Weekend Buzz: All-Star votes right on target, mostly
That the Giants were forced into overdrive with their "Vote Bonds" campaign provides spectacular insight into just how fatigued people have become -- even in San Francisco -- by both Bonds* and home runs. I don't see any other way to read that.
Here's a guy who now has 750 career homers and is breathing down the neck of Hank Aaron's all-time record 755. For most of our lifetimes -- yours and mine -- that has been the most cherished record in sports.
Plus, the All-Star Game is being played on Bonds'* personal playground, in the one city in America that remains sympathetic to him.
And yet, until a late surge, he still almost wasn't voted into the game.
We'll have plenty of time to talk more about that next week in San Francisco during All-Star festivities and in coming weeks when I re-join the Barry Bonds* Home Run Road Show and Traveling Circus.
For now, just a couple of other thoughts on the All-Star rosters, and they have to do with glaring snubs. Coincidentally, they're both at shortstop, and how the fans, players or somebody couldn't have figured this out is just plain embarrassing.
Worst AL snub: No way the Los Angeles Angels' Orlando Cabrera should not have made the club. Jeter and Guillen are fine, but picking Texas' Michael Young over Cabrera? I know, Texas needed a representative, but couldn't coach Ron Washington count? Nobody has been a bigger proponent of Young's than me over the past few seasons, but last year's All-Star MVP is having just a so-so season. And Cabrera rocks.
Worst NL snub: Philadelphia's Jimmy Rollins and Florida's Hanley Ramirez both deserve to be on the team. Milwaukee's J.J. Hardy is the backup shortstop (to the Mets' Jose Reyes) and is having a marvelous season, but he's slowed down significantly (only two homers in June). I'd go Rollins or Ramirez over Hardy.
By the way, one more good thing about Manny Ramirez's being named to the team as a reserve rather than as a starter: If he doesn't show up until the eighth inning next Tuesday night because he's off selling another grill on e-Bay, it won't matter. Nobody will notice.
2. Mike Hargrove stuns Mariners by resigning: This was one of the most bizarre, mysterious, oddly timed managerial changes in memory. There has to be something more to the story. Did he fail a steroids test? Cross Ichiro Suzuki one too many times? Ask for a contract extension behind closed doors and get denied?
His official reason was because "my passion has begun to fade", but all he was doing in Seattle was taking up space from the very beginning, anyway. Passion? Multiple Mariners over the past few seasons told me he rarely was seen anywhere other than his manager's office or the dugout and had little-to-no rapport with the players.
Why would a guy suffer through two miserable losing seasons and then walk away when his team had won seven consecutive games, eight of 10 and was holding firm in second place, just four games behind the Los Angeles Angels in the AL West?
Hargrove said there are "no dark, sinister reasons" for the decision and general manager Bill Bavasi said he was stunned.
As you can tell, there are far more questions than answers to this odd twist. But mark it down: Long-run, this will not be a bad day in the history of the Seattle Mariners.
3. Cincinnati, too: On pace for their first 100-loss season since 1982, the Reds fired Jerry Narron on Sunday as a procedural matter. Procedural? Oh yeah: Any club making the Washington Nationals look like a World Series contender must fire the manager. It's in the rules.
4. The Bronx is Burning: Oh, sorry, that's just Yankees reliever Scott Proctor's jock. Excellent reporting by the team's website the other day to unearth the fact that Proctor burnt some of his personal equipment in front of the team dugout following Saturday's loss in an effort to burn off the bad juju of his own poor relief outings. Because everybody else thought that was smoke still emanating from Kei Igawa's start.
5. Craig Biggio reaches 3,000: Not a minute too soon, either. The Astros were terrified that they were going to have to keep Biggio (.212 vs. right-handers this season; .206 on the road) in their lineup for the rest of the year.
6. Troy Percival returns: From his perch in the Cardinals' bullpen, the comebacking reliever says, "I want to see if we can get a championship. I didn't come back to muddle around in last place somewhere." Like Roger Clemens with the fading Yankees, you mean?
7. Ken Griffey Jr. hits No. 585: Now Frank Thomas is only 85 homers behind Junior on the all-time list.
8. Mets reawaken against phading Phillies: Biggest series of the season, and Philadelphia's pitching staff is so shredded by injury that Charlie Manuel has to start, along with Cole Hamels, J.D. Durbin, J.A. Happ and Kyle Kendrick. Good thing the Phillies ran out of initials, because Kendrick was impressive in salvaging a W on Sunday.
9. Agent Scott Boras pitches best-of-9 World Series: How about we just make it through the rest of Commissioner Bud Selig's term without canceling any more World Series before we begin thinking about changing the format?
10. Don't look, Ethel: First-place San Diego finally activated outfielder Brian Giles on Friday for the key weekend series against the Dodgers. Don't know if Giles will be the final piece of a third consecutive NL West title for the Friars, but given the man's penchant for nude clubhouse hugs, I'm pegging them as immediate favorites to lead the league in streaking. Boogity, boogity.
