Tabe

Red for health? Well, you should be healing after every battle or every other battle. How many people in your group now?

Re: Sheffield - You gotta admire a guy with the balls to come out and say "Yeah, I tanked to get out of town" like Sheff did regarding the end of his time in Milwaukee. I mean, Randy Johnson did the same thing but Sheff admitted it.

Yeah, you should start off with "Well Supported". There's no penalty for it and you get a ton of gold & pearls to start with. But you really shouldn't be dying constantly at any point until after you beat the story.

If you like that you should hear the Jimmy Rollins HOF arguments. Jimmy's got no case. 1 year as an elite player among a career of below-average offense doesn't get you in the HOF unless you play Ozzie-level defense. And Jimmy, fine defender he might be, ain't Ozzie.

See, this is the kind of wisdom for the ages that I just haven't acquired yet. Sensei, you have much to teach me.

.285/29/99 for 11 years for a 3B that plays elite-level defense isn't HotVG. Who else has done that in the last 40 years? Not George Brett. Not Wade Boggs. Not Scott Rolen (almost!) Mike Schmidt? The "and before that he was decent" was basically to say he wasn't a terrible player before the 11-year run in question. It doesn't add to his case, it doesn't detract from it.

My post was written when the speculation was that Brandon would last through the end of the school year. Since he's gone immediately, Hoke is done. No way he comes back. Dave Brandon has been getting killed in the alumni newsletter as well as his terrible emails surfacing. He HAD to resign or he was getting fired.

He's had an 11-year run (2004-2014) averaging 29.7 homers and 99.9 RBI per 162 games. That's including a season where he was hurt the whole year (2009) and hit just 8 homers. So I've got a 3B who averages .285/29/99 while playing elite-level defense. For 11 years. More than half of which were spent in pitchers' parks. And he was decent before that. Yeah, that's a HOFer.

So I apparently left my car unlocked last night and somebody broke in. I can't tell that they took anything - maybe a charging code for a phone but maybe not even that. No damage or anything, just annoying. They could have at least stolen my wife's - yes, my wife's, not mine - Katy Perry CD, fer cryin' out loud.

Man, my Facebook is gonna be unreadable for like, six months after the Alums see this. Well, the movie's been out for almost a year so maybe you've missed all the fun. On the other hand, when the OTHER Happy Valley movie gets made and released - the HBO one with Al Pacino - well...

That means Brady Hoke is as good as gone as well. The timing is interesting though - a new AD will want his own guy as coach. Are they going to get a successor for Brandon soon? Or are they going to let Hoke destroy the football program for another year and then let the new guy hire somebody new next year?

Oh, and as for the mentions of Adrian Beltre...in my eyes, he's a no-brainer HOFer. I don't think he'll get in, which is a shame. But he's absolutely a no-brainer if you spend more than 5 seconds looking at his career.

No, he really doesn't. His defense was amazing - the best ever - but it wasn't SO much better than Schmidt's that it offsets the giant gap between him and Schmidt at the plate. People forget that Schmidt was a GREAT defensive 3B. So, no, Brooks doesn't deserve a mention as the best 3B of all-time unless we're strictly talking defense.

Tiant is a guy who had some great years - he had a ridiculous year in 1968 that absolutely no one remembers (21-9, 1.60 ERA, 264 K in 258 IP). He didn't even get a single vote for the Cy Young cuz some guy named McLain won 31 games. Tiant had a couple other 20-win seasons and led the league in ERA one other time. And that's all good. Problem is, he also had plenty of years where he was terrible. He followed up 1968 by giving up 37 homers in 1969, finishing with a 9-20 record. He had four seasons with an ERA over 4.00 in a time when that was just atrocious. He finished with 229 wins and a 3.30 ERA. Those are both fine stats but nothing special for his era. Jim Kaat - this is a guy that's really completely forgettable. If he wasn't an announcer, nobody would remember him despite the 283 wins. He played forever, which is all well and good, but he wasn't great for, well, hardly any of that time. He had some good years in the 60s (25-13, 2.75 ERA in 1966) but nothing that really stood out. By the standards of his era, he put up solid numbers for a top starter but nothing great. If you named the top starters in the AL in the 1960s, Jim Kaat's name wasn't going to come up. Not when Denny McLain, Jim Palmer, Dave McNally, Jim Lonborg, Dean Chance, and others were active. After the 60s, his career is basically a great half-season in 1972, two good - but not great - years in the mid-70s and a whole bunch of mediocre or terrible years. This is basically a guy that hung around forever, putting up a nice win total and that's about it. Oh yeah, he won a whole bunch of Gold Gloves. Whoopdeedoo. Tommy John - Another guy who put up some good, but not great, years. He hung around forever, had some good years in the 60s, won a bunch of games a couple years with the Yankees, but was never great. Never won any awards, never led the league in anything that mattered, and was generally just a good hand for a long time. In my HOF, you gotta be elite for at least a little while to get in. Tommy never was. Now, if you wanna make the argument that Tommy should go in because of the surgery* named after him, I'd listen to that argument. But as a player, and only a player, no. Heck no. * - Frank Jobe should be in the HOF. His work on Tommy and a whole host of other guys has changed baseball more than just about any other person.

As for Dick Allen, I admittedly am basically ignoring his "cancer" status. I was too young to be aware of him when he was still playing and haven't heard much about him other than "he was an asshole". Well, he was an asshole that could HIT. Consider: - one of the all-time great rookie seasons in 1964. .318/29/91, leading the league with 352 total bases. OPS+ of 162. No, that's not a Mike Trout/Ted Williams/Albert Pujols rookie season but it's really good. - he was the absolute best hitter in baseball in 1972. You could make a case for Billy Williams but Allen played in a much tougher park (Comiskey vs Wrigley) while putting up the same numbers. - led the league in OBP twice - led the league in slugging three times - led the league in OPS four times - led the league in OPS+ three times, including a high of 199 in 1972 - rookie of the year in 1964 - MVP in 1972 - during the famous Phillies collapse of 1964, Allen hit .438 with 5 doubles, 2 triples, 3 home runs and 11 RBI in those last twelve games - career OPS+ of 156. One of the knocks on Allen are that his career was short. That's a fair assessment. However, his career was short due to injury, no different than Sandy Koufax or Kirby Puckett. Allen was an elite hitter right up until breaking his leg in 1973 and even after that. In the end, he played 14 years in the majors (ignoring 1963) and was an elite hitter pretty much the entire time. The other knock on Allen is that he was a "cancer" and "locker room lawyer". At least some of that stems from where he was playing - Philly wasn't black-man-friendly in the 60s. Some of it stems from a famous fight with Frank Thomas that led to Thomas - a white player - being immediately released. Allen was ordered not to talk about the issue and was perceived as costing a white player his job. Every witness (other than Thomas), however, puts the blame on Thomas and Thomas actually swung a bat at Allen. Allen's managers - Chuck Tanner and Gene Mauch - both sing his praises. In answer to whether Allen was a negative influence on the Phillies, Mauch said "Never". In describing Allen, Tanner said "Dick was the leader of our team, the captain, the manager on the field. He took care of the young kids, took them under his wing. And he played every game as if it was his last day on earth". Goose Gossage said Allen worked with him to learn about the league's hitters, making him a more effective reliever. Stan Bahnsen, another pitcher teammate, called Allen "the ultimate team guy". Mike Schmidt, a HOFer not afraid to criticize other players, said of Allen "The truth is that Dick never divided any clubhouse". In his one season with the Cardinals, Allen made a believer of manager Red Schoendienst, converting him from not wanting Allen at all to not wanting him to be traded or let go and that his attitude "was never a problem". Having said that, there's no doubt that Allen had issues of his own doing. He got suspended for missing a doubleheader and left the White Sox 2 weeks before the end of the 1974 season because of a feud with Ron Santo. Those things are inexcusable. In the end, however, we're left with a guy with a terrible reputation that's probably mostly undeserved. His own teammates and managers say his attitude was not a problem, that he was a winner, and that he played balls-out for them. He was an elite hitter for over a decade - a longer run of greatness than Sandy Koufax - and has the highest OPS+ of any guy not in the HOF not named Bonds or McGwire. He belongs in the HOF. p.s. One thing OSJ and I definitely agree on - Albert Belle belongs in the HOF. But that's another discussion.

Regarding Ken Boyer: He was a Gold Glover - winning 5 of them in a 6-year stretch - and would give you .300/25/95 every year at the plate. That's an elite 3B. He didn't have the power Mathews had but was a better fielder, hit for higher average, and won an MVP. Was Mathews better? Yep. But the gulf ain't huge. The case against Boyer is that he was a top player for 9 years. That's good but is it great? Probably not.

Gut reaction was that none of them belong. Thinking about it a little harder, Dick Allen belongs. Career OPS+ of 156. 156. He was an elite hitter for 11 years and a good hitter in a 12th. That's enough, IMHO. The rest miss the cut, I think. I could live with Ken Boyer and Bob Howsam. Hodges, Minoso, Kaat, Pierce, et al? No.

I thought he WAS retired. He didn't play at all this year and barely played last year. And was stealing paychecks for a couple years before THAT. So, yeah, thought he was already retired.

How soon we forget the team of Bruce Prichard, Mike McGuirk, and Pete Doherty. Hoooooooly cow they were awful.

Bob Geigel has passed away

Well, I went to school for several years with two of them (at least) so my count is up in the thousands.

Sign me up! Yeah, that looks awesome.

Stranger still because the Redskins' bye is next week. Why not bring him back after the bye instead? It's probably to satisfy Brittle Bob's ego so that he doesn't go make weird statements to the media. OH NO YOU DIDN'T!

That's some seriously bad coaching right there. Good lord. You don't wanna punt? I get that. Tell your guy to roll out and heave the ball into the stands. Or, you know, teach him the actual rules. Ugh.