1050. Johnson
1044 You should have set it up like the batting title, where if a player doesn't get enough at-bats (or is it plate appearances?) to qualify, he can take an 0-fer in the number of ABs he is short, and if after the 0-fer he's still on top, he wins the batting title. You know, prevents a guy from outhitting his league by 40 points but coming up 5 ABs short.

So you could spot Carmona 11.2 (or however many it would be by the end of the year) scoreless innings. Not that your buddy would go for it - sounds like he's going to hold on to his money if he's got an out.

That's a very good idea, wish I would've thought of it at the beggining of the year. Fausto would need to throw 68.1 scoreless innings to catch him.

Accuview has the Dodgers winning by 74% tonight.

This is the least-fun fringe decision of my life. Gah.

Kennedy asked for a trade today.

I guess we're not the only ones (re Wednesday night).

Looking back at that table, the Giants pitching did in fact give Arizona trouble, but dag-nabit, the Giants had no offense to back it up. Arizona is really the same team they were a week ago, except that Webb and Haren returned to form.

I predicted a runs scored / runs against of 780-690, and 91 wins. If they win the next 9 games by an average of about 14-7, I'll have made a great prediction!

He's a friend of the Griddle.

https://griddle.baseballtoaster.com/archives/685171.html

http://www.bb-ref.com/pi/shareit/gbhq

Shawn Marshall is playing mop-up man.

He had 1 HR and 30 RBI in over 300 AB before today's game.

In the first 2 innings today he doubled his HR total with a grand slam off Big Z and added 5 RBI.

SportsNation Jerry Crasnick: Jeff, Cano is coming off a terrible year, so the Yankees aren't going to get close for fair value in exchange for him. Plus, he just signed a four-year, $30 million deal. I think that would make some clubs hesitant about giving up a ton in return for him. There are some rumblings that Joe Torre would love to have him in LA -- particularly with Jeff Kent nearing the end -- but I would be surprised to see the Yankees trade Cano this winter.

http://proxy.espn.go.com/chat/chatESPN?event_id=22481

Good point!...

However, you pointedly did not answer a family-related question (related to you, that is) on the Griddle a few days back (Our Man in Havana), so I hesitate to follow up. Or do you in fact prefer to answer questions here? :-)

3 No, I'm in Columbus, OH. Workers from, I think, Canada and WV (all of the Ohio workers were in Texas, from what I'm told) finally got to my apartment complex on Wednesday and powered us up-- except a transformer blew in my building, and they won't come back for a few more days. I'm able to come to campus and check my email every couple of days.

Then I forgot.

I don't usually condone such a measure, but we are playing the Giants, and a playful beaning of the guy might be in order. Somewhere in the soft tissues (no, not the head!) like the gluteus minimus (he's too skinny to qualify for maximus).

--

From the SF Chron today, re the Giants vs. Maddux:
>>Their next shot comes tonight in the opener of the Giants' final road series of the year, at Dodger Stadium, when Maddux faces Barry Zito. There is one difference this time. The Giants have a secret weapon in Pablo Sandoval.

Maddux is a master at setting up hitters. In his brief major-league stay, Sandoval has proven he almost cannot be set up. Get him 0-2, throw a waste pitch and watch him drill it.

"Pablo has the best plate coverage of any young player I've seen," manager Bruce Bochy said.<<

The Mets and Phillies could both still win more than 92 games (they both could get to 95), which would force a playoff between the Cubs and Brewers in that case.

Coolstandings.com has Arizona at 2.7% chance of winning the divison. In other words they're drawing to a 1 outer on the river (2.3%)

A sound of clanging can be heard in my head right now. I really need to get into the math side of poker.

So it's sort of like drawing to a 1 outer on the river.

Not that I know what that means, but I wanted to sound cool.

I like Cain and all but Fielder and Hardy and another player for him? Dream on. Probably just Gammons idly conjecturing.

Hey Nate, any thoughts on the new Okkervil River album? I just heard it for the first time today.

http://tinyurl.com/3rzka3

The quick and easy way is to use Phil Gordon's rule of 4 and 2. Which is to multiply the number of cards that will give you the desired hand by 4 on the turn and by 2 on the river. It is not exact but it is close.

I would think it's an inferiority complex, but it can't all have to do with size. After all, New Yorkers hate us too.

And yeah, I love Iron and Wine, too, and their collaboration with Calexico.

61 Sounds like you and Jacob B will be at the same concert. 9

Here is all you need to know about California:

1) Bay area has a superiority complex and thinks that everything in NoCal is better than LA.

2) San Diego has an inferiority complex and thinks that LA treats it like a step child.

Don't get me started on the Westside/Valley issues.

But one difference this year is that the Dodgers do not have any games left with Arizona, unlike in 1982 when the Braves played 2 games at Dodger Stadium. One of those games was a 4-3 loss in 12 innings where Braves closer Gene Garber pitched the final 4 innings to get the win. A win would have tied the Braves in the standings with 4 games left. Instead it was the 8th consecutive loss for the Dodgers and put them 2 games back with 4 to play.

I was working in the Dodger clubhouse that year, and that particular game was the one that really hurt the most before Forster's pitch to Morgan on the final day.

Here are the box scores of the Friday and Saturday games of that weekend. The Dodgers outscored the Giants 19-2.

http://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/SFN/SFN198210010.shtml
http://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/SFN/SFN198210020.shtml

65 Nah, he's going to Austin City Limits and garnering the envy of me. Both acts I listed will then be heading to the Greek a week later in LA.

If I were to head to ACL, the Must-See list would look like this, in order: David Byrne, Neko Case, Iron & Wine, Fleet Foxes, M.Ward, Beck, Yeasayer, Gnarls Barkley, Okkervil River (they can totally kill a show, in both ways. I've only seen the good side, but have heard dull reports before), Stars, Old 97s, Man Man, Robert Plant+Allison Kraus, Mates of State. A few of these are lower ranked (Swell, Okkervil, Man Man) because I'm not sure if they'd make for a good festival set. If they got full billing, they could be much closer to the top (I'm expecting Swell Season to play 90% of "Once" songs, where a full show it only garners 40%)

61 It's good but not as good as The Stage Names. A worthy addition to the discography, though

49 I few of us with emotional memories don't believe that's only 2.7 ;-)

"...Not Even Stevie Nicks" is one of my favorite songs of all time, but I have now and then thought Garden Ruin was their best effort to date over Feast. I go back and forth. I've yet to hear the new one, though. Their show with Iron&Wine is up there in favorites over the last few years (Along with Arcade Fire@Troubadour, Beulah@Troubadour,And Swell Season@Wiltern). The DC version of said show is available somewhere through NPR.

end wall of text

But since it's a Cubs-Cardinals game at Wrigley, I think any fans left there are likely going to stand down, aka fall over, on their own from the amount of beer they consumed.

The ones who get up will then start fights.

During the losing streak at home they were very frustrated, especially after losing the last 2 of the 8 straight losses in extra innings. But it was a veteran team that did not give up or seem to play tight in my opinion.