I went out to see the Zephyrs last night on free tickets from Dr. Chop's volunteer gig. The Z's were dominated at the plate all night, and played some pretty horrid defense. They were about to be shut out, down three runs in the ninth, and they loaded the bases. Their catcher came to the plate, and belted the first pitch he saw for a walk off grand slam. Awesome. I'm hoarse from all the yelling.
That sounds cool. I don't care what level you're watching. Town-ball, Indy league, AAA, Pros. A walk-off grand-slam from a 3-run deficit is awesome (or crushing).
Were there two outs?
1 out, and it was the kid's first {edit: walkoff} homerun. I high fived about 400 people. It was awesome.
I've been to a few Zephyrs games and they've always been fun.
Off to Wisconsin for the Weekend. Back Sunday night.
Someone take Friday Music Day, OK?
I'll cover FMD for you.
The iPhone blared a flash flood warning at me around 4:30 this morning. About 4" of rain in SBGville. North of 6" in G-Town, some unofficial reports put the rain totals closer to 8 inches here. Lift stations out; raw sewage in the factory, factory workers sent home. A foot of water running over the road on two state highways in three different spots.
More coming.
Rice crop looks good, though.
with or without the raw sewage? Kidding aside, holy crap. (no pun intended)
So, basketball. Game 7 tonight. This is a great night for the league. They have an absolutely terrific storyline and either team winning will be great for the league. This is David Stern's last NBA Finals game as commissioner. What a run for Mr. Stern. What a run for the Spurs over the last fifteen years. What a player LeBron is. What a game basketball is when played at the highest level.
As a fan, I am completely stoked.
And I will be in the car, unable to watch, making me sad.
Here's something to watch for in game 7:
For the series, the Heat have scored 131.7 points per 100 possessions when James is on the floor without Wade, and just 100.8 when the two have shared the floor, per NBA.com. The Heat are minus-12 for the series, but the James–Mike Miller–Ray Allen super-shooting trio is a crazy plus-50 in just 68 minutes, per NBA.com. The James-Miller-Chalmers trio is plus-43 in just 80 minutes, and the combination of those four players is a stunning plus-49 in just 29 total minutes together, per NBA.com.
Those four have only played 15 minutes total with Bosh. The other 14 have come with Chris Andersen in Bosh’s place, and that group has been so successful in those 14 minutes — plus-26 — they nearly break NBA.com’s stats database and replace it with that Home Alone image of Macaulay Culkin screaming.
Now that we've seen three years of it, I think we can say that Wade is just about the worst teammate (in terms of all-star caliber players) that LeBron could have. Also, what was Spoelstra doing benching Birdman for almost two games? That was ridiculous.
Also, read Zach Lowe's take on Game 6, which was one of the 5 best games I've ever seen, for sure.
As I said the other night, this world needs more Spoelstra-sadface.
Spoelstra should start only one of Mike Miller's shoes.
Who would be the best all-star caliber players to pair with LeBron?
Also, if David Stern declared that LeBron James had to switch teams from Miami to Minnesota effective tomorrow, where would you expect the Timberwolves to finish the 2013-2014 season?
Who would be the best all-star caliber players to pair with LeBron?
Durant is the obvious answer, right? Almost as obvious as "Anyone-but-Carmelo".
I think Rubio would be a great PG to pair with LeBron- awesome defense, great passing and vision. The lack of shooting ability would allow for more double-teams on LBJ, but that's gonna happen anyhow.
LeBron on the Wolves- with an effective low-post tandem of Love and Pek and Rubio running point, that team should be in the Finals for sure (until everyone gets injured, as would surely happen).
Thanks for playing, gents. I appreciate the thoughts.
Oooh, I love these sorts of games.
Best all-star caliber player(s) to pair with LeBron?
LeBron is at his best with the ball in his hands, initiating the offense. He's ok otherwise (coming off screens, posting up, or the picker in the pick-and-roll), but he's world-class with the ball in his hands up top, where he can drive and dish or finish. He meshes well with a dominating defensive post player who can finish at the rim, but doesn't need a ton of post-up opportunities to keep him happy; and some spot-up shooters. He plays outstanding defense, and would pair well with other strong, on-ball defenders.
so, I'd team him up with Tyson Chandler or Joakim Noah at center, maybe a David Lee or David West at the 4, Klay Thompson at the 2 and someone like George Hill (solid ball handler, but not really a penetrate-and-dish ball dominator) at the point, and bring more shooters off the bench.
looking at my picks, I guess it is hard for me to be too critical of Miami's current roster. They lack a major rim protector (Birdman is about as close as they get), and Wade needs the ball a bit too much, but the rest of their complementary players fit the roles pretty well.
as for what would happen to the Wolves, they would immediately become Western Conference contenders, but would struggle from a lack of outside shooting. Unless Bud and Love come back fully healthy. Rubio would struggle a bit to mesh. He needs the ball to do what he does. But Peck would be a borderline all-star and feast on easy dunks.
The first hour-plus will be while I'm at work. Hopefully it's slow in there.
Yesterday, Joe Mauer saw fewer pitches (15) than any other player in the lineup. I wonder how many times in his career he has been in the starting lineup and had that happen.
It was. I saw the large number of comments and couldn't help myself from investigating the trainwreck. This was my favorite: "Is their a bigger P/R guy for Mauer than Souhan." That's pretty rich.
I was also impressed with the Jhonny Peralta comparison without mentioning lineups.
If somebody's griping about Mauer's deal, citing something like that won't matter. People think what they want to think.
That's a little cynical. Not everyone is obstinate and argues against pure logic. Some people just have not been given the evidence and may just be parroting things they've heard. Which reminds me never to listen to The Common Man as long as I shall live. The effing tool just yells his original point even louder when presented with damning evidence.
It's an over-generalization, I admit. But I think it's true a lot of the time.
I am with Jeff A. It is called confirmation bias. We all overweight the things that agree with our original opinion and underweight those things that don't.
This is 10,000 percent true.
Last night, the NHL Finals had their third OT game in four tries and it's tied 2-2. I hadn't committed to seeing them, but now I sort of wish I had. Who's watching? Is it as crazy as the box scores look?
Last night was nuts. I got out of Irish and it was 3-1 Blackhawks. In about 3 minutes it went 3-2, 4-2, 4-3.
I'm totally biased, but it has been epic. Both teams are great with strengths and weeknesses that align with the other team's strengths and weeknesses. Each team tends to carry the play for good stretches with the ebb and flow carrying over from game to game. Both teams have great individual players, but play with very different structure. I just wished I had DVR-ed the first four.
I watched some of the game last night, but I have a hard time getting into hockey on television when it is sunny and 70 degrees outside. I kind of wish their season was shifted a couple months earlier in the year. I think it'd be easier to transition into hockey going into fall than it is to stay interested in hockey going into the summer. If the Wild were involved, though, I'm sure I would be more interested.
He's clearly doing something right since I keep seeing him being mentioned as someone people think will be a target come the trade deadline.
Still, the Cards are proving with Mujica that there are a lot of so-so middle relievers that can be successful closers.
like, say, Todd Jones, to name one example of someone who made a buttload of money out of a mysterious hold on the closer role.
"You can stand there and look like an idiot or high-five the air like an idiot. I chose to high-five the air like an idiot."
That's pretty great.
Rain map: you can see that SBGville is in the 4 to 5 inch area and some areas around G-Town were in the eight inch range.
edit: oops can't get the map to work.
There was a guy north of G-Town who was swept away in the flood waters and killed this morning. Turns out it was the brother of Fran Materi, who is a twitter active Twins fan.
Good God, Ginobili has done some idiotic things in the last couple of games.
Yeah, he pretty well f*cked the spurs. At least i can still hate him now.
I was mostly apathetic to him for a long time, but I may have learned to dislike him today.
His flopping is what has long bothered me about his game. That's why i find it completely awful that Bosh and Battier (and James, really) now have two championships.
what a great series. Spurs had their chances, but could not overcome some bad outside shooting and lebron's greatness. and Battier. ZOMG, Battier.
Rick Bucher stopped sniffing Kobe's jock long enough tonight to write this
The rush to judgment and, in most cases inflate, everything LeBron and, to a lesser extent, the Heat, have done has long bothered me. The same barking dogs who fail to see the entire game and jump to anoint Danny Green a Finals' MVP candidate are at it again, rushing to decide here and now how LeBron compares to Kobe and MJ and everybody else with a multiple rings. That argument isn't any more ready to be made today than when it was first posed upon his arrival in the NBA. I applaud LeBron for his two championships. I truly applaud both he and the Heat for three straight runs to the Finals, a test of will and endurance and hunger that few have achieved and that I, admittedly, wasn't sure they had. I applaud LeBron, too, for accepting the responsibility that comes with being 6'9" and 270 pounds in the paint. But I can't forget that he still was peculiarly passive at times in this series. Even in Game 7, who set the tone? I'd argue it was Dwyane Wade, who shared the load of seeking out every mismatch and gap and aggressively exploiting it at key moments in the game. Wade, physically broken, sent a clear message with his multiple offensive rebounds on that one early possession. Wade tailored his offense to the player guarding him but never did he defer unless the situation called for it. (I had to laugh at the stats on how the Heat scored with Wade off the floor, ignoring who the Spurs had out there at the same time.) The harsh truth? LeBron *still* floated through parts of the game tonight and let the Spurs off the hook by dribbling out the shot clock or taking a stand-still jumper. Call it "hating" if you want; I call it not getting starry-eyed over the numbers and understanding that how and when a basket is scored and against whom adds or lessens value in the big picture of how a game unfolds. The great ones that I've seen don't have you repeatedly asking, "Why isn't he going at him?" I sense those who over-estimated what he did in Cleveland and when he first arrived in Miami are now gleefully looking at his two championships and saying, "See, I told you he was all that!" Only he wasn't. LeBron has evolved; the occasional lapses into who he once was provide the contrast. The growth is a credit to him, and those that drew it out of him. But let's hold off on the sweeping judgments about Game 7 or his place among the greats. It's safe to say he's the best player in the game today. Let's enjoy that. Let's hope he continues to evolve, because as amazing as it sounds, he *still* has room to grow. I, for one, look forward to watching it.
Rick Bucher thinks that we are no further along to decide LeBron's place in history after 10 years, 4 MVPs, 2 rings than we were when he came into the league? Really? He's nitpicking tonights game? What a clown.
Watching the game, I figured that was the nit that would be picked. The Spurs were giving LeBron space to shoot outside jump shots, so instead of stubbornly bowling his way into the paint, he took what the defense gave him and made them pay. (At least that's how I saw it.) For some, that's smart basketball and a show of versatility. For others, it's a lack of intestinal fortitude. I'd guess there's a big overlap between people who didn't like LeBron's game tonight, people who generally didn't like KG's play in Minnesota, and people who were always looking for Bonds to expand the strike zone during his HGH days.
Overall, I thought the game was terrific. The two teams seemed to really push each other to play better, which is really the whole point of getting the most talented guys into a league and playing them against one another.
That's a really long paragraph.
One interesting statistical presentation feature I noted and liked--on some of the small sample size percentage stats, say field goal percentage in games 1-6 compared to game 7, they would show the percentage if it was a medium-ish sample (like FG% in games 1-6) but they would give the FGs and attempts for game 7 (like 9-20) instead of the percentage (.450). It seems like a wonderful way to avoid everyone's tendency to extrapolate too much from a SSS percentage.
I went out to see the Zephyrs last night on free tickets from Dr. Chop's volunteer gig. The Z's were dominated at the plate all night, and played some pretty horrid defense. They were about to be shut out, down three runs in the ninth, and they loaded the bases. Their catcher came to the plate, and belted the first pitch he saw for a walk off grand slam. Awesome. I'm hoarse from all the yelling.
That sounds cool. I don't care what level you're watching. Town-ball, Indy league, AAA, Pros. A walk-off grand-slam from a 3-run deficit is awesome (or crushing).
Were there two outs?
1 out, and it was the kid's first {edit: walkoff} homerun. I high fived about 400 people. It was awesome.
I've been to a few Zephyrs games and they've always been fun.
Off to Wisconsin for the Weekend. Back Sunday night.
Someone take Friday Music Day, OK?
I'll cover FMD for you.
The iPhone blared a flash flood warning at me around 4:30 this morning. About 4" of rain in SBGville. North of 6" in G-Town, some unofficial reports put the rain totals closer to 8 inches here. Lift stations out; raw sewage in the factory, factory workers sent home. A foot of water running over the road on two state highways in three different spots.
More coming.
Rice crop looks good, though.
with or without the raw sewage? Kidding aside, holy crap. (no pun intended)
So, basketball. Game 7 tonight. This is a great night for the league. They have an absolutely terrific storyline and either team winning will be great for the league. This is David Stern's last NBA Finals game as commissioner. What a run for Mr. Stern. What a run for the Spurs over the last fifteen years. What a player LeBron is. What a game basketball is when played at the highest level.
As a fan, I am completely stoked.
And I will be in the car, unable to watch, making me sad.
Here's something to watch for in game 7:
Now that we've seen three years of it, I think we can say that Wade is just about the worst teammate (in terms of all-star caliber players) that LeBron could have. Also, what was Spoelstra doing benching Birdman for almost two games? That was ridiculous.
Also, read Zach Lowe's take on Game 6, which was one of the 5 best games I've ever seen, for sure.
As I said the other night, this world needs more Spoelstra-sadface.
Spoelstra should start only one of Mike Miller's shoes.
Who would be the best all-star caliber players to pair with LeBron?
Also, if David Stern declared that LeBron James had to switch teams from Miami to Minnesota effective tomorrow, where would you expect the Timberwolves to finish the 2013-2014 season?
Durant is the obvious answer, right? Almost as obvious as "Anyone-but-Carmelo".
I think Rubio would be a great PG to pair with LeBron- awesome defense, great passing and vision. The lack of shooting ability would allow for more double-teams on LBJ, but that's gonna happen anyhow.
LeBron on the Wolves- with an effective low-post tandem of Love and Pek and Rubio running point, that team should be in the Finals for sure (until everyone gets injured, as would surely happen).
Thanks for playing, gents. I appreciate the thoughts.
Oooh, I love these sorts of games.
Best all-star caliber player(s) to pair with LeBron?
LeBron is at his best with the ball in his hands, initiating the offense. He's ok otherwise (coming off screens, posting up, or the picker in the pick-and-roll), but he's world-class with the ball in his hands up top, where he can drive and dish or finish. He meshes well with a dominating defensive post player who can finish at the rim, but doesn't need a ton of post-up opportunities to keep him happy; and some spot-up shooters. He plays outstanding defense, and would pair well with other strong, on-ball defenders.
so, I'd team him up with Tyson Chandler or Joakim Noah at center, maybe a David Lee or David West at the 4, Klay Thompson at the 2 and someone like George Hill (solid ball handler, but not really a penetrate-and-dish ball dominator) at the point, and bring more shooters off the bench.
looking at my picks, I guess it is hard for me to be too critical of Miami's current roster. They lack a major rim protector (Birdman is about as close as they get), and Wade needs the ball a bit too much, but the rest of their complementary players fit the roles pretty well.
as for what would happen to the Wolves, they would immediately become Western Conference contenders, but would struggle from a lack of outside shooting. Unless Bud and Love come back fully healthy. Rubio would struggle a bit to mesh. He needs the ball to do what he does. But Peck would be a borderline all-star and feast on easy dunks.
The first hour-plus will be while I'm at work. Hopefully it's slow in there.
Yesterday, Joe Mauer saw fewer pitches (15) than any other player in the lineup. I wonder how many times in his career he has been in the starting lineup and had that happen.
Perfect: Sopranos Restaurant Pays a Touching Tribute to James Gandolfini.
Per fangraphs, Mauer has given the Twins $15.0 million of value this year. Albert Pujols has given the Angels $2.4 million.
Just a reminder in case you want to gripe about Mauer's deal or hear someone else doing it.
Souhan hopped on the "Mauer worth every penny" bandwagon on Sunday.
Whaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaat!
Well, at least he's able to see what's absolutely clear beyond a shadow of a doubt. That makes him smarter than Skip Bayless.
Yep.
That was... actually a pretty good article.
It was. I saw the large number of comments and couldn't help myself from investigating the trainwreck. This was my favorite: "Is their a bigger P/R guy for Mauer than Souhan." That's pretty rich.
I was also impressed with the Jhonny Peralta comparison without mentioning lineups.
If somebody's griping about Mauer's deal, citing something like that won't matter. People think what they want to think.
That's a little cynical. Not everyone is obstinate and argues against pure logic. Some people just have not been given the evidence and may just be parroting things they've heard. Which reminds me never to listen to The Common Man as long as I shall live. The effing tool just yells his original point even louder when presented with damning evidence.
It's an over-generalization, I admit. But I think it's true a lot of the time.
I am with Jeff A. It is called confirmation bias. We all overweight the things that agree with our original opinion and underweight those things that don't.
This is 10,000 percent true.
Last night, the NHL Finals had their third OT game in four tries and it's tied 2-2. I hadn't committed to seeing them, but now I sort of wish I had. Who's watching? Is it as crazy as the box scores look?
Last night was nuts. I got out of Irish and it was 3-1 Blackhawks. In about 3 minutes it went 3-2, 4-2, 4-3.
I'm totally biased, but it has been epic. Both teams are great with strengths and weeknesses that align with the other team's strengths and weeknesses. Each team tends to carry the play for good stretches with the ebb and flow carrying over from game to game. Both teams have great individual players, but play with very different structure. I just wished I had DVR-ed the first four.
I watched some of the game last night, but I have a hard time getting into hockey on television when it is sunny and 70 degrees outside. I kind of wish their season was shifted a couple months earlier in the year. I think it'd be easier to transition into hockey going into fall than it is to stay interested in hockey going into the summer. If the Wild were involved, though, I'm sure I would be more interested.
Minnesota Twins closer Glen Perkins is Helping Fans Forget Joe Nathan
He's clearly doing something right since I keep seeing him being mentioned as someone people think will be a target come the trade deadline.
Still, the Cards are proving with Mujica that there are a lot of so-so middle relievers that can be successful closers.
like, say, Todd Jones, to name one example of someone who made a buttload of money out of a mysterious hold on the closer role.
"You can stand there and look like an idiot or high-five the air like an idiot. I chose to high-five the air like an idiot."
That's pretty great.
Rain map: you can see that SBGville is in the 4 to 5 inch area and some areas around G-Town were in the eight inch range.
edit: oops can't get the map to work.
There was a guy north of G-Town who was swept away in the flood waters and killed this morning. Turns out it was the brother of Fran Materi, who is a twitter active Twins fan.
Good God, Ginobili has done some idiotic things in the last couple of games.
Yeah, he pretty well f*cked the spurs. At least i can still hate him now.
I was mostly apathetic to him for a long time, but I may have learned to dislike him today.
His flopping is what has long bothered me about his game. That's why i find it completely awful that Bosh and Battier (and James, really) now have two championships.
what a great series. Spurs had their chances, but could not overcome some bad outside shooting and lebron's greatness. and Battier. ZOMG, Battier.
Rick Bucher stopped sniffing Kobe's jock long enough tonight to write this
Rick Bucher thinks that we are no further along to decide LeBron's place in history after 10 years, 4 MVPs, 2 rings than we were when he came into the league? Really? He's nitpicking tonights game? What a clown.
Watching the game, I figured that was the nit that would be picked. The Spurs were giving LeBron space to shoot outside jump shots, so instead of stubbornly bowling his way into the paint, he took what the defense gave him and made them pay. (At least that's how I saw it.) For some, that's smart basketball and a show of versatility. For others, it's a lack of intestinal fortitude. I'd guess there's a big overlap between people who didn't like LeBron's game tonight, people who generally didn't like KG's play in Minnesota, and people who were always looking for Bonds to expand the strike zone during his HGH days.
Overall, I thought the game was terrific. The two teams seemed to really push each other to play better, which is really the whole point of getting the most talented guys into a league and playing them against one another.
That's a really long paragraph.
One interesting statistical presentation feature I noted and liked--on some of the small sample size percentage stats, say field goal percentage in games 1-6 compared to game 7, they would show the percentage if it was a medium-ish sample (like FG% in games 1-6) but they would give the FGs and attempts for game 7 (like 9-20) instead of the percentage (.450). It seems like a wonderful way to avoid everyone's tendency to extrapolate too much from a SSS percentage.