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Sunday, April 22, 2007
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DAILY 04-22-07 MD RE E14
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The Washington Post
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MLBSunday
By Dave Sheinin
12
Home runs by the Yankees’ Alex Rodriguez in his first 15 games this season. He tied
the Phillies’ Mike Schmidt (1976) for the fastest to 12 homers. He needs two more to
tie Albert Pujols (2006) for the most home runs hit in April. Rodriguez also has 31 RBI,
four short of Juan Gonzalez’s April record of 35, set with the Rangers in 1998.
WHAT IT FEELS LIKE . . .
Gotta Love a Good LOOGY
LOOGY (LOO•gee) n. Acronym for “lefty one-out guy,” refers to
a left-handed relief specialist whose primary job is to
retire left-handed batters in high-pressure, late-inning
situations, often facing only one such batter per game.
What’s a
LOOGY?
One-out lefties have carved a niche in baseball strategy.
GREAT MOMENTS IN LOOGY HISTORY
. . . to get pancaked at home plate
by a 6-3, 220-pound base runner
going full speed
On April 21, 2005, Mike
Redmond, the Minnesota Twins’
backup catcher, was run over at the
plate by Kansas City Royals first
baseman Mike Sweeney, a collision
that forced Redmond out of the
game and left him with bruised ribs.
Here is his account of the collision:
You see the ball coming from left
field, and you see the runner in your line
of vision. It was the ninth inning, close
game, and I said, “I have to hang in
there, hang in there,” as the ball’s
coming. And the ball took a hop on the
turf and just kind of slowed down. And
by then I was in no-man’s land, I
couldn’t get out of the way. So I just
had to take it. He hit me. I mean, he
crushed me. And I just went straight
backwards.
Then I was on my back, kind of doing
a check of my body, trying to find out
what hurt the most, so I could tell the
trainers when they got there. At first I
thought I’d separated my shoulder. And
I was having trouble breathing, and
every time I breathed it was hurting. It
just kind of paralyzes you.
Sweeney is the nicest guy in the
world, and he’s saying, “Dude I’m sorry,
I’m sorry. You okay?” I said, “Don’t
worry about it. That’s what you’re
supposed to do.”
. . . I didn’t go on the disabled list,
but it still hurt almost all year. I can still
feel it in there every once in a while.
I have a photo of [the collision] on
the wall in my office. It’s not something
I think about much now, but when I’m
done I want to be able to remember
what it felt like.
A youthful
Tony LaRussa
brought LOOGY
philosophy
to Chicago in
1979.
Barry Bonds
with a swing
and a miss
against his
LOOGY nemesis,
King, in 2004.
BY DILIP VISHWANAT—GETTY IMAGES
ASSOCIATED PRESS
1
2
Aug. 2, 1979
Chicago White Sox name Tony La Russa manager
La Russa may not have invented the LOOGY, though he
often gets the credit, but he certainly helped popularize
it, deploying such proto-LOOGYs as Kevin Hickey (White
Sox, 1981-83) and Rick Honeycutt (Oakland, 198893). After moving to St. Louis, he further standardized
the double-LOOGY bullpen, using both Honeycutt and
Tony Fossas in that role in 1996.
May 15, 1987
3
Jesse Orosco loses the New York Mets’ closer job
Just seven months after closing out the Mets’ World
Series title, Orosco lost his job to rising star Roger
McDowell, relegating Orosco to the ranks of LOOGYdom. But Orosco turned the demotion into a mission,
authoring arguably the greatest career in LOOGY
history. He pitched until he was 46 years old and still
holds the all-time record of 1,252 games pitched.
Ray King faces Barry Bonds for the first time
In a historic meeting, King gets Bonds to tap back to
the mound for an out. Why is this historic? In the next
six years, King will hock a figurative loogie into Bonds’s
eye. Bonds has gone 1 for 16 (.063) in his career vs.
King, his lowest batting average against any pitcher
he has faced more than 15 times. The one hit,
however, was a walk-off homer in 2003.
MOST PROLIFIC “PURE” LOOGYS
TOP LOOGYS OF 2006
Most career games pitched while averaging less than one inning.
(minimum 50 games pitched)
INNINGS OPPONENTS’
GAMES PITCHED BATTING AVG.
PITCHER
July 31, 2000
Dennys Reyes (Twins)
Will Ohman (Cubs)
George Sherrill (Mariners)
Trever Miller (Astros)
Matt Thornton (White Sox)
Damaso Marte (Pirates)
Mike Myers (Yankees)
66
78
72
70
63
75
62
50.2
65.1
40.0
50.2
54.0
58.1
30.2
.197
.208
.213
.225
.229
.244
.244
Reyes, near right, held opponents under .200 last
year. Stanton, far right, is the career uber-LOOGY.
BY JONATHAN DANIEL—GETTY IMAGES
INNINGS
PITCHED
PITCHER
GAMES
Mike Stanton (1989-2007)*
Paul Assenmacher (1986-1999)
Mike Myers (1995-2007)*
Buddy Groom (1992-2005)
Steve Kline (1997-2007)*
Alan Embree (1992-2007)*
Graeme Lloyd (1993-2003)
Tony Fossas (1988-1999)
Scott Radinsky (1990-2001)
Ricardo Rincon (1997-2006)
1,117 1,061.2
884
855.2
819
494.1
786
734.2
732
640.0
717
627.2
568
533.0
567
415.2
557
481.2
557
439.2
OPPONENTS’
BATTING AVG.
.253
.255
.252
.285
.250
.252
.271
.269
.253
.233
BY CHRIS TROTMAN—GETTY IMAGES
* through Tuesday’s games
SOURCE: STATS LLC.
As a Twin,
Former Nat
Ortiz Excels
Nice Work if You Can Get It
Left-handed Relief Specialists Have a Unique Job: Face Just One Batter
By Dave Sheinin
Washington Post Staff Writer
And now, faithful readers of MLB
Sunday, let us join in praise for the
LOOGY: the “lefty one-out guy,” also
known as the left-handed relief specialist. You know him. You love him
(as long as he’s retiring his one batter per game). You wish you were
him.
He is typically goofy and often
overweight — his job description requires little in the way of sanity or fitness. He enters during the seventh or
eighth inning, faces his one batter
(usually the best left-handed hitter
on the opponents’ roster), and disappears into the clubhouse to sip a
beer. For a season of this, he often
earns several million dollars. Because of the low mileage on his arm,
he often pitches into his 40s.
He is the reason you tie your 2year-old son’s right hand behind his
back when your wife isn’t around.
“I was a big Nolan Ryan fan as a
kid,” said LOOGY extraordinaire Jamie Walker of the Baltimore Orioles
(current contract: three years, $12
million), explaining how one typically becomes a LOOGY. “Hell, I didn’t
want to be a reliever until I realized
my stuff is not as good . . . It does
blow my mind, the money we make.”
The LOOGY (freelance writer
John Sickels is often credited with
coining the term), did not fully
evolve until recent times, but has
been around longer than you might
think. The first documented LOOGY
season by our (admittedly) arbitrary
definition — a season in which a lefty
made at least 40 relief appearances
while averaging less than one inning
per appearance — was by the immortal Bill Henry of the Cincinnati Reds
in 1962. That makes Fred Hutchinson the first manager to deploy — or,
some might say, “to hock” — a LOOGY.
But it wasn’t until the 1980s that
the LOOGY began to take hold as a
standard bullpen weapon. Two significant things happened in that decade: Tony La Russa (in 1980) managed his first full season and Jesse
Orosco (in 1987) lost his closer’s job.
Over time, La Russa would come to
be known as the most prolific (or,
some might say, most egregious) deployer of the LOOGY in history,
while Orosco, in the second half of
his career, would become known as
the Godfather of the LOOGY.
“Oh, man Orosco,” said Dennys
THE LIST: Five Likeliest to Reach 3,000 Hits
Houston Astros second baseman Craig Biggio entered the weekend needing only
56 more hits to reach 3,000 — the magic number that typically gains one entry
to Cooperstown. Of the 26 batters with 3,000 hits, only Pete Rose (who is ineligible), Rafael Palmeiro and Rickey Henderson (who are not yet eligible)
are not in the Hall of Fame.
But after Biggio, there are no slam-dunk future members of
the 3,000-hit club. No one under 40 has as many as
2,500 hits, and Ivan Rodriguez is the only player 35 or
younger with as many as 2,200.
Still, the 3,000-hit plateau will be reached again.
Here are five players with the best chance to be next:
Reyes of the Minnesota Twins, who
last season authored one of the greatest LOOGY seasons of all-time (66
appearances, 502⁄3 innings, 0.89 ERA,
.197 opponents’ batting average).
“He’s the one we all look up to.”
La Russa began using Kevin Hickey as a LOOGY with the White Sox
in 1981, and La Russa’s future teams
in Oakland and St. Louis almost uniformly carried one LOOGY, if not
two. The list reads like a Who’s Who
of LOOGYs: Rick Honeycutt, Tony
Fossas, Lance Painter, Orosco (for
six games in 2000), Steve Kline and
Ray King.
Last season, La Russa deployed
one of his LOOGYs (Tyler Johnson
or Randy Flores) to face a single batter a total of 33 times, tops in the National League and third in all of baseball behind Joe Torre’s Yankees (Ron
Villone and Mike Myers) and Mike
Hargrove’s Mariners (primarily
George Sherrill), who each did it 35
times, according to retrosheet.org.
“Everybody gives La Russa a hard
knock [for over-managing],” King
said, “but he’s a guy [who] put every
pitcher in a situation to have success
. . . A game could be 14-1, and he’s
still going to match up.”
Interestingly, though King is one
of the greatest LOOGYs of all-time,
in his first five appearances for the
Nationals this season he has faced
five, two, three, four and six batters.
Nats rookie manager Manny Acta
has some learning to do, it seems, in
the art of the LOOGY.
Staff writers Barry Svrluga and
Jorge Arangure Jr. contributed to
this report.
3 UP & 3 DOWN
A-Rod
Soriano
What’s more jaw-dropping — 12
homers in first 15 games, or
keeping his foot out of his mouth for
three straight weeks?
Former Nats star struggling, injured
with Cubs. On pace for another
“40-40” year — 40 hits, 40 RBI.
Virginia Tech Hats
Johnsons
For one night, all the Nats were
Hokies, even U-Va. product Ryan
Zimmerman.
Five of them currently on the
disabled list (Nick, Randy, Dan, Josh
and Reed). Tyler and Kelly, better
watch your backs.
1962 Mets Watch
Time to start showing daily
comparisons to all-time worst
team. Through 15 games: ’62 Mets
(3-12), ’07 Phillies (4-11).
DEREK JETER, NEW YORK YANKEES
32 years old, 2,170 hits
Jeter, who turns 33 in June, should have no
problem reaching 3,000 by around 2011 and could
even make a run at the rarefied 3,500-hit club, which
has only five members (Rose, Ty Cobb, Hank Aaron,
Stan Musial and Tris Speaker). Jeter has five 200-hit
seasons on his résumé, and his career batting average
of .317 ranks sixth among active players with at least
3,000 plate appearances.
1
BARRY BONDS, SAN FRANCISCO GIANTS
42 years old, 2,852 hits
Don’t laugh. If he matches his 2006 production (99 hits in 130 games), Bonds, who turns
43 in July, would reach 3,000 midway through
the 2008 season. As with his home run chase, a
lot depends on how often pitchers choose to
pitch to him.
2
RODRIGUEZ, NEW YORK YANKEES
31 years old, 2,087 hits
3 ALEX
He has more hits than Jeter had at the same
age, but is not advancing as quickly. A-Rod has
not had a 200-hit season since 2001, but he has
averaged around 180 per year since then — a
pace that would put him on the cusp of 3,000
by the end of the 2011 season.
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Ramon Ortiz might have
re-signed with the Washington
Nationals this winter if the
organization could have made
two things happen: Prove they
were ready to be a winner in
2007, and move to the American
League. The chances of either,
of course, were nil.
And so Ortiz, the Nationals’
winningest pitcher last year, is
plying his trade for the
Minnesota Twins — fulfilling
his wishes of playing for a
potential winner, and not having
to bat. Through three starts, he
is 3-0 with a 2.05 ERA, and he
says he could not be happier.
“I felt good in Washington,”
said Ortiz, who was 11-16 with a
5.57 ERA in his only D.C.
season, “but I feel great here.”
Ortiz has been effusive in his
praise of Twins pitching coach
Rick Anderson. “Sometimes you
pitch, and you do something
wrong,” he said. “[Anderson]
sees what I do wrong, and he
teaches me the right way.”
Asked about the implication
that Nationals pitching coach
Randy St. Claire was not as
attentive, Ortiz backed away.
“No, St. Claire is good,” he said.
“But every pitching coach is
different, and [Anderson] just
sees everything.”
Ortiz said the Nationals made
a competitive offer to keep him,
but had no chance. He signed a
one-year deal with the Twins for
$3.1 million.
“I like to win,” Ortiz said. “I
don’t care if I could be the
number one starter in
Washington. I’d rather be
number five here and win.”
K FAMILIAR DIFFICULTIES: Why
does the greatest closer in
history, Mariano Rivera of the
New York Yankees, all of a
sudden turn into Jorge Julio
when he gets anywhere near the
Boston Red Sox, as he did again
Friday night in blowing a save at
Fenway Park?
The Yankees, of course,
would say it’s merely
coincidence that Rivera has
converted only 66.7 percent of
his saves (14 of 21 with an ERA
of 2.87) against the Red Sox
since the start of the 2004
season — including playoffs —
vs. a save percentage of 93
percent (120 out of 129 with an
ERA of 1.62) against the other
28 teams.
However, familiarity
undoubtedly has something to
do with it. Rivera has pitched
372⁄3 innings against Boston in
that span, nearly nine innings
more than he has pitched
against any other team.
THE WASHINGTON POST
King Felix
Mariners ace Hernandez injures
elbow in third start. Pity the fool
who flew all the way out to Seattle
to see that.
THE WEEK AHEAD
PUJOLS, ST. LOUIS CARDINALS
27 years old, 1,171 hits
4 ALBERT
Pujols has averaged 193 hits per season since
his debut in 2001, and at that pace would reach
3,000 in just over decade. Like Bonds, he could
be hurt by pitchers’ unwillingness to pitch to
him.
ICHIRO SUZUKI, SEATTLE MARINERS
33 years old, 1,368 hits
Ichiro is at a severe disadvantage, of course,
by having spent nine seasons in Japan. But he
has caught up in a hurry, averaging 225 hits a
year in the U.S.. At that rate, he could get close
to 3,000 by the end of 2013, when he will be 39.
5
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NEWS & NOTES
RED SOX AT YANKEES
WHITE SOX AT ROYALS
Friday through Sunday
Yankee Stadium, New York
Tomorrow and Tuesday
Kauffman Stadium, Kansas City
After this weekend’s showdown
in Boston, the teams reconvene
at Yankee Stadium, where Red
Sox rookie Daisuke Matsuzaka
(who is lined up to pitch the
opener) gets his first taste of the Bronx cheer.
.
Poor Johnny Vander Meer. The
only time his name is invoked is
when someone who has thrown
a no-hitter takes the mound the
next time. Tomorrow it will be
Mark Buehrle trying to join Vander Meer as the
only pitchers to throw consecutive no-hitters.
TIGERS AT ANGELS
BREWERS AT CUBS
Tomorrow and Tuesday
Angel Stadium, Anaheim, Calif.
Tomorrow through Wednesday
Wrigley Field, Chicago
The injury-depleted Angels are
slowly getting back to full
strength, with ace Bartolo
Colon and slugger Vladimir
Guerrero both expected back
this weekend — just in time to welcome the
defending AL champs to town tomorrow.
The Cubs expect to get Alfonso
Soriano (hamstring) back early
in the week — and they hope
they’ll be getting the Soriano of
2006 (46 homers, 95 RBI) and
not the Soriano of 2007 (no homers, 1 RBI).
They’ll need him against the Brewers, who
surged to the top of the NL Central this week.