Six Very Important Things this Morning - 8.3.2010

1.  Jeremy Hellickson had an awfully good debut.  Nice outing for the rookie, even against a Twins lineup that didn't have Morneau or Mauer, but at least had 9 guys who aren't gigantic pussies.  Seriously, has there ever been a team whose two best players missed this many games?  The real M&M boys would be ashamed.  Mickey Mantle drank a fifth of whiskey on a slow night and would regularly knock back enough to kill Nicolas Cage, washed it down with a couple big ole stogies, followed that up with a roll in the hay with some random broad, and then got two hours of sleep before rolling out of bed and going 2-4 with a home run.  And everybody knows Roger Maris was functionally retarded, as is everyone from North Dakota, but he managed to have some of the better seasons of his era (and no, he's not a hall of famer.  Don't be an idiot).  Yet Morneau gets bumped in the head and Mauer is a little sore and they can't be bothered to play despite the team being in the middle of a good ole fashioned pennant race.  Seriously pathetic.  I say they trade them both.  Except for Morneau.

2.  The Big Ten is gonna make bank.  With the Big 10 (11) changing to the Big 10 (12) next season, it also gains a championship game for football.  This is good, because it's an extra game, and it's an extra game between two good teams (at least for the conference, not necessarily nationally - zing), so that means extra money.  I read somewhere else that it would be approximately $5 million more bucks to the already cash-stuffed conference, which will also get a boost from adding Nebraska TV sets.  If you click on the link and read the article there's a bunch more in there, but to be honest I got really bored and then scrolled down and it was way too long to keep reading.

3.  The Reds are loaded with young pitching.  Seriously, this team is going to be a serious NL contender for years with all the young stud arms, the latest example of which is Travis Wood, who tossed 7 innings of 2-hit ball last night, which isn't even his best outing of his seven career starts because he nearly tossed a perfect game in his third career time out, ending up with a one hitter.  With him, Mike Leake (7-2, 3.57 ERA), Johnny Cueto (10-2, 3.32) they already have three guys under 25 who have shown they can do it and they still have Homer Baily (super talented but constantly injured), Edinson Volquez (recovering from injury but awesome when pre-injury), Aroldis Chapman (famous foreigner) and Matt Maloney who has only made two starts but has been solid (3.09 ERA, 1.11 WHIP).  If you want to go deeper they have four other guys on John Sickels' top 20.  I predict them to become a dynasty, but based on my history of predicting they're probably going to become the next Pirates.   

4.  So much for the Smoak monster.  This happened over the weekend, but I didn't get around to mentioning it ever and I figured I should since I've been blowing so much Smoak about him:  Justin Smoak was sent down from Seattle to AAA.  I guess these days a .198 batting average and .624 OPS don't get you anything these days, what with all the politics and all.  Seriously though, he's been successful in the minors, he's just 23 and in his third professional season, and he still shows good plate discipline (39 walks in 340 big league plate appearances).  He'll be fine.  Or he's the next Scott Stahoviak.

5.  So much for that trade.  Carlos Santana, rookie catcher, super stud, future star, the next Joe Mauer but less of a girl, non-guitar player or Rob Thomas collaborator, guy who would lead the Majors in OPS for catchers if he had enough at-bats, and guy I just MOTHER FUCKING TRADED FOR in fantasy baseball on Sunday ended up leaving the Indians' game last night with an apparent leg injury after Ryan Kalish of the Red Sox, who doesn't matter now and will never matter, barreled into him on a play at the plate.  The best part of that article is the end, where they make sure you know that "Television replays showed his left leg buckled."  Awesome.  He was on my team for less than 24 hours.  Wait, no.  I mean this is a terrible blow to baseball and Cleveland and this poor young man's career or something else less selfish.

6.  Is Miami-Dade the new convict U?  I'll assume you are all aware of Trevor Mbakwe and his legal woes, and if you're not I think you're in the wrong place (unless you like crappy SyFy movies, in which case stay tuned)), but his Miami-Dade teammate Darnell Dodson is now in a bit of a pickle at Kentucky.  Well maybe not a pickle, since there doesn't seem to be any definitive information out there, but John Calipari announced that Dodson will not be playing for Kentucky this season, although he seems to be academically ineligible.  Apparently there has been some friction between Calipari and Dodson, so this isn't a huge surprise, but it could hurt the Wildcats since Dodson was their #1 three-point shooter last year.  Of course, since basically the entire team turned pro, we don't really have any idea what their strenghts and weaknesses are next season.  Although I feel comfortable saying a strenth will be sliminess and a weakness will be ethics.


By the way, dickmittens, start paying attention.  I've now had two people who I know read this blog regularly say something like, "oh, you're on Twitter?"  Yes, idiots.  Look at the text bar at the very top of the screen.  And then go sign up.