We Blog Baseball!

Sportsgist.com gets to talk with Tampa Bay Ray pitcher Chris Mason and his pitching coach down in Durham, North Carolina during and after his Bullpen. Just in case you forgot, Chris is in Durham pitching for the Durham Bulls, the AAA affiliate of the Rays. Our objective was to hang out with Chris and learn exactly what a pitcher does both on the days he pitches and on the days that he does not pitch.  Working in the pen is where a pitcher fine tunes his mechanics before stepping out onto the mound for his next start.

BULLPEN SESSION: 

In this video, Chris is going through the one of the most important, yet underrated, aspects of pitcher: the Bullpen.  Pitching greats such as Greg Maddox and Roger Clemons worked out the kinks in their bullpen sessions.  Chris works on keeping his mechanics in order.  As his coach states, Chris has an unorthodox delivery which makes his timing all the more important.  If he loses his release point or his shoulder flies open, Chris will have a hard time getting out of trouble.  With that being said, Chris has decent stuff.  His fastball is consistently at 87-88 mph and tops out at 91 mph.  He has a good breaking ball and a decent change up.  His deceptive delivery makes it difficult for hitters to pick up the ball…one of the reason why Chris has been successful throughout his career.

By Sean Connolly

So we’ve hit the mid-season point and a lot has changed since the beginning, but the question is will this be how it ends. Both Chicago teams, Cubs and White Sox, stand alone in first place in their respective divisions. The Mets’ season has started just as disastrous as it ended last year and the Yankees, well they’re just hanging around waiting for a trade like always. But the big surprise of this season has to be the Twins and the Rays.

Big Surprises

For a team to lose the best pitcher in baseball and get nothing good in return to be 1.5 games back in their division is astounding. The Twins have played it very quietly this season and have made themselves into contenders in the American League. Their ten game win streak came to a close this past Saturday but they easily bounced back with a win over the Milwaukee Brewers. They have a solid, young team with one of the best closers in the game in Joe Nathan. Don’t be surprised if you see this Twin team in the running for the A.L. Wild Card or even the Central Division.

The biggest surprise of the season has the be the Tampa Bay Rays though. They have shocked the American League, putting up a 49-32 record at the mid-way point and have established themselves as a legitimate threat in one of the toughest divisions in baseball, the American League East. Throughout this season people have been calling it a fluke and that it’s just luck, but with half the season gone they are atop the A.L. East and have the players to catapult them into the franchise’s first post-season. They are also beginning to bring in bigger crowds and have been rumored to possibly bring in one of the game’s biggest stars in Ken Griffey. If the Rays can complete a trade for Griffey this team will have to be considered one of the best teams in baseball.

The Second City in First

Is this their year? The Chicago Cubs have finally fielded a team that may be able to get past the curse. But that’s what they think every year. This year is different though. The Cubs have one of baseball’s most potent all-around threat in Alfonso Soriano, and are led by a fiery coach who simply knows how to win in Lou Pinella. The Cubs have the best baseball team with a record of 49-33 and are playoff bound and possibly World Series bound. As for the other side of town, the White Sox have surprised some critics and stand atop a very difficult A.L. Central with a record of 46-35. Ozzie Guillen and his team have played great baseball in a division that was etched in stone by many writers that the Detroit Tigers would win. The White Sox have a powerful team that can score at any moment, and are possibly one trade away from having a team capable of making a significant impact down the stretch.

800 miles east of Chicago sits millions of disappointed New Yorkers. The Mets are crumbling again behind poor management, poor upper management, and poor play on the field. They’ve lost their manager in Willie Randolph in an absolute fiasco that ate up thousands of headlines, and the players such as Jose Reyes, and David Wright, have yet to prove they are as good as their paycheck. Speaking of overpaid, in the Bronx the Yankees are having yet again another unpredictable, chaotic season. New skipper, Joe Girardi hasn’t shown New York much with a 44-38 record sitting 5.5 games back of the Tampa Bay Rays. Injuries of Chien-Ming Wang, Jorge Posada, and M.V.P Alex Rodriguez have hampered the Bombers’ season and have yet to prove that they the best in the bigs as they should be. A trade is looming in New York that could make or break these Yanks but with the tumultuous season they’ve had so far, Bomber fans should consider themselves lucky to only be 5.5 games out.

So with that said I’ll give you the second half predictions with who I think will end up in the playoffs come the end of the regular season.

AMERICAN LEAGUE

EAST- Boston Red Sox

CENTRAL- Detroit Tigers

WEST- Anaheim Angels

WILD CARD- Tampa Bay Rays

NATIONAL LEAGUE

EAST- Philadelphia Phillies

CENTRAL- Chicago Cubs

WEST- Los Angeles Dodgers

WILD CARD- St. Louis Cardinals

This season has been strange to say the least. After Memorial day the two teams with the highest payrolls, Yankees and Tigers were in last place in their division. Coincidentally, the two teams with the lowest payrolls, Marlins and the Rays, were in first place in their division. So, it only makes sense that someone makes this season even stranger and ends up at the end of the season with a .400 batting average. That someone could be Chipper Jones.

This is simply great for the game. In recent years we have been watching juiced up fools bash home runs over the fence over taking some of the games greats. Finally we don’t have a home run watch this season. We have a .400 watch. This is so refreshing because Chipper seems legit, (but, you never know) and could bring integrity back to this game. So, when does Chipper’s .400 watch begin to scroll below the screen when you’re watching ESPN? How about now. We hype up home run chases from the first swing that Barry Bonds, or Alex Rodriguez take. So why not hype up a pure hitter’s approach to one of the hardest things to do in baseball?

Chipper Jones is hitting .418 right now. 418!!!! Are you kidding me!! All this in the national league, a.k.a. a pitcher’s league. In the past 50 years there have only been three other players to be hitting as well as Chipper is past May 29th. Hank Aaron in 1959, Rod Carew in 1983, and Rico Carty in 1974. People, a .400 watch is extremely rare and we need to be paying attention. It comes about just as often as Haley’s Comet and we need to marvel at it.

I hate the Atlanta Braves just as much as the next guy. I don’t even like Chipper Jones that much to be honest with you. But, if with one amazing, hit filled, unique season this Brave that I hate can bring back respect to the game I love. I’m routing for you Chipper.

If A-Rod comes up one home run shy this season of a record or milestone, blame the MLB for not having instant replay by now. In yesterday’s game against the Baltimore Orioles, Alex Rodriguez drilled a pitch from Lance Cormier below the bleachers and off a set of stairs behind the wall. The ball bounced back onto the the field and Oriole’s right fielder, Nick Markakis quickly threw the ball back in. The umpires ruled it as a double and not a the home run it really was. The MLB has begun to bring instant replay into baseball starting in the Arizona Fall League, but is it right or wrong?

With this being the second hit not correctly called a home run in the past week at Yankee Stadium, the instant replay topic in baseball heats up. On Sunday, Carlos Delgado’s home run was called foul by the umpires on the field, but after second look through instant replay it was clear that it hit the foul poll and was a home run. After seeing the replay of Carlos Delgado’s disputed foul ball, home plate umpire, Bob Davidson admitted that it really was a home run.

I ****ed it up. I’m the one who thought it was a **** foul ball. I saw it on the replay. I’m the one who ****ed it up so you can put that in your paper, bolts and nuts, I ****ed up. You’ve just got to move on. No one feels worse about it than I do.

Bob Davidson

With umpires admitting they were wrong after seeing instant replay, MLB officials have gotten the ball rolling on instant replay. They said they will begin using instant replay in the Arizona Fall League. If successful and deemed useful, instant replay will then be used in the World Baseball Classic. If all goes well we could be seeing instant replay used on homerun calls and foul balls as soon as the 2009 season.

This move by the MLB to start using instant replay brings a lot of debate between whether it will be good or bad for the game. The positives of instant replay in the MLB are numerous. There have been so many mistakes by umpires in MLB history that easily could have been corrected if instant replay was there. Look at the 1996 divisional series between the Baltimore Orioles and New York Yankees. A young boy, Jeffrey Maier, reached over and brought Derek Jeter’s flair over the wall for a home run. One simple look at a video tape would show that the call should be fan interference, not a home run.

People who say that instant replay would ruin the game, and slow it down are simply wrong. Football, Hockey, and Basketball all have forms of instant replay and neither sport has been ruined due to instant replay. If anything it has made each sport better and more accurate. Why wouldn’t you want instant replay in baseball? I don’t understand why one wouldn’t. It makes no sense. Some people say instant replay would slow down baseball. Listen, it’s slow enough, another five minutes isn’t going to hurt. Plus, if you’re going to sit and watch a game for three hours, wouldn’t you be fine with watching a correctly called game for three hours and five minutes. I know I would.

Listen, we have the technology now to make sure that every call is correct on the field. Why not use it? Every other sport is using it and it has proven to make each sport better. For a majority of these calls you can see the right call after one look at an instant replay. Please Major League Baseball, bring instant replay to the game I love.