Why the Democrats are wrong and other meanderings

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Location: Metro Phoenix, Arizona, United States

I'm too lazy to type anything about me. Read my blog and I'm sure you'll eventually learn a few things.

Thursday, July 13, 2006

Mid-Season Baseball Notes

As the All Star Game has come and gone, I figure I'll type up some thoughts on how the season has gone. I made some predictions for the season here, and, well, they haven't been very good (though a majority of my playoff picks being right is still a possiblity).

I've held on to first place in my fantasy baseball league for awhile, though the good doctor pulled up right behind me heading into the break. He could try to take credit for how well my team has done, as he drafted half of it (I had to leave the draft early), but I dropped almost all of his draft picks for my team, so it wouldn't be a very credible claim (not that I thought all of them were bad picks -- Clint Barmes has been worse than I expected; Chipper Jones and Reggie Sanders were okay later-round picks; all-star second baseman Mark Loretta didn't fit onto my team with Chase Utley as my second baseman (I actually began the year with both all star starting second basemen on my team -- kinda interesting); I'm nowhere near as big on Javier Vazquez as some other people (I prefer to avoid him like the plague; I held on to him for as long as I did mostly because I hoped that someone would want to trade for him; no luck there); I didn't trust the National League's starting all-star pitcher Brad Penny (okay, bad call on that one, though I did have three National League starting pitchers who made the all-star team (Schmidt, Zambrano, and Capuano, all of whom did not pitch in the game, and the last of whom was actually available as a free agent after the season started in our league)); Willie Taveras and Torii Hunter didn't meet my offensive needs; Matt Cain was actually the one player I told him to get me but has since been dropped (he's not having the ROY season I predicted); Freddy Garcia is still on the team, though I'm dangling him as trade bait; and Barrett I dropped and picked back up. I managed to pick up some good performers from the free agent market, such as pitchers Capuano, Papelbon, Ray, and Dempster (except Dempster had a bad June), and I've had mixed success with position players, mostly picking up players who have performed well on the year, but less well when I actually put them in my lineup.

Now, back to real baseball, and not fantasy.

A few teams have exceeded my expectations, most notably the Detroit Tigers, who after averaging over 100 losses over the last five seasons, are on pace for over 100 wins and have the best record in baseball. The most notable other team is the Mets, who have benefitted from the division being weaker than I anticipated. Also, this is one of those rare years where they live up to the hype.

Teams not meeting my expectations include the Cubs (wow, they've been bad), the Braves (no complaints), and the Phillies (yeah, I know, they routinely fail to meet general expectations, but seven games under .500 is still worse than almost anyone would've predicted).

Among players doing better than expected, the first is Jim Thome; I had him pegged for washed-up, and, well, boy, was I wrong. I figured Alphonso Soriano was in for a bad season, too, but wrong again. Pujols is doing better than expected, but that's because he's been amazing (29 HR/76 RBI in only 70 games), same with the power numbers of David Ortiz (31 HR/87 RBI). Joe Mauer took off in about mid-May (and boy, do I wish I traded for him in fantasy while he was on the block), and Nomar Garciaparra, after the expected injury, has played some amazing baseball. I expected B.J. Ryan to fizzle out, but he's had a great first half. Papelbon and Liriano have been great, but they fall more into the category of not being on my radar at the beginning of the season rather than beating my expectations of them.

Players not performing up to my expectations include Barry Bonds, Aramis Ramirez, Clint Barmes, and Matt Cain.

Expected closer busts include Felix Cordero, Jose Valverde, and Keith Foulke (though I expected him to be an ineffective closer, not to lose his job as the season began). On the flip side, a lot of people were bad-mouthing Tom Gordon before the season began, but I pegged him as being a quality closer, which he has been (better than Wagner, even). An unexpected bust has been Brad Lidge, who has only gone more than two appearances without giving up an earned run twice since mid-April, and whose best month was either May (ERA over 4, WHIP approaching 1.50) or June (WHIP just over 1, but ERA approaching 5.50), your choice (okay, June was skewed by one appearance in which he gave up four earned runs -- factor that out and he'd have a WHIP around 0.75 and an ERA under 3, which would be respectable).

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Wednesday, July 12, 2006

Various notes

The baseball All-Star game took place yesterday. Unfortunately, the (un-)American League won. Interestingly, ESPN had put together all-time all-star teams and posted the results of a simulated game between the two in the morning before the real game. The losing pitcher in the fantasy game was also the losing pitcher in the real game, Trevor Hoffman.

A judge has ruled against Rep. Jefferson's (D-LA) attempt to have the items seized from the raid of his congressional office (related to the bribery investigation against him) returned to him, dismissing the bizarre claim that Congress is above the law. I've blogged on this previously, and I'm feeling a bit lazy, so I'll leave it at that for now.

I expect the situation with Israel and Hamas/Hezbollah/whoever else wants to join in to escalate before any calming down (well, maybe not literally "any" but before any significant calming).

The recent terrorist attacks in India are certainly cause for concern, especially if they are traced to the Kashmir region (quite likely), which would almost certainly mean Pakistani involvement (not necessarily on the part of the government, and even if government actors were involved (their intelligence services are not completely reliable), it is very doubtful that any government higher-ups were involved).

More stuff to comment on, but not at the moment.