Rounding the bases
By Dr. Jekyll,
A weekly feature on the good, the bad, and the ugly happening around the diamond.
Single: Ichiro Suzuki is the most overlooked future hall of famer in major league baseball. The most consistent hitter of our generation is once again doing just fine, thank you for noticing. He currently sports the 4th highest batting average in baseball and leads the league in hits. Just another day at the ballpark for Ichiro.
Double: A double is what you expect off the bat of a power hitter. Consistent, nothing special, but you’re just where you thought you would be. Your 2010 Philadelphia Phillies, baseballs most average great team. They give you nothing special, and they’re a no-nonsense club that just comes in every day and delivers. No glaring holes, just great talent. This team has nothing to write about, other than run of the mill dominance. Like the late ‘90’s Yankees, this is a phenomenal club.
Triple: As in triple play. Like the one started by the New York Mets Angel Pagan (take a minute and soak in how great a name that is) against the Nationals and Livan Hernandez. Not only did he start the triple play, he also homered in the game. But his unconventional inside the park round-tripper made him the first big leaguer since 1955 to accomplish both feats in the same game. It’s nice to see someone on that team still showing up.
Home Run: The San Diego Padres were no ones pick to do well this year. With a lineup with no feared hitter besides Adrian Gonzalez, they looked like they’d be lucky to finish any higher than 3rd in the NL West. But behind their absolute dominance of the Giants, the Pads are just a half game shy of the best record in the entire league. They’re doing all of this despite hitting an abysmal .240 as a team, thanks to their out-of-this-world 2.74 team ERA. The chances of keeping up that kind of a stat line are slim, but for now, the Padres are putting together an impressive run heading into the summer.
Strikin’ them out: Looks like Justin Verlander has gotten himself back on track in a hurry, putting together back to back wins against the Yankees and A’s, including 4-hitting the Athletics in a complete game against last week’s talk of the down Dallas Braden. The Tigers will need Verlander to keep this up if they’re going to stick with the Twins again in the AL Central.
Popping Up: Closers everywhere. Specifically, three of the biggest names in the game with Jonathan Papelbon, Mariano Rivera, and Trevor Hoffman all struggling tremendously. First an uncharacteristic grand slam given up by the Sandman himself, then Papelbon giving up four runs of his own to the tune of two two-run homers. Then Mo coming back the next night and blowing it. Meanwhile, the formerly ageless wonder Trevor Hoffman has now allowed more runs this season than he did all of last year. Yikes.
Caught Looking: Me. At Theo Epstein at a Pearl Jam show. Why worry about your .500 ballclub when you can rock out? I kid. Only a little.
