Vote for Lopez

With two outs in the 9th inning last night, Alex Rodriguez took the first pitch he saw from Keith Foulke and knocked it out the park. Rodriguez's blast helped the Yankees get within 6 of the Red Sox.

Is this the exception or the norm when it comes to baseball's highest paid player? Well, Stats, Inc. defines Close and late situations as "results in the 7th inning or later with the batting team either ahead by one run, tied or with the potential tying run on deck".

How has Alex Rodriguez performed in those situations this year? .091 batting average, no homeruns and 3 RBIs.

This isn't to take anything away from Rodriguez, and I would never argue against him being the most talented player in the game. At the end of the year, he'll still post numbers in the .320-40-130 range, which by itself is very impressive.

However, his salary (inflated since moving from SS to 3B, not that the Yankees can't absorb that) and lack of playoff production since joining the Yankees (.277-3-8 in 16 games, including a .133-0-0 last year) will always keep him in the "most overrated" debate.


Stupid Is As Stupid Does

I'll admit that I don't want to sit down and give Tim McCarver a rational explanation for why he's horrible at what does as much as I want to deliver a hatchet wound to his face. He's part of the reason why I don't believe FOX should broadcast anything other than NASCAR. His constant harping on all things Yankee drives me nuts, and then he uttered that "...if Brian Cashman assembled the Mets, they'd be considered the best team money can buy". Translation: Omar Minaya doesn't get the criticism of building through free agency that Brian Cashman gets.

Boo. Freakin'. Hoo.

Incredibly, the mouth at the base of Joe Buck's drive in movie theatre-sized melon stated the obvious:

New York Mets 2006 payroll: $100M
New York Yankees 2006 payroll: $198M

You could assemble two New York Mets with the amount of money that Brian Cashman has spent on the Yanks, Tim. Nice attempt, but you're wrong. Let's also mention that in the last 2 years, the Mets farm system has produced 3B David Wright, SS Jose Reyes and should-be-starting pitcher Aaron Heilman and SP Brian Bannister. The Yankees have produced 2B Robinson Cano and SP Chien-Ming Wang.

With Lastings Milledge and Tagg Bozied in Norfolk, Willie Collazo and Michael Abreu in Binghampton, the Mets will add 2-4 more before 2008.

As someone who likes the Boston Red Sox, whose payroll is over $100M, I can't whine about how much money the Yankees spend on payroll. But for McCarver to point the finger at Minaya and basically say "Look, he's spending a lot of money, too" just reeks of him being the Yankee-loving shill he is.

If you want to skewer Minaya, do so over him trading Scott Kazmir for Victor Zambrano. That trade is going to haunt the Mets for a long, long time.

All-Star Balloting

If you're interested in voting for the 2006 All-Star game, you can do so here. They have links that allow you to vote in English, Spanish or Japanese.

It's at this point where I'm going to begin campaigning for a certain player. We all know that that with every All-Star ballot, there are guys who have been on the DL since mid-April who still win the fan vote, while a more deserving player gets shut out.

This year, I'm urging everyone to do the right thing, and vote for Seattle Mariners 2B Jose Lopez as the American League 2B. The 22-year old Lopez is in his 2nd season with the big club, is a slick fielder and currently leads all American League 2B in: hits, triples, homeruns, slugging % and OPS, and is tied for the lead in doubles.

He's clearly the best choice in the AL, but seeing how he's an unknown guy, which playing in Seattle doesn't help, he'll likely finish well behind Robinson Cano, Mark Loretta, Luis Castillo and Brian Roberts in the fan vote.

Don't let that happen, people.