Armadillo: Thursday's six-pack
Odds to win the PGA Tour event at Colonial this weekend:
12-1— Jon Rahm, Jordan Spieth
14-1— Sergio Garcia
20-1— Jason Dufner
25-1— Matt Kuchar, Paul Casey
30-1— Bud Cauley, Kevin Kisner
35-1— Adam Hadwin, Tony Finau, Zach Johnson
**********
Armadillo: Thursday's List of 13: Doing some thinking out loud……..
13) Dodgers beat St Louis 2-1 in 13 innings late Tuesday night, but Cardinals tied the game in the 9th inning in an odd way. Clayton Kershaw was going for a complete game shutout but threw a wild pitch with a man on second and Randall Grichuk scored all the way from second with the tying run. Don’t see that more than a couple of times a year.
12) That game Tuesday started the Cardinals out on a 47-game in 48-day stretch that takes them up to the All-Star break. Has to be a makeup game in there somewhere, since teams generally aren’t allowed to play more than 20 consecutive days.
11) They had a 3:12 rain delay in Atlanta Tuesday nite; with non-division opponents only visiting a city once a year, teams don’t want to have to play doubleheaders, so they wait the rain out and finish the game when they can, which in this case was close to 2am.
10) If you’re trying to develop young pitchers, like the Milwaukee Brewers are, is it smart to have your AAA farm team in the high altitude of Colorado Springs?
Arizona, Colorado, Milwaukee, San Diego and the Mets all have their AAA teams in high altitude cities.
9) North Carolina’s 6-10 Tony Bradley scored 7.1 pts/game in 14.6 minutes per game, but he is bolting to the NBA, UNC’s first one/done player since 2007 (Brandan Wright).
8) Most overused word in English language these days: “process”. If ballplayers don’t know what to say during an interview, they “trust the process”- its become a cliche.
7) Former Duke guard Frank Jackson had a stress reaction in his foot last winter at Duke but reportedly played pain-free through the season, but decided to have surgery on the foot now to begin the rehabilitation process- he is expected to be back by late July, but summer league is in early July.
Unless the kid got a promise from an NBA team that they will draft him, what on earth was he thinking, signing with an agent? That prevented him from going back to school, having the operation on Duke’s dime, rehabbing all summer and then playing for the Blue Devils next winter.
6) Purdue’s chances of making the Final Four next spring went down the drain when big man Caleb Swanigan stayed in the NBA Draft. Matt Painter is suspect as a game coach, so they probably wouldn’t have made it anyway, but having Swanigan gave them an advantage.
5) All-time, there have been 18,988 major league baseball players; Houston’s new backup catcher Juan Centeno became the 875th all-time Astro this week.
4) Colorado’s Charlie Blackmon has 44 RBI, most in the major leagues and he bats leadoff— part of that is because Colorado has sacrificed 22 times (most in MLB) this year, giving him lot of guys in scoring position when he bats.
Blackmon has come to bat with a guy on 3rd base 15 times this year (T2 in MLB), also 15 times with a man on second base (most in MLB). Makes it easier to get a lot of RBI that way.
3) Phillies were 12-12 on May 1st; they are 3-17 since then, with all three wins in games started by Jeremy Hellickson- they’ve lost their last 15 games not started by Hellickson.
2) If/when David Ortiz gets in the Hall of Fame and I think he will, then Edgar Martinez has to get in, too, since that would eliminate the anti-DH bias. Playing in Seattle shouldn’t work against him; Ortiz played in the eastern media spotlight, Martinez didn’t.
Martinez had a career on-base percentage of .418, he hit .312 with 309 homers. A great hitter.
1) Eagles’ QB Carson Wentz spent 10 days in LA this spring with QB gurus Adam Dedeaux and Tom House (of baseball fame), to improve his throwing mechanics, I guess. Doug Pederson is the Eagles’ coach, a former NFL QB and apparently he wasn’t all that happy Wentz did that.
Odds to win the PGA Tour event at Colonial this weekend:
12-1— Jon Rahm, Jordan Spieth
14-1— Sergio Garcia
20-1— Jason Dufner
25-1— Matt Kuchar, Paul Casey
30-1— Bud Cauley, Kevin Kisner
35-1— Adam Hadwin, Tony Finau, Zach Johnson
**********
Armadillo: Thursday's List of 13: Doing some thinking out loud……..
13) Dodgers beat St Louis 2-1 in 13 innings late Tuesday night, but Cardinals tied the game in the 9th inning in an odd way. Clayton Kershaw was going for a complete game shutout but threw a wild pitch with a man on second and Randall Grichuk scored all the way from second with the tying run. Don’t see that more than a couple of times a year.
12) That game Tuesday started the Cardinals out on a 47-game in 48-day stretch that takes them up to the All-Star break. Has to be a makeup game in there somewhere, since teams generally aren’t allowed to play more than 20 consecutive days.
11) They had a 3:12 rain delay in Atlanta Tuesday nite; with non-division opponents only visiting a city once a year, teams don’t want to have to play doubleheaders, so they wait the rain out and finish the game when they can, which in this case was close to 2am.
10) If you’re trying to develop young pitchers, like the Milwaukee Brewers are, is it smart to have your AAA farm team in the high altitude of Colorado Springs?
Arizona, Colorado, Milwaukee, San Diego and the Mets all have their AAA teams in high altitude cities.
9) North Carolina’s 6-10 Tony Bradley scored 7.1 pts/game in 14.6 minutes per game, but he is bolting to the NBA, UNC’s first one/done player since 2007 (Brandan Wright).
8) Most overused word in English language these days: “process”. If ballplayers don’t know what to say during an interview, they “trust the process”- its become a cliche.
7) Former Duke guard Frank Jackson had a stress reaction in his foot last winter at Duke but reportedly played pain-free through the season, but decided to have surgery on the foot now to begin the rehabilitation process- he is expected to be back by late July, but summer league is in early July.
Unless the kid got a promise from an NBA team that they will draft him, what on earth was he thinking, signing with an agent? That prevented him from going back to school, having the operation on Duke’s dime, rehabbing all summer and then playing for the Blue Devils next winter.
6) Purdue’s chances of making the Final Four next spring went down the drain when big man Caleb Swanigan stayed in the NBA Draft. Matt Painter is suspect as a game coach, so they probably wouldn’t have made it anyway, but having Swanigan gave them an advantage.
5) All-time, there have been 18,988 major league baseball players; Houston’s new backup catcher Juan Centeno became the 875th all-time Astro this week.
4) Colorado’s Charlie Blackmon has 44 RBI, most in the major leagues and he bats leadoff— part of that is because Colorado has sacrificed 22 times (most in MLB) this year, giving him lot of guys in scoring position when he bats.
Blackmon has come to bat with a guy on 3rd base 15 times this year (T2 in MLB), also 15 times with a man on second base (most in MLB). Makes it easier to get a lot of RBI that way.
3) Phillies were 12-12 on May 1st; they are 3-17 since then, with all three wins in games started by Jeremy Hellickson- they’ve lost their last 15 games not started by Hellickson.
2) If/when David Ortiz gets in the Hall of Fame and I think he will, then Edgar Martinez has to get in, too, since that would eliminate the anti-DH bias. Playing in Seattle shouldn’t work against him; Ortiz played in the eastern media spotlight, Martinez didn’t.
Martinez had a career on-base percentage of .418, he hit .312 with 309 homers. A great hitter.
1) Eagles’ QB Carson Wentz spent 10 days in LA this spring with QB gurus Adam Dedeaux and Tom House (of baseball fame), to improve his throwing mechanics, I guess. Doug Pederson is the Eagles’ coach, a former NFL QB and apparently he wasn’t all that happy Wentz did that.
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