"Home Runs Kill Rallies"

This kind of surprised me, but it turns out that you cannot always count on 140 characters of Twitter talk to give you the full account of a given subject. Sure, sometimes you can, like when Justin Bieber tweets, “Happy.” But other times, it might help to get a little bit more perspective and context.

For instance: The Kansas City Royals hired George Brett to be their hitting coach this week. It’s a long and lurid saga, but at the end of the day the Royals hired their signature player and Kansas City’s most famous athlete to come in and heroically save an astonishingly ineffective offense. It reminds of the (probably mythical) legend about a Texas town that was dealing with a fierce and terrifying mob. In desperation, the city leaders reached out to the legendary Texas Rangers -- not the baseball team but the originals, the law enforcement group known throughout the state for their bravery and effectiveness. The leaders explained that they simply could not handle the mob, and the Rangers sent word that help was on the way. The townspeople waited anxiously and excitedly at the train station.

And, one Texas Ranger walked off the train.

“One Ranger?” the townspeople asked.

“One mob,” the Ranger explained.

The Royals called on Brett -- one bad hitting team, one George Brett -- and he answered the call, at least for a while, there’s no telling how long. He made it clear right from the start that he’s only the “interim hitting coach,” -- it seems he insisted on the title -- and he said that they would meet in a month to see if it’s worth continuing. That doesn’t sound like the start of a long relationship, but, hey, it’s clear that Brett isn’t really sure he wants to do this or can be any good at it. He’s just sick and tired of watching the Royals flail around and so he’s willing to give it a try. The Royals, desperate as they are, they will take whatever they can get from the best hitter who ever wore the uniform.

I did not hear the press conference live so I first heard about Brett’s “Home runs kill rallies” quote through Twitter. He apparently said those exact words at his introductory press conference, and the statement obviously caused great consternation among Royals faithful because, let’s be honest, it’s overpoweringly stupid. Home runs kill rallies the way winning lottery tickets kill bank accounts, the way hit songs kill bands careers, the way raspberry sauce kills chocolate cake. I’m sure you could make some sort of circuitous argument to make these statements sound true, but they are primarily and fundamentally false as is any argument about home runs killing rallies.

To be honest, I kind of found it hard to believe Brett said it. I’ve known Brett for more approaching 20 years, and I’ve spoken with him many, many times about hitting and I’ve never heard him say anything remotely like “home runs kill rallies.” I have heard him talk about how important it is to have your mind blank at the plate. I have heard him talk about the importance of feel in a swing -- he often likens it to a golf swing. And I’ve heard him say, in a very Yoda way, that the key to hitting home runs is to not try to hit home runs.

But I never once heard him actually disparage the value of the home run. Hey, he hit more than 300 of them in his brilliant career, many of them famous like the tomahawk homer to knock out the Yankees in 1980 or the pine tar homer or the three he hit off Catfish Hunter in the ALCS or the two homers he hit in his amazing against Toronto and so on. The home runs kill rallies thing didn’t really sound like him, but, hey, it was repeated again and again on Twitter, so he obviously said it. Kind of weird, but, hey, whatever.

Then, Friday night, I mentioned on twitter that the Royals have been outhomered 24-3 since May 15 which doesn’t seem like a good trend. And a whole bunch of people responded by joking, one way or another, that Brett should be happy about this because that meant opposing teams had killed 24 rallies while the Royals had killed only three.

It was then I thought: You know, it might be a good idea to listen to the press conference and hear what the heck George Brett actually said.

It was kind of a strange press conference. Manager Ned Yost went on and on about the greatness of George Brett, his passion, worth ethic, his general awesomeness … I don’t know, that just seemed kind of weird and funny. It seemed like the mayor of Gotham City talking about how great Batman is. Isn’t the real question why the mayor of crime-ridden Gotham City still has a job?

In voice, Brett sounded even more reluctant to take the job than he had in print. Oh, he sounded passionate when talking about how he wants to share his life with the players and help them work through the bad times. But he admitted he was scared, admitted he wasn’t sure if he would like the job, admitted he had no idea if he would be any good at it. He talked about trying it for a month at least three times -- when our buddy Bob Dutton asked “George, just a month?” Brett’s response was a less than persuasive, “Well, I hope not..”

When it came to hitting, Brett talked in that zen way I’d heard him talk before -- he said he’s not much of a video watcher (there was so little of that when he played) and he’s not overly concerned about knowing intimate details about opposing pitchers. The key to hitting, he said, is to embrace the moment, to tackle the current situation, to be entirely AWARE. Brett said he did this by being scared out of his mind; his fear of failure heightened and focused his senses. Pitchers will throw differently on different days. Pitchers will pitch you differently depending on where you hit in the lineup and depending on the situation. You have to understand all that.

“I know how hard the game is to play,” he said, and he hoped he could do for these hitters what Charlie Lau had done for him. In 1974, as a rookie, Brett was hitting .232 and slugging .299 coming out of the All-Star Break. Lau reworked Brett’s swing, but more than that he reworked Brett’s mind. Think gap-to-gap. Do what you’re capable of doing. Sit fastball. Adjust to the curve. Brett hit .316 the rest of the season -- no homers, but Lau told him not to worry about that. The home runs would come naturally, a consequence of hitting baseballs hard. Brett would hit 11 homers the next year, 22 in 1977, 30 in 1985 when he led the Royals to their one and only World Series title.

Someone asked Brett if he is good teacher. He said he hoped so but then admitted that he actually hired someone else to teach his own kids how to hit. “I’ve found you can’t teach your own children,” Brett said, an amazing quote, one that I find much funnier than the home runs killing rallies bit. That rally-kill quote was on the last question. Here’s what he actually said:

“I’m sick and tired of watching guys try to hit three-run home runs with nobody on base when you’re down two runs in the eighth inning. A lot of times home runs kill rallies. Let’s do what you’re capable of doing. What are you capable of doing? Gap to gap, let’s hit the ball hard in the gaps. Hit a single, let the next guy hit a double. Let the next guy hit a single -- there’s two runs right there. But don’t try to be a hero. Be a soldier. Just go out there and do the best you can with what you’re capable of doing and try not to be somebody you’re not. Because when that happens that’s when you start hitting .200, .170, .180, you start pressing too much.”

OK, well, technically he did say “A lot of time home runs kill rallies.” I guess if you want to hold him to that, you can. But, you know, looking at the whole thing, I don’t think he meant what Twitter thought he meant. I think Brett meant that TRYING to hit home runs can kill rallies. His clear point when the quote is read in full is that when players try to do too much, try to carry the whole team, try to swing for the fences, a lot of times they hurt the ball club. I remember once Brett talking with a young Mike Sweeney about home runs. It went something like this:

Brett: “Michael, how many home runs did you hit last year?”

Sweeney: “Eight.” (This was spring training 1999)

Brett: “And how many of those did you hit when you were TRYING to hit a home run.”

Sweeney thought for a moment and said, “Zero.”

Brett: “Exactly. Now how many outs did you make when you were trying to hit a home run.”

Sweeney nodded, he apparently had made LOTS of outs trying to hit home runs, and the point was made. I have no idea at all if this little lesson had any impact at all on Sweeney -- or if he even remembers it -- but it was apparent that Brett was not telling him to stop hitting homers. He was saying that home runs are a by-product of a good hitting process, they do not come by swinging harder. “Be quick but don’t hurry,” John Wooden famously said. I thought Brett was making the same point.

And I think that was the point Brett was making in his press conference too. It might work and it might not work -- Brett himself is the first one to say that. But I’m pretty sure that the Royals won’t hit fewer home runs with George Brett whispering in their ears.

Another Royals Power Update

OK, so, I’ve been around the Kansas City Royals a long time, and because of this I usually see things coming. Losing streaks. Illogical decisions. Ridiculous statements. They’re usually not too hard to anticipate once you know what you are looking for. However, I have to admit that the last few days of Royals baseball has kind of blindsided me. I think it’s because I broke my cardinal rule of watching Royals baseball, a rule best verbalized by Buddy Bell: Things can always get worse.

I really believed that this Royals team was different from years past. That was probably Mistake No. 1. But I did believe it. No, I did not really think the Royals were going to be winners this year -- I picked them as a playoff team more as a lark than anything else -- but I did think they would be different. I saw a Royals team with viable starting pitchers, which is not something I’ve been able to say in almost 20 years. I saw a Royals bullpen with great arms -- not good arms, but great ones, 100-mph arms, 12- or 13-strikeout per nine inning arms. I saw a young Royals lineup anchored by big talents -- Eric Hosmer, Mike Moustakas, Alex Gordon, Billy Butler, I mean, just about every scout loved those guys.

I saw a Royals team that realistically could hold their own. They seemed to me to have a legitimate shot at being .500, and, with some luck, maybe even slightly better than that. They played great ball all spring and they started the year 17-10. No, they obviously were not going to play .625 baseball all year. But, all signs pointed upward, and I think that’s when I let my guard down and forgot that these are still the Kansas City Royals.

The slide really did begin on the day Royals manager Ned Yost pulled James Shields for no apparent reason after he threw eight innings of two-hit shutout ball. I’m not saying that’s WHY the slide started, but I am staying that’s when it started. The Royals led 1-0 going into the ninth there, and Shields was yanked because, as Yost said, he could only win it or lose it. The bullpen blew the game. They lost again the next night, and again the night after that, and, well, to save the suspense, the Royals are 4-19 since that day.

But, as you know, the amazing part has been the astonishing lack of power, which has set off a bizarre chain reaction that is so Kansas City Royals, they should have it trademarked. Here you go:

Step 1: The Royals go 14 straight games (and counting) without having a regular player hit a home run. The Royals have hit two home runs since May 15, both by 440-year-old Miguel Tejada, and there are all sorts of ways you can illustrate the lunacy, thought my three favorite are:

-- The Chicago Cubs pitching staff has outhomered the Royals since May 15.

-- Two different players (Dioner Navarro and Ryan Zimmerman) hit more homers YESTERDAY than the Royals have hit since May 15.

-- The Royals have as many hitting coaches as homers since May 15.

Step 2: Royals manager Ned Yost admits he has no idea what to do. “Take my belt off and spank them?” he asks. “Yell at them? Scream at them? What do you want?”

Step 3: Several people (including yours truly) make note of the fact that the Royals fired hitting coach Kevin Seitzer last year precisely BECAUSE they wanted to hit for more power. This is what the highfalutin like to call “ironical” and it makes for good blog fodder and talk radio stuffings.

Step 4: The Royals hitting coach, Jack Maloof, gives one of the most bizarre interviews I’ve ever read with an old pal, Jeff Flanagan. I mean this thing was plain nutty. As crazy as the reasoning might have been, Ned Yost really did say that he fired Seitzer because he favored a more opposite field approach. Ned Yost really did say he believed the Royals young players had a lot more power potential than they were exhibiting. Ned Yost really did seem serious about these things. It seems hard to believe he did not relay these thoughts to one of his two hitting coaches.

But, it appears, he did not.

Jack Maloof says this: “There’s just no reward (here at spacious Kauffman Stadium) for us to try and hit home runs.”

And he says this: “I think we’ll lead the league in fewest home runs again this year.”

And he says this: “The risk for (the young players) to go out and hit a home run in one of 80 at-bats, the reward isn’t great enough.” (Editor’s note: ??!!?!!?!?)

And when asked why other teams do hit home runs at Kauffman Stadium (they’ve outhomered KC 32-11 this year), he gave a quote that, well, you just have to read the whole bit: “Here’s the thing: Other teams come in here from Anaheim or wherever and they have their swings down. This park doesn’t even enter into their minds when they hit here. They have their swings, the same swings, because it pays dividends for them at home.”

I don’t know Jack Maloof, he has been around baseball many years, and he has many people who swear by him including Tony Gwynn, so I mean no disrespect to his coaching abilities. But those might be the most illogical 45 words I’ve ever read in a row. Seriously, if he had said: “Hot dog telephone sweet frog livable water supply chicken tennis ball lunatic monster potato glass teflon wrist house fire tackling dance toboggan muffin spark shoelace kissing Qatar ballooned bandana post Baltimore coast kangaroo sassafras disco shines McGovern landing pen minibar flagging sailing palm digit sanitizer,” it would have made exactly the same amount of sense. I don’t even know where to begin, the thing is so irrational that it almost seems impolite to point that Anaheim is a lousy hitters park too.

Then, during the game last night, the announcers actually encouraged Royals fans to go READ that story, which they obviously did before reading it themselves.

Step 4: Fire Jack Maloof immediately and replace him, wait for it, Hall of Famer George Brett.

I love George Brett. He is one of my favorite athletes. He’s absolutely hilarious, and he’s a great story teller, and he’s fun guy, and I think he probably knows more about hitting than almost anybody on planet earth. Not only that, I think he probably could TEACH hitting better than almost anybody on planet earth -- I don’t see George being one of those natural stars who cannot relate to people without the same talent.*

*I always loved the story Rick Mahler used to tell about pitching coach Bob Gibson -- at least I think it was Mahler. He said Gibson came to the mound one time and said “Just bust him inside with a fastball” and he headed back to the dugout leaving Mahler, who did not have a fastball, left to the problems of mere mortals.

I’ve been lucky enough to talk hitting with George on numerous occasions, and I learned something every single time. There is absolutely not doubt in my mind that George Brett should be a terrific hitting coach, one the Royals would be proud to have.

But, um, well, two things.

One is fairly obvious: If George Brett was available to be hitting coach, why in the hell would they have hired Jack Maloof in the first place. Agaiin, no disrespect. But, um, what?

Two, though, is even more important, a small point that seems to be have been lost: It is almost a certainty that hitting coaches, well, DO NOT MATTER. OK, maybe the all capital letters is a bit over the top. They matter. I mean, they’re good for the players psyche. They help a player’s comfort level. They certainly can improve players’ hitting over weeks and months and years -- Brett is a prime example, having been the prize pupil of one of the most famous hitting coaches ever, Charlie Lau. I have little doubt that Brett, given these players to work with over a long period of time, can make them better hitters.

But even assuming Brett is hitting coach for a long time (he was hired as an interim coach and has always said his life was too busy for a full-time baseball job) these are small, incremental changes -- a hitting coach isn’t like a new offensive coordinator where you will suddenly start running different plays. it was entirely ridiculous for the Royals to think changing hitting coaches would improve their power numbers back when they fired Kevin Seitzer in the first place. It’s just as ridiculous now, even if George Brett is the greatest hitting coaches of all time. Once and for all: The Royals problem is NOT their hitting coach. It’s NEVER the hitting coach.

It’s the first base coach. Everybody knows that.

Upcoming Dodger Appearance - Scott Van Slyke

June 29, 2013

Scott Van Slyke

$20 - any item

$10 - inscription

Stage Time - TBA

This signing is being promoted by Hall of Fame Sports and JD Legends Promotions and will take place at Frank & Son.  Jaime Jarring will also be appearing courtesy of Hall of Fame Sports and JD Legends Promotions.  

Also taking place at Frank & Son on June 29th are the signings being promoted by OC Dugout, Honabach & Sons, and JD Legends Promotions.  The Dodgers making appearances are Luis Cruz, Jerry Hairston Jr., Matt Kemp, Steve Yeager, Tommy Davis, and Nick Punto.

For more information on Luis Cruz click here 
For more information on Jerry Hairston Jr. click here  
For more information on Steve Yeager click here   
For more information on Matt Kemp click here   

For more information on Tommy Davis click here 
For more informatio on Nick Punto click here 
For more information on Jaime Jarrin click here 

True to the Blue!

Royals Power Update

Well, OK, the Royals did not hit a home run again on Tuesday -- heck, they only managed two hits against the Cardinals, a hard double and soft single by Billy Butler -- and so that means they still have two home runs since May 15, both by 439-year-old Miguel Tejada (he aged a year since yesterday). it is now a 13-game streak without a regular hitting a home run. The last regular to homer for the Royals was Butler on May 14 against the Angels. The last left-handed batter to homer for the Royals was Mike Moustakas on May 10 against the Yankees.

And so, to update things:

-- The Chicago-Chicago game was rained out, so the Cubs pitching staff did not have an opportunity to hit another homer and expand their lead. They still have a 3-2 homer lead since May 15.

-- Blog favorite Jedd Gyorko DID homer last night, so he now has more homers than entire Royals team since May 15.

-- The Cardinals hit three homers last night which, of course, is more than the Royals since May 15. This is a point worth making: The wind was blowing out at Kauffman Stadium Tuesday. The Cardinals sent rookie lefty Tyler Lyons to the mound. Lyons is a promising prospect but he’s still a rookie, and he’s a lefty, and the wind was blowing out. The Royals still didn’t even come close.

And this gets to the heart of something else. The Royals have not exactly been facing the 1965 Dodgers pitching staff in this absurd stretch. A look at the starting pitchers the Royals have faced during this streak makes the thing even more impossible:

5/28: Tyler Lyons (rookie making his second big-league start)

5/27: Adam Wainwright

5/26: Jerome Williams

5/25: Billy Buckner (former Royal, making his first big league start in three years)

5/24: Jason Vargas (30-year-old who was second in homers allowed last year, giving up 35)

5/23: Joe Blanton (who came into game 0-7, 6.62 ERA, with league slugging .562 against him)

5/22: Jordan Lyles (22-year-old who came into game with 6.63 ERA with league slugging .524 against him)

5/21: Bud Norris

5/20: Dallas Keuchel (who came in having given up 19 homers in 113 career innings)

5/19: A.J. Griffin (who had allowed eight homers in 51 innings, he gave up three more in his next start)

5/18: Tommy Malone (31 homers in his previous 241 innings)

5/17: Jarrod Parker (nine homers in 40 innings coming -- also a 6.64 ERA)

5/15: Barry Enright (second start in more than two years)

You know who is not on that list? Justin Verlander. And CC Sabathia. And Felix Hernandez. And really any of the, say, 40 best pitchers in the American League. Other than Wainwright, you would have thought the Royals would hit home runs BY ACCDIDENT.

By the way, the Royals loss was their 18th in 22 games, and their 10th straight home defeat, tying a record. The other day, I predicted that the Royals and their connections would spend a lot of time talking about the little things -- which they seem to be doing -- but I did not make the equally obvious prediction that soon Royals manager Ned Yost would make some kind of bizarre and hilarious statement that showed him beginning to lose his mind. Hey, it happens to all of them. The Royals drove Tony Muser to his make his locally famous quote about how the Royals needed to pray less and drink more tequila. The Royals drove Tony Pena to guarantee a pennant and jump in the shower with his clothes on. The Royals drove Trey Hillman to all sorts of craziness. You can’t blame them -- they’re only human.

And so is Ned Yost, only human:

“What are you asking me to do?” he told reporters after Tuesday’s game. “Take my belt off and spank them? Yell at them? Scream at them? What do you want?”

Yep, Ned Yost is out of ideas. Every Royals manager gets there sooner or later.

Schlemiel, Schlimazel and the Kansas City Royals

OK, it seems a bit like overkill to keep writing this stuff about the free-falling Royals … but even for someone who has witnessed the repeated disasters of Kansas City baseball the last 15 or so years, this current power outage is something new and kind of breathtaking.

Since May 15 -- this is now 11 games, so we’re not talking about just a bad weekend here -- the Royals have hit two home runs, both (as mentioned in the last Royals column) by 438-year-old Miguel Tejada. This means that the Royals have not had a regular hit a home run in about two weeks. Or, you can say it this way:

-- Since May 15, the Royals have been outhomered by the Chicago Cubs PITCHING STAFF.

-- Since May 15, the Royals have been outhomered by Eric Chavez and, no, just Eric Chavez.

-- Since May 15, Miguel Cabrera alone has hit THREE TIMES AS MANY HOMERS as the Kansas City Royals.

-- Since May 15, the Royals have exactly as many home runs as Jedd Gyorko, which is not as interesting or depressing a stat as the others but it does offer an opportunity to say “Jedd Gyorko,” which I intend to do at every opportunity.

Jedd Gyorko! See?

I did mention this comical home run dry spell in the last Royals piece, but there’s something in there I did not mention, something that in so many ways gets at the heart of the curious beast that is Kansas City Royals baseball.

Last October the Royals fired hitting coach Kevin Seitzer. That made me a bit sad because I like Seitzer a lot, everybody in Kansas City does, he’s a very public figure around town (Seitz and another former Royals player, Mike MacFarlane, own a baseball academy in Kansas City) and, even more, because I think coaches -- especially hitting and pitching coaches -- take a wildly disproportionate percentage of the blame when teams struggle.*

*This happens everywhere, but it is especially true in Kansas City, where coaches are fired early and often. The team has had two general managers since 2001. I could be miscounting on this, but off the top of my head I count that the Royals have had at least six first base coaches over that same time, including Doug Sisson who apparently was causing such significant damage that the Royals felt it necessary to fire him IN THE MIDDLE OF LAST SEASON.

But, such is life. The Royals didn’t hit and Seitzer was the hitting coach and he got fired. Life isn’t always fair.

The Royals have fired so many coaches through the years that they now have it down -- they fire the coach and then in the firing press conference praise him so profusely for the job he did that you wonder why in the world they would have let go of such a talent. This was especially true of Kevin Seitzer. General manager Dayton Moore sounded like he was firing his favorite uncle at the end of season press conference. “Kevin’s one of the most gifted coaches I’ve ever been around,” he said. “Kevin’s one of the greatest people I’ve ever been around. I respect him immensely. I mean him and (Royals latest first base coach) Rusty Kuntz are 1 and 1A for me ...”

It was so gushing that you wanted to stop the press conference right there and comfort Dayton by telling him that it wasn’t too late, he could still hire Seitzer back. But the logical takeaway from it was that Dayton probably did not want to fire Seitzer. He was, rightfully, backing the decision of manager Ned Yost, who did want to fire Seitzer for a very specific and compelling reason.

The reason? Yep, you already knew it: The Royals didn’t hit for enough power.

“(Seitzer’s) philosophy was basically to stay in the middle of the field and to the off side,” Yost said. “I think we’ve got a group of young power hitters who are capable of hitting home runs.”

Sigh. The Royals fired their hitting coach so they would hit more home runs, and now they’re not hitting ANY home runs. That could be the subtitle of the Royals book I have to write someday.

But believe it or not, this thing gets even wackier than that. Less than a month later, the Royals replaced Seitzer with, get ready for it, TWO hitting coaches. Yep, two, they hired Jack Maloof as their regional hitting coach and Andre David as the assistant to the regional hitting coach. It should be noted -- it was noted at the time -- that the Royals are not the first team to hire two hitting coaches, this has become something of an odd little mini-trend. Philadelphia did it. St. Louis did it. A couple of other teams. So this isn’t just some hair-brained Royals idea.

But there were two things that made the Royals’ hire slightly different from the others

1. They were, I believe, the first American League team to do it.
2. They are the Royals.

The first thing might not mean anything, but I did find it interesting. The second thing means everything. Someone else could hire two hitting coaches and suddenly (and probably coincidentally) start crushing the ball. There was exactly zero percent chance this would happen with the Royals. There was no doubt once the Royals hired two hitting coaches, absolutely no doubt, that it would become a punchline at some point. It only took a month and a half.

The Royals have as many hitting coaches as home runs since May 15.

You know the difference between a schlemiel and a schlimazel, right? They are both Yiddish words, made famous by Laverne and Shirley. A schlemiel is a fairly easy word to define, he or she is a bit like a klutz, someone who messes things up all the time. The definition of schlimazel is a bit harder to get at, it is something a little bit more existential. A schlimazel is someone who bad things happen to. The classic vaudeville explanation is that a schlemiel is the guy who spills a bowl of soup. The schlimazel is one who has the soup spilled on him. Wile E. Coyote is a schlimazel.

The Royals are both schlemiel and schlimazel. But they’re more schlimazel. Yes, they often make moves that are not particularly smart, true, but they could be relatively harmless … and instead they backfire in unnecessarily spectacular three-dimensional explosions. Ken Harvey might not have been good enough to play every day (much less be the Royals All-Star selection) but he did not HAVE to get hit smack in the back with a relay throw. Mike MacDougal might not have been quite good enough to close in the big leagues but he did not HAVE to throw the ball 10 feet over the catcher’s head from 40 feet away. Kerry Robinson should not have been playing center field but he did not HAVE to climb the fence and have the ball land five feet in in front of him. Juan Gonzalez was a dreadful signing but he did not HAVE to suffer a minor day-to-day injury that kept him out for five months. On and on and on.

So, yes, the idea that hiring two new hitting coaches as the way to get more power out of players was kind of a schlemiel move -- klutzy, silly, pretty illogical, mostly pointless. Who really thinks a hitting coach -- or two of them -- can make that much of a difference? But to hire two hitting coaches to get more power and THEN go on a semi-historic powerless streak … yeah, that’s Kansas City Royals baseball.

Also: Jedd Gyorko!

Dear Axe Shampoo

To Axe Shampoo Company Customer Service

Re: Shampoo product

My name is John, and I have been using your Clean Control Shampoo every day for about six months now. It might be a little bit more than six months, now that I think about it. I remember I started the day after Halloween. The timing might not be important, but I want to give you all the necessary information to help me.

First, let me say: It is good shampoo! I don’t want this to sound like a complaint letter or anything like that. I’m not the complaining type at all, you can ask anyone. It’s just that, like I said, I’ve been using your shampoo every day for months now, and so far I have not had even one gorgeous woman run up to me and run her fingers through my hair. I’m worried that I’m not using it right.

I apologize if this is going to the wrong person; I guess this is probably a question for your technical department. But I found your email, so I will just ask: You’re supposed to put the shampoo on wet hair right? It seems like that’s what the guys in the commercials do, and that’s what I’ve been doing. I’ll wet my hair, and then I’ll put on a dollop of Axe shampoo, and then I’ll kind of rub it into my hair. Then after a few seconds, I’ll rinse it off. Then, I repeat the process. Is that right? I’m worried that maybe I’m not leaving the shampoo on my hair for a long enough period of time to get the full effect? Could that be it? A a few weeks ago I left it on for two hours, though, and it it still didn’t work. I’m sure it’s something simple and I feel kind of stupid even asking, but I’m stumped!

To be honest with you I’m kind of a shy person, which is why I was drawn to your product. When I saw the way gorgeous women would just run up to the guy on your commercial and run their fingers through his hair, I thought, “That’s for me!” I get kind of tongue-tied around women, and it would be a lot more convenient for me if they would just run up to me and run their fingers through my hair. I think I could handle it from there! Well, actually, I do kind of wish you would have included instructions on what to say to these women who run up to you and run their fingers through your hair, but I realize that you are a shampoo company and that is probably not your area of expertise.

I should tell you that before I was using Axe, I was using “Head and Shoulders” because I think I have dandruff, and based on their commercials it looked like women don’t like dandruff at all. I thought this might be my problem other than my general shyness that I told you about. But even after using their product for three years, not one woman noticed that my dandruff was gone -- at least none of them came up to me to mention it -- so that was a disappointment. That’s why I was so excited to buy Axe, and I’m very eager for any advice you might have on how to use it properly.

Oh, I should probably add that I did have a very pretty woman come up to me at the mall. I naturally thought she was going to run her fingers through my hair, so I prepared something to say, like, “Yeah, my hair is really clean from using Axe” -- I am absolutely willing to promote your product when women run their fingers through my hair (any suggestions on things to say?). But it turned out she only wanted to talk to me, which was still very nice, and I was able to buy from her this kind of sea salt thing from the Dead Sea in Israel that is really supposed to really open up the pores. It does seem to work pretty well, though I can’t tell. When she left, I kicked myself for not asking her on a date or something, but to be honest I was kind of thrown off because she did not run her fingers through my hair like I had expected, and like I say I get kind of tongue-tied. I don’t blame Axe for that, of course, but I just wanted to let you know in case that will help your technicians troubleshoot the problem.

I want to be clear that I am not asking for my money back or anything like that -- the Head and Shoulders people sent me a refund check, and it’s like I told them on the phone I really didn’t want the money. I’m just looking for any technical advice you can give me so that I can use Axe the proper way and have gorgeous women come up to me and run their fingers through my hair. I also want to say that I’m not picky, the women don’t have to be quite as gorgeous as the ones on TV. They can be just kind of pretty. There’s this girl in my apartment building who is like that, she’s very pretty, and if you can arrange it for her to run her fingers through my hair, that would certainly be fine. I already called my State Farm agent about her, but so far she has not appeared in my apartment.

Fingers crossed,

John

KC and the little things

OK, well, I know what comes next. If you have been around the Kansas City Royals for any extended period of time, you do too. The Royals have lost 14 of their last 18 games. But more, much more, 11 of those 14 losses are by two runs or less. Oh yeah, we know what comes next.

Lots and lots and lots of talk about … the little things.

Get ready for it. There will be closed door meetings. There will be public proclamations. There will be quotes galore. People from the Royals organization will be lining up to tell us how they’ve got to start doing the little things, they can’t keep messing up the little things, they must concentrate on the little things. Those little things will become an obsession, at least for a little while. At some point manager Ned Yost will say he will not put up with players who don’t do the little things. General manager Dayton Moore will say that the team can’t panic, that it’s simply about getting those little things right. Team leaders will emerge to publicly challenge teammates to do those little things.

In a way, I agree with the Royals. Unfortunately, we have very different views of what little things actually matter most. The Royals -- and, really, almost every baseball team -- think of the little things as getting the bunt down, moving runners over, getting them home from third, hitting the cutoff man, getting the sure out and so on. Don’t get me wrong, I believe these are all good things for a team to do, important in their own way. I tend to think of them like I think of the little twisty air blower above your seat on an airplane. It matters. If the plane is hot, that thing feels like an important device. But, you know, even when it’s hot, that little twisty blower doesn’t really power the plane.

The Royals are always terrible at close games. Always. They have won just 44% of their one- and two-run games since the 1994 strike, by far the worst percentage in the American League.* They have also lost by far the most blowout games of any team since 1994, but let’s focus on one problem at a time. I believe those close games DO often come down to little things, but I just happen to think those little things have little to do with bunting, productive outs or saving/gaining the extra base.

*The Yankees have won 57% of their one- and two-run games sine 1995, by far the best percentage in the AL, which could lead to a long post about about mystique and aura and more hosannas for Mariano. But not right now.

Here’s what I believe are the little things that matter. in no particular order:

1. Construct a sensible lineup. There have been countless studies that show lineup construction in baseball makes very, very little difference … the difference between the best possible lineup and the worst is minuscule. I believe that. But I also believe that when you do something obviously self destructive, you must accept destruction as your fate.

The last three games, the Royals have had Chris Getz and Alcides Escobar at the top of their lineup. You are not trying to win when you put Chris Getz and Alcides Escobar at the top of your lineup. You’re just not. Chris Getz has a .311 career on-base percentage and a lifetime OPS+ of 70. Alcides Escobar has a .304 career on-base percentage and a lifetime OPS+ of 79. You hit those two guys 1-2 when you are trying to lose games for a better draft pick.

The Royals have lost all three of those games … and I’m not saying that the lineup is the reason. Hey, Getz has actually gotten on base (three hits, three walks) which, undoubtedly, will prompt Royals manager Ned Yost to stick with him long after his average and on-base percentage return to normal. Escobar meanwhile has gone two for 12 with one walk, zero runs scored, zero RBIs. But, again, I’m not saying that’s the reason because I don’t believe a smarter lineup would make that much difference. I’m saying that the Royals deserve to lose with a lineup that stupid.

2. Walk! For crying out loud, WALK! I spared you a whole post on just this topic. I overvalue the worth of a walk. I’m preachy and obnoxious about walks, just the way baseball people are about getting the bunt down. I’m know this and am sorry about that. I do know, deep down, that walking more is not a panacea, that there are limitations to the walk as an run-scoring strategy.

But, damn it, I think the walk is STILL the most underrated weapon in baseball.

And the Royals don’t walk. The Royals never walk. They have not finished in the top half of the American League in walks -- just the TOP HALF -- in 24 years (1989, which, coincidentally or not, was the last time they won 90 games). They have finished dead last in walks five times over that span, and they are dead last in walks so far this year as well. Ever since Dayton Moore took over as Royals GM in 2006, we have had many, many conversations about walks, and in them he always makes it sound like he values the walk. Then he goes out and gets Jose Guillen or Yuni Betancourt or Jeff Francoeur.

This year’s Royals team was supposed to have some players who walk. Alex Gordon looked like the kind of guy who could control the strike zone, who might walk 80 or 90 times in a season once he established himself. This year, his strikeout-to-walk is 39-12 … so, I guess, no. Eric Hosmer and Lorenzo Cain showed signs in the minor leagues that they might develop into disciplined hitters -- combined they have struck out 62 times and walked just 29. So, again, so far, no.

Then there are the Royals standbys, like Jeff Francoeur, still out there, still hacking away with his 36-to-5 strikeout-to-walk ratio. Mike Moustakas is a free swinger. Alcides Escobar is a free swinger. Young Salvador Perez is a terrific young player but swinging at only strikes will never be his strong suit. He has three walks all year.

It isn’t just the value of walks, though. The Royals swing at a lot of pitches outside the strike zone -- and they put more of them in play than any team in baseball. That’s not a good thing. When you put bad pitches in play, you make lots and lots of outs, something the Royals are expert at.

3. A little power? Just a little? The Royals have no power at all. Of course they are dead last in the league in home runs. But, it’s much worse than that. They have hit two home runs since May 15. That’s as a team. TWO HOME RUNS. Only it gets even worse, both of the home runs were by 438-year-old Miguel Tejada. Yes, we chose a bad year to give up smoking. The Royals have not gotten a home run from a left-handed batter in two weeks -- which is really, really sad because the Royals came into the year worried they had TOO MUCH left-handed hitting.

Power is not a little thing, of course, but I include it here because it often feels like the Royals are anti-home run. You know in the early 1900s, before Babe Ruth emerged, the home run was looked upon as a cheap thrill, unworthy of the real ballplayer, and this is exactly the sense you get from the Royals. You hear them all the time talking about not pulling the ball, not going for the home run, always hitting to the middle of the field, going the other way, taking what the pitcher gives you. Let’s be clear: All of that is excellent advice based in sound hitting principles.

BUT … the Royals’ team home run record is 36 -- and even THAT was set almost 30 years ago. The Royals have not developed a pure power hitter since, well, um, Bo?

Complete list of Royals hitters who have hit more than 30 home runs in a season:

1975: John Mayberry, 34 (acquired from Houston)

1985: Steve Baltboni, 36 (team record -- acquired from Yankees)

1987: Danny Tartabull, 34 (acquired from Seattle)

1989: Bo Jackson, 32 (developed!)

1991: Tartabull, 31

1995: Gary Gaetti, 35 (free agent)

1998: Dean Palmer, 34 (free agent)

2000: Jermaine Dye, 33 (acquired from Atlanta

Seriously, have you ever seen a more depressing chart? Not only does it show you that the Royals developed exactly one power hitter for themselves through the years, and it was Bo Freaking Jackson, who really was developed by Greek Gods on Olympus using fire, stone and a Nintendo machine … it also shows you that the Royals have not had ANY PLAYER with more than 30 home runs since the year 2000.

There are complicating factors, of course. The Royals play in a huge ballpark, one of the toughest home run ballparks in baseball. And power, at least on the free agent market, costs money, and the Royals have embarrassed themselves too much through the years chasing after it. Once you’ve signed Juan Gonzalez and Jose Guillen, you are best off just getting out of the power game.

Even so, the Royals have had young players who were supposed to have terrific power potential. It’s not like they haven’t tried. Two players on this year’s team, Mike Moustakas and Eric Hosmer, were both supposed to have titanic power.

Moustaksas: “Lightpole power.” -- Unnamed scout 2008.

Hosmer: “Outstanding raw power.” -- 2010 Baseball America Handbook.

Moustakas: “Exceptional hand speed and a vicious stroke.” -- 2009 BA Handbook

Hosmer: “The strength to drive the ball out of the park while going the other way.” - 2011 BA Handbook.

Moustakas: “Plus-plus power.” 2011 BA Handbook.

Moustakas and Hosmer have combined for five home runs this year, four by Moustakas who is hitting .174. They are both still very young (Moustakas is 24, Hosmer 23) and the weather has not even heated up yet, so you can’t say they won’t develop big home run power. Carlos Beltran, for instance, did after he left Kansas City. But with the Royals’ track record in developing young power hitters*, you can’t really bet on good things happening.

*Dee Brown, Juan LeBron, Joe Vitiello, Mark Quinn, Jeremy Giambi, Bob Hamelin among them.

4. Do not give away outs. It seems to me that because the Royals hit with no power and draw no walks, they must be particularly careful about giving away outs. My guess is they will do the opposite. There is a theory out there that teams that don’t hit with power must make up for it with speed, you know, take the extra base, steal a lot of bases, run with abandon. For this people often point to Whitey Herzog’s Cardinals of the 1980s, who scored a lot of runs despite hitting few home runs.

It seems to me people get this very, very wrong. Herzog had three great teams with the Cardinals -- 1982, 1985 and 1987. And it is true that none of those teams hit with much power. It is also true that all three of those teams led the league in stolen bases and ran with pretty wild abandon. That’s usually where the examination ends.

But you know what else you can say about all three of those teams? They all -- ALL THREE -- led the National League in on-base percentage. All three of them got on base more than any other team. So, they could AFFORD to be super aggressive on the bases. They could afford to give away a few outs in order to play at the tempo Herzog loved. When his team didn’t get on base, like in 1986 and 1988, they were lousy offensive teams. They led the league in stolen bases those years too -- it didn’t matter one bit. You can’t score runs when you make outs and hit with no power, I don’t care how many bases you steal.

People, it seems to me, learned the wrong lessons from those Cardinals teams. I have a new JoeWord here (one I was sure I introduced earlier but I can’t find it listed anywhere): Belichize, a verb, which means “To take the easy and wrong lesson from a success story.” It is named, of course, for Bill Belichick, whose immense success has inspired countless imitators. Unfortunately, those people imitate the stuff that doesn’t matter at all -- they imitate his surliness toward the media, his vapid secrecy, his senseless hoodie look. I think it’s because it’s a lot easier to imitate that nonsense than it is to emulate his intense work ethic, his creativity for game planning, his organizational skills, his clear vision for winning football games.

If I had to predict -- and I admit I’m guessing here, but I’m basing this on years of observation -- I’d bet on the Royals facing their offensive troubles by getting more aggressive. More stolen bases. More caught stealing. More productive outs. You can begin to see it happening. It seems to be exactly the opposite of the right answer.

5. Do not let small samples guide you. I already mentioned that I would bet on Chris Getz staying in the leadoff spot because he got on base a few times in a three-game sample. Based on, you know, his life, Chris Getz should never have led off a game, never ever, except maybe on Chris Getz Appreciation Day. But he did lead off. He got one hit and drew one walk. Next day, same thing. Now, he might be there in the leadoff spot until 2018.

The Royals do this all the time. They allow themselves to be directed by negligible signs and unlikely trends. In 2008, a pitcher named Kyle Davies had an excellent September -- it got him 67 more starts for the Royals, and he posted a 5.55 ERA in those starts. Jeff Francoeur had two good months in 2011, the Royals promptly signed him to a not inexpensive two-year deal, and he has hit .233/.281/.366 with four times as many strikeouts as walks since. The Royals drafted pitcher Aaron Crow in the first round -- ahead of, among others, Shelby Miller and Mike Trout -- with the hope that he would become a top of the rotation starter. Less than two years later he was pitching middle relief in the big leagues. He was pitching pretty well -- he made the All-Star Team -- and now he’s just a blah 60-inning a year seventh inning guy. How does this help the ball club?

It isn’t that these moves flopped … it’s that it was fairly obvious they probably would flop. They were short-sighted decisions based on limited and unlikely information. A few days ago, the Royals moved Lorenzo Cain to the leadoff spot because he had been hitting well through the first six weeks of the season. In three games there, he failed to get a hit, so they quickly moved him back to the sixth spot when, I’m sure, they will say he’s “more comfortable.” Does that matter? Probably not. It’s probably just rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic. But the Royals seem to be putting deck chairs on top of each other, placing them upside down and using them as hat racks.

Meet Tommy Lasorda, Jay Johnstone & Bob Boone and Ride the Metro Link to Union Station

For Orange County Dodger fans who must navigate traffic on Southern California freeways to enjoy a game at Chavez Ravine, Monday May 27th is your kind of day!  The Dodgers will host the Angels at 5:10 pm on Memorial Day and MetroLink is partnering with Metro to provide special train service to Union Station.  A round trip ticket will only cost $7. Once at Union Station, fans can board the Dodger Stadium Express to the stadium.  As part of th festivities, Jay Johnstone, Tommy Lasorda, and Bob Boone will be making appearances at select MetroLink stations. 

Jay Johnstone
Monday May 27th - 1:30pm
MetroLink Irvine Station
15215 Barranca Pkwy, Irvine

Tommy Lasorda
Monday May 27th - 2:00pm
Fullerton Station
120 E. Santa Fe Avenue, Fullerton

Bob Boone
Monday May 27th - 3:15pm
MetroLink Laguna Niguel/Mission Viejo Station
28200 Forbes Road, Laguna Niguel

For more information go to Dodgers Express

True to the Blue!

A Brief History of the Charlotte Hornets

Economists have done countless studies that show the economic impact of major league sports -- and especially the impact of building new arenas and stadiums -- are pretty negligible, often even painful for individual cities. I believe that. But it’s still hard to explain just what it meant to Charlotte to get the Hornets.

We moved from Cleveland to Charlotte when I was in high school, and the culture shock for an awkward and perpetually nervous teenaged boy who lived for professional sports was, well, pretty overwhelming. Charlotte had nothing then. Nothing. Well, that’s not precisely right -- Charlotte had its own insular sports culture which revolved around ACC basketball, NASCAR and professional wrestling, not necessarily in that order. I became a North Carolina basketball fan because that seemed the easiest way to fit in. I learned the 10 names that mattered in NASCAR by osmosis -- Petty, Wallace, Labonte, Elliot, Yarborough, Allison, Gant, Richmond, Rudd and, of course, Earnhardt. And I could hold my own when the conversation turned to the sheer absurdity of of Jimmy the Boogie Woogie Man Valiant.*

*Valiant, best we could tell, was an 87-year old wrestler with a white beard who would dance out to the ring in step with The Manhattan Transfer’s “Boy From New York City.” He would then jump around a lot, call himself handsome and use his one move (throw guy into rope and, then, elbow him) to defeat an evil masked man named The Assassin or, perhaps, a different evil masked man named The Assassin No. 2. The Boogie Woogie Man baffled us in every way and it goes without saying we always rooted for the masked men.

Everything felt stifling in Charlotte then. Downtown was called Uptown. Restaurants closed at 9. The baseball was Class AA, played in an old ballpark made out of wood that, one day, simply burned to the ground. The pro football choices were the unpalatable Atlanta Falcons to the South and Washington Redskins to the North. The arena was a dingy place on the ironically named Independence Boulevard, and it was called, plainly enough, the Charlotte Coliseum. A major event there might be a Davidson basketball game or Styx on the Mr Roboto tour. There was nothing to do, no place to go, nothing to ever get excited about. Two of my best friends then were transplanted New Yorkers who lived pro sports, and it was hard for us to breathe. We sat in the school library at lunchtime and talked about big-time sports happening seemingly everywhere except Charlotte. We sat in our parents’ cars after dark and tried to pick up just a little bit of sports civilization through static on the radio dial.

And so when it was announced that a quirky businessman named George Shinn was actually bringing an NBA team team to town, well, it was like VE Day Charlotte. OK, I don’t know if women were actually kissing sailors on Trade and Tryon in Uptown, but I do remember car horns blaring. The joy was unabashed. At last! We were Major League!

None of us actually thought George Shinn had it in him. He was a self-made millionaire -- he, rather famously finished dead last in his high school class in Kannapolis, N.C. -- and nobody seemed entirely sure how he made those millions. It had something to do with business schools and textbooks, if I remember right, and nothing about it seemed above board. But, maybe it was. Hey, who really knows how any millionaire makes their money?

Shinn was small town Carolina through and through -- he spoke with a twang -- but there was just something insubstantial about him. And, at the same time, there was also something oddly appealing about him. I have written before about the time he went to New York to pitch Major League Baseball on bringing an expansion team to Charlotte but it’s worth bringing up again. I went along as a reporter for The Charlotte Observer, and after the presentation ended Shinn seemed SURE that the owners were going to grant him a big league baseball team. This was his real dream -- Shinn was a huge baseball fan -- and so in celebration he asked the limo chauffeur to take the group to Tavern on the Green, which I can only assume Shinn believed was the best and most famous restaurant in big ol’ New York City. This glorious day deserved only the best.

When the driver explained that Tavern on the Green was closed -- for renovations or something -- Shinn decided to go for the next-best thing which ended up being, yes, the Hard Rock Cafe. Yeah. The Hard Rock Cafe. Well, where else? Shinn would become a reviled figure in Charlotte, for good reason, but I can’t help but feel a small pang of warmth for the guy when I think of him being so excited, on top of the world, sitting in that Hard Rock Cafe, certain that he was in a great New York restaurant and was about to bring a Major League Baseball team to Charlotte.

Baseball did not come to Charlotte, of course -- Shinn did later buy a Class AAA team, at least -- but this new NBA team did. Everything was so exciting. A new coliseum -- this one glitzy and with a staggering 23,900 seats -- was built along with a bunch of new roads and those cool traffic lights you only see in major league cities, you know, the lights with arrows and Xs, to tell you which lanes were coming and which were going. Hotels popped up around. The new Charlotte Coliseum was called “The New Charlotte Coliseum.” We were on our way.

Every tiny detail about this new team captivated us. They would wear teal back when that color wasn’t omnipresent -- Charlotte probably started the teal revolution. And the team would be called the Hornets. The name was steeped in North Carolina history -- during the Revolutionary War, Lord Cornwallis -- a leading British General -- called the fighters in the Charlotte area a “veritable nest of hornets.” It was a good name, just right, and the anticipation was overwhelming. The arena was absolutely packed for the team’s first NBA Draft, when the team made its first NBA Draft pick -- Rex Chapman out of the University of Kentucky. In memory, you started seeing Rex Chapman jerseys around town the next day.

You simply cannot overstate how deeply in love Charlotte was with the Hornets that first year and for a long while after that. The New Charlotte Coliseum sold out every game. Marginal players like Tim Kempton became Charlotte superstars. Everybody wanted to shoot like Dell Curry. Everybody wanted to gun like Kelly Tripucka. Everyone wanted to pester like Muggsy Bogues. Kurt Rambis was on that first team. Earl Cureton. Robert Reid. Every time the Celtics or Knicks or, especially, Los Angeles Lakers came to town, we felt like the world had finally discovered us. We had a real live NBA team -- a terrible one, yes, but the team’s general awfulness did not dampen the spirit one bit. Losses were beside the point. Victories were like little daily miracles. Hey look: That’s Larry Bird!

That enthusiasm lasted for a long time, much longer than many people expected. The one thing you heard from the cynics around town was that Charlotte was a college basketball town and could never embrace the world-weary grind of pro hoops, not long term. But cities are never one thing, and while the fervor for college basketball never relented, the Hornets had their own place in the city’s heart. The next year, they= Hornet drafted a North Carolina Tar Heel named J.R. Reid, who couldn’t really play but who lived in both Charlotte basketball worlds. Every game sold out again -- they averaged 23,901. The next year, Charlotte led the NBA in attendance by 100,000, and the Hornets led in attendance again the next year, and the next, and the next, and the next, and the next, and the next. It wasn’t until 1998 -- Jordan’s last year with the Bulls -- that Chicago finally edged Charlotte in attendance.

In time, the Hornets built a nice little team -- surrounding Larry Johnson and Alonzo Mourning -- and they made to the Eastern Conference semifinals twice, and the atmosphere at the New Charlotte Coliseum was electric, all its own, just a little bit different from any other place in the NBA. Charlotte was growing so fast then. Strip malls appeared overnight. Two lane roads became four almost in real time. Uptown grew skyward. New restaurants, new neighborhoods, new highways, airport expansions -- I wasn’t living in Charlotte then, but my parents were and every time I would come back the city seemed drastically different in some significant way. The Final Four came to town. The NFL awarded the city a football team. A huge and beautiful new stadium was built right across from The Charlotte Observer, where I had spent my college years inaccurately typing and justifying agate.

And I guess it was right around 1998 or 1999 when everything changed. Most people blame George Shinn, and I guess that’s right since that was around the time Shinn was being sued for sexual assault -- this after he was accused of kidnapping a woman he supposedly was suppose to be taking to see his lawyer for help. The suit was rejected, but the trial was a national circus, one where Shinn did admit to various extramarital activities that did not exactly match up to the religious persona he had held up publicly. Shinn went underground -- the guy had many flaws but he had been the most public of figures. Not anymore. He disappeared in shame, and reappeared only to demand that the city build a new arena for the Hornets -- this even though people were STILL CALLING it the New Charlotte Coliseum.

People in Charlotte voted down a new arena, and people stopped coming to games, and Shinn moved the team to New Orleans. The Hornets last year in Charlotte they finished dead last in attendance. The team kept the name “Hornets” because that’s how the NBA does it -- they allow new cities to keep names that are comically in appropriate. There is no Jazz in Utah, no Lakes in Los Angeles, there’s nothing Kingly about Sacramento. If Orlando’s team moved to Des Moines, then Des Moines would become the Magic City, and Detroit moved to Richmond, then Pistons would become a part of the city’s culture. It’s incredibly stupid, but the NBA has been pretty consistent about it, so the Charlotte Hornets became the New Orleans Hornets though Lord Cornwallis had nothing whatsoever to do with the place.

The NBA, having watched the pathetic Charlotte Shinn Show, felt so bad about things they promised a new team would come to Charlotte as soon as possible. In 2004, the new team came, and they were called the Bobcats, which was a name so bland and uninspiring that even in Charlotte nobody seemed to remember it. The first year, the Bobcats played in the New Charlotte Coliseum and finished second-last in attendance. Finishing last: The New Orleans Hornets. The next year, the Bobcats moved to this sparkling new arena downtown, a beautiful place that was called, yes, you guessed it: “Charlotte Bobcats Arena.” That’s just how Charlotte rolls. After a while, it was called Time Warner Cable Arena -- normally I’m opposed to corporate names for buildings but in this case Charlotte clearly needed the help.

The Bobcats were terrible, then terrible, then terrible, then terrible. Only this time around, Charlotte was not the blindly enthusiastic city it had been for the Hornets. The Panthers had been to the Super Bowl, and they also had been terrible. The banks that drive the city had been sky high and they had crashed. Traffic was abysmal. Homeland was filmed in town, so was THe Hunger Games. Charlotte WAS Major League, in both the cool and numbing ways of big cities, and nobody needed a lousy NBA team to justify anything. Larry Brown did somehow eek a playoff team out of Stephen Jackson, Gerald Wallace, Ray Felton and Boris Diaw. That was the year Michael Jordan became majority owner of the Bobcats. Things looked up. They weren’t. The next year, 2011, the Bobcats were terrible again. The year after that, they might have been the worst team in NBA history. This year, they were regular old terrible again. They finished 27th in attendance.

Tuesday, Michael Jordan announced that the Bobcats are dead and the team will be called the Hornets again -- the New Orleans team decided to go for Pelicans -- and there was a tiny bit of buzz around town. I don’t know if it’s really “buzz” -- nostalgia, maybe. Hey, the Charlotte NBA team should be called the Hornets. There’s history to the name in Charlotte, a good history, even if it doesn’t seem that way. The Hornets were underachievers for a little while, they had a series of abysmal drafts (Greg Graham, George Zidek), they traded Larry Johnson for Brad Lohaus and Anthony Mason, they traded Alonzo Mourning for Glen Rice and a bunch of nothing, in 1996 they drafted and immediately traded Kobe Bryant, something Bryant was not averse to mentioning Wednesday on Twitter.

In honor of the name change #13thpick #nbadraft #96 #freshface instagram.com/p/Zl7QeYRNrz/

— Kobe Bryant (@kobebryant) May 21, 2013

But the Hornets brought something to Charlotte, something hard to describe, something that might not mean anything tangible at all but FELT tangible at the time. It’s not something Charlotte can ever recapture or, frankly, would even want to recapture. The Hornets made some of us feel like we lived someplace that mattered. So, it’s nice getting the name back, and Michael Jordan deserves credit for that. Now, Jordan only has to do one other thing -- actually build a basketball team worth that doesn’t stink and is worth caring about. I’m guessing here, but that might be harder.

New Links Page

NBC Sports is in the process of adding an archive page for my work … and a few other pretty cool bells and whistles that are pretty exciting. In the meantime, if you look at the top you will notice that I put up an NBC Links page, which doesn’t include all the writing I do for NBC, but I think has most of it. I’ll do my best to keep that updated.

My Two Cents on Don Mattingly

photo credit: USA Today Sports

Soon after the Dodgers were swept out of Atlanta by the Braves on Sunday, Ken Rosenthal of Fox Sports, was reporting Dodger ownership would soon be firing manager Don Mattingly.  Mattingly is forty-three games in to his third season as Dodger skipper and his managerial record is six games over .500.  While his first season was played under the penny pinching ownership of Frank McCourt and the 2012 season was one of transition, the Dodgers entered the 2013 season full of expectations.  

While expectations were as high as the team's payroll, the 18-25 start was definitely not what ownership and the Dodger fans were hoping for.  Injuries have had their influence on the teams horrible start.  Chad Billingsley only made two starts before being lost for the season and Hanley Ramirez has only played in two more games than Billingsley.  Unfortunately, the Dodgers are not the only team to suffer injuries.  Injuries are common place in sports but it's how the team reacts and handles the injuries that separates winners from losers.  Has Mattingly's laid back approach come back to bite him in the behind?  At a time when the fans are looking for the player's to play with fire and to play with something to prove, it appears as if they don't seem to care.  Most will say it is the manager's role to push the right buttons and motivate the team.  However, if that isn't the manager's normal style, wouldn't it seem silly for him all of a sudden change his ways?  Would it make the players feel as if their manager were cracking under the pressure?

Two to three weeks ago, fans on message boards and social media were calling for the head of lead trainer Sue Falsone because she "wasn't keeping the players healthy."  Now, the cries are for Mattingly's head. Obviously, there is no quick fix to solve the Dodgers problems.  It would be nice to get some consistent production from Matt Kemp and Andre Ethier.  It would also be great to get Hanley Ramirez back in the line up.  After the bullpen's implosion while being swept by the Braves, the team seems to have hit rock bottom.  

Clayton Kershaw's dominant complete game in Monday night's victory was just what the doctor ordered.  It gave the struggling bullpen a much needed rest.  Andre Ethier contributed with an RBI triple and a solo homerun and Matt Kemp added a solo Bison Bomb for a 3-1 victory. The three game series against the Brewers should be an excellent gauge as to where the Dodgers truly are as a team.  The Brewers are a struggling club as well and the Dodgers will be marching out their top three starters for the series.  Tonight, the Dodgers will be sending Zack Greinke, the number two punch in the one-two punch combination with Kershaw, to the mound to face his former club.  Wednesday afternoon, Mattingly will send Hyun-Jin Ryu to the mound.  If Greinke and Ryu deliver and the offense does its part, come Wednesday evening the media and Dodger fans may be talking about a Dodger 3-game sweep of the Brew Crew.  If the Dodgers pull off the sweep, they just might save Mattingly's job. 

Since being swept by the Braves was rock bottom, things can only get better.  Right??

True to the Blue!

Upcoming Dodger Appearance - Eddie Murray

Saturday July 6, 2013

Eddie Murray

8× All-Star - 1978, 1981, 1982, 1983, 1984, 1985, 1986, 1991

World Series champion - 1983

3× Gold Glove Award winner - 1982, 1983, 1984

3× Silver Slugger Award winner - 1983, 1984, 1990

AL Rookie of the Year - 1977

Hall of Fame - 2003

Dodger - 1989 through 1991

Dodger Hitting Coach - 2006 & 2007

$89 - balls, mini helmet, figurine and flats up to 16x20

$119 - jersey, bat, equipment, art work, and flats larger than 16x20

$20 - inscriptions

Stage time: 11:00am - 1:00pm

This signing is being brought to you by OC Dugout and Honabach & Sons and will take place at Frank & Son.  For tickets go to ocsportscards.com

True to the Blue!

Upcoming Dodger Appearance - Jaime Jarrin

Saturday June 29, 2013

Jaime Jarrin

$49 - balls and flats up to & including 11x14

$59 - large flats, minis, figurines & equipment

$69 - helmets, bats & jerseys

$20 - inscriptions

stage time: TBA

This signing is being promoted by Hall of Fame Sports and JD Legends Promotions and will take place at Frank & Son.  Also taking place at Frank & Son on June 29th are the signings being promoted by OC Dugout, Honabach & Sons, and JD Legends Promotions.  The Dodgers making appearances are Luis Cruz, Jerry Hairston Jr., Matt Kemp, Steve Yeager, Tommy Davis, and Nick Punto

For more information on Luis Cruz click here 
For more information on Jerry Hairston Jr. click here  
For more information on Steve Yeager click here   
For more information on Matt Kemp click here   

For more information on Tommy Davis click here 

For more informatio on Nick Punto click here 

 

True to the Blue!

Links for May 20

A couple of links while I put together posts on the Farmers Only service, this new hair curler bucket, my burgeoning tennis career and Miguel Cabrera.

-- Albert Pujols at-bats used to be events. If you were a baseball fan, you would basically build your entire game-watching experience around it. I know that’s how I felt watching the guy hit. Now? I watched Pujols Sunday. The overpowering feeling was nothingness.

-- Doc Emrick isn’t only a joy as a hockey announcer. He has a pretty great story.

Jeff Francoeur and ANT

“I know you care about him. I’ve never seen you like this about anyone … so please don’t take it wrong when I tell you that I believe that Tom, while a very nice guy, is the Devil.”

-- Albert Brooks character, Broadcast News

* * *

The other day, I was watching the visiting announcing crew call a Kansas City Royals game, when Jeff Francoeur came to the plate. Before it even began, I knew what was coming. The announcers started to praise Francoeur. You know, it was all the usual stuff -- great leader, plays terrific defense, bat coming around, wonderful guy. And, suddenly, a question came to mind.

What player in baseball do you think has the most ANT -- Announcer Nonsense Talk -- spoken about them?

By ANT, I’m not just referring to stuff announcers say. I’m referring to a sort of universal praise that does not tie to logic or anything tangible but instead to a sort of whimsical hope and powerful narratives. I remember in a playoff game against the Cleveland Browns, John Elway once dropped back, almost fell down, ran into his own offensive lineman, almost fell down again, flipped a short little pass to Mark Jackson who broke and avoided like 49 tackles on his way to a long and ridiculous touchdown catch. As soon as it ended, the announcer shouted: “John Elway did it again!”

That’s ANT.

You know ANT when you hear or read it -- it is when people start speaking in broad generalities about a player (“This guy just wants it more”) or when they start over-crediting a player for dubious achievements (pitcher wins and RBIs tend to be the sweet nectar of Announcer Nonsense Talk) or when they start to turn sports achievement into life achievement (“That was just a courageous pitch!”). And like I say, it’s not only announcers who do this -- far from it. You see it everywhere. I’ve spent plenty of time writing ANT.

Derek Jeter has been the recipient of a lot of ANT through the years -- I coined the word Jeterate based entirely on this -- but Jeter is a legitimately great player, one of the best shortstops ever, and he is a consummate professional worthy of respect and admiration. So you can understand why people would want to tack on some nonsense talk to make the record even more sterling. For a while, David Eckstein seemed to be the worldwide leader of ANT, but, heck, the guy is 5-foot-6, can’t really run, can barely throw the ball across the infield, and yet he was a shockingly good baseball player for a handful of years. In 2002, he finished 11th in the MVP voting and deserved it, maybe deserved even a little more. So, yeah, you could see why he got so much ANT. When a player defies logic or sparks intense emotion, nonsense talk often seems the only way to capture the awesomeness of it.

Tim Tebow has probably had more ANT spoken about him than anyone, ever.

But back to baseball … and Jeff Francoeur. At this moment, Jeff Francoeur is hitting .209 with five walks and one home run. We are about a quarter of the way through the season, so you can multiply those numbers by four to get a sense of where he would finish the year at this pace. He has an OPS+ of 48. The Pitch FX numbers show he can’t catch up to the fastball, can’t recognize the slider and cannot stay back on the change-up. He’s O-swing percentage -- that is, his percentage of pitches he swings at outside the strike zone -- is at a staggering 44.6%, a career high in a career of hacking. It is the third-highest percentage in baseball, behind only legendary free swingers Pablo Sandoval and Alfonso Soriano.

Those guys, however, tend to be bad-ball HITTERS. Francoeur, no, not so much on the hitting part.

Jeff Francoeur is also a great guy -- one of the greatest guys, really, impossible not to like him -- and he has a strong arm, and he once won a Gold Glove (six years ago) and he once hit 29 home runs (seven years ago) and he’s a great guy. One of the greatest guys. Really. Impossible not to like him.

And it is this trait -- Francoeur’s striking niceness -- that leads to an astonishing barrage of ANT. Anytime you watch the Royals play you will hear announcers find all sorts of ways to praise Jeff Francoeur. They will talk about how many runs his defense saves*. They will talk about how he’s a winner.** They will talk about how much he helps the Royals young players.*** They will talk about how he’s a good hitter have an uncharacteristic slump.****

*Last year, the Fielding Bible people studied every single play Francoeur and every other player made, and determined he COST the Royals 12 runs against an average defender (largely because he’s pretty immobile out there), making him the 34th best right fielder in a sport that only fields 30 teams.

**Jeff Francoeur’s first full year with Atlanta, 2006, was also the first time in 15 years the Braves did not reach the postseason. They also did not reach the postseason in 2007, 2008 or 2009 -- the three years Francoeur played with Atlanta. They did make it in 2010, the year after he was traded to the Mets, who were not good at all the two years he played for them. The Mets traded him to Texas with 15 games left in the season and the Rangers did go to the World Series, though I don’t think Francoeur deserved too much of the credit (he went three-for-24 in the playoffs with one RBI and one run scored). He then signed with the Royals, who have gone a combined 163-201 in his time. I should quickly add here I’m not BLAMING Francoeur for any of this -- that would be ridiculous, no one player wins and loses games. But I am saying calling Francoeur a “winner” is even more ridiculous.

***The Royals young players -- particularly Eric Hosmer and Mike Moustakas -- have been pretty big disappointments so far.

****He’s not. He’s a perpetual slump who has uncharacteristic hot streaks. That sounds meaner than I mean it … but Francoeur has been a pretty consistent player. His on-base percentages for full seasons are: .287, .293, .294, .300, .309, .329, .338. Those last two seem like the outliers to me. His OPS+ for full seasons (and remember 100 is average) are: 72, 81, 85, 87, 93, 102, 119. The last of those was the one that inspired the Royals to sign Francoeur to a multi-year contract.

It is tempting, based on all the ANT, to overcorrect and blame Jeff Francoeur too much for the Royals failures. They lost again Sunday -- gave away the game, really -- and dropped to .500 for the first time since the first week of the year. Their offense looks lost, really. The Royals have no power at all -- as a team, they only have 12 more home runs than Justin Upton -- and so must rely on a parade of good at-bats to score runs. Unfortunately, they are probably dead last in baseball in good at-bats. They swing at a higher percentage of pitches than any team in the American League and they put the ball in play more than any team in baseball -- which might sound like a good thing, but it isn’t when you have no power whatsoever. They have the fewest walks in baseball.

Francoeur represents the Royals troubles perfectly. Sunday, he came up with runners on second and third, two outs, and Kansas City leading by two. He had a chance to blow the game open with a single. And the frustrating fact wasn’t that he failed to come through, that happens to the best players all the time. It was that he had a miserable at-bat, swinging at the first pitch, an 88-mph fastball in a not-especially good location, and chopping a routine ground ball to short. That’s his season in a nutshell. That’s a lot of his career in a nutshell.

Let’s face it: He’s killing the Royals. Just killing them. No, he’s certainly not the only one killing the Royals, not by a long shot. If anything, the early struggles of Eric Hosmer and Mike Moustakas are hurting the Royals more because they had reason to expect a lot more. Hosmer is slugging .326 and at the moment does not resemble the can’t-miss prospect who pummeled baseballs as a 21-year-old rookie. And Mike Moustakas, whew, he’s another big-time prospect who looks completely overmatched -- he’s hitting .178/.252/.311. The Royals were counting on those two, perhaps more than anyone else, to take a step forward. So far it isn’t happening, and that’s as big a reason as any why the Royals can’t score runs.

But there’s little-to-no ANT spoken about Hosmer and Moustakas. Meanwhile, tune in and you will still hear people praising Jeff Francoeur relentlessly. Here’s something for you -- Jeff Francoeur has a career 93 OPS+ and before the end of the year he will have 5,000 big league plate appearances. Do you know how many other slow* corner outfielders with an OPS+ of 95 or less got 5,000 big league plate appearances? Just one. Bob Kennedy.

*Quite a few speedy corner outfielders who stole bases but couldn’t really hit -- Shano Collins, Vince Coleman, Stan Javier, Dave Collins -- got a lot of big league at bats as well. But they represent a little bit different category. Francoeur is a big guy who can’t run.

There are a lot of similarities between Bob Kennedy and Jeff Francoeur. They were both likable and strong-armed outfielders who started as phenoms (Kennedy played every day as a 19-year-old; Francoeur was on the cover of Sports Illustrated as The Natural) and kept finding teams that wanted to give them a chance even after they had made it crystal clear they couldn’t hit enough. They were just guys you rooted for. Hey, don’t take it wrong. I root for Francoeur too. You can’t help but root for him. He’s a very nice guy.

RIP Dick Trickle

Ten years ago, I wrote one of my favorite ever stories … about the late, great Larry Phillips. Larry was, as I wrote in the piece, “the roughest, toughest, meanest, craziest and grouchiest son of a gun who ever climbed into a race car.” Only, Larry told me later, he wasn’t really all that.

No sir, he said. That was Dick Trickle.

They were wild young men. It was true even after they stopped being young. They traveled the country -- Dick Trickle was from up in Wisconsin, Larry Phillps from the heart of Missouri -- and they chased around the moth-flapping lights of the short tracks. They smoked their cigarettes and drank their whiskey straight and chased wild young women, even after they stopped being young. And, most of all, they raced. Late Model. Super late model. Modified. Semi-Modified. The money wasn’t great, and the trophies were pointless. But they weren’t in it for money or trophies, not exactly. They were in it for the roar and the danger and the checkered flag. It was something, Larry told me, you either got or didn’t get. If you got it, well, come on then. And if you didn’t, well, Larry said, to hell with ya.

Person after person told me there was no man tougher than Larry Phillips. They said he won more than 2,000 races on short tracks all over America. They said he could do things in a car that no one ever did before or ever will again. They tell one of my favorite tales: Someone was giving $500 to any man who could break the track record at ol’ I-70 Speedway in Odessa, Mo. There was a hole in the race track and the dirt on turns was loose and slick, there was no one crazy enough to go for a track record. Well, there was one. Larry shoved pedal to the floor and never pulled back and broke that track record. Larry was actually trembling when he finished that run -- that’s how crazy it was. But he got his $500.

Larry was dying when I talked to him -- dying a choking and coughing death where he found it hard to breathe -- but he had some things to say. He said that some of the stories were true (like the $500 record story) and some them were not true. He said that he didn’t have no regrets except maybe he could have spent a little more time with his children. He said that nobody ever wanted to win more than he did, nobody, except maybe one guy: Dick Trickle.

At the time -- and still to this day -- people will say that Dick Trickle won more short track races than anyone who ever lived. But those are Dick’s people. Larry’s people say HE won more short track races than anyone who ever lived.

Larry just wouldn’t stand for that.

“How many races did you win?” I asked him. He laughed. “Just a few less than Dick Trickle,” he said.

“Well, there are some people who say that you won more than Trickle,” I said.

“Is that so?” he asked. I confirmed that it was so.

“Well,” he said. “People are entitled to their opinion. I figure I won just a few less than Dick Trickle.”

Maybe that’s just to camaraderie of old racers. But there was respect there. They called Trickle the White Knight, because of his white car. “It was a serious thing seeing that car come up behind you,” Larry said. But it wasn’t the car … it was the man. Larry said Dick Trickle would stay out all night, drink everyone under the table,tell the best stories, lie the best lies, then limp back to the room -- he limped from childhood injury -- take a quick shower, grab his pack of cigarettes (he would go through a pack or two every race) and without a wink of sleep go out and win the race like it was nothing. Then he would get out the car, find an Old Style beer, down it in about three seconds and start the process all over again. “I’ve seen him do it,” Larry told me. “Man wasn’t human.”

Larry didn’t have a NASCAR career. He raced in one race, but he didn’t like much. Too corporate. Too many responsibilities. He wasn’t the type to entertain sponsors or sign autographs at a local supermarket. Dick Trickle, though, did start racing NASCAR when he got into his late 40s. His first year, he finished Top 5 six times and won more than $300,000 and was named rookie of the year. Not bad considering he was 47 years old. At 56, he won more than $1 million. Every year, people voted him the most popular driver or one of them.

All in all, he raced 303 times in NASCAR. He never won a race. He laughed about that, at least in public. He’d won plenty of races in his life.

On Thursday, the Lincoln County Communication Center in North Carolina received a call. A man on the other side reportedly said, “There’s gonna be a dead body, and it’s gonna be mine.” When they tried to call back the number, there was no answer. When they got to the scene, near a cemetery, the dead body of Dick Trickle was lying near his pickup truck. He had apparently shot himself. He was 71 years old.

“He was Superman,” Larry Phillips had said of Dick Trickle. They’re both gone now, as is their time.