Nick's Picks: Red Sox VS Yankees Round 2

Well if last night wasn't a total disappointment then I don't know what is. How you play a terrific comeback effort like what was unfolding for 19 innings in the Bronx and then walk away with the loss. So many mistakes were made in that game, surprisingly none falling on the pitching. Esmil Rogers was exhausted, you cannot fault him for that. What a gritty effort he made, even though he did have a hiccup every other inning or so. The offense is atrocious. Especially with runners in scoring position. Sir Didi, I am not a fan of you at all. How many times are you going to have a chance to prove yourself, like that of Chase "Mr. Clutch" Headley. You will always be remembered for how you do not know how to hit and unless you prove us wrong we will always see you as someone who unfortunately is a weak hitter. So, let's throw all that away and make our picks for today. Hopefully this match-up is a lot better than last night, but then again I am losing hope fast.

Best Pitching Performance: So, we have established that our pen will be a strength for us all year. So, I am picking Mr. Miller to be my pick on the mound today. I think that he comes in and shuts the door down on another hard fought Yankee game today and obviously a win. I think Miller throws a perfect 9th with 2 K's for the save.

Breakthrough Hitter: This is a joke of a category anymore and honestly I am sick of what I saw last night. I am going to go with J.R Murphy here. Yeah I know he likes it spelled out but I think he is going to come up big today and prove why he broke camp with the Yankees. I think he goes 2-3 with a big double and two RBI's.

Mr. Clutch: I know my names change but you catch the drift. I think today the clutch performer will be ARod. Yes I know I did not want to go with him for breakthrough hitter but playing first base today, and finding some sort of stroke I see him being the X-factor today. Watch Arod do some work over at first and maybe come up with a big hit late.

All in all I think this will be another perfect Yankees VS Red Sox game and will go back and forth. Hopefully with young Adam Warren on the mound the Yankees can find some way to remember how to hit the ball. I am picking the Yankees winning this one 4-2. Let's go Yankees, hit the ball when it counts!

Nick's Picks: Jays VS Yankees 4/9/15

Well, first picks of the year didn't go too poorly, other than getting mostly everything wrong. The Yankees won the game, the first win of the season and of course Pineda pitched pretty well; just wish we knew how to hit. If it was not for that crazy 8th inning I believe I would have had a giant goose egg with picks but thankfully the game ended 4-3 with a shutdown 9th inning by new closer Andrew Miller. Yeah, I appointed him.

So here we are into game three of the opening series with a crazy lineup. Sabathia is on the hill and Arod is hitting second. If this was 2005 I might be actually excited about this game but sadly, it is not. I want to go with my gut and say that this game will be a definite win but the numbers make me want to say LOSS. Hopefully Girardi knows what he is doing, otherwise look out Yankee Universe, it is going to be a long night of baseball. Time for the picks.

Top pitching performance: I love CC Sabathia. I love him even more when he is not on the mound though. Tonight will be a huge test, one that I do not think he passes so I am going with Esmil Rogers as my top pitching performance. I am saying that when and I do mean when CC gets in trouble I feel Esmil will be first out of the pen. My guess is three innings of two hit ball striking out 4. Let's hope I get this one wrong.

Breakthrough Hitter: It is early in the season, and the Blue Jays are throwing a young lefty against this old Yankees team. My best bet here is that, yes I am going to say it, Mr. You Know Who himself, Chris Young will be the breakthrough hitter. Thought I was going to say Arod huh? Not in this day or any other day this year. I like to stay clear until the steroid smoke clears and then I might go to the big man. Tonight though, Chris Young will go 2-4 and provide some big hits for the Yankees. I have him hitting both for extra bases. A homer he might hit? Let the force be with us tonight on offense.

Clutch performer: Why not give this to the newly acquired Gregorio Petit. I think that he will flash some leather on the field and maybe get on base a few times. Who could be worse than Brendan Ryan? Let's hope not Gregorio Petit. It is hard to match guys up against this young lefty for Toronto, but why not bring out the dark horses.

So, in tonight's match-up of CC Sabathia and Toronto's rookie Daniel Norris watch a lot of offense take place. Most notably for Toronto. I think that if the Yankees can figure out this rookie, which is not their MO, I think that we can make this game interesting. I predict that Yankees win a close one again, 6-5. Let's go Yankees, take home this open series! Remember, you cannot predict sports, but you sure as heck can try.

Daniel "pinch-hitting" on the LoHud Blog

Everybody in TGP family needs to go check out this thought provoking article written by our very own Daniel Burch on the LoHud Yankees blog this morning! Good work Daniel!

http://yankees.lhblogs.com/2014/02/07/pinch-hitting-daniel-burch-2/?utm_source=dlvr.it&utm_medium=twitter

Papi Goes the Weasel

Seems like just yesterday when David Ortiz and Alex Rodriguez were sharing a drink and a cigar on the golf course at Ortiz's charity golf touney. Through all of the allegations and scandal that ARod was dealing with, all was well in the cozy seat of a golf cart in the sun drenched beauty of the Dominican Republic.All was right with the world.....ahhhhhhh.

Well, A funny thing happened today on ESPN radio. The ever so boisterous talk show host Colin Cowherd had a chat with Joe Tacopina and within a blink of an eye, buried one of ARods few remaining friends in baseball. That bridge was burned when this comment was made by Tacopina...

“No one else was compelled to say anything and no one else did say anything,” Tacopina said about the time period when a Selena Roberts book was released detailing Rodriguez’s alleged PED use and the Times story broke. “People were denying stuff. And I’m not gonna start naming all the other players, but some of them are God-like in Boston right now, and people seem to forget that … Alex came clean and admitted something when he didn’t have to.” 

Let's get real, no one is really surprised by this comment. Ortiz has dealt with allegations of steroid use for years now and for good reason, as Cowherd stated...

When it’s too good to be true, it is … Here was a guy in May of 2009, batting .222 with a slugging percentage of .300, no injuries and he couldn’t hit … He’s significantly better today than several years ago. Interesting story. The story of David Ortiz hitting .733 is about as believable as Big Foot.” 

Although, with it coming from the mouth of Tacopina, this will certainly have an immediate backlash. Let it be known though, it certainly won't be coming from Yankee fans! 

The steroid accusation is so freely used by Sox fans (2nd only to "buying our team") as the reason for the Yankee's championship success. Even after Manny Ramirez and his suspensions for anything from steroids to his...female fertility pills..heh, heh...Manny being Mary? Anyway, it still seems that it just disappears within the gates of Red Sox nation. 

I figure, if ARod is going to keep shooting off cannons while the ship sinks, why not aim it at the Red Sox?

Fair trial for A-Rod?

As I’m sure everybody knows, Alex Rodriguez’s arbitration hearing continues in New York with him appealing against the 211 game suspension handed down to him by MLB.

Like a lot of Yankees fans, I would like to know exactly what evidence MLB have on A-Rod and how they justify his suspension being 211 games (I know it was the number of games remaining in the 2013 regular season and all of 2014 season but I want the actual reasons for why it is so long). On the face of it, A-Rod is a first time offender under the MLB drug scheme. If MLB are claiming obstruction of their investigation and coercion of other players then there are 2 issues:

1) What proof is there? How substantial and reliable is it? 
2) Since a situation like this has not been legislated for, who has decided on the term?

Sure, it seemed like a nice number at the time, taking A-Rod out for the rest of the season and all of next but if it is upheld, then surely it would now have an impact on his 2015 season, such as it may be, which seems a bit harsh. If he is going to face a suspension in the realms of this amount of games, surely missing an entire season would be punishment enough? Again though, I come back to the fact that A-Rod is a FIRST TIME offender (assuming they even solid enough evidence to back this up).

I’ll admit, when this first came out, I was shocked and believed that if all of the allegations were true, then A-Rod should have the book thrown at him. Initially, I would probably have backed a full lifetime exclusion from the game. BUT, when I actually sat back and looked at it in the cold light of day, rather than the harsh bright lights of the media, I thought to myself, “Why is A-Rod being treated SO MUCH differently to others?”

This smacks of a vendetta by MLB to get rid of a player who, admittedly, can be prickly and kind of arrogant. A-Rod has always been a polarising figure in baseball, who in England we would describe as being like Marmite – you either love him or you hate him. No matter what you think about him as a person, he is a stand out player. Ok, so the Yankees may have made a mistake on his 10 year contract but that’s hardly his fault – he wanted a long term deal and to be paid well for his abilities. Because, he does not always conform to how MLB want him to behave, they now appear to be taking issue with this. From what I have heard, there is a good deal of delving into A-Rod’s personal affairs in the appeal hearing, which I know is a standard legal practice in order to attempt to sway the decision maker (Judge, jury or in this case Fredric Horowitz) one way or the other. It just does not seem right though to be dragging this up; it has little to do with the case, apart from seemingly trying to discredit A-Rod.

At the end of the day, if A-Rod HAS done something wrong, then he should be punished. There is no way that we can teach kids that you can get away with something, just by appealing it even if you have done wrong. The sticking point is that A-Rod should not be treated any differently to other people and he should receive a fair hearing and if it comes to it, a fair punishment. If Mr Horowitz decides that the 211 game suspension should be upheld, then I hope we are given some justification for the term. In fact, whatever the decision is, I would like it to be transparent so that we can see exactly what evidence led to it and how the punishment has been decided.

A little while ago I made the following declaration, “My name is Clive Barker, I am a New York Yankees fan and I forgive Alex Rodriguez”.

This is not something that I did lightly but as it says, I am a Yankees fan. I feel that we need to forgive A-Rod and accept that he may have messed up. Forgiving him does not mean that we condone him not being punished if he has done something wrong but it does mean that we can move on.

Ultimately, all we are asking for is that A-Rod be given a fair hearing and if it comes down to it, a fair punishment. This would be best for A-Rod, best for the Yankees, best for the fans and best for baseball, which is the key here! Baseball does not need to get dragged through the mud for singling out and discriminating against one player. This would be worse for the game than the whole steroid saga as it is a basic human right to have fair trial and fair punishment. In a way, this whole A-Rod thing, transcends baseball and comes down to fairness and doing the right thing, no matter what!