Monthly Archives: June 2017

Keeping Track

Happy Birthday–June 6

Ed McKean (1864)
Fresco Thompson (1902)
Bill Dickey (1907)
Wild Bill Wright (1914)
Hector Espino (1939)
Merv Rettenmund (1943)
Bud Harrelson (1944)
Bobby Randall (1948)
Dave Bergman (1953)
Max Venable (1957)
Tony Graffanino (1972)
Brooks Kieschnick (1972)
David Lamb (1975)
Mark Ellis (1977)
Jeremy Affeldt (1979)
Matt Belisle (1980)

 Wild Bill Wright was a star in the Negro Leagues in the 1930s and 1940s.

Hector Espino is considered the greatest player in the history of the Mexican League, hitting 453 home runs there.

Continue reading Happy Birthday–June 6 →

First Monday Book Day

FMMD – The Economist

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First Monday Book Magazine Day - The Economist

I’ve been a subscriber to The Economist for many years. I like that it has kind of an external view of things (a different perspective than what I read in the daily online broadsheets). I also watch BBC World News.

I usually get it in the mail on Saturday, and a goal has been to get through the prior week’s version before the next one shows up (a goal often missed). In fact, one time I got so backed up that I cancelled the subscription, but then caved and re-upped. I’m at parity this week.

It’s where I often learn new words, like Iftar (first meal after Ramadan), bête noire (a person or thing that one dislikes), liguica (Portuguese smoked sausage with garlic), poisson d'avril (April fool), civvy street (civilian life).

I generally share the world views of The Economist editors (open markets, free trade, cultural liberalism).

I read The Economist from back to front (the obituary, world market charts, exotic job postings, book reviews, articles about natural selection (in markets, economies, insect-world, shopping behavior, etc.), then country-specific blats, and if I can’t get to the first part (recent news) that’s OK as I’ve heard all of that stuff on the Internet or radio.

They’ve got some standing opinion columns I enjoy – Johnson writes about language (e.g. Oxford comma – “We invited the strippers, JFK, and Stalin.” “We invited the strippers, JFK and Stalin.”) Schumpeter (business), Babbage (technology), Buttonwood (Finance), Lexington (US stuff), Charlemagne (EU stuff), Bagehot (British stuff).

As an analytics guy, I like their charts/graphs. Big Mac index is good. I find it interesting how they selectively pick which countries to include on their graphs. I’ve made several investment decisions based on their articles (SQM – huge win; NBG – win but right before Greece went kaput; and several disasters - genomics  startups comes to mind).

So, WGOM peeps, what books/magazines are you reading?

Keeping Track

Happy Birthday–June 5

Jack Chesbro (1874)
Eddie Joost (1916)
Lou Brissie (1924)
Duke Sims (1941)
Bill Spiers (1966)
Ray Lankford (1967)
Mike Coolbaugh (1972)
Russ Ortiz (1974)

Prior to beginning his major league career, Lou Brissie served in World War II.  He suffered severe leg injuries, receiving the Bronze Star and two Purple Hearts, but overcame his injuries to spend seven years in the majors.

Mike Coolbaugh was the first base coach for the Tulsa Drillers when he was struck on the head with a line drive and killed.

There appear to be no major league players with connections to the Minnesota Twins born on this day.

2017 Twins Game Logs

Game 53: Twins at Angels

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Jose Berrios vs. Ricky Nolasco, 2:37 p.m.

This is one crazy sport. The Twins have been having the worst time figuring out the back of their rotation. Adalberto Mejia and Kyle Gibson started the first 2 games of this series basically by default because the Twins had no one in the minors even close to being capable of replacing them. So of course, both pitched well and the Twins won the first 2 games of the series, although it took a 9th-inning rally in the first game, but only because the Twins' offense was stymied for the first 8 innings.

In Game 3 of the series, the Twins sent out Ervin Santana, who has been pitching unbelievably well to start the season. The Angels' offense is missing superstar Mike Trout and Cameron Maybin and struggled against Mejia and Gibson, so with Santana on pace to set a record for fewest hits allowed in a season, I was wondering if he might get his second no-hitter of his career. Of course, the Angels hit 3 home runs, including a grand slam by Albert Pujols for No. 600, to knock Santana out early (although I'm sure Jeff A would argue that Santana could have stayed in longer and I wouldn't have disagreed.)

So the good news is it is Berrios vs. Nolasco. The bad news is the pitching matchups have not gone according to what you would think they should based on the results this season coming into the game. I guess that's why they play the game.

Nolasco, of course, is a former Twin. His results have not been good for the Angels. Twins fans will most likely think that it's just Ricky being Ricky, however, one difference is that Nolasco's high ERA is actually better than his FIP, which has not been the case for Nolasco throughout his career, including his tenure with the Twins. While his K rate has increased slightly, so has his walk rate and his home run rate has really jumped.

Hopefully, the Twins will help that ERA continue to climb. Of course, even better would be seeing Berrios getting back to being dominant and taking advantage of a weakened Angels lineup.