A Quick Look at the Newest Player to Join the Dodger Organization, Jeremy Hazelbaker

The Dodgers dealt Alex Castellanos to Boston today for a AAA outfielder, Jeremy Hazelbaker.  When Alexander Guerrero was signed two days ago, the Dodgers freed up a position on the 40-man roster by designating Castellanos for assignment.  This trade isn’t surprising to me.  This is a swap of minor league outfielders and Hazelbaker brings some upside, which is speed.  He stole 37 bags at Pawtucket last season.

So the mid-season deal two years ago where the Dodgers traded Rafael Furcal to the Cardinals now results in Hazelbaker in the Dodger organization.  Since he’s not on the 40-man, he’ll need to impress the organization if he wishes to play some in Los Angeles next year.  Hazelbaker has 4 years of minor league seasoning and is 26 years old.  He’s a lifetime .258 hitter and he has played all three outfield positions.  Lately mostly in LF.

A native of Muncie, Indiana.  So there’s always that connection with Don Mattingly, though that’s a 230 mile jaunt from Don’s Evansville, IN home.  Hazelbaker is a tall lanky kid, at 6’3”, 200 lbs.  He’s a lefthanded batter that graduated from Ball State.  Scouts report that he haa a tendency to strike out a lot, but that beats banging into DPs.  It’ll be interesting to see what the Dodgers hitting gurus of Valentin and McGwire can do for him.

Attached are some articles from the PawSox minor league blog.  Linked HERE

This is an excellent site that includes a few video clips from last year, where Jeremy was interviewed.  He seems to be an enthusiastic and positive kid.  Hopefully his adjustment to the Dodger organization will go smoothly.  He spent last off-season  playing for Obregon in the Mexican League.  

Hazelbaker has that classic pretty left-handed swing follow through.(photo by Kelly O'Connor/PawSoxblog.mlblogs.com)

Below is the four year old scouting report on Hazelbaker when he was drafted in 2009.  I'm not sure if there is improvement in some of his weaker areas.  Interestingly, the ceiling that was predicted back then seems to be fairly accurate.:

Outfielder with a filled-out athletic frame and plus speed. Hazelbaker had a breakout year at Ball State in 2009, showing an excellent ability to make contact. Turns on the ball well, drops the head of the bat on the ball nicely and creates good lift. Swing can be on the long side. Struggles with fastballs on the inner third. Solid-average power potential. Hit tools plays down due to poor recognition of secondary pitches. Has a lot of trouble with breaking balls and struggles against left-handed pitching. Hazelbaker gets out of the box well and has excellent instincts on the base paths. Improving with his reads and jumps. Potential impact runner on the bases. Defensively, Hazelbaker has above-average range, but tends to freeze on contact and takes poor routes to the ball. Does not see the ball well off the bat. Fringe-average arm strength. Speed to play center field, but profiles as a left fielder. Ceiling of a decent fourth outfielder, but may end up as an up-and-down player due to pitch recognition.

It should be noted that for three consecutive season, Hazelbaker progressed nicely through the Red Sox organization, with OPSpver .800. This past season was his first regression, as his OPS decreased to .687 and he struggled against AAA pitching.  One thing in Hazelbaker's game that hasn't regressed is his speed, and 37 out of 44 SB attempts attests to that.  

The Boston Globe’s Craig Forde wrote, “He [Hazelbaker] needs to improve his patience and cut down on the first-pitch swings that seem to almost always result into outs for him and he needs to improve at recognizing pitches which should help tie everything together.”

Baseball America has this to say : “Hazelbaker can go from the left side of the plate to first base in less than 4.0 seconds on a bunt and his speed rates a 70 on the 20-80 scouting scale. In addition to sheer quickness, he also possesses the best baserunning instincts in the system. More than just a speedster, also has plus raw power to his pull side.”

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Final World Series thought...

Carlos Beltran banged his ribs against the right field wall while making a home run saving catch in the second inning of Game 1 of the World Series tonight.  He couldn’t continue playing after returning to the dugout between innings.  The Cardinal training staff announced that he suffered a right rib contusion, which was the exact same thing the Dodgers diagnosed Hanley Ramirez with initially after he was hit with a pitch in game one of the NLCS.

Looks to me that he might have to play the remainder of the series with a possible cracked rib.  If the Cardinals are smart, they’ll get x-rays and an MRI immediately and not wait until tomorrow when Beltran wakes up and is unable to move.

After all the whining and crying from the Cardinals regarding the Dodgers celebrating some of their positive moments on the field during the NLCS,  which was as hypocritical as all get out, I really have a hard time feeling sorry for them.

Nobody wishes injuries on anybody, and I certainly don’t for Beltran.  But just once, I see some poetic justice in baseball this year, and immediately after St. Louis benefitted from the injury to Hanley Ramirez.   I believe that injury was the biggest factor in costing the Dodgers the series.

                           

It Appears that the Dodger Managerial Position is Up in the Air

This photo from today's press conference really tells it all.  The Dodgers and Mattingly appear to not be close to an agreement. (photo by Nick Ut/AP)

Just when you think Dan Mattingly will be manager for he next few years, the Dodgers hold a press conference and the stability of the situation is shown to be anything but that.  In what some may consider to be a moment of career suicide, Don Mattingly let the world know that he isn't happy with the one-year contract that automatically vested for him for next season after the Dodgers defeated Atlanta in the NLDS.  Apparently Dodger ownership is reluctant to give him more than one year.

"This has been a frustrating, tough year, honestly," he said.  "You come in basically as a lame duck manager, and with the payroll and the guys you have, you make it tough in the clubhouse, put me in a spot where you're basically trying out, auditioning.  Can you manage or not manage?  To me we're three years in.  We're at the point where you know or you don't."

Mattingly's got a point.  After three years, you can fish or cut bait.  I like the man.  He's a wonderful interview and about as nice a guy as you'll find in the game, but we saw how he was seriously lacking as a manager with in-game strategy.  Don's rather predictable.  He doesn't manage according to sabermetric guidelines.  He loves the double switch.  He's quick to give up outs, often setting up situations where the bat is removed from his best hitter via intentional walk.  His handling of his bullpen is questionable.  We've seen what he is as a field manager and I'm ready for the team to go in another direction.  Jim Leyland is out there.  What a find he would be.

So that's where we are on this Monday after elimination Friday.  Though Colletti said that the situation would be resolved soon, ("It's going to be resolved rather quickly," he said),  it sure seemed strange that they went into this presser, knowing full well that questions about Mattingly's future would be asked and neither of them had a concrete answer on the subject.

The Dodgers will have organizational meetings the next five days.  Maybe we'll get some answers during that time with regard to the field manager and the coaches.  Several writers are speculating that Mattingly is as good as gone and that his comments will be found as offensive to the Dodgers ownership group.  With Managerial openings in Washington, Cincinnati and Detroit, all locations close to Mattingly Evansville, Indiana home, maybe he believes he can land a position somewhere closer to his roots and family.

"I don't want to be anywhere I'm not wanted," he said today.  Those words can't be well received by Stan Kasten and the Guggenheim Group.

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Alexander Guerrero, the Cuban infielder who was rumored twice before to have signed with the Dodgers a few months back appears to officially now have inked a deal with Los Angeles.  It is reported to be a 4-year pact for $28 million that can actually earn him $32 million if incentives are reached.  Represented by Scott Boras, the superstar agent has ensured that Guerrero will be 31 years old when he reaches free-agency, and ideal situation for him if he excels as expected.

Guerrero is a power hitting infielder that had been blackballed from the Cuban national team since it was suspected that he wanted to defect.  Working out at the Campo Las Palmas facility the Dodgers have in the Dominican Republic, the Cuban refugee accepted the Dodger's offer over those from other suiters.

Scouts question his arm and whether it is strong enough for the shortstop position at the major league level, but few question if  he can handle second base.  Guerrero is slated to play winter ball this off-season, probably in the Dominican, as no hint has been made that he'd head over to Arizona for the Fall League.  Geuerrero turns 27 years old this December, so his baseball development is beyond the raw skills that we all experienced watching with Yasiel Puig this past year.

The signing of Guerrero does not completely doom Mark Ellis' future with the Dodgers.  Ellis' option is for $5.5 million this next season.  The Dodgers just may re-sign him and allow him to battle Guerrero for the position.  We all know the solid defense second baseman Ellis is.  Perhaps the Dodgers are keen on having both players in the roster next season.

Shoulda Been This Year

I had to work this Sunday morning and it was tough to go in.  Being the first work day since elimination day, I didn't look forward to it  Though I had made an effort to not boast and keep quiet regarding my Dodgers allegiance during post-season play, there are some that were simply waiting for the chance to talk smack about the Dodgers falling short.

You see, these are the dreary days of autumn having come fresh off a post-season disappointment knowing full well that it'll be months of Dodger-less news and no games to sit back and enjoy.   The wonderful thing about baseball is that there is almost always a tomorrow after a tough loss.  That isn't the case in October, and that's what makes post-season baseball so difficult.  The recovery takes weeks if not months.  Coincidently it's also the time of year where I know that my work ramps up to a crescendo of unpleasant tasks, making the fall and winter by far my least favorite times of the year.

So I got to work this morning and parked my car and there it was again, another vehicle with one of these license plate frames on it.  It was as if it was taunting me.  Poking fun at me.  A "neener-neerner-neener" moment.

They're all over the place and they aren't going away.  I wanted to witness another Dodger World Championship in the worst way, mainly just to shut up the Giant faithful that take a particularly macabre joy in watching the Dodgers fail to advance to the fall classic.  But mainly because I wanted to put one of the World Championship frames on my vehicle.

Next came their inevitable boasting.  The emails and social media taunts from "friends" had started up shortly after the loss of Friday, essentially twisting that knife in a fresh wound.  It was done simply because they could, and that's what they do best.  Kick people when they're down.  I'll never get it and I never will.  They call it "schadenfreude."  Getting a thrill out of someone else's misery.  Schadenfreude is the basis and the backbone of the mentality of San Francisco Giants fans.  So many years where they fell short, (fifty-six years to be exact without a World Series championship they went).  There wasn't a lot to celebrate so they sought out what the considered the next best thing: watching the Dodgers fail to win championships.  

They developed their schadenfreude mentality to an art form.   It advanced to the point that watching the Dodgers lose was more joyful than seeing their team succeed.  I witnessed it one night at chilly Candlestick Park in 1996.  The Giants were losing and completely out of the pennant race, but when the out of town scoreboard posted a Dodger loss, the 13,000 fans let out a cheer in jubilation.  You'd have thought they won the pennant.

So now that they've won a couple of titles you'd think that they would be above that schadenfreudism.  You'd think so, but it isn't the case.  What a bunch of losers.

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Following this Dodger team with such passion is painful.  I didn't enjoy the playoffs.  That was torture from start to finish.  The Dodgers went 5-5 in this post-season, but it felt like it was 2-8.  Never in my life have I second-guessed a manager as I did this time around.  It probably had to do with the desperation to get that San Francisco monkey off my back.

It'll be another year, and I wonder how many of these I can take.  Twenty-six years now, and the Kirk Gibson footage looks grainier and grainier.  Isn't there some high definition footage of that home run somewhere?  Heck, Ronald Reagan was President and steroids hadn't even made a dent on the baseball records yet.  My daughter mentioned it when watching the footage once, "Why are the players so skinny dad?"

2014 seems so far away.  Another 162 games to go through against some western diviison opponents that really have an axe to grind.  They want to do us serious damage.  It's not easy to get within two games of a World Series.  It's only happened once to the Dodgers in the last 26 years.  They were never closer and now, they have to start from square one.

 So while others talk about what a fine season it was and how the team needs to be proud, I have a hard time accepting that.  This team was very close to that ultimate goal.  Yes, the injuries were a lot to overcome, but with Kershaw on the mound with plenty of rest, I simply expected much more than what happened in game six of the NLCS.  As Dodger fans, I believe that we should all be expecting more.  This fan base deserves a championship.  The time is now.  Colletti will get to work to rebuild the roster again and the hot stove debates will begin, but I'm not over the sting of this loss.  This should have been their year.  I HATE that "wait till next year" saying.  This should have been the year that we were making preparations to attend a downtown L.A. parade.

Giamatti's Wisdom

He wrote it in 1977, on the very day that his beloved Red Sox were eliminated from post-season play on the last day of the season.  Yes, it is centered around the Red Sox, but the poignant words apply to all baseball fans that mourn on the day their team is eliminated and reality sets in that the season is over and a long winter of baseball-less nights awaits.

From A Great and Glorious Game: Baseball Writings of A. Bartlett Giamatti
"The Green Fields of the Mind "

It breaks your heart. It is designed to break your heart. The game begins in the spring, when everything else begins again, and it blossoms in the summer, filling the afternoons and evenings, and then as soon as the chill rains come, it stops and leaves you to face the fall alone. You count on it, rely on it to buffer the passage of time, to keep the memory of sunshine and high skies alive, and then just when the days are all twilight, when you need it most, it stops. Today, October 2, a Sunday of rain and broken branches and leaf-clogged drains and slick streets, it stopped, and summer was gone.

Somehow, the summer seemed to slip by faster this time. Maybe it wasn't this summer, but all the summers that, in this my fortieth summer, slipped by so fast. There comes a time when every summer will have something of autumn about it. Whatever the reason, it seemed to me that I was investing more and more in baseball, making the game do more of the work that keeps time fat and slow and lazy. I was counting on the game's deep patterns, three strikes, three outs, three times three innings, and its deepest impulse, to go out and back, to leave and to return home, to set the order of the day and to organize the daylight. I wrote a few things this last summer, this summer that did not last, nothing grand but some things, and yet that work was just camouflage. The real activity was done with the radio--not the all-seeing, all-falsifying television--and was the playing of the game in the only place it will last, the enclosed green field of the mind. There, in that warm, bright place, what the old poet called Mutability does not so quickly come.

But out here, on Sunday, October 2, where it rains all day, Dame Mutability never loses. She was in the crowd at Fenway yesterday, a gray day full of bluster and contradiction, when the Red Sox came up in the last of the ninth trailing Baltimore 8-5, while the Yankees, rain-delayed against Detroit, only needing to win one or have Boston lose one to win it all, sat in New York washing down cold cuts with beer and watching the Boston game. Boston had won two, the Yankees had lost two, and suddenly it seemed as if the whole season might go to the last day, or beyond, except here was Boston losing 8-5, while New York sat in its family room and put its feet up. Lynn, both ankles hurting now as they had in July, hits a single down the right-field line. The crowd stirs. It is on its feet. Hobson, third baseman, former Bear Bryant quarterback, strong, quiet, over 100 RBIs, goes for three breaking balls and is out. The goddess smiles and encourages her agent, a canny journeyman named Nelson Briles.
Now comes a pinch hitter, Bernie Carbo, onetime Rookie of the Year, erratic, quick, a shade too handsome, so laid-back he is always, in his soul, stretched out in the tall grass, one arm under his head, watching the clouds and laughing; now he looks over some low stuff unworthy of him and then, uncoiling, sends one out, straight on a rising line, over the center-field wall, no cheap Fenway shot, but all of it, the physics as elegant as the arc the ball describes.

New England is on its feet, roaring. The summer will not pass. Roaring, they recall the evening, late and cold, in 1975, the sixth game of the World Series, perhaps the greatest baseball game played in the last fifty years, when Carbo, loose and easy, had uncoiled to tie the game that Fisk would win. It is 8-7, one out, and school will never start, rain will never come, sun will warm the back of your neck forever. Now Bailey, picked up from the National League recently, big arms, heavy gut, experienced, new to the league and the club; he fouls off two and then, checking, tentative, a big man off balance, he pops a soft liner to the first baseman. It is suddenly darker and later, and the announcer doing the game coast to coast, a New Yorker who works for a New York television station, sounds relieved. His little world, well-lit, hot-combed, split-second-timed, had no capacity to absorb this much gritty, grainy, contrary reality.

Cox swings a bat, stretches his long arms, bends his back, the rookie from Pawtucket who broke in two weeks earlier with a record six straight hits, the kid drafted ahead of Fred Lynn, rangy, smooth, cool. The count runs two and two, Briles is cagey, nothing too good, and Cox swings, the ball beginning toward the mound and then, in a jaunty, wayward dance, skipping past Briles, feinting to the right, skimming the last of the grass, finding the dirt, moving now like some small, purposeful marine creature negotiating the green deep, easily avoiding the jagged rock of second base, traveling steady and straight now out into the dark, silent recesses of center field.

The aisles are jammed, the place is on its feet, the wrappers, the programs, the Coke cups and peanut shells, the doctrines of an afternoon; the anxieties, the things that have to be done tomorrow, the regrets about yesterday, the accumulation of a summer: all forgotten, while hope, the anchor, bites and takes hold where a moment before it seemed we would be swept out with the tide. Rice is up. Rice whom Aaron had said was the only one he'd seen with the ability to break his records. Rice the best clutch hitter on the club, with the best slugging percentage in the league. Rice, so quick and strong he once checked his swing halfway through and snapped the bat in two. Rice the Hammer of God sent to scourge the Yankees, the sound was overwhelming, fathers pounded their sons on the back, cars pulled off the road, households froze, New England exulted in its blessedness, and roared its thanks for all good things, for Rice and for a summer stretching halfway through October. Briles threw, Rice swung, and it was over. One pitch, a fly to center, and it stopped. Summer died in New England and like rain sliding off a roof, the crowd slipped out of Fenway, quickly, with only a steady murmur of concern for the drive ahead remaining of the roar. Mutability had turned the seasons and translated hope to memory once again. And, once again, she had used baseball, our best invention to stay change, to bring change on.

That is why it breaks my heart, that game--not because in New York they could win because Boston lost; in that, there is a rough justice, and a reminder to the Yankees of how slight and fragile are the circumstances that exalt one group of human beings over another. It breaks my heart because it was meant to, because it was meant to foster in me again the illusion that there was something abiding, some pattern and some impulse that could come together to make a reality that would resist the corrosion; and because, after it had fostered again that most hungered-for illusion, the game was meant to stop, and betray precisely what it promised.

Of course, there are those who learn after the first few times. They grow out of sports. And there are others who were born with the wisdom to know that nothing lasts. These are the truly tough among us, the ones who can live without illusion, or without even the hope of illusion. I am not that grown-up or up-to-date. I am a simpler creature, tied to more primitive patterns and cycles. I need to think something lasts forever, and it might as well be that state of being that is a game; it might as well be that, in a green field, in the sun.

Dodgers Fall Two Games Short in Embarrassing Finale in St. Louis

So I'm sitting in my living room, watching the Dodger season fade away as the boys in blue trail 9-0 in an embarrassment of epic proportions.  The TBS announcers have been making things worse with their constant reminders of the Dodger foibles.  I guess you can't blame them, they are simply calling the action.  Perhaps I'm overly sensitive having lived and died with this team since the first pitch at Spring training by Hyun-Jin Ryu, (that I personally witnessed at Camelback Ranch).

Kershaw's worst start of the year couldn't coincided with his most important start of his career. (photo by Jeff Curry.USA Today Sports)

Clayton Kershaw will without a doubt have to live with having pitched the worst game in his career on the night when everyone recognized that it was the most important start of his career.  That, my friends, is going to be hard to live with.  It'll also be something that will haunt him until he does win the big one.  I hate for a great player like Kershaw to be the kind of guy that is constantly reminded of that failure, but such is the world of sports.

The Yasiel Puig bashers are having a field day.  Both on TBS and on twitter.  There is little doubt that Puig has had better days, and the two errors attest to that.  But the joy they get in his failures is something that irks to no end.  Puig is an amazing talent and he'll recover, but he'll also continue to make mistakes.  That tends to happen with players that play with reckless abandon and have little seasoning.  I just hope that fans will be patient with him and not expect that next season he'll magically turn into that mature major leaguer that never makes mistakes. Remember, the kid has been learning the major league ropes on the fly while making his way through the majors in his first go-around.  It has been quite an exciting run for the kid.

Players that probably won't be back:

 1) Mark Ellis, even though he has one year and $5.75 million remaining on his contract, I see Ellis being moved or released.  He'll be age 37 next season.  The rumors of Alexander Guerrero seem to attest to the fact that the Dodgers are looking in another direction.  

2) Juan Uribe, because his contract is up and I highly doubt he accepts a one year deal, which is the only contract the Dodgers should offer him.  His production in contract years seems to be a recurring situation.  It was a great comeback year for him, but Uribe will be 34 years old next season. 

3) Nick Punto, is a free agent and at age 36, it's time to let the little Pony ride off to another team, if there are takers.  

4) Jerry Hairston Jr., also he needs to retire.  It was a nice career.  He played one year too many. 

5) Michael Young, at 37 he's another retirement candidate.  It was a good career for the versatile infielder, but his bat isn't as quick as it once was and he's a DP machine now.  

6) Ricky Nolasco will seek a multi-year deal (probably 4 years) in the $45 million range.  He'll probably not accept a home town discount if there's a team out there willing to guarantee him a number 3 slot with big money.   That team shouldn't be the Dodgers. 

7) Brian Wilson, what a great acquisition.  He's still a closer and unless the Dodgers agree to hand that role over to him, he'll get a multi-year deal with a team that agrees to hand him the ball in the 9th inning.  I wish they could work something out, but his success pretty much guarantees that he'll seek a closer job elsewhere.   I hope he doesn't come back to haunt us.

8) One of the three outfielders should be dealt, with the Dodgers paying a ton of his salary, Ethier, Crawford or Kemp.  I just get the feeling that they don't want to go into the season next year with the turmoil that could be created by four guys vying for three spots.  Of course, injuries may resolve this dilemma once again, so maybe they'll stay.  One thing for sure though, they'll need better production from all three.  It's fair to say that all three disappointed.

9) Skip Schumaker, also a free agent in 2014.  He isn't anything other than an above average utility-man with little power.  A nice team guy and team player, so maybe he re-signs, but Schumaker will be 34 next season also.  

That's nine players off the roster, and some important ones as well.  In the months that come, we'll be debating the areas of weakness and the things the Dodgers must do to advance at least two games further and into the World Series.  It is painful to come so close.  A little better luck In the injury department and this team could have gone all the way.  Hopefully 2014 provides better fortune on that front. 

A thank you to the readers this season.  All the tweets, comments and support were really appreciated.  At 200,000 strong, it is amazing the growth over the years as I try to provide my personal analysis of this team we all love.  it's not always easy.  I wish I was in a position to do this full time, and one day in the not too distant future, I hope that will be the case.  (Retirement is on the horizon...but still a few years away).   Here's to a great off-season and just think,  it's less than 120 days until pitchers and catchers report to Camelback Ranch.

We'll be warming up the hot stove shortly after the World Series.  

Congratulations the the St. Louis Cardinals for their pennant winning season.

All For the Marbles, Part I

On “Do or Die Friday” the Dodgers put their ace on the mound before the whining St. Louis Cardinals and their fans who seem to be obsessed with the fact that it is somehow unprofessional for a team to celebrate when they do something well on the field.  That is unless they themselves are doing the celebrating, of course.

Never have I lost so much respect for an organization in such a short period of time as with the Cardinals organization that has essentially self-annointed themselves as the “class of baseball.”  All to which I say, “phooey!”  Their fans and players have been whining since day one of this series.  They have shown a complete misunderstanding of the modern game and they could really use an education in cultural differences as well when you consider their comments on Puig.  There is also a serious hypocritical slant to their words and actions as well.

St. Louis has had a lot more to celebrate this series than the Dodgers, and they haven’t backed off from dancing, fist pumping, elevating arms and hip gyrations from game one on.  Yet, not a word of complaint has been uttered from the Dodger dugout because they understand that is part of the game.  All you need to do is look at the highlight clips and such Cardinal players as Molina, Carpenter, Kelly, Wacha, Rosenthal, Freese and others that have engaged in celebratory activity that isn’t any less boisterous than that of the Dodgers.

I really wanted to avoid this topic altogether, due to the silliness of it, but it hasn’t gone away and Bob Nightengale's USA Today columnn today really took the cake.   Where do the Cardinals get off at crowning themselves as the authors of the un-written rules of baseball?  They come off as whiners and cry-babies.  Perhaps they can use those white towels they waive to wipe away their tears tonight.

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The Dodgers present a starting lineup void of shortstop Hanley Ramirez, who probably can’t loosen up enough to play in this cold weather which is said to dip into the fifties and perhaps upper fourties tonight.   This broken rib condition is something that will probably shut down Ramirez for the remainder of post season play.   Additionally there is a 30% chance of showers.  So it’ll be Clayton Kershaw trying to keep the Cardinals off the scoreboard, with hopes that the Dodgers can put up two or three runs.  That should be enough to hold them off, but you never know how this crazy game will play out.

So grab your rabbit’s foot, rosary beads, or anything thing that you deem worthy of providing good fortune to the L.A. nine tonight.  This one promises to be a real nail-biter.  Wouldn’t have it any other way.
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UPDATE:  Hanley Ramirez has been inserted into the Dodger lineup.  Apparently he has loosened up and been swinging the bat in the batting cages underneath the stadium.  A very interesting development.

A Well Needed Day Off From Post-Season Baseball

There’s nothing like a day off and day of rest following a post-season play victory.  It allows the emotional batteries to be recharged.  It’s good for the soul.  I can’t deny that my ticker could use a break for a day as well.

Juan Uribe watches his game winning NLDS homer as delirious fans in the background explode in euphoric excitement.

Post-season play is what we aspire to each year, but when it arrives, I’m seldom ready for it.  It’s just that there is so much on the line and after 162 contests, it’s hard to find solace in the fact that a simple break of two could render those previous 162 as meaningless.  For that reason baseball is far and away the most heartbreaking sport in the world.  Nobody plays so many games in a season.  No fans invest more time in following the sport as well.

Baseball fans are an interesting lot.  They’re far more cerebral than those following football, basketball or hockey.  The baseball fan invests time and brain capacity into their fandom.  We’re the stat mongers and the ones always looking for that minute little edge that would push our team past others in the standings.  We debate the small stuff until our throats are hoarse.  Can you imagine a football fan discussing the decision to punt on 4^th and one plays on their opponents 39 year line, or to risk it all and go for it in such scenarios.  Football fans go by emotion.  They don’t think, they just react.  Good baseball fans are analysts who methodically think things through.  We're so much different.

There's no way a football fan discusses the nuances and acute strategies of the game like we do.  I could start a thread on the sacrifice bunt on a popular baseball message board and get hundreds of responses from stat analysts discussing with passion whether players should hit behind the runner, bunt or swing away.  We are the nerds of sport.  We’re the smart ones and the most passionate ones.  We’re the fans that live and die with our sport.  Baseball fans are those that need to get an anti-depressant prescription each October when our team is eliminated.

I’d hate to add up all the hours that I have spent on the game because I’m fairly certain that years of my life have engaged in watching the sport.  Okay, I lied.  I like statistics and I have no problem crunching the numbers.  Being that statistical analyst that I am, I just did a conservative calculation and I figured that I have spent AT LEAST 2.31 years watching baseball games in my life.  That figure surpasses my hours attending school and getting an education (and I have an advanced degree).  It also exceeds  the hours I have spent eating, driving, gardening, talking on the phone, shopping. reading, and cooking, (most things that  I enjoy doing).

Steve Finley's 2004 division clinching grand slam.

We are baseball geeks, savants, nerds,  and gurus.  There will be some that will state that we’ve wasted a good portion of our life away.  There’s probably some truth to that.  We were groomed by over-the-line, wiffle ball, baseball cards, Strat-o-matic, Vin Scully and Bill James  Reality is that the joys experienced when baseball goes our way are treasured throughout our lives and discussed for decades.  We Dodger fans all know where we were when Gibson’s shot was hit, Big D and Orel's broke the scoreless streak record, Sandy's perfecto was thrown and Finley's slam was lofted into the RF Pavilion.  The low points make us better persons in the long run and are growth opportunities.  And guess what?  There’s always next year too.

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Conversation with my wife yesterday:

Her: “I want to see “Captain Phillips” (new motion picture with Tom Hanks) this Saturday, you want to go?”

Me:  “  Um…uh,…”

Her: “Oh that’s right, the Dodgers.  That’s more important than going to the movie with me, right?”

Me: “Let me see if I understand you correctly.  I watch 162 games a year and that’s not counting spring training.  On top of that there’s hours writing on the blog, more hours participating in Dodger related discussion boards, watching pre-and post-game shows, listening to sports talk radio, reading  days and days worth of material on the team.   You rarely ever complain about the time I put in to all that.  All of this leading up to the playoffs and World Series that the Dodgers haven’t qualified for lately.  So on Saturday, when the Dodgers are probably playing their most important game in a quarter of a decade, a game determining if they make it to the World Series for the first time in 25 years, you want me to go to a movie that I’ve never heard of.”

Her: "Only if you love me… (after a long pause)…the game's at night, right?  Maybe we can go to the 11:00 AM showing.”

Me: "Absolutely."