Brilliant Harden Blows Blue Jays Away, A's Win 4-1
by danmerqury on Aug 9, 2011 6:42 PM PDT
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Harden was simply amazing, striking out 8, walking 2, and allowing 1 run in his 7 innings of work. The A's supported him (what a concept!) with two mammoth home runs off of the bats of Josh Willingham and Kurt Suzuki, the former coming with Cliff Pennington on base.
Aside from allowing a solo HR to Edwin Encarnacion in the 2nd inning, Harden was fantastic. The HR was one of only 5 hits allowed by Harden all day, and the only one worth extra bases. And perhaps the best news of all? He averaged 92.3 mph on his fastball, and hit 96 twice. He hasn't done that over a season in the entire PitchFX era, save for 25 innings in his injury-shortened 2007.
In the 7th inning, the Jays finally threatened, as Edwin Encarnacion walked and advanced to 3B on a Colby Rasmus single. And just like that, the winning run was at the plate with no outs. What did Harden do? Got Aaron Hill to pop out to 2B, and then struck out J.P. Arencibia and Brett Lawrie on gorgeous diving low and away changeups. Remember how then-backup catcher Adam Melhuse called Harden's changeup a "spluckle", because it was like a splitter crossed with a knuckleball? It's back.
Brett Cecil, on the other hand, actually pitched fairly well, but the two homers were obviously his downfall. To his credit, he had a no-hitter midway through the 3rd inning, and he only allowed 4 hits in 7 innings. Of course, when two of those are home runs, things look a bit different.
In other news, Coco Crisp is still day-to-day with a calf strain, but Bob Melvin thinks he could be available to pinch hit on Thursday (via Slusser).
Oh, and perhaps the best thing of all? Best Hitter In Baseball™ Jose Bautista went 0-4. That's worth a win by itself.
Current Series
Athletics lead the series 1-0
| Tue 08/09 | 4 - 1 win | |
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Oakland Athletics Wednesday, Aug 10, 2011, 4:07 PM PDT Gio Gonzalez vs Henderson Alvarez Partly cloudy. Winds blowing in from left field at 15-20 m.p.h. Game time temperature around 70. |
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| Thu 08/11 | 9:37 AM PDT | |
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Too soon
We need to digest, gain perspective ;)
Visit my blog the Todd Van Poppel Rookie Card Retirement Plan!!
whoops!
"If we start getting into that sh*t, we might as well get out the plastic sheeting and have an orgy." --Gaijin Suketto
by emperor nobody on Aug 9, 2011 7:14 PM PDT up reply actions
#winning
"BA doesn't stand for Batting Average. It’s Brandon Allen, as in the percentage of a hitter’s worth compared to Brandon Allen. Ted Williams, at his best, was only 4/10th of the hitter Brandon Allen is today." - YonYonson
so...much...alliteration!
nice recap. harden…healthy? seriously?
The funny thing about baseball is that people will believe what they want to believe. —Joe Posnanski 8/29/09
Well, there was that nice comment on TV about Harden rotating his arm around
Like he was trying to get it loose or he was trying to unscrew it. Either way, I expected it to fall off before he left the mound.
Hey dad, I got this guy's autograph, Rollie
Fingers. Who's he?
It's like 2005 all over again
"Once you go Bed....everything else is dead." - Bed
"So you're saying we should skin the Rangers and wear them as uniforms? I’m down." - Kyli
Can we suggest to Bill King that he not go in for hip replacement surgery?
I like Cindi. A. She never pretends to know more than she does. B. She has unbridled enthusiasm for her "Hotties," and isn't afraid to show it. -IM4Oakgal
Our Germans were better than their Germans
We yet enjoy little to be envied, but endure much to be pitied.-Thomas Dudley
Fun fact:
In his career, in 65 PAs, Bautista is now batting .140/.209/.193 against the A’s.
I like Cindi. A. She never pretends to know more than she does. B. She has unbridled enthusiasm for her "Hotties," and isn't afraid to show it. -IM4Oakgal
And the DDJ news
What a great day!
My mannerism a prism/ And it should shine
Light it if you would/ Be so kind, right now'd
Be A' Good Time
by DaRubiesSLOKingsA's on Aug 9, 2011 6:50 PM PDT reply actions
yep
"Their batters are patient to the point that it's annoying." -Ryan Franklin
by Helloooo 1st on Aug 9, 2011 7:10 PM PDT up reply actions 2 recs
Hey Dan
Are you sure the name of that pitch wasn’t “The Splunkle”?
In any case, he keeps proving me right that he’s back better than he has been in years. I’d like to see him develop a new pitch besides the change and fastball……cutter maybe?
"You're early, but hang around; we'll have a fight for you sooner or later."
-John "Blue Moon" Odom
That's normal for this time of year, isn't it?
If they get claimed, you pull them back. If they don’t, you can trade them.
Hey dad, I got this guy's autograph, Rollie
Fingers. Who's he?
Most players get put through August waivers
So it’s not necessarily significant.
by OaklandSi on Aug 9, 2011 8:15 PM PDT via mobile up reply actions
Waivers?
Did I miss something? I only caught the last inning today. They put DDJ on waivers? I don’t see any articles anywhere about this…. or am I just a gullible idiot and are you guys talking about something else?
It's the "we can pull him back" kind of waivers
Not significant.
I like Cindi. A. She never pretends to know more than she does. B. She has unbridled enthusiasm for her "Hotties," and isn't afraid to show it. -IM4Oakgal
Yeah, sorry guys! haha I posted and ran off to the gym without clarifying
Wow, Harden looked amazing. In Brandon Allen news, he went 1-4, 2B, RBI, while batting in the #2 spot. Michael Taylor also went 1-4 with an RBI Double.
Bad news: Tyson Ross, what is wrong with you? 3 Innings, 3 ER, 4 Walks, 5 hits.
My mannerism a prism/ And it should shine
Light it if you would/ Be so kind, right now'd
Be A' Good Time
by DaRubiesSLOKingsA's on Aug 9, 2011 8:33 PM PDT up reply actions
Hitless tonight, right?
“He’s hit in two of his last three games!!!!”
I like Cindi. A. She never pretends to know more than she does. B. She has unbridled enthusiasm for her "Hotties," and isn't afraid to show it. -IM4Oakgal
It's fun watching Harden pitch
I’m enjoying it while it lasts, and hoping it lasts a long time.
OK, maybe not 100
but there were some straight-up Ghost Pitches tonight.
"If we start getting into that sh*t, we might as well get out the plastic sheeting and have an orgy." --Gaijin Suketto
I remember this poster ad!
Still love it….maybe they can bring it back?
"You're early, but hang around; we'll have a fight for you sooner or later."
-John "Blue Moon" Odom
When I was in Australia I went to the 1999 Intercontinental Cup and 2000 Olympics
All the USA Baseball games, and it was funny because people would be “wow, he threw that 156 km/h!” It was strange, guys were hitting balls 150 meters away… all sorts of stuff that was strange.
Visit my blog the Todd Van Poppel Rookie Card Retirement Plan!!
I want to convert Brandon Allen's WAR
What’s “infinity” converted to the metric system?
I like Cindi. A. She never pretends to know more than she does. B. She has unbridled enthusiasm for her "Hotties," and isn't afraid to show it. -IM4Oakgal
∞ eh?
Last of the Ninth - Photography
by Flashfire on Aug 9, 2011 8:42 PM PDT up reply actions 1 recs
I remember attending Expos games
And having to go metric as well as figure out what the “cc” stat was. The announcing was in French also.
Allez Expos!
by mikedaviswhereareyou on Aug 9, 2011 10:27 PM PDT up reply actions
Allez Expos!
I miss that team but I have no idea why
Hey dad, I got this guy's autograph, Rollie
Fingers. Who's he?
You haven't lived til you've experienced baseball in French though
“Cirques”…“premier but” and I think “base sur de boules”…I forget the rest. I went to an Expos game on my honeymoon.
Hey dad, I got this guy's autograph, Rollie
Fingers. Who's he?
Voltegeurs!
I lived in Montreal for a year. Went to a ton of games, caught an average of 8.7 foul balls per game. God bless competing with 2500 poeple most of whom had better seats for balls.
Visit my blog the Todd Van Poppel Rookie Card Retirement Plan!!
Abreu with a 2-run HR off of Mariano Rivera,
6-4 Angels bottom of the 9th.
I like Cindi. A. She never pretends to know more than she does. B. She has unbridled enthusiasm for her "Hotties," and isn't afraid to show it. -IM4Oakgal
Shizer!
"You're early, but hang around; we'll have a fight for you sooner or later."
-John "Blue Moon" Odom
I wish Harden stayed healthy forever
… or atleast until Brett Anderson becomes 100%.
Yes. The problem with Harden is that often he isn't healthy enough to pitch.
The problem with Moscoso is that often he is healthy enough to pitch.
I like Cindi. A. She never pretends to know more than she does. B. She has unbridled enthusiasm for her "Hotties," and isn't afraid to show it. -IM4Oakgal
by Nico on Aug 9, 2011 8:09 PM PDT up reply actions 5 recs
Hope Harden holds up and makes the Sox look stupid for pulling out of that deal
I mean, quite honestly, if he only gave them 3-4 good starts the rest of the season, that would be worth a massively overhyped prospect that may or may not even cut it in the majors.
by guy incognito on Aug 9, 2011 10:21 PM PDT reply actions 1 recs
But then we wouldn't have Brandon Allen and the sun wouldn't come up tomorrow on the west coast
Hey dad, I got this guy's autograph, Rollie
Fingers. Who's he?
I see Delmon Young was placed on waivers. 25 and having a weirdly bad season this year that he's digging himself out of.
I want him.
WHAT!??!?!?!?!?!?!
by true torture on Aug 9, 2011 11:11 PM PDT reply actions 1 recs
I'd rather say his 2010 was his weirdly good season
His wRC+ since playing his first full year in majors
2007 89He has had exactly one year where he was not below average with the bat and by all accounts seems to be a poor defender playing the easiest position on the field, the one for which the A’s have an abundance of options/hopes. He is also making $5.3m this year.
2008 96
2009 86
2010 119
2011 80
2011 Oakland Athletics: We have Cy Young pitchers and make yours look like it, too
I'm sure this is a massive teaser
but how awesome would it be if Harden has finally learned to stay healthy and give the team he started w/ a major late bloom.
I don’t know about the rest of you all, but Harden for me has been easily the most exciting part of this season.
I have to wonder
does anybody know if there’s such a precedence? i.e., a pitcher who was hurt during much of the early part of his career only to learn to stay healthy late and ended up having a quality career?
Chris Carpenter
He seems to be a possible comp, having had a lot of injuries during his years with the Blue Jays starting in 1997 and continuing through 2002, but came out of that in St. Louis and had a great run from 2004 through 2006, before needing TJ after the first game of the 2007 season. Lost 2007-2008 but has been fine ever since.
You just made my day
Carpenter redux in Harden would be sensational.
Quest for Schadenfreude
I was just over at the Red Sox blog, hoping to find Sox fans saying to each other, “Gosh, Harden is good, I’m so bummed we didn’t trade for him.”
Alas, I found no such thing. I did, however, find an interesting follow-up on the trade that never was. This was three days after the trade deadline. Apparently Peter Gammons was on the Boston pre-game show and had some follow-up reporting. Maybe this was all reported elsewhere, but I hadn’t heard it.
The Red Sox’s first target was Hiroki Kuroda. They had a deal in place with the Dodgers, but Kuroda had to approve and at the last minute he decided not to. (He intends to return to Japan after the season.)
After the Kuroda deal fell through, the Red Sox intended to trade for Harden AND Bedard. So it was never that Bedard was the alternative to Harden, like we thought at the time. They would have taken both.
The specific thing that Theo heard about Harden that made him ask for the insurance clause was that Harden is taking a cortisone shot after every start. It was then that he asked for the clause saying that if Harden doesn’t complete X starts there’s no PTBNL, and when Beane said no to that the deal was off.
Gammons says the PTBNL was going to be a single-A pitcher with high upside, but he didn’t give a name. Another commenter said elsewhere that it was speculated the PTBNL was Chris Hernandez, but no source of who “speculated” it, so that might mean nothing.
I had never heard of him. I see he doesn’t make Sickels’ top 20, though he does appear in the long “others of note” list below. Maybe his stock went up during the year. I did find a post on SoxProspects where some guy was complaining that the Sox won’t promote Hernandez fast enough. Reminded me of A.J. Griffin.
Sweet is the lore which Nature brings; / Our meddling intellect
Mis-shapes the beauteous forms of things:— / We murder to dissect.
haven't heard about the cortisone shot
does that seem made up? wouldn’t it be really hard for someone to make every start if they’re getting a cortisone shot after each time they take the mound? also, even if that was true, he’s still making good starts, and it’s not like anderson was a lock to even make it to the bigs, let alone be any good, as he had become a slightly above-average minor leaguer. so, even if you only got a few quality starts from harden the rest of the year, that would seem to be more than fair for a once-hyped prospect who wasn’t exactly killing it in AAA and a PTBNL that wasn’t even on sickels’ top 20 sox list. theo was pretty unreasonable in tying the PTBNL to harden’s starts, and beane was right in refusing.
by guy incognito on Aug 10, 2011 5:28 AM PDT up reply actions
Nice Win
Great performance by Harden; he pitched the way I knew he would when he came back from injury. He’s basically like the Harden of old, and I love seeing him pitch again.
Decent offensive performance; after all, it’s always nice to hit 2 homeruns.
A shame Matsui’s hitting streak ended.
So, seriously
Victorino gets 3-game suspension and none of the Giants get any?
2011 Oakland Athletics: We have Cy Young pitchers and make yours look like it, too
They're punishing the Giants by making Ramon Ramirez keep pitching.
I like Cindi. A. She never pretends to know more than she does. B. She has unbridled enthusiasm for her "Hotties," and isn't afraid to show it. -IM4Oakgal
Ramirez and Sandoval seem like the only candidates
We yet enjoy little to be envied, but endure much to be pitied.-Thomas Dudley
for what? protecting the pitcher?
or for failing Dancing with the stars.
A player can running at the action and he blocked that player from advancing.
We yet enjoy little to be envied, but endure much to be pitied.-Thomas Dudley
someone should tweet McCarthy and see if he sees it
"Once you go Bed....everything else is dead." - Bed
"So you're saying we should skin the Rangers and wear them as uniforms? I’m down." - Kyli
by cuppingmaster on Aug 10, 2011 11:20 AM PDT up reply actions
plus
the red sox and yankees say the Jays are stealing signs, so espn does an expose?
BS
We yet enjoy little to be envied, but endure much to be pitied.-Thomas Dudley
Jeter never cheats
He doesn’t have to, because he is always right.
i've never tried to rank them to be honest. i guess i like beer.- stm72
by Tutu-late on Aug 10, 2011 12:54 PM PDT up reply actions 1 recs
I've been wondering about the Rangers
Only in Texas did hitters strangely lay off of Harden’s changeup and DLS’ slider.
I like Cindi. A. She never pretends to know more than she does. B. She has unbridled enthusiasm for her "Hotties," and isn't afraid to show it. -IM4Oakgal
Does anyone know what happened to A. J. Kirby-Jones
It looks like he got HBP on Friday and hasn’t played since, but I can’t find anything about it.
Don't you realise you'll find next monday or next Tuesday/Your golden shoes day
by PDXAthleticsfan on Aug 10, 2011 9:47 AM PDT reply actions
Just found the following:
Burlington first baseman A.J. Kirby-Jones was hit by a pitch in the seventh inning and left the game with a possible head injury.
from The Hawk Eye
Hope he is OK.
Don't you realise you'll find next monday or next Tuesday/Your golden shoes day
by PDXAthleticsfan on Aug 10, 2011 11:37 AM PDT up reply actions
6yrs ; 66million dollars... (Chavy contract)
The way inflation is going, this might be A’s friendly???
Every man for himself...
You've spelled deflation wrong
2011 Oakland Athletics: We have Cy Young pitchers and make yours look like it, too
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