MVPs to Miggy, Posey

Miguel Cabrera’s Triple Crown season (the first in MLB in 45 years) won him the A.L. MVP award today. Cabrera hit .330-44-139 with an OPS+ of 165.

Buster Posey won the award in the NL with a .336-24-103 mark, OPS+ 172. His OPS+ was the best in the majors. He led the majors in batting average (after Melky disqualified himself after having been nabbed for PEDs).

Robbie Cano of the Yanks finished 4th in the MVP voting, Derek Jeter 7th. In the past three years, Cano has finished 3rd, 6th and 4th.

For Jeter, it was the eighth time in his career he finished in the top 10 for MVP.

Rafael Soriano finished 2oth in the balloting, and someone (?) actually gave a 10th place vote to Raul Ibanez (.240-19-62, OPS+ 104), who finished 24th.

Meanwhile, if you didn’t already hear, the Yanks’ AAA franchise in Scranton/ Wilkes-Barre has a new nickname: the RailRiders.

Giants sweep away Tigers for crown

As I stay at home today with work called off because of Hurricane Sandy, I hope everyone stays safe.

Meanwhile, last night the S.F. Giants won their second title in three years. This time, it was in a sweep. The Giants defeated the Tigers 4-3 in ten innings.

Pablo Sandoval, who tied a record with three HRs in Game One, was named the WS MVP. He hit .500 (8 for 16) for the Series.

In the second, Pence doubled, and Belt tripled to give the Giants a 1-0 lead.

Miguel Cabrera put the Tigers up 2-1 with 2-run HR in the third.

In the sixth, Buster Posey put S.F. up with a 2-run HR, but Delmon Young tied it with a HR of his own in the bottom of the sixth.

Some littleball won the game and the Series for the Giants in the 10th. Ryan Theriot singled, was bunted over to second by Brandon Crawford, and then Marco Scutaro, with two out, singled in Theriot.

The final out was a strikeout of Triple Crown winner Miguel Cabrera, who watched strike three go by.

Now as for that ring, I wonder if PED users (Melky) shouldn’t get diamonds but should get cubic zirconia instead?

Game 162. YANKS CLINCH AL EAST and #1 SEED IN AL

If this was Bobby V’s swan song as Red Sox mgr., the Yanks made it one he won’t forget.

The Yanks won the A.L. East tonight, trouncing Boston 14-2 (actually the Orioles loss to Tampa Bay, courtesy of three Evan Longoria homers, happened before the Yanks’ game was over so that clinched it) to win not only the best record in the East, but also sew up the #1 seed for the entire A.L.

They will start the best of five ALDS on the road. The first two games will be on the road, the next three at home as the format has changed. All they know is that they will open up in Baltimore or Texas. The Rangers collapsed in the last week, handing the A.L. West title to Oakland. So it’s Det-A’s and Yanks/Balt. or Texas in the A.L. For the N.L., it is Cincy/SF and Washington/Atlanta or St. Louis.

Hiroki Kuroda gave up a run in the top of the first tonight but after that it was a bloodbath. The Yanks got 3 in the second on Granderson’s 42nd HR of the year.

Cano made it 5-1 in the third with HR #32.

Robbie wasn’t done. Not by a long shot.

He made it 7-1 in the 5th with HR #33.

With the bases loaded in the 6th he singled in two. 9-1. He went 4 for 4 with a walk, 2 HR, 6 RBI. He finished the year .313-33-94.

Granderson wasn’t done either. The Yanks got 5 in the 7th (Boston got a run in the top of the 7th) to make it 14-2, which was the final score.

Granderson started the inning by hitting HR #43, which put him just 1 HR behind Triple Crown winner Miguel Cabrera (Cabrera’s Triple Crown was the first in MLB since Carl Yastrzemski did it in 1967 [and how many people remember that Killebrew tied Yaz that year with 44 HR?] ). It made it 10-2. The Grandy Man wound up .232-43-106. I hate the batting average, and the strikeouts (over 190, a new Yankee record), and wish he had more SB (just 9 for a guy with speed) but you can’t argue too much with 43/106. Still, .232-43-106 looks too much like an Adam Dunn line.

That second Granderson HR of the night was the Yanks’ 245th of the year, a new team record (of course, had the 1961 Yanks (240) had a DH…)…

Anyway, Ichiro doubled in two to make it 12-2. A bases-loaded single by Swish (.272-24-93) made it 13-2 and a SF by Teix (.251-24-84) capped the scoring.

Kuroda went 7, 2 R, 7 H, 2 walks and 4 K. He finishes at 16-11, 3.32. He and Phil Hughes (16-13, 4.23) tied for the most wins on the team.

2/3 for Eppley. 0 R, 1 H, 0 walks and 1 K. 3.33.

Rapada 1/3. 0 R, 0 H, 0 walks and 1 K. 2.82.

Garcia finished up. I don’t know where he’ll be next year. 1 IP, o R, 0 H, 0 walks, 3 K. 1-2-3, all by K. 5.20.

Jeter ends the season at 3304 career hits. In 2013 he should pass Eddie Collins (3315) and Paul Molitor (3319) in April.

A-Rod got hit #2900 tonight. He finishes 2012 with 2901 hits. Next year he needs 99 hits for 3000. He needs 14 HR to pass Willie Mays and 50 RBI for 2000.

Game 109. Yanks’ comeback in 9th falls short, 6-5.

The Yanks scored two in the ninth, and down 6-5 with two out, had runners on 2nd and 3rd, but Curtis Granderson (more on him in a bit) popped up to end the game.

It is the 12th loss in the last 18 games for the Yankees, and I noticed something about the first 2/3 of the season (2/3 + 1 game now).

What kind of team are the Yankees, anyway?

Consider this. In the first 42 games of the season, the Yankees were a .500 team. 21-21.

Then they got hot. They won 26 of their next 35 games.

After that? They have become a .500 team again. 16-16.

Do the math. 21-21, plus 26-9, plus 16-16 give you what they are now. 63-46. That 26-9 in the middle looks awfully good, but in the other 74 games out of 109 they are a .500 team.

Now here is what is really disturbing. That 26-9 run? It was fueled by going 12-3 in interleague play. Now I hate interleague play. Maybe I should love it.

Take away that 12-3 run in the middle of that hot streak, and the Yanks are 51-43. That is an 88 win pace. Not the pace of a division champ, but of a wild card, if that. Remember that in the only year since 1994 (the strike year) that the Yanks missed the playoffs—2008—the Yanks won 89 games, and consider that outside of that 26-9 run, that the Yanks are a .500 team for the other 74 games.

It makes you wonder what kind of team they will be over the next 53 games.

If they keep being a .500 team (except for that 35 game run), and they go 27-26 they’ll be a 90 win team, and that may not be enough.

In other words, they need to snap out of it, and soon.

Another observation before the game recap. Ichiro, like A-Rod, isn’t what he used to be. He did have two hits and two RBI tonight. But the Yanks lineup had A-Rod, Ibanez and Chavez in it. Now it’s Ichiro, Ibanez and Chavez. So, with A-Rod’s injury, you are substituting Ichiro for A-Rod. Now A-Rod gets criticized often, mostly because of his salary and for not being the A-Rod of old. But consider this. A-Rod’s OPS+ this year is still a 114 (14% above league average). Ichiro’s is an 80, 20% BELOW league average. Don’t get me wrong. I like Ichiro. Both players aren’t what they were. But that’s a huge difference. Don’t tell me that A-Rod isn’t missed right now.

But people on Twitter aren’t thinking. They are clamoring for Ichiro to leadoff. Now I’ll get to Granderson in a minute, but do these people realize that Ichiro came into this game with a .286 OBP? That he walked only 17 times this year? That he still HAS NOT DRAWN ONE WALK AS A YANKEE? Is THAT what you want out of a leadoff hitter? I think not.

Now for the game.

Through three innings, Phil Hughes was doing pretty well, but as YES’ Jack Curry reports,

Hughes was a 2-pitch pitcher tonight (FB, curve) as he barely used change. Didn’t have put away pitch. Threw 102 pitches, 34 were fouled off

Eric Chavez hit a 2-run HR in the top of the fourth (HR #11) to put the Yanks up 2-0.

Then that beast, Miguel Cabrera, struck again. He hit a solo HR, his 29th, to make it 2-1 in the bottom of the fourth. Two outs and a single later, Hughes had a 1-2 count on Jhonny Peralta. Once again, with two strikes on a hitter, Hughes couldn’t put him away. Peralta doubled in the tying run.

Once again, from YES’ Jack Curry:

Hughes needed 42 pitches to navigate through the 4th, in part because Tigers fouled off 17 pitches. Hughes threw 43 across 1st 3 innings.

That says it all about not putting people away.

In the fifth, Cabrera struck again with a two-run double to put the Tigers up 4-2.

Hughes 4 1/3, 4 R, 8 h, 0 walks and 3 K. (L, 11-9, 4.10).

Logan 2/3, 0 R, 0 H, 0 walks and 1 K. 3.55.

Cody Eppley 1 2/3, 1 R, 3 H, 0 walks and 1 K. 3.19, as the Tigers made it 5-2 in the sixth. A single and double with two out.

Clay Rapada 2/3, 0 R, 0 H, 0 walks, 0 K. 2.70.

Doubles by Swish and Ichiro made it 5-3 in the seventh.

Joba came in and gave up a run in the eighth that proved to be the ballgame.

2/3 IP, 1 R, 2 H, 1 walk and 1 K. 6.75.

In the ninth, Teix popped up, Chavez singled. Swish struck out, but then Ibanez walked, Ichiro singled in a run and Martin doubled in another to cut it to 6-5. Granderson then popped up to end it.

I’m concerned about Granderson. The 29 HR are nice, but the batting average is down to .240. Two more strikeouts tonight give him 135 for the year. He has the Yankees record for striking out (169 last year), and he is on a pace to shatter that. His pace is for 200 strikeouts! Now as for him leading off, he DOES lead the team in walks, and his OBP coming into the game was .339 as opposed to Ichiro’s .286.

But Granderson’s .240 BA and just 8 for 11 in SB aren’t what I’d like to see. I wonder if he’s too HR conscious (or if the coaches have made him that way). The 29 HR are nice, but I really think it might benefit the Yanks if he concentrated more on getting the BA up to .270, stole more bases, and concentrated less on the HR. In 2007 for Detroit, Granderson hit .302 and was 26 of 27 in SB. He still had 23 HR that year, along with 38 doubles and a MLB-leading 23 triples. Yes, he still struck out a lot (141 times) but that’s more of the player I’d like to see. Make more contact and use your speed more, Curtis.

Jeter had one hit to take him to 3231. Chavez has been hot, and he had 2 H, 2 RBI (the 2-run HR). Teix had two hits, and Ichiro had 2 h, 2 RBI.

The Yanks better snap out of it, and soon. The race is tightening up.

Update: The lead is down to 4 1/2. The time to snap out of it is now, with CC going tonight (Wed.).

No suspense in ASG. NL gets 5 in first, wins 8-0.

Justin Verlander gave up five runs in the first, and the AL were down 5-0 before they came to bat. Melky Cabrera hit a HR for the NL as they won 8-0.

The AL only got six hits, and two were by the Yankees. Jeter and Cano each went 1 for 2, Granderson 0 for 2.

KC fans were once again classless in their treatment of Cano. How classless? From Twitter:

Daniel Barbarisi‏@DanBarbarisi

Cano said people were yelling things at his family when they went to the bathroom. Cano was not pleased.

Billy Butler is a nice player who has never hit 25 HR in a season. If not for the rule that each team (no matter how lousy) has to have a rep in the All-Star Game, he may or may not be an All-Star, and of course MLB wants to avoid the embarrassment of the hosting team having no All-Star of its own to showcase. Butler has had a nice year so far. But really. Butler over Bautista or say, Fielder in the Home Run Derby? Who, outside of KC, is going to tune in to that? I mean, say it’s 1958. Who do you want to see in a home run derby, Bob Cerv or Mickey Mantle? Get real, KC.

The win ensures home field in the WS for the NL pennant winner for the third straight year.

The MVP of the game was Melky Cabrera. What Yankees fan would have thought that a few years ago? Congrats, Melky.

KC fans could only wish he were still a Royal.

Game 52. Cabrera belts Yanks, 4-3. RISP woes continue.

Miguel Cabrera hit two shots against the Yanks as the Tigers won 4-3.

It’s 420 to dead center at Comerica. Cabrera became the first player to have a two-HR game there in which both HRs cleared the CF fence. One was said to be 466 feet. The other, I don’t know, but combined, the distance of the two homers were over 910 feet. Two moonshots.

The Yanks are now 0-12 in games in which they don’t homer.

Once again, the lack of a two-out hit, and RISP killed them.

In the first, after two out, two hits put runners on the corners. Can they get the two out hit for a run? Nope. The Tigers got a man on third, one out, but after a rain delay, Kuroda stranded him.

Kuroda pitched a good game, and got nothing to show for it. 7 IP, 2 R, 7 H, 1 walk, 4 K. ERA to 3.82. People may criticize him, and yes, he has been inconsistent, but tonight, and the game against Darvish, are tough luck. 4-6, 3.82. Meanwhile CC is 7-2, 3.68. CC’s ERA isn’t that much better….

A tw0-out double by Chavez in the second. The Yanks can’t get the big two-out hit.

Granderson singles, gets a SB in the third. Big two-out hit? Nope.

Cabrera made it 1-0 in the  fourth with his first bomb, and the Tigers made it 2-0 in the fifth.

2nd and 3rd, one out in the sixth, Ibanez gets a groundout for a run, but that’s ALL they get. No big hit for more.

I should mention that in the fourth, the play of the game(?)… Teix was robbed of a HR by LF Don Kelly.

In the seventh, down 2-1, the Yanks had 2nd and 3rd, one out. NOTHING. Need I remind you how many times on this blog I’d kill for a SF? NOTHING. Long and Girardi both got ejected. One pitch to Granderson, called a strike, did look ridiculous. But NADA.

The Yanks tied it in the eighth. Swisher RBI single.

But Cabrera hit his 2nd bomb, this one off Wade (and it looked like a decent pitch) in the 8th to make it 3-2 Tigers.

Wade 1 IP, 1 R, 1 H, 0 walks, 0 K. 2.55.

Bitch all you want, but remember…. no Joba, no Robertson, no Mo. They are waiting on Aardsma…. and as for Garcia, right now he is a mop up man and nothing more.

The Yanks tied it in the 9th but blew an oppotunity. Bases loaded one out and Cano pops up. Remember a few days ago where I wrote about the RISP problems and Cano was .136 at that time with RISP? Now they had to rely on Teix to get a bases loaded walk to tie the game. Ibanez made out. They tied it, should have, could have, gotten more.

Want to know why they lost 4-3? Here you go.

1 for 12 with RISP (nothing new). 12 men LOB.

Pena (acting manager) brought in Phelps. With one out, a pair of singles. Logan comes in, a walk, a SF.

Game over.

Phelps 1-2, 1/3 IP, 1 R 2 H, 0 walks and K. 2.94.

Logan 1/3 IP, 0 R 0 H, 1 walk, 0 k. 2.79.

When will they hit with men on base?

 

 

Trade deadline 4 pm today.

The trade deadline is at 4 pm today. It looks like nothing is imminent regarding the Yankees.

Rafael Furcal appears to be heading from the Dodgers to St. Louis.

A Red Sox-A’s deal for Rich Harden fell through.

Forget Jiminez, Yankees fans. He’s going to the Indians. The Yanks wanted a physical from the Rockies on Jiminez a few days ago. Colorado refused. The Yanks pulled all four players the Rockies wanted (Nova, Montero, Banuelos and Betances) off the table. The Rockies changed their official offer to Nova and two of the other three, Cashman would not budge. Cashman offered another package built around Phil Hughes (no longer untouchable) and other prospects. The Rockies said no. No physical? Our top four prospects? I’d have told the Rockies where to go, too.

The Yanks checked in on the A’s Josh Willingham, didn’t like the price (from Ken Rosenthal).

Derrek Lee goes to the Pirates. Orlando Cabrera to SF.

 

Tigers pull off blockbuster, Yanks *not* to have 6-man rotation, and Farnsy setup?

WOW. The Tigers have made a blockbuster in getting Miguel Cabrera AND Dontrelle Willis from the Marlins. Forget the nice young pitching the Tigers have to go with aging Kenny “Coward of the County” Rogers. The lineup could include Pudge, Carlos Guillen, MVP runnerup Magglio Ordonez, Polanco, Renteria, Miggy, Granderson, Thames (or Jacque Jones) and Sheff. That’s tough. It also looks like Santana could be a BoSawx. Ugh, but those demands by the Twins were unreasonable. Santana/Beckett/Dice-K/Buchholz as a front four sickens me. Then C. Montague Schilling and Wakefield? Yuk. Damn Twins. One thing that may help the Yanks could be the Angels possibly getting in at the last minute. (I know the Angels give the Yanks fits, but at least Santana would not be on Boston). After losing out on Cabrera, they may swoop in with an offer for Santana.

Meanwhile, Yanks manager Joe Girardi, in a short talk with the media, stated his desire to go with a six-man rotation–NOT (the first report that I read elsewhere had a typo and the word not was missing. It’s now been fixed. Lovely.) Hmm, Pettitte turns 36 next June, Mussina will be 39, and you have three kids. It actually sounded like a good idea. Damn typo. Saves arms, would it have it worked? Unfortunately, this next sentence was NOT a typo. He also reaffirmed the organization’s line of confidence in Farnsworth(less) bouncing back. Hoo-boy.

Update. The Angels are denying the Santana reports. Damn. Meanwhile, the Yanks are officially OUT of the Santana deal. Between Sawx/Santana and the Tigers deal, the Yanks may be entering 2008 in an unfamiliar role–that of underdog–$200 million+ payroll or no $200 million+ payroll.

Update II, Dec. 5th, 4:15 P.M. Tim Lincecum may be going from SF to Toronto. This could be a big deal for the Jays, who have been stuck in 3rd in the AL East (2nd in 2006) for a while. If Burnett can realize his potential, Lincecum could then team with Halladay and Burnett for a decent 1-2-3 for the Jays. Lincecum is only 23, and K’d 150 in 146.1 in his rookie year this past season. He was 7-5, 4.00. 26-year-old Alex Rios would be going to SF in the deal, as the Giants look for some offense to replace Barry Bonds. Getting B.J. Ryan back, and back to the way he was, will be another key for the Jays in 2008.