Nolan Ryan on Wash and Daniels

The Ft.Worth Star Telegram has an interesting article this morning about the future of Rangers manager Ron Washington and GM John Daniels. In an interview with Nolan Ryan yesterday the team president said, "I have no intentions of making a change at this point in time," Ryan said. "He’s under contract for next year. I think that speaks for itself." When asked about Washington Ryan went on to say, "I think the players like him," Ryan said. "I think he’s gotten them to respond to them. I think that’s important. I really believe his intent is trying to get them to improve and address our shortcomings." When asked about Daniels and the philosophy of the Rangers system Ryan had the following comments.

"It’s easy to see where we ended up and where we finished and say, 'We need to go out and make all these changes,’ " Ryan said. "We all agreed that we’re going to develop within our system. When you say 'develop,’ that’s not a quick fix."

"We still believe that that is the route that we’re going to take for this organization. I think we have shown that we are committed to that. I don’t think that when you did’t see our record change from one year to the next you just dump the program that you’ve committed to."

I'm glad that Ryan believes in the plan and I hope he continues to make sure that the young pitchers that come to the majors can experience what they experienced in the minors. The move to replace the Rangers pitching coaches really encourages me that Ryan is dedicated to the success of this organization and if he can handle a charging Robin Ventura I have faith that he will make this franchise better and win a playoff season in the next three years.

Go Rangers!

Rangers End Season

I'll be honest I have not been keeping up with the Rangers since the Cowboys season started and the Rangers decided to repeat April with horrible pitching and even worse defense. Since I have a three year old that loves the Rangers and Tuesdays are kids free day and Tuesday was the last night home game we decided to go.

I was happy to hear that Nippert was pitching, but was disappointed that Laird was catching and Metcalf was playing third. I really wanted to see Teagarden and Davis. Nippert started out good but then served up some juicy pitches that just seem to hover over the plate, and he paid the price giving up two homers. The first homer hit by Jack Cust landed in the upper deck of the home run porch, and there was no doubt that it was gone when it left the bat. I hope that Cust thanked Nippert for that batting practice pitch on a 3-2 count.

The Rangers second was really fun and surprising. Hank Blalock led off the inning with an opposite field shot off the scoreboard in left. Yes you read that correctly Blalock hit a shot to left. Left... I don't want to over due it but if you have watched Blalock over the years you know he doesn't hit the ball to left. I said wow! It made me instantly think that Hank really wants to be with the Rangers next year. I just don't know if he can do enough this late in the season to keep him. He has looked good at first and hasn't made any crazy errors. If he continues to hit the ball to all fields and play hard the last few games you may have to really think about his value to this club.

Another player that I like is Travis Metcalf and I'm glad he's getting some playing time even if that means that Davis sits. Travis hit three deep balls that all stopped at the wall they just happen to end up in the outfielders gloves, but he hit each of those balls hard and if the outfield had been aligned a little bit different he would have had 3 doubles. Keep it up Travis.

Additionally I noticed last night before the game and also during they kept showing the walk off hits the Rangers had over this season, and there has been a lot I haven't researched it but I'd bet the Rangers had more ninth inning comeback wins this year than ever. The player that was in on almost everyone of those comebacks was Ramon Vazquez. I know many people I talk to don't like Vazquez, but I really like the way he plays the game and you can't argue that he hits in the clutch. I know the Rangers are stacked at the corners now, but I really think Vazquez will continue to make an impact in the MLB and I'd like to see him with the Rangers.

There were two plays that bothered me last night and they were running errors. Bradley and Arias both ran into outs and I can't stand that! Bradley tried to stretch a shot off the wall into a double, but the ball got to the wall so fast and bounced so far back to the outfielder that it was obvious he was out two strides into his turn of first. I was yelling stop, stop, he didn't listen to me and the ball was waiting for him when he got to second. Arias tried to go first to third on a shot to the gap that was fielded cleanly between center and left and again the ball was waiting for him at third. Stupid!

The last thing that I noticed in the middle of ninth was a video that played on the video board for Frank Francisco coming in to close the game. The video lasted until the first batter came up, and I thought how long has Francisco been the closer? Wow, he already has a video? I will tell you this he was awesome! Strike after strike after strike, he through 7 strikes and two balls and got two fly outs and a strikeout. Not bad at all. I prefer him over C.J. Wilson.

Quick Hit: Byrd and Bradley looked really good at the plate last night and Hamilton was just looking to get hits, his swing was so short and compact there was not doubt he was just hitting for a base hit. I hope Josh is just out of gas and doesn't have any injuries.

The Rangers need to win today and win at least one against the Angels over the weekend, if they could sweep the Angels I'd be on cloud nine.

I was going to include my thoughts on Daniels and Washington coming back next year, but I'll write another post for that.

Go Rangers!

BASEBALL MUSINGS

Have you heard the talk that the Rangers are trying to trade both Millwood and Padilla? I find this interesting because the Rangers could be in the race for the playoffs if this offense keeps up the production, and if they are in contention and trade the two veteran pitchers that they have then what? I would support trading Padilla, just because you never know what you will get from year to year / start to start, but I'm on the fence about Millwood. He's been a real asset in the clubhouse in my not there opinion and he was willing to sign a free agent deal with the Rangers.

And what about Milton Bradley do you trade him also? I would consider signing Bradley to a 3 year deal and make him the DH and a back up in Right.

With the production of Clayton Kershaw, John Danks, and Edison Volquez I'd really like to see some of the AAA and even AA pitchers in the majors.

Speaking of the minors, nine players from the Single A "Lumber Jacks" made the all star team in that league.

Josh Hamilton is not human. I think they need to test him and make sure he's not a Terminator.

Oh and one more thought. Chipper Jones hitting .409 I thought he was done after last year.

Leave Roger Clemens Alone!

Another story about Roger Clemens is out today and this is about a supposed "relationship" between the pitcher and a country music singer. I don't get why the New York Daily News needs to publish a story like this. Leave this retired guy alone. I guess once you play in New York you are never free from the scrutiny.

Rangers Update

After my last post about the Rangers I figured I should add another since play has improved a little. The highlight of the last week was the shut-out/complete game pitched by Vicente Padilla yesterday. Yes that's right for the first time in over three seasons a Rangers starter pitched a complete 9 innings. He did this while giving up only 7 hits, no Runs, 2 strikeouts, and 2 walks. He threw 121 pitches with 79 strikes. I can't say enough about this wow just about covers it.

Oh and Josh Hamilton now leads the AL in RBI. It’s nice to have such an athletic and talented Center Fielder in a Rangers uniform and Kinsler seems to be doing well hitting in the number one slot also. This one won’t surprise any Ranger fans Hank Blalock is hurt. “Texas was without 3B Hank Blalock for the second straight game due to a strained left hamstring Sunday against the Twins. Blalock reported that some of the soreness has subsided. He'll have an MRI exam on Monday to determine the extent of the injury. Blalock has been talking the last few days about a stint on the DL, but Monday's MRI should decide that. Here we go again with Blalock. As soon as he gets going at the plate, another injury pops up. It's like a never-ending cycle with him. With Blalock talking DL stint, he looks like an extremely risky start for Fantasy Week 5 (April 28-May 4). When healthty, he is a viable corner infield option in mixed leagues.” Courtesy of cbssports.com.

On the television broadcast there was much discussion about how Nolan Ryan's philosophy of starters pitching complete games should be the expectation of the organization from single A all the way the MLB pitching staff was very interesting. Pitching 6 innings is not the expectation for starters. If you thought that Nolan was just going to be a figurehead I guess this new philosophy change should address that.

And after a meeting between Ryan, Daniels, and Washington the team actually looks a lot better...... It makes one wonder if Wash doesn't have an impact on the team, either that or Daniels and/or Ryan spoke with the team about the status of Wash. We as fans may never know what happened, but something did. If they keep this up for another week or two I may consider going to another game this year.

Go Rangers beat up the Royals this week!

Rangers

Week four of the 2008 baseball season is upon us and where are our Rangers? That's right last place in the AL and only one game up on Washington for the worst record in the MLB. What's more amazing is that except for maybe 4 games the starting pitching has been really good. So what has led to such a poor start to yet another season? It's got to be something in the clubhouse. I'm a Ticket P1, 1310 AM, and heard a great rant from The Old Gray Wolf on Monday and I'm as upset about what the Rangers are doing as he is.

So far this season we have witnessed one bone-head play after another on defense, and on the bases. I think we lead the MLB in errors after today. A team that is pressing at the plate can't afford these mental mistakes, so where does the blame reside? I was all for giving Washington a break, but that was then. His whole philosophy was playing sound fundamental baseball, and they have demonstrated a total lack of playing fundamental baseball. Not only that but some of the stupid game management decisions are killing me. The peak of which was Laird DHing on Saturday. What are you kidding me? And I thought Broussard was a spare at the beginning of the season, but then I warmed to him a little, but after the last week, he's a huge SPARE and sucks especially on defense. Then there's Hank Blalock who refuses to hit the ball down the third baseline when the overshift is put on by the opposing team. He could get a hit and possibly a double if he would just drag bunt the ball right down the line. Even if he's hitting clean up, he should be working on that OBP.

And that leads me to the fact that John Daniels has to go also. Two starting pitchers that are doing well that the Rangers screwed up on are Danks and Armando Galaragga. They didn't even get anything for Galaragga since he was waived at the end of spring training. And don't even get me started on the Chris Young trade. And then you pay Ben Broussard $3mil this year when Boston has Casey at $800k. Makes me ill.

I think that Nolan Ryan has his work cut out for him, he needs to clean house from the front office on down. But who do you hire especially this early into the season? I think the manager and bench coach have to go now and maybe even more of the coaching staff. Two guys I'd love to see on the bench in some capacity are Will Clark and Rusty Greer. I know that Rusty has been managing a college summer league organization, but I really think we need someone with his mind set in the clubhouse. Maybe Rusty isn't ready to be the manager, but he would be a good bench coach. It'll be interesting to see what Ryan does with this mess. Better luck next time Wash....

Batting Average and Slugging?

Here's something for baseball nerds out there. Baseball is a game of stats and for decades Batting Average has been a key measure of a hitter, but what does batting average really show? What is a good, or bad batting average? The standard is .300 if a player hits .300 or better he's a good hitter, but what was the average batting average in 2007?

My favorite radio show host Bob Sturm broke down not only batting average, but also slugging and on-base percentage. Take a look at his blog from Friday, April 4 titled Ask Sports Sturm – Web Episode #1.

Especially note how Bob gives the reader details about historic numbers, in other words how do todays batting average numbers compare to those in the 1930s or the mid 1990s?

Mitchell Report

I must say that I really wasn't looking forward to reading the REPORT TO THE COMMISSIONER OF BASEBALL OF AN INDEPENDENT INVESTIGATION INTO THE ILLEGAL USE OF STEROIDS AND OTHER PERFORMANCE ENHANCING SUBSTANCES BY PLAYERS IN MAJOR LEAGUE BASEBALL that Senator Mitchell has worked on, but after hearing the press conference I couldn't help but open up the report and start reading and searching for specific players. Please take into context that this report is merely documenting verified incidents that tell the history of the use of illegal performance enhancing drugs. The goal of the report is not to prosecute individuals identified but rather to make the argument that more needs to be done and that the program that the MLB currently has is still not enough. As Senator Mitchell stated this report should be utilized to help focus the goals of the future, and should not focus on what has already happened. In other words don't dwell on the past and instead focus on the future! That said some of the accounts documented in the report are really fascinating especially the section about Roger Clemens. Check out section VIII, subsection B, page 167.

Gadgets and TV Part II

What do NASCAR, NFL, MLB, NBA, and NHL have in common besides the fact that they are major sport conglomerates? I would like to see the NASCAR NEXTEL FanView™ migrate to the other major sports. Wouldn't it be great to have a video/stat view at your NFL venue of choice. Do you even know what the FanView is?
It's a revolutionary, handheld device designed to enhance your entire race experience — from practice and qualifying to full race-day coverage — and offers these features:

• Live race broadcasts
• In-car views from up to seven drivers
• Live driver, race and track stats
• Comprehensive audio coverage of drivers, teams, race officials and radio broadcasts
• New! Watch SPEED's Trackside Live and ESPN's NASCAR Now live on your device!

I imagine uniquely designed shapes for the different sports, so maybe the NFL version would be the shape of a football and MLB would be the shape of a baseball. Time magazine even labeled the FanView as one of the Best Inventions of 2006. There must be some kind of exclusivity clause with NASCAR for FanView, because I'm sure the other sports would love to have another item that people at the games can pay to use. Parking $20; hotdog $5; beer $8; hat $30; FanView rental $50. Why not? Some supporting venues offer free WiFi so why not just provide a device that is wireless and connects to the internet, and includes event content and advertising? Yet another WiMAX possibility that could also utilize EVDO Rev0.

Another utilization of WiMAX was announced by NEC in Japan recently, from Gizmodo; "Just in Japan for now, the NEC Lui is a system designed around a central server that will stream media to any device around the house using WiMAX and Windows Vista."
So instead of utilizing wifi it utilizes WiMAX. It will interesting to see how use of the WiMAX technology is charged to the consumer? Will there be a subscription service like Tivo? Tivo provides content and WiMAX is just a connection to the internet. I can see where Tivo might want to add WiMAX to their devices and then just charge a little more for utilizing that type of connection. Maybe the satellite providers would like to add it to their boxes as well?

So if the Xohm service from Sprint Nextel still happens the gadget crowd will have even more options to choose from.

Gadgets and TV

Ok so the holiday shopping season is in full swing, and everyone is rushing out to purchase their goodies. Top sellers seem to be the Wii and iPods. Is the iPod/iPhone/Touch the most impactful gadget of the 2000's? The cell phone has really transformed our lives, remember back when we just dialed 4 digits on a rotary dial phone to talk to our friends? Remember when we first saw a car with a phone? My first car with a phone experience was a 1986 Mercedes roadster, I remember my friends and I were amazed and could only imagine that a doctor would need such a thing. Then in 1994 I remember seeing people carrying these large phones that reminded me of the field phone used by the military at the end of WWII and Korea and Vietnam. I remember a class mate of mine in high school said his mom worked for southwestern bell mobile systems a new pager and cell phone division of southwestern bell and I thought mobile systems, what's that? Then I remember the first RIM pager/calendar thing and the first US Robotics Palm III. The year was 1995 I was working for a long distance company called US Sprint that was changing it's name to just Sprint and they were launching a wireless digital phone service, not a cellular service but a digital service called Personal Communication Service (PCS) that worked on technology called CDMA developed by some company called Qaulcom. About that same time GTE rolls out a PCS service and so does PrimeCo. Looking back on PrimeCo and Sprint they were at the forefront of the technology. So fast forward to 2001 and the launch of Apple computers new music device the iPod. Wikipedia states,"As of September 2007, the iPod had sold over 110 million units worldwide (stated in "The Beat Goes On" conference) making it the best-selling series in history." So it was just a matter of time before the PCS device and the digital music player merged. So what's next? Where do we go from here? I still believe that the future is upon us, and the days of being tied to wired high speed internet connection are numbered, but aren't their some things that require one to sit a desk? The real question is what can't one do? Do I really need a seperate GPS device, Blackberry, iPod, and laptop? Why can't I have all of this in one Pearl sized package? Is this where the iPhone is heading? If it isn't maybe it should. Why do I need a laptop? To check email and access custom applications for my company? I can already check email on my iPhone. One thing I'm pretty sure of is that most people, including me, don't want to watch TV or a movie on a two inch screen. I prefer the big home theater with full surround sound, why limit my movie/tv watching experience, but there is something to be said for being able to watch my movies or DVR from somewhere else if I'm traveling. Why should I have to wait until I get home at the end of the week? Will a wireless carrier offer me cable or satellite programming on my phone? What about on iPhone or Touch? I really think Sling Media is on to something, but I'm still dependent on a home internet connection. If Sling can manage to add a built in high speed wireless data connection to their devices, then I don't have to have a home network. Which leads me to another new device/service that Amazon has just released the Kindle. I'm still not sure about this little thing, but I must say I'm really intrigued. If I could get rid of my book library that takes up so much space, and I can access my books almost anywhere in the U.S. why wouldn't I want that? The Kindle has built in wireless high speed internet access for downloading new material from books to magazines. I can get my New York Times or Wall Street Journal everyday on this little thing. So which wireless carrier is going to blink and step out there and say to Sling use us? Did you know that some counties and police departments are not issuing carbon copies of traffic tickets any longer? I learned first hand that Dallas county is utilizing a handheld device to issue citations and I get a printed copy that's a lot like my receipt I get at National Rental Car when I return my car. My ticket is electronically transmitted to the court and no paper can get lost or shuffled. I suppose my data could get scrambled, but the chances of that happening are slim. So what's next. Apple has some great ideas, and I expect them to challenge the portable GPS market soon with an iPhone GPS service along with 3G or 4G high speed internet connectivity. Who says that Apple will only work with AT&T? What other industries will be revolutionized or infused by this growing state of mobility that people are experiencing. There's another interesting device that I have not mentioned to this point, and I'd like to pick up here next time. What do NASCAR, NFL, MLB, NBA, and NHL have in common besides the fact that they are major sport conglomerates?

Cowboys

The Dallas Cowboys are a very interesting team. The 2007-2008 season should be fun viewing every week. I expect a play off appearance, but not so sure about the Super Bowl. Watch for more Cowboys talk on the blog as the season gets going.

Sports

I have not commented on North Texas sports lately so I thought I would take this opportunity.
Baseball - Rangers: The Rangers's season was over at the all-star break, we have been able to see the results of the trades made at the deadline this year and the verdict..... In my opinion the outfield and future DH positions are of concern to me. I also wonder about catcher. What do the Rangers want to do with Saltalamacchia? He's listed as a catcher on the Rangers's website. Don't we want him playing First Base? I guess the Rangers are not happy with Laird, or want to carry two good catchers with one playing everyday at either first base or catcher. Not sure what the Rangers will do at first base either with this situation? Won't even get into the pitching situation. I think there are more questions than answers about the Rangers for 2008.

Texas Rangers Adopt New Ticket Technology

It looks like the Texas Rangers the MLB franchise in the D/FW metroplex is one of the newest teams to offer the use of a mobile device as a ticket to a game. Check out the great article from DallasNews.com.