Master Index of Archived Threads


Leaguewide Callups

Edgy MD Sep 04 2013 12:38 PM

Sliding Billy Hamlton called up by Cincinnati after 395 minor league stolen bases. Debuts as a pinch-runner, steals second (against Yadier Molina, no less), and scores the game's only run in a win for the Reds in a game with serious post-season implications. I'm perhaps in the minority, but I kinda like expanding rosters. (Inexplicably offended that the Reds have minor league teams that wear any color but red.)

Frayed Knot Sep 04 2013 12:47 PM Re: Leaguewide Callups

Stole it on the first pitch too. Probably would have scored on the following double anyway, but it's still fun to steal a base when the entire world knows you're going.

Frayed Knot Sep 08 2013 08:58 PM Re: Leaguewide Callups

Hamilton has now been in four games since his call-up, but doesn't have an AB yet. He's pinch-run four times and has stolen a base each of those four times. - In one of those games he got as far as 3rd but then was doubled up straying too far on a line drive come-backer. - In the other three he's scored the game-tying or game-winning run. Reds have yet to use him in tonight's game but the Reds are tied 2-2 with the Dodgers in the 9th Orel Hershiser called Hamilton "Aroldis Chapman's set-up man" - although, tonight, Chapman is in now so he may be setting up Hamilton. Reds going for the sweep.

Zvon Sep 08 2013 09:01 PM Re: Leaguewide Callups

OOO, I'll put on that game.

Zvon Sep 08 2013 09:05 PM Re: Leaguewide Callups

Ahh, baseball, how I do love thee. Nice ending.

Frayed Knot Sep 08 2013 09:09 PM Re: Leaguewide Callups

And the Reds win on a walk-off double without using Hamilton - but I wonder, as that play was unfolding, whether Dusty was kicking himself for NOT using him there in the 9th as Zack Cozart, the runner on 1st, was justbarely safe at the plate.

Zvon Sep 08 2013 09:25 PM Re: Leaguewide Callups

Frayed Knot wrote: And the Reds win on a walk-off double without using Hamilton - but I wonder, as that play was unfolding, whether Dusty was kicking himself for NOT using him there in the 9th as Zack Cozart, the runner on 1st, was justbarely safe at the plate. Any manager who kicks himself after winning a game (only exception being a player injury due to something done) just likes to kick himself.

Gwreck Sep 08 2013 11:46 PM Re: Leaguewide Callups

Edgy MD wrote: I'm perhaps in the minority, but I kinda like expanding rosters. I keep hoping for a move to making teams designate 25 players to be active for one game. You want a roster of 38? No problem, but only 25 get to play that day. Will still get the manager extra flexibility (ie. you wouldn't designate yesterday or tomorrow's starting pitcher as "active") but levels the playing field between teams that call up 15 guys and teams that call up 3.

Edgy MD Sep 09 2013 05:50 AM Re: Leaguewide Callups

if there's a taxi squad, the first four guys on it are always going to be the four starting pitchers not schueduled to go that day. We'll still get the expansiness.

Ceetar Sep 09 2013 06:11 AM Re: Leaguewide Callups

I really have no problem if opposing managers want to use their 8th, 9th, 10th, etc best relievers.

Edgy MD Sep 09 2013 06:29 AM Re: Leaguewide Callups

Baxter, Harang, and Centeno join the team today. Have we seen the last o' Wheeler?

Frayed Knot Sep 09 2013 07:20 AM Re: Leaguewide Callups

Any manager who kicks himself after winning a game (only exception being a player injury due to something done) just likes to kick himself. Not that he should have been kicking himself after the game, and maybe it was one of those situations where he would have PR'd Hamilton once the potential winning run got to 2nd. But, as the play was unfolding with the hit heading for the corner, my immediate reaction was that I bet Dusty wishes he had put in Hamilton in place of Cozart running from 1st and that I bet he wishes he had too. Cozart being safe obviously made it all moot (and in fairness to Dusty I don't know what his SS situation looked like if the game stayed tied and they needed to continue after that half-inning) but every game at this point is critical to Cincy and the play at home was close which it wouldn't have been with the pinch-runner. I don't mind expanded rosters but I'd like to see some sort of limit. And, yes, part of this is a reaction to watching Francona opt for a new pitcher after every other batter yesterday, something which helped to turn a 2-1 game into an ungodly-paced 3:43. But, in general, it does seem odd to play stretch-run baseball under radically different rules than the rest of the season. Like maybe we could hold it down to just slightly different. Managers survived all year with 25 and suddenly now 30 isn't enough?

Edgy MD Sep 09 2013 07:41 AM Re: Leaguewide Callups

I don't know that the rules are radically different, though, and every team in beisbol knows that the expanded roster is coming, just like it cometh every year. So there's no particular advantage or disadvantage to any team, except maybe the team who doesn't want to remove a call-up-able guy from a minor-league team in the playoffs, but that's their prerogative. The greatest September callup, to my memory --- even better than Jefferies --- was Marty Bystrom. Bystrom went 5-0 in September of 1980, but there was no way he was allowed on the post-season roster unless somebody was hurt. Dallas Green had to sit Nno Espinosa down and explain to him --- just like Michael Caine to Kevin O'Callaghan in Victory (1981) --- that while Nino may feel perfectly healthy, he's actually very badly hurt. So sorry.

Frayed Knot Sep 09 2013 07:53 AM Re: Leaguewide Callups

I'm not suggesting that roster expansions are unforeseen or are unfair to any particular team*, but playing a ballgame with 35 players available is a whole lot different compared to when there are just 25. * although some have argued that the poorer teams make fewer call-ups because they can't/won't pay for the hotels and meal money costs associated with extra players. Montreal in its final days was banned by its MLB overlords from calling up anyone for those very reasons.

Edgy MD Sep 09 2013 08:06 AM Re: Leaguewide Callups

Yes, it's different, but not radically so. Changing the roster limit is a merely a matter of degrees. Regarding the footnoted point, the issue, as always, isn't that richer teams have and advantage over poorer teams (not shocking) but the system that ensures the wealth of some teams and the poverty of others. The league-owned Expos, of course, was a special case.

Benjamin Grimm Sep 09 2013 08:34 AM Re: Leaguewide Callups

Edgy MD wrote: Have we seen the last o' Wheeler? I suspect he has another couple of starts before he hits his innings limit.

MFS62 Sep 09 2013 08:42 AM Re: Leaguewide Callups

Unless somebody's wife is going to be in labor for the rest of the season, Centeno might make it into a game. Later

Vic Sage Sep 09 2013 10:20 AM Re: Leaguewide Callups

It's not so much that i object to the roster expansion as much as question its timing. There are teams in pennant races, and some of them are playing teams that are out of it and so are giving their minor leaguers a good long look, to see what they have for next year. But they're playing teams still very concerned about THIS year. And its one thing for that bad team to run out a few extra backups each day, and quite another for them to use an extra 15 minor leaguers, with literally none of the regulars even having to see the field most of September. Its the kind of unpredictable wild-card that skews results toward the arbitrary and not necessarily deserving. I probably wouldn't mind so much if the expansion happened in April, where teams are coming out of spring training and would still like to give a longer look at some of their younger players or veteran FAs to see if they could be useful THIS season (not in some utopian future year), and allow them to use a 40-man roster to shake out gradually over the course of the month. Then, May 1, you finalize your final 25 and go from there to the end of the season. In either case, i don't think it's that big a deal, and i do enjoy seeing kids like Hamilton come up and impact a pennant race. I'm just not sure how much Pitt and St.L like it though. RUN, FORREST, RUNNN!

Edgy MD Sep 09 2013 10:31 AM Re: Leaguewide Callups

Well, it's generally hypocritical of me, because I generally think baseball would be well-served by smaller rosters, which would discourage specialization, expose players to perform in roles at times for which they are not ideally suited, and humanize them, but also accentuate the greatness of the truly great athlete who is not exposed when positioned outside his field of specialty. That's what I believe. I also believe short bursts of performances from specialists like Hamilton can be fun. But there should be a downside to carrying them on the roster if they can't do anything else, and there really isn't in September. The game should belong to generalists, and not specialists. And so I will silence myself until I resolve my feelings on the matter.