Lee Lowenfish

Orioles just won a Fenway Park classic 9-7, spoiling the Red Sox April 11 home opener.
Chris Davis's mammoth two-out three-run homer to dead center off Red Sox expensive new closer Craig Kimbrel provided winning margin in top of 9th.

Mookie Betts homered to lead off bottom of 9th off O's closer Zack Britton and Bosox got the tying runs on with none out. But a great 4-6-3 DP started by Jonathan Schoop and strikeout of Hanley Ramirez cemented the O's sixth win in a row to start season.
The pundits who saw the O's as a sub-.500 team must be at their computers now coming up with explanations for this aberration.

One doesn't win a pennant in April but you can dig yourself a big hole by losing in April. The Minnesota Twins are facing that climb. Amazing how streaks can start and end suddenly. Orioles lost 7 in a row to Minnesota last year who essentially knocked them out of pennant race in mid-August. This year the Birds swept them to begin the season.

American League East looks like another dogfight all season so nice to start building up a little lead. If Orioles starting pitching goes deeper into games (Yankees have the same need), they could have a lot of fun in 2016.

And let's hear it for backup catcher Caleb Joseph who started both big rallies today for Birds - the five-run third against another Red Sox big ticket acquisition David Price punctuated by a Mark Trumbo 3-run homer, and the ninth inning rally that ended with Davis's mammoth shot. Earl Weaver is smiling somewhere tonight in Baseball Heaven or more likely in a very liquid passionate Baseball Hades.

Caleb Joseph is what Oriole baseball is all about. He toiled in the minor leagues for almost 10 seasons, living in the clubhouse in double-A at times. Hard not to root for a guy like that.

FINAL NOTE: I hope you can see Part I of the Ken Burns Jackie Robinson documentary. It airs on PBS tonight Mon Apr 11 with Part II on Tues Apr 12. There are three cuts of me in Part I talking about Branch Rickey's role in Robinson's emergence.

Thanks for your time this time until next time, this is Lee Low' (aka Teny Ymota) reminding you to Take It Easy But Take It.

PS Teny Ymota stands for The Earl of NY Your Man On The Aisle.
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The overhyped July 31st Major League Trade Deadline has come and gone. It could very well happen that the old adage will come true again: “The best trades are the ones you don’t make.” But in this age of incessant TV and internet coverage, you would think that Armageddon was near if your team didn’t make a trade.

The games on the field remain the best barometer for how your team is doing.
Toronto has been struggling to get over .500 all season. Yet many pundits are proclaiming they “won” the deadline deal process by nabbing shortstop Troy Tulowitzki from the Rockies and southpaw David Price from the Tigers.

‘Taint so easy, McGee (boy, am I showing my age referring to Fibber McGee and Molly the Golden Age of Radio couple.) Toronto still has bullpen issues that obtaining 42-year-old LaTroy Hawkins in the Tulowitzki trade is not necessarily going to solve. Adding Mark Lowe from Seattle may help.

The Jays are also not deep in starters even adding Price. And amazing how short memories are in baseball. The financially-strapped Tampa Rays traded Price a year ago and many pundits again declared the Tigers winners of Deadline Day.

What happened? The Orioles swept Detroit in three games, neutralizing their top ace Max Scherzer (now with the Nats), knocking out fading Justin Verlander, and beating Price 2-0 in the clinching game.

Yet I understand Toronto’s acquisitions – the Jays haven’t made the post-season since 1993 when they won the second of back-to-back World Series.

What a difference a year makes! Bud Norris won that clincher for the Orioles over Detroit but was designated for assignment on Trade Deadline Day. After winning 15 games in 2014, he fell to 2-7 in 2015 and was demoted to the bullpen.

My Orioles have been underachieving from spring training on. I saw it coming – that they were basically a .500 team - but it doesn’t make it any easier to watch. Watch I still do because I love their defense, especially now that shortstop JJ Hardy has returned to anchor it.

A prime example was the great 8-4-2 relay – Adam Jones-Jonathan Schoop-Matt Wieters – that saved the Friday night July 31 8-7 victory over the Tigers. The good news was that the O’s made up an early 6-0 deficit. The bad news was that pending free agent southpaw Wei-Yin Chen put the Birds in such an early hole.

Hardy’s power bat may be on permanent hiatus, but he remains a pleasure to watch on the defensive side of the ball. With Manny Machado at third and Schoop at second, both healthy again after serious knee injuries, the Oriole infield should be in very capable hands for a few years.

Free agent-to-be Chris Davis is more than adequate at first base but recent addition Minnesota castoff Chris Parmelee was truly excellent at first – if only he could find his batting stroke. Davis played a surprisingly good right field, filling in for a while the huge hole left when Nick Markakis departed to Atlanta as a free agent.

However, Parmelee was designated for assignment on Trade Deadline Day when the Orioles received left fielder Gerardo Parra from the Brewers in exchange for promising minor league righthander Zach Davies.

Now that the hoopla is over for July 31st it is time to take careful note of how your teams are playing in the dog days of August. As humidity increases and the sun keeps beating down, staying in condition and keeping firm one's readiness to win are more important than ever.

GOOD AND SAD NEWS ON THE SCOUTING FRONT
A well-deserved kudo is in order to the Goldklang Group of minor league franchises for continuing their project of honoring baseball scouts at their different ballparks.
On August 7, the Charleston (South Carolina) River Dogs will erect a plaque in
honor of current Giants scout Ed Creech.

Later in the summer the St. Paul Saints will honor Mike Arbuckle, long with the Phillies and now with the Royals, and the Hudson Valley Renegades will honor longtime Astros scout John Kosciak.

The sad news is the passing on Cape Cod on July 31st of Charles “Buzz” Bowers, a renowned New England scout. Buzz was one of the first scouts inducted into the Goldklang group’s Scouts Wall of Fame. He was joined by Lenny Merullo, who also passed away earlier this year.

Bowers was a contemporary and friend of a fellow pitcher Hall of Famer Robin Roberts. Like Roberts, Bowers attended Michigan State and both also played in the Vermont college summer league. Buzz considered former Reds hurler Ray Fisher, the legendary U. of Michigan and Vermont summer coach, his greatest mentor.

Buzz never made it out of Triple-A for the Phillies but began his scouting career with Philadelphia and later worked for the Dodgers.

In 1992 he went to work full time for the Red Sox. The legendary scout Bill Enos, who died in January 2015, named Bowers as his replacement.

Among the future major leaguers Bowers signed were infielder Lou Merloni, now a Boston sports commentator, and pitcher Carl Pavano, who after some success in Boston was traded to Montreal with fellow righthander Tony Armas Jr. for Pedro Martinez.

A scout is not only judged by the future big leaguers he signed, but by his commitment to evaluation of all players and devotion to the game. Buzz Bowers got high marks in all these areas.

A long-time high school teacher and coach, Buzz liked being around young people. He was not one of those nay-sayers he thought the "good old days" were better.

He was a firm believer that the measurement of talent had improved immensely since he was a player. He also was impressed by how many young pitchers starting in high school realized the importance of the changeup.

I was fortunate to spend an afternoon with Buzz Bowers on my first visit to the Cape Cod summer league five years ago. I will never forget his insight that he picked up from Bill Enos: “You don’t have to be drafted to play in the big leagues.”

Well, that’s all for now. I will be making my second trip to Cape Cod baseball next week and will be back to you with more stories from that legendary league next time.
In the meantime Always remember: Take it easy but take it!
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