boston- 22
chi sox- 16
LAA- 24
Atlanta- 18
St. Louis- 11
Padres- 21
My god the NL West is bad....
Stu 17
09-07-05, 08:05 AM
Other than the Cardinals and Atlanta I think the entire National League is bad.
huh?
09-07-05, 08:16 AM
Hell, at this point, Colorado could go on a tear and take the division.
twikoff
09-07-05, 09:14 AM
Other than the Cardinals and Atlanta I think the entire National League is bad.
pretty sure Houston, Philly, Florida.. and maybe NY will disagree heavily with you there!
Stu 17
09-07-05, 10:36 AM
No, they are all mediocre teams who have above .500 records cuz they get to play the terrible NL West.
If there were good teams in the West, the NL East would suck.
Good:
Cardinals
Braves
Mediocre:
Rest of NL East
Astros
Brewers
Terrible:
Everyone Else
twikoff
09-07-05, 10:46 AM
with the astros and marlins pitching staffs
I dont think many people are looking forward to an easy wildcard game
B.A.
09-07-05, 02:56 PM
Prospectus Today
Merit vs. Moments
by Joe Sheehan
By rights, the NL MVP Award should come down to a choice between two first basemen having monster seasons. Derrek Lee chased a Triple Crown for a while, and while he won't snag that honor, he's still the best player in the NL this season. Meanwhile, the Albert Pujols Factory cranks out another .330/.420/.620 season and wonders what it has to do to win one of these things.
Lee's edges in power and glovework translate to a WARP edge of more than a win and a half. Even if you care to grant Pujols extra credit for being part of a successful Cardinals' team (or, as I prefer to think of it, penalize Lee for not working under better management), I don't see how you make up more than a win on bonus points. Derrek Lee has been the most valuable player in the National League, and that argument should be enough to carry him to the top of most ballots.
It's not going to be, though. We know that MVP voters like team success, and with no Barry Bonds season in this mix, a bias like that become influential. Moreover, voters may be inclined to treat this ballot as something of a lifetime achievement award for Pujols, who has been eating Bonds' dust for four remarkable seasons.
Pujols getting the MVP Award would be wrong, but not silly, as he's clearly the second-best player in the league and at least within shouting distance of #1. The real problem is the guy coming up on the outside, the one with the very loud bandwagon.
About two weeks ago on XM Radio's "Fantasy Focus" show, I dismissed the notion of Andruw Jones' candidacy, pointing out that he was 80 points behind the Lee and Pujols in OBP, a gap that couldn't be closed by his home-run count or solid defense. After the show, in fact, I ended up in a friendly wager with host Chris Liss that Jones would not receive more than two top-two votes for the award. The whole idea seemed silly to me, as should be clear when you compare the players' performances:
Let me make this as clear as I can: Andruw Jones is not one of the two most valuable players in the National League. There's no amount of extra credit you can assign--the Braves' success, his durability on a fragile team, his being the only Braves' outfielder old enough to know that Will Smith used to be The Fresh Prince--that makes up 70-odd points of OBP, along with the other markers Lee and Pujols have on him. In fact, Jones slots in well behind a number of other National Leaguers, as Clay Davenport shows in this list of 2005 WARP leaders:
WARP
Derrek Lee 11.2
Albert Pujols 9.6
Roger Clemens 8.9
Jim Edmonds 8.9
Morgan Ensberg 8.8
Dontrelle Willis 8.8
Jason Bay 8.7
Miguel Cabrera 8.3
Marcus Giles 8.3
Todd Helton 8.1
Andruw Jones 8.1
Jones isn't the best center fielder in the league: that's Jim Edmonds. He is arguably not the MVP of his own team: that may be Marcus Giles. I wouldn't use WARP as the only determinant of my MVP ballot, but it says something that Jones is three wins behind Lee, one and a half behind Pujols, and trails a handful of other players as well. If you look at VORP, or runs created, or really any performance metric, you'll get the same result. Jones shouldn't be mentioned with Lee and Pujols as a candidate for Most Valuable Player.
Of course, we're doing performance analysis here, and MVP voting doesn't always rise to that level. It is often about the best story, and while the AL voting has lent itself to more of this silliness in recent years than the NL has, this may be a year in which the NL gets to have its own head-scratcher. Jones has been stronger in the second half than he was in the first, which tends to garner attention; he plays for a team that will go to the postseason; he's a center fielder, and as such more prone to highlight-reel defensive plays that show off his skill. His hot streak has coincided with people's turning their attention to him; since I made that wager with Liss, he's hit just .250 with three home runs, but racked up 17 RBI in 12 games. That's what the voters like to see.
Very often, MVP voting will come down more to moments than to merit, and Derrek Lee is going to have a hard time holding back Pujols and Jones in that regard. Consider Monday's games; Jones came to bat in the fourth inning of a tie game with the Mets and smacked a solo home run to give the Braves the lead. He also made two good defensive plays in a game televised nationally. In St. Louis, Pujols hit a three-run home run in the eighth inning that broke a 2-2 tie and pushed the Cards to a 6-4 win.
Lee? He batted in the ninth inning of that Cards/Cubs game, with two on and one out and his Cubs down by two. He grounded into a 6-3 double play to end the game, dropping the Cubs a bit deeper into irrelevance.
Merit vs. moments. In the battle for votes, the former should carry all the weight, but it's the latter that wins awards. There's a very real chance that the best player in the NL this season is going to go home empty-handed.
I love how Edmonds is having a horrible year offensively and he is still the best centerfielder in the league (according to the formula above). :lol:
Mordred
09-07-05, 03:44 PM
Yeah, I don't get that for Edmonds either. He's not having a horrible year, but it's certainly his worst since 1999.
Anyway, a month ago I would have thought there was no way Lee could lose the MVP. But Pujols is playing his best baseball of the season and Lee isn't playing quite like he did in June & July. Will definitely be an interesting contest between the two as the season winds down. For all Jones success, I don't see him finishing anywhere but 3rd in the balloting.
Flashback
09-07-05, 03:50 PM
Well another idiot failed the idiot test. I think right now we have proven that 1.9 percent of MLB are taking steroids. :lol:
OAKLAND, Calif. -- Mike Morse of the Seattle Mariners was suspended Wednesday for 10 days for violating the steroids policy, the ninth major league player penalized under baseball's tougher drug rules.
Morse hit a go-ahead single in the seventh inning Tuesday night in a 3-2 win over Oakland.
Morse, 23, was batting .287 with three home runs and 23 RBI in 209 at-bats since being called up from Triple-A earlier this season. The infielder-outfielder was acquired last season in the trade that sent pitcher Freddy Garcia to the Chicago White Sox.
Earlier this season, Mariners pitcher Ryan Franklin and Seattle outfielder Jamal Strong were penalized for violating the steroids policy.
B.A.
09-07-05, 03:55 PM
Twins came back from a 5-0 deficit and are now clinging to a two-run lead going into the ninth. :up:
Brian Gentz
09-07-05, 04:16 PM
If Maddux is able to get 5 outs (totalling his 2 year Cubs IP to 400) his 2006 $9mill option vests.
Jobronie
09-07-05, 07:46 PM
Sheffield pulled up lame chasing a home run; removed from the game; Yanks down 4-0.
Obligatory: Friggin' Millar..........:)
Jobronie
09-07-05, 08:01 PM
Red Sox with the bases loaded, none out, Tizzle up..........
EDIT: That was disappointing, only a two run single.
namrfumot
09-07-05, 08:21 PM
Sheff's roids are finally taking their toll....much the way they did with Nomar :)
namrfumot
09-07-05, 08:25 PM
namrufmot <3 Alex Cora
6-3 Sox
Stu 17
09-07-05, 08:51 PM
Well another idiot failed the idiot test. I think right now we have proven that 1.9 percent of MLB are taking steroids. :lol:
OAKLAND, Calif. -- Mike Morse of the Seattle Mariners was suspended Wednesday for 10 days for violating the steroids policy, the ninth major league player penalized under baseball's tougher drug rules.
Morse hit a go-ahead single in the seventh inning Tuesday night in a 3-2 win over Oakland.
Morse, 23, was batting .287 with three home runs and 23 RBI in 209 at-bats since being called up from Triple-A earlier this season. The infielder-outfielder was acquired last season in the trade that sent pitcher Freddy Garcia to the Chicago White Sox.
Earlier this season, Mariners pitcher Ryan Franklin and Seattle outfielder Jamal Strong were penalized for violating the steroids policy.
I heard Morse took steroids a few years ago, and was punished for it then (in the minor leagues maybe?). Anyway, apparently he is saying the drug can show up years later, and he is clean since the first time he was caught.
FantasticVSDoom
09-07-05, 08:53 PM
Nice play by Arroyo to get out of the inning :up:...
Brian Gentz
09-07-05, 09:05 PM
for the 2nd straight night the Cards are playing down to the Cubs level... they just loaded the bases with no outs and failed to score :thumbsup:
chrisih8u
09-07-05, 09:23 PM
Captain Intangibles with a bases loaded double play. :up: Tampa up 4-3.
namrfumot
09-07-05, 09:42 PM
Sox win...
Yanks go ahead with Giambi hitting a 2 run homer...
for the 2nd straight night the Cards are playing down to the Cubs level... they just loaded the bases with no outs and failed to score :thumbsup:And now it looks as if they are going to let the Cubs run away w/ it in the top of the ninth.
Pull Mulder, Tony!!!! You can't get the DP every time!!
Edit: Maybe they can. :D
Brian Gentz
09-07-05, 10:47 PM
Neifi is always good for a DP.... Dempster is the real deal.
Maddux gets #12 :thumbsup:
sundog
09-07-05, 10:48 PM
Fucking Marte! Guillen gives him TWO chances at redemption and he fucks it up TWICE. And yet they win another 1-run game.
And Maddux gets his 12th win. I'm pulling for him to make to 15 again.
Plus the Cards loss puts them behind the Pale Hose by 1 game in the loss column for the best record in MLB (it don't matter, but it's nice . . . ).
MrX
09-07-05, 11:40 PM
Ozzie gets too caught up with the lefty vs lefty/righty vs righty matchups late in innings. Cotts should be the late inning lefty, Marte should not see the mound unless it's a blowout.
Konerko has his avg over .280 now-eek-
Jeremy517
09-08-05, 05:02 AM
Well another idiot failed the idiot test. I think right now we have proven that 1.9 percent of MLB are taking steroids. :lol:
The "idiot" only took steroids in 2003 for a torn muscle, and has now been suspended three different times for taking steroids during that one injury. The arbitrator even said that the results show that Morse hasn't taken anything since 2003.
Flashback
09-08-05, 08:50 AM
The "idiot" only took steroids in 2003 for a torn muscle, and has now been suspended three different times for taking steroids during that one injury. The arbitrator even said that the results show that Morse hasn't taken anything since 2003.
Did he purposely take the steoids? Yes .. idiot in my book. "I was desperate and made a terrible mistake which I deeply regret."
And you know why it is called the idiot test? Because only idiots get caught....and he did 3x's :lol:. There are guys taking them that have not even been caught once and he still keeps failing. However it is unfair to keep getting punished for the same thing.
namja
09-08-05, 12:11 PM
Went to the Dodgers-Giants game last night. Definitely one of the best baseball games that I've ever been to. Didn't matter that both teams were more than 10 games below .500, didn't matter that both teams had slim chance of making the playoffs; all that mattered was ... "Giants Suck! Giants Suck!" :lol:
And the dramatic comeback of the Dodgers at the bottom of the 9th ... :up:
Jeremy517
09-08-05, 02:22 PM
Did he purposely take the steoids? Yes .. idiot in my book. "I was desperate and made a terrible mistake which I deeply regret."
And you know why it is called the idiot test? Because only idiots get caught....and he did 3x's :lol:. There are guys taking them that have not even been caught once and he still keeps failing. However it is unfair to keep getting punished for the same thing.
An idiot in 2003 for taking steroids? Sure. Even he says it was a mistake.
An idiot now for "failing" this test? Hardly. You do realize that the masking agents are banned also, right? You want him to take masking agents for something that he did two years ago? Getting caught with those would be more damaging than this would be.
He came clean and admitted it, paid his time, and tried to move on. To still call him an idiot is... well... idiotic.
Flashback
09-08-05, 03:49 PM
An idiot in 2003 for taking steroids? Sure. Even he says it was a mistake.
An idiot now for "failing" this test? Hardly. You do realize that the masking agents are banned also, right? You want him to take masking agents for something that he did two years ago? Getting caught with those would be more damaging than this would be.
He came clean and admitted it, paid his time, and tried to move on. To still call him an idiot is... well... idiotic.
Wait, so now I am an idiot? :lol: Please....
Jeremy517
09-09-05, 12:50 AM
I didn't call you an idiot. I said that calling him an idiot now for not using steroids any more and for not using another banned substance (masking agents) is idiotic.
Flashback
09-09-05, 01:27 AM
I didn't call you an idiot. I said that calling him an idiot now for not using steroids any more and for not using another banned substance (masking agents) is idiotic.
"To still call him an idiot is... well... idiotic." is the same as calling me an idiot...
But you still buy the fact that a steroid is still in his system over a year later? :lol: Boy we will never get rid of this problem... or atheletes were insane to beleve that they can just cycle down (or mask it) to get away with it. Damn, Giambi admited to a jury he took steroids...guess it would still show up ya thunk? Maybe?
Yes - he = idiot. and he deserves a season not this 10 day BS. Break the law and the rules of your company deal with it.
Jeremy517
09-09-05, 02:02 AM
But you still buy the fact that a steroid is still in his system over a year later? :lol:
Considering that the arbitrator said that his levels were consistent with his statement, yes.
Also consider that his levels have dropped with each successive test (now being only 0.2 above the limit).
Also, the substance was the same every time. If he was going to keep doping, don't you think he'd use something else that mght not be detected?
Jeremy517
09-09-05, 02:09 AM
Morse's bad 3-for-1 deal
By Peter Gammons
Special to ESPN.com
Sept. 7
The first time Mike Morse tested positive, he was in the White Sox' farm system, in May 2004.
"I told them the truth," Morse said Wednesday afternoon. "I didn't tell them that it was a mistake or it was a supplement or that I didn't know how it got in my body. I told them I took steroids. I told them I made a mistake, that the test was correct. And I was violated."
The Mariners rookie was suspended Wednesday -- for that same mistake -- for the third time.
"This is really an incredible thing, and I was embarrassed and ashamed," Morse said. "But how many times do I have to pay for this? But at least this is over. I've been living with this nightmare since my hearing [July 19 in Toronto], waiting for a decision."
Arbitrator Sam Das backed every aspect of Morse's story. In his decision, he said there were no performance-enhancing effects gained from the low level of steroids found in his blood in early May. Das acknowledged that Morse was being punished for the same offense three times, but noted that, because there is no correlation between the minor- and major-league tests, the Players Association considers the player to have a blank slate when he is put on a major-league roster.
"People are forever going to think that the only reason I got to the big leagues was because I took steroids," said the 23-year-old Morse, who is hitting .287 and had a huge hit in the Mariners' 3-2 win Tuesday night -- just hours after breaking down in tears in the clubhouse when informed of MLB's impending announcement. "I'm in the majors despite the steroids, but who believes it?"
The arbitrator believed him, but would not overturn MLB's decision, which offers up a positive test to Congress.
Morse was 21 years old and had a severely torn thigh muscle at the end of the 2003 season.
"I really thought my career could be over," he said. "I was trying to rehab, but it wasn't going well [in fact, it still isn't completely healed]. So I tried to speed it up."
In November and December of 2003, Morse took Deca. Then he found he was getting too big, and tried Winstrol.
"I quickly found that I made a serious mistake," Morse said. "But I paid the price."
He tested positive in May 2004. A month later, he was traded to Seattle in the Freddy Garcia deal. He told the Mariners that he had tested positive, that he'd taken nothing since January, but he was tested again in July -- and tested positive again. The test showed a noticeable decline in the steroids, confirming his assertion. But the Players Association cannot deal with minor-league cases, and Morse -- then playing for Double-A San Antonio -- was suspended again.
"This winter, I hired a nutritionist because I wanted to make sure that I didn't put anything in my body that could test positive," Morse said.
However, when he was tested this May, there was a minor residue from the steroids he said he last took 14 months earlier, a claim that doctors in the arbitration hearing said could be true.
"The arbitrator even said that there is little doubt that because there was so little left -- .2 above the level -- that he accepted my story as the truth," Morse said. "But they didn't care that I'd been punished twice before. Right now, everything is completely out of my body."
But Mike Morse is out for 10 days.
Because of the unusual nature of the case, Morse's positive test went to the arbitrator. It was heard in Toronto after the All-Star break.
"That was the worst series of my career," Morse said. "I think I made five errors. But I've been living with this ever since, not sleeping, worried about the result. Now this."
Morse said manager Mike Hargrove has known about his dilemma, and according to Morse, he's "been really supportive. I didn't think I'd be in the lineup [Tuesday] night, but he put me in there. Maybe that was the best thing."
He played left field, and almost caught on fire when he slid into a heater in the Oakland bullpen trying to make a catch. He had two hits, including a double, scored a run and had an RBI.
"Playing," he said, "took my mind off this nightmare."
There is no question that baseball needs a stronger steroids testing system. But that doesn't mean that it should have a system that suspends human rights and fairness. That Morse could be suspended three times for the same mistake is unfair. Because minor-league players have no union protection, the lack of coordination between the minor and major leagues raises the specter of potential abuse by the commissioner's office. Also, the notion that everyone who enters the Players Association has a clean slate means that a player could test positive five times in the NFL, switch sports and have no record.
The Morse case is a reminder that steroids can be a complex area, and that while multimillion-dollar players can afford masking agents to escape tests not capable of detecting designer drugs, a minor leaguer -- scared that his career could be over -- can be in violation three times for the same mistake.
Major League Baseball knew all this. But because offenders are run up the flagpole and held out in the square of public opinion as an offering to Congress, a Mike Morse can be a three-time loser for a one-time offense.
"I never tried to claim that there was a mistake [in the testing]; I tried to be honest," he said.
Buy: