Your 2009 AL All Star, Curtis Granderson

Well, he did it. Generally absent from the All Star conversation--almost entirely because of a unremarkable .256 batting average, Curtis Granderson was voted to the All Star game by a group of his peers. For as much crap as the fan voting gets, (much of it deserved), I'm not sure that enough credit is given to the player voting. For Granderson to make the All Star game in this fashion tells us that things like Defense actually are taken into consideration. Or that the ability to change a game, via speed, or power or what have you, go further than just the stat line.

For that, congratulations to Curtis Granderson, on his first of what we all hope will be many All Star selections. For those of you who may gripe about the selection, the only candidate I can see with a real beef is Nelson Cruz, who's 20 HR, 13 SB and high-quality defense should have given him a nod as well. However, Josh Hamilton, also of the Rangers made it in, despite not deserving it in any way, shape or form. My guess is that he declines the invitation, due to injury, and Cruz is added to the roster as his replacement. That would be fitting and just.

Onto other All-Star musings: Miguel Cabrera just misses out again. Here's a guy was an All Star in 4 of his first 5 professional seasons, but hasn't been included in his first two years in Detroit. Last year, he led the American League in Home Runs and was in the Top 3 for RBIs behind Hamilton and Arod. Nope, not an All Star. This year, he is tied with Justin Morneau (who deservingly did make the team) for the lead among first basemen in Batting Average (.323). His 16 HR and 47 RBI are greater than and equal to (respectively) those same stats for '09 All Star Kevin Youkilis. He has struck out fewer times than any of the three All-Star first basemen. Now, I'm not saying that the three selected players are not deserving, because it is a tough call. However, Miguel Cabrera seems to me to be the most complete first baseman of the bunch, and I have a hard time finding a reason to keep him out of the game.

Which leads me to a final point: The "Final Vote" competition for the last roster spot.

There are five candidates for this position, one of whom is Brandon Inge of the Tigers. Let's take a look at the group with some brief analysis:

Brandon Inge: Leads all AL 3rd basemen in Home Runs (19), Second (behind Evan Longoria) among AL 3rd basemen in RBIs (54), Arguably the best defensive 3rd baseman in the league, 2nd among AL 3rd basemen in Runs Scored.

Now, Inge is also the victim of a poor batting average (.269), but he is OPSing .874, behind only Arod and Longoria in the American League! And look at him play defense! If there is one player who should feel cheated, it is Inge, who lost out to the defensively inept Michael Young, in his first year as a 3rd baseman.

Although, Ranger teammate Ian Kinsler also has a legitimate claim to the All Star team. He was cheated out of a spot by Dustin Pedroia, who coasted in on the tails of Red Sox nation to a starting spot. Kinsler deserves to be an All Star, I don't know how anybody can argue with that either.

As for the other three:

Carlos Pena: has 23 HR and 55 RBIs--and a .233 batting average. He was nominated because the AL Manager is Rays manager Joe Maddon. He does not deserve it more than Miguel Cabrera. Next.

Adam Lind is having a breakout year with 18 HR, 57 RBI and a .310 average. In a normal year, that is All Star caliber. Oh, but he doesn't play defense and this is a national league All Star game with no DH. Next.

Chone Figgens. I've got no beef with Chone. He's got 24 SBs and a .312 average, but almost no power and doesn't have the same leather that Inge posesses. If he were tearing up the league in Stolen Bases then he'd get my consideration, but that's Carl Crawford and he's already on the team.

So, to me at least, both Brandon Inge and Ian Kinsler have legitimate claims to the Final All Star Slot. I will not be particularly upset if either of those two make the squad. However, I will say that there are already three second basemen on the roster (when you include Ben Zobrist of the Rays) to only two 3rd basemen, and considering this game "counts," who else would you want as a defensive replacement late in the game than Mr. Inge down at the hot corner.

Vote Inge. You won't be sorry.

Happy 4th!

2007 UD Black #PN-CG Curtis Granderson "Pride Of A Nation" (#54/75)

After some 16th inning fireworks from Curtis and the Tigers last night, it is only appropriate that he wish everybody a happy, safe 4th of July.

Mail Day! Part 1 from A Cardboard Problem

It is possible that this weekend, despite all of the relaxing and around the house things that I intend to do, I will be able to catch up on the piles and piles of cards that have accumulated over the last few weeks.

Since Marie just recognized the fact that I sent her some return cards, I figure that it's high time I show off the cards she sent me in the first place. Part 2 from A Cardboard Problem will be a pile of Grandersons/Tigers that Sooz sent me out of the goodness of her heart.

Having held out on buying Topps Series 2 cards until the retail parallels were released, I have missed out on picking up some of the Tigers inserts that I needed, including a couple of Mr. Cobb himself.

2009 Topps #LLG-15 Ty Cobb (Target Exclusive)

I'm a huge fan of the retail-exclusive inserts this year, despite them being a bit cumbersome to pick up. Of course, with people like Marie out there, it makes life a little bit easier. This card, and the Wal-Mart exclusive from Series 1, are the two Cobb inserts that come in regular packs from each respective store. Of course, there is a regular Ty Cobb insert as well, available in all packs:

2009 Topps #LGCB-TC Ty Cobb

I'm less impressed with this card, which is part of the reason that I like the retail exclusives so much. Something about those faded color photos make them much more personal than this even more colorless shot of Cobb outstretched. I think that it is the picture I don't like, mostly. Maybe if he were sliding in to a base to amputate somebody below the knee I would feel different.

I thought that after Series 1 that I would be Cobb-ed out. Honestly, I thought that I was tired of Cobb cards during Series 1, with all of the parallels and exclusives and SPs and the like. What I've found instead is that Series 2 has some very nice Cobbs as well and, considering that he is the greatest player to ever put on a Tigers uniform, I guess I should be glad that he is featured so regularly, instead of, say, a card that looks at the career of Paul Gibson or Dave Collins or something.

Just for good measure, Marie threw another card into the bunch.

2009 Topps #TTT43 Curtis Granderson

Sweet. Bright blue, Tigers logo, Granderson swinging? All good things. He may even morph into 3-d under a digital camera, although I haven't tried that yet.

So, a hearty Thank You to Marie, who made my life so much easier by sending these cards my way. I hope you enjoyed your little return package of Yankees.

Series 2 Tigers: Carlos Guillen Silk

This is a baseball card blog after all, despite the many recent non-baseball card posts. Helping to share the shipping costs with Mr. Ni was a Silk version of the poor, injured Carlos Guillen:

2009 Topps Carlos Guillen Silk (#22/50)

I tend to like the silk cards for a few reasons.

1. They are cards printed on cloth, which is kind of kitschy and fun. I've recently thought that this idea should be expanded upon and instead of giving us blank pieces of game used cloth in cards, they should just print the cards on the jersey.
2. They are distinct enough to not confuse with a regular parallel. For one, the picture portion is quite small, like a mini card, but it is housed in a regular sized frame. They stand out from the crowd with ease.
3. They are serial numbered on the front, something that I am a proponent of. Granted, in this case the numbering is a bit too big and takes too central a role, but so be it.

The only problem with these cards is that I'm not quite sure how I want to classify them. I normally wouldn't consider them part of the master set because they're so obviously a parallel. At the same time, they're definitely an insert/separate subset: Not all players have them, they have a completely different structure etc. For now, I guess, I'll think of it this way: If I can pick one up cheap, I will, but I'm not going to kill myself trying to chase these down. I do like them, though.

Card Cost: .99
Shipping: 1.50 (1/2 of a 3.00 package)

Totals to Date:
Cards: $15.91
Shipping: $13.75
Total: $29.66

What Will You Trade For Your Child (Age 7-17)?

Sooz beat me to it but I also got a random email from Wife Swap seeking for candidates who collect things.

Wife? Check.
Live-in child, aged 7-17? Damn. I guess I can't take home the undisclosed amount of money that comes with being on the show. That's ok, my wife didn't sound too keen on swapping either.

Thinking around the blogs though, I had some ideas for candidates, having no sense of their family situations:

Baseball Dad
Dayf
Night Owl
JayBee

If any of you guys (or any other collectors) feel like trying out for Wife Swap, just let me know and I will happily refer you. Heck, if you make it I'll even split my finders fee 50/50 with Sooz, because she asked first.

If Mariano Rivera Was A Tiger, Would He Still Be Mariano Rivera?

Note: Because of formatting on the blog, some of these tables look blindingly small, if you click on them, you can make them big. Sorry!

Craig Calcaterra, of Shysterball fame blogs daily for NBC as well. In today's series of posts one article caught my eye. Apparently, Mariano Rivera was considered in a trade to the Tigers, once upon a time.

This comes from the original NY Daily News article that Calcaterra references:

[Then-GM Gene] Michael had his own 'What if?' moment a few years later, in 1995, when he considered trading Rivera to the Tigers for David Wells. At the time Rivera was still trying to make it as a starter, still throwing in the low 90s, and when Michael asked the Tigers what they would want in a deal for Wells, Rivera was one of the names they put on a list.

Of course the next paragraph talks about how those talks coincided with a jump in Rivera's velocity in the minors to the mid- to upper-90's and that how "At that point there was no way I was trading him." Still, it makes a body wonder what could have been.

Well? Let's say that trade goes through and Rivera becomes a Tiger in 1995. Other than altering the course of NY Yankees history, what does it do for the Tigers? For Rivera?

I started to jump to conclusions i.e., no way Rivera reaches 500 saves, it makes no difference to the Tigers who suffered from poor pitching, hitting and defense in addition to closer issues (although Todd Jones was more than serviceable in his better years), they would have screwed it up and traded Rivera in 1999 for Sterling Hitchcock, so why bother etc.

However, I thought that I would pull a few numbers to see what I could make of it. All of the data that follow comes from the incredible baseballreference.com

First of all, the Tigers, as a team, had 789 Save Opportunities from 1995 through 2009. For comparison, the Yankees had 937 save opportunities over the same period. Rivera was obviously given more of an opportunity to earn saves with the Yankees, although he was stuck behind John Wetteland in 1995 and 1996, something that wouldn't have happened in Detroit. Still, for reasons of fatigue, strategy or any other number of things, it is important to note that the closer does not have all of those save opportunities. Of the Yankees 937 SVOPs, Rivera had 562. For simplicity sake (instead of going year-by-year) let's assume that Rivera would handle 60% of the save opportunities for the Tigers, just as he did for the Yankees.

That allows us to break it down year-by-year:

From Grand Cards

To calculate the Win Difference (W +/-) I assumed that 60% of the win opportunities were taken by Rivera at his prevailing save percentage and 40% were taken by the Tigers at their team percentage. Given that the Tigers closers during that time were probably better suited to set-up duty, this assumption is not too erroneous.

Clearly, the Tigers are unambiguously better off with Rivera than without--they have more wins in each year as their hypothetical closer. But, how much better are they really? Do they make the playoffs when they wouldn't have before? How about a .500 season?

From Grand Cards

They certainly would have been more respectable over the last 15 years though. With Rivera, the Tigers would have enjoyed .500 seasons in 1997, 2000, 2004 and 2008 in addition to the actual .500 seasons that they had in 2006 and 2007. Respectability, woo! Also, that disappointing 2008 season? Yeah, the Tigers would have won the AL Central with 90 wins, thanks to the +16 wins attributed to having a solid closer.

And how does Rivera turn out? 60% of the Tigers' 789 Save Opportunities from 1995-2009 is 473. Meaning he would have pitched in fewer save situations than he currently has saves for the Yankees. With his 89% career save percentage, that would have left him with 420 saves, putting him 5th on the All Time Saves list between John Franco and Dennis Eckersley.

But wait, there's more! You may have been thinking: "But with so many fewer save opportunities for the Tigers, he would have been able to pitch in a higher percentage of them!" Fine. For him to have had the same number of Save Opps with the Tigers as he has had with the Yankees, he would have needed to pitch in 71% of the Tigers save situations. What difference does that make?

From Grand Cards

From Grand Cards

Eh, not so much. An additional .500 season in 2005 and enough wins to win the AL Central in 1997--except that the Tigers were in the AL East that year. [UPDATE: It appears as though the Tigers may have been in a playoff against the Yankees for the Wildcard spot in 2007 as well]

So there you have it, the tale of Mariano Rivera: The Tiger. It sure would have made for some more interesting summers in the doldrums of the 90's and early 2000's, if nothing else.

Good Things Come...

...to those who wait.

Sometimes it just pays to stick it out. Think about it. You've bought your ticket, you've committed your day, or night, what's the worst thing that can happen? Maybe you get a little cold, or wet. Or maybe you have to pour an extra cup of coffee in the morning to get going. But think about what might happen if you call it quits! Would you risk missing out?

To date, my go-to example was the 2004 Michigan-Michigan State football game. Losing by 17, about 6 minutes to go and hope appeared lost. The warm, sunny day had started to cool. One of my housemates headed home. Braylon and Braylon, the couple that stood in front of us throughout the season and wore matching Braylon Edwards jerseys, called it quits. And a good chunk of the 111,000+ crowd had headed home. Enter: the Braylon Edwards show, triple overtime and the most electric, exciting game that I've ever been a part of, freezing cold--jumping and yelling to stay warm. Of course, all 111,000 will claim to have been there, but only a fraction of that number actually made it through. For the rest of you, here's a recap.

So why all of this? Last night, with cream-of-the-crop company tickets in hand, I went down to Camden Yards with my wife, a co-worker and his girlfriend. I was excited to see John Smoltz, who I had never seen pitch before (it turns out, that I actually had, in the 2005 All Star Game, when he took the loss), who looked stellar in the first few innings. Meanwhile, U-M alumni Rich Hill was getting destroyed on the mound and before you knew it, the game was a 9-1 laugher.

Then the rains came.

My wife saw it coming in the concession line--an enormous black mass of clouds heading in from the direction of the football stadium. By all accounts it wasn't really supposed to rain, but it did--hard. My first thought was, "ooh, this game isn't official yet, so maybe it will get rained out and we'll have these great seats again." It was certainly raining too hard to walk to my car to go home, so the concourse it was.

Rain Delays are exceedingly dull, by the way. Step 1: find something to do.

"Ok, let's come up with all the words that rhyme with Oriole"
(hilariously wide eyes as we realize how hard that was). We came up with three: (in order) Arboreal, Memorial, Sartorial
More delay. Fewer things to do. No word when the game would start. It started to lighten up after about 35 minutes, and I was cold and wet again, debating whether to stick it out. We decided to stay--we had great seats, we were already there and we only saw 4 1/2 innings of the game, we'll still have plenty of time to leave early if we want. So we stayed.

Witness: The greatest comeback in Baltimore Orioles history and the greatest comeback by a last place team over a first place team in Major League History. I wish I had brought a camera, although I was able to take some halfway decent pictures with my 5 year old cellphone (it was state-of-the art at the time). Here's Nick Markakis studying Jonathan Papelbon's warmups as Felix Pie prepares to march to his ugly, swinging death. Markakis will drive in the winning run, via a double and play at the plate in approximately 3 minutes.



99% of the time it won't be worth it, but that other 1% you'll never forget. Also, never, EVER, take good seats for granted.