One hundred and eleven.

It's hard discussing anything but the ever-increasing loss total when previewing a series involving the 2003 Tigers. It's not like they have one enormous Achilles' heel to describe, either; they don't hit well, they don't pitch well, they don't field well and they don't run well. They don't take losing that well, but they've also lacked the kind of competitive fire needed to go out and compete hard the next day. Beleaguered manager Alan Trammell described Saturday's effort as "bland" and Sunday's showing as "blah." Too bad Lou Piniella's gainfully employed.

Nate Cornejo has a chance to stop the bleeding tonight, as Pete Walker makes a spot start. But tomorrow's Halladay-Loux match-up is reminiscent of one of those Kansas-Prairie View A&M games in the first two days of the NCAA men's basketball tournament. Josh Towers hopes to continue his strong pitching of late in the series finale.

On to the Advance Scout!

Kent and Jordan are going to be scarce around here for the next few days, as Real Life (that cartoon villain that he is) intrudes roughly on the paradisal idyll that is Da Box. I'll try to hold up my (normally silent) end of the Management Triumvirate.

Both gentlemen apologise (unnecessarily) for their absence.

Congratulations to R Billie and Scott Lucas on reaching the BBFL finals, defeating the Coach and Snellville Jones respectively.

Remember spring training? Back then, the Blue Jays' rotation looked like this: Roy Halladay, Cory Lidle, Tanyon Sturtze, Pete Walker and Mark Hendrickson. Had we told you back then that Lurch would have been the second-best starter of the lot -- and that his mid-September line would be 9-9, 5.46, 153 IP, 199 H, 39 BB, 75 K -- then you'd probably have predicted the Jays and Rays would be battling for the basement right about now. Thanks to the big bats and the remarkable in-season transformation of Kelvim Escobar, the Jays might yet hit their 85-win plateau. But it's no thanks to their erstwhile #2 and 3 starters.

Congratulations to Billie's Bashers and Nation Builders, who will meet in the two-week championship final. In last week's report, I said, "Our big July deal (he got Giambi and Morris; I got Lowell and Schilling) might come back to haunt me, but I have no regrets."

R Billie won the match 7-4 because he won the trade: compare 4-4-0-.375-.516-.667 from Giambi and 7.0-0-0-2.57-0.71-5.00 from Morris to Lowell being on the DL and Schilling unable to start. A complete game win by Curt would have made the difference for the Walrus, but it wasn't meant to be.

In the other semi-final, the Gashouse Gorillas, who led most of the way in the regular season, were eliminated. The 7-5 margin was extremely close -- Scott took ERA 4.09 to 4.15; considering that's the primary tiebreaking category, Snellville lost the match by .06, or less than a run.

Sixth in a 10-part series

In a recent interview with Batter's Box, Toronto Blue Jays General Manager J.P. Ricciardi was characteristically blunt about his relationship with the media.

"I really don’t care what the writers say about me," Ricciardi said at the time. "Because in the end, they don’t really count."

While it's true that anyone who lives in the public eye -- as Ricciardi does -- has to turn a blind eye to the criticism offered his way or risk being drowned in it, it's also true that the work of those writers he "doesn't care about" is often the first and only line of communication between the team and the fans.

Both Toronto Star Blue Jays beat writer Geoff Baker and columnist Richard Griffin have had plenty to say about "the Ricciardi Regime" since former G.M. Gord Ash left town -- some quite good, and some extremely critical.

Colby Cosh, Canadian UberBlogger, National Post columnist and Sabermetric devotee, takes up the cause of the Expos. The blocking of Montreal calling up the likes of Terrmel Sludge for the stretch run Cosh calls "the overt, collusive, unapologetic manipulation of a pennant race". Right on! the Expos have been kicked around too much, why not kick back a bit. Cosh suggests a class action suit against Major League Baseball whose plaintiffs would include anyone who bought a ticket to an Expos game, home or away, this year.

I'd join it like a shot. What do the ZLC's legal experts think of the idea ?

In the the New York Times Magazine, Pat Jordan writes about flamethrowers (registration required) like Bobby Jenks, Steve Dalkowski, Kerry Wood and Billy Wagner, beginning with this observation.

The year 2003 may go down as the year the stat geeks won over organized baseball, converting the evaluation of talent from art into science.

The author, a big fan of scouts and "stuff" who apparently hasn't seen as much of Billy Koch as we have, feels compelled to take one more swipe.

The stat geeks are officially neutral on the importance of the 100-m.p.h. pitch -- whether an out is recorded off a blazing fastball or a fluttering knuckler makes no difference to them. And they are leery of old-school scouts who tend to be overly impressed with rudimentary gifts like velocity, while overlooking the other skills that make a major-league pitcher successful.

Leery? I think it's the other way around. Somebody sounds worried about SABR-rattlers.

The Jays, going for their fifth win in a row, can even their home record at 37-37 by completing the sweep today. Don't expect a pitcher's duel. Cory Lidle, just playing out the string in a mostly unhappy season, wasn't very good against Tampa on Tuesday. He's not helping his free agent cause.

Matt Riley gets the last-minute nod for Baltimore in place of scheduled starter Rodrigo Lopez. The southpaw made three forgettable starts as a 20-year-old in 1999 and has been in the minors since; he was 4-2 with a 3.58 ERA in 13 starts for AAA Ottawa, striking out 77 and walking 28 in 70.1 IP. This is a tough assignment for the rookie, against Carlos Tosca's "lefty-proof" lineup, featuring the almost-forgotten Tom Wilson in a rare appearance behind the plate.

Pete Walker will start in Detroit on Tuesday; does this mean Mark Hendrickson is now in the bullpen? As I suggested a while ago, they will give Doc one extra day of rest this week; it sets him up to open the next home stand and make his last start on the final weekend.

In case you missed it, the Oakland GM took Baseball Prospecutus reader questions yesterday, including one from a BB regular. Gerry asked how much of the A's success in developing pitchers is due to good drafting, minor league coaching, the players' internal makeup, and luck. Beane's reply:

A little bit of everything that you mentioned. We also try and minimize economic and health risk by drafting college pitchers. We also feel that because they are older and more experienced, college pitchers have a tendency to give you better early results when they enter the Major Leagues. A small market team has to get as much production as possible during the first three years before a player hits arbitration. Remember, young players are good because they are cost effective. If we can't afford them it doesn't matter how old they are.

Just another reminder that the BP Pizza Feed is only two weeks away. Hope to see you there.

In the National Post, John Lott chats with Meat Loaf, a visitor at last night's game. Turns out even J.P. is a fan, who can quote the famous Phil Rizzuto passage from memory.

"Senior year in high school," Ricciardi said as he shook hands with Meat Loaf yesterday. "Paradise by the Dashboard Light."

The singer's inning in the radio booth last night was delightful. Mike Wilner teased his broadcast partners by saying "anyone from 28 to 48 knows Mr. Loaf," but the venerable Tom Cheek quickly reminded listeners he was a former DJ who still knew his music. Cheek filled in the essential play-by-play while his guest, obviously a great fan, offered some entertaining commentary.

There was a sound bite on TV last night in which Pat Hentgen was asked if he was "quietly" rooting for Roy Halladay's continued success. "No, I'm openly rooting for him," replied the first Jay to win a Cy Young award.

In his column today, celebrating their similarities, Richard Griffin called a pre-game meeting between the two righties "a nice torch-passing moment," and obviously respects both men.

Of all the Blue Jays' aces over the past decade, Hentgen and Halladay resemble each other the most — the kind of people you would want your sons to grow up to be like.

The Orioles, rumoured to be shopping for high-ticket items like Vladimir Guerrero this winter, might not exercise their $4 million option for 2004 on Hentgen, who Griffin suggests would like to finish his career in his hometown of Detroit. I'd be very happy if he returned to Toronto; he's 5-2 with a 2.85 ERA in his last 11 starts, fully recovered at last from the Tommy John surgery he required in 2001, and would be a wonderful mentor for Doc and the other young hurlers.

Josh Towers doesn't like the Baltimore Orioles. The Jays righty resents the way he was cast aside, and appreciates his chance for revenge tonight. How do I know? Mike Wilner said so on The FAN 590. The most reliable and entertaining source of Blue Jays information in the "real" media, Wilner will be stepping into Da Box in an upcoming interview.

In his last two starts, Towers has a seven-inning, 4-hit shutout against the Tigers and a complete game 6-hitter vs. the Mariners. With a similar effort tonight, he'll solidify his claim on a 2004 rotation spot; he's already shown enough to make the team as a swing man. He's throwing a much harder fastball than I remember in 2001, and challenging hitters with a lot of strikes. It's been fun to watch; I was right behind the plate for the adrenalin-charged ninth inning against Seattle.

With Eric DuBose on the mound for the O's, Carlos Tosca employs what Wilner called his "lefty-proof" lineup: Dave Berg's bat is at 2B instead of the O-Dawg's glove. Eric Hinske drops to seventh in the order; SS Mike Bordick hits second. Kevin Cash, Towers' personal receiver, is behind the plate, but his great arm and footwork don't justify a .136 average. Bobby Kielty, more of a masher from the right side, is in the 6-hole behind Josh Phelps.

Fifth in a 10-part series

"A Jays team once led by Joe Carter, Robbie Alomar, George Bell, Tony Fernandez and Devon White was for years known to be as diverse as the city it represents. That is no longer the case."
... "Whitest Team in the Majors" by Geoff Baker for the Toronto Star

Let's get some things out of the way.

The Jays are enjoying a 7-3 month, and they face an Orioles team that appears to be prone to lapsing into its annual late-season swoon. On the hitting side, the O's haven't been very healthy or productive of late -- with Larry Bigbie a notable exception. However, in Eric DuBose and Pat Hentgen, the Jays lock horns with a couple of hot hurlers. Ex-Oriole Josh Towers will hopefully channel his extra motivation constructively tonight.

The Orioles are in an interesting spot, thanks to some shrewd dealings by their two-headed "Beatagan" front-office monster. Baltimore has much more young pitching in the system than they had when the season started, and they enjoy tremendous payroll flexibility for an offseason shopping spree that won't even implicate the luxury tax, thanks to the team's wise clearing of the books this year.

Peter Angelos says he wants to compete with the Yankees and Red Sox in 2004. Hopefully, the home team will take this weekend's opportunity to remind him that there's another AL East hurdle in his path.

On to the Advance Scout!

Patriot looks at a variety of run estimators using basic data (excluding SF, SH , GIDP etc). The results aren't particularly surprising: on a team-seasonal basis, all the estimators are in the same ballpark (in terms of RMSE); Base Runs is not any less accurate and is perhaps a little more accurate on a team-seasonal basis.

Tangotiger's comments are contained in the Primate Studies section at Baseball Primer. He suggested creating a best-fit formula for all odd-numbered years (sample A) for each method and then testing it on the even-numbered years (sample B). The reasoning there was that if a formula was really vaild on a team-seasonal basis, the loss of accuracy when going from the "best-fitted" sample to a completely different sample would not be great. Patriot tested Base Runs against the linear best-fit model for sample A and found the former to be slightly more accurate on sample B.