Do I Not Like That!
Graham Taylor – Manager of the England national football team, 1990-1993. He will be remembered forever over here as one of the worst managers we ever had. He made a string of puzzling team selections, changed formations unneccesarily and consequently we drew with teams we should beat easily and lost to anyone who was half decent. In one game against Holland he had a bit of a breakdown on the sideline after a refereeing decision went against us. He had a rant at the officials which has become legendary. A documentary about his time in charge called “Do I Not Like That!” was shown on TV following his sacking and is available on YouTube. Even for non soccer fans it’s well worth a watch for comedy value alone.
The problem with Graham Taylor was that he was just a bit out of his depth. He got the England job based on success he’d had with smaller clubs but he didn’t have the nouse to deal with the step up in class.
Suffice to say, when Graham Taylor was called up to be the Marlins 5th starter I had extremely low expectations of him. I’d never seen him pitch before, never read much about him, but just the name ‘Graham Taylor’ made me extremely concerned.
Three starts later and he’s back in the minors. So much for being able to throw strikes.
Whilst I’m not exactly a fan of Andrew Miller, his name doesn’t make me think of the time we didn’t qualify for the World Cup or the time we lost 2-0 to the USA. That must be a good thing for any fan.
Winning is not enough…
“Winning is not enough – everyone else must fail.”
And it’s just so much more fun to watch teams fail in spectacular fashion. The comeback wins over the Nats in Washington were fun, but victories in New York against the Mets and Chicago against the Cubs are so much sweeter. You see, we don’t have much of a history with the Nationals, we just turn up and beat them. It’s different with the Mets and Cubs though.
Every game at Wrigley is just a reminder for me of Steve Bartman and the Game 7 that followed. I’m sure it’s the same for many Cubs fans. As the cameras panned around the stadium last night I’m sure many fans were thinking “Not again” and “I hate the Marlins”. This pleases me.
Everytime the Marlins play in New York the announcers are compelled to talk about the rivalry that’s built up over the last few years. “And of course, the Marlins have ended the Mets season for the last two years” they’ll say. Marlins fans everywhere smile. Mets fans everywhere get upset and hate the announcers for reminding them about it. This also pleases me.
I’ve been given a lot of stick over the years for following the Fish. Yes, our stadium is poor. Yes, we have no money. Yes, we’ve had a lot of losing seasons. No, we’ve never won our division. That said, we’ve won 2 World Series titles and a new stadium is on it’s way. We’ve never had an epic collapse down the stretch. We’ve never lost a playoff series. It really does seem as thought it’s been more fun to follow the Marlins over the last 15 years than most other teams. This is because of the phrase at the top of this post. Even if we haven’t had success, we’ve always had someone else’s failure to enjoy.
And it’s never fresher in the memory than during a win at the Mets or a during a big inning on a cold night in Wrigley.
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In case you were wondering how the Sheffield Bladerunners got on in our season opener:
We got swept in our double header at Menwith Hill on opening day. I grounded out to the pitcher in my two at bats in the first game and was lifted for a pinch hitter in the 5th inning. In game two I started on the bench, came in as a defensive substitute in the 4th and hit an RBI single to right in my only AB. 1 for 3 with no errors in the field is a solid way to start.
We split the double header the following weekend in Halton although I was unavailable for these games. The second game was memorable for this relief appearance from our star Canadian: 3 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 0 BB, 9 K. Sadly, he’s off back to Canada soon and won’t be back until August.
This Sunday we’re at home for the first time against Liverpool. Report to follow.
Final record
If we carry on at this rate we’ll finish 147-15. Win 3 out of 5 from here and we’ll get 100 wins. Even if we play .500 ball we’ll finish 86-76.
Haha Haha Hanrahan
I’m sure the Marlins are going to lose again at some point this season but Joel Hanrahan is doing his best to keep our win streak going. 2 blown saves in 2 games and 2 more Marlins victories.
Yeah, Hermida and the pitchers deserve an awful lot of credit for the last two fighbacks but the Nationals sure played their part too with some helpful errors and bad pitches. They looked like a team that just don’t know how to win. It seemed like the fans on both nights expected them to blow it also. Where was the all the noise, roaring the team to the finish? Ok, so you can understand the lack of volume in extra innings after you’ve had the wind knocked out of you by those home runs but it wasn’t even loud before that. At least it certainly didn’t seem that way on TV.
We’ve now won 21 of 24 against Washington and if whether we get a lead or fall behind I’m not going to be too concerned. We look like a team of winners. All the walk-off hits last year showed that and it’s looking the same way again.
Closers may be overpaid, saves maybe overvalued, but blown saves are seriously damaging. And for that, Joel Hanrahan, we thank you.
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Tomorrow is the first day of the British Baseball season. My Sheffield Bladerunners are away at the Menwith Hill Patriots, a team made up of US Air Force servicemen stationed at Menwith Hill, North Yorkshire. It’s one of the best playing facilities in the league, with the runway just beyond the left field fence and the air traffic control tower in right. Sadly, security restrictions mean I won’t be able to take any photographs but I’ll hopefully have some good news to report from our double header.
Last year we ended our season against them by losing both games by the mercy rule after 5 innings. We were already 4-0 behind in the first inning of the first game when I dropped an inning-ending fly ball with the bases loaded. Whilst that didn’t exactly help, I’m not sure it changed the outcome.
We should have a better team this year. Certainly a couple of new Canadian recruits look like they can play a bit. We’ve also got some guys who are completely new to playing the sport, like I was last year. The success of the Menwith Hill team will be dependant upon how many of their good players from last year have been stationed elsewhere and how good the replacements are. My guess is they’ll still be rather good and that we could be in for a long day.
Errors
Just wanted to make a quick point about errors. Yes, the Marlins are going to make plenty of them this season but so is every other team.
The Mets handed us a game last week by dropping a simple fly ball with 2 outs, leading to both of our runs in that narrow win. Just yesterday the Braves dropped two fly balls in foul territory, one of which led to the Marlins starting a rally that essentially put the game beyond Atlanta.
At some point there’s going to be a game when we have a defensive shocker. It’ll probably be soon and it’ll probably cost us a win. When it does, can we all agree not to get upset about it? We’ve benefitted recently so I certainly don’t want to hear anyone complaining that it’s only us who makes these sort of mistakes.
One week, many observations
6 games. We’ve only played 6 games. It’s far, far, far too early to get excited about this season. This time next week we could be under .500. With less than 4% of the season gone it’s wrong to draw conclusions about how our season is going to go.
That said, I’m going to do it anyway.
* I’m excited and concerned about Bonifacio. He might be brilliant, legging out triples and stealing bases every night. Alternatively, pitchers might figure him out and he might never actually reach base.
* I love our infield. I love how many home runs they’re going to hit. I’m also prepared to put up with their errors.
* I like the fact that our catchers can hit. Baker looks like the real deal and as a starter against lefties Paulino doesn’t look overmatched at all.
* I fear that our outfield might only end up hitting around .250. I like Hermida but I doubt whether he’ll ever fulfill his potential. Ross dosen’t fill me with confidence at the plate (I’m not sure why) and I don’t think the constant changing of position in the batting order will help Maybin’s development.
* I’m impressed with Gonzalez’s defensive switches. Twice games have ended on tough catches by Carroll after he’d be brought in as a replacement.
* I think Lindstrom will be fine after a few more outings. He seemed a bit rusty in clinching his 1st save of the season and although he’s not going to be lights out I doubt he’ll be a liability either.
* Nunez and Calero will be fine. The rest of the bullpen scare me half to death.
* I’m not sure if Miller’s the man to be the 5th starter. Certainly if his relief appearances are anything to go by.
I’m sure I’ll look back on this post in a few weeks and laugh at how wide of the mark I’ve been. You can’t make good long term judgements on so few games but I’ve really enjoyed this first week and I just can’t help myself.
Baseball Blackout
Wednesday October 15th, 2003. I woke up on this morning with more anticipation and excitement than any other. The previous night the Marlins had played the Cubs in Game 6 of the NLCS and I knew that if we’d won Game 7 would be live on UK television that night. Not only could the Marlins make it to the World Series but I’d get to see it live. In the UK we only get coverage of ESPN’s Sunday Night and Wednesday Night Baseball and Marlins games are quite rare. Our most important game in 6 years would be live, if only we could win Game 6…
I headed straight for the university library, logged into the Marlins homepage and prayed for good news. I wasn’t disappointed. Marlins 8, Cubs 3. Game 7, Wednesday night, live on TV. Wow.
I look back on that day with great fondness but sadly, days like that aren’t going to be happening anymore. Channel 5 in the UK has announced that they will no longer be showing live baseball on Sunday and Wednesday nights. For the fans of baseball in this country it’s a hammer blow. No more coverage. No more baseball. The UK market has been blacked out.
It’s the global economic crisis that’s to blame apparently. Since the show goes out between 1am and 5am it’s not exactly a prime spot for advertisers (often whole shows would run without commercials – what a luxury for us fans) and there were simply too many costs to cover. The presenters, Jonny Gould and Josh Chetwynd, made the show special. Yes, the live game is what we’d tuned in for, but in between innings the highlights and stories from around the league, the chat between the presenters, the fun and games and the viewer interaction was just as entertaining. That won’t be a part of my life anymore and I’m saddened by it. Yes, I’ll still watch games on MLB.TV like I have for the last couple of years but this isn’t a luxury that many fans have. I’ve had emails read out on the show, got a birthday shout-out for my dad and seen an article I’d written for the student paper discussed and shown live on air. I felt a bond with the presenters and so did other fans too. It seemed like we were a community of baseball lovers staying up late to indulge in our passion. Other mocked our devotion but we were proud of it. At times the show ceased to be a baseball programme and seemed more like a social gathering. You get your mates round, have a few of beers and watch the game. The presenters were everyone’s friends and the banter that flew around the studio and in the emails was something special.
Only having two games per week plus the World Series meant that most teams were rarely shown. Yes, the Marlins won the World Series during the first year of coverage (1997) but in the next 5 years we were on just once as far as I can recall – a 10-0 loss to Atlanta. Still, it was live baseball and it was better than nothing. We were next shown on September 24th 2003, our playoff clinching win over Philadelphia. With the way the scheduling worked out our games against the Giants weren’t on and had we lost Game 6 to the Cubs it would’ve been Game 6 of the Red Sox/Yankees series instead. As it was, I got to see the Marlins play in the playoffs, a pleasure that I thought fate would conspire to deny me. The World Series was magical, of course it was, but seeing them play live for a place in the World Series is a memory that’ll last a lifetime.
I know that should the Marlins ever make it back I can catch it all online but there’s no sense of occasion when you watch everyday. That Game 7 simply wouldn’t have had the drama for me if I’d watched Game 6. I don’t think I’d have looked forward to it in quite the same way. If baseball was back on British television I’d still watch the Marlins games on MLB.TV, except on Sunday and Wednesday nights because that show was the best thing on the box.
I hope the show comes back soon and I hope it stays on the same channel. New presenters, new format, new channel – well, that’d be fine, but we’d still long for the way it used to be. 12 great years of baseball coverage included some great moments, such as Cleveland coming from 14-0 behind after 7 innings to win 15-14, Boston hitting 4 home runs in a row against the Red Sox, Houston’s extra inning marathon that ended at 7:21 UK time plus all the classic World Series games. If that Houston game happened again now I’d log off, go to bed and watch the rest the following day (just like I did for the SD-COL playoff decider not long ago) but games on TV are different to those online. You felt you needed to keep watching. You couldn’t go to bed. You’d be letting down the presenters and all the other hardcore viewers who’d stuck it out. So what if the sun was already starting to rise, the show must go on and the fans must keep on watching.
Sadly, we can’t watch anymore. The sunshine this morning was lying to us – today was a very grey day indeed.
Holy Ødin!
What a few days it’s been for the Marlins.
Ricky Nolasco and the bullpen threw a combined no-hitter against the Tigers. I’ve been less excited by this than most because I don’t pay an awful lot of attention to Spring Training results. I don’t think they mean an awful lot. If they did, then it says more about the Tigers than the Marlins, especially since the following day they gave up back-to-back-to-back-to-back home runs against the Red Sox. You can take the positives from performances, but not results. Nolasco does seem to be developing into a top class starter and the outlook for the ’09 season for him seems rosy.
And now, finally, the new stadium has the official go ahead. For every step forward there has been a step back soon afterwards and it’s all been very frustrating. I’d pretty much ignored news regarding it because I didn’t want to build my hopes up. Even after the first vote went our way I didn’t think anything of it. I guess I just expected the second to go against us and we’d be back to square one. So what a great surprise it was to hear this morning that it’s all set. Finally, I can read about the stadium plans in detail. I can take a proper look at the artists impressions and not worry that we might never see it for real. No longer do we need to worry about the Marlins moving to San Antonio or Charlotte or anywhere else. At least, not until 2047.
All in all, a very positive and surprising few days for Marlins fans. We don’t usually get many like this.
Ballpark envy
The vote on the Marlins’ new stadium is something that I’m pretty much trying to ignore. There have been so many false starts, new dawns and setbacks in recent years that I’ve ceased paying attention. Any news item on the club website regarding a stadium vote I tend to skip right past. I’ve ridden on the emotional rollercoaster for too long now and I can’t bring myself to get excited by good news because bad news always seems to follow. Once we get the go ahead – the proper, complete, no more votes required go ahead – I’ll do a little jig. Until then, I’m not going to think about it too much.
Stadiums and fields are on my mind at the moment though. The Sheffield Bladerunners commence pre-season training this Sunday but since it’s Mother’s Day here in the UK, I have other plans and will have to give it a miss. I’m disappointed to miss out in one way and pleased in another. I want to get my glove out and play again but before we do that there’s some gardening that needs doing.
Our field forms part of a large sports complex with soccer pitches, cricket pitches and a golf course. The outfield grass gets cut for us but the infield remains our responsibility. We can be sure that after 6 months away there will be grass and weeds growing in the infield dirt. The pitchers mound is bound to be partially washed away and will need to be built back up to regulation height.
Getting the infield ready means we can properly begin our practices but so much more effort has to go in on every game day. You see, the infield dirt is the only indication that baseball is played there. Everything else you need to play baseball has to be put up before every game and taken down afterwards.
We have a net backstop that needs to be assembled and secured (it did blow over in strong winds during a game last year). 4ft high orange mess stretched between metal stakes makes up the outfield fence. One foul pole is a golf flag, the other is a soccer corner flag. The away team is given a bench, the home team just sits under the trees. I’ll get some photos posted on here as the season goes along so you can see for yourself.
It would be great if we could leave everything up but sadly we can be sure that if we did it’d all get vandalised or stolen. Arriving at the field 3 hours before gametime to build the stadium is just one of the issues we face. Not every team in our league has to go to quite this much effort as some have better facilities but I’m not sure of many teams that have it worse. Sadly, unlike the Marlins, there isn’t anywhere we can move to. There are no other facilities in the region and the local authorities aren’t going to build us our own field. Baseball just isn’t popular enough over here so it looks as though we’re stuck where we are. We don’t really mind though, we just get on with it and are grateful we have somewhere to play at all.
If the Marlins stadium vote does go through it’ll be fantastic for the franchise and will have fans the world over delighted. It’ll mean that we don’t have to play in Dolphin Stadium much longer.
That said, Dolphin Stadium isn’t that bad. I mean, at least Uggla, Ramirez and Hermida don’t have to put up a 1000ft long fence before every game…
Manny in the middle
I watched the MLB.com feature on Manny Ramirez trying his hand at cricket with interest (http://mlb.mlb.com/news/article.jsp?ymd=20090318&content_id=4024744&vkey=news_mlb&fext=.jsp&c_id=mlb) because I am taking the challenge in reverse. Having played cricket for 14 years I’ve become about as good as I’m going to get and since that’s not as good as I’d like to be, I’m trying baseball instead.
I’m following a path set by Ed Smith, a professional cricket who went to America try try his hand at baseball. He even wrote a book about it – http://www.amazon.co.uk/Playing-Hard-Ball-Cricket-Baseball/dp/0349116660/ref=sr_1_8?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1237456546&sr=8-8
I haven’t read the book, but it is on my wish list and it’ll probably help my development as a baseball player to see how an international class cricketer dealt with the challenges that I’m facing.
In a charity match last season the Great Britain national team took on professional cricketers at baseball. GB won convincingly, of course, but the talent is there amongst cricketers. In his book Smith apparently mentions that if he stuck at it, he could make it to the big leagues in baseball. I’m not sure about that, in the same way I don’t think Manny will be playing much cricket when he retires. Although the two games involve the same skills – hitting, catching, fielding, throwing, running and require high levels of hand eye co-ordination there is a huge difference in technique between the two sports, as I’m finding out. Anyone who can play one sport well has the potential to be good at the other, but requires them to forget everything they know and rebuild their technique from scratch.
Some examples:
* As an outfielder in cricket you stand on the very edge of the field (“the boundary”), akin to an outfielder standing next to the fence. High catches and ground balls come towards you and catching them and throwing back in is routine. Crucially though, you only ever have to run forward. One thing I’ve learned early on in right field is that quite often the ball is hit deep and you have to run backwards to catch it. I’ve never practiced running backwards. My footwork is poor and I’ve got to get better at it. In order to make a catch you’ve got to be in position to make the catch and at the moment I’m not doing so well. Shallow flies are considerably easier – coming forward to take a catch is natural for me.
* The flight of a baseball is different to that of a cricket ball. Judging the flight off the bat is 2nd nature to me on the cricket field but is more of a challenge to me as an outfielder. Baseballs seem to carry further and although my cricket instinct is telling me to move forward, I really should be moving backwards. I’m slowly picking up other clues, like the sound of the ball off the bat, to help my judgement. It’ll come with time and dedication to improvement in practice.
* Fielding a groundball in cricket requires you to turn your body sideways, put your knee on the ground and gather the ball in with two hands infront of your leg. Trying to field the ball with my feet apart, facing the plate is a completely new concept and I’ve still not really got it yet. I still want to turn sideways and struggle to stop myself, especially on a hard hit grounder. Judging the bounces and hops isn’t too much of an issue, but getting my feet in the right place is more of a challenge.
* A cricket batsman has to protect his stumps and to do this he stands right next to them. Imagine a hitter stood with his feet an inch off home plate. In cricket you play with a vertical bat and hit anything up to 18 inches away from your body, regardless of height. I’ve no issues with a horizontal bat swing as it feels somewhat natural, but leaving an inside pitch isn’t in my nature. I can’t let stuff pass close by to my body because I still think I have some stumps behind that I need to protect. Pitches on the outside corner I want to let go because in cricket they’d be called a “wide” – equivalent to a passed ball. Learning what to swing at and what to leave isn’t easy.
They’re just some of the things I’ve encountered in my short career so far. By short, I mean a dozen 2 hour practice sessions and 8 games. I do have some talent because I can smash line drives in BP without much problem. I keep getting asked why I can’t do that in the games – because in games pitchers don’t throw softly from 50 feet away. I feel as though I have the potential to become a decent baseball player – possibly better than I was at cricket – but I need to be prepared to work hard and accept the rookie mistakes that will inevitably happen. There will be strikeouts and there will be errors but I’m not the only one. Just watching Manny getting clean bowled reminds me of that.
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