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All hail the Royals PR machine! From the producers who brought you “David DeJesus for Gold Glove” and last summer’s blockbuster “Jose Guillen for the All-Star Game,” we have “Zack Greinke for the Cy Young Award.”
The print is small, so let me give you what the critics say.
“...Fun to watch”
- Bret Saberhagen
“...Best performance I’ve seen in a long time…”
- Ozzie Guillen
“...A true embodiment of performance art.”
- Jeff Passan
Full photo is here.
The Boston game should have clinched the Greinke For Cy Young vote. The only remaining argument against him was floated by Gammons who coughed up the gem that Greinke had compiled his outstanding season by avoiding the Red Sox and the Yankees.
Love the East Coast Bias inherent in this ignorant comment. No, it’s not because Gammons is putting the Sox and Yankee offense on a pedistal. It’s because he’s leaving out the Los Angeles Angels.
Three teams are scoring more than five runs a game this year.
Yankees - 5.68 R/G
Angels - 5.47 R/G
Red Sox - 5.35 R/G
Fine. Greinke hasn’t pitched against the Yankees this year. (And you know what, it’s possible he won’t. If Hillman keeps him on normal rest - and given the fact that Dusty Hughes will start on Thursday, he probably should - Greinke will start the home finale on Sunday against the Twins. By the way, he hasn’t faced Minnesota this season, either.)
However, Greinke has now made three starts against the Angels and Red Sox. How’s he done against the cream of the AL offensive crop?
22 IP, 14 H, 2 R, 1 ER, 18 SO, 5 BB
His ERA? 0.41
At this point, I just can’t imagine this as a valid argument against Greinke. The unbalanced schedule throws all sorts of problems like this before the electorate. Is Tampa’s Matt Garza a better pitcher than Zack Greinke? He’s made 10 starts against the Yankees and Red Sox and has a 2.70 ERA against them. He’s been pretty effective. Except he’s made two starts against the Indians and has given up six runs in 12 innings. In fact, against the entire AL Central - the weakest division in baseball - Garza has allowed 25 runs in 34.2 innings covering six starts. That’s a 6.49 ERA.
I guess my point is, we can cherry pick reasons all day long. If a voter sits down, examines all the stats and thinks about what Greinke has done this year - there’s absolutely no way you can vote against him.
Unfortunately, we can’t rest on Greinke’s outstanding season. There are still those in the electorate who just can’t get past Greinke’s lack of wins. The latest is Patrick Reusse of the Minneapolis Star Tribune. Normally, I wouldn’t bother. Except Reusse has a ballot in the Cy Young vote. He recently appeared on the radio - somewhere in Minnesota, I assume - and discounted our man Zack:
“I got the Cy Young vote… I’m gonna have a hard time (voting for Greinke)… He’s gonna have to move that number… I’m not going to give it to a guy with 14 wins. I don’t care what his numbers say. He’s got to at least get to 16 for me to vote for him.”
According to The Biz of Baseball website, Reusse has been a member of the BBWAA since 1971. He carries badge number 18, which basically means he is the 18th longest tenured member in the organization. This is truly a case of the old guard ignoring the new approach.
Although it seems he has a computer. If you choose to
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, please be respectful.
At the opposite end of the spectrum is Luke Hochaver. I kind of get the feeling what we saw from him last night is a microcosm of his career: Great for a few innings, awful for the rest. He was doing pretty well for the first four innings last night - a little wild, but he was getting his share of strikeouts. Then in the fifth, it all fell apart.
It can be difficult to remember that Hochevar is still relatively young as far as big league experience. He's only made 46 starts, which is essentially a year and a half in the rotation. Even though he's 26, there's still time for him to learn, but pitching is such an art. Some guys have tons of talent and can never master the finer points. Others lack the talent but understand how to get big league hitters out. I think Hochevar falls into the latter category where he doesn't have the talent (or pitches) of a front line starter. His success will hinge on whether or not he eventually understands how to pitch.
The jury is still out.
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Comments
Oh, and by the way...CC Sabathia hasn't had to pitch against the Yankees either.
Also, John Kruk (who I know doesn't vote, but still) said that Greinke will have to "run the table" and win 17 games to be the Cy Young winner.
Who knows how representative these guys' opinions are, but they are scary opinions, particularly because they echo so loudly on comment boards and in blog postings. So don't discount the possibility that a bunch of ignorant voters like Reusse could screw Greinke out of his award. And yes, it is his award.
And John Kruk is one of the world's larger idiots. The more-respected names (Kurkjian, Olney, just to name two) at ESPN are all saying that it's Greinke's, for whatever that's worth.
The whole Woody Paige, the Chicago clown-the Boston old fart- newspaper guys who sell out to t- and be famous is really sad, the levels they sink to to be oon Espn- these guys are just pathetic
A lot of desperation and bluster