Does it seem to you that every “innovation” baseball has come up with over the past decade or so has done us very little good? They realigned divisions in time to give us the endless Braves (who would've made for better company pre-1991 than the Cubs, Cards or Bucs did at precisely the wrong moments); […]

I wish you could've been inside my head last Saturday afternoon. For the first four innings before I left the house, I made so many in-game deals with the gods and censored so many between-pitches thoughts that you would've assumed I was carrying the fate of the free world in my consciousness. Or that the […]

People ask me what I do on an off-day when there's no baseball. I'll tell you what I do. I stare out the window and wait for later in the spring. *

Off-days suck. They suck anytime. You've lost three of five, you've lost nine straight, you've finished the season having lost 90+ games and nobody […]

Didja see the Mets game Tuesday night?

Yeah.

Who won?

Mets did.

Great! Who pitched?

Kaz…

Cuz I wanna know. Who pitched?

Kaz…

Like I said, cuz I wanna know.

You're not listening closely. Kaz!

Cuz I wanna know!

Kaz…he pitched.

Cuz who pitched?

Kaz!

Cuz without knowing who pitched, I don't really know what happened.

I know this is a stretch, but the pitcher's name was Kaz. Kaz Ishii.

Oh. […]

Good night to be a Kaz. Ishii was good and Matsui was better, writing a storybook finish.

I shouldn't feel so confident so soon after losing five of seven, but I went about various household chores waiting more or less calmly for us to come back and grab this one. Maybe it was just not […]

Don't stand pat. Look smart! Have the answer to any given problem. “Say, you know how our second baseman isn't quite up to snuff at the moment? I have the solution that isn't right in front of your nose!”

Thus the recurring theme of Bring Up Schmendrick! — or Keppinger or Bell or Wright or whoever […]

Yeesh. Our spiritual cousins at Faith and Fear in Cincy are no doubt writing some furious screed right now, pausing between gouts of venom to consider the cosmic significance of some long-ago game featuring the likes of Ed Ott. (I sat next to Ed Ott's wife on a plane once. She was beautiful.) As you've […]

Conventional baseball wisdom has it that you can't take every single game serious as death. If you are a player or a manager or an executive or an owner, perhaps. Me, the überfan? I find it impossible to treat any of them as if there isn't something important going on. Blame my skewed priorities or […]

So according to the soon-to-be-today's Times, the Mets will figure out what to do with Heilman after soon-to-be-today's start. And Willie's not interested in sending Zambrano to the bullpen, even though in 2001 and 2002 he made nearly 70 appearances out of the pen. Curious, I'll grant you, but I'm having trouble getting up in […]

Maybe this kangaroo court thing is apropos after all. Justice Glavine ruled in favor of targeting and hitting the inside corner for once and then sentenced the Cardinals to an hour-and-a-half of futile flailing, with no time off for good behavior. It was gratifying to watch, even though I still find myself desperately rooting for […]