Visions Part Deux …..
Posted: July 14, 2010 Filed under: Dailies | Tags: A's, Albert Pujols, American League, Andre Ethier, Angels, Arizona, ASG, Astros, Athletics, Atlanta, Baltimore, Blue Jays, BoSox, Braves, Brewers, Canada, Cardinals, Chicago, ChiSox, Cincinnati, Cleveland, Colorado, D'Backs, Detroit, Diamondbacks, Dodgers, Florida, Florida Marlins, Giants, Halladay, Houston, Indians, Jayson Werth, Kansas City, Los Angeles, Mariners, Marlins, Mets, Milwaukee, mini-soda, Minnesota, National League, Nationals, Nats, New York, No Hitter, Oakland, Orioles, Padres, perfect game, Philadelphia, phillies, Pirates, Pittsburgh, Rangers, Rays, Red Birds, Red Sox, Reds, Rockies, Royals, Ryan Howard, San Diego, San Francisco, Seattle, St. Louis, Tampa Bay. Boston, Texas, Tigers, Toronto, Trade Deadline, Tribe, Twins, Washington, White Sox, Yankees 11 Comments
The National League managed an upset of the American League by taking the All Star Game victory, because of recent history showing the dominance of the American League this is a good way to move forward into the second half of the 2010 season for National League teams.
At the beginning of the season I laid out how I thought the season would progress and how teams would position themselves for October baseball, with just over half the games played it’s a good time to reflect and update my season ending visions.
The American League has shown some surprises, out West the Mariners have not faired as I thought so this has left the Rangers and Angels duking it out for a post season place. In the Central the Indians are not performing in the manor they could have been and in the East the top 3 are as expected, but the Jays are doing better than I had thought, as a mid way summary I now have the following possible outcomes.
AL WEST
Angels ……..88-93 wins
Rangers ……..86-91 wins
The A’s will hover around the .500 mark and the Mariners will finish below .500 with about 70 wins.
AL CENTRAL
ChiSox ……..84-89 wins
Twins ……..81-86 wins
Tigers ……..81-86 wins
The Royals and the Tribe will fight, but fail to reach .500 this year.
AL EAST
Yankees ……..93-98 wins
Rays ……..92-97 wins
BoSox ……..90-95 wins
As you can see this could be any of these, I had considered the Yankees breaking 100 wins again, but recent history shows last time they had 56 wins in the first half they had a dismal second half with only 33 wins, so the Yankees number is a crap shoot, the Jays should end around the .500 mark and the O’s will probably break 64 wins, but no more than 70 wins.
The National League has also given us a couple of surprises, the Padres are the biggest one for me, kudos to them, I thought they would struggle to be a .500 team this year, but they proved me very wrong. The Pirates are more disappointing than anything, I really thought they could be a above .500 team this year, but not going to happen, the Reds are better than expected or are the Cardinals not as good as expected. The East is as expected a 3 horse race and will continue through season end.
NL WEST
Padres ……..85-90 wins
Rockies ……..84-89 wins
Dodgers ……..83-88 wins
Giants ……..79-84 wins
Arizona will struggle to reach 70 wins this year.
NL CENTRAL
Cardinals ……..85-90 wins
Reds ……..85-90 wins
The Brewers and Cubs will struggle stay around the .500 mark on the year, the Pirates and Astros will have chance to play spoiler or helper in September as the Cards and Reds are on target to give us a game 163 this year, but as the Astros and Pirates play out the year they’ll both struggle to get over 65 wins.
NL EAST
Phillies ……..90-95 wins
Mets ……..88-93 wins
Braves ……..87-92 wins
Still a close 3 team race and could go to any of the 3, itll be up to the Nats and Marlins to play spoiler, since both those teams wont even be knocking on the .500 door.
So these are my mid-term visions as far as the divisions are set, as for Phillies players and that dreaded date of July 31st, where teams negotiate to the wire to get the best possible deal, or they think is the best possible deal. The past few seasons the Phillies have faired pretty good at the trading deadline, this year I would say look to see Jayson Werth end up with one of 3 teams, Astros, Pirates or even the Reds, also movers could include, Dobbs, Castro or Ransom and maybe even Kendrick or Happ, I do not think anything major will occur, it is possible we could get Oswalt, but no breath holding here, or even one of the Reds pitchers, it maybe that the Dodgers decide they can lose Broxton, so the Phillies can lose Lidge, but that’s as farfetched as a straight trade of Pujols and Howard, or Werth and Ethier, dream on people ESPN’s got no inside track and the second half is just beginning. So tighten that safety belt, keep your hands and feet inside the car at all times and enjoy the ride, don’t forget to scream and raise your arms at the appropriate times, but most of all have FUN.
King James and Tribe
Posted: June 22, 2010 Filed under: Dailies | Tags: All Star game, All Star Team Voting, American League, Arizona, Cavaliers, Cavs, Cleveland, D'Backs, Dodgers, Indians, Kansas City, King James, Lady Ga Ga, Lebron, Mets, National League, New York, Online vtoing, phillies, Pirates, Tribe, voting, Yankees 8 CommentsThe Cleveland Indians head to Philadelphia, this must be the best chance
Philadelphia is going to have to break out of the ‘anti’hot’ mode and actually
win a series that they should win, yes they won the series at Yankee stadium,
but the Yankees just got the hell knocked out of them by
Arizona.
The Indians are currently number 2 in the
American League‘s bargain basement,
if you don’t understand that expression then check out the standings, basically
it means for National League teams there are just 4
American League teams that
you should expect to either win the series against or even sweep, the prime
number 1 team everyone wants to play are the Orioles, then you have the
Indians,
then the Royals and finally the Mariners, any other
AL teams would on paper be a
tough opponent for any of the National League teams.
This
isn’t to say the American League is better than the
National League, because
during inter-league play I am sure there are just 4 NL teams that the AL would
like to play, they being, Pirates, Astros, D’Backs and the
Brewers. Sometimes
though the alignment of baseball planets and good and bad karma just don’t allow
what should be, to be. Take the Yankees, please take the
Yankees, or at least
prevent them making headlines because of Lady GaGa, for instance, they
should conceivably sweep the D’Backs, lets face most people thought it, most
Yankee fans expected it, but yesterday they got what could only be looked upon
as the playground bully being smacked around by the nerdy loser kid, doesn’t
happen often, but when it does, we all root for the loser nerdy kid, even now I
find myself thinking, wouldn’t it be good if they actually swept the Yankees.
I was kind of hoping when the schedule was released for 2010 that the
Phillies would actually play the Tribe at the
‘Jake’, yep I am told to call it
that up and coming insurance name is some kind of insult to true Clevelanders, I
am not sure why cause no one actually goes to the games anyway. Maybe if they
could encourage a celebrity to turn up in underwear and flip everyone the bird,
maybe it would draw more fans in Cleveland, probably not, what about if they had
‘King James’ make an appearance, again probably not since he’d show up as the
final pitch was being thrown and then only if there was a chance he’d be
supporting the winning team. Lets face it the great ‘LeBron Day’ that was supposed
to show support for him staying in Cleveland, that was held at the University of
Akron’s campus, was a wash out, some 4,000 people showed up to claim a free
t-shirt and then went double time so it appeared like 8,000 people were in
attendance. Yes, the chances are good once again New York will wield it’s mighty
check book in a different sport and land ‘King James’ although for this sport in
question it does seem as though Chicago’s check book could be bigger than the
Knicks, but it’s all speculation as is the content of the little chat between
James and Curry.
Off track a little, well it is a sporting event and it uses a ball and it has
ties to Cleveland, who are playing the Phillies, in
Philadelphia for 3 days,
whooopi, I get to watch it all happen on some Cleveland Indians
sports channel
that is about as lame as the Dodgers,
Kansas City and the Astros winning skills at the moment.
Notable occurrences, the Indians got swept by the
Mets, then lost 2 of 3 to
the Pirates and the answer to the Tribe fans prayers during the off season, the
Nationals manager, Manny Acta moving to Cleveland, and after being handed a 5-3
loss Sunday what words of wisdom do the Indians fans get from Acta “We
weren’t able to pick up the ball and throw it to first base. That’s why we
lost.” WOW, I see Manny has come a long way since playing the staring
manager’s role in Washington DC, although you’d think it was
DC Comics with
the way he managers the Tribe.
Lets just hope tonight the Indians are
nothing more than a comedy of errors and the Phillies
are able to use it to their advantage, with the return of J-Roll it
should be an interesting 3 days.
Just a minor gliche in the online voting system, they seem to have Pat
Burrell listed as a DH for the Tampa Bay Rays, when he’s actually in San
Francisco, and his numbers are already better in San Fran than they were in
Tampa, so here’s the dilemma, has anyone got voted onto the AL roster and actually
being playing for an NL team at the time of the All Star game, or visa versa…
Phillies Playing Blankety Blank ….
Posted: June 1, 2010 Filed under: Dailies | Tags: American League, Braves, Cardinals, Detroit, Dodgers, Giants, God, Memorial Day, Mets, National League, nil, nothing naught, Padres, phillies, Royal Air Force, Tigers, zero 6 CommentsMemorial Day weekend is now behind us, it was a time we honor those
that paid the ultimate price so that we may enjoy our
freedom. Some little known facts a place in Ohio, Ironton lays claim to
the longest running Memorial Day parade, they have been holding one since
around 1868, as far as I can find out, I wasn’t there then so I can’t confirm
it. Ironton sits on the Ohio river a stones throw from Kentucky
and West Virginia.
In Great Britain the last Monday of May is a different holiday, there
equivalent to Memorial Day is normally the second Sunday of November,
although a 2 minute silence is observed on November 11th, in remembrance of
those that paid the ultimate price. Many of my ancestors have been members of
the British military for as long as I know, my father was in the Royal
Air Force, which is the same branch of military I served my country.
I hope everyone had some good memories of this past weekend, we may complain
about the beer not being cold enough or it may have been the burgers over done,
or the weather stopped you from lighting that grill. I am sure many sat around
with a beer or 2 and righted all the wrongs in the world, some probably
disagreed with the current conflicts overseas, it’s your right, that’s the
beauty of ‘Freedom’ I trust you all remembered that if nothing else this weekend
and just maybe you did something nice for at least one person, you never know
what fruits it may produce in a world where the ‘pay it forward’ program mostly
comes naturally for those that enjoy the true free world.
———————–
It’s June we are as good as 1/3 of the way through the season, I was going to
evaluate the current standing with regard to how my predictions are working out,
but decided it’s not worth doing that till at least July, when teams start
dumping or finding players based on their chances for postseason. Since there
has been many conversations started and ended with the fact that Philadelphia
has more zero’s in May than a lot of teams see in a season, I thought I would
try and put some of it into perspective, even the Phillies
own analysts are starting to ask, where’s it end, when does it end. Well I say
it end’s now, this week, maybe not tonight, maybe not tomorrow night, but by
this weekend the Phillies will be either
back on top of the division or at worst by the time the weekend its over.
How do the Phillies compare to the rest
of baseball, in May they went 16-12, the best team in baseball went 20-8 in fact
2 teams did that and both those teams moved from the bottom of their respective
divisions to the top or almost.
The
top 2 teams of each of the American League divisions is the same on June
1st as it was on May 1st, those top 2 teams of each American League
division were on average winning between 15 and 17 games and losing
between 12 and 14 games, the only one of the 6 teams to have a losing record was
the Detroit Tigers they went 12-14 for the
month.
The top 2 teams of each division in the National League saw 2 teams go from
top to bottom or almost anyway, the Giants
dropped down in the West and Mets in
the East, those 2 teams were replaced by the best 2 teams in baseball the
Dodgers and Braves
respectively. The Phillies had the same
record as the Padres, a better record than
the Cardinals, in fact on the 1st of May the
Phillies were a 1/2 game out of 1st place in
the NL East and on June 1st they are a 1/2 game out, before today’s game.
More of how the Phillies performed, from
the 17th of April to May 1st the Phillies
went 4-8 and from the 17th of May to June 1st the Phillies
have gone 5-9, yet for the most part they lead the division in both April and
May. How about runs I hear you say, well during the same time period April 17th
or May 1st, they went 38 runs for and 57 runs against, from 17th May to 1st June
they went 34 runs for and 54 against, so the numbers are similar again.
I’ll admit there were more zero’s on the board in May, but it’s wins and
loses that count, so if at the end of June the Phillies
are still putting up zero’s then maybe I will start to ask, what is going on,
how do we fix this, but at this moment in time it seems all the players have hit
that down turn at the same time, so as I said before when the bats wake up, even
some almighty, visible only in the mind of those that choose to have imaginary
friends in adulthood, won’t be able to help the pitcher of the moment.
Phillies leave Brewers Drained….
Posted: May 17, 2010 Filed under: Dailies | Tags: American League, Boston Red Sox, Brewers, DL, drained, ESPN, Hamels, inter-league, Lidge, life, National League, phillies, Pirates, Rollins, Ruiz, suck, sweep 5 CommentsThe Phillies left Milwaukee
after sucking the life out of the Brewers,
the sweep was a back to back the Brewers
suffered at the hands of the National League East. It was a little cooler
last night in Brewer Town or were the Milwaukee
Brewers just trying to change their luck at home by closing the roof,
either way it made for a pleasant atmosphere, gave the pitchers a comfortable
environment, but it didn’t change the Brewers
luck as the Phillies completed a 3 game
sweep in a 4-2 win.
The game aired live on ESPN, who as usual showed their lack of up to
date knowledge of teams and players, other than the advanced scouting reports,
which at times are grossly out of date or inaccurate at best, given to them so
they could show some elements of knowledge about the 2 teams that were playing.
They pounded the commercial breaks with the information on the upcoming FIFA
World Cup, which is great for me, but I just hope they really do their
homework on the countries and the players, and don’t just go at it with the
minimum information on the players and the countries abilities and
accomplishments. It’s a little more insulting when you get information about a
country wrong than a home grown city or town.
So last night Cole Hamels got win number 4 and put him at 4-2 on the
year, coincidence that matches last nights score, it means about as much as Mick
Billmeyer using binoculars in the bull pen in Colorado, absolutely
nothing. It was a relatively okay performance by Hamels, nothing earth
shattering, he managed to get a RBI hit, but then left the bases loaded twice,
still ESPN felt he did enough to warrant being player of the game, personally I
don’t think he did, I am not sure anyone player jumped out at me, everyone
seemed to do their thing and no one really screwed anything up, except maybe Weeks,
should have had the out, on the Victorino base stealing, but let the ball
fly into centerfield instead, and he just didn’t seem focused, 
and
as good a game as Zaun called for the Brewers,
I was a little concerned at how when he went to the mound with the pitching
coach, he just stood there gazing into the air, paying absolutely no attention
to what was going on, does he not like, Rick Peterson, the pitching
coach, because he had that same attitude each time he came to the mound during
all 3 games.
The Phillies are utilizing back-ups for back-ups, with Ruiz out
and 3rd string catcher Hoover working everyday, Ruiz should be
back Monday, maybe. Valdez filling in at shortstop while JRoll
rehabs, Valdez is also filling in for Castro who is also out of
action, Rollins should be back on Monday, then we have Madson out,
Happ out the good news is that Lidge is also back on the DL, the
list goes on a bit, but really the Phillies
have managed just fine and when these guys return it should only be an
improvement, except for Lidge of course.
Last year we saw the images of Lidge where each time he came into a
game you had
to hope that for just this game he was able to hold it together long enough to
close the game. Unfortunately that didn’t happen to often, it was like a Holiday
Inn commercial, where Lidge is on the mound and Dubee comes out
cause Lidge is struggling and you know the conversation, Dubbe to Lidge
“Lidge you good, your our closer, right, you can do this” then Lidge
would reply “Yeah sure, I stayed in a Holiday Inn Express last night, no
problem”. We all know how that worked out.
This year I think we should stay with the 
Holiday
Inn commercials, you must have seen the new ones, where people are sometimes
doing dumb things, like being total idiots, yep that’s it, we’re going to work
with that this year for Lidge.
The Phillies return home to face 2
against the Pirates, and 2 against the sCrUbs,
then it’ll be on to that stupid thing they call inter-league play. I think we
should get one of those hidden dog fences to keep American League teams out of
the National League games, I am still not sure why there pitchers are such prima-
donnas that they can’t pick up a bat. The
Philles get to host the Boston Red Sox as
the first of what will no doubt be long drawn out inter-league play.
On Reflection….
Posted: April 2, 2010 Filed under: Dailies | Tags: 2010, American League, Boston Red Sox, Cardinals, Chicago, Colorado, divorce, Dodgers, Los Angeles, Mariners, McCourts, National League, Outside the Phillies Looking In, Philadelphia, phillies, Phillies Outside, Predictions, Rays, Rockies, sarcasm, St. Louis, Tampa Bay, The Rock, White Sox, World Series, WWE, WWF, Yankees, you tube 6 CommentsJust in case no one even noticed, the name changed from ‘Outside the
Phillies Looking In‘ to ‘Phillies Outside‘ as part of a concerted effort
to make everything a little more unified, in other words, most
everything else is labeled Phillies Outside so is this blog now, so it’s easier for me, not
that anyone gives a crap, and yes you will still find the same
rambling, sarcastic, drivel as always here, unless I am feeling
particularly friendly then I may up the sarcasm a little more, no it’s not always like a kindergarten playground where you punch the ones you really like, sometimes you actually have to smack the crap out of someone cause they deserve it…
On
to the post at hand, a review of my past predictions and I can assure
everyone that there is absolutely no bias on these predictions, there is
no hatred targeted at any team, and just because some see a certain
blue team as the ‘Evil Empire’ and the fact that some Philadelphia
Phillies players have inferred a wish to exact revenge on that said evil empire,
I would like to assure everyone that none of that was taken into
consideration when constructing my predictions.
I see the American
League like this:
…Yes much to the pleasure of some and displeasure of others I did not select the Yankees to make the post season this year, there jump to the top of the leader board for most global denominated currency spent on average per player for a sports franchise for last year, (in case you didn’t know, the most spent per player on average is normally monopolized by English Premiership Football Teams or soccer teams to those less edumacated, last year the Yankees jumped into the top 10 at number 1), this will come back to bite them this year, as it has with other sports franchises before them in there respective sporting championships. The American League playoff picture will look like this:
Seattle Mariners vs Chicago White Sox – Mariners win
Boston Red Sox vs Tampa Bay Rays – Rays win
ALCS Mariners vs Rays – Mariners win
I see the National League like this:
…No I didn’t make a mistake with the picture, this is just a reminder that the Yankees couldn’t even buy there way in via the National League, although inside sources inferred that they tried, by way of offering Mr. McCourt some under the table assistance with the silencing and/or gratifying of the soon to be ex-Mrs McCourt. The National League playoff picture will look like this:
St. Louis Cardinals vs Colorado Rockies – Cardinals win
Philadelphia Phillies vs Los Angeles Dodgers – Phillies win
NLCS – Phillies vs Cardinals – Phillies win
The World Series – Phillies vs Mariners – Phillies win in 5
A. L. East Crystal Ball….
Posted: March 20, 2010 Filed under: Dailies | Tags: AL East, American League, Baltimore, beer, Blue Jays, Boston, East Division, fishing, Kleenex, New York, Orioles, Rays, Red Sox, sarcasm, Tampa Bay, Toronto, Tropicana Field, wild card, Yankees 12 Comments
How will the American League East surprise baseball fans come October 2010….
Like it or not here are my suggestions for
the fans of the AL East teams…
Toronto Blue Jays have nothing left in the tank and so fans in Toronto should….
…buy themselves a fishing pole and enough beer to get through, what will be a long painful season for the Blue Jays fans.
Down in Baltimore things may not be much better, fans should consider buying…
…an Orioles bird feeder, so at least they’ll get to see one type of Oriole happy this year.
New York Yankee fans enjoyed the ultimate result in 2009 and have probably spent enough on the memorabilia covering the World Series celebrations, this year however they may need to be more practical with lots of…
…cheese for their WHINE WHINE WHINE during the season and some specially formulated tissues for those Yankee tears as they experience a season of ground outs, fly balls and strike outs instead of the walk-off wins of last year.
Down in sunny, warm Tampa Bay, the Rays fans should be prepared….
…with their sweatshirts and hoodies so they can enjoy the cooler air in the stands at Tropicana Field during the post season with their Wild Card winning ways in the AL East.
Up in Boston, Red Sox fans should consider…
…this selection of CD’s to get them through the season to win the AL East, but be warned save the ‘Pain Relief in a box’ CD to help overcome the Red Sox early exit from post season play.
any sarcasm is not meant to offend,
unless it does, then consider the possibilities of more during the
season
trademarks, trade names,
copyrights and patents are the property of their respective owners.
A. L. West Crystal Ball….
Posted: March 12, 2010 Filed under: Dailies | Tags: A's, AL West, American League, Anaheim, Angels, division, Los Angeles, Mariners, MLB, MLB shop, More Cowbell, Oakland, Rangers, Rays Renegade, Seattle, Tampa Bay, Texas 29 Comments
What will the American League West look like come October 2010. I know we are not even halfway through spring training and already I am looking to October. This is a time when I want to have a record i look back at and say “Jeeez was I wrong” or “Wow I nailed that one”.
Like it or not here are a few suggestions for fans of the American League West teams…
Oakland A’s fans, I am suggesting that you…
…invest some of your money in this Northwest Bolster Pillow at $19.99 Item no. 3538060 from the MLB shop, because the Oakland A’s are going to put you back to sleep this year and finish at the bottom of the division.
L.A. Angels of Anaheim should consider reviewing the possible purchase of this….
…Memory Company ‘Born to be’ Piggy Bank for $19.99, Item no. 3055337, from MLB shop, so you can start saving for game tickets for the 2011 season, because the Angels this year will disappoint as they struggle to stay in contention with the teams above them.
Texas Rangers fans should seriously consider splurging on the purchase of…
Kolder Jersey Bottle Holder for $14.99, Item no. 3094273, from the MLB shop as I fear this is the only thing the Rangers will hold in 2010 as they once again fall short of the division title.
Seattle Mariners fans will need one of these….
….Turner Licensing 2010 Box Calendar & Paper Cube for $21.99, Item no. 3785928, from the MLB shop, so that they can keep track of the post season games they will enjoy after winning the AL West division title for 2010.
any sarcasm is not meant to offend, unless it does, then consider the possibilities of more during the season.
…..and finally so as not to generate any hard feelings with a fellow blogger I have added a link to his blog to my side bar, so now you can navigate to both of these Tampa Bay fan blogs Rays Renegade and More Cowbell from my site…..
product images above are all from the respective teams online MLB shop, no guarentees on accuracy of pricing, please visit each teams MLB shop through the specific teams official website to make any purchase or for more information on these or any other products, trademarks, trade names, copyrights and patents are the property of their respective owners.
MOUNTAINS to CLIMB…
Posted: September 19, 2009 Filed under: Dailies | Tags: American League, Angels, Atlanta, BoSox, Boston, Braves, Cards, Chicago, Colorado, Cubs, Detroit, Dodgers, Florida, Giants, Halos, Los Angeles, Marlins, Minnesota, mountain dew, National League, New York, Philadelphia, phillies, race, Rangers, Red Sox, Rockies, San Francisco, Sox, spoilers, St. Louis, Texans, Texas, Tigers, Twins, wild card, Wite Sox, Yankees 10 Comments
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A million dollar hole in one
American
Yankees – without Detroit – are Angels – are Boston – look set to
National
Phillies – sitting on Cardinals – with the Dodgers – still have Colorado – sit on top More… Streaks… I Spoilers… Race… the
My choices at this time It is September ball and we For the
…being |
Phillies Outside Archive Vault 