With Curt Schilling going on the DL, a roster move had to happen with the Sox. I am not sure if J.D. Drew’s quad injury changed their thinking but they decided on calling up David Murphy from Pawtucket. He is with the team and will be available tonight. He will probably be with the club for only 4 days as the Sox will need a starter on Tuesday.For that, the Red Sox have decided on Kason Gabbard instead of Jon Lester to fill that role. Gabbard has already been up for one spot start this season as he filled in while Josh Beckett was on the DL. In his one start with Boston, he went 6 innings, striking out 7 in a win.

Murphy’s numbers in Pawtucket look like this: .283 avg with 5 home runs and 34 RBIs.

Gabbard’s numbers in Pawtucket look like this: 7-2 with a 3.24 ERA in 14 starts.

If I had to venture a guess, I would say that Gabbard will most likely make two starts for the big club while Schilling recovers.

Major League Baseball that is. Just a few days after the Yankees announced the signing of two players from China, the Mariners have done the same thing.

The Yankees got things started on Tuesday when they signed Kai Liu, a 19-year-old left-handed pitcher, and Zhenwang Zhang, a 19-year-old catcher, to minor league contracts after receiving the blessing of the Chinese Baseball Association. Both of them will report to Tampa around July 6th. This all comes on the heels of the Yankees signing a working agreement with the Chinese Baseball Association back in January.

On Wednesday, Yu Bing Jia, 24-year-old infielder/outfielder, and Wei Wang, a 28-year-old catcher, both signed minor league contracts with the Seattle Mariners. Both of them will report to the Mariners summer league team in Australia and will be there unless they are playing with the Chinese National Team.

It was only a matter of time before MLB teams tapped into the Chinese market. We have seen players from Japan and Korea and shortly you will be watching Chinese players in the big leagues. It also great for the teams because it now gives them another market to be seen in and sell merchandise.

Since I am all about press releases right now it seems, Bud Selig has issued a statement about Jason Giambi and the comments he made about his performance enhancing drug usage. Giambi does intend to cooperate and will only speak about his usage.

First up is Giambi’s comments:

“I alone am responsible for my actions and I apologize to the commissioner, the owners and the players for any suggestion that they were responsible for my behavior.”

“I will address my own personal history regarding steroids. I will not discuss in any fashion any other individual.”

“A direct conversation the commissioner impressed upon me the idea that the game of baseball would be best served by such a meeting,” Giambi said. “I will continue to do what I think is right and be candid about my past history regarding steroids. I have never blamed anyone nor intended to deflect blame for my conduct.”

Catch Bud Selig’s official statement after the jump.

Continue reading →

(Repost from February. I added a video of Sam’s interview at the Yale-Harvard football game in 2006.)

Recently, I was able to talk to one of my friends, Sam Rubin, about his new book titled “Yale Football”. I’ve known Sam since 1995 when I first started working in New Haven with him for the New Haven Ravens Minor League Baseball team. He was the webmaster and ran the scoreboard among many other duties there.

Tell us a little about yourself Sam:

I grew up in New York City but now live and work in New Haven. I have been in New Haven since 1991, my freshman year at Yale. I spent 10 years working for the New Haven Ravens, the local Minor League Baseball team that left town in 2003. I have also worked for the Yale Athletic Department since 1995, mainly covering the football team.

Tell us a little about your book “Yale Football” and what inspired you to write it:

I wrote a book called “Baseball in New Haven” for the same publishing company, Arcadia, in 2003. They have a series of pictorial histories entitled “Images of Sports” that are all the same format: 128 pages of black-and-white photos with detailed captions. The baseball book was very well-received, so Arcadia asked me to write one about Yale football as well.

Can you tell the readers why you decided to use Walter Camp on the cover?:

Walter Camp, an 1880 Yale graduate who was both a player and a coach, was called the “father of American football” by John Heisman. He developed concepts such as downs, play from scrimmage, and keeping score by points instead of goals. He helped turn football from something that resembled soccer and rugby to the game we all know today. He is a Hall of Famer, and there is still an All-America team that bears his name, so he is clearly Yale’s most influential football figure. I was able to get a photo of another famous Yale coach, Carm Cozza, in the background of the cover. Cozza was Yale’s head coach for 32 years and was responsible for 10 of Yale’s 14 Ivy League titles.

How far back were you able to find pictures or documents for the book? Were you able to get all the way back to when Yale Football first started?

I was able to find a poster that promoted the first game Yale ever played — Nov. 16, 1872 (a 3-0 win over Columbia). Back then there were 20 men on a team so the posted referred to “Picked Twenties”. That was the only game Yale played that year so I was not able to find any team photos, but I did find the 1873 Yale team photo. I tried to get an even distribution of photos across Yale’s 130+ years of football, and fortunately the university and the athletic department have very good archives.

Give us a few names of some famous people who played football during the years at Yale :

Some Yale players have gone on to play in the NFL, such as Calvin Hill, Dick Jauron and Eric Johnson. There are also dozens of College Football Hall of Famers from Yale, including two Heisman Trophy winners (Larry Kelley in 1936 and Clint Frank in 1937). There have also been people who have gone on to fame away from the field, such as Stone Phillips and Jack Ford. Additionally, former U.S. President Gerald Ford was an assistant coach at Yale.

Have any of them given you feedback about your book?

I mainly hear from fans, who all enjoy the way books like this bring back memories. People who have followed the team for a while remember players such as Brian Dowling, who inspired the character “B.D.” in Doonesbury — I did write to Garry Trudeau to get permission to use a copy of the comic strip in the book. The baseball book I wrote contained photos of George H.W. Bush and George W. Bush, who both played for Yale. My father sent a copy to George W. Bush, who wrote a letter from the White House thanking him.

What was your most memorable moment you found during the process of creating the book?
One of Yale’s biggest wins was an upset at Princeton in 1934. The Tigers were 6-0 and had 15 wins in a row overall; one rumor even had them going to the Rose Bowl. Yale beat them 7-0 on a touchdown pass to Larry Kelley, who would win the Heisman Trophy two years later. The same 11 guys played the whole game for Yale, earning them the nickname “Iron Men”. I uncovered a photo I had never seen before of Kelley leaping to make the catch that won the game — a huge play in one of Yale’s greatest wins by one of its greatest players.

Any future works planned?:
I would like to eventually write another book, assuming I can find a subject that is both interesting to me and marketable to the general public. I’ll keep you posted.

I’d like to thank Sam for taking the time to answer a few questions about his book. If you would like to know more about the book, you can head over to Yale’s football site by clicking here. If you are interested in ordering the book, it is available at Amazon.com and Barnes and Noble.com.

http://youtube.com/watch?v=
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d2Ren4Ce_k8[/youtube]

Here are some photos of Sam being interviewed by Kandace Krueger during the Yale-Harvard football game this past season.

Is the Nextel NASCAR Cup getting a new name for 2008? According to sources at NASCAR, Nextel will no longer be the sponsor and Sprint will take over as title sponsor. Nextel and Sprint are the same company as they merged together back in 2004. They are known as Sprint Nextel.

If this happens, it would be the third name for the NASCAR Cup Series since 2003. It was known as the Winston Cup before becoming the NEXTEL Cup.

Wouldn’t it just be easier to call it the Sprint Nextel NASCAR Cup?

Eight days ago, I had made a poll asking if the Red Sox should re-sign Curt Schilling. The voting was close with 33 saying yes and 27 saying no.

The Red Sox have never extended a contract during the season under Theo’s reigns. The Red Sox made the right decision in waiting until the end of the year to make a decision to see where he stood healthwise. And that decision looks none the wiser right now.

Schilling’s MRI results are back and on most accounts things are ok. They didn’t find any structural damage and it seems to be a case of tendinitis. What’s concerning to me is that this may have been going on all year. This could explain his up and down outings on the mound.

“This has been going on, on and off, since late spring training, from a feel standpoint, I just have not felt right this year and itÂ’s had an immense amount of influence on the inconsistency that IÂ’’ve gone through, and that’s the disappointing part.”

“I wasn’t discomfort free [pitching in Atlanta],” Schilling said. “Pain is a relative term. There’s been a lot of, this year, trying to discern what’s because I’m 40, and what’s because I don’t feel good, that’s been kind of what we’ve tried to do here.”

“My thought is, from what I’ve heard, I have a little touch of tendinitis that’s causing some other things to happen,” Schilling said. “No, I don’t really think I’ve ever been at this point before because the other day … well my last two starts, I’m throwing the ball, and it’s obviously hot and muggy out, 80 degrees with Atlanta humidity and I can’t throw the ball. I mean, it’s almost like firing out of your stance [as a football lineman does] and trying to block a guy without being able to bring your hands up. I mean I had nothing. And it was a tough one.”

“The scary part was the similarities in the innings,” Schilling said. “When I tore my labrum in 1995, I was throwing the ball 95 m.p.h. one inning, and the next thing I went out and I was throwing the ball 82 m.p.h. and I didn’t have any pain until the next day. The other night, thatÂ’s exactly what happened. I could not throw the ball. I could not get anything on the baseball. I was throwing the ball 82 m.p.h. and fortunately I didn’t wake up the next day with the pain, so there’s none of that. That was an eerie similarity that was playing on my head pretty severely there.”

You have to think the Red Sox knew about this all season. Then again maybe they didn’t. Only they will know.

Schilling is headed now to the disabled list where he will spend at least the next 15 days rehabbing his shoulder. He had a cortisone injection yesterday and will be examined again on Friday in Boston before heading out to San Diego to rejoin his teammates.

There is a lot of speculation going on right now as to who will be called up to replace him. With the day off on Thursday, Josh Beckett will pitch on Sunday on his regular rest and Yo-Yo Tavarez will pitch on Monday. The Sox will need a starter for Tuesday. Could it be Jon Lester? Or it will be Kason Gabbard again? I think it’s going to all depend on how long Schilling will really be out. They will backdate it to yesterday, so if he spends only 15 days on the DL, they will only need a starter for two days.

Tavarez has been pitching well enough to stay in the rotation. Lester can definitely help out and so can Gabbard. They will probably call up either a reliever or position player for the next four games after tonight’s game and then will need a starter.

So stay tuned. It is good news it’s nothing major for Schilling. I think I felt the big gasp of air let out this morning when the news broke.

[Extra Bases]

Total credit for the find goes to The Boss over at Sons of Sam Malone. He found the video and wrote about it. So I highly encourage you to see what he has to say. I am just going to show the latest commercial here.

[dailymotion 3UfNIc8OaEbqUgmse]

After doing the original article on Dwight Evans, Ian and I thought it’d be good for me to take a look at Jim Rice and ask the same question. So I decided to take a look at some statistics and see how they support it.

When you go to the baseball-reference.com and look up Jim Rice one of the things they give you is the pages for similar hitters and for players who were comparable at the same age. With Rice being a left fielder/DH I compared him to outfielder’s who are Hall members. The problem with Rice is that many of the players they compare him too are also not in the hall. Players like Dale Murphy, Dave Parker, George Foster and others. So what I did was used outfielders and some noted power guys to see how Jim Ed’s numbers stack up.

Jim Rice:
16 years, 2089 G, 8225 AB, 1249 R, 2452 H, 373 2B, 89 3B, 382 HR, 1451 RBI, 670 BB, 1423 K, .298 BA, .352 OBP, .502 SLG, averaged 30 HR, 113 RBI, 8 All-Star games, 1 MVP.

The players we will look at when comparing Jim will be:

Duke Snyder:
18 years, 2143 G, 7161 AB, 1259 R, 2116 H, 358 2B, 85 3B, 407 HR, 1333 RBI, 971 BB, 1237 K, .295 BA, .380 OBP, .540 SLG, averaged 31 HR, 101 RBI, 8 All-Star games.

Eddie Murray:
21 years, 3026 G, 11336 AB, 1627 R, 3255 H, 560 2B, 35 3B, 504 HR, 1917 RBI, 1333 BB, 1516 K, .287 BA, .359 OBP, .476 SLG, averaged 27 HR, 103 RBI, 7 All-Star games, Rookie of the Year, 3 Gold Gloves.

Kirby Puckett:
12 years, 1783 G, 7244 AB, 1071 R, 2304 H, 414 2B, 57 3B, 207 HR, 1085 RBI, 450 BB, 965 K, .318 BA, .360 OBP, .477 SLG, averaged 19 HR, 99 RBI, 10 All-star games, 6 Gold Gloves, 1 All-Star MVP, 1 ALCS MVP, 1 Batting Title.

Dave Winfield:
22 years, 2973 G, 11003 AB, 1669 R, 3110 H, 540 2B, 88 3B, 465 HR, 1833 RBI, 1216 BB, 1686 K, .283 BA, .353 OBP, .475 SLG, averaged 25 HR, 100 RBI, 12 All-Star teams, 7 Gold Gloves.

Mickey Mantle:
18 years, 2401 G, 8102 AB, 1617 R, 2415 H, 344 2B, 72 3B, 536 HR, 1509 RBI, 1733 BB, 1710 K, .298 BA, .421 OBP, .557 SLG, averaged 36 HR, 102 RBI, 16 All-Star games, 3 MVPs, 1 Triple Crown, 1 Gold Glove.

Roberto Clemente:
18 years, 2433 G, 9454 AB, 1416 R, 3000 H, 440 2B, 166 3B, 240 HR, 1305 RBI, 621 BB, 1230 K, .317 BA, .359 OBP, .475 SLG, averaged 16 HR, 87 RBI, 12 All-Star teams, 1 MVP, 1 WS MVP, 12 Gold Glove, 4 Batting Titles.

In addition to above mentioned stuff, Rice lead the AL in HRs 3 times, twice in RBI, twice in slugging percentage, once in hits, once in triples and 4 times into double plays grounded into. The GIDP has been for some voters a HUGE knock on Rice. He is 6th all-time in that category. The top five are 5. Eddie Murray 4. Dave Winfield 3. Carl Yastrzemski 2. Hank Aaron 1. Cal Ripken. The top 5 are all HOF members. End of argument.

When compared to the Hall Famers above he more than holds his own. Jim’s numbers compare favorably to the HOF’s listed above. He is only missing a batting title and maybe a few more All-Star games but even without those look at his numbers compared to Mantle.

My opinion is that Jim Rice deserves to be in the Hall of Fame and that the Hall voters are either blind or high or both. In fact I’d be willing to bet if you looked at numbers of some other players who aren’t in from the same era they deserve to go as well. I remember watching some of these guys that I mentioned above as a kid and announcers and writers would say they were having a hall of fame career. If that’s so how come these guys, especially Jim Rice, are not in the Hall?

Hideki Matsui has one. So Daisuke Matsuzaka. Now you can add Hank Aaron to the baseball players with faces on an airplane. Delta Airlines unveiled Hank Aaron’s likeness on a plane yesterday at Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport. The plane’s name is the “Hank Aaron 755”.

“I am honored and sometimes you know I pinch myself every now and then to see whether it is real or not,” Aaron said.

Added the 73-year-old Aaron: “I am so thrilled to have an airplane named after me. This is something I never dreamed about. As my mother always said, you’ve come a long ways baby, and enjoy yourself.”

Hat tip to my Uncle Jock for the tip.