It's No Mystery

As a member of the Baseball Blogger's Alliance, I am privileged to cast my vote for the American League's top pitcher. The BAA award for the top pitcher is known as the Walter Johnson award. If you don't know who Walter Johnson is, click here. Although I would love to provide a lot of insightful analysis, I am serving jury duty this week, and have to use the evenings to do some work for my day job. I know, cry me a river.

My top five American League pitchers appear below.

Justin Verlander, Detroit

Jered Weaver, Los Angeles

James Shields, Tampa Bay

Josh Beckett, Boston

Dan Haren, Los Angeles

All I have time to say is, what a year by Verlander. It was so much fun watching him take the hill this season. Kudos to him for taking his game to a whole new level. Almost every outing, it felt like there was a chance he could throw another no hitter.

I wanted to include Doug Fister, but didn't want to seem like a homer. His numbers were very comparable to Haren's.

Enjoy the World Series (if that's possible). I know I'll be watching, but will be thinking with every pitch "that should be my Tigers out there." To add insult to injury, a radio station played "Written in the Stars" on my way home from the Detroit court house today. I ask you, is that humane?

Busy Night

Think the big news tonight is Josh Beckett's bid for a no-hitter?  Wrong!

Tom Glavine's release(!) from the Braves?  Good guess, but no.  Well, maybe if you're a public relations firm, which Atlanta will be hiring to do damage control.

In a stunning move, the Braves have traded prized (and former Tigers) prospect Gorkys Hernandez plus two pitchers (their names are irrelevant here) to the Pirates for Nate McLouth.  (Thank you Big League Stew!) Hernandez was sacrificed by the Tigers with Jair Jurrjens (currently 5-2, 2.59 ERA, 1.23 WHIP, with opponents batting .241 against) in the Edgar Renteria trade.  (Could all boos, cat-calls, and spewing of expletives please come to a halt?)

Now you may say that Gorkys is exiled to baseball purgatory, Pittsburgh being a place in which the last 16 seasons have been losing efforts.  We're not just talking about sub-.500 records here, but something a bit grander--the Pirates have lost no less than 87 games in each of the last eight seasons.  (Yes, this is a most opportune moment to offer your sincerest sympathies to Pittsburgh faithful world-wide.)

Do not extend your sympathy too far, however.  I just read an ESPN the Magazine article (June 1, 2009, page 44) that chronicled the Pirates' recent rebuilding efforts.  They are methodical and well-thought. They're not trying to buy one championship (or one winning season) only to be back at square one.  It's a long-term plan--one that's hopefully understood by serious fans, or there could be some boos, cat-calls and expletives heaped upon Pirates' executives upon their entry into favorite coffee shops.  Only time will tell, of course, but their blue-prints may be very sound indeed.

All of this was said to distract you and me from the past two losses at the hands of the Sox, and save us from ripping hair directly from our heads' tender follicles.  I say no more on the matter, except to console you further with the salve that Chicago, Minnesota and Kansas City all lost tonight too.