fullcountpitch.com

By Gary Armida

Originally, I was going to skip the normal Friday Fungos column and write a sort of “I told you so” column about Joba Chamberlain and the Yankees. I told Mr. Harry Doyle himself, Bill Campione, at our Thursday staff meeting that I was trying hard to resist such a column. Well, Camp said the perfect thing–”You might want to hold off on that a bit…Your Chase Utley column doesn’t look to good right now”. Wow, he was right. Since I wrote that Chase Utley column, he hasn’t had a homerun and he just ended an 0-20 something slump. Then, I began to think about a couple of recent columns. One that jumps out is the one I wrote on the Braves proclaiming they were ready to make a run with all of their bullpen pitchers getting back. Well, later that day, news breaks that Smoltz is out for the year, perhaps his career. A week later, Rafael Soriano is said to still have arm problems. Only Mike Gonzalez made it back. Now I am beginning to wonder if I am the kiss of death to players and teams. Is there an FCP curse? I doubt it, but I will hold off on a full-fledged Joba Chamberlain column for a while.

While you ponder whether or not what I just said has any truth, here’s a quick look around the majors for your last Friday in June.

• We’ll start with Joba Chamberlain though. Chamberlain pitched into the 7th inning to beat the Pirates on Wednesday night. Sure, it was the Pirates and they had Doug Mientkiewicz starting in right field, but the important thing was Chamberlain threw 114 pitches, a normal pitcher’s pitch count. Chamberlain has been good as advertised and continues to improve. By the end of July he will fully be entrenched as the Yankees ace. He has the stuff, the makeup, and the desire to be a frontline starter. He’ll get Texas on Monday so he will get more of a challenge from their bats.
• Over the last 20 games, no team in the National League East has a .500 record. The Phillies are in a deep slump, both at the plate as well as their troublesome pitching staff. Their bats will awaken and they are quite lucky that every other team in the division didn’t break away.  The Braves continue to linger despite injury issues which is a good sign if they could ever get healthy. The Marlins are finally coming to the reality point that they are a young team with little pitching. Mark Hendrickson, who got off to a great start has been terrible lately. Now he has an ERA of 5.73. The Marlins have 3 members of the starting rotation with an ERA over 5.00. The Mets? Yeah, well I think we’ve covered them before.
•  The Rays continue to look strong, this time with Matt Garza almost throwing a no-hitter. Garza has been tremendous for the Rays this season. Garza is a bit of an after thought with Tampa’s young players but they need him to develop into a solid pitcher to stay in contention.
• Speaking of afterthought–Shawn Chacon (the ultimate afterthought) beat up his boss this week…literally. Seriously.  GM Ed Wade was supposedly talking with Chacon about his demotion,but things got out of hand quickly with Chacon throwing Wade to the floor and then getting on top of him. Now, many people may have wanted to do that to the boss, but this, obviously, was not fair to anyone. It’s funny–if this was in New York, talks would not be limited to a select few. This would be a tremendous scandal much like the Latrell Sprewell incident a few years ago (which makes you wonder why an event that happened in Golden State was more infamous tha this). The Astros released Chacon, but rest assured that Chacon will be picked up by another team soon.
• As we wrote about in the winter, Rich Harden is one of the best pitchers in the game. Because he’s been healthy, he’s been able to remind fans just how good he can be. So far, he is 5-0 with 2.44 ERA. While the A’s have a great staff, look for Billy Beane to look into dealing Harden while his value is high. If he goes on the DL soon, I can assure that I had nothing to do with it. He’s been doing that his whole career.
• Poor Aaron Hill, Blue Jays’ second baseman. He’s still dealing with post-concussion issues and has now been sent home for a week to two to relax. Hill was coming off a very promising 2007, but has been a disappointment in ‘08. We’ll continue to keep an eye on Hill’s progress.
• Quick–Who are the hottest teams in the AL? If you guessed the Royals and Twins, give yourself a cookie. Both teams have won 9 of 10. In the Royals case it is more of an evening out. In the Twins case its more of a good team making a run in a very mediocre division. The Twins are getting great pitching (ERA in the neighborhood of 2.00 over the last 10) and some great timely hitting (.300 + with runners in scoring position). 85 wins can win the division (beacause the Indians are just giving up at this point) so the Twins have just as good a shot as any team.
• MLB announced that it was suspending umpire Brian Runge for one game for his altercation with the Mets Carlos Beltran and interim skipper Jerry Manuel. I am glad that Major League Baseball announced the suspension (something they rarely do with umpires), but how is this remotely fair? If a manager or player bumps an umpire it’s usually an automatic three games. I usually take the umpire’s side when it comes to these altercations, but this was completely his fault. Players chirp about strike calls all the time, more than what the normally reserved Beltran did. Runge should be suspended at the minimum of three games plus get some help.
• One Indian who is not disappointing is Cliff Lee. Lee won his 11th game of the year (in just 15 starts). He is obviously the frontrunner to start the all-star game for the American League. It’s a great story that absolutely nobody saw coming. Lee’s career stats show a league average pitcher who is having a tremendous season. If not for Lee, the Indians would be in last place. Wait a minute, they are already there! Ok, without Lee, they would be the Seattle Mariners.

That’s it for now. Enjoy the weekend. We’ll see you back here on Monday.