Coming into the season, hopes were high for Andrelton Simmons of the Atlanta Braves. He put on a show at the World Baseball Classic, demonstrating the skills that made his injury-shortened 2012 season.
While the power he displayed when facing random Taiwainese pitchers is yet to materialize in the big leagues, the defense that helped him essentially rise from single-A to the Show in one year has been on display pretty much every night.
OBVIOUSLY the second half of that headline is completely untrue and sensationalized and ridiculous. I mean, nobody would actually believe a single win in April somehow means more than a single win in a 162 game season.
But Rajai Davis gunning Manny Machado down at the plate is nothing if not awesome, as Machado represented the game-winning run in the bottom of the ninthtenth inning. Davis isn’t exactly known for his cannon but he certainly throws a strike here, getting the Orioles third baseman by a significant margin, prolonging a game the Jays would go on to win in the 11th inning.
Remember when the Houston Astros moved to the American League and it ruined everything forever? While the Astros’ move to the AL West is mostly painful for the Astros themselves, there are many more dominoes of suffering yet to fall in this chain. No one will suffer more than you, the fan of baseball, now subjected to interleague play on every day of the year.
With 15 teams in each league, one from each league must be facing off at all times. The Reds and Angels started the season and the Royals and Phillies battled in Philadelphia this past weekend.
Games played in National League stadiums are subject to NL rules, meaning no DH. Interleague is what it is, the merits of which will not be debated here and now, but let’s consider this a bonus gift from the interleague gods. Because it gives rise to glorious questions like “will Adam Dunn play left field this week?”
It isn’t cool to care about awards anymore. We all know who the real most valuable player in the American League is, we don’t need the BBWWWWWAAAAAA (I think that’s right) to tell us.
Even further down the priority list of Concerns for Hip Bloggers are the Gold Gloves. Sure, they are chosen (at least nominally) by baseball managers who know the game. The clearly ridiculous choices of the past (Rafael Palmeiro? Derek Jeter? Michael Never Complains Young?) only confirm the impression some writers give: the managers basically are wracking their brains at the end of the year, just trying to think up the names of fielders on other teams since they can’t vote for their own.
It doesn’t help matters that voting occurs at a time of the year when other things are on their mind. It is unlikely to be high priority. It would not surprise me if some managers simply go to their team’s public relations flack to fill out their ballots.
I suppose I understand the apathy – or, as I suspect, the posture of apathy – among many bloggers and writers about the Gold Gloves. However, I am here to tell you that I care.
