REJOICE ON ORTIZ’S GRAVE YANKEE FANS

AND LISTEN TO GAMMONS BACKPEDALING HERE:

http://espn.go.com/video/clip?id=4366789

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

If it calms them down enough that maybe they aren’t “forced” to make a big move, I can almost kinda sorta almost see how a Boston comeback win today wasn’t the worst thing in the world.

Almost.

oh man, a whole thread about this already.

So let me say this, if the Red Sox get Victor Martinez I think that it would be worth upgrading the offense as well to maintain our superiority. If we could get a deal for fair value, and not hostage value, that is.

How do you want to upgrade this offense? Everyone in the standard lineup has been, at least, solidly above average. You cannot get a significantly better hitter for any of the positions without a stop the presses kind of deal.

And even if the Sox get Martinez, our offense is still better than theirs.

There’s also that whole issue about Hal Steinbrenner not wanting to take on any more salary. 

You could upgrade CF or RF I guess, but not sure who’s available and how much of an upgrade it would be overall given there are only two months remaining.

Even if the Sox get Victor Martinez, their offense remains a rung or two below the Yankees’.

Yeah, there is no one to get on offense. Thanks for calming me down. Hopefully the Red Sox don’t make Ortiz start cycling again.

This article is absolutely astounding.

http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2009/baseball/mlb/wires/07/30/2010.ap.bbo.ortiz.ramirez.sox.fans.1st.ld.writethru.0639/

Having watched Ortiz’ interview, I am reminded again that professional athletes are generally very young men whose incredible abilities reside in what they can do with their bodies and who receive very little training in life about how to analyze ideas or judge situations, or speak publicly.  It’s sad, in a way, that their decisions come back to haunt them in the form of media grilling or public name-calling.

That anyone should be surprised when one of these guys breaks a rule, purposely or otherwise, is simply foolish.  Likewise, that anyone should get up in arms when Bret Tomko or Dice-K or A-Rod says something foolish to the media is moronic.

Ideally, if they can’t get a better CFer (offensive/defense), Swisher could be packaged for an OFer that could hit as well or better than he can, but is also more consistent defensively, but that’s highly unlikely.

George Sherrill is a good pick-up for the Dodgers.

[10] *insert “or if” before Swisdher

O’s did a good job getting solid prospects for a salary dump.

[8] Clickable link:

[url=http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2009/baseball/mlb/wires/07/30/2010.ap.bbo.ortiz.ramirez.sox.fans.1st.ld.writethru.0639/ Red Sox fans say drug list news won’t taint title [/url]

Corrected

Red Sox fans say drug list news won’t taint title

C’mon SG, another important game?!

You’re wearin’ me out! 

ugh…rain delay

do they know how long the delay will last?

Zumaya to have season-ending surgery.  It’s sad to see all that ability off the field.

[18] Per Pete Abe (our most timely resource in such things) perhaps 45 minutes to an hour from now.

Pete Abraham says 9 or 9:15.

Also:

“A-Rod passed on answering questions about David Ortiz, saying only that the Boston slugger was his friend.”

This is the required answer, but it still strikes me as classy.

thanks, checking there never occurs to me.

Rilke, I don’t think A-Rod has gotten the credit he deserves in handling his situation.

Yeah, he weaseled out in the Katie Couric interview, and tried to say as little as possible at first when his name was leaked.

But in the end, he’s the one who has come closest to saying “Yeah, baseball didn’t have a rule against it, so I did what I had to do to compete/win/justify my contract, and now that they have a system in place I’m not doing it anymore”. Which is the plain truth of everyone’s situation.

Now, get caught by the current system and rules, and I say throw the book at ‘em, whoever.

I don’t see the 2004 or 2007 championships as being tainted.  The whole sport has been rife with steroids for well over a decade.  Furthermore, it’s the extension of a culture that has existed in the sport forever.  These are competitive men doing everything they can to get an advantage, including the use of pharmaceutical grade amphetamines, which, for the uninitiated, are much more than little pick-me-ups: they provide significant enhancement to focused concentration, response time, and coordination.  If you don’t think greenies affected stats like ‘roids have, tell me with a straight face that Pete Rose gets 4200 hits without them.  The Taint that is steroids is merely the most recent wart on a Taint bigger than Paul Bunyan’s, and almost as old.  The only good that comes from Ortiz being outed is that Sox fans can finally crack open a can of shut-the-fuck-up to wash down their plate of crow regarding the juice and their ridiculous stone throwing.

Zumaya to have season-ending surgery.  It’s sad to see all that ability off the field.

Sorry.

So can we chant 1918 again? 

Just kidding although I would laugh.

Dave S., look at Papi’s stats pre 2003 and after and tell me with a straight face that PEDs had no effect on his performance. The count is now… what… 6 players from the so-called confidential list? He and Manny are on it. That confirms that they took PEDs and that taints the two Boston titles.

End of story.

Here is a clickable link for the latest weather radar from the NWS…

Chicago, IL radar

Looks like another late night…

But this game is the ‘Thursday night game’ on MLB…

[28]
No, RIY, since we can name a very, very limited number of similar jumps in performance over the previous century of baseball (e.g., Maris), the only reasonable thing is to ignore the kind of evidence you have in mind.

Sorry… you’ll never convince me that the Red Sox titles were not tainted… besides, what does your comment mean? Roger Maris? What does he have to do with MLB players after 2000? And, the evidence is not in my mind… it is on a list of 100+ players…

David Ortiz couldn’t hit HRs in a building called “The Homer-dome”...

He comes to Boston and—as a left handed hitter, no less—is being mentioned as a future HOFer after 255+ HRs in 6 seasons… you don’t see a tainted connection there?

[31]
RIY, I was agreeing with you.

Yay! Baseball!

Having watched Ortiz’ interview, I am reminded again that professional athletes are generally very young men whose incredible abilities reside in what they can do with their bodies and who receive very little training in life about how to analyze ideas or judge situations, or speak publicly.  It’s sad, in a way, that their decisions come back to haunt them in the form of media grilling or public name-calling.

This, I think it’s often obsurd that super jocks are held up to the standards of an intellect.

Sorry Wombat… the beer hasn’t kicked in yet…

That probably could have gone better.

10 pitch inning from Floyd.. and he walked a guy too.

WOE

I hope quick, efficient Pettitte shows up tonight.  Bunker down battlin’ Pettitte can be frustrating to watch.

RIY, I think the point is that everything is tainted because you didn’t have a system of testing. So you’re right, it’s tainted, just not any more or less than everything else that went on. I think that’s what DaveS is saying (I’m sure he’ll correct if I’m missing his point).

My feeling is that you can only go on what you’ve got a system for testing. So it’s meaningless to talk about greenies, or Babe Ruth’s hot dogs, or pig testicle extract stories, or whatever.

But we apparently do have the tests from 2003 with Manny on it, and he flunks the official tests in 2008 - are we supposed to believe he was clean from 2004-2007 ? For Ortiz, and A-Rod, etc. who were on the 2003 list but never after, well that’s a case of you didn’t catch ‘em so you can’t say they did it.

I also agree with DaveS about “Sox fans can finally crack open a can of shut-the-fuck-up to wash down their plate of crow”. If the 2003 list is ever released and it’s Yankee-free, maybe you take a harder line, but to what productive purpose I don’t know.

[36] Unfortunately for you guys, the beer has kicked in for me.

Which brings me to this question - remember back when Joba was brought up the home crowd would chant “Jo-Ba Clap Clap” during a big moment?  Somewhere around 2008 it became the much lamer, “Let’s go Joba.”  I want the late 2007 chant back.  Does anyone else?

[24] had too much taint for my tastes.

I don’t get why people always focus on the hitters in regards to steroids.  They’re going up against pitchers that can come back from injury faster, meaning they’re facing better competition because of steroids.  And each era has their “thing” that you have to take into account when looking at accomplishments.  You had the pre-integration period where a whole subset of the population was barred from MLB, limiting the talent pool.  You had amphetamines, cocaine, and other drugs in other eras. 

I guess I also don’t quite see how this makes it a RS issue for 2004,2007.  I mean, all 100+ names weren’t on the RS.  I would be willing to bet that the names were fairly evenly distributed throughout MLB, maybe skewed a little towards high-payroll teams (POOMA).  How many 2004 Yankees were on that list?  Does it matter?

If the 2003 list is ever released and it’s Yankee-free, maybe you take a harder line, but to what productive purpose I don’t know.

We already know it’s not Yankee-free (A-Rod).

OK… i really don’t want to go long on this one but, i live in Rhode Island… proximate to Red Sox Nation and have been a Yankee fan all my life.

Even when they were own by CBS…

So, when the George Mitchell Roid list came out and not one Red Sox player was on it, didn’t you guys think that was a little unusual? Didn’t you guys see the connection with George Mitchell’s relationship with the Boston franchise and the politics involved.

The Red Sox cheated.

Period.

Even, Red Sox homer Bill Simmons from ESPN wrote a column in April (one that you cannot find on an internet search… hmmmmmmm) saying that the Red Sox cheated.

Does Swisher ever ends an at-bat without going full count?

[42] Puj, you’re right on. It can only matter to those who escape the list entirely. I wouldn’t take your bet - I would expect to see every team represented. But I’d like it to be released so we can put the whole thing to bed. And if some team is completely clean from the list, I’ll let them have their say about things being tainted.

To me, 04 and 07 are tainted by Manny rather than Papi, since he was positive in 04 and 08, and I think it’s then fair to label him for years in which he didn’t get caught. Papi got caught in 03, but not since, so I’d be willing to give him the benefit of the doubt and say he stopped whatever it was once they had a system of rules and testing.

My feeling is that you can only go on what you’ve got a system for testing.

Strange, I don’t have that feeling at all.  When statistics get obviously skewed relative to historical norms with no other obvious reason - e.g., both hitters and pitchers on steroids would lead to an expectation of more HRs - I don’t need testing to come to a reasonable (as opposed to irrebutable, of course) conclusion that the only obvious change in the practices, and the one the players themselves obviously seem to associate with the skewed results, is not unlikely to actually be associable with those results.
Testing results would be nice confirmation, but it is illogical to assert that their absennce we can come to no reasonable conclusions.

For Ortiz, and A-Rod, etc. who were on the 2003 list but never after, well that’s a case of you didn’t catch ‘em so you can’t say they did it.

Uhhh… yes, you can.  You don’t have to be able to prove it to say it.  Less trivially, you don’t have to be able to prove it to consider it the most likely scenario.  In fact, it seems to me that there’s a very strong argument that it is the most likely scenario.  Why should I assert something that seems less likely because I can’t conclusively demonstrate the thing that seems vastly more likely?

[43] That would be Alex Rodriguez of the Texas Rangers.

[44] This is not the first indication that George Mitchell was a skunk. Your politics may vary, of course.

I mean, all 100+ names weren’t on the RS.

Alas…

[48] - Yes, that is ARod of the Texas Rangers.  But you can’t say that 2003 ARod did it and then magically stopped when he came to the Yankees, but 2003 Ortiz used steriods and then obviously continued so they could win the 2004 WS.  I mean, if you’re going to say ARod being on the 2003 list only matters for the Rangers, then you can’t say that anyone on the 2003 list taints the 2004 Series for the RS.

White Sox announcers apparently can’t tell that both teams are getting the same plate.

[47] Pete, I’m saying we can’t issue penalties based on anything less than confirmation.

I think they’re dirty, and I’ll certainly consider 04 and 07 tainted, but it goes no further than my personal view.

Battle! Battle! Battle! Battle-cat! He battles and he battles and he battles! Battle-cat! With the head of a cat and the body of a cat and the battle of a battle! Battle-cat!

[50]
I’m going to go along with DaPuj.  The RS WS 2004 and 2007 seasons don’t count, and, for the sake of fairness, neither do the glorious endings of the 2004-2008 seasons for the NYY.  Like, for instance, the A-Rod-, Giambi- and Sheffield-tainted first round against the Tigers…
That work for you folks?

Kay and Leiter are debating Thome’s HOF chances…

Career line: .278/.405/.558 with a career OPS+ of 147 with 558 jacks and counting. 

That sounds right in the wheelhouse of HOF’er to me.

[50] I’m willing to give A-Rod the benefit of the doubt until he flunks another test, and then I’m willing to consider everything in between the two tests as tainted as well.

I sure wish there were a baseball game on that we could talk about instead.

[54] is an eminently fair and wel reasoned solution to me. A regular King Salami, our Pete is.

[53] Perfect.  Truisms are often so very, very true!

[52] You meant sanctions, Pinstriper?  Fair enough.  For this, though, I think our opinions are a sanction they honestly do care about.

[58]
Well, except for Sheffield.

That was quite a battlin’ inning.  Good to see Pettitte put up 0’s.

[58] to be fair, I was inspired by this comic:

http://buttersafe.com/2007/08/30/turkey-tiger/

So I was in New York City all day.  Just got home.  What I miss?

no-hitter broken up!

Melky!

Melky en fuego.

[62]
Oh, nothing, Jonathan.
Slow news day.
Nothing happening.

[58] Sanctions, or staying in an argument long enough to wallop someone with a beer bottle in a bar. Call it…strength of conviction.

[62] Two fat guys that play the game the right way and for a time played together on the best team in baseball had their dirty laundry aired by a few anonymous lawyers who needed to make a car payment or two.

In that Gammons piece, he actually suggests that maybe Ortiz tested positive in 2003 and then….wait for it….decided he was never going to take steroids again.  Shocker.
But were the results of the test even known by the players?

[69]
More specifically: “decided he was never going to take steroids again” without it affecting his performance.  Gee, why didn’t any other player think of that?

What kind of reception did Swisher get in Chicago ?

I would hope they wouldn’t boo.  I mean, it is Swisher’s fault that they got stuck with Wilson Betemit, but still.

A long, long, long, long time ago, legend tells that Andrew Pettitte had a very efficient first inning.

can’t get sick of this:

“I’m in spring training, and I got an 8:30-9:00 meeting in the morning. I walk into that office, and this happened while I was with the Boston Red Sox before this last regime, I’m sitting in the meeting. There’s a doctor up there and he’s talking about steroids, and everyone was like ‘here we go, we’re gonna sit here and get the whole thing—they’re bad for you.’ No. He spins it and says ‘you know what, if you take steroids and sit on the couch all winter long, you can actually get stronger than someone who works out clean, if you’re going to take steroids, one cycle won’t hurt you, abusing steroids it will.’ He sat there for one hour and told us how to properly use steroids while I’m with the Boston Red Sox, sitting there with the rest of the organization, and after this I said ‘what the heck was that?’ And everybody on the team was like ‘what was that?’ And the response we got was ‘well, we know guys are taking it, so we want to make sure they’re taking it the right way’... Where did that come from? That didn’t come from the Players Association.”

...the battle of a battle.

http://www.boston.com/sports/baseball/redsox/extras/extra_bases/2009/05/merloni_sox_nev.html

[76]
Wow… the collective denial in the comments section is truly staggering.

RI Yankee…I’m not in the least suggesting that PEDs didn’t affect Papi, and I fully agree that the Red Sox won their championships at least partly fueled by steroids.  What I’m saying is that EVERY team that has won, at least in the last decade, stinks of the same taint.  Cheating has been going on in baseball for a loooooooooong time, and steroid PEDs are just that latest addition to a long line of cheats.  It’s all dirty, the 2004 and 2007 Sox are no dirtier, in my mind, than the 1999 or 2000 Yankees, say.  So yes, the Red Sox cheated.  But so has everyone else, including our fair and beloved Yankees: we have no high horse to climb on without becoming instant hypocrites.  I certainly agree with you that the Mitchell Report was bunk, there was obvious conflict of interest.

really, the 2004 sox are equally tainted to the 1998 yanks?

What Yankee in 1998 has come out on the roids list?

I am sure there were people (o’neill?) who juiced, but the 2000s Sox were MANNY and PAPI, the best since Ruth and Gehrig, or so the narrative went.

I would like to see the Yankee’s get some hits this inning. Failing that, a few walks and an error or two would be OK.

Or, Pinstriper… stop striking out.

Gameday had two of Swisher’s called strikes as balls. Clear balls.

Cy Floyd

really, the 2004 sox are equally tainted to the 1998 yanks?

Well, I wrote the 1999 Yankees.  But…are you really comparing degrees of steroid usage by champion team players as a stake for legitimacy on the moral high ground?

I love this whole “Strike guys out without walking other guys” thing Pettitte has working.  He’s pitched a nice game.

Unbattling and uncatlike efficient inning!

Pettitte’s working tonight.  He isn’t even battling all that much.

Incidentally - this, intuitively, is another (relatively) “run-suppressing environment” game.

I feel like Floyd has thrown like 17 pitches this game

[44] Is this the article?

http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/page2/story?page=simmons/090507&sportCat=mlb

[85-7] but… he has the battle of a battle.

Molino!

Molina leaves the park !!!

Molino?

A lead-off double by Molino.  They MUST score in this half-inning.  It is clearly the will of the gods.  To not do so would be to invite their undying wrath.

Also, among the comments under the “merloni” article was this lone wail:

Merloni has credibility and I believe him. It is time to realize the Sox organization that ended an 86 year drought was riddled with steroid users and cheaters. And unlike the Yankees, whose core (Jeters, Bernies, O’Neils) have never been accused, our two reasons for making the postseason and winning it all (Papi and Orteeze) are clear users.

Very sad day to be a Red Sox fan.
Dated May 11

Can he score on a triple?

Flipper !

Yay run.

Only needed a double!

What bounces more times - Damon’s double, or a Damon throw to the plate ?