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Joba Chamberlain/Joba Heath’s Mother’s Story In Her Words

admin — Tue, 16 Sep 2008 14:21:58 +0000

Joba Chamberlain’s life story has been well chronicled since his debut in the majors last year, a story that was intensified by the media thanks to his amazing performance. Born Joba Heath turned Joba Chamberlain, he has become one of the most popular players in baseball. But, Joba’s mother has stepped up recently and talked to the Journal Star in Nebraska (Joba’s mother talks about her son and her life). She has revealed that she was a big part of Joba’s life and the stories of Joba’s father raising Joba alone are not entirely true. But, the story is still entirely sad.

For those who don’t know the story, Joba was raised by his father alone after separating with Joba’s mother (apparently). Chamberlain’s father Harlan raised Joba in poor conditions against tall odds and helped his son become one of the most feared pitchers in baseball. Harlan, who has Polio along with other health problems, has been seen in Yankee Stadium cheering his son on with as much enthusiasm as Joba shows on the field which garnered more fan interest in Joba. It’s the story baseball fans love, overcoming adversity and becoming the best, but the story isn’t as it seems.

In the article, Joba’s mother talks about her son and her life by Colleen Kenney, Joba’s mother, Jackie Standley, says that she had much more contact with her now estranged kids as was reported. She said that Joba lived with her most of the time until he was about ten years old and when Joba was with his father he was only a mile away. Jackie said that she did take advantage of Harlan, waiting for him to come home from work so that she could dump the kids off on him and go to bars. She also, later in Joba’s life, picked up a crystal meth addiction.

A point in this story where things began to really turn around was when Joba was 10. For father’s day, Standley changed Joba’s last name(originally Heath, Standley’s maiden name) to Chamberlain, Harlan’s last name. It’s said that it is from then when Joba began staying with Harlan and Harlan began to take total control, which in hindsight was conducive to Joba’s success.

Me and my son have had a good relationship. We lived within a mile of each other for his whole life. … Once I gave him his last name, it’s like he took total power. It was like, he starts staying there more. I got to the point where I was not going to fight with him over it. Joba was getting to school, getting good grades. He was doing sports, which is what he wanted.I don’t know why Harlan is doing all this. I’ve called, tried to ask him, and he don’t want to speak to me, which is weird, because Harlan raised me.

Jackie Standley on Raising Joba Chamberlain

It seems like there isn’t much animosity in this story, just sadness. No matter what’s true, or who says what, what Joba Chamberlain has overcome is a testament to his character and he, not his mother or his father, should be getting the attention. A truly inspirational baseball tale.

Could Manny Be Manny in Pinstripes Next Year?

admin — Mon, 11 Aug 2008 21:31:13 +0000

We’ve all witnessed the tabacle that was the Manny Ramirez trade in which the Red Sox traded away a first ballot hall of famer to the Dodgers in a three way deal for Jason Bay. That along with Favregate became the two stories of interest and absorbed sports television. Well, with those two situations settling down(somewhat) who’s to say the Manny situation won’t heat up again. And, the Yankees might be involved…how juicy.

Manny’s love affair with the Boston Red Sox which rewarded both with two championship rings and ended the horrid curse of the Bambino, came to an abrupt end in the middle of this season. The love was gone. And soon enough Manny was gone. The Manny saga became as soap operish(that’s right soap operish) as Favre’s retirement. The two sides bickered back and forth, dissing eachother through the media. I did not agree with the Red Sox getting rid of Manny, because he’s such a great hitter that you can deal with his drama. But, the Red Sox could not. So now he’s a Dodger.

Does Manny want to be a Dodger? Of course not. He doesn’t want to be in the National League where the best pitchers in the world are. He doesn’t want to be in the least talented division in major league baseball in the NL West. He wants to be in the American League where the balls fly out of ballparks. He wants to be in the American League where he can get back at the Red Sox. And, maybe, just maybe, he wants to be the face of a new stadium. A new Yankee Stadium.

If you don’t believe me look at this coming from the New York Post…

According to people who have spoken to the eccentric outfielder since he was dealt to L.A. on July 31, Ramirez wants to sign a free-agent deal with the Yankees this offseason and get 19 chances a year to punish Boston.

George A. King III, New York Post

Ramirez becomes a free agent at the end of this year’s World Series. Brian Cashman may be in risk of losing his job by then because with the way the Yankees are playing right now, the Yankees won’t be the ones in this year’s World Series. Now, what’s the one desparate move that could save both he and the Yankees which will bring enormous crowds to the new Yankee Stadium? Putting one of the Yankees arch rivals in pinstripes and pitting him against his former team. You can’t make this stuff up…well I just did so I guess you can, but it would be awesome, right?

Go to the Video Tape! MLB on Their Way to Using Instant Replay

admin — Fri, 23 May 2008 02:45:15 +0000

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.

ROUND ONE: THE SOX

admin — Mon, 14 Apr 2008 20:03:57 +0000

It’s begun. Baseball’s greatest rivalry. First came the buried jersey. One construction worker/fan’s attempt to reverse the Babe’s curse by burying a David Ortiz jersey beneath the new Yankee Stadium.

The excavated David Ortiz jersey

Then came the ballgames.

And if you watched the series between the New York Yankees and Boston Red Sox at Fenway Park this past weekend, you’d have a heck of a time remembering it’s only April.

As far as the fans and the media were concerned, it could have been late September with the pennant at stack. Things are so hyped between the two teams that FOX broadcast the game on Saturday and ESPN took Sunday.

And because the Sox took two out of three, the media in New York has already raised the volume, worrying about the Yankee’s young star Phil Hughes, and criticizing Joe Girardi’s managing.
When it comes to the Yanks and Sox, it’s amazing how quickly things can turn.

After Friday night’s masterful showing by Yankee ace Chien-Ming Wang, Red Sox fans were worried. They were freaked out by David “Big Papi” Ortiz suddenly inability to hit the ball; they were worried that wunkerkind Clay Bucholz might have lost something one year after his magical no-hitter.

Chien-Ming Wang – Photo: Barry Chiu/Boston Globe

One night later – after rain – and Jonathan Papelbon’s blazing fastball and sinking split – it was New York’s turn to despair. It didn’t take long for New York to pile on Joe Girardi for his decision to let Mike Mussina pitch to Manny Ramirez. Manny – a one-man Yankee wrecking machine – did what he loves to do, he smacked the ball.

Manny running to first – Photo: Matthew Lee/Boston Globe

This is the way NY Newsday described it:

Up one run in the sixth inning, with Red Sox on second and third base and two outs, what would compel Girardi to go after Manny Ramirez? Before anyone could even voice such a thought, the decision backfired, with Ramirez’s two-run double on Mike Mussina’s first pitch putting the Red Sox ahead.

It’s important to put Girardi’s decision in context. If Mussina had walked Manny, he would have had to face Kevin Youklis. We’re not talking Julio Lugo here, we talking Kevin Youklis. And as great as Manny does against the Yanks, Mussina does well against him: even though he previously hit a solo home run earlier, Manny was 25-for-97, batting .258 lifetime vs Mussina. But this time, Manny got ahold of a fastball that made its way back over the plate and sent it to right centerfield. Ellsbury and Pedroia scored and a Yankee lead of 2-1 was transformed to a 3-2 deficit.

Girardi was direct: “You have to live by your decisions. There’s a lot of decisions that you’re going to make during the course of the year. Hopefully, 95 percent of them work out. But that’s not the case during this game.”

And Mussina took the blame: “Whatever the strategy was, I didn’t make a good pitch. Manny’s too good a player to make mistakes like that. He was up there ready to go, and he hit it.”

Newsweek blogger Ken Davidoff wasn’t so understanding:

That’s exactly why you take the bat out of Manny’s hands and take your chances having to be precise with Youkilis.
That’s why Girardi’s first high-profile tactical decision since he took over the Yankees manager’s office – with the understanding that he would exhibit more in-game savvy than Joe Torre – made surprisingly little sense.

Sunday night brought more pain to the Bronx Bombers. Already a bit shaky with Jorge Posada absence behind the plate, backup catcher Jose Molina’s hamstring injury revealed how easily things fall apart. The Sox, on the other hand, have managed to beautifully overcome World Series’ MVP Mike Lowell’s injury by shifting Youklis from first to third and bringing Sean Casey in to first.
Manny continued to be Manny on Sunday night, going 2-for-3 with a walk, one RBI and two runs scored.

So Round One goes to the Red Sox. But Red Soxers still have reason to worry – Big Papi’s silent bat and Matsuzaka’s propensity to walk batters.

A frustrated David Ortiz – Photo: Barry Chiu/Boston Globe

Round Two resumes at Yankee Stadium.

And just a reminder. Save some energy for the season to come. It’s still April.