Date: Tue, 31 Mar 1998 20:15:57 -0600 Reply-To: Discussion of Texas Rangers Major League Baseball Team <RANGERS@TAMU.EDU> Sender: Discussion of Texas Rangers Major League Baseball Team <RANGERS@TAMU.EDU> From: Beau Sharbrough <beau@CONNECT.NET> Subject: Todays game, odd thoughts
Here's one take on the game today ...
We took a drubbing from the Chisox, who feature Batman and Robin, or at least the Big Hurt and Robin Ventura, who along with Albert Belle batted in 5 runs in a 7 run 5th that sunk our battleship. I saw Martha Meyer and Gary Collard and the weather was here, wish you were beautiful. We sat in section 237, and I believe that no foul ball has made it there in the four year history of tBiA.
Hey, Four Years! That means that Nolan Ryan is eligible for the HOF next year! He and George Brett played their last game at the last game at the old ballpark! Such idle musings are the kind of fun thing to do on a sunny day at the ball yard. The grass was green, the players all wore their caps into the field to ward off the sun. I wondered when was the last time a guy went into the field without a cap. My girls would tell me that they lost theirs, or forgot them. That's going to keep them out of the big leagues, I'm certain.
One warning, the food service is getting worse every year. They use volunteers from the band boosters or the Let's Go Postal club to staff the concession stands and they don't know what they are doing. They don't know how to work the computerized cash registers. I swear I missed the first game of the doubleheader standing in line, telling first one guy, then a second, then a third guy what I had ordered. Maybe I could wear a sign. And you would have had to laugh at the poor guy who made a mistake on the register and tried to charge the lady in front of me $57.50 for a couple of sandwiches. He reminded me of Scotty in the Star Trek IV movie, going back to the 80s and talking to a Macintosh mouse, saying "Hello, Computer?" This guy was saying, "Clear! Clear!" over and over to the thing. I think I would have been there until the machine evolved into a voice activated thing, time went by slowly, my tray got heavy, and I started to think cruel, unpatriotic thoughts. I realized that they were probably calling for Tech Support. I began to wonder how the first week or so of the season would go. Then I realized that Tech Support was probably in Redmond, Washington, and that they were probably all Mariners fans. I started to wonder if this tricky register wasn't just the kind of sick trick that the Redmond Boys would play on us poor Rangers fans, who have little defense beyond the obvious method of pleading with the machine.
Anyway, here's the stuff that strikes me about the Opening Day game.
PUDGE, the INCOMPLETE CATCHER
We opened the season with the pitcher shaking off Pudge's sign. Ouch. Maybe Pudge missed a meeting or something. One of the challenges for him is handling pitchers -- calling pitches is a big part of that.
Another part is going out to the mound when a pitcher needs to get it together. Burkett put down the first 12 Chisox hitters today, but when he gave up a bloop hit, followed by a homer, followed by a first pitch hit, it was time to talk to him. Pudge didn't go out, Bosman didn't go out, I was trying to use the force to get a message to them, nothing worked.
I'm pretty impressed with Pudge's arm, and his hitting. He's 27, and has the world by the tail. I'd like to see him finish maturing as a player in time to help this staff.
DEFENSE
The defense looked really good. Elster made plays going to the left and the right that I did not see in the last game where I saw him play at tBiA when the damn Yankees rolled singles all around him in a cruel version of the Chinese grounder torture. If they rest him, I think he'll be a great asset to this team. That kid Tatis is pretty smooth in the leather, too. His footwork is the best since Buechele left the first time.
OATES and the BULLPEN
It's obvious that with XMan and Patterson on the DL, Oates has to do something different with his bullpen. I wish that he had come up with a plan for that before today's game. This game is about the big inning. I offer two pieces of evidence to support this claim: 1) In about two thirds of the games, one team scores as many runs in a single inning as the opponent does in the entire game; and 2) the Bible says that "in the Big Inning, God created the heavens and the Earth."
Oates should have gone to the pen earlier, it was obvious that Burkett was wheels off. Maybe they should sit up where we are, maybe they're just too close to the situation. Anyhow, here's the deal: Runners on the corners, two outs, Belle at the plate, lefthanded Ventura on deck, five runs in already. My Earl Weaver computer game always tells you to get him out, that Earl doesn't care who is on the mound, you can't get too far behind. The play was to walk Belle and bring in a lefty to pitch to Ventura. Burkett pitched to Belle, and he knocked in two runs. I could hear Oates saying, "Clear! Clear!"
Another possibility was to bring in a righty to face the Big Hurt and Belle. At that point it was only 4-0. I hope that Patterson gets well soon. I was ready to call in Wetteland at 4-0.
CLUTCH HITTING
We couldn't put two hits together in an inning until the 8th. Goodwin got to 3rd with one out in the first. The Chisox played the infield in on the grass, and Greer bounced to 2nd. Igor wimped out and the inning was over. Clark was erased on Pudge's double play ball in the second. I thought of Julio Franco and Jim Rice. Hard hit grounders will do that to you.
Elster led off the third with a shot off the wall in left, featuring a hustling head first dive into second, because like Brian Downing, Elster "can't run a lick." Tatis popped a bunt attempt to the catcher. The Hammer says the only bunting at the Ballpark was hanging from the rafters. It was curious, the White Sox played to stop a run in the first, and the Rangers went to small ball in the third. I expected a lot of scoring and didn't see the wisdom in either move. Terry Bevington, the Chicago manager, turned out to be psychic. He killed a potential big inning on defense. Oates surrendered one on offense, giving up that out. Goodwin lined a nice shot to left, but Joey Belle was there. McLemore was 0-4 today, and the invisible man at the plate.
When we finally strung two hits together in the 8th, we scored twice. And it was only a play by the rookie who knocked Benji Gil out of the majors that kept us from getting the tying run out of the dugout, making a great stop on Elster's grounder.
This would be a good time to point out that our hitters, on the whole, were not very selective. I saw a lot of people hit the first or second pitch. When they get out of an inning throwing 10 pitches, we won't be going very deep into their bullpen, exploring that promised land that comes after the 20th pitch that a pitcher throws in an inning.
GOOD NEWS
Trained SEAL Act. A C-130 flew over and about a dozen seals jumped out. They came flying into the ballpark in a variety of creative configurations, singly, and in twos and threes, some trailing colored smoke, or flying banners for NBC or the Rangers. I was very impressed, and I wish that I had been thru eating so I could have filmed some of it. You know, those guys are pretty amazing. Flying is a special talent.
This game was the first sporting event that was telecast in High Definition TV, by Channel 5. I think that they picked it up at a mall where they are waiting to sell the first HDTV set. Channel 5 seems quite proud of their ability to broadcast in HDTV before anyone can use it. They talk about it enough.
We had a pretty good version of the Natural Anthem, from a kid named Mikaela, I haven't got any idea how her name is spelt, who was a little strong on in the vibrato category for my tastes, but who was a strong as any I've heard in years. She was introduced as a Christian singer, but I've never heard anyone introduced as a Moslem singer, or an agnostic singer. I don't have any of her records. Wearing a Ranger's jersey bearing number 7 (Quick, Chris! Name a Ranger and a NYankee who wear or wore that identifier!) and her own name, she was no bigger than a minute, but she had great pipes. I couldn't see her name on the jersey and I would come closer to spelling Martin Muursepp's name without the umlauts anyway.
It isn't going to be easy to report things like this, but Goodwin had three hits today, and a nice catch on a very serious line drive to deep center. The only thing he missed landed up on the grass beyond the fence. With enough hustle, he could have climbed the wall and run into the grass and caught it. Sounds kind of pointless though. His out was a nice line drive, too.
Elster brought his glove and bat back with him. He was very welcome at the ballpark, and the crowd gave him a warm reception.
Some people remember Robin Ventura, he was booed in the introductions and when he batted the first time. Hey Chris, did you know that when Nolan Ryan retired, the Rangers players took up a collection and bought him two cows, named Robin and Ventura? I missed Bo Jackson today.
And so it went. I hope the other 161 games are different.
(And I'm sure that now that I've gotten MY game out of the way, some of the others of you will be glad to summarize others for the group later in the season.....)
-- Beau Sharbrough | GENTECH99, Salt Lake City, 22-23 Jan 99 Grapevine, Texas | <beau@connect.net> | Keep gambling out of the game, and www.connect.net/beau | keep Rose and Jackson out of the Hall.