Getting to the WS a couple of times over 5-8 years sure beats being a shitty team for 10-15.

So Puig has started decently

Slightly better now

I think Ethiers house just went on the market.

Pop a beer. Today is the one month anniversary of the last home win for the Royals.

Braves game getting interesting

Tuned in just in time to see Brandon Inge break up Teheran's no-hitter with 2 outs in the 8th.

boo

Once his shoulder heals, maybe another kind of rehab assignment ahead?

Drug agents check suspected marijuana shipment to Chris Perez of Cleveland Indians - ESPN

So Jason Marquis is no-hitting the Dodgers

Puig!

Talk about a hell of a debut week. That was oppo and not exactly a cheapy.

If the kid ever learns to take a walk, look out.

He's got that certain something. LA is probably the perfect place for him, whether the story goes good or bad.

Toronto just beat Texas in 18 innings, Marlins & Mets are currently in the bottom of the 18th.

Sounds like something wacky that happens on Sunday/getaway day.

Mets are terrible. Hit the ball!

Gerrit Cole is set to start Tuesday against the Giants. I'm interested to see how he does at the major league level because his work in the minors hasn't matched the hype or his stuff.

Marty Lurie (local baseball talking head, former lawyer) does the pre-game show for the Giants on the radio, and he was telling a story today about Cole. Apparently when he was in the minors, the team he played for had a tradition of the following day's starter sitting in the stands with a radar gun charting pitches. Lurie was at the game, sitting near Cole, and he noticed that Cole wasn't quite catching the pitches on the radar gun...rather the planes flying in to the local airport. Turns out the radar gun was catching them at 130 MPH on approach :)

After watching that pathetic Mets game yesterday I decided to watch them again. Why I don't know. :)

1st inning Valdespin gets thrown out stealing 3rd with 2 outs. How Fucking stupid can you be? A little league player knows you don't do that. God it must be tough being a Met fan.

What a tease the Royals are. Just when you're ready to throw in the towel, they roll off five in a row for the first time in two years. Ugh.

It is.

At least I don't have to watch Ike Davis strike out anymore.

Wow. About ten days ago the Reds bullpen turned into a pumpkin. There's not a one of them I feel confident about right now.

Hey, the Cardinals finally won an extra innings game.

Just saw the exchange between Trout and the fan wearing his jersey in Baltimore last night. Funny stuff and handled well by Trout.

For those that missed it, Trout was tracking a foul ball near the stands and reached into the crowd to get it. A fan wearing a Trout jersey ended up knocking the ball away from him. While Trout was a bit irritated initially, he later smiled at the fan and had a good laugh about it.

So does Greinke have the highest hit batter/bench clearing brawl ratio in MLB history?

So I've seen Arizona fans saying Grienke hit Ross on purpose, which started everything. I don't see anything in their history that would have caused Grienke to hit Ross. He'd faced him 4 times before, with one hit. It's not like Grienke was pitching poorly that would lead him to throw at Ross.

It seemed to me Arizona got pissed at Ross being hit, but they took it way to far by hitting Puig in the face. Montero had to get hit then, which he did, in the back. There was no reason to go after Grienke, especially at his head. I guess that's what happens when you only want guys with "grit" on your team.

The thing is, I'm not even sure Ross was hit. That ball looked like a strike that he flinched at, but I never saw contact with the player. Even if there was, if it's in the strike zone, it's a strike, by rule. You cannot be HBP if you swing at the ball or it is in the strike zone. Whatever, Kubel hits a two-run homer, and that's supposed to be the best response to a HBP.

Puig gets hit, Ethier homers, and you'd think there's equilibrium, except for where Puig was hit. That's partly why I'm iffy on the hit to Montero. If Ross was hit - and I'm not sure he was - I don't think it was intentional. I don't think Puig getting hit in the face was intentional (although I'm sure pitching up and in right there was). So if you have a couple unintentional HBP, does Montero need to get hit? Maybe yes, if you think the location of Puig's hit was problematic, maybe no if you think "well, both teams have been hit and both teams have responded with homers."

And then Kennedy goes headhunting again. And then Ellis gets hit after the fracas and there's no further action by Fagan and the rest of the umpiring crew.

Nothing I saw last night makes me think the Ross hit "started everything." That's not to excuse LA of culpability in their response, but what I see is an iffy HBP and a ball to the back from Greinke and a couple of headshots, unintentional or otherwise, from Kennedy. That's a little lopsided.

Only reason he doesn't have more is because he played in the American League for awhile where they couldn't throw at him to retaliate. He did it pretty often as a Royal.

The only thing that's clear in my mind is that Kennedy needs to sit for a while. headhunting is a no-no, especially when aimed at the actual fucking head.

I think you have to hit their best player after Puig (your best) got hit in the head, which I thought was unintentional. You aim for the meatiest part (back/hip/thigh) and throw. It's dumb psychology, but you have to let Puig know that he can't get hit in the head without you backing him up. That should have been the end of it.

I know you're bitter he left, but a quick, dirty search shows that a lot of pitchers (428) hit batters at a higher rate than Grienke since he became a full time starter (I'm not counting his rookie year where he had no idea what he was doing). Even Greg Maddux, arguably the greatest control pitcher of all time, hit batters at a clip equal to or better than Grienke.

Pitching Season Finder -- - Baseball-Reference.com

Greinke and the beanball wasn't ever an issue that I remember from his time in Milwaukee.

I'm sure with different pitching coaches, he would have hit more batters in his time with the Royals.

Has nothing to do with being bitter. He threw at people all the time. It's not a secret in any way. I liked him a lot for that reason. He had an attitude that was missing from all the other Royals pitchers. Glad to finally have that back with Shields.

If 'Doggie hit you, it probably wasn't an accident.

Jamey Wright and Byung-Hyun Kim really top the list when it comes to HBP frequency. But batters feared them too much to ever charge the mound.

Puig got hit first, right? That looked unintentional. The Dodgers retaliated by hitting whoever. At that point, it should have been over. But then the D-Backs throw at Greinke near the head, so I think the Dodgers reaction is completely justified.

But what is up with Clayton Krenshaw coming and throwing a bunch at a fully equipped catcher who just uses his mitt to stop it? That will cost him a start and really served no purpose.

The Dodgers hit Cody Ross first. Puig was hit after.

From an espn.LA column

:)

Thing is, Ross getting hit intentionally would have been the height of stupidity.

He was leading off the 5th, Greinke had retired 12 straight batters after giving up a single to start the game. And Kubel followed the mistake with a homer, which usually clears a random HBP up unless it was egregious.

Kennedy then goes more than an inning without incident before hitting Puig while "pitching him inside". Ethier homers ... but there's that egregious qualifier I mentioned (I guess).

Montero gets hit down low by Greinke, should have squared things.

And then Kennedy headhunts Greinke & the shit is on.

Why are the SportsCenter video highlights showing Puig getting hit first?

Because Puig is the new hot thing in MLB.

So the M's rushed C prospect Mike Zunino to the majors a couple days ago, both signaling the desperation that Jack Z is facing to try to save his job and at the same time proving why it's time for him to go.

Jack was an upgrade over Bavasi, has done a good job of upgrading the talent in the system and, in his first 1-2 years, did a good job overall. Then he stopped listening to his numbers guys and started making some pretty dumb trades and putting together really questionable rosters, with this year's edition of aging DH's the capper.

I liked Jack and had high hopes for him, but it's time (yet again) for the M's to start over. And hopefully this time Howard Lincoln and Chuck Armstrong are flushed away too before they can screw up another GM hire.

Always fun to see Valverde blow a save.

Dodgers and D-Backs to open 2014 season in Sydney.
Los Angeles Dodgers and Arizona Diamondbacks to play MLB in Sydney to start 2014 MLB season - Yahoo!7

Looking forward to it.

Hmm, so dodgers starting guy who does voice of Homer Simpson in of tonight

I can't believe there isn't more uproar in LA over the Dodgers season thus far. As things go, the D-Backs are on pace to win 89.75 games, figuring 90 wins should win you the division. The wild card, appears to be way out of reach at this point.

Using their current record of 28-36 the Dodgers would need to go 62-36 over the remaining games to take the division. That's a .633 winning percentage. Only the Cardinals are better this far into the season in just over half as many games. That sure doesn't seem likely, and it's only going to get worse.

Still a month from the break and the probabilities are getting very low of anything positive from this season.

Tired of this

I think anyone who looked at advanced metrics didn't see the Dodgers as a juggernaut, whatever the payroll .

I assume they will fire Donnie in the next month or so, try and get lightning in the bottle with a Jack McKeon type? I think the division is there for the D backs, even if Goldschmidt et all come down to earth - the Gints pitching is awful and a lot of their bats are out - the Rockies will do what the Rockies do and self destruct. The NL west isn't awful, but it isn't a very good division - the D backs have the best farm in the division as well, so greatest ability to upgrade.

I think that's precisely why the expectation was there to win. No, certainly nobody expected a juggernaut, but they expected a lot more than a last place team in a weak division.