Chipper Jones is on fire.

From the good people at the Canadian Press:

Jones hit .410 in April - an average for the month topped by only one player in the last 10 years: Barry Bonds hit .472 in April, 2004. Vladimir Guerrero also hit .410 in the opening month in 2000.

As if to make the point his stellar April was no fluke, Jones has pushed his major league-leading average to .425 for the Braves, who were off Monday and open a home series against San Diego on Tuesday.

Actually, after tonight’s two-for-four outing, Jones is hitting .429.

Bearing in mind that it’s early – very, very early – in the season, let’s take a moment to talk about Chipper Jones and his pursuit of history.

But first, a little background.

Since Ted Williams hit .406 in 1941, nobody has hit .400. Five guys have had 500+ plate appearances and hit over .375. Stan Musial hit .376 in 611 at bats in 1948. Ted Williams hit .388 in 420 at bats in 1957. Rod Carew hit .388 in 616 at bats in 1977. George Brett hit .390 in 449 at bats in 1980. And Larry Walker hit .379 in 438 at bats in 1999.

Last September, Vegas Watch (one of my favorite blogs) did a post listing the ten guys most likely to hit .400. Miguel Cabrera topped the list, followed by Albert Pujols, Vlad Geurerro and Matt Holliday.

Chipper Jones didn’t crack the top ten.

I emailed Vegas Watch’s editor to ask why. Here’s what he had to say:

The only reason he wasn’t on the list was his age. It was the guys who had the best chance of hitting .400 over their career, so that had a large effect. Also, he hit .375 in September; when I did the post, I had his three year average at .318.

That’s fair enough, I guess. A little agist, maybe. But reasonable.

Earlier today, I sent out an email to the Umpbump staff asking for their feelings about Chipper’s pursuit of .400. Here’s what Paul emailed back:

hitting .400 is now a near impossibility. chipper’s always been a high babip guy, but come on. his pitchers per plate appearance is down this year, so it’s not that he’s being more selective either. his line drive rate is a little higher than usual, but not high enough to think that the babip even has a chance of staying so high. with that said, it’s worth noting that he’s striking out a lot less than usual - and he never was a strikeout guy to begin with - which, if this continues, could very well result in a career high for batting average for him (although topping last year is really, really, really hard to do).

i think i’ve said this before, but baseball isn’t the same anymore. teams have far too much statistics on hitters’ tendencies, defensive positioning has gotten too advanced, and pitchers have become far too good for a guy to be able to hit .400 any more.

Of course, Paul is right. Hitting .400 in 2008 is a lot harder than hitting .400 in 1941. And Paul isn’t the only one who thinks so. Here’s what George Brett had to say about today’s more specialized bullpens, and the impact that has on hitters:

“Taking nothing away from Ted Williams or any of the players that have hit .400 in the past, like Rogers Hornsby, but back then, starters would pitch nine innings practically every game,” Brett said. “Teams had four starters along with guys in the bullpen, but the reason they were in the bullpen was because they weren’t good enough to be starters.”

So with all that said, what do you think, blogosphere? Will Chipper hit .400?

Personally, I think he’s going to do it.

I think Chipper is going to hit .400 because he has health, he has motivation and, frankly, he’s just that good.

Let’s start with health. For a while there Chipper was developing a reputation as another J.D. Drew, a guy who couldn’t stay on the field, who found new ways to hurt himself weekly. But last year Jones played in 134 games, his most since 2004. Moreover, he seems to have totally overcome the foot injuries that plagued him prior to 2007.

As for motivation, consider this: Last month I wrote a post asking which Braves belong in the Hall of Fame. 184 people voted and Chipper got 72 percent of the vote. This is pretty consistent with the public perception that Jones is a borderline Hall of Fame candidate. Now ask yourself this: would hitting .400 change that perception? Absolutely. Hitting .400 would stamp Chipper’s HOF ticket. And you better believe he knows it.

Finally, Chipper is good enough to hit .400. So far this season the switch hitter is hitting .440 against righties and .400 against lefties.

Here’s what AJC beat writer Dave O’Brien had to say about Hoss in an April 18 blog post:

In his past 200 games, since June 24, 2006, Chipper has hit .358 (273-for-763) with 61 doubles, 6 triples, 52 homers, 167 RBI, 113 walks, 104 strikeouts, a .437 OBP and a .658 slugging percentage.

And in 102 road games during that period he’s hit .376 (153-for-407) with 36 doubles, 5 triples, 29 homers, 86 RBI, a .445 OBP and a .703 slugging percentage. That’s a 1.148 OPS in his past 102 road games. Astounding.

Hoss is astounding. And the truly scary thing is, at the age of 36, he seems to be getting better.

That’s why I think Chipper’s going to be the first player since Ted Williams to bat .400. Because I don’t think his hot start is an anomaly. I think he has elevated his game. This isn’t a streak. This is a state of being.

That aforementioned Vegas Watch post started like this:

There is no such thing as a .400 hitter. Well, at least there never has been. People have hit .400, of course, but that’s always been something of a fluke. This is evident in the fact that Ty Cobb has the highest career BA ever, at “just” .366.

Like Cobb, Chipper isn’t a career .400 hitter.

But I think this season, Larry “Chipper” “Don’t call me ‘Hoss’” Jones will get there. And it won’t be a fluke.

Right now, he’s just that good.

For years now it has been established wisdom that most of the top-shelf talent in baseball eventually gravitates to the American League, due to the presence of big spending teams such the Yankees, Red Sox, and Tigers. This dominance of the AL over the NL has also been perceived in the AL’s recent maulings of the NL in the All-Star Game, the AL’s manhandling of the NL in Interleague Play, the perceived superiority of the recent AL World Series representatives, and the lists of big-name free agents who defect from the NL to the AL each season.

But even the most cursory of glances at the leaderboards this season yields the surprising impression that most of baseball’s biggest starts currently play in the National League, while most of the big name players in the American League are aging, injured, or both.

For example:

- The top five MLB leaders in batting average are all in the National League, as are 7 of the top 10.

- The top five MLB leaders in home runs are all in the NL, as are 7 of the top 10. Fourteen players in the NL have at least 7 or more homers, compared to a mere 4 players in the AL.

- The top eight leaders in OBP are all in the NL.

- All ten qualified players in the majors with an OPS over 1.000 are in the National League (and that is not even counting non-qualified Micah Owings). In fact, the AL only has 11 players with an OPS that is even over .900, compared to 23 in the National League.

While it is still early in the season and it is still possible that we could be seeing some sort of statistical fluke here, I think we may be seeing the beginning of a trend in which power begins to shift back toward the National League.

The way the American League has sustained its dominance in recent years was by significantly outspending the National League in the offseason free-agent market. But with the new trend which has emerged in the past two or three years of teams locking up all their good young players through their peak years by buying out several arbitration years, the free agent market has become thinner and thinner each offseason, making it harder and harder for the rich AL teams to pilfer all the NL’s hottest young stars by luring them with bigger contracts.

So now the AL teams are stuck with the aging, declining superstars they lured away five years ago, while the NL continues to produce the hot new young stars of tomorrow.

This is another in our occasional series of posts wherein we update you on the status of the nonstop schadenfreude express which is the 2008 San Francisco Giants…

Philadelphia and San Francisco were tied at 4 in the bottom of the tenth inning. The Phillies had runners on first and second. Right fielder Geoff Jenkins grounded the ball sharply to the left of second baseman Eugenio Velez, who bent down to pick it up and…oops!…the ball went under his glove.

And that’s how the Giants lost Sunday’s game, with Howard scoring from second on the play.

Some Giants fans will point to the team’s talented young pitchers as reason for hope. But this optimism takes for granted that, when those pitchers induce ground balls and shallow pop-ups, that the fielders will be able to catch the ball and throw it to the appropriate base.

After yesterday’s game, we can no longer assume.

The Giants made three errors Sunday. The first was charged to shortstop Emmanuel Burriss, who threw wide of first base in the third inning. The second was charged to third baseman Jose Castillo. And then, of course, there was Velez.

Giants starter Tim Lincecum allowed four runs in six innings – none earned. But don’t feel too bad for Lincecum. He made a few mistakes of his own. He had two wild pitches. One led to a run.

Today, the San Francisco Chronicle suggests that fielding errors are the price you pay when you stack your team with young players:

Any team that pushes youth makes a Faustian bargain. There will be moments of uninhibited enthusiasm and excitement, but the payback will be lots of mistakes.

There’s some truth to this. A majority of the Giants’ errors this season have been made by the team’s younger players. But here’s the rub: just because you’re one of San Francisco’s younger players doesn’t necessarily make you young.

Castillo, who is 27 years-old, is in his fifth major league season and leads the team with six errors. Brian Bocock, who actually is young (23 years-old) and is filling in while Omar Vizquel is out, is second on the team with three errors. After Castillo, Bocock and Fred Lewis (who is 26), the Giants have no starters under 30. Moreover, the only reason those guys are playing at all is because of injuries to older players.

So let’s not pretend that the Giants are in the middle of a youth movement. The Giants are not a young team (they’re ranked 15th in average team age). They are not a good defensive team (they are among the bottom third of teams in fielding percentage and errors).

This weekend, all three games against the Phillies were decided by one run and two of the games went to extra innings. Of course, the Giants lost two of three — further proof that in close games defense makes the difference.

That’s more bad news for the Giants.

A few months ago, inspired by some friends, my girlfriend and I started brewing our own beer. And we’ve never looked back.

There’s a homebrew store in town, called Brew Your Own Brew. They sell kits that make the brewing process pretty painless. All of the grains come pre-ground and dolled out in exactly the right amounts.

After a few batches we decided to take the next step. We decided to make a batch from scratch. This isn’t a huge deal. But it requires you find a recipe that you like. You also have to measure the grains and grind them yourself. And you need some additional equipment, like a large water cooler with a false bottom.

We decided to use a recipe that our friend James suggested, for a beer similar to Magic Hat #9. Here it is:

Grains
10 lbs 2-Row Pale Malt
0.5 lbs Crystal 60L
1 lb Wheat Malt
Hops
1.3 oz Tettnager (60 min)
0.5 oz Cascade (15min)
0.5 oz Williamette (15 min)
Misc
2 oz Apricot extract (secondary)
Yeast
White Labs California Ale (WLP001)

Instead of apricot, we used a combination of fresh mango and mango nectar from a jar. The result? The beer is slightly sweet, though not overwhelming. You can smell the mango more than you can taste it, which is ideal. Frankly, it’s probably the best beer I’ve ever had. Though, I may be a little biased.

We decided to call the beer Hoppy Papi, since there is a generous amount of hops, and since Big Papi says he gets his power from mango (salsa).

We’ve also created some beer bottle labels:

As you can see, our photoshop skills are a little rough. Are you a graphic wizard? If so, send us your Hoppy Papi label design. We’ll post the top entries on this site.

And bottoms up!

This is another in our occasional series of posts wherein we update you on the status of the nonstop schadenfreude express which is the 2008 San Francisco Giants…

As virtually everyone knows by now, $126 million man Barry Zito has been summarily banished to the bullpen after beginning the season 0-6. But what I still don’t get is why the Giants would do this, as it seems like the worst possible option. By all accounts Zito is fully healthy, and given that the Giants have no chance whatsoever of contending this season, the best way to get any return on their investment is to let him eat innings as a starter. Just put him on a 100-pitch count and run him out there, no matter how many runs he gives up. On the other hand, if they want Zito to work on his mechanics in a less pressurized environment, then they should get him to agree to go down to the minor leagues, where he can start every 5th day against AAA hackers and get his confidence back. And if he won’t go down, a third option would be to just do what every other team does and make up an injury so you can DL him and then give him “rehab starts” in the minors. But the last place you want a pitcher with an 80-mph fastball is in your bullpen, where he is going to be useless in anything other than once-a-week mop-up relief, won’t get enough work to work out his mechanics, and will be eating up a spot on the roster.

In other rotation news, Kevin Correia has gone down with an oblique strain which will sideline him until at least the end of May, and Noah Lowry’s recovery from a nerve injury in his forearm is going much slower than expected. Originally he was expected back in mid-April, but now Giants athletic trainer Dave Groeschner is saying, “We’re probably going to have to shut him down for a significant amount of time,” and his return date is indefinite. Pat Misch has been called up to replace Correia, but it is uncertain who will replace Zito.

Meanwhile, lone rotational standout Tim Lincecum was handed what should be the first of many losses this year, losing to the Rockies despite a strong 7-inning, 3 ER performance, because his offense could only muster 2 runs behind him.

As for that Giants offense, they remain last in the Major Leagues at 3.2 runs scored per game. Although they have somehow been able to compile a record of 13-16 so far, good for third place in the NL West, their run differential would produce an expected 19 losses, tied for worst in the game with the Padres, so the Giants have been lucky so far to do as well (?) as they have.

The bloom is off the rose for emergency minor-league call-up John Bowker. After a blistering major league debut in which he batted .364 with 3 homers and 9 RBI in his first 9 games, inspiring hope in Giants fans that they might have secretly had a hitting prospect they never knew about, the guy who had never played above AA before this year fell off a cliff, going 3 for his next 31, and is now batting .193/.217/.404 as reality reasserts itself.

Your obligatory Brian Bocock batting update - .157/.280/.171 for a mind-bogglingly low .452 OPS.

In steroid-related news, one of the lone bright spots in the Giants organization this season - catcher Eliezer Alfonzo - who had been on the verge of a call-up after batting .306 with 3 homers and 14 RBI for AAA Fresno, was suspended by MLB for 50 games for testing positive for taking a banned substance, which Alfonzo has admitted doing.

So I look at the leaderboards today, and I notice that White Sox leftfielder Carlos Quentin has already been plunked 6 times this year, and is on pace to get nailed 39 times by the end of the season. If he could maintain that pace, he would be in pretty elite company - the all time record for HBP in a season is Ron Hunt’s astonishing 50 in 1971, followed by Don Baylor’s 35 in 1986, and Craig Biggio’s 34 in 1997.

Of course, that plucky munchkin David Eckstein has also been plunked 6 times so far, and Reed Johnson of the Cubs has been hit 5 times, but who is most likely to keep up the insane pace?

The answer is clearly Quentin, who has already demonstrated that he is the greatest at getting hit by pitches in the history of the game. So far in his pro career, Carlos Quentin has been hit by a pitch every 16 plate appearances. This is an insanely high rate, when you consider that modern master Biggio was hit every 43.8, 80’s champ Baylor was plunked every 35.2, and HBP god Ron Hunt was hit “only” every 25.3 plate appearances.

In 2004, Quentin set the all-time minor league record for getting hit by the pitch by getting plunked 43 times across 2 levels, and in 2005, he set the all-time Pacific Coast League record for HBP by getting hit 29 times.

And Quentin’s propensity for getting hit by the pitch didn’t just start in the pros either. When I was at Stanford, he set the NCAA Division I record by getting hit by 5 pitches in a single game against Florida State. 5 plate appearances, 5 HBP! That was insane.

So get used to seeing images like the photo above, because going forward, if Quentin can avoid the injury bug that has plagued him thus far in his major league career, you can expect him to mount a serious threat to Ron Hunt’s record each and every season.

The Detroit Tigers have a stacked lineup, but their pitching has been a glaring weakness. Their bullpen, which many pointed to as a flaw before the start of the season, could certainly be better, but it’s not the problem right now.

“Everyone talks about the bullpen being a soft spot but I don’t think it’s fair to say that yet,” said manager Jim Leyland. “It’s not like they have been blowing leads. Heck, we haven’t had leads to blow.”

Leyland was actually talking about his team’s lackluster hitting, but he might as well have been talking about their starting pitching, which has been a black hole of suckery so far this season. Four of their starters have ERAs of over 6.00. And two of those have ERAs of over 7.00. Everyone, even staff ace Justin Verlander, has been downright awful. But what kind of awful? Let’s take a look.

1) No durability. Heading into tonight’s games, the other AL pitching staffs had between 16 and 12 quality starts. Detroit’s staff had 4. (Two of those have come from Armando Galarraga, who could be sent back to the minors at any moment.) Detroit’s only major winter addition to the pitching staff, Dontrelle Willis, is currently on the DL with a hyperextended knee. Another key piece of their starting rotation, Kenny Rogers, is 43 years old, and has been unable to go five innings in three of his five starts.

2) No control. The league average for walks? 92. Detroit’s total? 119, good for second in the AL, right behind the god-awful Texas Rangers. Detroit is also second-worst when it comes to WHIP, K/BB, and hit batsmen.

3) A lot of earned runs allowed. In terms of team ERA, Detroit’s 5.03 is second to last in the league, saved again from being last by the craptastic Rangers.

4) No domination. The Tigers are 10th the league in K/9. They ain’t fooling nobody.

5) No efficiency. Detroit pitchers have the second most pitches per plate appearance of any AL staff.

And lest you think it’s just bad luck, their pitching staff’s BABIP is .280, pretty darn close to the average.

Expect them to be eager buyers in July.

Yesterday, Paul sent an email to the Umpbump staff, announcing the day’s big news: Newsday was reporting that Roger Clemens was banging a country singer. The following is the contents of the resulting email thread.

Sarah: WHOAH! This is huge! Peter Gammons has, I think, touted Clemens as the ultimate faithful husband when all his teammates were sleeping with groupies!

Coley: Sarah, can you track down that Peter Gammons article? I think that would be something people would find interesting.

Sarah: You know, i may have been mistaken about that. I read later that it was Canseco who said that in his book…so while I do have this memory of hearing it from the lips of P-Gam, he may only have been repeating the words of Canseco. Or I just screwed up who said it in my mind, making this the first time anyone has ever confused Peter Gammons with Jose Canseco. Either way, I don’t think Gammons put it in an article. I think he was just talking. But they did write a book together back in the 80s.

Sarah: Also, this guy is a total douchebag. It’s a huge non story?!?! What planet is he on?

Paul: All Wallace Matthews ever does is complain. He’s one of the top examples of why mainstream NYC sports media sucks. Well, him and Mike & the Maddog.

Sarah: This may be my favorite line:

“The fact that she was 15 and he 28? Well, that one is a little tougher to get around, but these days, 15 is the new 30.”

Gross, gross, gross!

“With all due respect to my good friends at the New York Daily News, aside from the age of his alleged mistress at the time of their meeting, this is one big non-story, important to all of four people on planet Earth - Mindy McCready, the woman in question; Brian McNamee, who is being sued by Clemens for defamation; and Mr. and Mrs. Roger Clemens of Katy, Texas.”

Right, and Congress! And anyone who read the Mitchell Report! And anyone who watched Clemens’ testimony on television!!!!

And why does he keep talking about Miley Cyrus?! Has she really invaded every last corner of the earth?!?

Coley: Sarah, now that Miley Cirus has been photographed wearing a sheet, it’s now permissable to have sex with 15-year-old girls. Didn’t you hear?

[Scandalous Miley Cyrus photos after the jump. Go on, click it. You know you want to. Perv.]

Read the rest of this entry »

To be properly called a “gamer,” a ballplayer must be possessed of several crucial characteristics, most vitally the twelve listed below. It is the contention of this post that Dustin Pedroia fits all these essential criteria, and is, potentially, baseball’s newest Ultimate Gamer:

1) Dirty uniform. I don’t think I have ever seen Pedroia’s uniform clean. It attracts dirt like it’s a giant dirt magnet. Gamer? You betcha.

2) Small stature. If you are over 5′10″ tall, you are too big to be a gamer. Pedroia is listed at 5′9″, but those of us with the power of sight know better. Total gamer.

3) Inability to regularly hit for power. No gamer would ever hit 20 homers in a season. However, gamers do hit homers in key postseason games:

4) Can-do spirit. With Red Sox catcher Jason Varitek out with the flu, the Red Sox have played their last three games with only Kevin Cash available to catch. But Dustin Pedroia has volunteered to be the emergency catcher, should something happen to Cash. What a freakin’ gamer.

5) Hustle. Pedroia slid head-first into first base tonight, beating out the throw. Gamer alert! Next batter? David Ortiz, tattooing one into the right field seats to tie the game.

6) Helmet-banging/bat-tossing. Essence of any self-respecting gamer.

7) Knowing how to party. Pedroia’s got this locked down, with shirtless dancing (the “DADDY” scrawled on his chest only adds to the gamerishness) and impromptu bartending.

8) Permanent five o’clock shadow. Gamers don’t have time to shave every day. They’re too busy rocking out, hustling, and rubbing dirt all over their uniforms. Plus, they have so much testosterone, that the stubble regenerates fifteen minutes after they’ve shaved anyway.

9) Self-sacrifice. One of Peter Gammons’ favorite stories: in college, Dustin Pedroia gave up his scholarship so that his team, the ASU Sun Devils, could go out and recruit some pitchers. After Pedroia had already gone pro, those new pitchers and Pedroia’s old teammates made it to the college world series and all wore his initials on their hats. Gimme a G-A-M-E-R!

10) Playing in pain, but not sucking. Pedroia played through the last two months of the 2007 season with a cracked hamate bone. He OPSed .832 during the playoffs. Gutty.

11) Leadership/spark-pluggishness. Last year, Dustin was a wee rookie and thus acted as the team’s ’spark plug’ in dark moments. Now that he’s entering his second year in the majors, he’s becoming more of a ‘clubhouse leader.’ But he’s still wee. Because he’s a gamer.

12) Terrible local television commercials. This is the essence of a gamer, right here. How much intestinal fortitude do you think it took to grit this out?

And of course, to be called a gamer, a player has to be white. As you can see, Pedroia is gamerishly pasty.

David Eckstein, watch your back! There’s a new King Gamer in town!

Is John Smoltz the greatest pitcher of all time?

I only ask because that is apparently what Mr. Mark Bowman of mlb.com thinks. Or his editor. Or whoever it was that picked the headline for this article, entitled “Smoltz latest, greatest to reach 3,000 Ks.”

Do they even have editors over there? Because if whoever it was actually believes that John Smoltz is the greatest pitcher to ever reach 3,000 strikeouts, then they are the only one in the world who thinks that.

Even Smoltz’s own mother wouldn’t suggest that he is the greatest pitcher on this list:

Nolan Ryan, Roger Clemens, Randy Johnson, Steve Carlton, Bert Blyleven, Tom Seaver, Don Sutton, Gaylord Perry, Walter Johnson, Phil Niekro, Greg Maddux, Ferguson Jenkins, Bob Gibson, Curt Schilling, Pedro Martinez, John Smoltz.

In fact, it may even be possible to argue that John Smoltz is actually the worst pitcher on that list, but he certainly isn’t the best one, because that is basically a list of the greatest pitchers of all time. So in no way whatsoever is Smoltz the “greatest” pitcher to join the list.

So what really is going on with that title? I think what has happened here is another example of how these people get so up to their neck in sports clichés that they forget that what they are writing is actually English words that actually mean things, and simply apply these catchphrases where ever they please, much the same way Jackson Pollock applied paint to canvas, although probably with even less forethought.

I’m sure the person who came up with that headline probably just thought it had a nice “ring” to it, without even considering that it was actually words which would be making the insane claim that Smoltz was the greatest pitcher on the list above. But still, my gods. Learn to speak English - it’s your own native language (I hope).

Also, the subtitle of that article is pretty funny too - “Veteran no longer walking in shadows of Maddux, Glavine.” Um, okaaaay. Greg Maddux: - 349 wins, 4 Cy Youngs, 2 20-win seasons, so good he can be caught with your eyes closed. Tom Glavine: 303 wins, 2 Cy Youngs, 5 20-win seasons, hot baseball wife.

John Smoltz? 210 wins, 1 20-win season, 1 Cy Young. I think it is fair to say he is still chilling pretty deep in the shade of Maddux and Glavine. I mean Glavine has ninety-three more wins than Smoltz does. Even if you give him back the three years he was a closer, was he really going to average 31 wins per season?

Also, everyone is talking like Smoltz is a surefire Hall of Famer now, and he probably is, but if Smoltz makes the Hall for getting 3,000 strikeouts, than Bert Blyleven, who is number 5 on the list above, needs to have been inducted several years ago.