but I'll give it a shot.

walks in one runner 7-5 now WITH NO OUTS.

Runner at 2nd with only 1 out 9-7 LSU.

Starring Jeff Kent as Billy Jack

Also Starring:

Larry Bowa

Mark Sweeney

and Special Guest Appearance by - Ken Rosenthal

Outnumbered and the only voice of reason, Billy Jack schools the ignorant kids in the Dodgers Clubhouse and saves a franchise on the brink.

Hunter: .273/.340/.449/.789
Guerrero: .254/.319/.437/.756
Matthews: .234/.312/.355/.667

Sigh

does he have a golf size ball in his knee?

Veteran players grumble mumble yadda yadda..

Yeah, I was thinking Russell was half Kent, half Piazza with the stache, but I prefer to think Piazza.

I can see how you might be confused. But keep in mind that young players care about their stats, and veterans only care about winning. Ergo, young players want the sac fly (cause it won't count against them), while veterans prefer the Olney (as a means of demonstrating their selfless dedication to the team).

And they wonder why the LA Times sports section is so maligned.

it's 1-1, what are you talking about? unless you want him to cough up strikes left & right.

How do we know Gammons is right?

Not being Ken Rosenthal doesn't guarantee truthfulness.

What I'd like from everybody is a) their projection for Penny's ERA over the rest of the season assuming he had an average manager and b) what percentage of the credit Torre should get for the over- or under-performance. So, if you'll join me in this exercise, I'll try to tabulate the results. Then, when the inevitable news stories about Penny's struggles or lack thereof and whatever Torre's spin will be eventually come out, we can just ignore them. If I remember, we can then give out scores at the end of the season. I'll start:

A. 3.95
B. 7%

But who does Gammons talk to about the Dodgers besides Torre? Gammons is a popular place to leak news. Or "information."

That Peter Gammons report on the Dodgers struggles should have been accompanied by Adagio for Strings in the background.

They don't want Sandy Amoros as the answer?

so he's Cuban than right. That whole "latin" thing confuses me also, & I feel very strongly that it's one of those, what came first the chicken or the egg.

I guess I'm confused. But this is how I feel about that whole thing, if:

player A was born in Ecuador then that makes him Ecuadorian

if player B was born in Peru then he is Peruvian, kind of like what Bob does when he goes to other parts of the country. If he goes to Boston he calls the natives Bostonians & so forth...

I was gonna say, he kind of reminds me of the old school dominican players from back in the day.

Sometimes I swear people complain just to complain.

http://tinyurl.com/4hugq7

Beyond that, "can do no worse" is never a very tantalizing argument for an acquisition, especially when the upside is so limited. There's a legit argument that Berroa's offense won't justify replacing Hu's defense, woeful as Hu's offense is.

I'm fine with Hu being sent down, but it's okay not to like the Berroa acquisition.

I feel Bob H. complaint is a legitimate one, I mean for me I'd rather have Hu manning Short stop then somebody like Berroa who has no future as a Dodger, I would have stuck with our own, but the brain trust feels differently.

14:1

You settle for less, you get less.

Sports are filled with stories with guys who no one knew if they could play or not.

It's like there saying, kid you ain't cutting it we're gonna have to get somebody else because WE DON'T TRUST YOU CAN TURN IT AROUND, I feel there sending the wrong message plus the dude was playing great defense, NedCo just isn't patient enough.

When you're playing defense, field the ball and throw it to the proper place.

When you're on the bases, run hard at the appropriate times.

When you're at the plate, try to get on base.

When you're pitching, throw the pitch at the catcher's mit.

What is there to know?

It's like Dick Vitale with Duke

Boston: 19
LA: 2

That hanging slider was begging to be crushed. Thats the difference between the great players and the good ones. Must make pitchers pay for making bad pitches.

228

That game is a joke. Hard for the Lakers to do anything with that type of differential and with Boston hitting everything on the perimeter.

The logical player to eventually do this is Martin. Anything about the Dodgers from Morgan always has to be taken with a grain of salt. However a nice clean extra base hit from one of our players with someone on would offer the most help in tonight's game as well as going forward. We need Furcal back ASAP

Of course you want players to do the right thing. Of course you want young players to learn. No one disagrees with that. The endless problem is ignoring the good things the kids do and the bad things the vets do.

It's not the philosophy. It's the double standard.

But the endless repetition of this as the story of the Dodgers is just too much.

He has said:
Go back to San Diego
Go back to Las Vegas
Go back to Oklahoma
Go back to the 66ers

He needs some work.

I saw Kemp strike out 4 times in games that I went to this weekend and he is striking out a lot now.

Ask Candy Maldonado if Luis Olmo is Latino.

All dumb players made by veterans are merely the exceptions that prove the "rule", which is that veteran players play smart ball.

Boston 23
LA 2

it's not like that at all a couple of us talk trash to him, I once forgot the S in Sweeney & typed in Weeney.

I like living on the edge.

so he doesn't have a good VORP? what is his VORP by the way?

Maybe Barry Bonds just lifted a lot of weights.

He was hurt last year. I think the previous year and this year have shown that to be obvious.

what, are you serious? I thought he was born in NM. Man, Kemp looked totally out matched there.

Best thing about Berrora was that he didn't make any errors. Only Dodger extra base hit comes from JP!

Not bad for a bunch of kids who are still figuring out how to play the game the right way.

That would be pretty sweet.

Players are not paid on their ranking in terms of their position relative to other players in the league. Furcal would have the advantage of being the best player available which is a powerful negotiating tool.

Woo hoo!

No way i take Jeter over Raffy. Right now, Raffy is a better offensive and defensive player than Jeter.

Lakers have too many slow white dudes. It is a great accomplishment they got out of the west though.

Everything will change when the series goes back to L.A. I dont know if we'll win all 3, but home court is so huge in the NBA. The Celtics wont be shooting over 50% from 3 nor have the free-throw differential they had tonight. Its really amazing how much better teams are at home in the playoffs.

Definitely agree, but I'm talking about right now. He is one of the worst fielding shortstops in the game and he is also 4 years older than Raffy. Jeter will be in Cooperstown, but if both are healthy, give me Raffy.

2008 VORP
Furcal: 26.7
Guillen 15.7

2006
Guillen 66.3
Furcal 46.9

2007
Guillen 46.9
Furcal 11.8

Yes, I realize how horrible that sounds.

I am getting Trailer Park Boys season 7 next week. Cannot wait.

Next thing you know, I'll be on here claiming I wouldn't trade Jeff Kent for Chase Utley.

I need to get some of Finkleman's avant garde works.

I know Dontrelle loved the Giants. I was at a Warrior game when he was on the Marlins and he was there decked out in all Giants gear.

Mike DiGiovanna almost seems proud that he had apparently never heard of "Smilla's Sense of Snow" before today. I'm not saying he should have heard of it, but I personally never like to brag about being ignorant about something.

I actually thought the book was a little overrated, so I never ended up seeing the movie.

Julia Ormond is gorgeous. She should always light up the screen with her face. And she is always incredibly boring.

Watched the Kite Runner last night, loved the movie but how possible was the reality of him escaping into Pakistan with the child? Amir's father was quite a character, one of the best I've seen in the movies in quite a while. We planned to follow that up with Charlie Wilsons War but sleep beckoned and we answered it's call.

Sleep well, Larry:)

The Constitution prohibits naturalized citizens whose parents were not U.S. citizens. So, Arnold Schwarzenegger (Austria) and Jennifer Granholm (Canada) are out of luck.

Congratulations! You're eligible.

But you wouldn't want the job because the Secret Service requires all presidential candidates to wear batting helmets now.

I'd vote for Toy Cannon and defend his constitutional right to hold office with armed bears.

My wife is layed up at the moment with some torn knee ligaments. I was keeping her company the other day while she watched a syndicated episode of Friends. It was dreadful. I don't remember hating it this much when it was in first run, but now it may be the worst show ever.

After watching the dodgers struggle to put runs on the board again, I went up to the bar with some friends for the fourth quarter of the laker game, while i got to see a decent comeback..I was left thoroughly disappointed after both losses, especially what i saw a must win for the lake show..

www.theonion.com/content/node/39226

One of the summer projects in our house is cleaning out the garage. This includes shredding the 10+ years worth of bills, insurance forms and cancelled checks we have in boxes. You want a reason not to start a family--money. Its an expensive proposition. I'd be retired and living on an island without kids. Even nursery school was expensive and we went to a co-op.
To give you an idea how old some of this stuff is I found some LA Cellular bills. I forgot all about life before Verizon and AT&T took over the world.

I can't tell yet if "In Plain Sight" belongs in the pantheon of crime shows, or whether it's just a cheesecake show.

http://tinyurl.com/5cwhzw

Amazing that guys like Rodenthal get paid to say this kinda stuff. Seriously: is there absolutely no quality control in the MSM these days? Does no one actually read the material to ensure that it makes sense before it goes out?

416 Based on recent public quotations, it's hard to identify a Dodger who feels more entitled than Kent.

AKA "Who'sToSayberMetrics"

or signs a backup catcher with the yips

Incompetence and no player evaluation ability.

or keeps a pinch hitter who can't hit on the roster

Some kind of nostalgic/romantic commitment to older players and the "Baseball Guy" idea that every team needs these kind of players in the dugout/locker room and on the field in order to succeed. Plus, Ned seems to be concerned about hurting people's feelings, especially those of veteran players whom he probably likes a lot as people.

avg/ob/slg/ops

.316 /.425 /.432 /.857 martin

.307 /.355/.460/.815 kemp

.299 /.359 /.443 /.802 ethier

.298 /.372/.444/.816 dewitt

.280/.331 /.418/.749 loney

.276 /.344/.313 /.657 pierre

.257/ .296 /.433 /.730 kent

423 I've been thinking about that too. If Rosenthal has an ounce of integrity (yeah, I know) "club officials" doesn't refer to a player or coach. Doesn't sound like White or Ng. The one guy on the list whose job is tied to the 2008 record is Ned. Perhaps this is that "reverse psychology" Andy used to use so well on Opie.

Rather than Sweeney, honestly, just let the pitchers bat.

Not too bad.

But if you look further out, they are 11-19 over their last 30 games.

Also, if it's true that the kinds aren't blossoming into real baseball players, shouldn't the veterans be on the hook for failing to provide that leadership and guidance?

I know this is being pretty optimistic, but I feel like this team is going to catch fire pretty soon. If Furcal can come back 100%, I think it will make quite the difference.

This is what bugs me. On one hand, we're told we need veterans because they create a winning atmosphere, show the kids the right way to play, don't complain about playing time, do veteranny stuff like confront teammates in private rather than blabbing to the media, etc. etc. etc.

But then every time we turn around, we get examples of how our veterans aren't doing the things we're told we need veterans to do. Our veterans complain if they're not playing, run to the media to complain about their teammates, don't appear to teach our children well, etc.

If Ned and Joe are not going to accept any heat and they want instead blame inexperience, maybe at least Easler should come under the microscope.

And another thing: when Ned blames the kids, how is he not simultaneously blaming himself (for putting the roster together in the first place)?

Andruw Jones can stay on the DL all he wants.

And I thought he was a history professor!

Seriously, molly, i think you're right about the mentality of the rosenthals of the world. You and jon can counteract such thinking with your own more reasoned, factual approach. Help us won't you?

But I guess the follow up argument is that these dang kids just won't listen, with their iPods and Xboxes and what not.

I don't reject that possibility, but I haven't been shown any evidence that it (if true) affects team performance. Not only that, but why do we need veterans teaching the kids anyway? Isn't that what we're paying the coaches to do? If not, what are we paying the coaches to do?

But guys, I gotta say, after spending some time around the team, my opinions have changed a little bit. I'm not saying that the veteran leadership is good, but some of the kids could be a little more focused. Not saying they are to blame or should be traded or whatever, but it is possible that trading one of them would scare the daylights out of the rest of them, and perhaps light a fire.

And you know I've been pro-kids all along. But I'm just sayin'..

Let's see...

Let's see...

If something went wrong--broken window from playing ball, mud all over the house, rabbit flew the coop and ended up down the street--I would take the heat, even if it was Sarah's doing. Being the older sibling, I was supposed to be the one who policed her, and lead by example.

I have a feeling this is the way it goes in most households. I have no idea why when it comes to the media writing about the Dodgers, it's the other way around.

It didn't work, so I'm guessing this post won't show up either. Here goes...

... Or which post number did you really mean?

I was going going to post something in 453 to go in context with the future citing. I was too slow