The Sunday Morning One Man Roundtable

"A man is not idle because he is absorbed in thought. There is a visible labor and there is an invisible labor." -- Victor Hugo

The Randy Johnson Quintet

There is a massive one-man power shift waiting to happen in the 2004 season in the form of a trade for Randy Johnson and for a few days there, right around the All Star game, I was briefly allowed to entertain the fantasy of seeing that pockmarked face resting on that 6'10 gangly torso just below a Mets cap. But that fantasy is no more, apparently.

After just a few days of strange speculation that heard rumours of the Mets organising a coup that would have netted them this season's only perfect game pitcher, those rumours suddenly dispersed like heavy hanging clouds and the Mets were inexplicably, no longer in the running of the Randy. There were suddenly just five teams with a chance and none of them were based in Queens. This is the Randy Johnson Quintet.

But just prior to the Mets mysteriously disappearing from that five team list, as though the Idiot Collective at Wilpon Inc suddenly pulled up as scared and lame as a Jose Reyes hammy, I'd had visions of a strange three man rotation of lefties that might have been in the post season; Glavine, Johnson and Leiter. It might have been formidable. And possibly the oldest starting rotation of a team in postseason history, but poof! It is no more. Perhaps the Mets just don't fit the criteria of being a contending team that Johnson requested because when it came time for the Diamondbacks to announce their quintet of possible destinations, the Mets were no longer on the wish of wishful thinkers.

So with a unique three man lefty postseason rotation in the rearview mirror, it appears that two Chicago teams, the Yankees, the Red Sox and the Angels are the ones still standing and with the exception of the Angels, adding Randy Johnson to the postseason rotation could have a devastating effect on the outcome.

If the Yankees land him, combined with the Red Sox already having lost out on A-Rod this season, the psychological blow to the AL East could prove fatal. Whilst there is already a disturbing gap between the Yankees and the Red Sox in the standings, a diaphanous rotation consisting of the oft-injured Kevin Brown, coupled with an unpredictable Vasquez and Mussina is hardly an intimidating beginning. If the Red Sox were able to land Johnson, not only would their chances to make the postseason grow exponentially with each start of the terrible trio of Pedro, Schilling and Johnson, but their chances of moving beyond the AL and into the World Series would as well. After all, if Schilling and Johnson could do it all on their lonesome in 2001 with a collection of banjo hitters and a terrified and imminently chokeable closer, why wouldn't couldn't they do it again if they joined forces with Pedro and a bruising batting order?

And what if one of those Shy Town squads were able to land him? Well, considering the conga line of injuries the Cubs have suffered already this season (Prior, Wood, Sosa, to name a few), wouldn't it be ironic to see them construct a massive trade for Johnson only to see him go down to injury halfway through his first start in Wrigley Field? A healthy Prior, Wood and Johnson would be as devastating as Pedro, Schilling and Johnson and oh, if only there were a parallel universe with TWO Randy Johnsons so we could see an epic battle of battles with those two rotations facing each other and their respective "curses" in the World Series?

As for the White Sox, well, they've already made their pitching splash, haven't they, when they got the jump on the race for Freddy Garcia. But let's face it, even with Johnson, the White Sox rotation is hardly formidable and their team 4.59 ERA (currently 7th out of 15 in the AL) is not going to inspire fear in the likes of the Red Sox and the Yankees in the postseason.

As for the Angels, considering their splashy offseason pitching signings of Bartolo Colon and Kelvim Escobar have already nearly flushed them down the crapper, even with Vladimir Guerrero having an MVP-type season, the Angels wouldn't even have the best rotation in the AL West with Johnson. Perhaps Colon holding Red Sox batters to three hits in six innings last night will convince them they aren't really interested to begin with.

In the end, what these Johnson sweepstakes boil down to is that oft-cited canard that big budget franchises have an unfair advantage over their competitors. The success of the A's, Twins and prior to this season's collapse, the Montreal Expos, proves that a team can win without an enormous source of revenue but what the Randy Johnson trade also proves is that a big ticket superstar with a salary that dwarfs the salaries of alot of starting rotations all by himself, is simply not available to competitive teams like the A's, Giants, San Diego Padres and the Twins, to name a few. What would be pleasing would be for a darkhorse to emerge from nowhere, like the St Louis Cardinals, to snatch Randy Johnson from the mouths of the corporate logos and propel an already-surprising team into the World Series.

All Stars at Midnight

In the continuing struggle to meld waking hours with baseball games, on Wednesday morning, shortly after midnight, I was jarred awake from my sofa slumber by the mobile phone alarm signifying that it was time to rise if I wanted to watch this year's All Star game. Such is the burden of a baseball fan in England.

With Premiership football in offseason haitus until August, a sickly combination of transfer rumours, incessantly snooze-inducing cricket matches, meaningless rugby contests and the golf-like silence of billiards broadcasts have been the steady diet of local sports programming here in Warwickshire. Thus, MLB's All Star game, with the Roger Clemens-Mike Piazza battery, the 500 homer outfield that wasn't to be and a record five 40 year olds in the lineups, was not to be missed, even if it meant having to rub sleep from your eyes and brew a pot of peppermint tea at 12:15 in the morning, in hopes of keeping your eyes open once the sleep had been rubbed from them.

Five TV does a nice broadcast with a live feed from ESPN. One of the nicest aspects of watching it is that there are no commercial breaks. So when ESPN goes to indundate their viewers with self-promotions and mind-numbing strings of senseless commercials, Five TV goes to their broadcast booth duo consisting of an expat American and a surprisingly knowledgeable English host. Granted, their unprofessional drivel and inane repartee gives one the idea of watching some sort of guerrilla tv broadcast but it is occasionally laced with interesting trivia - the kind of stuff that sticks in your head at one in the morning for days, like Shibe Park being the host of the first night All Star game in history and having it pointed out how odd that in the middle of World War II, when most cities throughout Europe were blacked out to avoid bombing raids, Philadelphia was chosen to be lit up for an All Star game.

The All Star game lost a little fizz once Clemens was finished getting bombed. True or not, it was a great source of pleasure to speculate that Piazza was tipping pitches and helping Roger get humiliating in his hometown as the hoopla died down to an embarassing silence. You have to wonder why Mike wasn't miked for that first inning, squatting down behind the plate or how in this age of modern technology, they couldn't sort out a way to have Mike Piazza's subconscious streamed as a live feed to special pay-per-view customers as the American League batting order took Roger apart. Conspiracy theories are borne out of a lack of information combined with a series of coincidences that seem to form-fitted to be merely coincidence. Just like we'll never know what was going through Clemens' mind when he tossed that chunk of Piazza's bat at him in the Subway Series, we might never know whether or not Piazza was tipping off the American League hitters or even how much sublime pleasure he was deriving from the Roger Clemens meltdown.

This year's All-Star Game includes a record five players who will turnat least 40 years old during the 2004 calendar year. All-Star Games with the most 40+ players:1.

2004 (Five): Roger Clemens (42), Randy Johnson (41), Barry Larkin(40), Barry Bonds (40), Kenny Rogers (40)
1960 (Four): Stan Musial (40), Gerry Staley (40), Early Wynn (40),Ted Williams (42)
1962 (Three): Hoyt Wilhelm (40), Warren Spahn (41), Stan Musial (42)
1979 (Three): Lou Brock (40), Carl Yastrzemski (40), Gaylord Perry (41)
1982 (Three): Pete Rose (41), Phil Niekro (43), Carl Yastrzemski (43)
1989 (Three): Rick Reuschel (40), Mike Schmidt (40), Nolan Ryan (42)
2003 (Three): Edgar Martinez (40), Roger Clemens (41), Jamie Moyer (41)
Eight games tied with 2

Source: David Vincent, Society of American Baseball Research (SABR)

*****

What did the playfully sparring Derek Jeter know about Muhammed Ali that Hall of Fame pitcher Bob Feller didn't?

Whilst Jeter was getting jabbed at by Ali, Bob Feller was still fuming about MLB inviting Ali to participate in the All-Star Game ceremonies in Houston on Tuesday. Feller said he objected because Ali "is a man who changed his name and changed his religion so he wouldn't have to serve his country, and, to me, that's disgusting."

Of course, Bob Feller was the second big league star to enter the service for World War II (following Hank Greenberg) and lost almost four seasons to military duty.

It is rather odd that while MLB force feeds patriotism to its legions, forcing even Canadian fans to listen to the pro-Christian God Bless America instead of the traditional Take Me Out To The Ballgame during the 7th inning stretch, that Stupid-For-Life Selig would push a non-Christian, non-baseball-playing former draft dodger to participate in the All Star game ceremonies.

Baseball's Second Biggest Rivalry

Ask yourself this question: when do you recall there being a more fragile seven game lead than the one the St Louis Cardinals currently hold over the Chicago Cubs? When the Red Sox were blown out and fell behind the Yankees by 8 games a month or so ago, the AL East was allegedly all but surrendered and the only hope Red Sox fans had would be the wild card. (That may prove not to be the case as I wouldn't douse the flames of hope of an imminent Yankee collapse just yet.)

On the other hand, you have the Cubs still thinking it's just a matter of time before the sizeable 7 game advantage the Cards have over them in the NL Central is whittle down to nothing. Of course, the Cubs won't be able to do it by beating the Cardinals. The collective genius that is the schedule makers have seen to it that they won't play each other again after 20th of July.

There's a book out called The I-55 Series about the history of the Cubs-Cardinals rivalry. Then again, one has to acknowledge that Cubs, much like the Red Sox, are fighting an uphill battle. The Yankees have won more World Championships than any other team in baseball and the Cardinals have won more than any other National League team and meanwhile, the Red Sox and the Cubs fight over whose curse is the most unbreakable.

The Lads

While the New York Mercantile Exchange All-Star Futures game was being held, I couldn't help but wonder if any of those pitchers will be up in the Big Leagues in time to have an effect on any of the division or wild card races.

One of the top young pitchers, Colorado Rockies lefty and British Columbia native Jeff Francis struck out all three batters he faced in the Futures game and as an encore, earned his first win since being called up to Triple-A with seven shutout innings for Colorado Springs last night. Before that this season, he'd already 13-1 with a 1.98 ERA with the AA Tulsa Drillers.

Another eye should be kept on the Seattle Mariners righty phenom,Felix Hernandez.

"Hernandez is 18 years old, throws 98 mph, has a wicked curve and beyond-his-years poise. He started the year at Class A, blew hitters away, moved up to Class AA, and is still blowing hitters away. His combined professional statistics: a 16-5 record, 217 strikeouts in 169 innings and a 2.56 earned-run average."

The cat is officially out of the bag.

And also steaming forward in the Mariners' organisation is my newest favourite-name player, none other than outfielder Shin-soo Choo. Trying saying that name three times in a row very quickly. Just imagine the fun tabloid headline writers will have with that name somewhere down the road. Choo is hitting .391 in his last 12 games and whilst he isn't ready to start, even for the lowly Mariners, his name has already preceded him to the top.

The Human Hammy Saga Continues

As though he hasn't already caused enough headaches for the Mets this season, the tiresomely predictable legs of Jose Reyes are at it again. This time it isn't an injury, but the owner of those legs, Jose Reyes himself. After the Mets have spent so much time and energy trying to teach him a different style of running designed to lessen the stress on his fragile hamstrings, he's decided he's the Boss of his Own Hammies, not the Mets.

Yesterday he advised that he has completely discarded the new style and is back to his old way of running around the bases.

"I don't try to run the way they want me to run," Reyes was reported whingeing. "Because they changed my running mechanics and I hurt my back. I don't want that to happen again."

Running mechanics? Is this guy training for the 100 metre dash for the Olympics or trying to stay healthy for a full nine innings of baseball?

But it's a good move. With 66 games already lost in the season and after exhaustive efforts to find out why Jose's Hammies are the scourge of the Mets organisation, what better plan than going back to the old way you had of making sure you are perpetually injured? Way to learn. Way to progress. Wow, that kid has got a bright future on the DL. The reason why he is considered one of the most exciting young stars in the game is not, as you once thought, because he is a combination of speed and power and youthful enthusiasm, but because you love holding your breath every time he takes a step, just waiting for the Human Hammy to snap once again.

Oh well. Since the Mets are out of the Randy Johnson Sweepstakes and they've lost two in a row already to Larry Bowa and the Phillies, seemingly on the verge yet again of that imminent collapse, now is the time for me to jump on the bandwagon to seal the season by trading Wigginton and some so and so for Pirates starter Kris Benson and then call up David Wright to take his rightful place in the Mets starting infield already.

Since June 28th, Benson has started four games and pitched 30.1 innings. In those 30.1 innings, he's given up 27 hits, 6 earned runs (a 1.76 ERA) and is 2-0. In his last outing on Friday night, probably one of his last for the Pirates, he limited the defending World Champion Marlins to two runs over 8 1-3 innings.

Depending on who nets him, Benson might be even more influential than Randy Johnson in the battle for world domination.

*****

Lastly in the news, it appears the Crime Dog has finally had his day. The Devil Rays, no longer the laughingstocks of baseball, have designated Fred McGriff and his .181 batting average for assignment. Unless some other lowly club with aspirations of drawing a fan or two to their stadium to watch McGriff flail away at his 500 homer so-close-but-yet-so-far destination and bring mediocrity to a bubbling head, he will be traded, released or placed on waivers, never to be heard from again. Granted, 2,490 hits and 493 homers are nothing to sneeze at but when you compare Fred McGriff with the other man who hit 493 homers in his career, Lou Gehrig, well, you begin to get the idea that even with his numbers, he just never belonged somehow. Farewell Freddy. We hardly knew you were here.