Random Baseball Stuff

It's been a while since I've done a blog where I just randomly spouted out some stuff that's on my mind.  Football season is fast approaching, but right now my main focus is still on baseball.  And, let's face it, with the final month almost upon us and seemingly everybody (except the Mets) in contention, there's a lot of baseball worth talking about.  And if last year is any indication, the month of September is going to be crazy.

• Minor league teams are allowed to change their affiliation every other year.  They have to declare whether or not they want to continue with their current parent team within the next few weeks, and it looks like there aren't going to be that many changes, at least in Triple-A.  But there is going to be one change, and it will be major.  After four years, the Buffalo Bisons are firing the Mets.  The Blue Jays have been looking to get out of Las Vegas ever since they got stuck out there, so it looks like the Bisons will be Toronto's Triple-A affiliate next season.  And since no other International League teams are switching, the Mets are going to have to go to the Pacific Coast League no matter what.  It looks like they're going to be the ones affiliated with Las Vegas.  Now, the Toronto-Buffalo connection makes sense from both a baseball and geographic perspective.  The three Major League cities that are actually near Buffalo are Pittsburgh, Cleveland and Toronto.  The Bisons have been the affiliate of both the Pirates and Indians before.  And, let's face it, Toronto, a city 90 miles away where the Bills play a home game every year, makes a lot more sense for Buffalo than New York, which is 450 miles away.  Of course, that's a lot closer than the distance between New York and Las Vegas, though.  (Before Buffalo, the Mets' Triple-A team was New Orleans.)
• Speaking of the International League, how about the season the Scranton/Wilkes-Barre Yankees have put together?  Scranton hasn't played a home game all year.  They're rebuilding their stadium from the ground-up, and they weren't able to find a suitable temporary home for this season.  As a result, all of their "home" games are on the field of their opponent, with the occasional neutral-site series thrown in.  Despite this, they made the playoffs.
• If the Major League version of the Yankees wins the AL East, Joe Girardi's got to be the frontrunner for Manager of the Year.  With all due respect to Robin Ventura, Buck Showalter and Bob Melvin, Girardi's done a remarkable job this season (and I'm not just speaking as a Yankees fan here).  Sure, the Yankees have a high payroll and a lot of superstar players, but consider the injuries they've had to overcome this season: Mariano Rivera (out for the year), Alex Rodriguez (missed two months), CC Sabathia (two DL stints), Andy Pettitte (out since June), Brett Gardner (out for the year), David Robertson (missed a month), Mark Teixeira (missed multiple games a few times).  All those man games lost, yet they're in position to win the division.  Girardi deserves a lot of the credit.
• Want more proof that rushing into the second wild card this season was a bad idea?  We're looking at potential ties for the wild card, which will have to be broken before the wild card games.  And if, for example, the Yankees and Rays tie for the AL East, they've got to break that tie first.  The schedule has only one day built in for tiebreakers (Thursday) before the wild card games on Friday, which means no September rainouts.  And if the same team would be involved in a division and wild card tiebreaker before the wild card game, that's a nightmare that I'm sure nobody even wants to think about.  That's not even mentioning the fact that a team could potentially play three games in three different cities over the span of four days.  (The Giants end the season in LA, could theoretically fly to Atlanta for the wild card game, then, if they win, fly cross-country again to start the Division Series at home.)  Or that the No. 1 seed in each league will have no idea where it's playing until Friday night, then has to fly to the wild card team and play on Sunday.  (Say the Yankees end up with the best record in the AL.  They might end up playing Oakland and have to fly cross-country last minute.  Some advantage for finishing with the best record.)
• The AL wild card race is going to be nuts.  First of all, how are Baltimore and Oakland the two teams holding down those spots right now?  Oakland especially.  The A's aren't good.  I don't understand it.  I think they'll both fall out of the race in September, though.  Over the last couple weeks, the Tigers have remembered that they're supposed to be good, and the Rays will do their typical September thing.  I don't know what's going on with the Angels.  They're five games out of the wild card!  They still have enough time to contend for a playoff spot, but they need to take their heads out of their asses first.
• It's ridiculous that LA's other team was able to pull off that trade with the Red Sox.  Boston officially waived the white flag on this season and got rid of some clubhouse cancers in the process.  And it's totally amazing that they somehow managed to dump all that salary in one felt swoop.  I also think it was an acknowledgement that Gonzalez and Crawford were mistakes.  Beckett, meanwhile, had simply worn out his welcome, and evidently, once you wear out your welcome with the Red Sox, you get traded to the Dodgers (see: Ramirez, Manny).
• As for the trade itself, I definitely think the Dodgers got the better end of the deal.  Gonzalez is from San Diego, which is why he would never let the Padres trade him.  Maybe being back in Southern California will be good for him.  It could be good for Beckett, too.  He's not under that ridiculous microscope of Red Sox Nation and only has to be a decent No. 2 starter behind Clayton Kershaw.  I have no idea why they took on Crawford's salary, though.  Even if he was able to play, are you really going to mess with that awesome outfield of Victorino, Kemp and Ethier?  My only guess is that they're treating Victorino as a rental and planning on having Crawford play left field next year.  Regardless, taking on all of that salary is a pretty clear indication that Magic and Co. are willing to do whatever it takes to win now.  They're three games behind the Giants, but I think everyone would agree that, especially now, the Dodgers are the better team.  I expect LA to win the NL West.
• I know it's gotten to the point of being a broken record at this point, but it's embarrassing how bad Houston is.  Now that they've finally liberated Wandy Rodriguez and Carlos Lee, there's not a single guy on that team you've heard of.  Outside of Jose Alutve, there's not a Major Leaguer on the roster.  They might as well be an expansion team.  They certainly look like one.  And it's only going to get worse in the American League next year.  On the bright side, the Astros already have 40 wins, so at least the '62 Mets are safe.
• ESPN and MLB re-upped their deal today until 2021 for double the amount ESPN's paying now.  For the most part, ESPN's coverage is going to be exactly the same, but with several key changes, all of which are good.  The Monday and Wednesday night games won't be blacked out anymore and the nationally-televised games on the four baseball holidays (Opening Day, Memorial Day, 4th of July, Labor Day) are back.  They're also going to have one of the wild card games and two Division Series games each year.  (The TBS exclusivity of the Division Series games hasn't been bad, but it also kind of defeats the purpose when there are two games at the same time and one gets bumped to TNT.  Four games in one day is too much for only one network to have the TV rights.)

Just some baseball things that are on my mind.  The football preview is on tap.