off topic....

During the "hot stove" months, there is only so much one can write about baseball.

Sure, I can write about my beloved 49ers, who after half a decade of futility which pushed them off the screens here in the UK I now can see in almost HD glory each weekend through NFL.com's HD Gamepass.

Sadly, a sharper TV image does not equate to a sharper pass defense or a more accurate journeyman QB. Thankfully Gamepass did not include a HD shot of Mike Singletary's pantsless display.

However, despite a win yesterday, 2008 is truly yet another transport journey to a top 10 draft pick. Alas, I do not think this will change until the Niners get an owner who actually knows enough about football to own a team, but conversely realises he knows too little to meddle in everyday runnings of the actual team. (Hi Al Davis and John York). Although it now seems abandoned to an extent, you can still visit www.dumpyork.com for some more musings on this topic.

So, with no baseball, no football and nothing really to write about the premiership right now apart from another weekend of poor referreeing (ok, so the 'Pool will be top after tonights game!), what can I write about?

The frustrations of international migration? The fact that it seems near impossible for a highly educated career driven person to move to another continent?

Alas, as I don't want to ruin any chances in the future, I'll keep my frustrations inside whilst I wait for a more sports oriented topic to come around.

US State Dept, please find my application among the other millions...

Dream Team

1. CF Jacoby Ellsbury
2. 2B Dustin Pedroia
3. DH David Ortiz
4. 1B Mark Teixera
5. 3B Kevin Youkilis
6. RF JD Drew
7. LF Jason Bay
8. SS Jed Lowrie
9. C Jason Varitek

RH Josh Beckett
LH Jon Lester
RH Daisuke Matsusaka
RH Jake Peavy
RH Tim Wakefield


CL Jonathan Papelbon
SU Hideki Okajima
SU Ramon Ramirez
MR Manny Delcarmen
MR Javier Lopez
LR/Spot Starter Justin Masterson
LR David Aardsma

Bench:
OF Rocco Baldelli
C Jarrod Saltalamaccia
IF Julio Lugo
1B Jeff Bailey

On can dream, can't we?

If you can't stand the heat....

For those who follow international rugby, the New Zealand national team, the All Blacks, are well known for their pre game ritual.

They perform a Haka, a maori war dance, before the kick-off of every game. Whilst I find it very entertaining, nobody in their right mind can refute the fact that part of the ritual is to intimidate the opposition.

So why is it now that the All Blacks throw their toys out of the pram when an opposing team very classily refuse to be intimidated by their gamesmanship?

My blood pressure was pretty high but then I regained my composure. I was a bit upset about it.

This quote comes from the All Black's centre Ma'a Nonu, who got his panties in a bunch when the Welsh team decided to form a line and stare down the war dancing Kiwis.

But it was really hard. The haka is a war dance. If you're going to stand there like that then in the past people would have charged, but it's a rugby match and you can't do that.

Ehh...really??

So one team is allowed 2 mins of choreographed intimidation, but the other team forming a single line and staring back is outrageous?

Honestly Nonu, wake up and smell what you're shovelling. I enjoy the Haka as much as anyone, but if you do gamesmanship, then you better be prepared for getting some your way.

These mean Welsh are not playing fair when they're not being intimidated by our war dance...

To quote an OC girl....

Oh, puh-leeze

The little engine that could

For the second time in three years we have the previous years ROY become the MVP the following season.

After gargantuan Ryan Howard did it in the NL for the Phillies, the somewhat more vertically challenged Dustin Pedroia did it for the Red Sox.

And yes, the vote should have probably been closer, and yes, Joe Mauer was also a very valid choice, but I will not argue with the voters....for once.

Dustin Pedroia plays with a chip much larger than his shoulder. His size has always been an argument thrown in by perhaps less knowledgable pundits, and yet everytime he's confounded his critics by outperforming expectations.

Yes, he only hit 9 HRs in 2008, but he also led the league in doubles and his clutch hitting was on occasion superb.

Whilst Youk and Mourneau had v good years, I suspect part of the issue is that we simply don't expect that much offensively neither from a catcher or a second baseman.

This year we had two standout 2B, Chase Utley and D-Ped, which shows that the game is continually evolving.

Now we just wait for the recession busting contract coming to a tv screen near you.

9 figures? Honestly?

MLB Idol

After a short break, we return to the regular programme schedule....

With the actual awards based on merit; Silver Slugger and Cy Young, out of the way we now head on to the popularity contest that is the MVP.

To clarify for the uninformed, the MVP should be by definition be given to a player, who in comparison with his team mates has stood out across the MLB as the Most Valuable Player, i.e the team would not have been anywhere near where they ended up without said player. Also, it is not supposed to include post season feats, regardless what a bitter Albert Pujols said in 2006 when he lead the Cards to the playoffs but still lost out to Phillies' Ryan Howard who was spending October on the couch.

I see it this way: Someone who doesn't take his team to the playoffs doesn't deserve to win the MVP - Pujols, November 2006

"You have to consider everything. You have to put all the numbers together" - Pujols, November 2008

Way to turn the coat Albert. Now, don't get me wrong. Based on the context that only regular season feats playing part in the decision, both choices were correct. Pujols is a maginificent player, and his .357 with 37 home runs and 116 RBIs was head and shoulders above anyone else on the Cardinals and he carried, on a dodgy elbow, the team for most of the season.

However, it still raises issues about how the selection process is made. Just consider these figures for a second:

AB H HR BA OPS SB
546 173 50 .317 1.091 5

AB H HR BA OPS SB
550 165 39 .300 .963 11

Here's a hint - the second line, clearly inferior to the first one was awarded the AL MVP in 1995. The first line belongs to the Indians' former slugger Albert Belle, generally considered among sportswriters (as in the people voting for the MVP) as one of the surliest jack-asses in baseball. The second line belongs to Mo Vaughn, an mountain of a man (towards the end of his career a completely immobile mountain of a man) and a very genial man in dealing with the press.

Buster Olney of ESPN once wrote about Albert Belle:

It was a taken in baseball circles that Albert Belle was nuts... The Indians billed him $10,000 a year for the damage he caused in clubhouses on the road and at home, and tolerated his behavior only because he was an awesome slugger... He slurped coffee constantly and seemed to be on a perpetual caffeinated frenzy. Few escaped his anger: on some days he would destroy the postgame buffet...launching plates into the shower... after one poor at-bat against Boston, he retreated to the visitor's clubhouse and took a bat to teammate Kenny Lofton's boombox. Belle preferred to have the clubhouse cold, below 60 degrees, and when one chilly teammate turned up the heat, Belle walked over, turned down the thermostat, and smashed it with his bat. His nickname, thereafter, was "Mr. Freeze."

When Belle retired, the NY Daily News' Bill Madden wrote:

Sorry, there'll be no words of sympathy here for Albert Belle. He was a surly jerk before he got hurt and now he's a hurt surly jerk....He was no credit to the game. Belle's boorish behavior should be remembered by every member of the Baseball Writers' Association when it comes time to consider him for the Hall of Fame.

Hold on for a second...shouldn't the MVP be given to the best player, not the most friendly good player? NY Times writer Robert Lipsyte agreed:

Madden is basically saying, 'He was not nice to me, so let's screw him.' Sportswriters anoint heroes in basically the same way you have crushes in junior high school... you've got someone like Albert Belle, who is somehow basically ungrateful for this enormous opportunity to play this game. If he's going to appear to us as a surly asshole, then we'll cover him that way. And then, of course, he's not gonna talk to us anymore—it's self-fulfilling.

This is one of the two fundamental flaws in the voting process. It simply becomes a popularity contest. In 1947 the Red Sox splendid splinter Ted Williams, who was no friend of the 4th Republic, lost to the friendly Hollywood Yankee Joe DiMaggio, despite Williams winning the Triple Crown.

Williams numbers; .343, 32 home runs and 125 RBIs were far superior to DiMaggio's .315 with 20 home runs and 97 RBI, but one writer left Williams off the ballot completely after a clash with Williams, thus allowing DiMaggio to win the MVP by one point.

The second issue normally affects the top teams. A team cannot win 90+ games by having just one great player. Therefore teams like the Red Sox and the Yankees sometimes lose out on MVPs because other players "splinter" the vote.

This year it seems the 4 front runners for the AL MVP come from two teams; Dustin Pedroia and Kevin Youkilis from the Red Sox and Justin Morneau and Joe Mauer from the Twins. An outsider with a considerable shot is Francisco "K-Rod" Rodriguez, who of course set a new single season record with 62 saves (but in the process lowered his strike outs to a career low 77 since becoming the closer in 2002 and had a not too impressive 2.24 ERA).

The announcement is made later today. Now we wait.