Thirty-five drivers. Eighteen races. Three classes. It can only be the British Lawn Mower Racing Association Championship. For safety reasons, all blades were removed. Guess that’s what some of us dream about when mowing our lawns each weekend.

Major props go to Jimmy Fallon for greenlighting this hilarious Matt Harvey interview segment, which aired on NBC last night:

This exchange had me in stitches:

Fan in Mets t-shirt: “If I do have to pick my favorite, I’d have to say … it would probably be Lucas Duda. I just really enjoy seeing him play.”

Harvey: “What about Matt Harvey?”

Fan: “Um, you know, he’s a stud.”

Harvey: “Thank you.”

More here.

Good morning afternoon. (I am overseas this week and regret not having been able to post Reveille in time for you to chew it over alongside your big bowl of delicious Frosted Flakes.)

Here are several links from the past week that will make what’s left of your Monday a bit more bearable:

• The lineups for tomorrow evening’s All-Star Game may be found here. The contest at Citi Field will get underway with Matt Harvey pitching to Mike Trout.
• The New York Daily News’ John Harper and Anthony McCarron profile the All-Star Game debuts of other pitchers who once called Queens home:

En route to the clubhouse at Anaheim Stadium for his first All-Star Game, the July 11, 1967 Midsummer Classic, Tom Seaver was asked to show his player ID card to prove he belonged. “I looked like I was about 12,” Seaver says now, laughing. He was 22.

When Seaver arrived in the clubhouse, Lou Brock glanced over and said, “Kid, go get me a Coke.” Seaver, laughing again, says, “He thought I was a clubhouse kid!”

It didn’t take Seaver long, however, to show that he belonged. And the National League’s 2–1 victory in the All-Star Game helped prove it to, of all people, himself.

Seaver, who went on to win NL Rookie of the Year, got the save by pitching a scoreless 15th inning after Tony Perez had smacked a go-ahead solo homer off Catfish Hunter in the top of the frame. On the mound, Seaver says, he had a career-changing moment.

The phone rang in the bullpen and Seaver knew it was the call for him to pitch — Claude Osteen, the only other remaining NL pitcher, had thrown 9 2 / 3 innings two days earlier.

“I really had to work to keep from throwing up,” Seaver says. “I did. It’s probably an exaggeration, but that’s the feeling I had. When I got to the mound, I walked up the mound and I looked down at the rubber and that’s the time I finally believed in myself, I said, ‘I can do this.’ I remember distinctly. That was a huge turning point in my career. ‘This is what I do. I can do this.’ I threw my warmup pitches and all that sort of insecurity went away.”

• Erik Brady and Ted Berg of USA Today take note of the paucity of All-Stars from the New York teams and wonder if the locals are as into the sport as they were two or three years ago.
• Just because Yasiel Puig isn’t on the National League roster doesn’t mean we can’t talk about him. Heck, Fangraphs’ Alex Remington goes so far as to compare his hot start with Jeff Francoeur’s.
• Raul Ibanez isn’t on the American League Roster but Geoff Baker of the Seattle Times marvels at the 41-year-old’s power surge. Ibanez is a mere five home runs away from breaking the record for most home runs by a player his age (Ted Williams, 29 HRs in 1960).
• Bill Chuck of Baseball Analytics showcases the heat map for Tim Lincecum’s 148-pitch no-hitter last Saturday in Petco Park.
• Patrick Reusse of the Minneapolis Star-Tribune laments “Nine traditions lost from baseball,” including:

The Bullpen Car

Dick Stigman, the pride of Nimrod, Minn., was acquired by the Twins on April 2, 1962 for Pedro Ramos, and was an outstanding left-handed addition over the four years. He spent his share of time in the bullpen (except for 33 starts in 1963) and took rides at Met Stadium in a Dodge, in a Ford and in a golf cart.

“One year, the players got free Dodges for the season from the place out by Southview, so we rode in from the bullpen in a Dodge,’’ Stigman said. “Another time we got Fords from Midway, so we rode in a Ford.

“Nobody ran in from the bullpen. I don’t think we could’ve made it. We all smoked.’’

George Tsamis, the manager of the Saints, said: “I saw bullpen cars as a fan of the Giants and the A’s in the Bay Area. I don’t know why they don’t have them these days, the way everything in a big-league ballpark is marketed.’’

Glen Perkins agrees. The ace lefthander of the Twins’ bullpen has campaigned in recent months for a bullpen car at Target Field, mostly through his Twitter handle @glen_perkins.

• Beyond the Boxscorei’s Jon Roegele discovers that starters who face the same opponent in consecutive starts see results that are not appreciably different the second time around, although those pitchers on average tend to throw slightly fewer fastballs.

• Aaron Hicks initially misplayed this ball in the gap but then unleashed a long, rainbow throw to nail Vernon Wells at third base.

That’s it. Have a walk-off week!

In a friendly match against German soccer club FC Schalke, Martin Hinteregger of Austrian club FC Red Bull Salzburg scores from deep in his own half. His team went on to win 3–1.

Oops. “Justin Bieber disrespects Chicago Blackhawks by stepping on logo”

War-weary Iraqis have reason to celebrate: Iraq’s under-20 soccer team advanced to the semifinals of the Under-20 World Cup in Turkey, where they will face Uruguay. The Young Lions of Mesopotamia defeated England, Chile, and Egypt in the group stage, Paraguay in the round of 16, and South Korea in the quarterfinals. Favorites Spain and Portugal have been elimiated.

For a country that still suffers from sectarian violence, this is extraordinary. “We built this team to be like a family,” coach Hakeem Shakir, the coach explains. If the Young Lions of Mesopotamia win tonight, they will face either France or Ghana in the final on Saturday. Their country deserves a fairytale ending.

And, as expected, Michigan is getting its butt kicked:

A young Ohio State fan has won the fight of his life against cancer and is celebrating at the expense of heated rival Michigan for good measure.

Twelve-year-old Grant Reed, who was diagnosed with a brain tumor in 2011, named his tumor “Michigan” to motivate him for the long, scary battle ahead.

After completing his final round of chemotherapy last week, Reed could finally claim victory.

Doctors and faculty at Nationwide Children’s Hospital in Ohio marked the occasion with a traditional bell-ringing ceremony that symbolizes renewed life.

When Grant was asked why he named his tumor Michigan, he replied, “Because Michigan sucks.” I love this kid.

The rest of the story here.

Contrary to some fans, I do not believe that players in their 30s should bust it down the line on every routine ground ball to second base. On the other hand, I do think that even the rotting corpse of John Candy should make an effort to leave the batter’s box and run out a trickler hugging the third-base line, even more so when you’re in the eighth inning of a tie game against the division-leading Tigers.

So yeah, ten-year veteran with the goofy smile Nick Swisher, I am looking at you.

Watch:

More here and here.

Good morning.

Here are several links from the past week that will make your Monday a bit more bearable:

• The rosters for the respective leagues for next Tuesday’s All-Star Game at Citi Field were announced over the weekend.
• Each league still has one spot up for grabs, to be chosen by the fans. Crashburn Alley’s Bill Baer offers his thoughts on the candidacy of Yasiel Puig:

I can completely understand and appreciate a player’s perspective on this. Many players go their entire careers without ever making it onto an All-Star roster. Others come close, but are looked over in favor of other players (like Puig, perhaps). Others routinely make the All-Star team but put in a lot of work to maintain the level of skill necessary to do that.

The All-Star Game, however, is famously about the fans. Everything about it, from the All-Star balloting, to the live selection show on TV, to the Home Run Derby, to the Futures Game and Celebrity Softball Game, to the 30-minute pre–All-Star Game festivities — none of it is for the players, but for the fans. In the past, the All-Star Game was designed to give fans of a team in one league [an opportunity] to see the best players the other league has to offer, since they played so rarely. Now, with interleague play, MLB.tv, and a plethora of channels showing games and highlights, fans are well versed when it comes to players on other rosters, but the interest in the All-Star Game remains.

• Dan Moore of Viva el Birdos profiles the Matt Holliday contract, the most lucrative ever inked by the Cardinals, and wonders if the deal, now in its fourth year, is about to hit the rocks.    
• You now know who are the first half’s WAR-Stars. Well, Grant Brisbee of Baseball Nation names the ten worst position players, as judged by WAR. One of those on his list is B. J. Upton:

If you thought Upton was a good offensive player, you were pretty confident that Tropicana Field was an extreme pitcher’s park. If you thought Upton was okay, you were probably like the rest of us. But no one can ever predict a 28-year-old getting completely screwed into the ground like this. Strikeouts up, extra-base hits down, more grounders, more infield pop-ups and just 43 hits in 283 plate appearances. Seven of those were infield hits.

The worst part about the ranking: it has nothing to do with defense because Upton is rated higher than he has been in other seasons. Actually, the worst part about the ranking is everything. Everyone thought it was a good thing that he joined his brother, but maybe his brother just whales on him around the clock like mine did.

Wait, but B.J. is the older one. None of this makes sense.

• Doug at High Heat Stats looks back at the legendary pitchers’ duel between Juan Marichal and Warren Spahn, which took place on July 2, half a century ago. 
• Fangraphs’ David Laurila posts a fun interview with Pat Tabler of early-to-mid-1980s Indians fame. Here is the first baseman reminiscing about a couple of the brawls he experienced while playing for the Tribe:

In 1986, we were playing the A’s, who we always had hard-fought games with. Pat Corrales was our manager and he thought Dave Stewart was throwing at one of our guys. He was barking at him and Stew said, “Come on out here.” Corrales did. They met at the first base line and went after each other. Both of them had belts in karate. Corrales went to dropkick, and missed, and Stew smoked him. It was on after that. It was a good fight.

Another time, against the Royals, Jamie Quirk hit a home run against us. Next time up, Sammy Stewart hit him with a pitch and broke his hand. The following night, with Ken Schrom pitching, Willie Wilson hit a fly ball to center. As our center fielder is catching the ball, Kenny is standing behind the mound waiting for the ball to come in. Wilson charged him and blindsided him — he threw him into the ground and separated Schrommy’s shoulder. I was playing third base and saw it coming. I yelled, “Look out!” right before he smoked him. Willie had been a great football player in high school.

• For the very first time, a MLB umpire has reportedly been canned for testing positive for narcotics. Brian Runge, whose father and grandfather also umped in the bigs, was a 14-year veteran.       
• Speaking of “blue,” I think it’s safe to say that future Hall of Famer Chipper Jones is no fan of Angel Hernandez. Mark Townsend of Big League Stew has the details.

Brooks Robinson Manny Machado is just ridiculous. (Go ahead, tell me this isn’t the defensive play of the year.)

That’s it. Have a walk-off week!

Horrible: A Brazilian soccer referee was beheaded by spectators after he fatally stabbed a player.

Referee Octavio da Silva had apparently stabbed player Josenir dos Santos during an argument at a game in the Brazilian town of Pio XII. Spectators then stormed the field, attacked and stoned the referee, decapitated him, then planted his severed head on a stick.

Yesterday afternoon, we revealed this year’s AL WAR-Stars. This evening, it’s the Senior Circuit’s turn.

You know by now that WAR stands for “wins above replacement.” It’s a useful (not to be confused with “perfect”), all-in-one statistic combining both offensive and defensive performance, including baserunning. WAR also includes a defensive positional adjustment. (For those who need a primer, Alex Remington offered up an easy-to-digest yet pretty thorough explanation of Fangraphs’ version – which we are using here – a few years back.)

As with the AL winners, the outfield consists of a left fielder, center fielder, and right fielder.

So who are the NL winners, as of last night’s action?

1B: Paul Goldschmidt, Joey Votto (3.3)
Minor League Ball’s John Sickels recently offered a retrospective on the Diamondbacks slugger who boasts a .302/.380/.553 slash line and .397 wOBA:

It was never a matter of performance for Goldschmidt: he mashed in college and mashed in the low minors. His power and strength were never doubted. However, his strikeout rates were a caution flag from both a sabermetric and scouting perspective, and many hitters with similar profiles have failed to adapt at higher levels.

I don’t think even the most optimistic observers saw Goldschmidt as a potential .280–.300 hitter; even people who liked him saw him more as a .250–.260 guy, albeit one who would produce power. That was my take on him, and even that proved to be an underestimate of his ability.

By all accounts, Goldschmidt has worked very hard to improve his defense and mobility through better conditioning. Although his height/weight data is the same as when he entered pro ball, he’s in notably better physical condition compared to his college days. His baseball instincts are sound, and he’s even turned into an efficient stealer (26 for 30 in his big league career) despite his size and lack of plus running speed.

What separated Goldschmidt was his ability to adapt and remedy his weaknesses, even as he faced better and better competition. Figuring out which players will do that and which won’t involves the intersection of player tools/talent, baseball skills, and human/makeup factors . . . that’s what scouting is all about. Goldschmidt is a good example of how much we still have to learn.

Meanwhile, Votto (.325/.435/.513) is enjoying another Votto-esque season.

2B: Matt Carpenter (4.1)
Even more surprirsing than this Redbird’s (.321/.395/.483) leading the pack is that he is multiple horse lengths ahead, as his nearest rival, Brandon Phillips, posts only a 2.0 WAR.

SS: Everth Cabrera (3.6)
The 26-year-old Cabrera (.305/.382/.418) and his 24-year-old teammate Jedd Gyorko make up one of the more potent middle-infield combinations in the bigs, according to Paul Swydan. Here is what the Fangraphs author has to say about Cabrera’s progress since joining the Padres organization:

Room for improvement is definitely what Cabrera had when the Padres poached him from the Rockies in the 2008 Rule 5 Draft. He didn’t acquit himself too poorly, but after a 2010 hamstring injury severely hampered Cabrera’s effectiveness, the Pads plugged Jason Bartlett into the lineup and sent Cabrera to Tucson. He spent all of 2011 there, but in early 2012, San Diego finally tired of Bartlett’s ineptitude and recalled Cabrera. He’s been there to stay, in part because he swiped 44 bases in 449 plate appearances last season. That seemed like a pretty hard pace to keep up in today’s game, but with 28 steals in 288 plate appearances this year, he’s basically setting the same pace. His plate discipline has improved, and if he can keep his batting average on balls in play at its current level – a decent bet given his speed and how frequently he puts the ball on the ground – he is basically the ultimate slap hitter. Combine that with above-average defense and you have a pretty nifty player.

3B: David Wright (4.3)
Is the concept of “lineup protection” a myth? Those answering in the affirmative might cite Wright’s numbers to date (.305/.392/.517) and then point out that the Mets’ three-hole hitter is having his most productive season since 2008, even though those hitting clean-up for the Amazins have collectively posted a beyond-pathetic .236/.291/.396 slash line.

LF: Carlos Gonzalez (3.5)
CarGo is having another strong season at the plate (.292/.359/.596), but Joe Lemire of Sports Illustrated recently noted his outfield prowess:

A true five-tool talent, Gonzalez prides himself on his defense and is known for baiting runners into attempting to take an extra base. He’ll charge balls slowly or, as was the case [on June 20] when the Nationals’ Adam LaRoche was rounding second on a teammate’s single to left, Gonzalez may not take a single step forward at all. (LaRoche still didn’t run for third, and Gonzalez’s strike behind the runner to second didn’t quite work.)

CF: Carlos Gomez (4.3)
Hold on to your hats: Not only is Gomez (.309/.349/.557) rated No. 1 among NL center fielders, he and Wright share the honor of being the top-rated NL position player. His defensive skills have never been in doubt, and 2013 is no exception (10.9 UZR, 25.2 UZR/150). Even if the performance of this Mets and Twins castoff tails off in the second half, he may still be the wisest $4.3 million ever spent in one season on a ballplayer. (In March, the Brewers extended his contract through 2014–16 for $24 million.)

RF: Hunter Pence (2.9)
With a .280/.326/.480 slash line, Pence is providing power to an otherwise offensively challenged outfield in AT&T Park. In all likelihood, the Fort Worth native will not get dealt before the trade deadline, the first time he won’t have to rework his wardrobe in three years.

C: Yadier Molina (3.5)
Molina, always a premier defender, is arguably having his finest offensive season (.347/.388/.497), although his über-high BABIP (.369 vs. career .296) suggests there will be some regression in the second half. He finishes just ahead of last year’s MVP, Buster Posey (3.4), who currently posts a .316/.389/.532 slash line.

In truth, you cannot go wrong with either backstop.

The position player starters for this year’s All-Star Game will be announced next Sunday. Chosen by the fans who vote early and often, many of those selected will be rewarded for their superior play over the first three months of the season, while others may get their tickets punched to Queens mostly as a result of their popularity.

That’s all well and good, but who are the Junior Circuit’s top position players through last night’s action, according to WAR?

As most of you know, WAR stands for “wins above replacement.” It is a useful (not to be confused with “perfect”), all-in-one statistic combining both offensive and defensive performance. For those who require a primer, Alex Remington offered up a few years ago on Yahoo’s Big League Stew an easy-to-digest yet pretty thorough explanation of Fangraphs’ version of WAR – which we are using here.

So who are the outstanding performers to date?
 

1B: Chris Davis (4.6 WAR)
Davis (.332/.406/.728) is the first MLB player to have clocked 31 home runs and 25 doubles before July. Any questions?

2B: Dustin Pedroia, Jason Kipnis (3.2)
This does not explain Pedroia’s inclusion on this list:

Pedroia is what he is — a hungry, dirty (as in getting his uniform dirty) ballplayer who would come out of his body if he could to make a play. No team in baseball can boast anyone quite like him.

However, this does:

Taking Pedroia’s 104 hits, 44 walks, four sacrifice flies and one hit by pitch in his 323 at bats, we can calculate that Pedroia is currently sporting an OBP of .401, good for fifth in the American League. With a look at the names above him (Detroit’s Miguel Cabrera, Baltimore’s Chris Davis, teammate David Ortiz and Minnesota’s Joe Mauer) you can see why OBP is a strong way of determining a player’s value on offense.

As for the 26-year old Kipnis:

He struggled in April, but he’s hitting a robust .333/.421/.618 with 19 doubles, three triples and 11 home runs since the beginning of May. He’s also stolen 14 bases in that stretch and has only been caught three times. Best of all, the Indians’ offense has been one of the best in the league, so his run and RBI totals have also been stellar.

SS: Jhonny Peralta (2.5)
J. J. Hardy (1.8) is almost certainly going to receive the most votes at shortstop, but Peralta (.310/.369/.456) is the unsung hero in Motown in 2013.

3B: Miguel Cabrera (5.3)
With a .369/.456/.672 slash line and .472 wOBA, Miggy is on his way to having a better season than he did last year, when he won the Triple Crown and MVP award.

LF: Mike Trout (4.7)
Trout got off to a slow start (.261/.333/.432) but has been en fuego ever since, as his current .315/.392/.545 slash line demonstrates. Does anyone doubt that the not-yet-22-year-old is heaping scorn on the earlier concerns about a sophomore slump?

CF: Brett Gardner (2.9)
Gardner (.288/.347/.453) has been one of the few bright lights in the Bronx. In early June, Fangraphs’ Jeff Sullivan noted:

Gardner’s hitting way more balls in the air. He’s swinging a lot more aggressively, and that’s basically the whole of it. More swings at balls out of the zone, more swings at balls in the zone, more swings at first pitches. Gardner hasn’t seen a dip in fastballs, nor has he seen a marked dip in in-zone pitches. He’s generating completely different results. . . .

Gardner isn’t a free swinger, but he’s a more free swinger, and that makes a difference since everything’s relative.

These observations remain valid. Gardner’s 2013 swing percentage is seven points higher than his career average (42.2 percent versus 35.2 percent). Menwhile, his isolated power (ISO) of .165 is more than 50 points higher (.114).

RF: Jose Bautista (3.3)
Joey Bats is back with a robust .256/.355/.505 slash line. Although Bautista performed poorly at the plate in June (.213/.280/.435), going an anemic 7 for 43 during the Jays’ recent 11-game winning streak, he has slugged .591 over the past two weeks.

C: Joe Mauer (3.5)
While his brief power surge (28 home runs in 2009) hasn’t returned, Mauer (.319/.402/.478) remains an on-base machine for an otherwise unimpressive Twins lineup.

DH: David Ortiz (2.3)
Although the video below is from May, the views of Eric Karabell and David Schoenfield (of ESPN’s SweetSpot blog) on Big Papi (.317/.404/.604) are hardly outdated.

From Mike Oz of Big League Stew:

The jerseys hanging in the dugouts of the Arizona Diamondbacks and New York Mets on Monday had nothing to do with baseball. The No. 19 Yarnell jerseys weren’t for a rookie you’d never heard of. Nor were they an inside joke among players.

Instead, the jerseys were a tribute to the 19 firefighters who lost their lives Sunday while fighting a huge blaze near Yarnell, Ariz. The 19 men were an entire squad of the elite “hot shot” firefighters, who get dispatched to fight the toughest fires. This one, tragically, engulfed them. . . .

The Diamondbacks also wore black arm bands to honor the firefighters, and they’ve set up a raffle that will benefit Yarnell victims for their return home Friday.

More here.

Good morning.

Here are several links from the past week that will make your Monday a bit more bearable:

• Yasiel Puig remains en fuego. After collecting four hits in Sunday’s victory, including a triple and a double, the “Wild Horse” owns a .436/.467/.713 slash line and .503 wOBA in 107 plate appearances.
• Meanwhile, the Dodgers learned that Josh Beckett needs season-ending surgery “in which a rib is expected to be removed to relieve pressure on a compressed nerve,” according to Bill Shaikin of the Los Angeles Times. The pitcher described to Shaikin how he knew something was seriously wrong:

The numbness and tingling would come and go, usually in a day or two. For Josh Beckett, this went on for years, an uncomfortable side effect of pitching for a living.

The time, the condition persisted for six weeks, affecting his everyday life.

“I’d try to drive with my right hand,” Beckett said, “and my right hand would go numb.”

He could pitch, he said, but his arm would feel weak and heavy.

“I’d throw a bullpen, and I couldn’t feel my hand,” he said.

• David Schoenfield isn’t willing to say that the Pirates’ bullpen is being “overworked,” but does say that “it’s something to watch.”
• Speaking of the team with the best record in the bigs — yes, halfway through the season, the Bucs are 51–30 — Jeff Sullivan of Fangraphs did discover something “historically dreadful” about this season’s team: With a wRC+ of -63 (including Wednesday evening’s game), their pitchers can’t hit worth a lick.
• Derek Holland is now mastering the slider, according to Beyond the Boxscore’s Mike Mulvenna, which has enabled him to become one of the premier southpaws in the American League. He explains:

So Derek Holland has changed his release point, which may have something to do with his improved command, especially on his slider. He’s walking fewer batters than ever before (2.29 per nine) and hitting the zone at a 49% clip, confounding batters with a 62% first strike rate. With more precise movement, control and command, Holland’s slider has become a cornerstone of his pitch arsenal and has doubled in usage from last year to 25%. As a lefty pitcher, his slider is cutting across the zone and becoming a serious problem for left handed hitters.

• High Heat Stats’ David Hruska says of the Yankees team that Holland blanked last Wednesday, “Brian Cashman’s Contingency Plan Needs a Contingency Plan.”
• As Tyler Killian of the Arizona Republic points out, Gerardo Parra may be the most notable player absent from the All-Star Game fan ballot.

• “I will admit . . . it is not the most, wow, did you see that catch?!?”

That’s it. Have a walk-off week!

Boston Herald:

Boston police said they are also probing a possible link to Hernandez in the unsolved July 2012 drive-by killings of Safiro Furtado and Danny Abreu, both of Dorchester. The two pals were leaving a Theatre District nightclub July 15, 2012, when they were ambushed and sprayed with gunfire from a gray or silver SUV with Rhode Island plates at the intersection of Shawmut Avenue and Herald Street.

Boston police were back at Hernandez’s North Attleboro home last night executing a new search linked to the double murder.

Evidence against Hernandez continued to mount yesterday as Bristol County Assistant District Attorney Bill McCauley said investigators found a .45 caliber clip in Hernandez’s Hummer at his Franklin condominium. Authorities say Lloyd was coldly gunned down with a .45 caliber semi-automatic handgun just before 3:30 a.m. June 17 on a dark, gravel road about a half-mile from Hernandez’s house.

McCauley also referred to a widely circulated picture on the Internet of Hernandez posing with a Glock .45 and said, “There’s good reason to believe that the firearm that killed Mr. Lloyd was a Glock.”

Authorities also charged Carlos Ortiz, 27, with illegally possessing a gun at Hernandez’s home on the morning of the murder. Ortiz is from Hernandez’s hometown of Bristol, Conn.

Also last night, police issued a wanted poster for one of Hernandez’s alleged accomplices, Ernest Wallace, 41, who was called “armed and dangerous.”

Teams of robots compete in RoboCup, soccer’s world championship for robots, in the Netherlands. Organizers aim to develop a team of robots that can compete against — and beat — a human team by 2050.

So what appeared at a glance to be a harmless Tweet from Alex Rodriguez:

. . . resulted in this thermonuclear response:

Livid over Alex Rodriguez’s decision to tweet an update on his rehab process, Yankees general manager Brian Cashman had a message for the third baseman.

“You know what, when the Yankees want to announce something, [we will],” Cashman told ESPN New York. “Alex should just shut the f— up. That’s it. I’m going to call Alex now.”

In controveries involving an athlete and a team’s front office, one would think that the general manager would be the adult in the room. Cashman, who offered a war-ravaged Kevin Youkilis (.219/.305/.343 in a mere 28 games played) a one-year, $12 million contract to fill in at third base — hey, how is that deal turning out? — ought to hope that a happy A-Rod returns ASAP to a lineup that is currently anemic, at least from the right-hand side of the plate.

More here and here.

UPDATE: “Yankees GM Brian Cashman addresses his A-Rod comments“

It happened twice yesterday, in Philadelphia and Detroit, to outfielders Ben Revere and Daniel Nava, who experienced trouble transferring the caught ball from the glove to the bare hand.

Good morning.

Here are several links from the past week that will make your Monday a bit more bearable:

In honor of Jesus Guzman, Grant Brisbee of Baseball Nation asks, “How much is too much when watching a home run?”

According to Jay Jaffe of SI’s The Strike Zone, there are a number of talented pitchers receiving insufficient attention from the fans, including Travis Wood:

Wood has gotten more attention in this space for his hitting (.276/.323/.517 with two homers) than for his pitching, but the 26-year-old lefty is thriving on the mound, too. Thanks to an MLB-low .226 batting average on balls in play, he’s eighth in pitching WAR (2.6) and 11th in ERA (2.74). His peripherals (0.6 homers, 2.7 walks and 6.3 strikeouts per nine) certainly won’t wow anyone, but his 12.0 percent popup rate leads the league. So does his 93 percent quality start rate; only once has he allowed more than three earned runs or pitched fewer than six innings. The bat has its value, too — he’s added another 0.6 WAR via that route — but all too often the rest of the lineup is taking a day off; the Cubs are scoring just 3.4 runs per game in his starts.

In his first start of the 2013 season, how did Roy Oswalt manage to strike out 11 batters in five innings yet relinquish four runs? Baseball Analytics’ David Golebiewski explains that the 35-year-old did little nibbling and threw too many fastballs in the middle of the strike zone.

ESPN Sweet Spot’s David Schoenfield explores whether strikeouts take on greater importance during the postseason:

I looked at each postseason game from last year. The team that struck out fewer times went 14–17 (six games had an equal number of strikeouts). So strikeouts don’t matter? Not necessarily. I looked at 2010 and 2011 and the team that struck out fewer times went 44–23 (with three games the same). Over a three-year span in postseason games, the team that struck out less went 58–40.

So maybe it means [columnist Tom] Verducci is basically right? Strike out less, win more.

Or is it simply proof of the old axiom that power pitching wins in the postseason? I will say this: If your pitchers strike out more guys than your opponents and your hitters strike out less, you have a pretty good chance of winning a postseason series. Using regular-season totals, the team that bettered its playoff opponents in both categories has gone 8–2 since 2010 (the exceptions being the Yankees losing to the Tigers in a 2011 division series and the Rangers losing to the Cardinals in the 2011 World Series).

Steven Goldman is shutting down the Yankees-centric Pinstriped Bible blog.

Before reading Bruce Markusen’s Hardball Times column on the career of Manny Mota, I had been unaware that Mota was the first player the Expos chose in the 1968 expansion draft.

When a ballboy makes a play like this one in Target Field, it makes one wonder if a few scouts are now being assigned to watch him.

Writing in WEEI’s Full Count, former big leaguer Gabe Kapler believes that the Nationals front office needs to save Bryce Harper from himself.

• Carlos Lee, a.k.a., El Caballo, announced his retirement. The Outside Corner’s Jaymes Langrehr recaps the second half of his 14-year career in the bigs (.285/.339/.483).

That’s it. Have a walk-off week!

know that you’re probably sick of being force-fed a steady diet of LeBron James. If you’re like many, you find King James to be an overrated product of an ESPN hype machine that pummels storylines within inches of their lives to fill a 24-hour news cycle, and you think that James is nothing but a poor man’s Michael Jordan. But I would argue that James has earned much (though not all) of his hype, and that he compares more favorably with MJ than you might realize. Let’s look at the numbers:

Jordan earned his second ring in his eighth playoff appearance  — as James did last night when the Heat dispatched the Spurs in Game 7.

At the time of his second NBA title, Jordan had led his team to 13 playoff-series wins. Game 7 last night was James’s 19th playoff-series win.

At the time of his second title, Jordan had won three NBA Most Valuable Player Awards. James already has four MVP seasons on his ledger.

For those who point out that James has won his titles with high-profile sidekicks Dwyane Wade and Chris Bosh, let me remind you that Jordan never won a title until Scottie Pippen arrived in Chicago. And Jordan had the greatest coach in NBA history, Phil Jackson, lending steady guidance; when James looks over at his bench, he sees the slightly less inspiring figure of Eric Spoelstra and realizes that he has to do things himself.

I recognize that James entered the league at an earlier age than Jordan did and has had more opportunity to pile up accolades than Jordan did at the same age. I’ll also concede that Jordan remains the greatest scorer in league history; at age 28, Jordan already had six scoring titles to James’s one. MJ also was the better defender, leading the league in steals three times in his career, while James’s one scoring crown is his only statistical title thus far. But credit where it’s due: LeBron is fashioning a legendary career that, when it’s over, just might compare favorably with that of the greatest player of all time.

— Rob Doster is senior editor for Athlon Sports.