Ah, Chacin and Kazmir did indeed meet up in Binghamton last year. Kaz took a perfect game through six inning only to give up a pair of runs in the 7th while Chacin pitched 7 no-hit inning. The no-no was broken up off reliever Travis Thompson in the 9th but Chacin got the 2-0 win.

Too slow on the refresh button.

Of course Chacin had a little deja vu two weeks later as he pitched another 7 innings of no-hit ball only to have reliever Travis Thompson once again break up the no-hitter.

I think there's room on this team for a lefty crusher, either to spell Koskie or Hinske. Hillenbrand could start at 3B or 1B vs lefties with the new crusher assuming the DH duties. Menechino, with an 832 OPS vs LHP over the past 3 seasons, is probably the best in-house solution. He's obviously playing 2B tonight just to get some playing time -- a healthy Hudson will probably start 150 games. I guess we'll know how Gibbons intends to play this when the team sees their next LH starter.

Make a note of the time and place. The only reason it's happening is just to make sure everyone on the team has gotten into a game, and gotten some at bats, as soon as possible. I'm sure Myers will start one of the weekend games, and that'll be evryone.

Gus the Polar Bear. No one is afraid enough.

I'm more inclined to believe that Foulke giving up a home run to Jeter cost the Sox the game.

And I was kinda impressed by his high school numbers:

11-2 , 0.37 ERA, 75 IP, 175 Ks, 19 hits.

That's... insane. Imagine hitting against that in high school. It was less than three years ago and he struck out way way more than half the batters he faced. As near as I can tell, he faceds about 270 guys, and fanned 175...

Sawkiw has yet to make a contribution. That's not the same as "he hasn't said anything" - just nothing worth taking note of.

And Kazmir comes out after 88 pitches.

They don't know him like we do.

Hudson hits for Menechino - Gross for Rios when the spot comes up?

Chacin is from Venezuela.

I dunno, ask a Cubs fan. If it wasn't for Steve Bartman, Alex would be living in an eternal infamy. And he was way more to blame than Bartman.:-)

But Gonzo's a good defensive player. He was a good turf shortstop because he had decent quickness, good hands, and a very good arm. Those attributes should make him a good third baseman. There is no known universe where he hits enough to be a third baseman, but his skill set at short really fits turf better than grass. And turf is vanishing from the earth.

Huff didn't get an error because he was able to salvage an out by making the throw to second. After the play there shouldhave been a run scored on the sac fly, a runner at first, and another out. And that's exactly what happened.

Maybe it's just my need to for exactness but I would have preferred to see something like. RBI, hitter reaches on Error by Huff, and then I dont know could you give a baserunning Error to Killenbrand? Whatever, it's not a big deal I just dont really like it.

A combination of things. Not the 73 pitches, but it was a long inning to sit through. And it led to a big enough lead to turn it over to the pen, and begin getting them involved in the season...

Sawkiw just called Doc "a wily veteran."

Lord, give me strength.

I don't think I've ever seen a play scored that way before. Was it scored correctly?

Certainly had Huff been charged with an error (if Hillenbrand had made it to 2nd), then the scoring decision would have been E9 with a SF, RBI and no AB for Rios.

But as there was a FC on the play, doesn't that automatically negate the E9 (which it did) as well as the SF? Shouldn't Rios get the RBI, but also get charged with an AB? I can't believe you can get credit for a SF without (a) an actual SF or (b) an error on what would have been a SF.

Rios deserved the SF (and no AB), but I think Hillenbrand's brain fart on the basepaths precludes it.

As usual, I could always be wrong.

Nah, he's still 0-3.

So he was charged with an AB? Then that makes sense. I guess whether or not he gets credit for a SF (the non-AB saving variety which I never knew existed) or not is neither here nor there. He should have been charged with an AB and was. He should have received an RBI and did.

Hillenbrand owes him a beer for costing him an AB. If Rios ends the year hitting .399, we'll all remember this play.

I think R Billie is correct about Perez's future in the OF. Piniella does like his glovemen and is only tolerating Huff out there because of his bat. Perez does hit lefties well enough to warrant playing and should either DH or play 1B.

But it's true, it's true! He was benched on April 11, 2004 so Sexson could play 1b. And again on April 23. And four straight games from April 25-28. He only played 148 games... that's 125 more games than Sexson played, but whatever.

So he was charged with an AB?

Nope. He's flied out twice, grounded out once, and hit a sac fly. He's 0-3 in four plate appearances.

My head hurts. I thought (and still believe) that Huff gets off the hook for dropping the ball since Hillenbrand was out on a fielder's choice. To my mind, Huff dropping the ball and getting the 9-6 out is no different than Rios slapping a grounder to RF, Hillenbrand falling down and then getting thrown out 9-6.

On the topic of Huff's blunder, what is Rod Black talking about that Huff's gaff led to the big inning? Huff's dropped ball was irrelevant. There should have been an out on the play and there was. It was fortuitous, to be sure, but Huff's blunder did not end up causing any damage at all.

No kidding. I was screaming "enough with the fastballs" throughout that entire Lugo AB. His only non-fastball was what I think was supposed to be a sinker, but it was in the dirt. Luckily, the SS LOOGY will live to sail another day.

The TB TV guy said Frasor when he meant Speier? ;)

Okay, one more comment and then I'm leaving this dead horse by the side of the road. I was under the belief that for Rios to get a SF, the scorer would have to decide that a play on which an error was made would have otherwise been a SF had the error not been made. Insofar as no error was charged -- Huff catching a break due to Hillenbrand's misadventure -- I though that this then precluded the ability to give Rios the SF. Yes Huff dropped the ball, but still made an out and thus "deserves" credit for doing so, despite how ugly it looked. In my small brain, no E9 implies no SF. I have learned something this evening.

Call the glue factory.

I would think that he is just because we know that he's capable of playing CF when needed, something Ive never heard anyone suggest Gross is capable of. I would probably guess that Gross has the better arm though.

And there is, of course, absolutely no logical reason for this whatsoever. It's what they call "an ancient, goofy rule." They were originally just included as sacrifices when the rule was devised in 1908. The sac fly was abolished in 1931, reinstated in 1939, abolished again in 1940, and reinstated (for keeps) in 1954.

Sac flies count as plate appearances for on-base percentage. Sac hits do not.

Everything you are saying makes sense. And it makes sense that Rios gets a SF from a fairness point of view. My only confusion has to do with the technical details. The SF is a judgement call (i.e., what should have happened). And I don't dispute that. But to make that judgement call means that you must formally acknowledge that a defensive player made a mistake. By not charging that player with an error (which he avoided through a fortuitous set of circumstances), I would have thought that the scorer would then no longer be privileged to make a judgement call.

I am not arguing that I am right or should be right. I am just surprised since I have never seen this before.

This was a strange one - I've never seen precisely this one before. I've seen (several times) sac fly when the fielder dropped it and the batter was safe on the error. The batter reaches on the error but isn't 0-1 because it was a sac fly. Tonight the runner on first getting thrown out changed the error to a fielder's choice.

Its rewarding a hitter twice because a run scored. An RBI and no time at bat.

Excellent posting tonight everyone. Entertaining and informative, and it helped us get through another Rod Black debacle.

Rod Black and Pat Tabler have an amazing ability to avoid talking about the current game situation.

Even more curious, Warren Sawkiw talks more about his baseball career than Joe Carter did about his.

I should get royalties whenever someone uses it, dammit. I'd be a reasonably solvent man.

Thanks Brett. You have cleared up the matter.

So much for baby's college account :-)