I'd like to see what the average numbers against elite pitchers are. Gonzalez's numbers don't seem that bad relative to his final numbers.

Eric, Ian Stewart (?) for Cesar Carillo! Jk I like Cesar.

jon, and other people on this site, i'm not trying to start trouble or tension, but it seems like i'm having to defend myself as i am being attacked by some other people.

these comments i don't mind but i'm not just going to sit here and take personal attacks i am going to respond. i've been called a racist, bill plascke, joe morgan, annoying, and been accused of saying things i don't believe just to say them, and it does seem that other people on this site get treated with a lot more respect than me as i haven't heard any personal attacks upon any other commenter from another commenter other than directed towards me.

like i said i'm not complaining about it i can take it but i'm going to be defensive and not going to take it and i apologize if the other bloggers have to deal with me even if it seems juvienille.

jon i do appreciate what you do. great site i love the read and love conversing with most of my fellow dodger fans. less than 7 days til the ST opener!!!

3 - I agree. I think some people need to ease off.

1 Isn't it a real small sample size as well?

maybe it's just my love affair with furcal after the '06 season, but him batting leadoff i don't view as a weak point in the line-up, is james suggesting he should not be batting 1st?

7 I think the only problem with Furcal leading off last year was he was injured the entire season and it really really showed. I have no problem with '06 Furcal leading off.

but '08 is there really a better option?

If Furcal is really healthy, I'm sure he'll do just fine on offense.

9 Depends on how much you think speed is critical to a leadoff man. If you're like me and you don't, I'd like to see Loney lead off.

How did our pitchers perform in the early innings, as far as the team trailing so often?

http://xkcd.com/386/

When Bob says something stupid that requires that I call him an idiot, I just email him. That way I get to stand up for truth, justice, etc., but nobody else has to bother skimming over it. Win/Win/Win.

9 Last year the Dodgers would have been better served with just about anyone other than Furcal or Pierre in the leadoff spot, including Martin, Ethier, Kemp, Loney, or Kent. It's not about being a leadoff "type" so much as it is about a guy who stinks getting all those extra at bats.

However, this year I don't foresee Furcal being enough of a problem to complain about him leading off. Anybody with a higher on-base percentage than Furcal would, strictly speaking, be a better option to lead off. However, the difference in '08 between Furcal and the best OBP on the team isn't likely to be anywhere near as drastic as it was in '07.

I can't do the exact math right now, but we allowed more runs from innings 1-3 than in 4-6 or 7-9.

14 you think the giants of '02 '03 would've scored more runs with bonds batting lead-off? he actually may have seen more pitches than batting 3rd because they'd have less reason to walk him, and over the length of a season his PA would go up and those are the most productive PA's in a long long time.

11, that'd be sort of cool. Martin bats 2nd then? Furcal/Kemp, Jones, Kent, Ethier, Kemp/Furcal, LaRoche?

I'd like to see Penny change his numbers again, too. Although I'm not sure how he'd do it unless he's got that fastball all the way back or he's improved another "sweatball" pitch.

Dodger pitchers gave up:
269 runs in the first 3 innings
250 in the next 3 innings
200 in the last 3 innings
8 in extra innings.

12 Runs allowed by inning for Dodger pitchers, 2007

1 94
2 84
3 91
4 77
5 79
6 94
7 82
8 72
9 46

Really, I think the thing about trailing in the first three innings is merely an artifact of Tomdrickson. Those guys were often out of the game by the fourth inning after getting bombed.

That, and our bullpen was really good. And relief pitchers in general tend to be significantly better than starting pitchers. It doesn't strike me as an unusual split, and I would suspect that every team in baseball allows more runs per inning from 1-3 than 4-9.

16 They absolutely would have scored more runs with Bonds batting leadoff. Many people have run the numbers ad nauseam and they all reach the same conclusion.

Again, the whole "seeing pitches to hit" thing doesn't really play into it because that is largely a figment of people's imagination.

The 9th inning totals are lower also because the Dodgers wouldn't get the chance to give up a run in the 9th when they lost on the road.

In most cases.

3 cargill, if it helps, I don't know you well enough to toss ad hominems in you direction :)

11 Yeah, I actually like the idea of putting speed at the bottom of the order. My lineup goes Loney, Martin, Kent, Jones, Kemp, LaRoche, Ethier, Furcal. If Kent slumps, swap him with either LaRoche or Ethier. Put your best on base guys first, follow that with power, then follow that with slappy guys.

I will have a couple of openings in the Yahoo+ Keeper League I run. You'd inherit a roster and get to choose Keepers based on Salary. $10 fee (pays league) Trophies for 1st and 2nd (out of 12). Email me at my screen name at yahoo if interested and I will fill you in.

3 cargill, if it helps, I don't know you well enough to toss ad hominems in your direction :)

21 Yeah, I figured that went without saying, but maybe it doesn't.

Also, Saito is good.

Whoops, that was weird.

I think the reason that guys like Loney and Bonds hit in the power positions is because shortops, 2nd baseman, centerfielder's tend to generally be smaller players. It is the exception that your shortstop is big, so if the Bonds of the league were to bat leadoff, you would have a lot of Raffy shortstop built players hitting in the power spots. Defensively, their are very few big men that can play the speed positions well.

20 then why did Giants fans always boo if he was seeing pitches to hit

23, I look at the possibilities of that lineup and get a smile. Man! I guess I don't trust Kemp's power numbers to warrant that position, but I'm hopeful. On the other hand, I believe (read want to believe) that Ethier's power will go up this year, maybe they'll morph into similar batters.

26
Since most people can't figure out why EVERY batter has a lower batting average with a 2 strike count than every other count, I've learned not to make assumptions.

13 I thought maybe this one was for Bob:

http://xkcd.com/280/

30, I say that about Ethier partly because I expect his ABs to go up.

32
I'd love to go visit Baltimore.

32 Those are pretty good, DZ!

Another reason not to have Juan Pierre. It's just ludacrous to think that anyone would want the guy now. He had a normal season last year and his WSAB was a -1!!!

Too bad we have to put up with him for 4 more years!

30
I thought the same thing. Other than the Diamondbacks and Tampa Bay, I think that this Dodger lineup has as much upside as any in the league. I salivate to think about the best case scenarios for Loney, Kemp, Bills, Jones, Kuroda, and maybe even Schmidt.

I know that this kind of thinking has a very dark flip side (Kent, Penny, Pierre, Schmidt, and the young 'uns all sucking or getting hurt or playing too much when they don't deserve to), but spring training is all about optimism, and I am currently grinning ear to ear.

You know looking back, I was never & will never be a Choi fan but if he would land in L.A. again, he does have a good OB% & pop so I wouldn't have minded him but we've got Loney now so it's a moot point now I guess.

Jon: The majority of this post (from 'For example' onwards) is italicized. I'm using Safari at the moment, if that's any help.

39 I'm guessing it has something to do with the tags on 'Bill James Gold Mine 2008.' I didn't see it on my PC/Firefox, though.

39 - Yes, I mean, let's not carried away here. :) I've been italicizing excerpts of other people's work for five years.

41 Oops. I completely missed that. I did eat some mushrooms for lunch, so, you know.

42 ...and huffing semi-toxic fumes all afternoon. It's been a long day.

So I see that the first televised ST game is the 29th on ESPN.

I wish I knew this before or else I wouldn't have scheduled interviews with 2 different companies in Phoenix on that day.

This makes me a sad panda. I might just have to cancel....who needs a job right?

44 When there's practice baseball to be watched? Nobody! I'm taking the day off. I might order a pizza.

45

Its Kuroda's debut!!!

From Gurnick's notebook:

"No. Nomar's experience plays into this thing," he [Torre] said. "It's not necessarily Andy's job to lose. We'll decide how it best helps the club. I don't expect Nomar to play 155 or 160 games."

Um, Nomar won't play 155 games anyway; that's like talking about Mark Prior pitching 200 innings for the Padres.

Sorry for the OT, but does anyone remember the call letters of the radio station (AM 1150) the Dodgers were on before moving to KFWB? Thanks in advance.

48- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/KTLK_(AM)

Channeling my sisters. You know, the toaster looks really cute & cuddly when mobil.

Bill James. The man changed the way I look at baseball. For the better, I think.

CBS Sportsline power rankings.

http://www.sportsline.com/mcc/blogs/entry/5820921/6512696

48

They were (drumroll) KXTA.

From the other thread:
>>>>>> please refrain from ever bringing up the two guys out at home plate on a double off the wall with the bases loaded and nobody out play from the first game of the playoffs in '06. We all need to put this out of our memory. It still hits me in the gut. Please do not mention it anymore in DT or TrueBlue or even in my nightmares. Please? <<<<<<<<<

I was at Shea that day. I saw it with my own eyes. I still don't think I've recovered.

They must have had lunch with Sporky.

http://tinyurl.com/2uvnfm

54
Trust me. Time heals just about every wound. And your team can't disappoint you in a devastating way unless it was good to begin with.

52

We're ranked too high!

I'm superstitious that way.

44 I take it no Tivo or DVR Nate? Mine's already scheduled. :-)

Futurama + possible Rule 5 violation = http://tinyurl.com/3b2c5q

There's some NBA on TNT and they just did 30 seconds of split screen, apparently so they could show a Dance Team performing at a different arena.

I'm not injured or anything by this conduct but I do find it odd.

Also, I had the same reaction as cargill to the Keith Law stuff from the last thread. Disagree, be sharp, whatever, but what's the point of an online chat if you don't at least briefly explain why you think things are stupid or the basis for your opinions. Even Simon Cowell explains his harsh notes.

What? When did 1150 stop being KIIS-AM? :)

Luc Richard Mbah a Moute is the second best basketball player ever.

Thanks Jon for giving me an opportunity to express something for the first time this year that helped me get into some arguments when I suggested it last year. I call it my "Broken Lineup". The only two important players in my lineup are Pierre & Furcal(hic). I break up the lineup in two. In the first half of the lineup my leadoff man is Pierre(BTWno relation) The reason why I pick J.P. is because there is no other place I could put him(hic) and he's a pretty good leadoff man. Batters 2-4 & 6-8, really don't matter, you can put them in what ever order you desire. (ummm)Just for argument sake Loney will bat 2nd, Kent 3rd, Jones 4th. Furcal another good leadoff hitter with some --power-- bats 5th, (yagetit?)*Now mind you my point is to have a lead off hitter in both halves of the lineup. **Furcal starts the second half.(arite?)I'll finish up with Martin Kemp & LaRoche followed my the pitchers spot.(HIC) Howz dat? There u go Bill James (HIC)

62
Behind Andrew Bogut?

64- No, the Padre's announcer, whose name I have difficulty spelling. Pay attention. Actually, I think this calls for one of those emails where I call you an idiot. Check your inbox.

Unsubscribe.

65
You are clearly top 10 now, and I'm not just saying that to avoid a nasty email.

Did I miss the thread where these running inside jokes were explained? Ah, that's okay, ignorance is bliss. {insert follow-up punchline here}

47 Also in Gurnick's article:
http://tinyurl.com/yrkek9

"I've been wanting to see Loney swing a bat, so I camped out in one spot, and I was very impressed with the ease with which he swings it," said Torre. "He has good coverage and doesn't have to hit to one field. Good stuff."

"There are guys who hit the ball in the air and it doesn't come down," said Torre. "You think [Kemp] missed it, but the ball carries. It will be fun watching his game."

Joe, you can watch this every day, man. Just write 'em into the lineup.

Someone compared Kevin Love as a future Andrew Bogut. So every time there is a player in any sport who is pretty good, he is compared to Andrew Bogut.

While looking at Orel Hershiser's stats I stumbled across another great name in baseball. I hadn't seen this one before, though I'm sure many of you have: Orval Overall, who, interestingly enough, was born in a town called Farmersville. Did something no Cub pitcher has done since.

http://www.baseball-reference.com/o/overaor01.shtml

Plus, according to the page sponsor, he has a Stanford/Cal connection, which ties this to a spate of comments in a recent thread. Sort of.

Both USC and Oregon with new style uniforms tonight.

Oregon's are awful. USC's aren't bad, but they're cut funny.

70 I grew up near Farmersville!

There's nothing very exciting about it.

I thought we had all agreed it's only postworthy news when Oregon DOESN'T have a new uniform.

71
The stripe down the side of Oregon's unis reminds me of these:

http://www.nba.com/media/hawks/pistol_240_hawks.jpg

I admit I am in awe of Bill James enough that I may lose some objectivety. I feel embarrassed ocassionally about what the D's organization does. Batting their worst hitters first was awful. But no one expected Furcal to be that bad. I think it is imperative to find out how good he is in the first few months of this year.

I didn't see Oregon play the other day, but it looks like they are doing the same color names & jerseys again. It's like Helen Keller designs these damn things.

71 aren't they cut the same? they both seem to have the Nike skinny sleeveless tee/ overly baggy shorts look that Ohio State had during the tourney last year.

It's like Helen Keller designs these damn things.

Surely, there's a rule against that. ;)

77
The gold stripe on the Oregon uniform has blinded me.

Wow. I'm actually getting the USC game on Fox Sports Net in NYC tonight. That's two in a row!

76 Oh wow, I just noticed that. How is that even an idea? But nothing will ever be worse than the NBA All Star uniforms.

The student section yelling "Si, se puede" when Mata-Real shoots free throws is amusing to me.

80
Come to the dark side, Molly! :)

Is the ghost of Cesar Chavez haunting Pauley, or is the chant an Obama thing?

71 Mayo wanted to emphasize his muscular torso tonight

82- Oh. There we go; it's about Mata-Real?

I'm going to check Yankee road uniforms extra close from now on to make sure they don't also have the player names stitched in gray on the back.

78
Yeah, I lost my senses on that one.

Looks like Good Oregon showed up tonight

79 then Phil Knight's nefarious plan has almost reached it's endgame (insert diabolical laughter and possibly a twirl of a handlebar mustache).

But if D4P isn't here to be pessimistic about Oregon, does the game really exist?

87 Bravo.

(taps palm approvingly)

At my workplace, we're switching from paper timesheets to doing it all online. Should I address the staff tomorrow and tell them ominously, "This is the last timesheet you are ever going to fill out."

And then walk out of the room.

That's enough frittering around in here Bob. You've got a trade proposal to answer.

92 Aren't they technically still filling it out even when it's online?

94 What you should do is something much more poetic like "This is the last time your hands will ever touch the pen that will touch this paper."

Is it still a sheet in the brave new world, though?

92
I like that idea. Studies have statistically shown that it's easier to deal with these kind of things on Fridays.

Are you using ADP for the online timesheets? Thats what we use.

I think Orval Overall was in Strange but True Baseball Stories.

97
I'll find out next week when I get trained.

I'm sure the software was made by Low Government Bidder.

92- You could just accuse them of stealing postit notes, and tell them that because they're being fired for cause, there won't be any severance.

98
I could check at work, but I don't recall Overall appearing in either the original (written by Furman Bisher) or the sequel (written by a guy who was likely Bisher's ghost writer on the first one).

Are you thinking of Nick Altrock?

100
We work for the government. You know how long it would take me to fire someone?

99 You could ominously note that soon they may know what it like to depend on the LAUSD to produce their paycheck. Or so I've heard.

Is Petros Pakadakis doing the PA announcing at the Galen Center tonight? Does he usually do that?

104
Petros Papadakis was even the PA announcer for the last season at the Sports Arena.

101 - No, it was Odell Barbary. Chapter 5. I knew it was an O guy.

104 Petros echoing through the rafters. That might be a definition of hell.

107
Petros has a much different persona as the PA announcer. It's like they shot him full of tranquilizers before the game.

Oregon State is making me wonder if it's worthwhile to go to Staples to watch the 7-10 and 8-9 matchups of the Pac-10 tournament.

I remember thinking, as a kid, that one the Strange But True Stories books, Baseball vs. Football, was much better and stranger than the other, but now I can't remember which. I'd guess now that it would be baseball, midgets and one-armed men being stranger than left-footed European kickers, but I can't trust my memories these days.

The baseball Strange but True had stories about Eddie Gaedel, Gene Rye (who hit 3 homers in an inning in the minors), Pete Gray, Stan Musial (becoming an outfielder after hurting his shoulder), and Preacher Roe winning a game throwing one pitch.

The football version had Dicky Moegle getting tackled by a guy coming off the bench.

I envy you people who can watch basketball games on a Thursday night instead of preparing a lecture for tomorrow's class. I remember when I used to watch Pac-10 basketball.

Daniel should only be allowed to MWC basketball.

Steve always told us that it was vastly superior to the Pac-10.

113 Now that you know the both Daniel and I have a birthday on 3/22, I think at least the two of us combined deserve a special birthday post on the Griddle.

112
Just prepare your lecture to revolve around basketball. Then, you can watch for research and probably get the university to pay your cable bill!

114
I will take the matter under advisement.

113 I did listen to 5 minutes of the BYU - Utah game on the radio last night while driving home. And it would be nice for BYU to win even one tournament game this year. But clearly, MWC << Pac-10.

115 Maybe I can have Bob do a guest lecture.

118
I've got a webcam in my MacBook. I could do it remotely.

68
"There are guys who hit the ball in the air and it doesn't come down," said Torre.

That is my favorite quote of the year so far. He almost channeled Yogi.

Updated Pac-10 hoops standings
UCLA 11-2, 23-3
Stan 10-3, 21-4
WSU 9-5, 21-5
USC 7-6, 16-9
ASU 6-7, 16-9
___ 6-7, 16-9
Cal 6-7, 15-9
Wash 6-8, 15-12
Ore 6-8, 15-11
OSU 0-14, 6-20

I believe I have them in the order that they would be seeded in the Pac-10 tournament.

121
A rematch of tonight's Galen Center matchup on day 1.

How so, Oregon is in 9th place and USC is in 4th. USC would play ASU on Day 2.

Oregon would play Washington on Day 1. The seeding really doesn't matter too much unless you are curious about which ugly colored jersey Oregon is going to wear. The winner of that game will play the regular season champ, either UCLA or Stanford.

82

I'm glad you heard our chant, Bob. My roommate and I started doing it a few months ago and it caught on. Gotta love 'Zo, and its going to be really sad to see him leave.

I hope UCLA gets to face USC again.

123
I messed up there. I thought 1-2 get a bye, and the remaining (3-10) are essentially 1-8, and USC (the #2 of the bottom 8) would play Oregon (#7)

126
As someone who went to all 9 games in the Pac-10 tourney last year, I can tell you that nothing matches the excitement of the 7-10 game.

Two new posts up top.

Let's forget there was a tournament last year.

125
Day 3 of the Pac-10 tourney. I'm not expecting it to be pretty for USC.