coming into town for a series right about now.
Fark the stats. I will repeat, FARK the stats. This team is deadly right now. It is wonderful to watch. This is a great team and I will take great joy watching them in the playoffs.
Jeff,
Easy to say when we’re playing like the ’01 team…we simply can do no wrong at the moment, and yes, it’s an absolute joy to be a fan of the M’s right now. The problem is this hot streak can disappear overnight, and we still have plenty of time to choke our way out of this race. I’d be happier if the Angels were losing, but they’re not. With the way we’re playing, it’s slightly disappointing we haven’t taken the div lead yet. I’m keeping my fingers crossed on that, and I hope you are too.
309 – He also said he wanted to pave the road to the sea with the skulls of jews
frankb – If I remember correctly from a few LL umpire clinics, I think it boils down to interference basically being a judgement call. The way that play is usually called in the majors is there’s no interference, even on a hard slide, if the umpire sees the base in reach of the runner. Guillen had no chance to reach the base on that slide.
By the way, the ‘out of the baseline’ call wouldn’t matter there, I don’t think, since that’s generally only applicable when a runner is avoiding a tag, which was not the case on that play.
Anyway, I’m certainly glad that the umpire agreed with you, and not with me. This is great stuff.
#313: Citation? (Inflammatory quotes should always be cited chapter and verse; there are too many fake ones floating around. Luther certainly was far from perfect when it came to the Jews, but that one sounds iffy.)
Oh, and the comment I meant to make on Guillen is that, imho, the interference non-call is balanced by the fact that Guillen was never actually tagged — it’s the old “phantom tag” thing on a DP where you just pretend that the fielder touched the base. If you’re going to be sticky about interference, you have to be sticky about the fact that aside from the interference, Guillen shouldn’t be out at all. As such, calling him out but letting the rest of the play go forward sounds like a reasonable compromise to me.
say, wasn’t Garret Anderson supposed to be ‘done’? 🙂
“The Mariner Moose and Navigators (Mariners Street Team) will be out on Monday and Tuesday in Seattle”
Coco Crisp recommends to watch out for the ATV!
Ancient – I agree with you on that and would not be surprised if the umpire factored that into his call. The only point I was trying to make is that there was alot of leeway for the call to go in favor of the Twins on that play.
Bloomquist @ 2nd, Broussard @ DH for today’s game.
In the aftergame MacLaren said he was going to “give the regulars some rest” so that’s not unexpected. We may even see it during the Texas games (given the way the heat and humidity can sap you, I should certainly hope so). But Joh is playing?
Broussard moved to first and Burke catching plz so we can have a killer B infield >_>
As always, I heart you guys. One Lutheran comment and a whole discussion resulting. The skull thing (nice imagery!) caused me to hunt around the web and find this:
http://www.awitness.org/books/luther/
DAMN. I had no idea Luther was such a raving anti-Semite. Not that I know that much about him… he’s a bit after my period of study.
No Burke on a day game after a night game? Even Mauer gets a few games at DH.
Even when he’s trying, McLaren can’t buy a clue.
Bloomquist @ 2nd, Broussard @ DH for today’s game
Mac playing the “hot streak” w/Sexson again.
Actually, it’s a bit simplistic to call Luther an anti-Semite; later in his career, he said some very harsh things against the Jews, but it wasn’t actually anti-Semitism that motivated him, it was other things. Which is a conversation for somewhere else, because it would take a while to explain (that period, as it happens, is my period of study) . . .
. . . and coming back on topic, Dan W, I certainly realize that the ump could have done a number of different things. I just notice that umps generally don’t call the rules as written, but according to a set of unwritten emendations, of which the “phantom tag” is usually one; but if the “phantom tag” is going to be allowed, then to call interference strictly would give the fielders an unfair advantage. As such, I suspect that in cases where the middle infielder is trying to turn a phantom DP, there’s a pretty strong tendency to let the runner go beyond the letter of the rulebook to try to break it up. As there should be, really — either hold both sides to the letter or neither, but don’t play favorites.
Uh, Lauren, before you go taking anything on that site as (ahem) gospel, you might look at what else is on there.
I’m not sure who Brent Herbert of 119 lochrie cres, Saskatoon, is (other than the owner/admin of the site) but here presumably the same guy writes “On the story page linked to above I discuss the luminescent craft I witnessed at Banff National Park when I was fifteen, and then a few months later I received my driver’s licence…. You will notice the ‘6 6 6’ on the licence number.”
I’m not saying Luther didn’t write what page claims he wrote, or wasn’t an anti-semite (which afterall was pretty much the default attitude at the time); I’m just saying I’d look for a more authoritative citation. Anybody can have a webpage, and most nutcases do.
Also, game thread is up.
Joser: Yeah, I saw the book cited in a number of places. Obviously I didn’t check to make sure that the site owner didn’t adulterate the text with alien references, but it looks like the real thing.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Jews_and_their_Lies
Ancient M: Yes, those pages are quite a compendium of “harsh things.” It seems a bit like splitting hairs to say he wasn’t an anti-Semite. At least in the sense that word has come to be used today. But I’ll bow to your presumed expertise…
P.S.: The extremely comprehensive Wikipedia page discusses varying scholastic opinions on whether Luther in his later life was opposed to Jews’ religion or their race. It seems there are viable arguments for both.