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SI.com
NL West Preview
Evaluating Defense
Colletti and Depo
World Baseball Classic
Minor League Broadcasters
Slow Starts
Eric Gagne
Groundball Pitchers
Dodger Prospects
Albert Pujols
Humbled Angels
You Be the Manager
Eric Gagne II
Unreliable Relievers
Revived Angels
It's Okay To Sell
Dodger Turnaround
Andre Ethier
Padres-Dodgers Showdown
NL Final Weekend
Mets-Dodgers NLDS
Postseason ratings
NL Wish Lists
Manny vs. J.D.
McGwire Controversy
Dodger Offense
Trainers Matter
Variety
Will Arnett
John C. McGinley
Laura Dern
Imelda Staunton
SAG Awards
Ellen Pompeo
Grey's Anatomy
2004-05 Rookie Dramas
Anthony Hopkins
NATPE
Scrubs
Award Shows
Topher Grace
Ashton Kutcher
Writing on Improv Shows
Rainn Wilson
T.R. Knight
Guest Actors
Animation Guests
Joey Carson and Tennis
Donald Trump and Golf
2006 Emmys Nominees*
*Comedy Series
*Comedy Director
*Comedy Writer
*Comedy Actor
*Comedy Supporting Actor
Blue's Clues
Lizzy Caplan
Ann Donahue
CMT: Giants
CMA Awards
Little Miss Sunshine
Actor-Directors
Freshman Series
Clint Eastwood
Showrunners vs. Censors
Little Children
Breaking and Entering
Tartikoff Legacy Awards
Jackie Earle Haley
Knights of Prosperity
Office Online
2007 Screenplay Noms
Friday Night Lights
Robert Benton
ABC Fridays
Rookie Actors
Global Casting
2007 Pilot Casting
Sublime Slime
Also ...
A Season in Savannah (Stanford Magazine)
Five Questions: Los Angeles Dodgers (2005) (Hardball Times)
Rick Monday (Baseball Analysts)
Baseball's Odd Couple (Baseball Prospectus)
Five Questions: Los Angeles Dodgers (2006) (Hardball Times)
Five Questions: Los Angeles Dodgers (2007) (Hardball Times)
Dodger home record: 39-30 (.565)
When Jon attended: 5-3 (.625)
When Jon didn't: 34-27 (.557)
Dodgers at home: 745-600 (.554)
Jon attended: 293-233 (.557)*
Jon didn't: 457-374 (.550)
* includes road games attended
Current Roster with Estimated 2008 Salaries
(updated March 28)
Most figures are estimates (some are wild estimates) but will be updated as information comes in. Corrections welcome.
More contract details here.
Starting Pitchers (5)
$12,300,000 Hiroki Kuroda
$10,000,000 Derek Lowe
$9,500,000 Brad Penny
$7,000,000 Esteban Loaiza
*$500,000 Chad Billingsley
Total: $39,300,000
Bullpen (6)
$2,000,000 Takashi Saito
$1,925,000 Joe Beimel
$1,125,000 Scott Proctor
*$500,000 Jonathan Broxton
$500,000 Chan Ho Park
*$400,000 Hong-Chih Kuo
Total: $6,450,000
Starting Lineup (8)
$14,100,000 Andruw Jones
$13,000,000 Rafael Furcal
$9,000,000 Jeff Kent
$8,500,000 Nomar Garciaparra
$8,000,000 Juan Pierre
$500,000 Russell Martin
*$400,000 James Loney
*$400,000 Matt Kemp
Total: $53,900,000
Bench (6)
$875,000 Gary Bennett
$600,000 Mark Sweeney
$424,500 Andre Ethier
$391,000 Delwyn Young
$390,000 Chin-Lung Hu
$390,000 Blake DeWitt
Total: $3,071,000
Disabled List
$12,000,000 Jason Schmidt
*$400,000 Tony Abreu
*$390,000 Andy LaRoche
Total: $12,790,000
Also Paying ...
$1,000,000 Brett Tomko
$750,000 Odalis Perez
$540,000 Yhency Brazoban
$500,000 Randy Wolf
$487,500 Jason Repko
$135,225 Rudy Seanez
$100,000 Mike Lieberthal
$50,000 Ramon Martinez
Total: $3,562,725
Working total: *$113,268,725
*Rough salary estimate
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1) using profanity or any euphemisms for profanity
2) personally attacking other commenters
3) baiting other commenters
4) arguing for the sake of arguing
5) discussing politics
6) using hyperbole when something less will suffice
7) using sarcasm in a way that can be misinterpreted negatively
8) making the same point over and over again
9) typing "no-hitter" or "perfect game" to describe either in progress
10) being annoyed by the existence of this list
11) commenting under the obvious influence
12) claiming your opinion isn't allowed when it's just being disagreed with
Baseball Toaster runs on some experimental software called Fairpole. It's still under development.
For more information, please visit the Fairpole blog, or read the FAQ.
I first became aware of the hole closing up in 1997, the year after an incident in which, for the second time in about 18 months, a friend of mine died unexpectedly and tragically.
This was someone I saw or talked to on an almost daily basis, someone who combined joy and thoughtfulness, someone who taught me when I was single, unemployed and depressed - taught me like I was learning to walk - that I was still young and that my life was very much ahead of me.
It wasn't that John Egan didn't have his own troubles, but he didn't let those troubles run his life. It is not trite, but rather simple fact, to say that Egan conveyed to me much of the means I needed to cope with his passing.
Egan's death, just before his 26th birthday, left a hole in my life painful enough that I could physically feel the wound open.
Though it was one of the deepest, this was not the first time in my life that I could feel such a wound. In fact, I'm fragile enough to have felt it after a breakup. Even the pang I feel in my stomach when I leave a place where I've built sentimental ties, I associate with that wound.
But something about the lessons Egan passed on to me made me experience his wound in a new way - and I say this with some regret. In helping me be positive about my life amid the gloom, he made me conscious of how the holes that open in your life almost always close. The wounds heal. There might be a scar, but faint.
And so it is today that when I think of John Egan, my very good friend, I don't feel pain, but disbelief. I don't feel physicality. I just wonder, wonder what his life would be like today, what he would share with his family, and his friends, and me.
I find it strange that I had not connected this awareness with the Dodgers until this month. The Dodgers won a division title, won a playoff game, celebrated more than they had in years. They did so without a player, Paul Lo Duca, who was part of the fabric of the team, whose departure ripped open wounds for many fans. Lo Duca is remembered and his contributions missed. But the outpouring of grief, which had people all but rending their garments on July 31, is gone. Nowhere to be found. The hole closed up.
And so it is today that I return from a weekend away at my college reunion, a weekend all about connections made and lost, to learn that Ross Porter has officially been told not to return to the Dodger broadcasting booth.
This is not a tragedy, not a death in the family. Some fans won't even miss Porter, though I think even most of those, as has been written elsewhere, cringe at how callously his departure was handled. (Among other insults, Dodgers.com did not even do a news story on the event, instead publishing only that feeble press release.)
But for me and many others, when we think of the Dodgers right now, there is that hole where Porter sat, where his friendly drawl floated through the air. There is that emptiness.
For selfish reasons, I feel this even more than a few others. Porter, as you might know, became a friend to me and this website this year, friendships that I consider among my highlights of 2004. Those won't end with his departure, but I will certainly regret the distance as he moves on to his next job.
We can cherish the fact that Vin Scully is still around, but the hole of Porter's absence remains.
For now.
From where I sit today, what saddens me the most about Porter leaving the Dodgers is not that it leaves a hole, but that the hole will eventually close up. And what we'll be left with are just the hair's-width memories of what it was like to listen to him talk about the Dodgers with some of the same passionate level-headedness that I try to bring to this site.
Today, people feel Porter's departure. Tomorrow, all they'll do is remember it. Because, as John Egan certainly would have shown me by his example, there's so much in this world to feel good about. When I think of Egan at this moment, it is sadness mixed with a smile. How could it not be?
But, even in deference to Egan, I say this. Time marches on, time grabs lives before they are lived and careers before they are completed, and I don't like it.
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