All-Star Break Time

Bunt, You Cowards!

Players don’t know about situational hitting anymore. In Monday’s Home Run Derby the defense was clearly playing the hitters to pull. There were a couple dozen kids covering left field, but no one guarding the third base line. Not one participant thought to take advantage of that and lay down a bunt. But no, the hitters all insisted on hitting it right into the defense. Not exactly Willie Keeler hittin’ ‘em where they ain’t. SMDH.

Over the years we’ve learned several things about the Derby. First, there’s a big difference between winning the night and winning the event. We frequently see someone go off in the first round only to be worn out by the later rounds. This year it was Julio Rodriguez. He totaled 41 long balls in round 1, but he clearly emptied his tank. Regardless of the final result, his showing will be long remembered, especially since he did it in front of his home fans.

Second, the pitcher is crucial. The way to win is through volume, you need perfectly placed pitches served up rapidly in order to pile up the necessary score. Take a look at Mookie Betts’ pitcher. He was working at a Trachsel-like pace. I believe he pitched out of the stretch a couple of times. And Pete Alonso’s pitcher was working the outside of the plate. This isn’t the right time to pitch around a guy. Contrast that with Rodriguez’s pitcher. He wasn’t even bothering to wind up; he simply lobbed soft tosses exactly where Rodriguez needed them.

Congrats to Vladimir Guerrero Jr. He didn’t waste any energy, doing exactly what he needed to do in each round. And kudos to Adley Rutschmann; switching sides of the plate during his bonus time was a serious baller move. And once again the event is much more watchable without Chris Berman at the mic. I know that it’s one of his trademarks, but the constant “back back back” would always grow very tiresome very quickly. Now if only ESPN could find a way to track the fly balls a little better. It’s difficult to do so with the hits flying that rapidly, but that’s why they make the big bucks.

Pump The Brakes On Elly De La Cruz

Let me start by saying that it was an undeniably cool moment when Elly De La Cruz stole second, third, and home in rapid succession last weekend. Furthermore, the whole purpose of the All-Star Game is to showcase the top talent in the game, especially the guys that fans really want to see. But I heard a lot of people advocating for De La Cruz’s inclusion on this year’s team despite the fact that he has played a grand total of 30 major league games thus far. Not to sound like too much of a stick in the mud, but his presence on the team this year would have been waaaaaay too premature.

I get the impulse. After only one month in the majors, he’s already setting the league on fire. But his time will come. If his debut month offers a hint of what the rest of his career has in store, then there will be many All-Star appearances to come. It’s tough enough as it is to find room on the roster for every deserving player; adding a player with such a thin resume makes that task even more difficult.

He may even be better off having been left off the team; the NL uniforms this year were hideous beyond belief. With those black pants the players looked like they were wearing Dockers. Instead of bats and gloves it looks like they should have been carrying clipboards instead. And they also needed to complete the ensemble with keychain clips on their belts. I know I sound like a grouchy old man, but so be it. The players need to wear their standard uniforms in the ASG! This is a hill I will choose to die on.

One postscript to the game - on Monday I bemoaned the fact that there are too many late in the game at bats for guys from teams with a sole representative. I specifically called out Elias Diaz as someone who I don’t need to see hit with the game on the line. So of course he went out of his way to make me look bad and hit what proved to be the game winning home run, which earned him MVP honors. Never mind.

You’re Hired! Now Get A Shave, You Hepcat

One of my favorite traditions occurs at the introductory press conference whenever a former Yankee signs a free agent contract with a new club. Much more often than not, he is suddenly sporting a beard. Hell, even Jeter grew a beard once he started running the Marlins.

Clearly, the Yankees have every right to institute whichever organizational rules they wish to. It’s still puzzling that they have such rigid grooming policies in the year of our lord 2023. Sure, it’s reasonable to prohibit some of the absurdly long beards that were all the rage among relief pitchers several years ago, but the Yankees’ policy gives me flashbacks to the days when I attended Catholic grammar school and the nuns would line up all the boys to make sure none of us had hair growing past our collars. To treat professional adults like that?

I bring this up now because the Yankees are hiring Sean Casey as their new hitting coach. Casey of course has worn a goatee for years. Can you imagine telling a grown-ass adult that he would need to shave in order to get the job? Never forget the team’s original sin. Way back in the 70s they forced Oscar Gamble to trim his iconic Afro. Truly unforgivable.

New Owners For Immaculate Grid

I mentioned Immaculate Grid in passing on Monday, and somewhat big news popped up concerning the game just yesterday. Sports Reference, the company behind Baseball-Reference.com and related sites for several other major sports has purchased the game. I’m glad to see that the game is in good hands; playing it every day is such a perfect way to Remember Some Guys. Happy gaming!

Swimming In The Wake

By all rights Missy Elliott’s induction into the Rock & Roll Hall Of Fame should serve as an impetus to bring more hip-hop acts into the institution. Remember, artists become eligible 25 years after their initial recording, so the cutoff for this year’s class is 1998. We’re well into the era in which hip-hop is the world’s most dominant musical form, yet voters have still been unable to honor more than one act per year.

A lot of that is due to the makeup of the voting bloc. Boomers still make up a large percentage of the voters, and you can bet that there is a significant portion of that demographic that remains hostile to hip-hop. The number of younger voters is steadily rising, which means the slow trickle of inducted hip-hop acts will eventually increase, but we’re not quite there yet.

And Elliott’s honor proves this. She will become the first female rapper to be inducted, which is just ridiculous. Salt-N-Pepa should be in by now, for pioneering reasons if nothing else. Queen Latifah is receiving a Kennedy Center honor this year, placing her firmly into the Lifetime Accolades portion of her career, although I’m not sure if I would classify her as Hall worthy.

If Missy Elliott leads more hip-hop acts into the Hall, it need not be limited to female emcees. There are lots of worthy acts from the genre’s early years still awaiting induction. Rakim is one of the greatest pure rappers in history, so I could see an Eric B & Rakim induction. De La Soul’s long delayed addition to streaming services has spurred on a full-blown resurgence of interest in their music; if it will ever happen for them it’s now or never.

In addition to the aforementioned Salt-N-Pepa, I would call for 2 other hip-hop acts to move to the front of the line for inclusion in next year’s class. First, A Tribe Called Quest clearly has a solid of amount of support with nominations the last 2 years. Third time the charm? And I find it hard to believe that OutKast has yet to be nominated, let alone inducted. OK, I’ll add one more name to the list. What about the Wu-Tang Clan? Finally, if the purpose of this discussion is to see who would follow Missy’s steps into the Hall, why not her chief collaborator? Timbaland warrants strong consideration for a Musical Excellence induction.

Neil Is Back

The date and preliminary lineup for the 2023 edition of Farm Aid was announced yesterday. It will take place September 23 in Indiana. I only mention this because this year’s show will include the return of one of the event’s founding fathers for the first time since 2019.

On one hand, it’s great that after almost 4 decades they are still staging the annual concert, but on the other hand it’s sad that it’s still necessary. From year 1 the headliners and board members have been Willie Nelson, John Mellencamp, and Neil Young, with Dave Matthews and Margo Price joining in as board members in later editions. (The event has been running so long that in its first year Mellencamp was still using Cougar as part of his stage name.)

Neil Young had sat out the 2 most recent, saying that he felt uncomfortable staging a large concert during COVID. (The 2020 edition was held remotely, but 2021 & 2022 ran as normal shows.) His reasoning was understandable but there were also 2 additional factorsthat had gotten me a little worried. First, like many of his contemporaries he had recently sold his publishing catalog. This has become increasingly common; largely for estate purposes. But he has also released substantial amounts of concert material from his archives. Now, he’s in his late 70s so I get that he’s facing his mortality to some extent. But doing this at the same time he sat out of an event in which he always participated made me wonder if there’s something more going on and that he’s been having health issues that he wishes to keep private. Because of that it’s encouraging that he’s back in the game and my concerns were misplaced. Long may he run.

Closing Time

Thanks as always for being part of the Tending The Herd family. See you all again on Friday.