Happy New Year

Here's hoping that the New Year finds you happy, warm, and well-fed.

This is probably my last post until next Tuesday. I'm still on vacation with family.

In the meantime, feel free to make like Roberto Clemente.

King of the World

More weird and impressive news about our poised rookie.

Elmer the Great

In October 1936, the two New York teams were playing in the World Series. Lux Radio Theater, then considered the best and most high-brow of radio drama shows, performed "Elmer the Great," a play from a Ring Lardner story about a hayseed pitcher who is better than Dizzy Dean. He pitches in the "World Serious" until he's framed by a gambler. It's a pretty interesting look at the status of baseball players in the 1930s. Not much has changed since then, I think.

Carl Hubbell and Lou Gehrig also appear - star players from the opposing teams - and do what might be called a comedy routine if either man had any talent for radio.

You can find a free stream of the October 5, 1936 program here.

Cool Steelers music

Please help Eileen name that tune.

On minor-league stats

Regular readers of the blog know that I can be impatient with fellow amateur Bucco writers who think they understand the value and potential of minor-league players more than the folks in the front office. It's the Allegory of the Cave, as far as I'm concerned. We fans and part-time baseball scholars can only work with shadows cast upon a wall by shapes and beings we can't actually see. And for all the beauty of the translation and projection systems that are publicly available, I'm pretty confident we can be sure that the big-league teams have models and systems that blow these away. And since they are proprietary, we'll never see them.

So I'm cautious when it comes to second-guessing a GM's decision to throw away some A-level pitcher, even if the numbers say that he throws the ball hard. I'll admit it's possible that the GM is a complete moron. I don't think so, but that doesn't mean much. Still, if fellow Pirate fans don't at least concede that it's possible that they can't know as much as him from their rumpus-room iMacs, then they lose some credibility with me. And so what if Rob Neyer, Royals partisan, wants to gloat about acquiring Leo Nunez for Benito Santiago and enough money to pay much of Santiago's contract? My fellow Bucco fans should buck up when it comes to such things. Of course Rob Neyer will look on the bright side of Leo Nunez.

Over at the Birdhouse, a Cardinals blog I just discovered through a link from Primer, Jeff Luhnow, Cardinals Vice President of Baseball Development, talks about the way the St. Louis team evaluates minor-league numbers. I'll quote the part that supports my view of the situation.

I think at Double-A and Triple-A, we’re very comfortable with our methods for converting those stats and projecting major league performance.  Once you get to Single-A and especially down to rookie ball, those leagues, even though they are competitive and you want to win, the pendulum swings more to the development side of things.  A player may be down there working on plate patience or how to hit a breaking ball or control if he is a pitcher.  So, you never know the real picture of what is going on.  Because those environments are more developmental than Double-A or Triple-A, you may be misled.  It becomes more of a challenge.  Our rule of thumb basically is that we look at the stats below Double-A, but the stats we consider important at the minor league level are the ones as the Double-A and Triple-A level.  Those are the ones that we feel are more predictive of major league performance.  That is one of the challenges of the lower minor leagues.

I don't think we have any idea what Leo Nunez is worth. And like most Bucco fans, I'm glad we're not saddled with two years of Charles Johnson. I had reasons to doubt the Bucs would find a use for Nunez any time soon. And while I didn't think Humberto Cota and J.R. House were so obviously insufficient that the Bucs had to go get another catcher, I'm not foolish enough to think that I have all the information I'd need to say, with complete confidence, that I'm smarter than the GM here.

All that said, more power to the folks who want to play it that way. It takes all kinds. Whatever gets you through the offseason, it's all right.

Brian Walton did a great job with that interview and I recommend the whole.

Trading with Arizona

John Perrotto reported last week that the Bucs might get involved in the Return of the Randy Johnson Trade. CNN/SI clipped his paragraph a few days ago.

What would we want off the Arizona roster? My hunch: Chad Tracy.

Tracy works the count and has better range at third than Wigginton. He's shown little power and for that, reminds me of Sean Burroughs. He's young (25) and has two more years of service before he's arbitration-eligible. And he hits left-handed.

The D'backs also have a number of young starting pitchers. But I don't see anything worth Kip Wells and Craig Wilson. Maybe that rumor, like the one Gammons reported with the Bucs non-tendering Fogg, really has nothing going for it.

All hail Bert

Rich Lederer has posted an interview with Bert Blyleven.

Blyleven was traded to the Pittsburgh Pirates prior to the 1978 season, and he helped lead the Bucs to a World Series victory over the Baltimore Orioles in 1979. Although Bert won two games in the postseason — including a “do-or-die situation” in Game Five of the World Series — he became disenchanted with the fact that he was only allowed to complete four games that year (after never having fewer than 11 in any full season) while setting a record with 20 no-decisions.

“Chuck Tanner and I did not see eye-to-eye. My only beef with him ever was ‘why do I have to wait five to six days to pitch if I’m only pitching five to six innings?’ What you’re doing is taking away about 50 extra innings.”

I'm not sure they were counting pitches in the 1970s. Still it's clear in his record that Blyleven's managers restricted the number of starts he made and innings he pitched after the early 1970s. Tanner looks like the first in a series of managers to deny Blyleven 40 starts and 300 innnigs. He gave Blyleven as many starts as any Pirate pitcher in the 1970s but, as Blyleven told Rich, he surely pulled him early often, as Blyleven's total number of innings pitched never got real high again until he returned to Minnesota. I'm away from all of my books and reference books that might explain Tanner's approach. Any old-timers remember what he was thinking? Obviously it's a four-man vs. five-man rotation question. I'm curious if anyone remembers what was the rationale for the latter under Tanner.

The Bucs dealt Blyleven to the Indians in the middle of 1980.

Looking over the Pirate teams from the 1970s, I'm struck by how many games they won. Those teams were good.

Steelers 20, Ravens 7.

Sweet. Stillers secure home-field advantage throughout the playoffs by pounding the crap out of the lowly cheapshot-artists/professional thugs/Cravens. AP recap and boxscore here. Post-game quotes here. Steelers never punted, put up 404 total yards, and stuffed Jamal Lewis for 26 pathetic total rushing yards. My favorite part was the dozen-consecutive-rushing-play-bitchslap:

Drive Summary: 14 plays, 71 yards
  1st-10, PIT29 B. Roethlisberger passed to H. Ward to the right for 7 yard gain
  2nd-3, PIT36 J. Bettis rushed up the middle for 7 yard gain
  1st-10, PIT43 J. Bettis rushed up the middle for 3 yard gain
  2nd-7, PIT46 J. Bettis rushed to the left for 11 yard gain
  1st-10, BAL43 V. Haynes rushed up the middle for 11 yard gain
  1st-10, BAL32 V. Haynes rushed up the middle for 9 yard gain
  2nd-1, BAL23 V. Haynes rushed up the middle for 5 yard gain
  1st-10, BAL18 V. Haynes rushed up the middle for 3 yard gain
  2nd-7, BAL15 J. Bettis rushed to the left for 6 yard gain
  3rd-1, BAL9 J. Bettis rushed up the middle for no gain
  4th-1, BAL9 B. Roethlisberger rushed up the middle for 2 yard gain
  1st-7, BAL7 J. Bettis rushed up the middle for 4 yard gain
  2nd-3, BAL3 J. Bettis rushed up the middle for 1 yard gain
  3rd-2, BAL2 B. Roethlisberger passed to J. Tuman to the left for 2 yard touchdown. J. Reed made PAT

Of course this was followed by my least favorite part, as the Cravens managed to get in another costly cheapshot, "injuring" Rotty's ribs. If anyone's got any info on the rib status, please pass on in the comments thread.

All hail the Bus for racking up 117 to pass Dickerson! All hail Plaxico! All hail James Harrison! All hail an undefeated Heinz field record!

Gone fishing

See you January 3rd. Feel free to amuse each other in this comments thread.

Go Steelers. Merry Christmas. Happy New Year.

Joe Liggins

True or false: Lloyd McClendon looks more than a little like Joe Liggins.

More pictures here.

No wonder I like him as much as I do. I'm listening to Joe Liggins and the Honeydrippers every chance I get. Including now.

Pink Champagne, that stole my love from me.

Honest Wagner NFL pick 'em: week 16

VIS SPRD HME SCOOP BONES ROWDY
gnb 02.5 MIN .MIN* ..MIN .MIN*
oak 07.5 KSC .KSC* ..KSC ..KSC
den -4.5 TEN ..TEN ..TEN .TEN*
snd 06.5 IND ..snd .snd* ..IND
bal 05.5 PIT ..PIT .PIT* ..PIT
chi 06.5 DET ..DET ..DET ..DET
atl 02.5 NWO ..NWO ..NWO ..NWO
hou 07.5 JAX ..hou .JAX* ..hou
nyg 05.5 CIN ..CIN ..nyg ..CIN
nwe -2.5 NYJ .nwe* ..NYJ .NYJ*
bf -11.5 SNF ..SNF ..buf .SNF*
car 02.5 TAB ..car ..car .TAB*
arz 06.5 SEA ..arz .arz* .SEA*
was -2.5 DAL ..was ..was .DAL*
cle 06.5 MIA .MIA* ..MIA .MIA*
phl 02.5 STL ..STL .phl* ..phl
Asterisks indicate best bets.

Season to date:
Bones 122-102 .545
Scoop 121-103 .541
Rowdy 113-111 .504

Consensus 43-31 .581

Best bets
Bones 42-28 .600
Scoop 29-20 .592
Rowdy 43-35 .551

Altoona well promoted

All hail Stink Night!

More McClatchy

Dejan Kovacevic's interview with Kevin McClatchy continues. They discuss G. Ogden Nutting and other mysteries of ownership.

Thursday Steeler links

The team gets the Washington Post treatment from Camille Powell. Not much to see, but it's hard to tire of reading "the Dominant Team in the AFC." Too bad the Colts and even the Chargers have been pretty dominant, too.

Re: injury report. What did Hines Ward do to his hip?

Troy Polamalu got a hand from the team for making the Pro Bowl. Alan Robinson of the AP reports that

Polamalu called his selection a testament to perseverance and patience _ namely, that of his teammates for patiently waiting out his underachieving 2003 season.

But we know the real reason:

''If you look at all the great warriors, starting biblically with Samson, he had long hair. The American Indians, the Samurais, the Greeks, the Chinese -- everybody had long hair. I don't know of anything that says you have to have your hair short.''

Of course that's Troy from this wire story on the long-hairs in pro sports.

There's another Alan Robinson story making the rounds. This one is on Myron Cope, who deserves as much attention as anyone cares to give him. Now that he's 75, they should put him on the endangered species list. We'll never see another like him. I read his autobiography - Double Yoi! I think it is called - last winter. If you mainly know him from the radio, you might be surprised to see that Cope is a great writer.

ESPN's John Clayton also reported that former Steeler Jim Haslett won't get fired at the end of the year. I couldn't be much of a fan of the Saints; if I lived in New Orleans it would be hard to get past the food and the music. That's no kind of hobby, following the soap opera of the Saints.

For USA Today, Skip Wood wrote the article I would write about the Patriots. Losing to Miami like that is like taking one cannonball through both sides of the ship. Bail, boys, bail. The Jets have a great chance to further sink that ship this weekend. New England faces a new kind of challenge here.

Rod Woodson retired. Were there any discussions of moving him to safety before he left the Steelers? I always thought he got pushed away too quickly. And for what? Lee Flowers? On the other hand, I also thought that Woodson's second act in San Francisco/Baltimore/Oakland did much to motivate the Steelers to hang onto Jerome Bettis. We all thought he was done a few years ago. In football more than baseball, these hall-of-famers can really surprise late in their careers, given the chance and good fortune to get healthy.

Ben Roethlisberger's name comes up in this story about the role scholarship limits are having in the recent success of the MAC. Didn't Roethlisberger sign with Miami because they were the first team to make an offer? I remember there being some kind of loyalty lesson to his career at Miami. I mean, I'm pretty sure he would not have been a JV player at Ohio State before scholarship limits. He would have been a starter there.

Finally, here's another Steelers team: meet the Sheffield Steelers Ice Hockey Club.

Paul Meyer Q & A

Meyer says the Bucs can't win it all with a $50M payroll. A reader recommends that MLB cane and flog players who test positive for steroids.

We got Pro Bowlers

Six of them.

I'm confused. How can they make a list of bowlers and not include Bettis?

Ward signed for just under $1M

Daryle Ward was great pre-thumb injury, so this signing strikes me as a good gamble. Power is expensive. There's a chance - maybe not real great - that he puts together 500 productive at-bats. If the chance is one-in-three, this is a great gamble. If it's one-in-six, it's a solid bet. The team needs left-handed power. He's a good fit.

Payroll going up

Dejan Kovacevic interviews Kevin McClatchy. The owner suggests payroll will cross $40M soon and generally says the right things about competing as a small-market club.

No Nishi

The Japan Times reports that Toshihisa Nishi will stay with the Yomiuri Giants. His agent, Scott Boras, attempted to get a major-league team interested in him. The Bucs obliged Boras but stopped short of offering a contract to Nishi.

Festival of Steelers links

Patriots nation is in full sour-grapes mode. All that is laughably stupid. They lost to a two-win team on Monday Night Football. The loss may not hurt the playoff chances, but anyone who watched that game and now says the Patriots should still be the favorite to win the AFC is in full-on denial. I'm more worried about the Chargers and the Colts. We can pick on Troy Brown and pick off Tom Brady, too. The way the Patriots played last night, it doesn't look like they'll see the Champtionship game, regardless of whether or not they get a bye. More on the home-field advantage angle in a moment.

This site has the Steelers as 4:1 to win it all.

All hail Dan Rooney.

Everybody wants a Steelers jersey for Christmas.

Down the hall at the Uniontown Mall, Sears general manager Wayne Pracel said because of the success of the Pittsburgh Steelers, the football team's merchandise, notably Ben Roethlisberger shirts, had to be restocked several times since the start of the holiday shopping season.

It's not just wives wanting to buy their hubby a great Christmas gift, instead, Pracel said, "there's no rhyme or reason" to the people who come to purchase Steelers merchandise.

There's plenty of rhyme and plenty of reason: everyone wants the Steelers this season. Or, shall we say, black and gold is the new black.

Here's a fun story about balancing football and church. Rowdy's dad, a Methodist minister, might not approve of the way we're raising Rowdietta. When we say "Sunday," she says "Football!"

More horse people supporting the Steelers. Ward is a good name for a horse, but I think Scoop's horse, Kip Smells, has the better Pittsburgh-sports-themed name.

Don Pierson of the Chicago Tribune writes something I've seen in more than one editorial. Namely, that the Steelers don't really want home-field advantage throughout the playoffs. They lost two AFC Championships at home under Cowher. So what? They can learn from mistakes.

And home-field advantage is not just about maximizing your chance of getting to the Super Bowl. It's about playing the championship in front of your fans. It's fine that the 53 Steelers wouldn't mind going on the road. What about the 60,000 Steeler fans who won't be there if the team goes on the road? You'd think the players and the media would know enough of the world to keep the fans first. And it's pretty pathetic how Hines Ward is more or less quoted (in that Pierson link) blaming the 2001 Championship loss on the "distraction" caused by reading the newspaper and getting tickets for his family. Hines Ward doesn't often play the crybaby; this is out of character for him; obviously someone asked a dumb question and he gave a dumb sour grapes answer. The athletes are trained to give all kinds of answers to inane, leading questions. They should add this one to the list. Why do you want the home-field advantage? To play in front of our fans, who did so much to help us get to this position. We think they deserve it.