Lee Lowenfish

No doubt the schedule came at the right time to help my scuffling Orioles. Although my Birds couldn't sweep either the tail-end Colorado Rockies in Denver or the historically bad Chicago White Sox at home, at least they won each series. And even won 3 games in a row for the first time since June.  

 

It is a very strange AL East pennant race this season.  It's remarkable how since the early summer neither the Orioles or Yankees have managed to play like a real World Series contender. With the demotion of Yankee closer Clay Holmes and the season-long doubt on who really can close for Baltimore, both teams have question marks in a key area of the bullpen.

 

Since I last posted, the injury bug has again bitten the Orioles, two in the same Sat night Aug 31 game in Colorado. Third baseman Ramon Urias, who had provided an unexpected offensive boost in August, sprained an ankle when he stumbled on the third base bag trying to make a tag on a Colorado base stealer.

 

Earlier that game, starting pitcher Dean Kremer got smoked just above the wrist on his pitching hand by a 103-mph one-hopper hit by Colorado

outfielder Jordan Beck.  Rarely does a couch potato like yours truly see the swelling come up immediately on the TV screen but it did in this case.   

 

Kremer, the only dual citizen-Israeli-American player in MLB history, is vowing to not miss a turn which manager Brandon Hyde calls "incredible".

Sure enough he plans to start on Friday Sep 6 in the opener of a home series against the Tampa Bay Rays. 

 

I am not a big one for highlighting strength of schedule in the last month of the season. IT'S HOW YOU ARE PLAYING, NOT WHO YOU ARE PLAYING AT THIS TIME OF YEAR. 

 

After Tampa Bay, Orioles go on to Fenway to play fading Red Sox whose recent offensive drought has surprised me - their pitching and their overall defense doesn't seem ready for prime time.   

 

Over the weekend of Sep 13, Birds go on to Detroit for 3 games, a .500 team playing much better these days. The Tigers also have the leading contender for AL Cy Young award, southpaw Tarik Skubal.  The Baltimore final home stand consists of 3 with the SF Giants Sep 17-19 and then the final home games of the regular season against the Tigers. 

 

The Orioles wind up season on the road - 3 big night games at Yankee Stadium likely to determine AL East winner, Tu-Th Sep 24-26. Then to Minnesota to play an inconsistent, oft-injured Twins team fighting for a wild card with Kansas City.  Cleveland seems to be in driver's seat to win AL Central with 4 game lead on Minnesota, 5 over KC before games of Fri Sep 6. 

 

The Yankee September schedule starts with 3 at the Cubs Sept 6-8, then 3 big ones back home against the Royals, then 4 with the Red Sox Sept 13-16.  Then a road trip to the west coast at Seattle Sep 17-19, three at Oakland Sep 20-22 with the A's .

 

All things considered, Oakland has had a good season, given their pending move to Sacramento for three seasons until the supposed new stadium in Las Vegas is built.  Mark Kotsay will get some deserved Manager of the Year votes but I think Cleveland's rookie skipper Stephen Vogt has to be

considered the leading candidate. 

 

Yankees return home for the 3 big night games against the Orioles. Yankees have an edge in that they host fading Pirates for the last three games.  I kinda doubt that Pittsburgh will send out possible NL Rookie of the Year Paul Skenes in one of those games.  

 

At least the Pirates have announced that Skenes will pitch deep into September to get the experience of competing in the climactic month of regular season, something the Buccos have sadly not enjoyed first-hand for too long.  (As promising as Skenes looks, it will be hard to deny ROY award to the Padres' productive center fielder Jackson Merrill.) 

 

In the National League races, the Dodgers, Phillies, and Brewers have almost clinched division titles but there is quite a wild card crunch coming among Padres, Diamondbacks, Braves, and Mets. One of those teams will not make it - as of morning of Sep 6, only 2 games separated them. 

 

I have been tardy in not giving props to the Mets' resurgence.  Stuck at 22-33 in first half of season, they are now a bona fide wild card contender.

If Shohei Ohtani were not also in the National League, shortstop Francisco Lindor would be an MVP favorite.

 

He's been playing sensationally on both sides of the ball and even came up with a great quote after he won an eleven-pitch AB in the Aug 29 win over the also resurgent defending-NL champion Arizona Diamondbacks.   "I GET PAID TO HIT THE BALL FORWARD," Lindor said.

 

The arrival of veteran infielder Jose Iglesias has provided spark and levity to a team that seemed to lack it.  The starting pitching has settled in

with Sean Manaea and former number one draft pick David Peterson really looking good.  If Edwin Diaz at the back end of the bullpen can get

the saves, they could be a dangerous team in the playoffs. 

 

I've often been a critic of the so-called balanced schedule that reduced intra-division games from 19 to 13.  It turns out though that the Mets play 4 of their final series against NL East teams.   After the Reds at home Sep 6-8 and Blue Jays on road, they go to Philly and return to play Washington

and Philadelphia again, the last home regular season series Sep 20-22. 

 

Then likely a very big series at Atlanta Sep 24-26 - as I post on morning Fri Sep 6, Mets are tied with Braves for 3rd wild card.

Mets wind up with 3 with Brewers in Milwaukee, the runaway winners of the NL Central. There will likely be more pressure on Mets at this time because Brewers would only be playing for best record in the National League. 

 

Best advice for baseball in September still comes from legendary Mets broadcaster Bob Murphy:  "Fasten your seat belts."    

 

Now it's time for a new feature . . .  LEE LOW'S TIPS OF CAP!

**Mets cable channel, SNY.TV, featured a fascinating interview in late August with former Mets reliever/now broadcaster Jerry Blevins and Mets rookie third baseman Mark Vientos. In separate segments, they interviewed each other about their careers.  It was not typical pap but provided frank and revealing insights.  I hope it can be accessed on the sny.tv website.

 

**"I don't want flowers at my retirement," tennis star Danielle Collins explained last week after turning down an offering from tennis officials when she lost her singles match last week at the US Open.   She said she didn't want to be like the character Gaylord in "Meet The Parents," the 2004 film in which Ben Stiller plays the son of doting parents that fills his bedroom with runner-up trophies.

 

**Speaking of tennis, here's to the two Americans who made or will make the men's and women's finals for the first time since 2002:

Jennifer Pegula who plays Belorussian Aryna Sabalenka in the women's final on Sa Sep 7 at 4P EDT on ESPN

 

**And either Taylor Fritz or Frances Tiafoe who play each other on F Sep 6 at 7P on ESPN

The winner meets either highly-favored Italian Jannik Sinner or English southpaw Jack Draper on Fri Sep 6 an 3P on ESPN

Men's final will be Su Sep 6 at 2P on ABC network - rebroadcast at 830P that night on ESPN2. 

  

That's all for now - my mantras remain:  Stay positive test negative & Take it easy but take it.  

 

“History never repeats itself exactly,” noted American historian Charles A. Beard once opined. Don’t tell that to fans of Ivy League baseball.

As the final weekend of the regular season nears, the Penn Quakers and the Columbia Lions are tied with stellar records of 14-2 atop the Gehrig Division. Just like last year. And this Saturday and Sunday, they will meet four times to determine who will qualify to meet Dartmouth, the perennial Rolfe Division winner, in a best-of-three championship series the following weekend. The survivor gets an automatic bid to the NCAA tournament beginning at the end of May.

And just like last year, it may take an extra winner-take-all game to decide the Penn-Columbia winner. Both teams feature plenty of hitting and solid pitching.

Penn features six regulars hitting over .300 with Matt McKinnon an all-Philadelphia area selection. Starter Mike Reitcheck also made the all-Philly team and the Quakers also possess lefty Ronnie Glenn who was effective last year against the Lions.

Columbia has some thunderous left-handed sluggers in seniors Gus Craig, Joe Falcone - the Iraqi-Afghan war veteran, the oldest player in Division I who blasted three home runs last weekend in the four game sweep of Cornell - and Dave Vandercook. Another lefty powerful slick-fielding first baseman, junior Nick McGuire, bats eighth in this lineup.
Last year's Ivy League batting champion Will Savage may bat seventh ahead of McGuire.

After a slow start in tough non-league games, Columbia pitching has come around led by junior righthanders George Thanopoulos and Kevin Roy. Ivy League rules mandate that the first game of each doubleheader is seven innings followed by a regular nine-inning nightcap. So it is imperative that a strong pitcher starts the first game and goes as deep as he can.

There is no attendance charge for Ivy League regular season games though there is usually a nominal charge for the championship series. Though the sound of the aluminum bat does make many a baseball purist cringe, I have become a big fan of the college game. Without interminable TV commercials between half-innings, the games move swiftly and the curious fan will be surprised at the crispness and near-professionalism of the players.

Adding spice to the Columbia-Penn rivalry is the alternation of home fields: The Saturday doubleheader will be played at Columbia’s Satow Stadium – located behind the football field up the hill off 218th Street west of Broadway - and the Sunday twinbill moves to Meiklejohn Stadium on the edge of the Penn campus near the Schuylkill River.
Batter up on both days will be 1pm.

FIRST IMPRESSIONS OF THE MLB SEASON
I journeyed to Citi Field on Sunday April 19 for the Matt Harvey show. Unbeknownst to the ticket buyers, the Mets star young right-hander reported in sick early in the day, but after missing more than a year for Tommy John surgery he was not going to miss a precious start.

He pitched six very efficient innings and the Mets batters helped out with a seven-run fourth inning. But trying to save the overworked bullpen, Mets manager Terry Collins let Harvey start the seventh inning. He quickly gave up three hits and a run and then disaster struck (though the Mets held on to win the game, 7-6).

First, lefty reliever Jerry Blevins got struck by a line drive on his pitching arm. He will be in a splint for six weeks and no one can accurately predict how soon he will come back. Even worse, in the bottom of the seventh inning, rapidly improving Mets catcher Travis D’Arnaud got hit on the wrist by Marlins reliever A.J. Ramos. He suffered a fracture and will be out indefinitely.

The Mets have still won eight in a row and have come from behind in many of those wins, always a good sign for a potentially contending team. They have another promising young catcher Kevin Plawecki ready to replace D’Arnaud for the near future, and with solid starters like Harvey, Jacob DeGrom and perhaps Jon Niese too, there might be regular nights and days of fun and hope in Queens this year after a long dry spell.

However, there is always something to criticize about these Mets.
(1) The elevators from the upper decks run very sporadically after the games (unlike at Yankee Stadium). And believe it or not, the one escalator I found was running up and not down at the end of the game.

(2) Their half-inning contests for fans on the big video screen need work. The most embarrassing was a hula hoop twisting "competition" between Mets center fielder Juan Lagares, recorded on video, and a not particularly athletic woman who had trouble even getting the hoop on her body let alone spinning it. Where do these ideas come from?!

Meanwhile, injuries have struck my Orioles, too. Their fine second baseman from Curacao Jonathan Schoop (pronounced “Scope”) suffered partially torn knee ligaments in a collision with Red Sox first baseman Mike Napoli on Friday night at Fenway.

The early diagnosis is that Schoop might not need surgery and he is already starting rehabilitation at the Orioles fine all-year facility in Sarasota. We fans can only hope that he won’t be out for most of the season. When Schoop’s teammate Manny Machado hurt his knee last year, they also said he might not need surgery. But he did for the second time in two years. And Manny's off to a slow start with the bat and there are troubling signs that he may be taking his offensive problems out to the field which is an absolute no-no.

Schoop’s stumbling over the base leads me to pose a serious question: Is there any reason to still require the bases being attached firmly to the ground? Wouldn’t softer pads serve the same purpose? They are used in many amateur games.

That’s all for now. Always remember: Take it easy but take it!

YIBF (Yours In Baseball Forever), Teny Ymota (The Earl of NY, Your Man On The Aisle)
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