From Randy to Pedro goes Schilling.
I’m somewhat surprised that he’s willing.
In some other place,
He’d be the clear ace.
In Boston, he’s still second billing.

The Long and Hernandez duet go
To play in the new park at Petco.
The Padres should not say
Regarding Mark Kotsay
They’ll someday regret he was let go.

Locked in a doghouse, unfree,
The recent transaction for Lee
Allows Hee Seop Choi
To escape Illinois
By turning a Florida key.

Saint Lou
Ain’t Lou.

[Spoiler warning…] Well, I watched JAG last night for the first time in about four years. I used to watch it every once in a while, but I kinda got bored with it. If last night’s episode is any indication of what I’ve been missing, I don’t feel bad at all. Even if the characters are still likable, the plot was so thin and formulaic, it’s clear that the writers are completely out of ideas for this premise. This is a show that has stayed alive too long.

But that’s not why I was watching, of course. It was to see the performance of Barry Zito.

One thing I really hate when I watch baseball on film or TV is when the baseball isn’t realistic. The pitcher throws like a European shotputter. The batter has a terribly uncoordinated swing that would never do anything but hit weak grounders to shortstop yet he somehow supposedly hits a screaming line drive. The batter hits a popup to second base, and the next thing we see is the ball is flying over the left field fence for a home run. It’s like fingernails on a chalkboard to me. So you’d think that if they have a real major league pitcher on the mound, you should be able to get some realistic baseball action.

No such luck. Zito plays a guy who is supposed to have a 95mph fastball. He doesn’t (he tops out at 90), but he should be able to produce a reasonable facsimile of one for the camera. Or a real, honest to goodness curveball. But all we see from Zito in this episode of JAG are warmup tosses, probably about 60-70mph, and we’re supposed to believe it’s going 95mph. I didn’t buy it.

OK, but that’s probably picking nits, but it’s a recurring annoyance for me. It’s probably not Zito’s fault. Blame whoever directed/edited the thing.

As for Zito’s performance otherwise, I don’t think he embarassed himself, really. But I’ve seen him do much better in commercials. They obviously wrote the story to give him as few things to do off the field as possible. I mean, usually when a guy wins his case, they almost always show the reaction of the guy who won. Not here; in this episode they focused entirely on the reaction of the guy who lost. I’ve never seen that before. Barry Zito, you’ve been found not guilty of assault! What are you going to do now? Barry? Barry? Hey, where’d he go?

When Zito did have to speak, I sensed a “deer in the headlights” look going on. I began to fear the quality of his acting may be declining right along with his K/9 rate. But then I realized he was playing a military guy, so he’s supposed to be a little bit stiff, right? Yeah, that’s it! It’s ACTING, I tell you! ACTING! Sheer genius.

Beane’s outfield was so bad he felt he
Should make it less Lucy Van Pelty,
While JP’s poor mound
Was too Charlie Browned:
And thus was born Lilly-for-Kielty.

Barry Zito will stand trial on Friday for assault with a deadly weapon, after hitting a batter in the head with intent to kill. At least, that’s the premise of this week’s episode of JAG on CBS. In his latest artistic endeavor, Zito gives acting a whirl. He portrays a pitcher (what else) in the annual Navy-Marines baseball game who throws a malicious pitch and gets in trouble for it.

There is no doubt in my mind that Zito will be great on the show. His performance as “the weird guy” in the A’s commercial about “What animal would you like to be?” is one of the best thespian performances in baseball history. His timing and delivery was flawless; after hearing his teammates go on and on about lions and horses and eagles and the other usual animal suspects, it is nearly impossible to fail to fall off your chair in stomach-wrenching laughter as Zito delivers the classic line “This is gonna sound weird but…I’m gonna say…a fly.”

Zito won’t be alone in his baseball connections on the show. The father of Diamondbacks first-round pick Conor Jackson will portray, as usual, the Admiral in charge of JAG.

The show will be broadcast on CBS at 9pm ET/PT on Friday, November 21. There’s a preview here.

Although I don’t have any proof,
This Nathan-Francisco-and-Boof
Trade made today
Will make A.J. say,
“I miss hitting under a roof.”

Ok, this one is not gonna be a poem. It’s 2:39AM, and I’m tired.

As I wrote recently, I’ve been contemplating changing a few things about this site. In order for a blog to be successful, you need to have people coming back every day. Unfortunately, I simply cannot write baseball poetry every day, or I’ll go nuts. The verses need to come when they want to come.

So I have been planning to expand my writing to include essays. I won’t be doing any sabermetric analysis; there are a gazillion sites that do that. Instead, I intend to look at baseball aesthetically– a side of baseball that the blogosphere is neglecting, and an area I know something about. The science of sabermetrics can explain why teams win, but only the science of aesthetics can explain why fans watch.

I also plan to redesign the site, and add a few features that will make this site more fun and interesting, while still continuing with the baseball poetry. I was hoping to launch the new design around New Year’s.

One of those fun things I’ve been working on is a Periodic Table of Links. Thinking I had about a month and a half before it needed to be done, I was just sort of leisurely working on it. I started trying it out, to see if it was useful. One of the links was to Instapundit, the king of the blogosphere.

Well, even though I had no links to it on my site, Instapundit saw the URL in his referrer logs yesterday, and then linked to it himself. So much for security by obscurity. Suddenly, the whole blogosphere knew about it.

Unfortunately, I wasn’t in the blogosphere at the time; I was outside painting a playhouse I’ve been building for my kids. Imagine my surprise when I logged on later and found that Instapundit had linked to a page of mine that was incomplete and nobody was supposed to know about!

Well, I’ve been scrambling ever since to make that page presentable. It was intended to be just my personal list o’links, like every other blog has, only with a humorous interface. But thanks to Instapundit, now it’s got some kind of Authority, with a capital A. People want to be on the list. It’s quite strange.

So I guess I’ll be accelerating those changes now; implementing them piece by piece instead of all at once. But that’s for tomorrow to worry about.

Now it’s bedtime. Maybe when I wake in the morning, Patrick Duffy will be in my shower. I’ll think to myself, “Barry Zito’s uncle! What is he doing here?” And since he’s all wet, I’ll wonder if it isn’t Barry Zito’s uncle at all, but the Man From Atlantis, and that will remind me of the weird episode where the Man From Atlantis goes to another planet where water is completely invisible and he runs into Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, which will make me try to remember whether Kareem is called Roger or Clarence in Airport, which will remind me of the angel named Clarence in It’s a Wonderful Life, and I’ll think about jumping off a bridge into the water because I’m going insane from a lack of sleep, but the angel will tell me that I mustn’t do that, and I’ll say “what are you gonna do to me, make it so I’ve never been born?” And he’ll say, no, because the man in my shower is not the Man From Atlantis at all; it’s only Bobby Ewing; and so then I’ll ask Bobby Ewing to go get his brother J.R. for me, and I’ll ask J.R. to get that genie friend of his to blink me back in time so I never clicked on that Instapundit link on that half-completed page, so none of this really happened, and I went to bed early and got a good night’s sleep.

And all will be well, and all my friends will love me, and we’ll all gather around the Christmas tree and sing, “Should auld aquaintance be forgot…” And I’ll look up, wink, and say, “Good night, Clarence.”

Gillick, unlike guys like Sabean,
Would no deals he should have been mabean.
The good thing, I’m guessing,
About never yessing
Is never Giambi-for-Mabrean.

Will replacing Stand Pat with Bavasi
Make Seattle’s GM seem less lasi?
Though I’m sure that it might,
And their present looks bright,
Their future now looks very hasi.

This site’s first year is coming to an end
with 138 verses penned,
200 hits per day, bots excluded,
which is not a lot, so I’ve concluded
it just isn’t worth it, as it now stands,
to keep up the effort this site demands
in this format. Something has to be changed;
this site somehow has to be rearranged
into a new format that can attract
a bigger audience that it has lacked
so far. It must grow or it must die.
Stagnation means death. I am forced to try,
despite my doubts, something more bold and new.
I’ll break to figure it out. What to do?

Picture a vessel, adrift neverending oceans:
peacefully, it embarks, rocking…rocking…emotions
tranquilly ebbing, just easily riding along,
waves intoning longing lullabyes in song.
Envisioning nature’s calm aquatics, romantic nostalgia arouses completely inaccurate oceanic notions.

Undersea reality belies its nostalgic appeal.
Life offers only pain; environments reveal
rough options: defeat, ruin, injustice, grief–unsatisfied emotions. Zero
habitats offer luxury, leaving alternatives nobody desires. Sometimes, wistfully, one rare, true hero
can avoid suffering, thereby inspiring life’s lamentable ordeal.

Heroes are required. Regret, illness, shame,
heartache, evil: living life is no game
featured on Xbox;
but all needles, kicks, shocks–
real experiences. Defiance merits a name:

Marlin! Overcoming real dangers, even competitors are impressed:
giant obstacles neatly zapped, a lightweight exhibiting zest,
bearing each confinement keenly; escaping, then thanking
powers eternal; nurturing; never yanking
chains; achieving breakthrough results, excellence rightfully assessed.

Basically, unless Marlin pretends
courage overcoming nasty impediments naturally extends
life, our willpower evaporates. Little lies
replace evidence, disable memory. Optimism never dies,
lest existence ends.

Just when fans conquer their fear,
And start to think, “This is the year”,
Some Dent, Boone or Beckett
Will show up and wreck it:
Still Waiting for Goats to appear.

Nightmares arose from our innocent dreams,
From childish wishes on shimmering stars,
Once-cheerful faces disfigured with scars,
Our laughter transformed into ghastly screams,
Tricked by mirages which won’t quench our thirst,
Our seeds get planted but fail to take root,
Our hungers fed by hollow, rotten fruit–
We’re destined to want, and thereby we’re cursed.

Five more outs. Just five is all we needed.
We hoped. We prayed. We begged and we pleaded.
They never came, and now we’re left haunted
By ghosts who curse us for what we wanted.
Our curse is not to fail, it’s not to cry,
Our curse is just an echo: Why? Why? Why?

Rosters for Jack and Dusty:
Remlinger, Cruz, Guthrie,
Penny, Banks, Lofton,
Beckett, Bump, Simon,
Bako, O’Leary, Borowski,

Wood, Alfonseca, Tejera,
Mordecai, Conine, Cabrera,
Goodwin, Lee, Willis,
Rodriguez, Miller,
Clement, Sosa, Urbina,

Redman, Redmond, Ramirez,
Encarnacion, Veres,
Glanville, Harris,
Lowell, Karros,
Grudzielanek, Martinez,

Prior, Pierre, Pavano,
Gonzalez, Gonzalez, Zambrano,
Fox, Hollandsworth,
Helling, Farnsworth,
Looper, Alou, and Castillo.

Rosters for Little and Torre:
Mueller, Millar, Mirabelli,
Mussina, Matsui,
Arroyo, Dellucci,
Damon, Almonte, Merloni,

Boone, Posada, Giambi,
Garciaparra, Embree,
Johnson, Burkett,
Jackson, Pettitte,
Clemens, Kapler, McCarty,

Heredia, Lowe, Ramirez,
Timlin, Ortiz, Contreras,
Rivera, Rivera,
Soriano, Sierra,
Garcia, Suppan, Martinez,

Williamson, Wakefield, Wilson,
Williams, Walker, Wells, Nelson,
Flaherty, Varitek,
Jeter, Jones, Sauerbeck,
Weaver, White, and Nixon.

was talking with a friend before the game yesterday, and he noted that the A’s 0-9 curse is a first round curse, while the Red Sox’ curse doesn’t necessarily apply to the first round. That’s why our curse took precedence over their curse. The Red Sox pain is yet to come.

The Red Sox and Cubs are long-suffering, but the A’s are densely-suffering. I’m not sure which is worse.

Oddly, I’m not nearly as upset now as I was after Game 3. I’m not going to stop being a baseball fan, although the thought did cross my mind, too: is this pain worth it? But then I think: our rotation next year will be Hudson, Mulder, Zito, the new-and-improved Lilly, and Harden, and I can’t wait for spring training to begin. I may not ever watch any more playoffs, though.

Barry Zito needs a fourth pitch he can rely on. Zito lost the feel for his curveball in the sixth inning, and he was suddenly a two-pitch pitcher. When the count went 2-2 on Manny Ramirez, Ramirez fouled a fastball straight back, meaning he had timed Zito’s fastball. So without his curveball, and not wanting to risk walking the bases loaded, Zito’s choices here were to throw a changeup, and risk hanging it so Manny could hit it hard, or another fastball, which Manny had the timing down on. Either way, his choices weren’t good. If he had a sinker or a cutter or a splitter–something besides the curve that has some movement–he could get through those innings where the curve temporarily abandons him. He could be Zito Forever instead of Zito Twice Through The Order. Zito threw another fastball to Ramirez, and there went the season.

As much as Dye has struggled against Lowe, I think pinch-hitting for him was a mistake. I wanted to see him get a chance to drive in at least one run. You don’t need a hit there; just contact. I think Dye, a powerful guy, would have been more likely to hit a sac fly deep enough, or a ball hard enough to get through the drawn-in infield. Dye looked visibly angry and disgusted as he was called back to the dugout. I don’t blame him.

I’d like to see Tejada and Foulke come back, but that’s probably not realistic. Perhaps getting Jose Guillen back is a little more realistic. I liked watching him play. Even with a broken hand, he was the best A’s hitter in the playoffs, and from what I’ve seen this year, his hitting seems very Tejada-like: not a whole lot of patience, but some (like, for instance, that 9th inning walk last night which was a very good at-bat), and with good pop, so if they lose Tejada but keep Guillen, then what you basically need is for Bobby Crosby’s offense to replace Terrence Long’s offense to get similar production from 2004’s lineup as compared to 2003’s lineup.

For some reason I was channeling Ray Fosse when I wrote that last sentence. I apologize. I’ll bet you didn’t even realize I was actually trying to ask a question.

Snow travels lightly
But falls hard, stuck there, stranded,
Until the spring thaw.

OK, I think I got about 3 1/2 hours sleep, but now it’s 6:40am and I’m awake again. I wonder how sloppy a game we’re going to see in Game 2 because nobody got enough sleep. Personally, I’m probably going to cheer every pop-up thinking it’s gonna be a home run.

The anti-Moneyball types will say the A’s won because of the bunt, but really, the A’s won because they drew 10 walks. The Red Sox almost won because they hit three home runs. That’s Moneyball right there on both sides.

Speaking of walks, I started having nightmares in advance when Rich Harden came in the game. I thought he might be so nervous he’d walk every batter he saw. Well, he did walk Manny and then uncorked an extremely wild pitch, but he got the job done.

I suppose now is the time to thank Grady Little for intentionally walking Terrence Long.

That bozo (me) who said “Keith Foulke for two innings” doesn’t know what he’s talking about. It’s Keith Foulke for three innings!

I wonder if the Red Sox are regretting only putting 10 pitchers on their roster now.

How effective will Lowe be in Game 3 after throwing two innings? Can Pedro go in Game 4 after 130 pitches last night?

I got to the game during batting practice, and I looked down and who was the very first person I saw? No kidding: Buck Martinez in a horrible brown suit he must have had left over from the 70s, standing out like a sore thumb in a sea of TV sportscasters all dressed in conservative colors. My immediate thought, “They’re out to get me. Run away!” And then: “Maybe seeing him before the series starts won’t count in the curse.” This series ain’t over yet. You never know what will happen when curses collide. I have a feeling we’re gonna see more weird stuff…

How can I sleep? I just witnessed the best baseball game I will ever see in my whole life. When my grandkids ask me about the best baseball game I ever saw, I will say “Game 1, 2003 ALDS, October 1, 2003.”

And to think, I was feeling stupid about paying above face value for 3rd deck seats behind the plate. I could have paid ten times as much and it would have been worth it.

I’m gonna be a zombie at tomorrow’s game, because I’m sure I will get no sleep whatsoever. Adrenaline is still pumping throughout my body. I’m finding it hard to sit still long enough to type this. I gotta go bounce off some walls or something now. Later…