Good morning!

Here are several go-to links to make your Monday a bit more bearable:

• Via the Arizona Republic: Diamondbacks broadcaster and former Cubs standout Mark Grace has taken an indefinite leave of absence immediately following a DUI arrest in Scottsdale.
• The Red Sox–Dodgers waiver-wire mega-deal described here was not the only trade that went down this weekend. Via MLB Trade Rumors: The Orioles, who sit 4.5 games behind the Yankees in the AL East, obtained southpaw starter Joe Saunders from the D’backs in exchange for reliever Matt Lindstrom and a player to be named later.
• Andrew Martin of Seamheads shares fascinating excerpts from an unearthed radio interview with Hall of Famer Lou Gehrig on August 22, 1939. (Although Gehrig was still on the Yankees roster at the time, he would not play another game in the bigs.)

Gehrig on night baseball — “Well, night baseball is strictly a show and is strictly advantageous to the owners’ pocketbook. But as far as being a true exhibition of baseball, well, I don’t think I can say it is, and it’s very difficult on the ballplayers themselves. Of course, we realize that the men who work in the daytime like to get out at night and really see a spectacle, and we do all in our power to give them their money’s worth. But after all, it’s not really baseball. Real baseball should be played in the daytime, in the sunshine.” . . .

Gehrig on the top young players in 1939 — “I see young [Ted] Williams come out of Minneapolis. He’s around this part of the country. And we’ve got young Joe Gordon with the Yankees. And we’ve got a young fellow by the name of Charlie Keller, and a young man by the name of [Atley] Donald and there’s a couple of young fellas down in St. Louis — a pitcher by the name of [Bob] Harris and pitcher by the name [Jack] Kramer who looks might well. And you’ve got a young pitcher who was sent back for more experience, had a sore arm, with Boston — a fella by the name of [Woody] Rich.”

Gehrig on the possibility of a future players’ union — I don’t see how it possibly could work because at that rate a boy would not be rewarded for his abilities. A ballplayers’ union would put everybody in the same class, and it would put the inferior ballplayer, the boy who has a tendency to loaf, in the same class, as far as salary is concerned, with the fellow who hustles and has great ability and takes advantage of his ability.

• Jeff Sullivan of Fangraphs charts the rapid decline of Andruw Jones from All-Star center fielder to replacement-level, part-time player.
• Meanwhile, Matt Philip writes in SweetSpot about Johnny Cueto’s growing maturity and what it means for the Reds.
• What better way to celebrate Jewish Heritage Day at Citi Field than for Member of the Tribe Ike Davis to smack two home runs, the latter a walk-off, in a 2–1 Mets victory?
• On Friday, Yahoo!’s Jeff Passan offered up his annual “25 things you didn’t know about baseball” column. Two goodies in particular caught my attention:

6. . . . Meet Kelvin Herrera. Not only is he the hardest thrower this year, but also he’s threatening to be the hardest ever. His average fastball of 98.6 mph is tied with Joel Zumaya’s 2006 fastball for hottest ever. At 97.8 mph, Chapman is closer to Nate Jones (97.4) than he is Herrera.

Herrera also threw the single hardest pitch in baseball this season at 102.8 mph. Chapman just missed that title at 102.7.

As for starters, Stephen Strasburg is the king this season at 95.7 mph, not far behind Ubaldo Jimenez’s record 96.1 mph that he set in 2009 and matched in 2010. After adding an extra mph to his fastball this year, David Price is close behind Strasburg at 95.6.

25. . . . The worst player in baseball this year is Kansas City outfielder Jeff Francoeur.

FanGraphs says he has been worth -1.7 WAR, which means by using a replacement-level player — some bum from Triple-A — the Royals actually would have won two more games. B-R is even harsher: The site has Francoeur at -3.0 WAR, which ranks as the 11th-worst season for an offensive player since 1901.

With a dreadful August and September, Francoeur could threaten the season both sites agree is the worst ever: Jerry Royster’s 1977 with Atlanta, a -3.7 FanGraphs and -4.1 B-R debacle. The utilityman hit .216/.278/.288 and, the metrics say, played brutal defense. Francoeur isn’t that bad, at .240/.287/.372, with a major league-leading 14 outfield assists, but as Wil Myers sits at Triple-A with a .311/.389/.603 line, 35 home runs and the title of best hitting prospect in the minors, it cannot be anything short of maddening for Royals fans to swallow where part of the cost of their ticket will go.

Kansas City owes Francoeur $6.75 million in 2013. [Or is it the other way around?]

• Vin Scully, 84, will be back behind the microphone in 2013! The Los Angeles Times’ Bill Shaikin has a write-up of the happy news.

• Adrian Beltre became only the second player ever to slug three home runs in one game and, in the same week, hit for the cycle. Mark Townsend of Big League Stew has the details.

That’s it. Have a walk-off week! (And for those of you in Tampa: Have a dry one too.)

Why waste precious time on coherent paragraphs to describe the ongoing waiver mega-trade talks between the Dodgers and Red Sox involving Adrian Gonzalez, Josh Beckett, Carl Crawford, Nick Punto, James Loney, prospects, and cash, when we can embark on a Twitter whirlwind odyssey instead!

Here we go:

Just. Wow.

Suppose a rookie brought up from the minors early in the season and starting every day was hitting .211/.277/.322 since the middle of June. It’s now the third week of August. As the manager, would you sit him down? (It’s too late in the season to send him back to Triple A.)

Here’s SB Nation’s Rob Neyer on 19-year old Bryce Harper:

Nobody’s really squawked much about Harper’s struggles, perhaps because the Nationals have just kept on winning. But they haven’t been winning because of Harper. They’ve been winning because of Jayson Werth, Ryan Zimmerman, Adam LaRoche, and all that fantastic pitching (the Nationals lead the majors with a 3.23 staff ERA).

Eventually, though, shouldn’t Davey Johnson’s patience give out? It’s nice that Harper was an All-Star and everything, but shouldn’t Johnson go into the postseason with the best players he’s got? They’re already going to lose one of their best starting pitchers; should they also go with their fourth- or fifth-best outfielder in center field against the National League’s best teams? . . .

Which doesn’t mean Harper should be playing center field every day. I don’t know a lot about it, but doesn’t it seem possible that Harper’s wearing down, between the physical and mental pressures of playing almost every day as a 19-year-old rookie? Harper bats left-handed. Bernadina bats left-handed. Wouldn’t it make sense to bench Harper once or twice a week, in favor of a Bernadina? Or, with a left-hander on the mound, shift Werth to center field and get Tyler Moore into the lineup?

On balance, yes: Bryce Harper probably is one one of the Nationals’ three best outfielders. Even with the fifth-best OPS+. But if the Nationals want Harper at his best in October, maybe a little more rest would help. They’ve got a big lead, and they’ve got the bodies. So why not?

More here.

Yes, that Jim Joyce. He goes from goat to hero in my book:

Major League Baseball umpire Jim Joyce is being hailed as a hero for making a life-saving call before the first pitch had even been thrown at a game between the Arizona Diamondbacks and the Miami Marlins.

Joyce, 56, was heading to the umpire’s dressing room on Monday night at Phoenix’s Chase Field when he saw a stadium employee begin to shake and collapse to the ground, according to MLB.com.

Joyce, a 24-year veteran umpire, did not immediately respond to a request for comment today, but he told his story to MLB.com.

“I knew something was wrong,” Joyce told MLB.com. “And I knew if something wasn’t done, this lady could actually die in front of me. It was more instinct than anything else.”

Joyce began performing CPR on the woman to the tune of “Staying Alive,” which is often used to time the chest compressions during the maneuver.

 

You might have noticed that 50-year-old Roger Clemens has re-inserted himself into the national conversation by joining the independent Atlantic League’s Sugar Land Skeeters, for whom he will toe the rubber this Saturday night. Is he that ravenous for attention? Does he simply love the game that much? In both cases the answer might be yes, but it’s also possible that another motivation is driving Clemens back to the mound.

There’s an interesting theory floating around that I wish I could claim as my own: Clemens is considering a return to Major League Baseball — specifically, the sad-sack, attendance-challenged Astros, for whom a soft-tossing 50-year-old would actually represent an upgrade — in order to postpone a referendum on his Hall of Fame candidacy.

Think about it. Clemens and Barry Bonds are the poster children for baseball’s PED generation. Their Hall of Fame candidacies are on the same clock, and their concurrent five-year waiting periods have elapsed. Roger would love nothing better than to put a little distance between himself and Bonds, Sosa, and the other steroid-tainted candidates whose Hall worthiness is about to come under the unsympathetic scrutiny of the Baseball Writers Association of America.

Who knows? Perhaps in another five years, the writers will be in a more benevolent mood. The PED stigma doesn’t erase what happened on the field, and Clemens, like Bonds, was among the all-time greats before the advent of the steroid era.

Plus, Americans — even crotchety members of the BBWAA — are known for their short memories and forgiving natures. Clemens would need only to make an appearance in a major-league game to reset his Hall countdown clock. And the Astros have already sent a scout to take a look at what they would be getting. As pathetic and desperate as it might seem, the spectacle of this AARP-eligible relic in an Astros uniform could be worth it, for both parties.

— Rob Doster is senior editor for Athlon Sports.

Via Grant Brisbee of SB Nation, Matt Garza (3.91 ERA, 3.60 xFIP) has been shut down for the season, thanks to a right elbow injury.

Via Eric Simon of Amazin Avenue, Johan Santana (4.85 ERA, 4.03 xFIP) has been shut down for the season, thanks to a lower back injury.

Via Zonis of Athletics Nation, Bartolo Colon (3.43 ERA, 4.18 xFIP) has been shut down for the regular season and up to 10 postseason games that the A’s may play, thanks to a 50-game suspension after testing positive for testosterone, which is a banned substance.

As an astute commenter at Baseball Think Factory pointed out, “Bartolo Colon must contain at least 98% of all substances, so it’s no surprise that some of them are bad.”

Writing at Sweet Spot, Michael Baumann describes in detail what has prevented the Royals from becoming a .500 team, let alone a playoff contender.

***

Umpire Jim Joyce, best known for the 2010 blown call at first base that ended a perfect-game bid, was a hero on Monday afternoon after saving the life of a Diamondbacks food service employee who had suddenly collapsed in front of him.

***

In “NL West: A Shift in the Balance of Power,” Steve Treder of the Hardball Times is positively brutal yet accurate in describing the Rockies’ season:

Consider this dreary trend: in the month of May, 2012, the Colorado Rockies achieved a Pythagorean record of 13–15 but underperformed against it to yield an actual won–ost performance of 10–18. In June, their run differential declined and their Pythag mark was 10–17, and they slightly underperformed against that by slogging in at 9–18. And in July, the Rockies’ Pythagorean record sagged all the way to 7–17, a run differential so dismal that they couldn’t manage to underperform it, putting up an actual record of 7–17 for the month.

It seemed to be a team playing down to its misfortune, as though saying, “You might not think we’re really this bad, so we’ll prove to you that we are.”

At any rate, it adds up to a three-month span of 26–53 baseball, otherwise known as a season-wrecker. It scarcely matters how well the Rockies might do the rest of the way: 2012 has proven to be an irretrievable disaster for them.

***

Via the Associated Press: Roger Clemens, 52, is sporting an 88-mph fastball and plans to throw it in live action on Saturday for the Sugar Land (Texas) Skeeters, a team in the independent Atlantic League.

***

David Cameron of Fangraphs looks into what Nick Swisher may be worth when he hits the free agent market this fall. In the process, he disputes an analysis suggesting that Swisher may get a contract that seriously rivals the $126 million, seven-year deal dished out to Jayson Werth after the 2010 season.

Via Bob Sullivan of Red Tape Chronicles, Yankee Stadium has become the first sports facility in the nation to receive the U.S. Department of Homeland Security’s “Safety Act” seal of approval, meaning that it will receive considerable immunity from any lawsuits stemming from terrorist incidents.

According to Sullivan: 

Dozens of defense companies have been named to the Safety Act approved list since DHS started handing out the designation in 2004. But Yankees Stadium is the first of what is expected to be many sports venues whose operators will then be immune from standard lawsuits that might be filed by future victims of terrorist attacks. (The National Football League was placed on the Safety Act list in 2008, but the designation was vague and probably only applies to the Super Bowl, experts say.)

Supporters say the Safety Act gives strong incentives for firms to raise their security standards, and encourages innovation. Opponents say it unfairly terminates a basic consumer right, makes people less safe and serves as an under-the-radar version of tort reform. As evidence, opponents point out that the Safety Act framework is being copied for many other legislative initiatives, including the failed effort to pass a comprehensive Cybersecurity Bill this year.

It’s the mother of all liability waivers, says George Washington University law Professor Ellen Zavian, an expert in sports law. . . .

One may be forgiven for wondering how long it will take before the imperious Yankee brass try classifying bleacher brawls involving Red Sox fans and illnesses from a vendor’s undercooked hot dogs as acts of terrorism.

More here. (H/T Craig Calcaterra)

Eddie Veder has turned in his Red Sox Nation membership card.

Citing the move of wunderkind general manager Theo Epstein to the Cubs, his National League team, the Pearl Jam lead singer said he was done with Boston (59–63) and had decided to follow another Junior Circuit franchise.

His choice?

The Twins (50–70). (Cubs? Twins? Well, say what you want: The man is clearly no frontrunner.)

Meanwhile, the Marlins (55–67) have pulled the plug on The Franchise half-hour series with only eight episodes completed. Apparently, the reality of last place in the division after overhyped preseason expectations was too much “reality” for the club to handle.

The final new show will be shown on Wednesday evening at 10:00 p.m. EDT.

Good morning!

Here are several go-to links to make your Monday a bit more bearable:

• Via BustaPozee at Crawfish Boxes: The Astros (39-83) canned skipper Brad Mills, hitting coach Mike Barnett, and first base coach Bobby Meacham on Saturday evening. First-year general manager Jeff Luhnow has already cleaned house on the big-league roster, as Jason Martinez of MLB Depth Charts illustrates.
• The New York Daily News reports on a failed web-based scheme concocted to innoculate Melky Cabrera from being suspended after testing positive for a banned substance:

But instead of exonerating Cabrera of steroid use, the Internet stunt trapped him in a web of lies. Amid the information-gathering phase of his doping case last month, his cover story unraveled quickly, and what might have been a simple suspension has attracted further attention from federal investigators and MLB, the Daily News has learned. . . .

The scheme began unfolding in July as Cabrera and his representatives scrambled to explain a spike in the former Yankee’s testosterone levels. Cabrera associate Juan Nunez, described by the player’s agents, Seth and Sam Levinson, as a “paid consultant” of their firm but not an “employee,” is alleged to have paid $10,000 to acquire the phony website. The idea, apparently, was to lay a trail of digital breadcrumbs suggesting Cabrera had ordered a supplement that ended up causing the positive test, and to rely on a clause in the collectively bargained drug program that allows a player who has tested positive to attempt to prove he ingested a banned substance through no fault of his own.

“There was a product they said caused this positive,” one source familiar with the case said of Cabrera’s scheme. “Baseball figured out the ruse pretty quickly.”

Nunez told The News Saturday that he was “accepting responsibility for what everyone else already knows,” regarding the fake website, adding that the Levinsons were not involved in the website in any way. They also adamantly deny any knowledge of the scheme or having been involved with it.

• Since Johan Santana on June 1 became the first pitcher in Mets history to throw a no-hitter, his season has fallen apart. After giving up a grand slam to Michael Morse and a two-run blast to Bryce Harper at Nationals Park on Friday night, Adam Rubin of ESPN New York revealed that Santana (4.85 ERA, 4.03 xFIP), who had just become the first pitcher in Mets history to give up six or more earned runs in five consecutive starts, may get shut down for the balance of the season.
• Speaking of shutdowns, Sports Illustrated’s Joe Sheehan offers advice to the Nationals as to how to leverage Stephen Strasburg’s (2.91 ERA, 2.81 xFIP) remaining innings.
• Meanwhile, Sheehan’s SI colleague Jay Jaffe gives his two cents to the Padres’ new owners, including: “Resist the temptation to move the Petco Park fences.”
• Big League Stew’s David Brown chats up Josh Reddick (.345 wOBA) about that so-good-so-good-so-good-so-good melody that gets played every friggin’ day at Fenway Park:

DB: You’re not in Boston anymore, so can you give your honest opinion of “Sweet Caroline”?

JR: Overrated. By far. I was saying that even before I left Boston [laughs]. You just hear it too many times in your career in that organization. All the way from low-A to the big leagues. I think we just get tired of it. Every eighth inning. But the fans love it.

• Grant Brisbee of SB Nation acknolwedges that he was way off in an earlier assumption about how manager Ron Washington would utilize top prospect Mike Olt (4-for-24) in the Rangers lineup.
• The Platoon Advantage’s Cee Angi is no fan of the six-man rotation. In addition to the practice “taking starts from the rich and giving them to the poor, often to the detriment of a team’s record,” Angi notes that it limits in-game roster flexibility:

Deploying any six-man rotation means conducting a cost-benefit analysis of the moving parts of a roster. Teams that use a six-man rotation typically carry 13 pitchers. If you’re a percentage person, that’s 52% of a given roster as pitchers, with 24% of them working just once every six days. In a perfect world, that sixth starter will also pitch some innings in relief, but that’s rarely the case. It’s undeniable that there is a push towards maintaining an arsenal of specialized pitchers, but the six-man handicaps strategic options. There are a finite number of roster positions that no amount of shuffling can supplement. If you have an extra starter, you have one less bullpen pitcher or bench player. If you choose to have an extra starter and keep a full bullpen, the roster is now limited to just three bench players.

• Chris Creamer of theScore explores the history of memorial patches in baseball. He traces the tradition back to the debut season of the National League, 1876, “when the St. Louis Brown Stockings affixed black crepe (a popular memorial fabric of the Victorian era) to their uniform to honour catcher Tom Miller.”

• Paul Konerko (.384 wOBA) returned from a concussion-induced, seven-day disabled list on Friday evening to hit a home run in his second plate appearance.

That’s it. Have a walk-off week!

Via Dan Steinberg of the D.C. Sports Bog over at the Washington Post: The former relief pitcher and Nationals TV analyst, who in 2010 got canned from the booth gig after questioning Stephen Strasburg’s toughness, goes nuclear when discussing the star pitcher’s looming shutdown on a national sports radio show:

On Strasburg saying the decision is out of his hands

“That’s all you need to know. It’s out of my hands. I don’t want it in my hands, even though I’m a professional pitcher trying to — from spring training to the end of the season — win championships. . . . He’s in a totally different world. Remember the Stepford Wives? He’s a Stepford Pitcher.”

On Mike Rizzo’s credentials

“The manager of the Nationals has a world championship ring, called the ’86 Mets, when he was managing Doc Gooden, who was like 20 years old. I think he knows how to handle young pitchers. He’s not gonna burn them out. And then you have a general manager who’s never won a championship. And he’s telling everybody, he knows more than orthopedic surgeons, pitching coaches, everybody. He knows the answer to how you can keep a guy from getting hurt. It’s a wonderful concept. I hope it works. And if you’re hurt, go on the disabled list. If you’re not, then pitch for your team and try to win a world championship. It’s that simple. It shouldn’t be a story. It really shouldn’t be a story. That’s the sad part, that it’s a story. It shouldn’t be. We shouldn’t know the GM’s name or this guy in Washington. Just go out and play.”

On Strasburg’s father talking to Mike Rizzo

“Do you need your dad to talk to the general manager? You know, that’s sad to me. Is Scott Boras gonna come out? If he talks about Stephen Strasburg, so help me God, I’m gonna go bananas tomorrow night, because this kid is a man. He’s 23 years old, he’s married, he’s making $4 million a year. Speak up for yourself. . . . Nobody’s dad gets involved in their Major League kid’s career. It just doesn’t happen. But it shows you, Tony Gwynn pitched him once a week, every Friday at San Diego State. He goes to Washington, the PR people walk him to the bullpen, almost hold his hand to walk him out there. I mean, it’s just been one thing after another.”

On the J-Zimm comparisons

“What the Nationals are doing, they’re doing it on their own, and they don’t have any kind of data to back it up. And to keep on bringing up Jordan Zimmermann, I’ll bring up [this]: Jordan Zimmermann was rushed to the Major Leagues. Strasburg, rushed to the Major Leagues. Even Drew Storen, rushed to the Major Leagues. All three of them got hurt. So don’t tell me you were protecting them before they got hurt and needed Tommy John surgery. Now after the fact, oh, now we’re gonna hold them back and we’re gonna bring them along cautiously. It doesn’t hold water, the whole argument.”

More fireworks here.

Position players posting a .315/.391/.519 slash line halfway through August typically have not announced their intention to quit the game after the season ends, right?

On, yes, “Chipper Jones Bobblehead Night, presented by Coca-Cola,” the 40-year old third baseman and future Hall of Famer slugged two home runs in a 6–0 win over the visiting Padres. It was the 40th multi-homer game, and they were the 465th and 466th home runs of his big-league career.

Just. Wow.

Meanwhile, Baseball Prospectus this morning gives the Braves (69–49) a 91.6 percent chance of making the postseason, although, with the Nationals holding a four-game lead in the division, the Braves are far more likely to be a wild-card entry.

Indians shortstop Ray Chapman was hit in the head by a pitch 82 years ago today. At St. Lawrence Hospital on West 163rd Street, about a mile from the Polo Grounds, where the Yankees were hosting Cleveland, doctors operated on him but to no avail. A priest gave him last rites. The overflowing congregation at his funeral at St. John’s Cathedral in downtown Cleveland the following Friday, August 20, included city officials. Somewhere in the ton of flowers banking the sanctuary was an arrangement in the shape of a baseball diamond with players at all the positions except short.

Chapman is the only player to have died from an injury sustained in the course of a major-league game. His death sparked some talk about the need for batting helmets, but that faded pretty fast.

Baseball culture had a history of resisting protective equipment. It was felt to be unmanly. Early ballplayers caught line drives barehanded before gloves, or “mittens,” began to lose their stigma in the 1870s. Catchers in particular were expected to tough it out without shield or armor: Roger Bresnahan of the Giants “met with a lot of flak” for wearing behind the plate what in 1907 were considered some fairly elaborate tools of ignorance.

Against that background, it’s not surprising that the batting helmet was so slow to catch on. But what explains the timing of its adoption by both major leagues in the 1950s? Why not earlier, when the memory of Chapman was fresher? Or why not later? The National League began to require helmets in 1956; the American Leaague, in 1958.

That’s about when hard plastic helmets began to take hold in the NFL. They displaced the largely leather helmets that had been common for decades and that the NFL began to require in the 1940s.

Fashion, in other words, may be part of the answer: Football players wearing plastic helmets may have made it socially safe for baseball players to wear the equivalent. Another part of the answer involves technology. Postwar advances in polymer science made possible a kind of helmet that was both wieldier and more effective. It was something that both sports, baseball and football, could look at and say, Yep, that’ll do.

I became hooked on baseball on the evening of September 1, 1975, upon my older sister returning home from Shea Stadium. She was full of excitement, having watched the Mets’ Tom Seaver strike out his 200th batter for the eighth consecutive season in the midst of a complete-game shutout of the Pirates.

It was not until the summer of 1977 that I attended my first Major League game. t did not matter one iota that

http://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/NYN/NYN197509010.shtml

Pitching this afternoon before 21,889 fans in Safeco, Felix Hernandez was staggeringly dominant against the visiting Rays, throwing the third perfect game of the 2012 season (Philip Humber, Matt Cain). Of the 113 pitches he hurled, 77 were strikes, with a mind-blowing 45.8 swing-and-miss percentage. Going by the Game Score statistic, King Felix’s 99 puts him in a tie for eleventh place all-time.

Lookout Landing’s Jeff Sullivan explains what helped make Hernandez’s performance so extraordinary:

We have to look at the numbers, because I’m most comfortable looking at the numbers. Through five innings, the Rays had made 15 outs. Four of those outs had been strikeouts, and four of those outs had been groundouts. There had been 28 attempted swings, and seven of them were whiffs.

Over the final four innings, the Rays made 12 outs. Eight of those outs were strikeouts, and four of those outs were groundouts. There were 31 attempted swings, and 19 of them were whiffs. Felix went through the entire order and a third, and no one could do anything. The four grounders were routine. The Rays were fortunate that there were four grounders. Felix amped it up and took his defense almost completely out of the equation. Felix decided that he was going to throw a perfect game, and Felix decided he wasn’t going to let his teammates jeopardize the opportunity.

Just the other day I was reading a blog post critical of a manager’s strategy. The details don’t matter. The post talked about how pitchers wear down as games go on, and about how the hitters are far more successful the third time through the lineup. One of several things that makes Justin Verlander remarkable is the way that he ramps up his velocity as he works deeper and deeper. Most pitchers, even when they pace themselves, lose velocity and lose effectiveness as they work. Verlander frequently does the opposite. Felix did the opposite. Felix, at the beginning, was throwing a fine, generic Felix game. Felix, at the end, was the very best that Felix has ever been in his life.

What I found amazing was how Hernandez (2.60 ERA, 3.24 xFIP) pitched to the 27th and final batter, Sean Rodriguez. Falling behind 2–0 on a fastball and curve, everyone in the ballpark other than King Felix and his batterymate, John Jaso, probably assumed a 95-mph heater was coming.

Nope.

The next three pitches were a slider (swinging strike), curve (taken strike), and 92-mph changeup (taken strike).

Wow.

So why have there been five perfect games in MLB over the past three years — six if we overlook umpire Jim Joyce’s epic facepalm in 2010 — compared to two in the previous decade, four in the Nineties, three in the Eighties, zero in the Seventies, and three in the offense-starved Sixties? If I had to guess, I’d say today’s higher strikeout rate is likely most responsible, as more Ks mean fewer balls are being put in play.

On July 28, Andrew Baggarly of CSN Bay Area issued a public apology to Melky Cabrera (.387 wOBA):

Journalism school grads [do not, unlike med-school grads, take the Hippocratic oath], but our duty is clear: We’re bound to seek the truth, to be as fair and accurate as possible and to serve the interests of readers.

I thought I was doing that Friday when I chose to ask Melky Cabrera about rumors that I had heard from several different readers who had contacted me via email and my Twitter account over the past few days. I had no idea where these rumors started, but the questions were starting to mushroom about whether Cabrera flunked a drug test and would face a 50-game suspension.

Let’s be clear: There is no evidence that there is any shred of truth to these rumors. Cabrera knew nothing about it. He contacted the union and his agent. They told him the rumors were unfounded as well. If Cabrera had failed a test, he and the union would’ve been the first to know. The rumor, to my knowledge, is a red herring. Cabrera even suggested to me that Dodgers fans could have made it up as a distraction.

I wasn’t 100 percent sure what to do next. On one hand, it’s my duty to serve readers who look to me to provide accurate information about the team I cover. On the other hand, knocking down the rumors would serve to give greater voice to them.

Ultimately, I decided to serve the truth.

Upon reflection, I did more harm than good. . . .

So I feel it’s important that I issue a public apology to Melky Cabrera for giving greater voice to a rumor that, to the best of my knowledge and on his word, has absolutely no basis in fact.

Today, MLB announced that this year’s All-Star Game MVP has been suspended for, yes, flunking a drug test:

The Office of the Commissioner of Baseball announced today that San Francisco Giants outfielder Melky Cabrera has received a 50-game suspension without pay after testing positive for Testosterone, a performance-enhancing substance in violation of Major League Baseball’s Joint Drug Prevention and Treatment Program.

Cabrera said that he would not appeal and would start serving the suspension immediately:

My positive test was the result of my use of a substance I should not have used. I accept my suspension under the Joint Drug Program and will try to move on with my life. I am deeply sorry for my mistake and I apologize to my teammates, to the San Francisco Giants organization and to the fans for letting them down.

Should the Giants reach the postseason, the outfielder would be eligible to return to the roster after the fifth playoff game; otherwise, his suspension will carry over into the start of the 2013 campaign.

More here.

Thank heavens for the Subway Fresh-Take Hotline!

Legendary pitching coach Leo Mazzone was on Mike and Mike this morning and he was en fuego when asked about two current MLB flashpoints.

On the Bobby Valentine situation in Boston:

Then I go to Baltimore and I find out why they’re losing. The chain of command was always broken, where players got to voice their displeasure at the front office, which took away power from the manager. . . . Basically, what it was was a bunch of players finding excuses for losing.

On the upcoming Stephen Strasburg shutdown in Washington:

I think it’s absolutely pathetic, to be honest with you. . . . If I’m Strasburg, here’s what I’m saying. I’m saying, “You take the ball away from me and I’ll save my arm for some other team to pitch for.”

Much, much more here.

Jeff Passan of Yahoo! has details about the latest off-field incident to plague the Red Sox — a heated meeting a few weeks back between a majority of the players and ownership over manager Bobby Valentine’s managerial skills.

Eight days ago, besieged by questions about Valentine’s present and future, Red Sox general manager Cherington told reporters: “Bobby is our manager, and we’re not considering anyone else. He’s as committed to managing the team as he ever has been, and we’re committed to him and trying to do everything we can to support him and make this work.”

Henry emailed a statement to Boston media members that echoed the sentiment.

“To blame Bobby Valentine for the Red Sox being .500 at this point in the season,” he wrote, “is simply wrong.”

Some of the Red Sox’s biggest names disagree.

Issues that have inflamed players range far and wide. Leaving in Lester, a well-respected figure in the clubhouse, to get blasted for 11 runs and four home runs against Toronto soured players already beaten down by Valentine’s managerial style. Valentine uttering “Nice inning, kid” to rookie third baseman Will Middlebrooks after he made a defensive blunder – an episode to which Valentine admitted on WEEI radio — only furthered the animus toward the 62-year-old, who is managing in the major leagues for the first time since 2002. Since spring training, players have chafed at Valentine’s careless – and occasionally self-serving — interactions with the Boston media, which his predecessor, Terry Francona, handled adroitly.

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Since we are already frolicking through Fenway Park, check out the latest from Dan Brooks of Baseball Prospectus, who examines the decline of Josh Beckett (5.19 ERA, 4.37 xFIP). The data appear to suggest that the one-time ace’s decreasing reliance on his four-seam fastball, particularly after the first two innings of his starts, is at least partially responsible for recent woes.

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Here’s another interesting discovery about a well-known American League pitcher: the inability of Yu Darvish (4.54 ERA, 3.89 xFIP) to get love from the home-plate umpire on pitches on the catcher’s-mitt side. Baseball Analytics’ David Golebiewski has the details.

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Batting with two runners on base in the bottom of the ninth of a scoreless game, Jay Bruce (.346 wOBA) sent the locals home deliriously happy with an opposite-field blast. With the victory over the Mets, Bruce’s Reds opened up a six-game lead in the National League Central.

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Inside the Book’s Tom Tango argues that “Willie Bloomquist is as immortal as Mariano Rivera, his performance never wavering, just always there doing his thing.” Here’s why:

Willie Bloomquist also has a career WAR close to zero (*), playing for a [way long list] of teams, played all over the field. He entered the league at age 24, and is still playing at age 34. Other than his 38-PA rookie season, his observed wOBA has been within 1 standard deviation of his career wOBA in every single season. . . .

(*) If ever I roll out my version of WAR, I’ll likely call it W/w (Wins over Willie).

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WTF?!? Via David Haglund of Slate, the latest edition of the Merriam-Webster Collegiate Dictionary credits Hall of Famer Gary Carter with bringing the word “f-bomb” into the world.

Every team should have an alumnus so loyal. Johnny Pesky joined the Red Sox organization in 1940. Except for a few years toward the end of his playing career and a few years after it, when he managed in the minors, he spent the rest of his long life attached to the club that gave him his start in the game. He worked for the Sox in many capacities — shortstop, manager, coach, announcer, all-round ambassador of goodwill. He did everything except change the numbers on the center-field scoreboard at Fenway Park and would have done that too if they had asked him.

After taking the cutoff throw on a single to left-center, with the score tied at 3 in the bottom of the eighth inning of Game 7 of the 1946 World Series, did Pesky hesitate before throwing home, allowing Enos Slaughter to score all the way from first on a hit and run? It’s hard to tell from the grainy film. “I’m the goat,” he said at the time, perhaps to redirect fingers ready to point to center fielder Leon Culberson, although in later years Pesky said he thought film of the play exonerated him. No words, in any case, would change the outcome. Boston lost the game and the series, for that matter, 4 to 3, establishing what, after 1967, 1975, and 1986, began to feel like a sad tradition.

For the other bookend of Pesky’s career as a Sox icon, fast-forward to October 2004, when he was 85 and his team won the World Series for the first time in his life. That it was in St. Louis, against the Cardinals, must have added to his sense of personal redemption. He received his World Championship ring at ceremonies before the Sox’s home opener the following April.

Johnny Pesky, Ted Williams, Dom DiMaggio, and Bobby Doerr were friends in real life and, in baseball legend, brothers whose collective personality defines a bittersweet chapter in the history of one of the most storied clubs in baseball history. Only Doerr survives. He’s 94. Pesky, “Mr. Red Sox,” was 92 when he died yesterday in Danvers, Mass. His number 6, retired, is displayed in right field, not far from the Pesky Pole.

Move over, young Mike Trout. 

A wall-climbing experience on Sunday afternoon in Toronto by Tobey Maguire Andrew Garfield 31-year old Rajai Davis is the (latest) catch of the season.

Davis was the offensive star too, contributing two doubles and knocking in five runs during a 10–7 Jays victory over the visiting Yankees.