alifeofknuckleballs
This user hasn't shared any biographical information
Video of Candiotti pitching in 1993
Posted in (Baseball) Life Ain't Fair..., All About Innings, Baseball, Dodgers Baseball, Knuckleballs, Rare Baseball Videos on January 14, 2015
Thanks to YouTube, we are able to once in a while come across rare videos uploaded by people just like you and me. I recently came across a video of Tom Candiotti pitching for the Dodgers in Philadelphia back in 1993, posted by a YouTube user called Classic Phillies TV. Thank you, CPTV!
Now, this wasn’t one of Candiotti’s best games, and most baseball fans will be more interested in seeing a young Pedro Martinez pitch a few innings late in the game. However, following this contest, one in which Candiotti fell to 0-3 with a 6.55 ERA through four starts, the knuckleballing Candy Man would then have a dominant four-month stretch that has since been forgotten. In his next 22 starts following this disaster in Philadelphia, Candiotti posted a minuscule 1.85 ERA and the Dodgers won 15 of those games. Unfortunately, Candiotti’s won-loss record wasn’t great because the Dodgers rarely gave him much support, resulting in a modest 8-2 record in those 22 outings, even with that 1.85 earned-run average. Included in that stretch was a 15-start undefeated streak which saw Candiotti go 5-0 with 10 no-decisions. One of his two losses in those 22 starts was a 2-0 defeat to Atlanta’s John Smoltz, where Candiotti gave up just one run – on four hits – in eight innings (the only run came on a sacrifice fly and then the Braves added that second run in the ninth inning off Pedro Martinez).
In the 22-start stretch after the Phillies game, here were Candiotti’s numbers:
155.2 IP, 122 H, 43 BB, 120 SO, 6 HR, .217 opposing BA
It’s pretty amazing given the fact that Candiotti threw a knuckleball and yet averaged under 2.5 walks per nine innings. And only six home runs given up in those innings with nearly a 3-to-1 strikeouts-to-walks ratio.
That run actually gave Candiotti the National League ERA lead going into September, at a major league-best 2.43.
Thanks again, CPTV, for posting the video.
NFL takes
Posted in Baseball on January 5, 2015
One of the bigger stories in the NFL these last couple of seasons has been the controversy over the Washington team’s nickname. While some sportscasters and play-by-play commentators have decided to not utter that nickname during broadcasts, I wonder about a totally separate issue which I think deserves to be discussed. That would be, why do announcers and broadcasters keep referring to Robert Griffin III, the oft-injured and struggling Washington quarterback, as “RG3”?
Yes, it’s a completely different issue compared to the team nickname controversy, but my point is this: What has Griffin III done in the NFL to merit a cool nickname? True, he took Washington to the playoffs in his rookie year, but it’s been downhill ever since. A guy whose performance on the field isn’t cutting it doesn’t deserve a nickname, so I wonder if it’s because sportscasters are lazy and don’t want to use the full name that they keep on saying “RG3” constantly.
Oh okay, at least “RG3” are Griffin’s initials…but how do you explain Atlanta Falcons quarterback Matt Ryan still being referred to as “Matty Ice”? Ryan has won only one playoff game in five tries, and I still blame him for that pathetic performance in the 2011-12 playoffs where his Falcons got blown out 24-2 by the Giants, who then went on to beat the New England Patriots in the Super Bowl. (Yup, I like the Patriots.) So, does “Matty Ice” refer to Ryan’s play in clutch games, where he always seems to lose?
Speaking of Ryan losing big games, why isn’t there more scrutiny on him? It seems like certain quarterbacks don’t get scrutinized enough for their failures, but guys on more high-profile teams get so much abuse from the American national media? (See Jay Cutler of the Bears, Colin Kaepernick of the 49ers, and Tony Romo of the Cowboys, who all seem to be the favorite whipping boys of the media.) Another pivot who doesn’t get scrutinized enough would be Drew Brees of the New Orleans Saints (whom I’m a fan of, by the way), who fell just short (by 48 yards) of an unprecedented fourth straight 5,000-yard season. Sure, his 33 touchdown passes and 17 interceptions were comparable to his TD-INT numbers over the past few years, but his late-game turnovers this year cost the Saints several games, which contributed to the 7-9 season and New Orleans’ failure to win the NFC South. (And I was so sure the Saints were going to win the division especially after they won in Chicago, only to later get eliminated at home by the Falcons. For the interest of full disclosure, the Patriots are my AFC team while the Saints are my NFC team.) And Brees, who turns 36 on January 15, had said prior to the season that he thought he could play another 10 years and was looking forward to another big year in 2014. Had this been Jay Cutler or Tony Romo saying it, you can bet the American national media would have crucified them.
But I guess teams like Atlanta and New Orleans aren’t those high-profile teams that you either love or hate. One of those teams would be the Dallas Cowboys, and it seems so many people hate them, even those in the media. There was one guy on Fox Sports Radio (I won’t mention this loud mouth’s name because I do not wish to give him any further publicity) who was hypocritical last week when he acknowledged Lions defensive tackle Ndamukong Suh’s stepping on Green Bay’s Aaron Rodgers wasn’t a clean play, but he practically was celebrating the fact Suh won the appeal of his one-game suspension, allowing him to play in the Wild Card game against Dallas. This radio guy isn’t even a Detroit fan! He was just going on and on about how Tony Romo had just one playoff win, and he was hardly the only one. There have been so many media guys ripping Romo, which is just amazing because this guy was undrafted. Apparently, if you play for the Cowboys and you’re not winning Super Bowls every year, then you’re a bum. Who cares if you’re sort of an underdog (which is what Romo is for getting to the NFL after not being drafted). Amazing, because I thought Americans rooted for the underdog. Of course, that aforementioned Fox Sports Radio guy predicted the Lions were going to beat the Cowboys something like 34-30 in Dallas, without realizing Lions QB Matthew Stafford was 0-17 in his career on the road against teams over .500. The guy also was rattling off the statistic about how Dallas had won just one playoff game since 1996, but didn’t seem to care that the Lions hadn’t won a single postseason game since 1991. I guess it’s all about teams like Dallas and Chicago being hated, and not caring about the struggles of the Falcons and Saints. Heck, for some reason head coach Marvin Lewis in Cincinnati has been scrutinized for not winning a playoff game with the Bengals (he’s now 0-6 there), while nobody cares enough to scrutinize Lovie Smith for having a terrible year with Tampa Bay after turning down the Lions head coaching job, a gig that would have guaranteed him a competitive season given the fact Stafford and Calvin Johnson lead the way in Detroit. I guess Cincinnati should be happy since it means the Bengals for some reason are relevant in the league!
Speaking of crappy sports talk show hosts—who just seem to be happy and ecstatic when others fail—how about that guy who does standup comedy and also has his own sports talk show? No, I’m not going to say his name either, but he’s a high-profile guy. I haven’t heard him do standup comedy because I’m not interested, but I have to say his sports takes are just…moronic. He’s the same guy who suggests that professional athletes should be unprofessional and fail physicals on purpose so that they don’t have to go to a crappy team that they’ve been traded to! One of his latest takes was about Matt Kemp being on a great team like the Dodgers and then suddenly having to go to a lousy team like the Padres, and in the process giving up the wonderful lifestyle in Los Angeles including going to Laker games. According to this talk show guy, Kemp ought to just fake an injury so that he could fail the physical and not have to go to the Padres!! Like, yeah, not a funny take at all, and I personally find that most of his takes are horrible.
But anyway, since I love sports and want to listen to sports news and discussions/debates, I won’t change the channel. It’s because I love sports, and unlike some of these hosts, I don’t let my dislike or hatred of something take over my life (the way that some of them let their hatred of Tony Romo or the Cowboys cloud their judgement)! And no, I’m not going to refer to certain people as “RG3” or “Matty Ice”!
Uhm, how about doing some homework before you speak?
Posted in All About Innings, Baseball, Blue Jays Baseball, Dodgers Baseball, Knuckleballs on December 14, 2014
This post isn’t about baseball or knuckleballs, but rather, about commentators mouthing off about football when they don’t know what they’re talking about.
Last night on TSN 1410, a sports talk station in Vancouver, Canada, David Pratt was a guest on one of their shows and proceeded to talk about things that made him look like he needed to do more homework about the NFL before speaking.
*He talked about how the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, at 2-11, still had a shot at the NFC South because both Atlanta and New Orleans led the division at 5-8. Uhm, no. If he’d bothered to do his research, he would have realized that the Falcons and Saints play each other once more, meaning that there would be a winner in that one. So, either Atlanta or New Orleans would, at worst, have six victories. Even if Tampa Bay were to win out, the Bucs could finish only at 5-11. Last I checked, six wins beats five victories for the division. Perhaps Pratt was doing his own system of math there. Okay, even if the Falcons-Saints game ended in a tie, we’ll say that New Orleans, for example, would finish at worst, 5-10-1. Again, that’d still put them ahead of Tampa Bay. So, obviously, during their current three-game losing streak, the Bucs had already been eliminated from the playoffs, but Pratt still was talking like they were alive and had more to play for the rest of the year. Nice try – how about knowing the facts before going on the air?
*Pratt also mentioned how he was annoyed that the Miami-New England game was being shown on TV in the Vancouver area, instead of the Cincinnati-Cleveland game with Johnny Football (Johnny Manziel) making his first ever NFL start. Uhm, again, please do some research. Yes, both games are AFC matchups, meaning traditionally they would be airing on CBS (as FO
X does the NFC games). So, yes, the Dolphins-Patriots tilt is being shown on CBS in the Vancouver market, but FOX actually has the Bengals-Browns game because the latter network didn’t have enough 1:00 p.m. Eastern games so the Cincinnati-Cleveland contest was moved to FOX. This was a new rule that was in effect beginning this season and had already affected some other games earlier in the year. Even I knew that FOX had gotten the Manziel game earlier in the week, so it is laughable that a professional radio personality was clueless about that. (From what I heard, FOX had already gotten this game even before the Browns announced Johnny Manziel would start against Cincinnati.) So, instead of lamenting the fact he had to watch Miami-New England, Pratt should have been crying about how Green Bay-Buffalo on FOX in the Vancouver market was being aired instead of Johnny Football’s first career start. Get it right, bro! And by the way, if you’re not happy you get to watch Tom Brady and the Pats or Aaron Rodgers and the Packers, then something’s wrong with ya!
Anyway, since we’re on the subject, I was thinking that the Falcons, with their silly 5-8 record, was going to lose something like 58-34 to Pittsburgh, which has been on a roll with Le’Veon Bell carrying the load and playing well. I still hope New Orleans wins that division, though if the Saints lose at home to Atlanta next week, then they’re done.
As for baseball, it was announced earlier today that the White Sox have signed Melky Cabrera. I believe he’ll have a big year and will make the Blue Jays regret not re-signing him. R.A. Dickey could lose 18 games for Toronto this year, I say. He’s no innings-eater in Toronto. So many times last season when I looked at the boxscores, I noticed he was logging 6 innings or 6.1 innings consistently. I thought a knuckleball pitcher was supposed to go eight innings instead of being a six-inning pitcher? He gives up way too many home runs at Rogers Centre, and I predict a horrible 2015 season for him.
Was talking to a buddy a few days ago, and I still contend that Chris Sale and Felix Hernandez rank as the top two pitchers in baseball. Don’t get me started about Clayton Kershaw. NL pitchers don’t have to face the DH, and Dodger Stadium is a pitchers’ park. What Sale and Hernandez, in particular King Felix, have been doing the past few seasons, facing the DH and pitching against tougher AL opponents, should put them at the top of any lists concerning the best pitchers in baseball.
I’m no White Sox fan, but perhaps this season Chris Sale will win the AL Cy Young Award, Melky Cabrera will contend for the AL MVP, and Chicago will make it to the one-game AL Wild-Card game? I’m still not sure about Jeff Samardzija, whom the White Sox acquired from Oakland last week, as he hasn’t really proven himself over a long stretch. But at least he’ll be giving Chicago a lot of innings – something that R.A. Dickey, Mr. Six-inning Knuckleballer, hasn’t been for Toronto.
What Cy Young?
Posted in (Baseball) Life Ain't Fair..., Baseball, Blue Jays Baseball, Dodgers Baseball, Indians Baseball, Low-hit Gems on October 8, 2014
I was asked the following question on Quora.com earlier today:
How many times has a Cy Young award winner gone 0-2 or worse in the post-season?
My response was as follows:
Well, it’s happened to the best. Obviously, I am assuming this question was posted following Los Angeles Dodger lefty Clayton Kershaw‘s second loss in the 2014 NL Division Series against the St. Louis Cardinals, a defeat that sent L.A. home for the winter.
In 1997, Seattle’s Randy Johnson, the AL Cy Young winner two years earlier (and a 20-game winner in that current season), went 0-2 against Baltimore in the Division Series as the Mariners lost three games to one. The following year, Johnson was 0-2 for Houston in the NL Division Series versus Kevin Brown’s San Diego Padres, with the 102-win Astros embarrassed in four games. (In 1997, Johnson was 20-4 with a 2.28 ERA, finishing second in the Cy Young race to Roger Clemens. In 1998, the Big Unit was 10-1 with a 1.28 ERA following a late-season trade to the Astros.)
Speaking of Brown, his wild-card Florida Marlins beat Greg Maddux twice in the 1997 NLCS, giving the four-time Cy Young-winning Maddux an 0-2 record in that series. The Braves, who won 101 games during the regular season and finished nine games ahead of Florida in the standings, lost to the Marlins four games to two. Maddux had won the Cy Young in 1992, 1993, 1994, and 1995, and was 19-4 with a 2.20 ERA in 1997. [1]
Brown’s 1998 Padres also handed the Braves’ Tom Glavine an 0-2 mark in the NLCS, with San Diego knocking off Atlanta in six games. Glavine had won the Cy Young in 1991 and would win it again that same 1998 season with a 20-6 record and a 2.47 ERA. The Padres had a good year with 98 victories, but they were underdogs against the Astros (102-60) and the Braves (106-56). San Diego’s brilliant run ended in the World Series, where the Padres were swept by the 114-win Yankees.
In 1993, the Toronto Blue Jays beat Cy Young winner Jack McDowell (22-10, 3.37 ERA in the regular season) twice in the ALCS as his Chicago White Sox went down four games to two. It was McDowell’s second straight 20-win season that year, and he was named the 1993 Cy Young in the offseason. McDowell was 0-2 with a 10.00 ERA in that 1993 ALCS, and then two years later in the AL Division Series with the Yankees against the Mariners, was 0-2 with a 9.00 ERA (with the second loss coming in relief in the decisive fifth game).
So, it’s happened before. I’m sure others will chime in as far as exactly how many times it’s happened.
[1] 1997 was truly an odd season. In addition to Maddux and Johnson, a couple of other top pitchers went 0-2 in that year’s postseason. Brown himself went 0-2 in the World Series against the Cleveland Indians. Though Brown never won the Cy Young, he was runner-up to Atlanta’s John Smoltz a year earlier, and was also a 21-game winner in 1992. Andy Pettitte of the Yankees, meanwhile, was 0-2 also in the AL Division Series against Cleveland, one year after finishing second to Pat Hentgen for the AL Cy Young. The Indians also won two games in the 1997 ALCS that were started by Baltimore’s Mike Mussina, who got a pair of no-decisions as the Orioles couldn’t score in those two contests.
Don’t give me the ball….
Posted in (Baseball) Life Ain't Fair..., All About Innings, Baseball on September 27, 2014
Twins right-hander Phil Hughes is one out shy of reaching 210 innings this season, which will cost him a $500,000 bonus. His half-million-dollar bonus kicks in if he reaches 210 innings, and he is at 209.2 after a rain delay forced him out of his final scheduled start on September 24 against Arizona, in a game where he went eight innings.
Of course, Hughes also set a record in that last start, as he finished the season with 16 walks and 186 strikeouts, with his 11.63 strikeouts-to-walks ratio the best all-time for pitchers with a qualifying number of innings. He also has the same number of wins and walks, 16.
Whose record did Hughes break? Bret Saberhagen, who had 143 strikeouts and 13 walks for the Mets in the strike-shortened 1994 season for an 11.00 strikeouts-to-walks ratio. That was a great year for Saberhagen, as he had more wins (14) than walks (13) for a bad Mets team. It was also Saberhagen’s final great season – he was 14-4 with a 2.74 ERA in 24 starts and finished third in the Cy Young race and 22nd in NL MVP balloting. He was also an All-Star that year for the third and final time in his career. (Yes, I know Saberhagen had some success with the Red Sox in the late 1990s – 15-8 with a 3.96 ERA in 1998 and 10-6 with a 2.95 ERA in 1999 – but by that time he was a No. 3 starter at best.)
Another guy I remember is former Cards pitcher Bob Tewksbury, who in 1992 walked only 20 batters and went 16-5 with a 2.16 ERA. Never a big strikeout pitcher, Tewksbury had only 91 K’s in 233 innings that season. But he nearly had the same number of walks and victories! Tewksbury was also poised to win the ERA title, but the Giants gave reliever Bill Swift enough innings down the stretch and the San Francisco right-hander finished at 2.08 in 164.2 innings, beating him out. (The minimum number of innings to qualify for the ERA title is 162.)
You can also argue that the Cardinals’ main rival, the Chicago Cubs, cost Tewksbury that ERA title too. On August 31, his ERA was 2.01 after he gave up zero earned runs (and two runs total) in a complete-game victory over San Diego. He gave up two earned runs in each of his next two starts to improve to 16-5 with a 2.07 ERA. Then on September 18 at Wrigley Field, the Cubs pounded him for six earned runs in five innings and his ERA rose to 2.27. Tewksbury rebounded in his final two starts of the year – one earned run in 15 innings – but lost out to Swift.
Another thing too was at the time, he was thought of as a guy who would steal the Cy Young from reigning winner Tom Glavine, who raced out to a 19-3 start by August 19 before slumping late in the year (going 1-5 the rest of the way). On September 13, Tewksbury was 16-5 with three more starts to go, and had he won all three, would have had a shot. Alas, it was Greg Maddux (20-11, 2.18) of the Cubs who wound up being hot in the final weeks to take that sure Cy Young victory away from Glavine (20-8, 2.76).
So, that Hughes story made me think back to Tewksbury losing a couple of major accomplishments in 1992. Of course, they are not the same as one is money and the other is about awards… though I’m sure Tewksbury probably would have had some bonus clauses in his contract that would be triggered had he won the ERA title and/or the Cy Young.
In 1993, Tewksbury then went 17-10 (but with a mediocre 3.83 ERA) and walked just 20 batters, again nearly having the same number of victories and walks. He looked like the second coming of Bob Gibson the following year, winning each of his first six starts and getting out to an 8-1 record. Alas, the wheels fell off and he finished 12-10 with an ugly 5.32 ERA, notching a 6.72 earned-run average in his last 14 starts before the strike wiped out the remainder of the season. He walked 22 in 155.2 innings in 1994.
Bill Gullickson was another guy who gave up a lot of hits and didn’t walk that many hitters, though he didn’t have the control that Tewksbury did. After going 20-9 with a 3.90 ERA for the powerful Tigers in 1991, Gullickson was poised to win 20 games for the second straight season. On August 7, he beat Toronto 7-2 on a complete-game eight-hitter to improve to 13-7 with at least 10 starts remaining. Alas, he went 1-6 in his final 10 starts with a 6.45 ERA, including 0-5 and 7.79 in September and October.
And finally back to the Twins, who have said that they would let Hughes pitch out of the bullpen on the final weekend of the season to get the one out to trigger the bonus, according to USA Today. However, Hughes has declined. …which reminds me of another Twins pitcher from 1988.
That season, lefty Allan Anderson had a scheduled start on the final day of the season, but teammate Bert Blyleven told manager Tom Kelly that if Anderson sat out, he would win the ERA title. Kelly gave the left-hander a choice, and Anderson decided to sit out indeed, backing into the ERA championship. It was the first time he had led the ERA race all season, because on the penultimate night of the season on October 1, ERA leader Teddy Higuera of the Brewers gave up three earned runs in 6.2 innings to bump his ERA from 2.41 to 2.45. More accurately, it was 2.4545. Anderson’s ERA was 2.4465, after his shutout against Oakland on September 27. While both ERAs rounded to 2.45, Anderson’s ERA was lower, and he won the ERA title by sitting out his final start on October 2.
What Phil Hughes has decided in 2014 – declining to pitch again just so that he could make an extra $500,000 – is certainly more admirable than what Anderson had chosen in 1988. Bravo, Phil Hughes.
Buy from Amazon.com
Buy from Barnes & Noble
The 1988 Dodgers
Tom Candiotti: A Life of Knuckleballs
Flag Stats
A Life of Knuckleballs 