The Dude hit his 10th home run of the year last night. It came off Craig Kimbrel, the Braves’ ridiculously awesome closer who had only allowed one home run in 94 1/3 big-league innings before that one.
Duda can now boast a .295/.365/.480 line in 341 plate appearances on the year. Here’s hoping he takes to this outfield thing, because the guy can really hit.
The Mets announced yesterday that they agreed to a one-year contract extension with Tim Byrdak. The news came right on the heels of the lefty’s second win of the season.
After a rough start to the year, Byrdak has capably served his role for the Mets. He has held lefties to a .208/.260/.323 line and though he’s 37 now, he’ll likely again be a solid lefty one-out guy in 2012.
After the announcement, Sandy Alderson stressed that the Mets now have two left-handed relievers locked up heading into the offseason: Byrdak and Daniel Herrera. But since Herrera also seems to profile as a LOOGY, it’s tough to imagine the Mets carrying both pitchers on the 25-man roster.
Wait, that’s not true. It’s easy to imagine them doing so, it’s just tough to imagine how it would be a good idea. Unless the team believes Byrdak or Herrara can regularly retire both lefty and righty hitters — Jerry Manuel’s much-coveted “crossover” guy, carrying both would mean committing a pair of rosters sports to maybe 90 total innings. Unless they have a great rotation — which they won’t — that would likely wind up putting a lot of stress on the other arms in the bullpen.
For long parts of this season, much was made of the Mets’ need for a second lefty in the bullpen. That makes sense, given some of the strong lefty hitters in their division and Terry Collins’ worship of platoon matchups. But ideally one of those lefties would need to be able to work more than part-inning stints lest the bullpen collapse on itself (even more).
Also worth nothing: Byrdak is hilarious. Sometime in the next couple weeks I’ll post a montage of his videobombs on teammates.
After Michael Vick left last night’s game with a head injury, the Eagles turned to a quarterback named Mike Kafka. The broadcast didn’t make nearly enough jokes about his name.
In 2006, I watched a pitcher named Ari Kafka enter a game for the Everett AquaSox of the the Northwest League. It was the AquaSox’ season opener, and Kafka faced several hitters and left without retiring any of them, finishing the day with a rather Kafkaesque infinite ERA.
*- I don’t think this is actually a word. Is there a verb form of metamorphosis, or is it just morph?
That was pretty much the way the Jets drew up their defense before the season started. They got a good push from their pass rush, run defense that held Maurice Jones-Drew in check, and typical shutdown coverage from Darrelle Revis that forced Luke McCown to look elsewhere — mostly to Jets’ defensive backs. Of course, McCown appeared blessed with a rare combination of awful judgment and stunning inaccuracy, often throwing in the general direction of but nowhere actually close to receivers in double coverage. The Jets made four interceptions and dropped a host of others en route to the 32-3 victory.
Brian Schottenheimer and the Jets’ offense continued running on most first downs, a frustrating pattern until you consider this: By my count Mark Sanchez was 6-of-8 for 74 yards and a touchdown while throwing on first down, success obviously aided by the Jaguars’ efforts to stop the run. And one of Sanchez’s two incomplete first-down pass flew over the head of a wide-open Plaxico Burress in the end zone, a failure in execution but neither in judgment nor play-calling.
Sanchez threw a couple of interceptions, one marked by a great defensive play, the other by a poor pass into traffic.
But the big issue looming for the Jets’ offense involves the health of center Nick Mangold, who left the game late in the first quarter with an ankle injury. Mangold’s replacement, rookie Colin Baxter, looked downright awful. Not only did he twice botch the snap counts, he got pushed around by Jacksonville’s defensive linemen and missed multiple blocks that led to broken plays.
It was Baxter’s first NFL game, so it’s reasonable to hope he will improve once he adjusts to the speed at the new level. But subbing in a replacement-level center for one of the game’s best will hamper the Jets’ ground game and ability to employ complex blocking schemes. Baxter only appeared competent in straightforward pass-blocking assignments. If Mangold is out for any extended period of time, the combination of Baxter and tackle Wayne Hunter will turn the offensive line, one of the Jets’ preseason strengths, into a weak spot.
A few days out, I know:
With Toby and Patrick, as per usual. On iTunes here. Embedded here:
“The show has definitely changed,” said Friedman. “But it’s very much changed along with the times.” In other words, that movement seen above from “World Travel” to “My Son, The Doctor” is not willed into existence. Rather, it’s a growing with culture. Jeopardy! changed, and changed productively (compare its success to other long-running and flailing stalwarts like the nightly news and soap operas), because TV changed. HBO, DVDs, and the web happened, and in the process, we’ve moved from a norm, sometimes called Least Objectionable Programming, to one in which viewers are trusted with the possibilities of the medium as showrunners explore complexity and nuance.
The continuing evolution of Jeopardy! lets us see this shift happening in real time, providing a constant basis of comparison that isn’t there if we just look at, say, Full House beside The Sopranos. From a straightforward trivia contest predicated on a set of largely academic knowledge, the show has become a repository for jokes, references (both to pop culture and to itself), and language games. The questions have become dense tangles of allusions that rely on contestants’ ability to make connections and inventively parse language. Over the years, the show has been able to take advantage of the new complexity audiences were willing to accept, and the writers have seized the opportunity to turn this trivia show into something that intuitively probes the ways in which we understand the world.
This is an awesome article about Jeopardy!, focusing on the show’s oft-overlooked but excellent writers.
Yeah I asked Valentino Pascucci his favorite sandwich.
Can a newly single A-Rod smack more doubles and triples?
The Yankees slugging third baseman is due back in the lineup Friday night against Toronto for the first time since his split with Cameron Diaz – and fans hope the heartbreak means home runs….
Rodriguez, who was also linked with Madonna after his divorce, memorably dated “Almost Famous” actress Kate Hudson during the Yankees’ 2009 championship run.
The blond Hollywood honey received much of the credit when A-Rod reversed a disastrous post-season slump as the Yankees won the World Series.
– Larry McShane, N.Y. Daily News.
A-Rod’s hitting line, by celebrity girlfriend:
Madonna (August 2008 – end 2008): .258/.366/.511 in 50 games.
Kate Hudson (Late May 2009 – end 2009): .302/.419/.560 in 129 games, including postseason.
Cameron Diaz (July 2010 – Sept. 15, 2011): .274/.349/.498 in 156 games.
By my best estimates of when he started dating each based on the maximum number of celebrity-gossip articles I could stomach.
It’s worth noting that while dating Hudson, A-Rod enjoyed his best batting average with balls in play.
Oh, indeed.
Terry Kimball was drunk Tuesday night and wanted Taco Bell. Understanding the dangers of driving while intoxicated, he set out on foot for the 137th Street location in Largo, Fla., a quarter mile from his home.
When he got there he found the dining room closed, so he walked up to the drive-thru window only to find the restaurant unwilling to serve pedestrians. Hungry and frustrated, he responded in the only sensible way: By calling 911.
“It’s not an emergency,” he said. “However, can you — can you put me through to dispatch? I’m at the Taco Bell, and I walked in, and I left my car on purpose, so I wouldn’t drink and drive. I walked up, they wouldn’t serve me. So, I’m at the Taco Bell at 137th and Walsingham and I just want some tacos. That’s it.”
Kimball spent the next 11 minutes pleading his case before police arrived on the scene to arrest him for misuse of the 911 system.
“Certainly calling 911 because you didn’t get your tacos is not something that would constitute an emergency,” said Largo police Lt. Mike Loux.
But it’s all relative, no?
People lucky enough to live within walking distance of Taco Bells should not be punished for attempting to act as responsible citizens. If I were named CMO of Taco Bell, I would work to rectify this injustice. Terry Kimball’s suffering will not be in vain.
Hat tip to Catsmeat.
Tedquarters 