gOnna watch weetyweet in tha suitey-suite

last night, super prospect-turned-rookie backstop matthew q. wieters commanded rainbow to appear right before luke scott hit grand slam home run!

true story!


Image via Baltimore Sun, aka best pape ever
wayward o isn't sure what divine catcher will do tonight. maybe he'll get a hit or something.

see you at the yard! or at pickles! buy me a round and you can be on blog!! (except for gary and buck. they do not read blogs!!!)

ps. was it just may 21 that Team was utterly shtoonked by fat rich Yankees and it was bleakest of times? what a difference a few days makes...

weetyweet liveblOg

7:06 p.m.: matty orders rain to stop. rain complies

7:31 p.m.: weetweet makes first big league play, fielding bunt and throwing out detroit's josh anderson

7:52 p.m.: comes up to roaring applause, bats right-handed with mora and scott on base

7:53 p.m.: takes huge cut at first pitch for first strike; Os radio announcer joe angel fights off case of goosebumps

7:54 p.m.: slaps fly ball out to right fielder clete thomas; mora fails to advance to 3rd, running into an out

8:18 p.m.: luke scott kills rally with grand slam, and weetweet grounds out 1-3 to dontrelle willis

8:37 p.m.: wieters is so intimidating that detroit's players don't even want to get on base

8:47 p.m.: scott goes yard again! wieters runs night to 0-3 with ground-out to third base but game is turning into laffer

9:17 p.m.: nothing wieteriffic has happened for last 30 minutes. which is strange

9:21 p.m.: manager stretches weet's buddy "three e" bergesen into 8th inning. bradley is cruising, completing 8th in about three minutes

9:27 p.m.: weet looks at called third strike from nate robertson in bottom 8th; it looks like he'll take the collar with an 0fer four and Team ahead by five runs

9:43 p.m.: after giving up two hits to start 9th, young houdini bails out "three e" as wieters era begins with a 7-2 win, Team's fifth in row!

can yOu smell it?

Yesterday Wayward O caught WHIFF OF OCTOBER...


MASN via MLB.tv
Outfield Is Complete
Yard Won't Be Empty Long
In SUPERPALOOKA DOUBLE OT COMEBACK BLUE JAY MASSACRE.

Don't know when.

Don't know how.

But it's out there...

For first time in years it's really out there.

It won't be easy.

But Team is shaping up as 2009 Season of Change hits its stride!

night Of the living webheads!

Blogger Nite at Camden Yards. Lowest paid crowd ever.

coincidence? wayward O thinks not!!!
Hahaha just kidding everybody! It was nice to meet all bloggers at YardYap, MurraysSpasm and, of course, LukesLuger.net!


KNOW US. FEAR US. PLY US WITH FREE BEER!
And Super thanks to MASN public relations team of Todd Webster and Kristen Hudak, who also is blogger! They really went above and beyond CALL OF DUTY to make rag-tag group of Team chroniclers feel welcome.

Also, we learned SO MUCH THINGS at blogger night. For example:

THING No. 1:

Buck and Gary
BUCK AND GARY DO NOT READ BLOGS. Wayward O asked them and they said they are busy and only read TRUSTWORTHY SOURCES! This is the kind of HONESTY and HEALTHY SKEPTICISM that makes for GOOD ANNOUNCERS!

THING No. 2:
On set. Stadium too empty, people! Fill it up!
AS OF NEXT YEAR JIM HUNTER'S TENURE WITH TEAM WILL EXCEED THAT OF JON MILLER, the famed broacaster he replaced. Wayward O has always thought Jim does good job. Congrats Mr. Hunter and it was good talking to you. Thnax for TAKING MOMENT for little people!

THING No. 3:
Heyyy look at the time...
AMBER IS VERY NICE LADY. Thanks for stoppin, Amb!

THING No. 4:ROCH KUBATKO WORKS HARD and IS NICE MAN. Also he has callouses on hands from PUMPING IRON. Also many bloggers are JELLUS of Roch because he gets to talk to MANAGER every day and also ROCH has TROLLS on his site. Sure sign blogger has made it is blogger has TROLL.

But, like Amber, Roch could not linger because of

MATTY WEET WEET NEWS
which needs no repeating at this late juncture. Oh, ok. He is coming up Friday to further propel Team on QUEST FOR OCTOBER!!!

THING No. 5:

Famous catcher and Wayward O
Rick Dempsey is nice, polite man. And he takes COPIOUS NOTES during entire game for use on Os Extra later. (Either that or he was studiously ignoring in-laws.) I'M HERE ALL WEEK! Actually a very nice member of ZAUN family snapped above pic* and everyone was getting along great. Very nice! Many thanks. Wayward O is humbled!

*Wayward O thinks. Isn't actually quite sure.

And lastly....

THING No. 6:
They make magic happen
Magic of Orioles Baseball!
MASN CONTROL TRUCK IS WORTH $15 Million Smackers! HOLY MACKEREL no wonder DipnDotz cost $42.

Overall it was very exciting night and even though Wayward O pulled into NY train station at 2 a.m. and is operating on 4 hours' sleep, it was worth it!

Oh, Wayward O almost forgot: There is rumor that Billy Ripken is chained in boiler room in BOWELS of WAREHOUSE.

spring training extendO jam

technically it is still spring for three more weeks!

luke scott ---> nolan reimold
fettucine simon ---> bradley "three e" bergesen
mark hendo ---> rich hill
adam eaton ---> ????

two bona fide rotational upgrades have occurred. a third is in works.

luke, who in the opinion of this blog is basically jay gibbons + 10 BA points, is well on way to being wally pipped by young nolan, who along with adam jones and nick markakis could complete Team's starting OF for next four or five years.

felix pie ---> perfect 4th OF

and there is a little bit of hype over this catching guy, weet, or whatever kids call him these days. by mid-June Team should have its look. future is nOw. and we'll see what's up.

a nice place tO get thumped in

Wayward O went up to new Yankee Stadium last night and told ticket guy, "I'd like something in $50 range, I guess that's the terrace section."

Ticket guy said, "I've got one for $5."

And Wayward O said, "Scuse me?"

Anyway so you can get cheap seat at the House of Two.



Wind Tunnel
It was also hat night. Again ... pretty good for $5! Wayward O gave it to kid on Subway Train on way home. Wayward O has no use for Yankee hat. Just holding it made Wayward O feel weird and queasy ... kind of like how Frodo felt in Lord of Rings.

Early reports of stadium being "pin ball machine" -- as guy behind Wayward O said after three consecutive right field jobs (two cheap, one legit) in 2nd inning against Jeremy Guthrie -- are oh so very true.

The prevailing weather pours over walls that surround the stadium to west -- near home plate -- and then drops into jet stream that gets sucked out to center. The pennant flags in right fly inward toward CF, as do flags in left field. All that air funnels out via "Yankee Stadium" sign in center, hence wind conditions.

While usual gang of drunk, albeit happy, louts is in attendance, Yankees clearly have made efforts to make new place friendlier toward families and kids. Everywhere are customer service people holding "Can I help you?" signs. It's almost as if old vibe has been temporarily given fresh coat of white paint.

But of course there were a couple fights and one bleacher creature was asked to depart premises.

Concourses are wide and clean and signage is serviceable though not fancy. There are inumerable beer stations. Which is good if you are fan of Team. Easy to drown sorrows, especially if you're feeling flush, having saved $45 at gate.

Over years and decades, Wayward O guesses, New Stadium will take on beer-soaked veneer of the Old. And as courtesy brigade vanishes, so too will it take on vibe of old place. But still it is hard not to give place high marks.

Re game: Guthrie's night Wayward O didn't mind. He was hitting 95 on house radar gun, which normally he tops out around 94.

But soon enough umpire screwed him over, awarding walk to John Damon that sparked game's first run.

Incidentally Wayward O got a laugh when Damon threw out Melvin Mora at 2nd base. Yankee fans were heard in stands to say, "Uh oh he's testing Damon's arm." As if there is any rhyme or reason to Team's never-ending penchant for making soft outs on base paths.

Also Guthrie definitely plunked A-Rod and Teixeira on purpose by accident.

But there was a general feebleness about Team last night -- it has a lot to do with Robert Andino -- and while there was some spirit and life as they clawed back to 5-3, Aubrey Huff's fly out to medium deep CF with a man on and two out in the eighth was where all hope ended. That was Aubrey's pitch but he got under it a little.

lObsterbacks!

as diaspora sits around waiting for wieters, reimold, bergesen, tillman and patton, among others, to come up and start playing in big leagues, baseball is set to air BOMBSHELL DOCUMENTARY that claims game was played in ENGLAND as early as 1755.


They shyte ye not
ENGLAND, PEOPLE!

UK already tried to say they invented ROCK AND ROLL. now game?

that, if true, would be same as if that LOSER SIMON COWELL invented HOT DOG or if ELTON JOHN was from LONDON.

ummmm. wait a second... does that mean HONKY CAT is about SOCCER PLAYER instead of, you know, JAMIE WALKER?

wayward O is confused.
what happened to ABNER DOUBLEDAY?? What happened to KEN BURNS DOCUMENTARY? you know, all that business about "In Our Perambulations of Late......" and how drunks in Manhattan went over to HOBOKEN to AIR OUT LIVERS and all that?????


next thing you know we'll all be SPEAKING ENGLISH. where is TOM HANKS when you need him?

the lOgjam file -- let felix pleeay!

this balto. bugle story is SO INFORMATIVE!

here is breakdown:

rich hill starting saturday --> koji taking extra day; starting sunday --> hendo going to the pendo --> hill not coming up till saturday so team can keep position players --> but on sat. somebody is going down to minorz

paper says likely candidates for demOtion are nolan reimold, who just came up; lou montanez, who's hanging around; or felix pie, who would have to clear waivers.

here's what you do: you got to let nolan sniff the majors for a little while longer so you put either luke on the DL with the shoulder or jonesie on the DL so he can clear up his lingering hamstring issues.*

and you let the kids run wild in outfield until june 1. then you see where you're at.

perhaps by then if rich hill turns out to be quality you can afford to slim down pitching corps. (hahahahaha i know that's funny).

felix was quite impressive in CF v. royals last night. he sparked team with cubbie-NL-style hustle double that lead to team's comfy cushion of victory. also he played well in field.

and nolan got some good hacks in and got first MLB hit; albeit an infield hit.

* this is no joke btw. anybody who's fought a hammy strain knows it feels fine when you are jogging, stretching but can re-tweak when you try to turn on the speed. and it can get much worse!

SUPERPALOOKA PUDATE: And right on queue ... Luke goes to the DL ... retroactive to earlier in week. Wayward O guesses that means Jones has convinced team hammy really is fine. Also ... lots of speed on bench for next couple of games until at least May 26 when Luke comes back. Wayward O hopes to see PINCH RUNNERS in tight games when ZAUN or Chad Moeller get on base!

defined geOgraphical radius

one of best things about baseball are baseball fans.

for example, earlier today baseball issued semi-official news story / press release touting new patented system for enforcing home market blackouts for internet game watchers .... this is excerpt:

"Major League Baseball was the first professional sports league to broadcast its full schedule live over the Internet, and U.S. Pat. No. 7,486,943 allowed it to happen within the well-established guidelines for a sport that is delivered over multiple platforms. All clubs have local TV broadcast rightsholders, and their contracts specify that fans inside a defined geographical radius who can view their broadcasts shall be blacked out from live online viewing. Everyone outside of that radius can see that club's games live with MLB.TV."

anyway .... readers on mlb.com quickly hammered baseball. here are some verbatim comments grabbed by wayward o before everything was pulled ....

"Congratulations, MLB. It figures that their one achievement would be a feature that PREVENTS people from being able to watch games. On the other hand, NexDef and the many other buggy aspects of mlb.tv also do a good job of preventing people from watching games (or watching them in high quality, at least). Now maybe they will focus their efforts on producing a product that actually works as advertised."

"Only Major League Baseball would have a press release commending themselves on what a fine job they do of screwing over people that actually want to give them money to see as much of their product as possible in favor of 1950's-esque broadcast restrictions."

"i'm in Seattle and the thing places me in San Jose, which blacks me out of Giants and A's games, which are the ones i care about. so hopefully if someone makes a geo locator that actually works, they won't be infringing on the patent. this story is the most repulsive case of unwarranted back-patting i've seen in a long time. P.S. information wants to be free. these sorts of algorithm patents are only meant to stifle competition, and they benefit only those that can afford large legal departments. makes me sick."

"It's ridiculous that this article is a feel-good story about how MLB patented a technology that they basically use to prevent people who subscribe to MLB.TV from watching their home team. All of this because the dinosaur executives at MLB and the Cable companies are too stupid to work out a distribution deal, and too foolish to take full advantage of the internet as a distrobution medium."

next time, wayward o guesses, baseball won't be so quick to brag about antitrust exemption and derivative ability to openly screw home-market customers by forcing them to pay for cable or satellite instead of giving them cheaper option of watching on Internet.

(now incidentally this article appears to have been pulled from mlb.com web site -- or if it's still there it's buried; can't be found readily in search, either)

lOl

look at amber's wikipedia entry...

finally, baseball gOt it right

amid all of the self-righteousness, disappointment and schadenfreude that erupted when manuel ramirez was suspended for rubbing hisself with female ointment, wayward o believes an important point went un-emphasized:

baseball now has effective drug policy
this, friends of the sport, is the day we've been waiting for at least seven years and possibly longer.

an effective drug policy with consequences may not remove the temptation to try performance-enhancing drugs, but it will periodically remind the public and the players that, like other leagues, baseball cheaters face the risk of being outed and the collateral risks of losing millions in salary; losing any shot at HoF; and losing playing time.

in a society awash with illegal drugs that's really all you can ask for.



OMG! Wayward O almost forgot. Blog received very nice e-mail this week from Tom Sedlacek who is PR guy for BOWIE BASEBALL BAYSOX and he wants everyone to know that THURSDAY NIGHT is Rock Paper Scissors Nite at Prince George's Stadium!

So go play some RoChamNattyBo and cheer on Bay Sox!!! Tell 'em Wayward O sent you and get a FREE ....... a FREE ....... a FREEEEEEEEEE .....

nope. you get nothing free.

diaspOra, part XII -- derby edition

name: some dood
location: churchill downs, kentucky
status: Os fan
gear of choice: turned to the back black alternate "O's" cap, with backward apostrophe, possibly fitted


He bet his money on the bob-tailed nag
Somebody bet on the bay
quote: "spotted at the derby," from reader maggie in nyc, who also says "I have recently seen the light and become a big fan. My boyfriend is from Maryland and his (die-hard) enthusiasm is contagious."
wayward o says: you'd probably be happier if your boyfriend was from st. louis but maybe Team will surprise you. thnax for sending pix!!!

when i hit tha dance flO

Super Mad Properz to bjtylerx
diaspOra can't get enough of INTERNET SENSATION!



hip-hop has officially entered IRONIC PHASE

tales Of malfeasance

CubFanX: i don't know how interested you are in this
The Wayward O: yeah. he and maese were sh*t canned via telephone last week
CubFanx: well i figured you knew that but his tale is interesting
The Wayward O: "the people ultimately responsible, for the gutting of the paper and the callous treatment of its employees, whether they were in the office at the time or not, are a plane flight away. Clearly, to them 'Baltimore Sun'’ is just a line on a balance sheet"
CubFanX: To get laid off over the phone at a game seems to prove that much
The Wayward O: i always liked steele. he is a good journo
CubFanX: I hate the Tribune Company
The Wayward O: sam zell ought to catch a beat down that's f'sho
CubFanX: i hate that f*cker
The Wayward O: to think how many livelihoods he destoryed. how many tales of malfeasance won't be told
CubFanX: ugh -- poor newspapers

hOwever...

Team has been worst team in baseball last couple weeks except for stupid Nats. so last night's win was balm for souls of shrinking, beleaguered nation of fans.

and yet Wayward O must this rainy tuesday morning chide manager for not inserting pinch runner for ZAUN when ZAUN hit double in eighth inning.

with nasty losing streak eating away at Team's last shred of dignity, a two-run lead and a very shaky, flat-brimmed closer about to take hill for ninth ....


you have to put in a speedy runner there
as we now know, the situation was mooted when brian roberts crushed home run, making score 8-4 and helping assure win.

nevertheless, pie was inserted as defensive replacement in ninth inning. that, of course amounted to stroke of genius by trembo, as felix made following catch:



FS Florida via MLB.tv
with two men on and heart of Rays' order on deck.

so my man trembley got pie into the game albeit a half-inning late for Wayward O's taste. what's done is done.

but allow wayward o to elaborate for a moment. let's go back in time to top eight. let's say b-rob singles to right instead of going big fly. if pie is pinch running from 2nd there is a 84.57% chance he scores. as the game stood, there was a 13.87% chance of ZAUN scoring in same scenario.

Wayward O is not statistician but single to right scenario is far more likely there than home run.

of course sherrill did not give up any runs thanks to pie's great defensive play but the fact, as they say remains. moreover, if you're going to bring in pie for ninth there's no reason to leave him on the bench in eighth.

maybe it's all just peeay in the skeeay.

MORAL OF STORY: trembo has modeled himself after earl weaver. he does not like small ball. and of course you could argue that he kept his powder dry by not pulling all levers at once

OTHER MORAL OF STORY: it's PeeAYYYYYyyyyyyyy too early to "give up" on felix