Ridiculous calls from yesterday's game:

1. Swisher called safe when picked off at second in the top of the 4th, one out, Yankees up by three.
2. Swisher incorrectly called out for leaving the bag early on a sacrifice fly to end the 4th, Yankees up by three.
3. Robinson Cano called safe when out at third on a hilarious Swisher 1-2 DP, Yankees up by five.
   

It all evens out, you say? Well, using the THT Win Probability tool, we end up with the following changes in win expectancy due to bad calls from the umpires (Angels win ex is positive):

1. -4%
2. +10%
3. -1%
   

All in all, the umpires skewed game four of the ALCS in favour of the Angels by a non-insignificant amount - in fact, 5% WPA is almost as much as Albert Pujols contributed per game for the Cardinals (this is a silly comparison but it illustrates the point quite well).

The playoffs deserve better than this.

Manager Don Wakamatsu mentioned in the pre-game that Jack Wilson's hamstring was probably going to prevent him from playing in this series with Detroit. With seven pitchers in the pen and Jack Wilson lounging around, we are left with a three man bench. Tonight, that consisted of Michael Saunders, Mike Sweeney and Kenji Johjima. Notice a problem? I mean, beyond the usual? We do not have anything resembling a middle infield or third base option.

That can come into play in case of injury to our starting 2B, SS or 3B, but it also prevents any sort of pinch hitting from occurring over those three as well. Hopefully, Jack Wilson is actually useful during this series, in case of emergency, but hey, just another reason I typically hate 12-man pitching staffs.

In the top of the 2nd against Anaheim, with the count 2-0 to Maicer Izturis, Mike Blowers noted that Izturis would be looking for a fastball since it was a fastball count. It was a very astute piece of observation. For your convenience, I have cataloged every other count in which Felix might be expected to throw a fastball to a left-handed batter:

0-0

1-0

3-0

0-1

1-1

2-1

3-1

0-2

1-2

2-2

3-2

Felix is a moron

Jesus this team cannot hit righties at all. Yay we won somehow.

More photos » by Elaine Thompson - AP

Ronny Cedeno launches a line drive 388 feet on a 1-2 count.

Browse more photos »

Or, if you want the title to be more positive, Why Ronny Cedeno Should Start At Shortstop.

When Betancourt come up in 2005, watching him field was a revelation. I've seen bad shortstops and good ones, but I've never been quite so entranced just by watching a guy pick the ball off the ground and throwing to first. It wasn't just that he had a tonne of range, or a cannon arm - there was something else to his play. 2005 Betancourt was as smooth a defensive player as I'd ever seen. He was almost languorous in making plays - something that would have been detrimental were he the type who didn't have the physical talent to make the insanely difficult routine. Watching him make not a single motion that didn't help get the ball off the ground and into the first baseman's glove was amazing, and I used to try to get to Safeco Field as early as possible just to see him field the ball. His beautiful defence helped to make up for the frustration of watching him hit, too.

Those days are long gone. Since his arrival in the US, Betancourt has gone from a stick thin kid to a full grown Yuniesky. The added pounds have sapped his agility and range, and the astonishing efficiency has turned into laziness. Normally you expect a guy to defend worse with age, but to my eyes, Betancourt went from being one of the great defensive shortstops to a complete catastrophe within the span of three years.

All of this might have been mitigated by his development at the plate, but the added weight didn't really give him any power, and the added experience didn't teach him to wait for a pitch to hit rather than swinging wildly at whatever's near the plate. Being chewed out for it in spring training didn't change a damn thing. As a batter, Betancourt's in that horrible limbo in that he's just talented enough to squeak by without knowing what he's doing but not talented enough to avoid being a liability. He'll have his hot streaks here and there (including to start the season), but we've never been the sorts of people who like results based analysis anyway, so that shouldn't factor in.

Enter Ronny Cedeno.

A former top Cubs prospect, Cedeno was part of the return for Aaron Heilman, basically making him a part of the JJ Putz trade by extension. Some of you have not been lucky enough to see him play this year, but he's been quite clearly the best defensive middle infielder on the team. There was a great example of that today, when he started at second base - he made a Boone-esque dash to pick up a ball way over to his left and threw the runner out, making the whole thing look easy. Jose Lopez would have merely frowned gently at the ball as it trickled into right field. Betancourt, on the other hand, made two lazy errors that ended up blowing the game completely open in the seventh, failing to convert a medium-difficult chance at a double play, and then bobbling a ball that was hit straight at him in the next at-bat. I can excuse the occasional error, but Yuni failed to record one out of a possible four outs, and it looked like he was just indifferent to the whole thing. It's pretty safe to say that Cedeno's defence kicks Betancourts's ass.

I'd also make the argument that Cedeno is a far better hitter than Yuni, and probably on par with Jose Lopez. The results haven't been there, but unlike the double play twins, he always shows some sort of plan at the plate. He takes balls and waits for strikes, and he generally hits the ball pretty hard with a nice little line drive swing. When was the last time you remember Lopez or Yuni homering when down 1-2? And considering his success at AAA, I'll take the sort of player who knows to not swing at balls in the dirt or over his head over Yuniesky ****ing Betancourt, who couldn't learn plate discipline to save his life.

Either Yuni is too stupid to realise that he's playing terribly and needs to improve, or he's too secure in his starting gig to care. In the first case, he's irredeemable and doesn't deserve to be on a MLB team, let alone one that may well contend for a divisional title. In the second, he needs a wakeup call.

It's time to send a message. Ronny Cedeno should start every game of the Rays series at shortstop.

The Mariners currently have two major-league starting catcher-capable players in the organisation. One is currently on the disabled list after hurting his hamstring on Wednesday, and the other is playing terribly so far in Tacoma after a poor spring. Clement's struggles with the bat this year are only adding to the questions about his ability to adequately play catcher, but the solution to this problem is not to roll with two buckup catchers on the 25 man roster when the team is in pole position in the AL West.

Rob Johnson and Jamie Burke are not the answers for this team, and neither matters to the franchise in the long run. Johjima's injury was the perfect excuse to let Clement sink or swim in the bigs rather than languishing in Tacoma and impacting Adam Moore's development. It was also a great excuse to get what is potentially an impact leftie bat into a lineup full of righthanded hackers. Calling up Burke rather than Clement seems to send a message that the organisation thinks pretty poorly of Jeff, especially in that they're willing to make Rob Johnson (whose defensive reputation appears to be pretty unjustified) the starting catcher for two weeks.

I know that I'm biased towards Clement, but I recognise that at this point, he's a long shot to ever making his mark at the major league level. But long shots should at least be given a shot, and the way he's been handled so far this year seems completely unfair.

...

"Tomorrow is another game, it's a must-win game."

-Ozzie Guillen on tonight's game against the Rays

Pravda link

Tonight is Game 2. Unless the rules have changed, you do not lose the divisional series after two losses.

What's amazing is that Guillen knows this. From directly before that above quoted sentence:

"It's not a do-or-die thing, but I'd rather go home with one win than go against the wall."

I'm not trying to single Guillen out here, this is just the latest example of the increasing trend of games before an elimination game being "must-wins". I don't want to live in a world where six years from now they're talking about split-squad games in March being must-wins because you don't want to start the season on a bad note, which could cause you to lose games, which could cause you to have a worse playoff seed, which could cause you to face a better team in October, which could cause you to lose the first game, which could cause you to be in an unfavorable situation for winning the series.

There is only one type of game that is must-win and that's the game where if you lose, your chance for a title ends. I mean, it's built into the blasted word itself. How hard is that?