Posts Tagged ham
Projecting Much?
Posted by Pork Flu Ribs in Uncategorized on June 4th, 2009
One of Pete’s charms is that, although he constantly claims to be busy with ‘newspaper work’ during games, he has no end of time to delete critical comments and to engage in spats with his commenters.
During today’s game against Texas, fans were making critical comments about Wang’s sub-par return to the starting rotation. And thus Pete vomited up this juicy morsel:
Peter Abraham's Self-Awareness: 0
Peter Abraham has spent almost the entirety of his three-year tenure as Yankees beat writer for the Journal-News mocking, badmouthing, and advocating the trade of Alex Rodriguez. No one with a voice as influential as Pete’s (except for that tool at WasWatching, if you want to call him ‘influential’) has spit so much vitriol at the Yankees’ third baseman.
He delights in A-Rod slander. He ruts in it. He rolls in it and covers himself in it like a protective coating from the sun. For reasons I’m sure Freud would be overjoyed to analyze, Peter Abraham has centered his career around shrinking A-Rod. As Potato Chowder pointed out in the post below, he is still trying to make the discredited claims of Selena Roberts stick. This man is allegedly a professional, yet he continues to treat his blog as a venue for his personal vendettas.
“You must have a sad life when you take pleasure in the problems of other people.” So, true, Pete. So true.
Time Capsule
Posted by dead fish plate in Uncategorized on May 9th, 2009
According to Ham, the eyes of time will be the true judge of Alex Rodriguez, and in 20 years it will be judged whether his acquisition was a dumb move or not:
A-Rod said all the right things about focusing on baseball and wanting to win. But we’re heard that all before. His words were great, but his actions will tell the ultimate story. In 20 years, will the acquisition of A-Rod be looked upon as a smart move or a dumb one? Only time will tell.
Well, let’s go to the lab and see what we can deduct:
2 MVP Awards
209 Home Runs (and counting)
619 RBI
153 OPS+
I don’t think anyone that knows anything about baseball is going to argue that getting Alex Rodriguez to play baseball for the Yankees was a bad move, Abe.
Ham's LoHud co-workers gasp as his daily rations are "acquired".
Pete KNOWS ARod tipped pitches. Just ask him.
Posted by Green Cabbage in Analysis on May 2nd, 2009
It is well documented that Peter Abraham really doesn’t like A-Rod. His latest shot at A-Rod is regarding the allegations from Selena Roberts that A-Rod was tipping pitches to opposing batters so he could get garbage-time hits.
Defenders of Rodriguez are quick to point out — and correctly so — that many players were using PEDs during what we now call the Steroids Era. It is unfair to make him the face of baseball’s drug problem.
But not even Barry Bonds or Mark McGwire would have told the opposition what was coming. If A-Rod is found to have put his own meaningless statistics ahead of the legitimacy of the game, even his most ardent supporters would have trouble excusing that.
UPDATE, 12:58 p.m.: I stand corrected. A-Rod’s supporters apparently have no trouble whatsoever defending anything he does based on the comments to this post. It’s amazing how everything he did is either somebody else’s fault or simply shouldn’t have been reported in the first place.
There are so many things wrong with that statement, I’m not sure where to start.
Yeah sure, Bonds wouldn’t have told the opposing hitters what pitches were coming. Cause well, you know, he played LEFT FIELD!
Photographic evidence of Barry doing the deed
There’s also the fact that Abraham takes Selena Roberts’s word at face value. I mean, good lord, grow a spine man. You’re supposedly a reporter, right? Do some reporting and get some kind of confirmation on this before spouting all this self-righteous crap.
Then there’s the big elephant in the room. Just how likely is it that A-Rod tipped those pitches? Everyone who played with A-Rod is saying it’s not likely he could have done it. How could he have seen the catcher’s signs from SS with a RH batting anyway?
TBIC’s crack team of math geeks did some back-of-the-envelope calculations and here’s what we’ve found.
Looking at A-Rod’s MVP year in Texas, the 1 or 2 late inning hits he had in blowouts/dominated games that we could find are easily explainable by pitchers throwing strikes because it’s a runaway game. You can see it in what the other hitters do that inning. And another thing is in blowout games Alex always got replaced late. It just wasn’t happening at all.
If he wasn’t benefiting from this there is no way he was giving up signs for other players.
I genuinely looked for something in 2003 and saw nothing. I checked every team he played and lost against for some kind of late inning stat padding. There was nothing. I listed some games that I think are way too close to consider but included them anyway, for example April 2nd. No one is really giving A-Rod a chance to hit a 3-run bomb when you only have a 7 run lead in the 5th.
2003
April 1 vs Angels, A-Rod goes 1 for 4 with his hit in the 3rd. Texas loses 0-10. Batting .222 .222 .556
April 2 vs Angels, A-Rod goes 1 for 5 with a 3 run HR in the 5th while the score was 1-8. Texas loses 5-11. Batting .214 .214 .643
April 6 vs Mariners, A-Rod goes 0 for 3. Texas loses 2-11. Batting .240 .296 .640
April 9 vs Athletics, A-Rod goes 3 for 4. Single in 1st w/ no score, RBI Double in 3rd w/ a score of 0-2, Single in 5th w/ 1-8 score, 7th inning K w/ score 4-8. Texas loses 5-13. Batting .281 .343 .625
April 12 vs Mariners, A-Rod goes 1 for 2. 2 run HR in 1st, K in the 5th w/ score 2-8, HBP in 7th. Texas loses 4-13. Batting .293 .383 .634
May 6 vs Blue Jays, A-Rod goes 1 for 3. Single in 1st. Flyout in 5th w/ 4-15 score. Replaced in 7th. Texas loses 5-15. Batting .344 .427 .656
May 15 vs Red Sox, A-Rod goes 0 for 2. Walk in 8th w/ 2-12 score. Texas loses 3-12. Batting .323 .410 .600
May 24 vs Orioles, A-Rod goes 2 for 4. Single in 3rd w/ 0-0 score, HR in 6th w/ 2-1 score, K in 8th w/ 3-10 score. Texas loses 3-10. Batting .302 .386 .582
May 30 vs Orioles, A-Rod goes 2 for 4. Single in 6th w/ 1-5 score, Double in 8th w/ 1-8 score. Texas loses 1-8. Batting .298 .384 .577
May 31 vs Orioles, A-Rod goes 0 for 3. Walk in 8th (following a Blalock single) w/ 1-5 score. Texas loses 1-7. Batting .294 .382 .569
June 12 vs Mets, A-Rod goes 0 for 4. Flyball in 9th (following a Blalock single) Texas loses 0-11. Batting .298 .381 .556
June 15 vs Marlins, A-Rod goes 2 for 5. Single in 3rd w/ 2-3 score, Single in 8th (followed by Everett HR) w/ 2-9 score. Texas loses 4-10. Batting .296 .380 .542
June 20 vs Astros, A-Rod goes 2 for 4. RBI Double in 1st w/ 0-0 score, HR in 8th w/ 2-5 score. Texas loses 3-12. Batting .301 .383 .562
June 26 vs Athletics, A-Rod goes 1 for 3. Single in 1st w/ 0-1 score. K in 6th w/ 0-13 score. Replaced in 8th. Texas loses 0-13. Batting .296 .380 .549
July 11 vs Royals, A-Rod goes 1 for 3. Single in 4th w/ 0-4 score, K in 8th w/ 3-12 score. Texas loses 3-13. Batting .290 .378 .555
July 20 vs Rays, A-Rod goes 1 for 3. Single in 6th (followed by Teixeira single, A-Rod scores) w/ 1-13 score, replaced in 6th. Texas loses 4-15. Batting .279 .371 .531
August 21 vs White Sox, A-Rod goes 1 for 4. HR in 6th (followed by Palmeiro HR and Teixeira flyball) w/ 0-4 score, Groundout in 8th w/ 3-7 score. Texas loses 3-7. Batting .305 .399 .605
August 22 vs White Sox, A-Rod goes 1 for 4. Double in 5th w/ 0-4 score. K in 7th w/ 1-5 score. Texas loses 1-7. Batting .304 .398 .604
August 23 vs White Sox, A-Rod goes 0 for 2. Flyball in 6th (preceded by Blalock flyball and followed by Palmeiro single) w/ 1-10 score. Replaced in 8th. Texas loses 2-13. Batting .303 .398 .602
August 27 vs Royals, A-Rod goes 0 for 4. Flyball in 8th (preceded by Young flyball) w/ score. Replaced in 8th. Texas loses 0-9. Batting .302 .396 .597
So yeah, nothing. But don’t let that stop you from pushing whatever agenda it is you’re trying to push, Pete. That analysis took one heroic TBIC editor an hour or so to compile and it’s not like he gets paid to do this.
Introduction, and Indictment
Posted by EggFooYoung in Introductions on May 1st, 2009
Good evening ladies and gentlemen. Have a seat, won’t you? Thank you.
We’re here to discuss a man. Peter Abraham. Any internet-savvy Yankees fan knows him and knows his work for the Journal News, a newspaper serving New York’s counties. This wouldn’t be so bad, you’d think, a local hack writer with a limited audience of busy commuters who consign his fetid scribblings to the bottom of so many receptacles on the lower concourse of Grand Central Terminal by 9AM? But no, he happens to have a blog connected to his work, one which gives him a fairly large audience on which to perpetrate his indolent ramblings.
But don’t think we’re here strictly to heap unwarranted abuse on the man. We’re very much fans of a lot of his work. Pete provides the everyman-level access to the Yankees that is missing from so much of the media, be it his anecdotes from inside the clubhouse, to funny stories about connected personalities and other behind-the-scenes goodies you simply wouldn’t find in any other media outlet.
Our goal here is simply to trim the fat, and convince Mr. Abraham that he continue the good aspects of his work while ridding himself of certain behaviors. His grudges against particular players or management tend to cloud his judgment. His lack of actual reporting leaves him overdependent on other beat reporters, or on Brian Cashman’s cell phone number, which leads him to compensate by spouting bile. The upshot is that the intelligent Yankees fan is left screaming incoherently at their monitor or treating a pounding headache.
In the coming weeks we’ll be documenting this behavior with his own words, new and old. We’re always open to suggestion, so please feel free to either commiserate with us in the comments or to suggest new avenues of criticism.
Remember, we’re here to help with the healing. The first step is to admit you have a problem.