Sabathia’s second half has been absolutely amazing.  That 3.21 ERA on the season is mighty fine indeed.

pretty decent FIP to go along with it as well.

They’re wearing out Molina…

Yeah, there’s a very good chance C.C. will end the year as the most valuable Yankee in 2009, depending on how he does tonight and what Jeter does over the weekend.  They’re essentially tied right now.

They’re wearing out Molina…

Better him than Posada I guess.

These games have a non-alcoholic beer feel to them.  Bring on the playoffs and Oktoberfest beverages!

[6] I’m going to Munich to give a talk week after next.  Probably won’t be commenting.

[6] I’m going to Munich to give a talk week after next.  Probably won’t be commenting.

If you have internet over there you can comment.  Probably not coherently, however.

For the last 4 years or so, Sabathia is on a different plane compared to rest when it comes to durability and quality. And he obviously has taken very good care of himself and had good luck; he has not had any injuries.

If he stays healthy, Yankees likely will have gotten themselves a bargain at the end of his contract. Hope he doesn’t opt out.

Do I comment coherently now?

I’m not good with jetlag, and I’ve got a lot of talks to go to, and I’ll probably not have my own talk done (esp. since my data disk went on the fritz last night), and it’ll be hard to keep up with the games, and I probably will need to do a little sightseeing to keep up appearances, and ...

I guess Girardi shares my concern about Molina:

Jeter SS
Hairston LF
Teixeira 1B
Rodriguez 3B
Swisher RF
Posada C
Cano 2B
Cabrera CF
Molina DH

link

UPDATE, 6:02 p.m.: I’ve uploaded audio from Girardi’s session with the media. There’s a lot in there, including an explanation (in two parts) of why the mighty Jose Molina will DH.

[8] He’ll probably bitch about the games being on so late.

I can’t think of a worse use of the DH spot.  I’m sure CC appreciates the lineup depth as he goes for #20.

GO RAYS!!!

I have a 0.5 point lead in my roto keeper league. 2nd place guy has CC. I have Upton, Zobrist and Longoria. Is it too much to ask for CC to give up a cheapie, or get in his work in 2 innings?

I’m going to Munich to give a talk week after next.  Probably won’t be commenting.

Will you at least be partaking of some delicious Oktoberfest beverages?

Why not just let CC hit?  You know, get him some at-bats in preparation for the world series?

Somewhere in Munich a pig is missing his knuckles.

“Will you at least be partaking of some delicious Oktoberfest beverages?”

I don’t know if there are ever any left over.  If so I’ll be sure to report back.

The Indians are awful at baseball.

The Indians are awful at baseball

They’re good at rebuilding our fragile confidence.

Why not just let CC hit?

I’m sure the Yankees are still a little gun-shy about this after last year.

Ugh. Rays feed. Please tell me YES is trotting out Kay and Flash, and that I’m not missing Coney/Leiter/Singleton. Lie to me if necessary.

I don’t know if there are ever any left over.

They never run out of schweinhaxe.

Well, I’d rather this happen now than in Game 1…

Um…

Meanwhile, in games that technically matter, Peavy is keeping Detroit on edge. I’m not a huge Williams fan, but that trade might pan out nicely for them in 2010. Pretty solid rotation, no?

And Minnesota’s hopes hinge on a pitcher named “manship.”

Rays feed play-by-play guy is moonlighting from his day job making monster-truck-rally commercials. Sunday-SUNday-SUNDAY!!!!!!!

In the meantime, in the Detroit-Chicago game, ESPN shows a clip of Jacoby Ellsbury stealing home. What point it served in a game with playoff implications, who knows?

[28] That’s how you rest your players for the playoffs. ‘cause the Sox started resting last weekend, before they were eliminated from the division, before they clinched the WC, all so they could rest up.

Ok, they also showed Derek Jeter passing Gehrig. I am still not sure why this should take precedence over the game being played.

From tonight’s game? Not from the Yankee game back in May? The latter would be rather bizarre. Actually, given the situation I’m not sure why our hottest hitter is bothering to steal bases right now. But that’s slightly less stupid than focusing on ancient history.

all so they could rest up

You laugh, but it’s basically true.

Wait, Sam. Was the Elsbury clip from tonite’s game ?

Or was it from earlier in the season ? (In which case I owe Boston an apology, and don’t they wish they might ever get it.)

In which case I owe Boston an apology, and don’t they wish they might ever get it

Exactly why I was hoping it wasn’t from before… But Ells didn’t steal home tonight, he stole third and came home on an error of some sort.

Sorry guys, should have mentioned that the steal home was from Yankee game in May.

[35] Oy… like that helps us now?

Ellsbury did not steal home tonight.  He stole third and reached home on Shoppach’s throwing error.

He was also caught stealing second tonight.  As fast as he is, Ellsbury is not as fast as the Red Sox would like to believe.

I could totally understand it if they’re doing it as “playoff coverage starts Tuesday” and showed exciting moments from the participating teams’ regular season.

But if Boston really has Ellsbury stealing bases, much less home, at this point, they’ve got a major screw loose.

And no, SSF, with all due respect, that business about resting last weekend is nothing but the night soil of a well fed male ox.

Delmon Young: grand slam. Twins (or Lenny DiNardo) making the central race interesting.

So, is CC in ST mode today? The walks are very uncharacteristic.

38: Ells is probably trying to extend his team record in SBs or some shit. I don’t agree with it, but whatever. It’s not like they’re sending Lowell. And he’s almost certainly running on his own.

As to resting… we won’t agree, but my point is they have been lining up their pitchers for next week since before they clinched. At some point, I think just before the Yankee series, it became inevitable and they went into the mode of maximizing October. Obviously they “tried to win” but they didn’t rearrange their lineup to maximize their chances in that series, at the expense of the playoffs. That’s all. If someone is saying they were literally “resting” I haven’t heard it.

Edwin Jackson not looking so good. I think that augurs rather well if the Tigers make it.

Is Edwin Jackson Detroit’s #2? Because he sucks.

Make that “caught stealing third”.  My bad.

Is Edwin Jackson Detroit’s #2? Because he sucks.

He probably doesn’t. But Detroit’s OF defense does.

45: OK, I just have gameday. But he’s been in a massive tailspin, no?

Looks like 70% chance Verlander will pitch Sunday.

Ellsbury is not as fast as the Red Sox would like to believe.

Possibly, but Joey Gathright is Usain Bolt in spikes.

[45] That Guillen slide was incredibly bad.

Unreal. Could you guys get any luckier with the central race?

Does this affect what series the Yankees pick?

SSF, that’s right. For the last three months if you look OPS against, and two if you look only at ERA.

[50] You mean because they’d have to bring Verlander back on 3 days rest just to pitch Game 2 in Series B?  Interesting.

I think I have grown tired of the “Beyond Bullshit” slogans of MLB.

How ridiculous will it be if they run the Joba ad and Joba doesn’t make the post-season roster?

52: Er, I guess. I haven’t thought through the scenarios, but seems like there’s a possible difference depending on what Verlander has to do this weekend.

Damn, CC is “resting” today.

CC is making hard to catch up so as to get him his 20th.
Perhaps he is punishing Girardi for ‘helping’ him by inserting such a quality DH.

[41] It would be merely foolish to do this if he was chasing a record. One might expect that if they were eliminated from the playoffs and getting such a record was one way of making, say, a final home series have some meaning and excitement.

For a player on a playoff team to be taking a chance on pulling a muscle/breaking a wrist or finger on a slide… just to extend a meaningless team record he already has…is assinine.

Well, the Yankees are having a better day than me - the disk with the data I need for my talk in Munich suddenly stop responding, maybe permanently; the guy I could use to do the vacuum work to allow me to try to replace the data next week (when I was planning on writing the talk) is getting foot surgery; and after I took my wife’s car to the lab last night (perhaps you’ll recall that mine was stolen and recovered in an undriveable state) it wouldn’t start (which meant I had to walk home carrying the baby’s car seat so we could borrow my in-law’s car to take the kids to school in the morning) and it turns out that it won’t hold a charge - and won’t even idle without conking out.  I don’t even want to go to this conference.

For a player on a playoff team to be taking a chance on pulling a muscle/breaking a wrist or finger on a slide… just to extend a meaningless team record he already has…is assinine.

Sorta agree, though again it’s Ellsbury, who does this a lot. I dunno

As to Verlander, I suppose it doesn’t matter; in any case he gets two starts in five games, and whether he’s rested or not for any of them depends more on the Tigers closing it out tomorrow.

Has anyone heard from WJ? I am concerned about his well being. Or his laptop’s.

Tigers are now 16 runs from clinching.

Hmm, maybe I’m wrong on the worse day question.

OK, off to home. Enjoyed the chat. Lates.

[63] You mean I hunted this down for nothing ?

More “wave” action at Fenway.

Lastings Milledge is pretty good. Defensively, that is.

Off days suck.

[65] The frequency of waves in Fenway is pretty disconcerting. I refused to participate in it, much to the consternation of people I went with.

Sam, the only time I ever did the wave was during a USFL game in, I think 1984. I felt cheap and dirty afterwards.

Well, Jonathan Albaladejo proves once again why he wouldn’t pitch in the postseason. But he has a great chance of pitching tomorrow and the day after.

Joey Gathright is Usain Bolt in spikes.

Umm, isn’t Usain Bolt Usain Bolt in spikes?

because they’d have to bring Verlander back on 3 days rest just to pitch Game 2 in Series B?

Game 2 is on Friday in both series A and series B.  If the Tigers need Verlander to go on Sunday, he still lines up for games 2 and 5 on regular rest no matter which schedule the Yankees pick.  If they pick B, he could conceivably throw game 1 on short rest, though that seems unlikely.

Joey Gathright is the fastest man alive? Why is he playing baseball?

Tonight we learned what can happen to the best pitchers when they cant control anything. I guess we better hope this is an anomoly and not what CC does under pressure. I assume he really wanted this one, but who knows?  Apparently the Rays have been rude to him quite often of late.  I think Girardi better get the regulars out if he hasn’t already.

Our old friend Jose Veras up to his old tricks again at Fenway.

MC’s good at that math stuff. [71]
[69] Chuck Fusina!

Cone thinks Price intentionally thew at Teix.

We might need the Twins half of the “Twins or Tigers?” thing after all.

Buck Showalter says that he wouldn’t start Verlander on Sunday if the Tigers are still up a game.  Compared it to 1995, when he kept holding Cone out, saving him to go in games 1 and 5 of the ALDS.  He doesn’t seem to realize that there’s an extra day off (or two) in the first round these days.

Olney:

... An informal panel of six executives and player representatives was polled and asked to predict who among those likely Type A free agents would be offered arbitration…

Johnny Damon, Yankees—He is making $13 million in salary. All who were asked expect the Yankees to offer him arbitration—and they think it’ll affect Damon’s market value. “They’d love to have him back on a one-year deal,” said an AL GM. “If he accepts, they’ll live with the $13-15 million salary.”

[...]

Andy Pettitte, Yankees—He will earn about $10.5 million in salary, roster bonuses and performances bonuses this season. Three predict that he will be offered arbitration, three say no. “They weren’t willing to offer this to him last year, so why would they this year?” asked one official rhetorically. Here’s one reason the Yankees likely will: He has thrown the ball better this season, and is 14-7 with a 4.11 ERA

Those into numbers should check out Nate Silver on Strategic Vision.  He looks at the distribution of certain digits in their poll #s and concludes they’re probably made up.

C.C. No. No.

Bring Matsui back!

SSF slumming tonight, so I see.

I know 20 wins is sort of silly, but even still, how about what happened to Wainwright last night?  Leaves the game with a 6-1 lead in the 7th, only to have his bullpen blow it that inning. 

[77] - Heard that from Showalter too.  Seems like if Detroit only has a 1 game lead after today, they have to throw Verlander tomorrow. They’re going up against Danks, who’s had a very decent year, while the Twins are up against Hochevar.  I don’t think you mess around with the one game playoff possibility, especially with the extra off-day like you said.

So if it does go down to a 1 game play-off, do the Yanks still get to not declare which series they want till the end of Tuesday?  Seems like that would suck logistically for BOS/LAA, but I guess they know where they’re going already, so it doesn’t really matter.

[79] I was just reading the NYT article on it.

Oh no!  C.C. sucks in October!  That was a horrible signing!

Well if the NYT is reporting on it then it must be real…

[85] If you bother to look at the distributions in the link to Silver, you can decide for yourself.

And if you bother to read the Times article, you can see that the story is primarily about a reprimand of Strategic Vision by the American Association for Public Opinion Research, a professional association of pollsters, for failing to disclose “essential facts” about its methods.  Silver’s analysis is mentioned only in passing, along with a denial of the allegations by by David E. Johnson, the founder and chief executive of Strategic Vision.

[85] If you bother to look at the distributions in the link to Silver, you can decide for yourself.

Silver calls it “evidence continuing to mount” where it is really not anything of the sort.  It is all based on speculation and circumstantial evidence - there is very little substance at all, if any really.

It’s definitely substantive evidence - Benford’s law is used all the time for this kind of analysis (I’ve been bothering an accountant friend about it for years); and all sorts of things are very odd about the OK test data, not just the fact that the toy model he shows matches it too well; and the stuff about their business establishment is strange - but YMMV.  Maybe they’ll sue Silver and present any of their internal numbers in court and he’ll look bad.  Maybe he’ll end up paying that $2.7k he bet to charity - wouldn’t be the worst outcome.