Meltdown: Averted
Posted May 8th, 2008 by Neal ShafferCategories: Baseball, Orioles, by Neal
Thanks for putting up with the lack of front-page posts for the past couple of days. You guys make the site what it is — no ifs/ands/buts. Much appreciated.
Tonight’s game was as big as any game against the Royals in early May could possibly be. The fact that we rode the DC Cab to a complete game, 4-1 victory would be sweet on any night. The fact that it happened when we needed it most — in order to avert a six-game losing streak, which I count as a meltdown — is just…unspeakably awesome.
Could it be the Bynum Effect?
“I can do anything and everything you want to do on a baseball field,” Bynum said. “If you want me to run the catcher over, I can run him over. If you want me to drop-kick somebody, I’ll drop-kick them. I am ready. I am ready to play ball.”
Quotes like that make me all tingly, and I can’t help but think that an infusion of that kind of attitude might have been just what this team needed. What’s more, DT says that Freddie is the starter, and that’s that. Torres is back from whence he came, and Luis will slot into the utility role for which he’s probably not yet ready.
That’s Trembley showing his team two extremely important things: leadership, and the ability to be firm but fair.
To put this all another way, today was proof that we’re not watching last year’s team. Wins and losses aside, this group — from AndyMac down — is doing things a better way. If that keeps up all season then we will have much to celebrate, indeed.
Bring on game two…
(AP Photo/Charlie Riedel)
Explore posts in the same categories: Baseball, Orioles, by Neal
May 9th, 2008 at 12:02 am
DISCLAIMER: I’M DRUNK
Fuck yeah! We are witnessing what we have been waiting for for 4 fucking years: Daniel Cabrera is turning the proverbial CORNER. 6 straight quality starts, something he has never done in the bigs (and I’m actually surprised that he hasn’t). He pounded the strike zone and mixed in his breaking pitches like a real pitcher, and not a thrower. No one told this kid to use his 2-seamer more prior to this season? Really? Well, on behalf of the Loss Column, congratulations, DC Cab - you’re the real ace of this staff and it pleases us to see you pitch like you’re capable of. FIRST COMPLETE GAME WIN.
FREDDIE FUCKING BYNUM. Have you guys heard this dude jive? I heard him on the radio post-game and lost my shit - he’s ridiculous. 8 putouts: each, according to Angel/Manfra, masterfully executed. How novel an idea to charge the ball. Dude wants to play ball and you gotta love that shit, regardless of whether or not he’s “the answer”(he’s not).
I love the Royals and our utter dominance of them.
May 9th, 2008 at 12:06 am
Also!
Rick “The Fix” Kranitz!
Nick “The Stick” Markakis!
And DT gets up Sherrill “just to give them something to think about” - hahahahahaha I fucking love this guy. AND he successfully argues a call that umps botched in our favor - Ramon should have been out on interference, but instead he got a base hit.
May 9th, 2008 at 12:51 am
Nevermind, not DC Cab’s first complete game win - he had one against the Janqs. But still. 13 straight to close it out! Only 2 flyball outs! 6 k’s!
If you want to go negative - the O’s failed to score bases loaded, 1 out, later in the game. They only had like 6 hits. Luke Scott is still struggling. First 3-run homer of the year. Cakes almost runs past Mora on the basepaths when he hit the home run.
But a masterful Cabrera performance is so huge that it automatically overcomes any negative aspect of the game. Plus - bullpen rest.
I’m just so happy to see even scrubby Bynum out there at SS as long as he makes the routine plays, which he did. Shit, he can even hit a home run every now and then and steal some bases. I’m in!
Fuck, is it Trachsel tomorrow? Ideal situation: He gets tagged for 4 runs in 2 innings, but the bullpen holds down the fort and the O’s come back to win it 6-4, with Trachsel being DFA’d the following day.
May 9th, 2008 at 8:24 am
http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/columns/story?columnist=stark_jayson&id=3386182&lpos=spotlight&lid=tab2pos2
ESPN looked at the trades that happened over the offseason a month in. O’s - Seattle #5, O’s - Astro’s #8.
If I was just looking at Cabrera’s numbers over his career and this season, and not the name on his jersey, I’d be saying that this guy has definitely turned a corner. But since I’ve watched him over his career be dominant one start and terrible the next, i’m really cautiously optimistic about him right now. The old fool me once, shame on you, fool me twice, shame on me bit. It would be cool if he finally lived up to expectations though. I want two or three more straight good starts before I believe. Maybe thats a little much, but he’s tricked me enough, and that’s what its going to take.
May 9th, 2008 at 9:04 am
The Daniel Cabrera we’ve seen in the past six starts is the Daniel Cabrera he was supposed to be 4 years ago. He was pitching prodigy in the day, the next great pitcher to come up with O’s. He always had the stuff, it’s got filthy movement and it’s untouchable as long as he can get it in the strike zone.
I remember before this season started, there was an article with a Daniel Cabrera soundbite about how Mazzone was to blame for failings and how he screwed up his delivery. “OK Daniel, whatever, we know you’re absolutely batshit insane” was the common response. But oh my. At this point who could you blame besides Mazzone? He’s the only X-factor in this scenario. Could the same be said for Rodrigo Lopez and Bruce Chen? Both great pitchers until the tutelage of Leo? Who knows what kind of team we would have had under Kranitz starting 4 years ago.
I digress, not a lot we can do about it now. Kranitz has really stepped this whole pitching staff up a notch. I’m waiting for Terry Crowley’s replacement. Great win last night, nice to see the O’s come alive again.
May 9th, 2008 at 10:40 am
Rick The Fix was such a huge pickup. Look at the surprising success of Brian Burres.. Garrett Olson coming in and being aggressive.. the relative success of the bullpen.. Albers not looking much like the struggling version of himself in Houston. Too early to crown Kranitz the next great pitching coach, but you can definitely say he’s fit the situation here in Baltimore.
May 9th, 2008 at 10:42 am
Oh, and Jim Johnson! I mean, this guy was pretty mediocre in the minors and terrible in brief MLB appearances and yet you look at him pitch and his fastball is moving all over the place and he’s looked downright nasty at times.
May 9th, 2008 at 11:10 am
I just figured it out. We can sit here and say, what’s gotten into Daniel Cabrera? How could he suddenly figure out what pitching is? Well, I just figured it out. Daniel Cabrera changed his number to 40 from 35. The same 35 that was worn by a certain someone who I believe exists only to do harm to my baseball soul - a guy who would suck if I wanted him to do good, and does well when I want him to suck. A guy who certainly has cursed his current team, and apparently cursed his old number here at the Orioles.
You know the one…Mussina.
May 9th, 2008 at 11:33 am
Wowwww
a revelation
May 9th, 2008 at 11:45 am
and mussina seems to have turned a corner at the same time
eerie
May 9th, 2008 at 1:35 pm
From MLBTR (who I think nabbed it from Stark):
“Daniel Cabrera will be available again this summer. The Orioles should trade him as soon as possible; the .221 BABIP and 1.17 K/BB ratio indicate that his 4.06 ERA is a fluke.”
Are we buying or selling the idea of trading Cabrera at this point?
(I’m totally buying it. Who wants the DCab/Ramon/Payton pupu platter?)
May 9th, 2008 at 1:50 pm
If you ignore the first two games, then the DC Cab has a 1.8 K/BB ratio. If you ignore that other walk-a-thon, we’re talking just over 3 K/BB, which is tremendous. Obviously you can’t and shouldn’t ignore those badder games, but I’m not sure that his K/BB is exactly an indication of how he’s pitching this year so far (Basically he’s been hit or miss, but he’s been hitting consistently in the first month and a half).
The BABIP is troubling though.
May 9th, 2008 at 1:59 pm
Huge game tonight. Trachsel absolutely needs to pitch well against the worst offense in the league or I honestly think a cut is a-coming. He’s got the Sox next, and I doubt any of us think he can tame the Sox, who don’t believe in swinging at balls and love hitting junk out.
Beyond that, the team could really use the rejuvenating bump of a winning streak after the long losing streak. And I’ll continue to gain that much more confidence in them if they bounce back from that 5 gamer so easily. Last year that would’ve been it, for whatever reason - they would have just rolled over and called it a year, but we’re all hoping this year isn’t like that just yet.
Big, big game tonight.
May 9th, 2008 at 3:34 pm
As always, it depends on what you’d get in return for the guy. But as it stands, I’m inclined to say that I’m selling trading him until he gives some indication that his recent success is a fluke. If not, he’s what, 26? One of the best arms in baseball? NEVER GETS HURT. Can throw 130 pitches without losing velocity. Can pitch on 3 days rest. He’s a HORSE. I mean, we could be talking about Erik Bedard dominance without the wussy attitude and tendency to get DLed. We could be talking about a real ace here, as ridiculous as that sounds because I’m talking about Daniel Cabrera. I’m just saying let’s see what’s up in another month or so. There’s no reason he shouldn’t be a part of the rebuilding process because he’s still young even though it seems like he’s been around forever. After all, they did rush the guy to the bigs way too soon.
May 9th, 2008 at 4:13 pm
My opinion is that if he can pitch his way out of this season looking like an ace, sign him for 2-3 years. He’s young enough to still be a part of this club at 26, and a small contract like that will enable us to push him out when our Frederick guys are ready to crack the rotation, and we can sell high for some new magic beans to plant in Frederick. If he falters, then cut bait. I wouldn’t trade him yet, unless the offer was like “god damn”.
May 9th, 2008 at 7:02 pm
Of course it would depend on the offer…but I think if this was even 2 weeks ago we’d all be jumping at the opportunity to get quality players back for the DC Cab.
But yeah, obviously everything is dependant on how he performs in the next 2 months at least. I have no problem with our rotation at the end of ‘09 being Cabrera, Guthrie, Olson, Arrieta, Tillman/Penn/Liz/Spoone…none at all, if they’re all going to pitch like we’ve seen them capable of pitching (and goddamn, what do we do with the rest of these arms? Good thing the saying is you can never have enough pitching, huh))
May 10th, 2008 at 1:17 am
MacPhail is right about pitching, even if you wind up with too much, a good pitcher in a trade is worth a couple position players. Pitching is so much harder to cultivate.
I would love to see Penn dealt in a trade.