I don’t put any foreign substances on the baseball…
…Everything I use is from the good old U.S.A.
Rule 8.02 of the MLB rules categorically states what a pitcher can and cannot do, and calls for a 10 game automatic suspension for any “doctoring” of the ball. The Rays pitcher Joel Peralta can call himself lucky to get a eight game suspension after the ‘Pine Tar’ incident against the Washington Nationals last week. Peralta was caught with pine tar inside his glove as he was throwing warmup pitches before relieving David Price. That’s the easy bit of the story. What is less clear is the conduct of the Rays GM, Joe Maddon, and the Rays defence of Peralta. It seems pretty clear, based on the evidence, that the substance inside the glove was present for other reasons than leftovers from batting practice. However, Joe Maddon’s defence was that “it’s kind of a common practice that people have done this for years.” He also took umbrage over the fact that the Nationals’ had Peralta as a pitcher for a season and any knowledge about him had been the reason for the bullpen alerting the attention of the officials.
For me, the rules are clear and any illegal attempt to alter the flight of the ball shouldn’t be tolerated. Furthermore, any ‘local’ knowledge of Peralta suggests that he is a repeat offender. Peralta offered the explanation that he was wearing his batting glove but this can’t be put down to naïveté. As an aside, Maddon calling relief pitcher Ryan Mattheus for checking in the 9th inning was petty.
The New York Mets pitcher R.A. Dickey has been in sublime form of late and threw back to back ‘one hitters’ against the Tampa Bay Rays and the Baltimore Orioles. This is only the third time in baseball history that this has happened, demonstrating how consistently and devastatingly well that Dickey is pitching. He is 11-1 for the season and throwing the best knuckleballs of his career.
My website of choice this week is Fangraphs.com. Again, it’s a veritable smorgasbord of statistics lovingly served in various formats. My favourite aspect of the site is the “win probability” analysis in graphical form, showing the probability of each team winning and the key plays that tipped the statistical balance. However, the magnum opus for Fangraphs.com is their iPhone app which gives you a plethora of statistics on each player, game data going back to 1974, live scores including play-by-play data to name but a few magical features. This site was recommended by a fellow blogger, Boston Red Sox fan and Twitter friend from New England. I consider him to be a doyen of baseball and am indebted for his help! But he’s still a Red Sox fan….
