I want the first game at the Coli this year.

McCarver and Buck were making me want to stab myself in the ear drums with an ice pick.

I think AN should have a Texas Hold ‘Em tourney… and, donate the proceeds to Ken Korach’s thingie.

I’d play just to put PaulThomas out on one hand. ;-)

He was all over, hitting and fielding!

I didn’t watch past the sixth inning, just long enough to see Duke pitch.

Strangely, I couldn’t find the original feed of the game anywhere (fox had a film on here instead). Luckily, a local channel was also broadcasting the game, with the voice over play by play of the local baseball announcers (in Spanish). They transmit mlb games about 3-4 times per week, with these same two announcers, who are very good and knowledgeable, so I certainly don’t mind….although I found it strange not to find the original feed.

the other night I saw an ad for the coming mlb network, supposedly starting in January. I’m wondering how that will affect watching baseball locally—does that mean the end of baseball on tv if you don’t pay extra for it?

Stadium….(rolls eyes)

I’ve been checking River Cats for two weeks and he has not been playing, he’s not on the DL…does anyone know?

Uggla for being sooooooo tired this morning. Damn Marlin. It’s called a glove, Dan—perhaps you should look into purchasing one.

I didn’t turn it on till about 7:30 or so, right in the middle of Duke’s inning. Then I figured, what the heck, I’ll watch the rest … and it went on for hours.

Uniforms were nice. Nothing weird, just each guy’s normal uniform in either white or gray.

I always root for the AL, so I was pulling for them the whole way (yes, even the Angels). But I have to say, the few individuals who really impressed me were on the NL. Miggy especially was awesome. I forgot how much I love that guy.

The whole tie business could be easily fixed with a simple rule. Just say that any time after the 10th inning (or maybe 11th, whatever), if you’ve used all your guys, you can bring them in for a second go-round.

I still say they should make it an exhibition, and make best record for the season get home field advantage. Make every game count. When is the ETA on Big Frank coming back to the big club?

So I hear. Depends on how fast he gets in “batting shape”.

I’d say it was a very good AS game, but certainly not “amazing”.

The fact that some of the best hitters in the game failed with the bases loaded, and RISP, leads me to downgrade it.

6th inning: mrssalb918 asks me if I want to keep watching the game, as it looks like I’m doing more websurfing than game watching. Right after Duke pitches, I say.

7th inning: who the hell is this guy singing GBA? The hell with the game, let’s watch season 2 of the office

8th inning: oh, that Dwight.

9th inning: hahaha

10th inning: whoa, game’s still on? Now I’m going to watch.

11th inning: mrs salb918 goes to bed. I’ll be right there, the AL’s got the bases juiced with nobody out.

12th inning: guess I’ll be up a little while longer.

13th inning: Oh, that Uggla.

14th inning: starting get a little…yawn…tired here…

15th inning: thank god. What time is it? Oh, christ, it’s 1:30 am? I better go to bed.

::brushing my teeth::

mrs salb918 comes out of the bedroom. “Kiddo’s up. It’s your turn.” Ah, crap.

8 am: This day is going to suck.

There’s plenty of pitchers for the All-Star game, we shouldn’t be having this problem. In fact, we should probably reduce the number of pitchers. When they increased the number of pitchers the just exacerbated the problem of making sure everybody got an appearance.

But regardless of how many pitchers are on the roster, they should just assign innings to each pitcher before the game.

First of all, not everybody has to pitch. They’re professionals—if they can deal with being taken out of a close game, missing the playoffs, not being the #1 starter, etc, etc, then they can deal with being selected for, but not pitching in, the All-Star game. In a typical 9-inning All-Star game there are usually at least a couple of pitchers who don’t get an appearance anyway. The more pitchers who don’t get to pitch, the less shafted each of them (and their fans) will feel.

This is how the All-Star game is. No hitter or pitcher gets to play as much as we want to see them anyway-time is short for everybody. It’s not a big deal if we miss 3-5 pitchers who get assigned extra innings without the game needing extras. That’s the nature of pitching-you don’t know just who will be needed in the course of a game. The problems start when you pretend you can have a legitmate game while ignoring that fact.

They made the team, it’s an honor, but they don’t have to play. Just like a few players every year who win a ring without having an AB or taking the field world series.

Pitchers without enough rest, younger pitchers (who presumably could get more chances in the future when they’re more dominant), and those who aren’t on the verge of retirement, can be assigned the extra innings beyond the 10th.

Those having career years or hometown favorites can start the game, close the game and get the other primetime innings. Most pitchers should be scheduled 2-3 innings.

It’s already not like a normal game where the manager is making the moves on ballgame logic. To the extent that this is necessary, they can make their moves a hitter or two sooner or later depending on matchups, but the order and essential inning assignments would be scheduled.

If you still run out of pitchers because the game goes 20 innings, by all means, have fielders pitch. All this hand wringing is just really annoying. (Watching Selig squirm on the other hand, yeah that’s kind of fun.)

Here’s what my lineup would be, with a little of the logic I used. This really isn’t much different from what Francona did anyway, the managers just need to stop trying to wish extra innings away, and plan for them instead.

Innings 1-3 innings C. Lee career year
Innings 4-5 J. Saunders
Innings 6-7 R. Halladay
Inning 8 F. Rodriguez career year
Inning 9-10 M. Rivera Yankee Stadium
Inning 11 J. Soria
Innings 12-13 J. Nathan
Innings 14-17 E. Santana good to have for extra inning long relief (plus Angels had 3 pitchers in ASG)
Inning 18 G. Sherrill
Inning 19 J. Duchscherer pitched Sunday
Inning 20 S. Kazmir pitched Sunday
Inning 21 J. Papelbon I hate Papelbon

Clutch throw to save the game at the time, then nearly hits a go-ahead HR. All the while causing the entire country – including Pittsburgh – to collective turn to one another and say, “Who’s Nate McClouth?”

And by way of love for Russell Martin, how about mailing a video to Kurt Suzuki titled, “How to block the plate while awaiting a throw”?

Uggla had a rough game, no doubt, but it looked worse in the box score than it did in real life, because error #2 was a bullet that went through him like a blur and error #3 should have been ruled a bad-hop single.

Oh, and one more thing: DUCK-sher? I nearly bought a plane ticket and flew to New York just to stalk Joe Buck, hunt him down, and snap his neck like a twig, but only after leaning into his ear and yelling, “FOOK You!” He’s lukey I didn’t.