Mini All-Star Thread
DMZ · July 14, 2009 at 6:37 pm · Filed Under Mariners
Sorry, worked late, thought I had time. What in the world is going on with Ryan Franklin’s facial hair?
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He’s playing bass for Anthrax when he can get out on the road.
My original question was actually “what’s going on with Ryan Franklin in the All-Star Game?”
Not Anthrax. Maybe Sandfrog.
Damnit, I was too lazy to Google up the Speez.
Buehrle, not Felix?
Franklin’s story is truly an unbelievable one from the perspective of a Mariner’s fan. Not sure Buck and McCarver could convey the incredulity of the transformation.
Buck and McCarver, of course, are going to make anyone appreciate Niehaus. But they even make me appreciate Sims and Blowers.
God, those guys are idiots.
The reason the American League wins All Star games is because they have the DL in their league. Really? How exactly does that work?
What they should be explaining is why there’s no DH in the All Star game when it’s in a National League park.
Apostrophe and shift key weekend. Seriously.
Jason Newsted anyone?
I am sure I am not the only one sad to see Mr. Jones at the All-Star game as an Oriole. Soon Tillman will join him. For shame.
Ibanez. What are you going to do, huh?
Ichiro(!) got a hit, and his second time up hit a line drive. I was glad to see that.
Franklin has some sort of Amish thing going on, near as we could tell by his appearance.
Ichiro is so cool
Nice shoes Ichiro!
Ichiro is cool enough to ask for a presidential autograph and STILL look cool.
On XM Homeplate today Heath Bell said he was going to try and hug Obama. I don’t think that happened.
Why is Ichiro wearing white shoes? Is there a link to a close up on the new shoes? I would quibble over the aesthetic of the break in the color line, but then I think: Ichiro!
It’s not enough that we have to see Jones when we play the Orioles, we have to watch him tonight, too? I feel like someone is stabbing my eyes.
And to think Tillman could be a regular for years to come. Clearly a stabbing of the eyes plus a bit of gasoline poured on top of that.
It makes me feel much better that if we still had Jones, we would probably not have Gutierrez.
Way to go King Felix!
Happy Felix Inning
Huzzah King Felix!
Not this time Pujols!
GO FELIX!!!!
I wonder if Ashley Simpson could do that?
I recognize this singer is on national tv and looking for all the exposure she can get, but it would be nice if she could sing the actual tune of God Bless America. Also, it’s not “Amereeka”.
Wow, she’s straining so hard singing her botox-ed face is crinkling a little. That’s emotion, folks.
“Amereeka”… wow
Anyone else a little bummed that the announcers said pretty much nothing about Felix? Thanks a lot, Albert Pujols.
Or what passes for emotion on a Fox Sports broadcast (national edition).
Dear Mr. McCarver,
Everyone who has HD knew that ball was out. Try to concentrate.
Love,
The Fans of Amereeka.
Wow. Guess I never noticed Adam Jones’ earrings before that fly out…
Botox on young women is hot, doncha know.
Papelbon: nine pitches, nine 4-seam 95 mph fastballs. But the pitches did not look the same. Quite a reliever, that one.
As bad as McCarver is, in a way I was relieved to find out the game was not on ESPN. I had sort of resigned myself to having to listen to Joe Morgan.
Congrats to Felix for a great inning in his first ASG!
Oh, did he pitch? I was listening to the Fox announcers and assumed a pitching machine was throwing the ball.
“I had sort of resigned myself to having to listen to Joe Morgan”
heh, glad i’m not the only one. Joe Morgan makes me seriously wonder how someone could play the game so long and be successful like he was, yet can know so little about baseball in terms of what makes players/teams successful.
I don’t recall ever seeing an IBB in an All Star Game.
“I don’t recall ever seeing an IBB in an All Star Game.”
Not much reason to do so before the home field advantage thing.
You know what’s sad? I’d quite forgotten this was on… And now that I know, I’m not sure I care all that much…
And to think a few years ago, I was always excited about the ASG.
That was Adam Jones of the last-place Orioles driving in the potential winning run off Heath Bell of the last-place Padres. This time it counts!
So if this is the final score, who gets MVP? I can’t really think of a great candidate. Granderson?
Fangraphs has Granderson with the highest WPA so far, so he would be a good choice.
Power v Power
Its pretty much Granderson or Mauer at this point, short of someone hitting a home run for the NL.
Guess it just depends on if Granderson gets a hit the next at bat or not… IF he gets up to bat at all.
Wasn’t watching the game, how is Hudson go from first to third on an infield hit? Or is the game tracker wrong?
Grounder up the middle, SS Barrett dove at the ball and it bounced off his mitt into short left-center field, allowing the runner to take third.
I meant short right-center field.
“He has the most RBIs by a right fielder in the past two-and-a-half years.” That’s like one of those “hitting .384 in the past four games” stats.
Umm, was that Bud Selig awarding the MVP to Crawford wearing a really bad wig? Wow.
Did I lose my mind, or were the words “Brad Hawpe” and “excellent defensive outfielder” used in the same sentence? I think the portion of my brain devoted to fielding metrics gave up hope on life.
ESPN just commented that Ichiro! went to visit Sisler’s grave. Thought that was interesting… paying respect I imagine.
Franklin. Meche. Thornton. Pineiro. Sometimes I wonder what’s up with the M’s pitching coaching.
Mariano Riveria is pitching in the 9th inning of the all star game. The camera pans to his 14 year old son who has his head down not watching Dad but texting. Of course this is Dads 10th All Star Game. Just like the other 7 full innings he has pitched Dad did not give up s run. Life can be so..so…, boring.
Copy and paste from my iPhone showed my comments were in the box. Sorry.
It’s just proof that you can be a really good player from the neck down, and still be a really good player. AKA the Big Dumb Jock rule.
He’s learned how to throw a cutter and turned into Mariano Rivera Jr apparently.
Larry Stone covered this (linked from an earlier thread here at USSM).
It was better when they showed Rivera’s son spitting into Jeter’s ear. (I know that must not have been what he was actually doing — he was well behind Jeter, for one thing — but it amused me to no end that that’s what it looked like he was doing. Good thing it wasn’t Damon — he would spit back.)
First Apple doesn’t include a fundamental feature. Then they add it, and run TV commercials trumpeting the fact that they now have something that should’ve been there all along. And then somebody actually uses it, and it breaks the site. Way to go, Cupertino. Way to go, Evil Steve Jobs and your smug minions.
I don’t know about Meche (and Thornton? Really?) but Pineiro, like Franklin, is throwing a new pitch. And Putz learned a new pitch while he was with the M’s and Zduriencik managed to turn that into Franklin, Chavez, Cedeno, and several prospects, so it’s not entirely a one-way street.
I believe Ichiro’s shoes were silver.
Pineiro and Franklin are pitching in the NL….enough said.
Joser copy and paste from your phone. Might be word press.
It’s nice to see the All Star Game MVP win for a play on defense. (small victories)
Right you are Patrick.
Wow, it’s apparent joser is a bit irate. Let me guess, Verizon user? Sprint? Jealousy sucks, huh?
But before you jump to conclusions, I’m not an exclusive iPhone user, I run both an iPhone and blackberry bold (I’m putting that out there before the obligatory ‘fanboy!’ comment comes down). Yes copy/paste should have been there from the beginning, but then, you could say that intuitive touch screen interfaces should be on every phone, that simplified menus should be on every other phone, that a host of features that the iPhone did first are just now coming to other stores (app stores for blackberries and windows mobile phones! whee!)
It goes both ways.
As far as the game goes, am I the only one who found it odd the game was shorter than the ridiculous home run derby? The derby needs to be changed, it goes on way, way, way too long.
Franklin looks like he was picked up on the way to a Civil War reenactment. Or a homeless shelter.
The quintessential example of this is Dave Parker in the 1979 game in the Kingdome, where he had two outfield assists. I was sitting in the right field stands in the 300 level and never saw either play because of the angle of the stands meant we couldn’t see the right fielder.
Franklin looks like he was picked up on the way to a Civil War reenactment. Or a homeless shelter.
I have it on good authority that the chin growth is actually a curse that was laid on him because of his propensity to argue with base-runners that get to 2nd base, and relay the catcher’s signs to the batter. (A practice that has been going on for well over a century.)
Curses await other players who demonstrate similar ignorance.
“Franklin’s goatee is a Cardinal sin”
Were there enough Former M’s and current M’s to field a team last night? Thats not even including the former player from the UW. Another Win by the American League, which just goes to show you the best players play in the AL!
Maybe Franklin made a deal with the devil and was turned into half goat in exchange for the ability to get people out?
While I agree that the AL is better, the evidence I would use would be the records in interleague play, rather than the result of the All Star game.
I think he probably meant “the best stars play in the AL!”
I love the Ichiro quotes in this article about Obama at the All-Star game.
http://www.baseball-reference.com/players/t/thornma01.shtml
No, it has nothing to do with that, and everything to do with Ichiro’s annual pre-game speech.
And by “Thornton? Really?” I meant “You really care that much about a guy who throws ~60 innings a year, mostly in low leverage situations?” Thornton may have improved since he left the M’s, but he hardly matters.
Love this part:
Though (on further review) it looks like he didn’t do the speech this year after all:
Meanwhile, Obama talks about meeting Ichiro (”He’s an impressive guy”) in the video on this page (”Obama answers players questions” — note to DMZ: they left out the apostrophe, not me)
From fangraphs:
F Gutierrez WAR 2009: 3.1
A Jones WAR 2009: 1.5
That takes some of the sting out for me…
I think it was Big Papi who always insisted Ichiro give his speech.
Could it be a red squirrel that has attached itself to Franklin’s chin?
Anyone read the ESPN article on Ichiro visiting Sisler’s grave? Ichiro also wanted to say “what’s up” to the President…
Yes, we’ve linked to it like 1m times already.
“Not silver. Platinum.”