Archive for February, 2008
Roger Clemens visited the spring training complex of Astros early this week and has decided to spend some time in Kissimmee during the spring season. He announced that within two Days he will start giving batting practice to the young campers. Clemens said that he enjoys working with the mini-campers and the draftees has become more familiar with him in the past 2 or 3 years and are feeling free to ask more relevant questions about the play. Roger Clemens, who is 45 years of age, has signed a contract of extending his personal services to the Astros, when he retires from the game. But, for the past several years he has been helping the Minor Leaguers of Astro during their spring training sessions.
Clemens willingly had a talk with the reporters whom, he was avoiding after the controversy about the performance - enhancing drugs was started. Clemens was careful enough to avoid the references about the controversy. He expressed his wish to focus his time and mind on his duties at the Minor –league camp. His eldest son Koby is also a member of the training camp. Drayton McLane, Astro club owner welcomed Clemens to Astros’ facilities two weeks ago and wanted Clemens to come back to the game in this sprin
February 29th, 2008
Brian Cashman, the General Manager of the Yankees is expecting to get a new contract by the end of this season. The talks will go on between the senior vice president of Yankees, Hank Steinbrenner and Cashman during this season. Cashman is in the last year of his present contract and he wants to keep any talk about the new deal as a matter only between him and Steinbrenner. At present both are busy concentrating on the spring training session and are expected to have a discussion later, in between the games of the season.
Cashman was only19 years old, when he joined Yankees, as an intern in the year 1986. He took over the post of General Manager in the year 1997 as a successor of Bob Watson. Steinbrenner said that, he has known Cashman personally for along time but, is unable to predict whether Cashman would like to stay on as the General Manager again. Steinbrenner values Cashman for his organizational abilities and to put everything in place. Steinbrenner is happy with the way things are going now. He is very impressed with the work of the new manager Joe Giardi. Both Cashman and Steinbrenner are positive about the outcome of the discussion of the contract.
February 27th, 2008
Joba Chamberlain, the most prized right handed player of New York Yankees is ready to pitch the balls, whether he is a starter or reliever. He announced during his batting practice for the spring that it won’t make any difference to him where he is positioned as the pitching staff of the Yankees. He ended his last year season as a rookie and will begin this year’s season in the bullpen and is expected to join the rotation later. Joba, who is only 22 years of age, became fans favorite player at the Yankee stadium in the last season. He was welcomed with loud applause for his pitching session this spring.
Last year he missed his play in the first month of the season because of a hamstring injury and played only 18 minor league matches before joining the Yankees. In his training session he threw 27 pitches and the Senior Vice president Stein Brenner was satisfied with Joba’s performance. The New Yankees manager also expressed his satisfaction about Joba’s pitching by saying “it is just explosive stuff”. With the amount of hard work Joba Chamberlain has put in for his improvement this year, he is expecting a great and satisfying career this year.
February 25th, 2008
Don Mattingly, the LA Dodger’s Assistant Coach, had the surprise of his life when he found out that his wife, Kim Mattingly had been arrested. She was arrested last weekend and charged by the police with disorderly conduct and intoxication in public. The couple has been divorced since last November as Don was making his move from being a hitting coach to a major league coach. Kim was arrested after she refused to leave his home. Apparently, he had taken her cell phone away from her and she was trying to get it back. Don told police he did not have the phone and that in the future, Kim would have to go through their lawyers to have anything to do with him.
The police were called back in a matter of hours as Kim was getting ready to leave. She was sitting in the passenger seat of a car and the police pulled her out. She was very unsteady on her feet. Alcohol could be smelled very heavily on her breath. She was then arrested and then released after posting a fifty dollar bond. Don Mattingly said he had no idea what caused her to become so upset. He didn’t even know that she had a phone with her. He says she needs to get some help for her drinking among other things.
February 22nd, 2008
The world has completely changed for Johan Santana, the 29 year old pitcher, when he signed the richest contract of $137.5 million with Mets for a period of six years. Now he will have to play up to the expectations of the hype created by the richest contract, as the premier pitcher of the baseball. Santana is least bothered about all these and says he knows what he is supposed to do and pressure is a part of any game. Mets fans hope that Santana is capable of imparting the lost spirit into the team, which is suffering from the shocks created by last season’s collapse and poor performance.
Santana is viewed as a savior by the Mets fans because they believe only Santana can lead the team to victory with the exceptional playing skills and oodles of confidence he has. Randolph Willie the manager of the Mets thinks that Santana can adjust to any type of environment and players with some attitude have always performed well in
New York. The baseball world is closely watching each and every move of Santana to find out how he is going to perform in the new team. The acquisition of Santana itself has boosted the confidence of the Mets.
February 20th, 2008
The Major League Baseball with its Ambassador Program is on a policy to build the interest of baseball in various countries all over the world by holding clinics and nurturing the young talents in these countries. During the off season, Curtis Granderson, the Tigers center fielder had the chance to visit the South Africa through the Ambassador Program organized by the MLB. Curtis was amazed by the number of young players interested in taking baseball as a career sport. There is only one major baseball tournament in a year in South Africa and nobody knows where the game is heading in 10 to 20 years time.
There are no African players currently playing in the Major Leagues but Curtis’s says that there is no dearth of talented players in Africa. Granderson asked the youth in Africa not to quit playing rugby, soccer or cricket, but asked them to add baseball also in their sporting activities. Granderson said that the knowledge and the eagerness to learn the game is very clearly visible among the youth in Africa and the facilities at the Athlon academy in Cape Town were pretty impressive. It is up to the coaches and the instructors to instill confidence in the young players to take up the sport seriously and to help them develop their playing skills.
February 18th, 2008
It will be a new experience for Mike Sweeney this season as he says goodbye to the Kansas City Royals. He officially agreed to a minor league contract with Oakland Athletics last Monday, Feb 11. He also accepted an invitation from the club for spring training.
Mike Sweeney, an All-Star for four consecutive years in 2000 to 2003, and again in 2005, has played 13 seasons with the Royals. He hit .299 and drove in about 83 runs six times. He was drafted by the Royals in the 10th round in 1991. In 2003, he became captain for the 2003 opener. However, the 34-year old designated hitter and first baseman’s injuries had limited his plays. In 2007, his right knee injury caused him to play 74 games, while in 2006 his back injury caused him to play 60 games only.
The Royals decided not to bring him back in 2008 because of Billy Butler, who gave a good performance last season as designated hitter when Sweeney had his injury. But Sweeney is taking it all in good stride. He said that he looked for other opportunities to play when Kansas City Royals showed that they weren’t thinking of bringing him back. He said he’s going to miss his teammates, but it was time to move on.
February 15th, 2008
The sort of media attention and publicity that the talented Japanese pitcher Matsuzaka got in his rookie season for the Red Sox was tremendous and this year the spring training sessions for the Red Sox is much calmer as the media craze on the Japanese player is over. Only a handful of about 20 reporters talked to Matasuzaka about his second year in Major League Baseball and the $103 million worth Red Sox pitcher was pretty confident of putting up a big show this season in the Major League Baseball. He said that he aware of the playing conditions and the facilities as opposed to last year when he was a rookie.
Matsuzaka is pretty much aware that he will have to fill a large void left by Curt Schilling’s injury and he is determined to give his best shot this season. The gyroball pitcher is Japan’s best ever pitcher and has lived up to the expectations of the Red Sox fans last year. Matsuzaka is currently going through his second spring training session and is slated to play in Tokyo in March 25th and 26th where the Red Sox will take on the Oakland Athletics. Matsuzaka’s participation is yet not confirmed as his wife is expected to give birth somewhere around that time.
February 13th, 2008
Buddy Bailey is a long time serving manager in the various Minor league baseball clubs in the U.S. He found his success after joining the Tigres de Aragua club of Venezuelan league or LVBP and since 2002 the Araguans have won four championships and one sub championship. It is the passion for the sport that brings this workaholic man to Venezuela every year in October, once the winter season sets in the U.S. Many American coaches have put their strong feet on the Venezuelan soil, but none were able to achieve what Bailey has so far achieved.
According to Bailey, most American players or coaches who visit Venezuela during the American winter season go there for only a year. But Bailey is of the opinion that one has to get acclimatized with the league as well as the foreign playing conditions to come up with a commendable performance. Moreover, a manager or trainer needs ample time to understand each player and his playing abilities as well as the opponent teams skills and weaknesses. Bailey’s inaugural season in Venezuela in 2003 saw stupendous success and the Tigres team won back to back titles in the successive years. Most of the players as well as the coaches in the Venezuelan baseball league classify him to be a very successful and hardworking manager.
February 11th, 2008
Roger Clemens, former pitcher of the New York Yankees, is now in a legal battle against Brian McNamee, his former trainer. Clemens is said to have used performance-enhancing drugs, and McNamee claims to have been the one who injected them on him.
On February 7, they both went to Capitol Hill — Clemens to meet with congressmen and McNamee to meet with lawyers from the House Committee — and delivered different stories regarding the matter. Just a day before, McNamee gave physical evidence to to Jeff Novitzky, an IRS Special Agent, to prove that the former pitcher did use steroids and human growth hormones. This physical evidence was actually syringes and gauze pads used in 2000 and 20001 that he said had the pitcher’s blood.
This issue was first opened in December 2007 when McNamee confessed in George Mitchell’s report about drugs and baseball that he himself injected Clemens with drugs in 1998, 2000, and 2001. Reacting to the story, Clemens denied his former trainer’s words, and eventually caught the attention of Congress.
Now everyone’s waiting for the public hearing scheduled on February 13 Wednesday. Andy Pettitte, who is presently the New York Yankees pitcher, will be testifying along with other witnesses.
February 9th, 2008
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