Hoser hypocrisy: We stand on guard for being followers

A true Canadian would laugh this off since our sense of humour is what we're known for, eh? That said, good on Minnesota Twins slugger Justin Morneau for sounding off about Major League Baseball not having a vocalist for O Canada at the all-star game.

"I wasn't very impressed with that to tell you the truth ... You figure they could find somebody to come and sing the song. They have a hockey team here, the Canadian teams play here.

"It's something that didn't really go over too well. I think if it happened the other way around, if they were playing in Toronto and they did that, it would have been a lot bigger deal. But nothing you can do about it."

The rub is, though, getting indignant over such a trifle does not make you patriotic. Shame on media outlets who pander to the Great Canadian Inferiority Complex by running a poll asking the leading question that begins, "Do you think Major League Baseball disrespected Canadians and the Toronto Blue Jays..."

The reality is there was no outcry in Canada when it happened last year at Yankee Stadium. Secondly, it's nice to be acknowledged, however a country finds validation within, not from Bud Selig and FOX Sports' Americana porn on an idyllic summer night in St. Louis.

Deep-down, a true patriot would not care too much. It stung at first during last year's all-star game when on top of the anthem omission, FOX's Joe Buck mispronounced Roy Halladay's name and Tim McCarver incorrectly identified the Blue Jays' stadium as "the Rogers Dome," but it just doesn't matter. In hindsight, maybe that wasn't a snub, maybe it was just honest mistakes by one man who would rather be mediocre at seven media gigs rather than master one and a colour analyst who is well past his best-before date.

Making this out as even a mild international incident is facts-plus-fiction. The fiction is that MLB has to give Canada any acknowledgement simply because "for now, at least" (fist bump: Bob Costas) one of its 30 teams is based in this country.

Granted, it is a smaller fiction next to the way FOX presents baseball as something uniquely American. The sport would be screwed if it wasn't for players from the Caribbean, Latin America and Asia. They should play the national anthems of the Dominican Republic, Japan and Venezuela.

Using a taped version of O Canada has been standard at the all-star game for some time. The pregame ritual of trotting out sundry baseball legends, topped off last night by President Obama throwing out the first ball and squeezing in a ton of commercials is very tightly scripted. Something has to give. That's the reality. A celebrity speaks up, though, and suddenly everyone's a patriot.

(There is a talking point that should no national anthems played at all, but please. It's a logical, rational thought, especially since the practice is largely limited to North America. However, you live in this world — do you really see a day when that won't happen? Part of loving sports is resisting logic and rationalism.)

Related:
B.C. slugger not impressed with instrumental O Canada (CTV.ca; via Circling The Bases)

Batter up: Minnesota Twins

It's that mystical, wonderful time of year where you commit to a team which you know fully well won't win. This season, in honour of an popular Internet meme, we'll present 25 things about each team. Any wagering or fantasy baseball advice is for recreational use only. At bat: The Minnesota Twins,and spare some thoughts for their fans in Fargo-Moorhead.

1. The Twins' pattern is to alternate periods of modest success with sub-mediocrity. They aren't close to bottoming out like they did in the early '80s or late '90s, but expect the boundless speculation to start with all-everything catcher Joe Mauer close to free agency.
2. People probably assume Mauer will go free agent and sign with a team on either coast after 2010. Thing is, one wonders how sustainable it is, being a full-time catcher who's on an on-base guy (.413 last season) without much extra-base power.
   
   Players with that skill set are few and far between for a reason. Mauer, still only 25, is due to miss Opening Day due to chronic back pain.
   
3. Target Field has virtually the same right-field dimensions as the Metrodome, 328 feet down the line (a foot deeper) and 367 in the alley, minus the 16-foot-high "Baggie." It's a few feet shorter to straightaway centrefield (404 instead of 408) and in left field. The Twins hit the fewest homers in the AL (111) and allowed the second-most (183), so moving to an open-air ballpark might do some interesting things with their power numbers.
   
   Justin Morneau had a career high in extra-base hits last season (74), but no one noticed since that included twice as many doubles as home runs.
4. One wonders if the bloom has come off Justin Morneau, just a bit. He hit just .243/.298/.398 in the final month of the season, when the Twins went 11-15 to lose the division by one game. Don't expect to hear that mentioned any time the Twins are playing the Jays.
   
5. Lefty phenom Francisco Liriano will actually be allowed to pitch in the major leagues all season (although he have lost something off the fastball he had in 2006 before getting injured, and might not keep the ball down as well). It's a bold strategy, let's hope it works out for the Twins.


6. One reason the Twins do better than expected: Their pitchers don't walk anybody (just 406 last season, fewest in the AL). Matt Guerrier was the staff's wild man last season (37 bases on balls in 76 1/3 innings).
7. The Twins' batting splits reveal why manager Ron Gardenhire has such a good reputation. The Twins on-based .380 and slugged .446 with runners in scoring position, compared to .317/.379 the rest of the time, and they do it with a so-so bunch of hitters.
   
   
8. You're justified in wondering if moving to a new stadium might hasten the Twins becoming an American League version of the Pittsburgh Pirates: Nondescript team with nice, new stadium. FanGraphs notes nature of the economy and the pennypinching of late owner Carl Pohlad doesn't inspire optimism that they're going to pour all the revenue from the new park into the team. The rub is that they have a lot more talent than the Pirates.
   
9. They have a lot of nice players: Michael Cuddyer and Denard Span in the outfield, Jason Kubel at DH. Nice players, not great players.
   
10. You know how you can redeem your ticket stub for a slice of cardboard pizza when the Senators score six goals in a game, or when the Raptors score 100 points? The Twins should have something like that when 3B-SS Nick Punto hits a home run. He's hit only 10 in five seasons with the Twins.
    
11. Farmhands Justin Huber and Luke Hughes each played for Australia at the World Baseball Classic (the Aussies got as far in the WBC as Canada). That should help with the advance ticket sales at Triple-A Rochester.
    
    
12. Fun stat: The Twins were third in the AL in runs, without a single player scoring 100 (Mauer scored 98 and Morneau scored 97).
13. Blink and you might miss centrefielder Carlos Gomez's at-bats. He saw just 3.4 pitches per plate appearances, putting him in the bottom 10 among qualified American League hitters.
    
14. Joe Nathan might be the game's best closer, for what it's worth, which isn't much when the team isn't laying out the cashish to be a contender.
15. Toronto-born reliever Jesse Crain is getting good notices down in Florida. The Twins' bullpen had a 3.92 ERA, almost a full run worse than the Jays' league-leading 2.94.
    
16. Right-hander Kevin Slowey is having a excellent spring training, with a 15-to-1 strikeout-to-walk ratio.
    
17. The smart money is on righty Nick Blackburn to end up being dropped from the starting rotation. He was the Twins' workhorse last season (193 innings) and started the fateful one-game playoff against the White Sox.
    
18. Fantasy league addicts are probably well-aware outfielder Delmon Young is hitting the bejesus out of the ball down in Florida. You do know Baseball Prospectus called him "the most useless .290 hitter in the game." He's still only 23 years old.
    
19. Another minor-league pitcher with a headline-friendly name: Anthony Slama. He got Slamaed for a walk-off homer in a Triple-A spring training game yesterday.
20. Minor-league catcher Wilson Ramos will be good for some major-league team, but probably not in Minnesota.
    
21. Please spare a thought for reliever Pat Neshek. The sidearmer is working his way back after Tommy John surgery.
    
22. It's always risky to get excited over a minor-league outfielder with a gaudy batting average but not much power. The Twins' first-round pick from 2007, 20-year-old centrefielder Ben Revere, hit .379 with 44 stolen bases and 10 triples in Single-A last season. According to the Beep, he's comparable to Johnny Damon at the same age.
23. Retired former Twins second baseman Todd Walker was just elected to the college baseball hall of fame, which you'd never heard of until they said they were putting Rafael Palmeiro ("I have never used steroids") in there.
    
24. July 11 is the 20th anniversary of the 1989 All-Star Game, when then-Twins third baseman Gary Gaetti wore a batting glove inscribed "Jesus Is Lord" during the pregame introductions. The Twins finished dead last the following season, let God-squadder Gaetti walk as a free agent (he signed with the Angels, no word of a lie) and won the World Series in 1991. Just sayin'.
25. The Twins don't visit Toronto until Sept. 7, Labour Day. No doubt Morneau's teammates will be teasing him about why it's spelled with a U.

Our kind of team, Ernie

Mike Wilner posted Canada's presumptive lineup for its World Baseball Classic opener late last night, or at least the first six hitters:

1. Chris Barnwell, shortstop: Triple-A veteran on-based .364 in the PCL with the Albuquerque Isotopes last season.
   
2. Russ Martin, catcher: He walked 90 times last season with the L.A. Dodgers, so he's a natural fit here. He could probably lead off, but putting the catcher there is too radical.
   
3. Joey Votto, DH: Probably the best spot to put someone who will be the best Canadian corner infielder/outfielder eventually.
   
4. Justin Morneau, first base: Lots of RBI opportunities, no more need be said.
   
5. Jason Bay, centrefield: Breaks up the lefty bats and presuming you believe in lineup protection, protects Morneau.
   
6. Matt Stairs, rightfield: Wilner said DH, but that is Votto's spot.

The bottom third would be the Kansas City Royals' Mark Teahen at third base, longtime quadruple-A player Peter Orr at second base and Cleveland Indians prospect Nick Weglarz in left field. Weglarz was No. 58 in Baseball America's top 100 prospects.

Remember, Canada's exhibition game against the Blue Jays is scheduled to be aired on Sportsnet today at 1 p.m.

Related:
Corey Koskie thrilled to take field with Canadian team at WBC (Shi Davidi, The Canadian Press)

By George, if you give a Whit , it's not as simple as Simon

... but it's something to mull over while Wotherspooning out some cereal and pouring a glass of O.J. ... oh, why don't you Buttle out!

Chances are you screamed yourself hoarse cheering on Simon Whitfield in the Olympic men's triathlon.

You might not even able to say what O.J. Atogwe does, since the possible Pro Bowl safety plays for the dismal St. Louis Rams. How about Julián de Guzmán -- do you mean the architect? George St-Pierre, to some people, doesn't count as an athlete, although the ticket sales for his fight in Montreal would say otherwise.

This is really about the politics -- one hates to use that word, given how it's been devalued in Canada over the past couple weeks -- of the Lou Marsh Trophy and Lionel Conacher Awards, the country's top athletic honour now that the Leafs can no longer give Mats Sundin a new set of wingers every second week. The Toronto Star rolled out its Lou Marsh nominees last week (men and women can win it. The Canadian Press separates the Conacher and Bobbie Rosenfeld honours).

Atogwe, of Windsor, Ontario, wasn't included on an expansive list that included a guy who rides a horse (Eric Lamaze), an actual horse, a couple of curlers and myriad silver and bronze medallists from the Beijing Olympics. Atogwe, who might be an All-Pro for the way he plays safety, was playing left out on this list. St. Pierre, the UFC welterweight champ, was conspicuously absent. So was Jason Bay, who had the best season of any Canadian ballplayer.

There is a lot of apathy, judging by how many matches for "Lou Marsh" and "Lionel Conacher" came up in a Google search last night. The lack of interest leads to lazy thinking, which come to think of it, has some application to the gong show on Parliament Hill.

As an illustration, over in England where they speak really good European, The Guardian last weekend took the starch out of the BBC Sport Personality of The Year award, which actually is a big deal to the Brits. Trouble is, the criteria of the award is murky beyond belief. Sub in "puck" for "football" -- or sub in "baseball" or just picture more than one kind of football -- and you pretty much have the problem with the Canadian awards.

"According to the 40 sports editors from around the country who drew up the short list ... we are asked not only to compare swimming and boxing, tennis and motor racing, but we are to ignore their sex.

"Consequently, the archive of winners reads like something out of the Eagle Book of Sports, compromises at every turn, all squeaky clean and harmless and jolly fine, rarely a football in the frame, but a river of swimmers and tennis players and athletes, championed by the arch sick-making choice of them all, Princess Anne on a horse, ahead of George Best and Barry John in 1971."

(In Canada, analogues would be harness racing driver Hervé Filion over Cy Young Award winner Fergie Jenkins in 1971. Jacques Villeneuve over Larry Walker in 1997. Mike Weir over Eric Gagné in '03. Cindy Klassen over repeat NBA MVP Steve Nash in 2006.)

"... It is as if the judges are struck annually by some sort of be-nice bug: let's pretend, just for one day, that there is no difference between these sports and these men and women. Let's carry on comparing apples and pears.

"... This not meant to diss the deeds of the finalists. The thing is, though, any one of them deserves to win. They have all performed brilliantly in the same 12 months but are expect to accept that their heroics, the pinnacle of each of their careers in most cases, will not be good enough to win the acclaim of the public because of this truly daft system, sporting Oscars with not enough envelopes. We and they deserve better."

It's not that much different in Canada, except in our case it's not open to public balloting. Every year, the ballot has to be balanced, with the right mix of millionaire pros and amateurs, females and males, individual and team-sport athletes, as well it should. Diversity is important. The problem is that there's maybe not enough diversity among the selectors -- and this is a problem.

The bias comes in with the idea that the winner must stand for something beyond her/his sport, representing the way we would like to see ourselves. We want to see us, staring right back at us in the person of Klassen, Nash Sidney Crosby or Mike Weir. It's supposed to be about more than who's just the most talented person, or who had the best year.

The Canadian media has been slow to adapt to the changing face of Canada or its changing sporting tastes, present company included. These type of awards often come down to what you did when people were somewhat paying attention.

That means JDG, GSP and O.J. are SOL.

De Guzmán, whom our soccer guys can speak more about with more authority, has conquered terra incognita for a Canadian, playing in one of the world's best domestic leagues with Deportivo de La Coruña of Spain. He received 45% support in a Star poll, but that's hardly scientific and hardly indicative of what support he'd get in a nationwide poll. He was Deportivo's MVP this season, but Canada's failed World Cup qualifying run hurt his chances.

St. Pierre? This is coming from someone who has no interest in MMA (but believes it's high time Ontario licensed it), but he's important. He is the No. 1 welterweight in his sport and an icon in Quebec. He upstaged the Montreal Canadiens in the middle of a Stanley Cup playoff series against the rival Boston Bruins. At the end of the day, though, it's doubtful most journalists have open to voting for a MMA fighter when they can make the safe choice and vote for Simon Whitfield.

Any consideration of Atogwe is academic this time around. However, it seems like he doesn't get much notice in Canada -- although it might be as simple as the fact he's from Windsor, which is more part of Michigan than Ontario. He also plays defence in a league that builds its marketing around offensive stars. Only NFL nuts or people from the vicinity of his hometown, Windsor -- which culturally and geographically, is more aligned with Michigan than Ontario -- are really aware of what he's all about.

As it stands, there are good picks. Eric Lamaze winning would be a joke, but hey, it's an Olympic year and some people think they've got to vote for an Olympian. Whitfield also has the Beijing bounce, although going by the unscientific Torstar poll, it didn't help Carol Huynh . Tennis' Daniel Nestor probably has a shot.

Who knows who should be the female and male athletes of the year, the team of the year and the Lou Marsh honouree. Feel free to have at it in comments.

What is known is that is odd how some athletes from some sports aren't in the discussion.

Related:
A horse as Canada's top athlete?; Fans of Somebeachsomewhere push for pacer to win Lou Marsh (Halifax Herald)
Sue and Gary the only equals in the blandest show on earth; BBC Sports Personality of the Year is lazy smug broadcasting of the worst kind (Kevin Mitchell, Sportblog)

Zen Dayley: Baseball writers have thing for short, stocky second basemen

Dustin Pedroia winning American League MVP honours is kind of like Marisa Tomei winning an Oscar 15 years ago -- the academy was divided.

Pedroia was actually left off one writers' ballot. The Red Sox second baseman was a reasonable enough choice. Five players, including Canada's own Justin Morneau, who was the runner-up after he once again was not even the best Minnesota Twin with the initals JM, got at least one first-place vote. That's the most in the AL since the Great A-Rod/Delgado Schmozzle of 2003.

Pedroia's park-adjusted OPS+ of 122 is no great shakes, but remember, he played a key defensive position, second base and won the Gold Glove. It is pretty tough for a second baseman to win MVP. It has not happened in the AL since Nellie Fox 49 years ago, so until the baseball-followin' world clues in to how rarely a talent such as Joe Mauer comes along, Pedroia is an OK pick.

Craig Biggio and Roberto Alomar were across-the-board brilliant second basemen in the 1990s, and neither of them ever got much support from MVP voting. Biggio's best finish was fourth in 1997; Robbie Alomar finished third in 1999 (when the award should have gone to Derek Jeter, who ended up coming sixth) and fourth in '01, along with coming sixth three seasons in a row during his Jays days.

The larger point is, for lack of a more profound way to see it, it is good to see that the MVP can go to a player who doesn't have ginormous home run and RBI totals, because it takes all kinds to have a winning baseball team. One would think that would be appreciated by the anti-Moneyball flat-earthers, but a certain traditionally minded Toronto baseball writer got it wrong, calling Morneau, the RBI machine, to win.

His theory was that the Boston vote would be split between Pedroia and Kevin Youkilis, which would have allowed Morneau to sneak in.

He obviously could have used the help of some president-elect Obama's delegate counters. Pedroia won 317-257. The way it works is that a first-place vote is worth 14 points, a second-place vote is worth nine, a third-place vote worth eight, and so on all the way down to 10th place.

If you split the votes for Pedroia and Youkilis down the middle, you get a player who got nine first-place votes, five seconds, four thirds, five fourth, one fifth and two sixth-place votes. Do the math. One hundred and twenty-six (nine times 14) + 45 + 32 + 35 + 6 + 10 = 254 points.

Youkilis also got a seventh-place vote, which is worth four points. Two writers put Youk eighth, good for six points. That would have put "Youkroia" or "Pedkilis" over the top, just by a smidge.

The larger point is that whatever you think of the selection, it is gratifying to see someone other than a slugger win -- just like it's nice to see an Oscar go to someone who was in a movie that was made for moviegoers, not critics.

Update: Jeremy Sandler from the National Post lets us in on the rationale for his vote — his ballot went Pedroia-Mauer-Youkilis-Morneau.


(And what's with Francisco Rodriguez finishing higher in the MVP voting than he did for the Cy Young Award?)

Zen Dayley: AL MVP — the Morneau you know, the less you understand

The first impulse is to write that Justin Morneau could win the American League MVP award twice when he shouldn't have won it once.

It figures this would only come up once Morneau was in cooldown mode, mired in a 4-for-30 skid (can you ever be mired in something good, like an unending string of 80-degree days, a packed social calendar and free greens fees?). One New York City writer earlier this week used the Twins' Canadian slugger and Chicago's Carlos Quentin as a wedge when he took an ax to some of the sportswriters' totems about MVP voting.

It's understandable why baseball writers often go for the great RBI man on a playoff team. As with all journalists, it's easier when someone provides a good thumbnail sketch. This guy drove in a lot of runs in the heat of a playoff race. No one else need apply, unless of course you're Jimmy Rollins in 2007 and your team's fence-buster, Ryan Howard, was MVP the previous season. You don't play a corner position? You had a lot to do with your team's RBI leader getting so many opportunities to drive in runners? Your skill set is more across-the-board rather than being concentrated in one area of the game, like RBI or saves? Thank you, come again.

The columnist's argument was that by that tried-and-true criteria, it can only be Morneau or Quentin. They're as close in RBI (94-92 for the pride of New Westminster) as their teams are in the AL Central (tied). Meantime, while this will come off like more Massholiography, the campaign is underway for the Red Sox first baseman Kevin Youkilis. Youk ... Youk!!!

The hell of it all is that is that Youkilis, whom The Tao of Stieb contends might be the most "detestable player in baseball," has a case.

Massholiography (the combination of Masshole and hagiography) is new made-up word to describe the process whereby Boston fans embellish the contributions of any player who's white, hard-working (quote, unquote) and a relatively modest physical specimen. One of its synonyms is "Welkerification," was workshopped but was poorly received. David Ortiz is having an off-season, Manny Ramírez was traded and most Sox fans would prefer to deny that J.D. Drew carried them for a couple months this season, so it's gotta be Youk. Yoooouk!

Youkilis is third in the AL in OPS, although he benefits from righty-friendly Fenway Park, where he's about 100 points more productive than he is on the road. Morneau, in contrast, loses a few points on his numbers while playing in the Metrodome in Minnesota, which is playing as a pitcher-friendly park. It's hard to hit in a place that's danker than a failing tavern.

Youkilis (update: note that he wasn't in the lineup vs. Roy Halladay tonight?) ranks favourably in stathead metrics such as Adjusting Batting Runs and Offensive Winning Percentage. He's also got a bit of a halo effect that can be used to override the fact that he's not a big-time home-run hitter at a power position, first base, since he's an atypical first baseman. He won the Gold Glove last season and spells off Mike Lowell at third base when needed, so ipso facto, he doesn't need to have 40 homers and 135 RBI.

The odd part is, the longer he's been at first base, the more Youkilis has started to take on the characteristics of the position. He never reached double figures in home runs in the minors, but he has 22 already this season. He earns fewer bases on balls than he once did. The fielding stats say he's living off his reputation, although most baseball people won't give that a first glance, let alone a second.

The Morneau argument would probably claim that the runs he creates matter more since the Twins are an offensively-challenged team, lacking home-run clout (second-last in the league) and not loaded with pitching. It is true that his numbers come in a pitcher-friendly home stadium (about a run less per game is scored at the Metrodome than at Fenway, 8.94 to 9.95 through Friday) which shaves points off his averages. Overall, though, fewer runs are scored in Red Sox games than in Twins' games, although it's unclear how much this is dictated by each team's pitching and the quality of its opponents.

(The unbalanced schedule in baseball plays hell with park effects. It would really take someone such as Nate Silver or Voros McCracken to do the heavy lifting and factor in the strength of each team's pitching and its schedule.)

Youkilis' chances might seem dubious, especially since there probably is the same kind of resentment toward the Red Sox that there was toward the Yankees in the late '90s (Derek Jeter probably should have been MVP in 1999, but wasn't anywhere close in the voting). The upshot is, though, that if you set aside the crazy numbers Milton Bradley and Josh Hamilton are putting up in a hitters' haven in Texas (on average, more than 12 runs are scored in a Rangers home game), who is there, really?

It's looking quite likely this will be a split vote, where the MVP will be someone whom most of the sportswriters didn't think was the best player in the AL. It's a weird season, maybe weird enough that a closer such as Francisco Rodríguez could win (although closer should never, ever get MVP votes; it would be like the NFL giving the MVP award to a kick returner).

Ultimately, one could root for Morneau out of shallow, patriotic reasons as a more ego-flattering alternative to rooting against Kevin Youkilis out of shallow, Red Sox-resenting reasons. A whiff of Pukilis, or sniffing Morneau glories. Tough call.

Should-reads

• Yours truly has a piece up at Covers.com, which might become a semi-regular thing.
• John Brattain says the Jays could still make a playoff run, but picking up Richie Sexson to play first base vs. left-handers would be required.

Zen Dayley: Insert picture of upside-down Canadian flag in 3, 2, 1...

Fox Sports cutting to a commercial during O Canada is tacky -- but it's like expecting the class clown not to make armpit noises during a school assembly.

The point is, you almost look forward to it with Fox. One less than endearing Canadian trait is that we often overanalyze American interpretations of us, just to look for the boo-boos. It's kind of like the nerd who adds to the goofs section on the Internet Movie Database. Watching how Fox, the broadcast arm of the hyperbole-industrial complex, utterly ignored this country's baseball fans during the baseball All-Star Game telecast from Yankee Stadium, though, you can't blame us for feeling that way.

It happens too often. We are forced to keep score at home. No one in Canada would have known about this right away, save for the fact globesports.com's Jeff Blair blogged it, but MLB did have O Canada. While Sheryl Crow performed The Star-Spangled Banner, there was a recorded version of our national anthem, with no singer. The only reason it was even seen in Canada, ironically enough, was due to a screwup by the Canadian rights holder.

Think about it. Months of planning and preparation went into this Bronx bonanza, but MLB couldn't find anyone to sing O Canada. Hey, it's not like there were an unprecedented three Canadians in the game. In fairness, New York City isn't swimming in unknown performers who just need a break.

This very well could be the old Canadian insecurity talking. Doesn't it seem like U.S. broadcasters constantly betray a lack of broadcast preparation when it comes anything Canadian? The half-assed treatment of our anthem was just the tip of the iceberg.

What happened was that that chill bump-raising pregame ceremony introducing virtually every living Hall of Famer wrapped up and Fox went to a commercial break. That's not so bothersome. They had a lot of ads to squeeze in and the pregame ceremony was bound to run a little long.

On Sportsnet Pacific, the screen went to black for about 15-20 seconds. Then suddenly the feed came back, somewhere around the "from far and wide," although it was hard to be pinpoint it exactly, since there were no words. What, MLB couldn't spring for the airfare and a hotel room to get this singer down to New York City?

Any Canadian baseball nut who tuned to see a game that had an unprecedented three of our own playing in the Midsummer Classic -- the L.A. Dodgers catcher Russell Martin, Cubs right-hander Ryan Dempster and Twins first baseman Justin Morneau -- saw half of a half-hearted treatment of our anthem.

In the top of the fourth, Roy Halladay came on to pitch. Joe Buck called the four-time All-Star Holliday (no, he plays for the Colorado Rockies -- as Amrit pointed out, he homered an inning later, but not off his AL near-namesake). A few moments later, Tim McCarver, referred to the Jays' home stadium as the "Rogers Dome." (Well, it has only had Rogers' corporate on it since 2005, and it is a dome.)

Hopefully Jays president Paul Godfrey wasn't expecting any quid pro quo for persisting in playing God Bless America during the seventh-inning stretch at the Rogers Centre long after many U.S. teams discontinued the practice.

It was a slap in the face. They skimped on an anthem singer and then Joe and Tim skim over some basic prep work for the broadcast involving a Canadian-based player. It comes off as saying, hey, it's Canada, what does it matter?

This isn't coming from someone who's resolutely anti-American. There's so much they do better than Canada -- sports, movies, politically motivated witchhunts, Trials of the Century, showing celebrities at their worst, subtle political satire. How many Canadians who couldn't get anywhere creatively in this country have made it big down there?

One of the funnier aspects about that line "where else can even paperboy option the film rights to a book?" in that Bruce McCullough Kids In The Hall monologue, In America, is that it has a grain of truth. The U.S is still the country for the dreamers, the lottery players. Canada is where your life is just a job you have to finish, although that's probably just as true for most Americans (that's why country music is so popular in both countries).

Getting back to the point, no Canadian broadcaster would ever think to go to commercial during the American anthem. We're way too eager to ingratiate ourselves with the Americans. Our government even let American fighter pilots do a flyover over the U.S. ambassador's residence in Ottawa on July 4, as well we should have. We would never consider not giving our American friends equal consideration.

Down south, they figure there's no need to bother with acknowledging Canada, but then again, we are kind of boring.

You think Buck and McCarver mentioned that there were three Canadians in the game? Don't be foolish.

(How sweet was it to see the full range of Martin's talents -- hitting, going first-to-third on a single, working the plate -- and to see Morneau score the winning run?)

Forget it, it's the Bronx

• Capping the pregame hoopla by wheeling in George Steinbrenner was lame. Only the Yankees would have the gall to be so obvious about ripping off the scene in Boston in 1999, when the presence of Ted Williams, in evident poor health, turned Fenway Park into a giant kiss-and-cry area at a figure skating competition.
  
  There's no moral high ground in begrudging an 78-year-old plutocrat in his sunset years becoming America's grandpa. That said, you can sub in "baseball owners" into that line from Chinatown about how "politicians, ugly buildings, and whores all get respectable if they last long enough" and it fits the scene to a tee. It's no wonder he didn't get a big ovation from the crowd.
  
  Painting Steinbrenner in such a glowing light, giving him more of a spotlight than Hank Aaron, Ernie Banks, George Brett, Mike Schmidt and Frank Robinson, et al., is a whitewash. Sorry, but there's no way to be objective about Steinbrenner.
  
  In the back half of his time running the Yankees, he was the best owner in sports. However, you have to remember that for at least as long, probably longer, he was the worst owner in sports. He demeaned players and managers, ran roughshod over people who had no way of fighting back, traded in thinly veiled racism to try and shake down NYC for a new stadium -- remember when he kept saying the area around the Stadium was "too scary" -- and damn near destroyed the Yankee tradition.
  
  A generation ago, Goose Gossage, one of the Yankees legends involved in the first-ball ceremony (four first balls? Really?), said, "George always like to talk about the Yankee tradition. When did he ever play for the Yankees?"
  
  Gossage was right the first time. The Yankees can recognize Steinbrenner on their own time, like before their final home game of the season, rather than shoving it down the throats of fans whose teams don't have $209-million payrolls. The rewriting of history is well underway.
  
  Plus there was the time he invited himself to Costanza's wedding.
• The best hitters in the game (and Jason Varitek) went 3-for-28 with runners in scoring position. Basically, it was like a Jays intrasquad game.
• Everyone will be having a lot of fun with the story about Ichiro Suzuki's not-G-rated Gipper speech.
• Great lines from ShysterBall: "The baseball luminaries are riding in 100 Chevy Silverados. Baseball's carbon footprint is taking a beating this evening.
  
  "This thing reminds me of the Macy's parade. I hope I didn't tune in too late to see the David Wells balloon."
• Dustin McGowan's not out for the season. Even better news: He never watches movies that star Bill Murray.
• Via Uni Watch, here's a great trivia question: Who was the first player to play in an All-Star Game wearing Blue Jays gear? OK, It was Ruppert Jones, an outfielder in the '70s and '80s who never played for the Jays. How did he pull that off?
• Lastly, how much more informal was baseball back in 1967, the only previous time the game went 15 innings? Mickey Mantle was on the American League team that season, but didn't feel like he rated the honour, so he flew from Dallas to Anaheim, arrived after the game had started, pinch-hit for the starting pitcher in the third inning, struck out, and flew back to Dallas. The game was still going when he met up with his buddies at the country club.
  
  It's too bad that OPS+ wasn't around in in 1967. For a guy who was supposedly done, The Mick had an OPS+ of 150. Most players never get close to that in their entire career.

(Digression: Searching for the McCullough monologue turned up the greatest cold opening in television history. Try to work "guilty, but with various good excuses" into conversation whenever possible.)

BATTER UP: MINNESOTA TWINS

It's staying light longer, the Leafs are all-but-eliminated ... that can mean only one thing: We'll soon see the first halter top of the season. OK, two things: It's almost baseball season, that mystical, wonderful time of year where you commit to a team for six months, knowing full well they won't win. Here's a starting nine for the Minnesota Twins.

1. And the beer vendor even looks like Lou Bega: Yeah ... looks like.
   
   The 2008 Twins produce the kind of deja vu that normally only comes with hiaving been around the bar scene long enough that the terrible pop songs from a decade ago are now considered retro.
   
   The Twins without Johan Santana are basically where the franchise was in the late '90s, a midding 75-win team with not much to look at, Joe Mauer notwithstanding (he will still be man-pretty when the inevitable move to a corner spot comes, although it will hurt his fantasy baseball appeal). At least owner Carl Pohlad's economic circumstances are improved from a decade ago.
2. Best fake slogan: ESPN.com's Jerry Crasnick became the personal hero to many when he suggested the Twins slogan should be, "Ask not what Carl Pohlad can do for you, but what you can do for Carl Pohlad." The 92-year-old Twins owner is getting a $522-million ballpark funded mostly by the state, but the team is rebuilding.
   
   Oh, and the new park doesn't have a roof, but as far as that's concerned, Minnesotans should cram it. If it's between frosty nipples in April along with having a frosty brew under an open sky in July instead of sitting indoors all season, the first option is better. .
3. Your medium is dying: Far be it to suggest people are less inclined to pick up a paper when stuff like Twins closer Joe Nathan's quote after he signed a four-year, $47-million US extension is reported with a straight face, "We've shown that we’re committed to winning. A lot of people are counting us out, but we're going to be good this year and for years to come, because we're young and a lot of our guys are hungry."
   
   Hungry doesn't make up for trading the best left-hander in baseball to the New York Mets for four minor leaguers.
4. Something for upstate N.Y.: Who says New York City doesn't care about the rest of the state? Two of the four players the Mets gave up to get Santana, righties Philip Humber and Kevin Mulvey, are bound for Triple-A Rochester, thank you very much.
5. Justin time was two years ago: Baseball Prospectus 2008 pegs Justin Morneau to to have Triple Crown stats of .271, 24 homers and 99 RBI; not exactly MVP material.
6. You've wasted your life, sir: In high school, Twins farmhand Matt Macri was apparently the first freshman to start for the baseball team in 30 years and was Iowa's Mr. Football. Now let's figure out who bothered to put that on Wikipedia and have his hands cut off. He/s he has lost the privilege of having hands.
7. Shallow, fairly accurate observation from '07: "What other 96-win team would put any hope in Ramon Ortiz or Sidney Ponson?" Neither lasted the whole season.
8. The first team missed the bus: The Opening Day starter is Livan Hernandez, the human stopgap. He's an innings-eater, if not much more. The Twins might be good again in a few years, but for the time being, with Adam Everett at shortstop and someone named Carlos Gomez in centrefield, they are what they are.
9. Need-to-know: Losing Santana and keeping Nathan, who is a lights-out closer, is the classic Chara/Redden calamity. A team can't keep both, so they opt to keep the less talented one and assure everybody it's all gonna be OK. In the long run, it's bad juju.
   
   Twenty-oh-six, when Santana won the Cy Young and Joe Mauer was the MVP (although history, for some reason, says it went to Justin Morneau) was the high-water mark.

LYNX: SAME OL' SONG AND DANCE FAILS TO CAPTURE THE REAL BURN

Sun Media's "Minor Disaster" report on minor league baseball's slow slide to oblivion in Canada makes a passing reference to the Blue Jays possibly moving to their Double-A team to Ottawa when/if the Lynx pull up stakes. With a couple exceptions, that's about the only thing of value for an informed observer.

Chris Stevenson did a great job capturing original Lynx owner Howard Darwin's bittersweet sentiments during yesterday's XV Anniversary celebration at the Stadium. Our man Carl Kiifner of Ottawa Lynx Blog was quoted not once, not twice, but thrice in a couple of other articles.

The Lynx are dying a slow death. It's old hat. Move on, already.

Instead, why can't someone try to capture the real burn for a baseball fan in Canada -- that what's happening in this sports-illiterate country is 180 degrees removed from the baseball boom happening south of the border. The Americans get it with minor-league ball. Independent leagues and team are springing up. Triple-A attendance is up. There are people with money willing to take a risk on investing in a team. That doesn't happen in Canada and it sucks, but it's not the be-all end-all.

An afternoon or a night at a minor-league ballpark provides plenty of good old-fashioned visceral experience and at a reasonable price. It's something one gets to experience for herself or himself. In the larger picture, more people than ever before believe you get that from PVRed episodes of Lost or by playing video games to all hours, and vote with their wallets accordingly. (Yesterday, not long after the Lynx had lost by a fat pile of runs in front of an announced crowd of 1,826, I happened by an EB Games -- the first time I'd ever set foot in a video game store. It was late on a Saturday afternoon, but the place was packed.)

That's really what's happening. Sports operations who depend on having people in the stands for revenue and credibility are going to be affected further over the next few years.

The Americans get minor-league ball, but thy have issues. The same writer who batted out the "Minor Disaster" masterpiece also had an article today about investors in Wichita, Kansas trying to get a team in the independent Northern League. Wichita, a good-sized city of almost 600,000 people, is losing a Double-A team whose parent club, Kansas City, is only a few hours away. So it's not like the struggles of minor-league teams is even a Canadian problem. You see the irony?

Triple-A is almost certainly leaving Ottawa, but it's not a death, it's hopefully a rebirth. It's too bad the typical defeatist Canadian attitude has sway on people's judgment.

It's not a disaster for a Canadian baseball fan when you can sort through scores every night to see how Canadians such as Jason Bay, Erik Bedard, Justin Morneau and Joey Votto, who grew up in era when there good Jays and Expos teams and thriving Triple-A teams, are doing. It's not a disaster when there are more more young Canadian men down in the U.S. on baseball scholarships than on hockey scholarships (and the numbers of young Canadian women playing NCAA softball probably compares favourably with the number playing NCAA D-1 hockey).

It's just that being a baseball fan in Canada won't feel complete without access to minor-league baseball. The upshot is there are enough people in Ottawa who believe in baseball, in spite of everything.

Carl is now on record saying a future Ottawa club "would have to be affiliated with Toronto." Three months ago, one of The Tao of Stieb authors left a comment theorizing that Rogers Communications could move the Jays' short-season Single-A team in the New York-Penn League here, "extend the brand into this market" and give this city "a team that starts playing at the beginning of June, which is just about the time that people in Ottawa start wanting to go out to the ballpark."

Indie-league ball, the Can-Am League, has less appeal than being aligned with the Jays, but it does bear study since Montreal and Quebec are going to be in the Can-Am League. The upshot is greater minds who have followed baseball from an Ottawa vantage point for some time believe there's a future here.

One Lynx roster move: Anderson Garcia has been returned by the Philadelphia Phillies. Clay Condrey is back up with the big club; Jason Anderson is headed down to the R-Phils.

Tides 6, Lynx 1 (boxscore, play-by-play): The Lynx scored two runs in the last three games of this series and both came in on bases-loaded walks.

Bubba Nelson was allowed to start the seventh with his pitch count in the 90s and the Lynx down by only two. It was probably a good percentage move, but Norfolk scored three and got out of town with the series win.

Two of the principals from Canada's 2006 World Baseball Classic win over the States helped the Tides today -- Adam Stern was 1-for-4 and Steve Green, who got the final out in that game 16 months ago, finished up with two innings of shutout relief. How many people would even make that connection?

The Lynx are off to Pawtucket, where tomorrow they'll be the set decoration as the Red Sox Nation losers get ready to analyze Clay Buchholz's big Triple-A debut to death. Eude Brito (1-5, 7.71, 1.93 WHIP) goes the Lynx.

Previous:
A "Great, Eh" Performance (March 8, 2006)
Stop Lamenting The Lynx Already... Say Hello To The Capital Bandits (Sept. 6, 2006)

That's all for now. Send your thoughts to neatesager@yahoo.ca.

JAYS-TWINS: BAD MANAGING 101...

Sunday -- Twins 4, Jays 2: Another tutorial in Bad Managing 101 by John Gibbons got lost in the shuffle amid the two walks and the throwing error which sunk A.J. Burnett (who took the loss despite an eight-inning complete-game three-hitter) in the third inning.

As you probably saw, the Twins scored twice in the third to go ahead for good when Justin Morneau hit a two-out Baltimore chop that bounched high off home plate. Burnett, after having to wait an eternity for the ball to descend, overthrew first base instead of eating the ball, allowing Jeff Cirillo to score the second run.

Gibbons had just sat there like a goon after Burnett walked Cirillo on a 3-2, two-out pitch moments before the error. Perhaps Gregg Zaun, when he's in the lineup, goes to the mound and says something such as, "Look, you have good stuff, we'll give you some runs, you've got it." Gibbons could have got the attention of Jason Phillips, who was catching, or one of the infielders, or sent pitching coach Brad Arnsberg to the mound, but whatever the reason, he didn't.

The TV closeups seemed to indicate Burnett was feeling a bit burned after not getting a third-strike call from the home plate ump, Gerry Darling, earlier in the inning. Sure, Roy Halladay typically fights through those gumption traps, but Burnett's a different dude and might have needed someone to put him right. A manager who knows what he's doing would have acted there.

It all unravelled from there. Burnett lost track of the runners to give the Twins a gift double steal and issued another walk before having the bad break when he outwitted the reigning American League MVP, only to have Morneau's grounder go off the plate and shoot 20 feet into the air.

That's inexcusable for Gibbons to just sit there like a goon let the chips where they may. Burnett giving up that two-run upper-deck homer to Morneau that decided the game three innings later is forgivable. Good hitters always get theirs eventually.

Who knows, maybe Burnett would have reacted differently in the third inning if he had reason to logically feel his hitters were going to produce more than two runs for him. Ultimately, the Fire Gibbons and Fire Mickey Brantley bandwagons could be filling up soon.

(Related: John Brattain of Hardball Times captures just how bad the bottom of the Blue Jays order has been.)

Saturday -- Jays 9, Twins 8 (13 innings): It seems best to be on the up-and-up about Tomo Ohka throwing seven strong innings and the Jays not falling apart after blowing a four-run lead in the eighth and ninth innings. Casey Janssen and Jeremy Accardo have been so reliable that they're allowed one off-night.

Momentum only lasts so long as who starts the next game. Meantime, Lyle Overbay's game-winning hit which completed his four-RBI night couldn't have come at a better time. The Jays were running out of hitters since the genius manager who shall remain nameless pinch-ran for both his No. 4 and No. 5 hitters, and the Twins could have potentially brought the top of their order up in the 14th.

Putting in John McDonald for Troy Glaus after a leadoff walk with a four-run lead in the eighth was penny-wise and pound-foolish. True, the Jays have to play it safe with Glaus' sore heel, but that baserunner was moved up by another walk and then Matt Stairs hit a long double that could have scored anyone (non-Molina family) from second base. Unless Glaus was hurting, you only pinch-run there if he's on second with two out and you need the upgrade on speed. You-know-who got away with another rock there -- especially since McDonald started a 5-4-3 double play after taking Glaus' spot at third base -- but if that's the biggest complaint aside from the bullpen, it must have been a good night.

Friday -- Twins 4, Jays 3: Love that run production -- Alex Rios was on base three times tonight and scored once.

What was up with Scott Downs' fielding flub, plus another blunder by the pitcher, that gave the Twins an extra out to score the tiebreaking run in the seventh? That's the third time in about two weeks a pitcher's fielding error cost the Jays in a one-run game. When it happens that often, it strains coincidence -- it's on the manager and his coaching staff.

Jesse Litsch: He gave Jays fans a great night a couple weeks ago. Isn't that enough for now? He's geeked out of his mind, clearly.

So much for waking up this morning (hey, at 12:09 p.m. Eastern, it's still the morning in more than half of Canada) believing the Jays can go into Minnesota and sweep the Twins. That Garrison Keillor Prairie Home Companion pragmatism works after all.

BATTER UP: MINNESOTA TWINS

Counting down the seconds till Opening Day, when life begins anew involves providing a "starting nine" of obscure trivia, fun facts, high points and low moments for all 29 major-league teams, and if there's time, the Tampa Bay Devil Rays too! Presenting: The Minnesota Twins.

1. Justin Morneau as AL MVP last year was a bit of a joke -- but he's Canadian! It's cool that the Twins' 130-RBI man (pictured) joined the NBA's Steve Nash and the NHL's Joe Thornton as reigning most valuable players from The Great White North, eh. That said, Twins catcher Joe Mauer and ace pitcher Johan Santana were both more integral to last year's division title-winning season.
   
   Why did Morneau win? Because sportswriters fetishize RBI and he had a lot of them -- thanks to the fact the hitters ahead of him, including Mauer, kept getting on base.
2. The Twins original owner was a bigoted A-hole. The late Calvin Griffith gave a talk in the late '70s where he said that he moved the Twins to Minneapolis-St. Paul from Washington, D.C., "when I noticed you had only 15,000 blacks here." Not long after, the team's star player Rod Carew asked to be traded from Griffith's "plantation."
3. Today is a sad day for Twins fans. It's the one-year anniversary of the death of Hall of Fame centre-fielder Kirby Puckett, whose died way too young of a brain aneurysm at age 45. Not to overdo it on the schmaltz, but current centre-fielder Torii Hunter says he learned a lot of lessons from Puckett as a young player, and he's passing them along to minor-leaguer understudy Denard Span. Span, who's one of the Twins' top prospects, is likely to start this season with the Triple-A Rochester Red Wings, who visit the Ottawa Lynx July 20-23 and again on Aug. 29-30.
   
   By the way, Torii Hunter is one of the top three Tories of all time -- the others are Amos and Churchill.
4. Rod Carew is not Jewish. The seven-time batting champion, contrary to Adam Sandler's song, has never converted.
5. Johan Santana is all that, and a bag of potato chips. You probably know that the Venezuelan lefty won the pitching Triple Crown last year, leading the league in wins, strikeouts and earned-run average. He still has two more seasons before free agency, but he's already due $13 million this season and wants a deal done now, now, now! Obviously, there's widespread speculation of what he might command on the open market.
6. Did they get away with letting Big Papi get away? One of the few moves that hasn't worked out for Twins GM Terry Ryan was declining to offer arbitration to David Ortiz after the Twins reached the ALCS in 2002. Ortiz signed with the Red Sox for a bargain basement $1.25 million and the rest is lightweight Drew Barrymore-Jimmy Fallon romantic comedy history.
   
   The Twins haven't got past the first round since. If it had been possible to take a flier a 26-year-old slugger with an injury history and no defensive position without cutting corners elsewhere on the ballclub have made a difference? Did losing Ortiz actually cost the Twins?
   
   It may have in 2003. Ortiz's Runs Created/27 outs was 8.02. The Twins primary DH, Matt LeCroy, posted a decent 6.02 RC/27. It's hard to say if that difference would not have earned the Twins the seven more wins they needed to avoid a first-round matchup with the Yankees, who eliminated them in four games. Ortiz hit two homers in the 2003 ALCS vs. the Yankees. If he had hit similarly well for the Twins in the first round, would that have been enough for them to win two more games? Doubtful.
   
   It did in '04. Ortiz put 8.47 RC/27. The Twins had no regular DH; 35-year-old Jose Offerman saw the most time at the "position" and LeCroy was bad. The Twins only needed one more win to get home-field advantage for the first round and face the wild-card Red Sox instead of the Yankees, who eliminated them in four games again. No one needs to be reminded what Ortiz did to the Yankees in October 2004. However, the Red Sox swept their first-round series, and there's no guarantee of what Ortiz would have done playing for the Twins in an ALCS against the Yankees. The Yankees could have pitched around him more easily than they could have with the Red Sox lineup.
   
   In '05, Ortiz (8.90 RC/27) was the reason Boston edged Cleveland by two games for the wild card. The Twins finishing 12 games back. Would Ortiz have made up those 10 wins the Twins needed? He had 22 Win Shares Above Bench, meaning he was worth seven more wins to his team than a backup would have been -- good, but not enough. Maybe those extra wins Ortiz would have brought the Twins would have come at division rival Cleveland's expense. Minnesota likely would have just finished a close third in the AL Central.
   
   As for '06, with Ortiz (8.90 RC/27) Minnesota wins 100-plus games instead of 96 and finishes with the AL's best record. They would have still faced Oakland in the playoffs since Detroit was the wild card and teams from the same division can't meet in the Division Series and the A's swept the series. Ortiz could not have won three games by himself.
   
   So really, letting Ortiz leave only cost the Twins one ALCS appearance, and possibly a wild-card spot. His salary was in the $5-7 million range in '05-06, and it's questionable whether the Twins could have absorbed that without weakening their team. As well, there's no knowing how much the change of scenery helped David Ortiz become David Ortiz.
   

7. Our Retro Cool Twin was baseball's most multi-tasking player, ever. Not only was César Tovar (infielder, 1965-72) the second player in major-league history to play all nine positions in one game, but according to Mike Shropshire's book Seasons in Hell he was also rumoured to be married to three women in as many countries.
   
   Tovar was top of the order table-setter on some pretty good teams -- the Twins finished one game out in 1967 and won the first two AL West titles in '69-70.
8. For future reference: Bench Twins hitters until mid-May in your fantasy league. The new ballpark that slated to open in 2010 will be open-air --- no roof like Toronto, Milwaukee and Seattle. Stock up on the brandy and longjohns!
   
   Hey, anything has to be better than the Metrodome.
9. Need-to-know about the Twins: They're good but always have to make allowances due to their payroll constrants. That means trying to scrape by with with poor production from two power positions, DH and left field, and complementing Santana in the starting rotation with kids or reclamation projects. Young starters Boof Bonser and Matt Garza are going to be living a fishbowl existence (on a Minnesota scale, granted), and what other 96-win team would put any hope in Ramon Ortiz or Sidney Ponson? In a nutshell, the Twins make the most of what they have, and can compete since their division doesn't have an Evil Empire.

That's all for now. Send your thoughts to neatesager@yahoo.ca.

WHERE'D THE YEAR GO... OCTOBER

As 2006 draws to a close, we are reminded of a few of the events that brought us closer to you: Dick Cheney shooting a guy in the face, premium ice cream price wars, dogs that were mistakenly issued major credit cards, and others who weren't so lucky ... In our continuing quest to secure a lower rung on the inferno, Out of Left Field looks back at the wild 'n' nutty month of October.

Trailer Park Boys wasn't a great movie, but it was still, in its way, one of the awesomest things ever to happen to Canadian cinema.

We weighed in on baseball's individual award winners, and it never crossed our mind that some dumbass middle-aged sportswriters might actually select Justin Morneau as American League MVP.

Say hello to Steagle Colbeagle the Eagle.

Passings: Buck O'Neil (1911-2006).

A Queen's Golden Gaels loss sometimes sparks outbursts of unbridled creativity. There's meds you can take for that, you know.

So much for that Sager guy being the saviour of Ottawa sports (although we're gracious to Sportsnet's Ian Mendes for giving us the chance).

There's your bad World Series teams -- and there's the ones who were secretly subpar. The Detroit Tigers were a miracle team (near-total lack of plate discipline notwithstanding), but their World Series showing might've put them in the latter category.

My sweet lord, who lost the bet that led to Katie Atkins singing O Canada before a Leafs-Sens game?

Our Queen's Golden Gaels were up and down all season, but they beat McMaster in a playoff game, thanks to an inspired bit of field-goal fakery. You have no idea how happy this made me.

That's all for now. Send your thoughts to neatesager@yahoo.ca.

JEFF BAGWELL: EARLY ADOPTER AND FIRST BALLOT HALL OF FAMER

(Future Hall of Famer Jeff Bagwell is retiring today. Here's what appeared about him on Nov. 1, the day after it became clear he would retire.)

Jeff Bagwell has been handed a $7 million buyout package by the Houston Astros. Money for nothing -- what else would you expect from a franchise whose ballpark was once called Enron Field?

Very few Bagwell retirement tributes will refer to him and his buddy from the right side of the Astros infield, Craig Biggio, as "early adopters." That's Net lingo for people who can sense a coming change and lead it instead of react to it. Both Bags and Biggio were players who foreshadowed the Moneyball era -- which is why Bagwell's Hall of Fame credentials may be lost some of the Hall of Fame voters of an older generation. (Just look at the people who look like dunderheads for claiming that Mark McGwire's low career hit total is somehow relevant.)

The Hall of Fame voters have all these arbitrary standards -- 3,000 hits, 500 homers, a .300 career batting average, etc. -- that should have been discarded long ago, because they obscure the brilliance of players such as Bags and Biggio. Neither has a .300 career average, but both have excellent on-base percentages -- the all-important stat that teams used to discount before slowly waking up to its most importance over the past few years. Both were great "percentage players."

Both have skills which teams underrate. For Bagwell, that's defence and base-stealing ability from a first baseman. For Biggio, it's his surprising power for a second baseman.

That's lost on some baseball writers who fetishize Triple Crown stats -- batting average, home runs and RBI -- and World Series rings. When Bagwell comes up for the Hall of Fame, they'll look at the .297 career batting average and 449 career home runs -- fewer dingers than Jose Canseco, Fred McGriff and the disgraced Rafael Palmeiro (and Sammy Sosa and Mark McGwire, all of whose hopes for the Hall range from not a chance to iffy at best, for various reasons.)

On a side note, Bags and Biggio's career arc reflects how baseball, in the States, has tried to become (like a lot of U.S. pop culture) this white, Christian right-pandering enterprise — ironically at a time when it's more of a global game than ever before. The '05 Astros were the first pennant winner in 50 years to not have a single African-American on their roster.

A generation ago, baseball had lots of coulda-been-anything guys, black and white, who could easily be pictured playing another sport: Kirk Gibson, Paul Molitor, Eric Davis, Tim Raines, Rickey Henderson or Dave Winfield. Tom Glavine and Orel Hershiser both could have played hockey. Understandably, that could be off-putting to a veteran baseball writer.

Those are just a couple factors in why Bagwell and Biggio have gone so unnoticed. Back in '03, ESPN.com did a poll (unscientific, I know) and respondents didn't think either was a Hall of Famer. People have come around on Biggio, but mainly because he's hung on long enough to approach 3,000 career hits.

(Biggio reached 3,000 secondary bases a couple years ago. Hopefully, voters will perk up to value of secondary bases in a player's Hall of Fame credentials: Tim Raines, the great Montreal Expo, fell short of 3,000 hits due to injuries, but had more than 3,300 secondary bases.)

Bagwell slowed down after 2001 due to an arthritic right shoulder, which along with nine seasons of 81 games a year at the Astrodome cost him a shot at 500 homers. Still, a player should be taken at his peak value, and he managed 449 homers while playing only 14 full seasons. That's a Hall of Famer. He's also had the same strikes against him that Carlos Delgado has had -- played for a team that didn't get a lot of attention, and he was very consistent year-in year-out, so he didn't generate a lot of buzz like Ryan Howard or Justin Morneau did this year.

Plus, in the '90s, there was always a ton of guys putting up these ridiculous home run and RBI totals each year. Brady Anderson once hit 50 home runs in a season. It's tough to sift through the numbers and figure out who was for real during the Steroid Era. The 5-foot-11 Bagwell's body type changed a little but he seems to have escaped scrutiny, since the rules of American sports journalism prohibit steroid allegations from being directed at average-sized Caucasian ballplayers on teams based in Red States.

Nevertheless, Bags was bona fide, all right. His stats list how he fares on a series of litmus tests Bill James devised to measure a player's Cooperstown credentials, and Bagwell passes three of the four, no problem. It's just that his greatness is obscured from some people since:

1. He didn't play in a major baseball market
2. Wasn't in the post-season every year, and struggled when his team did make it
3. Played in a pitcher's park -- it would be a fair guess that he lost 4-5 homers a year while playing in the Astrodome from 1991 to '99
4. Didn't get to pad his stats during the "wind-down" portion of his career
5. His offensive skills were spread out over several areas, rather than just one or two (like McGwire and his home runs, or Tony Gwynn and his batting average)

Bagwell, like Albert Pujols, was a more complete player than the aforementioned guys who put up big career home run totals and won't get into Cooperstown. That should be taken into account. He's the only first baseman to ever have a 30-homer, 30-stolen base year, and he did win one Gold Glove for his defence.

Take a look at that .408 career on-base percentage -- OBP goes a lot farther toward helping a baseball team win than batting average. Take a look at his all-around game. Oh, and while I don't have the time to put it in historical context, his on-base plus slugging (OPS) of .948 is among the top 25, all time.

A Hall of Famer? Hell yes. There are plenty of early adopters among baseball nuts who realize Bagwell was a brilliant player. If he's not a first-ballot Hall of Famer, then burn the place down.

OK, please don't burn the place down.

Related:
Jeff Bagwell career stats (Baseball-Reference.com)

Quick note on secondary average (extra bases on hits, walks, hit by pitches and steals divided by total at-bats): Craig Biggio has a career batting average of .283, but his secondary average is .329. Fellow middle infielder and sure-fire first-ballot Hall of Famer Cal Ripken hit .276 lifetime, with a secondary average of .278. (I'm including hit-by-pitches in these figures, although some people don't.)

Tony Gwynn hit .338 for his career, but his secondary average is only .242. Again, none of this has been put in the context of eras or home parks.

Talk you later. Send your thoughts to neatesager@yahoo.ca.

DEAL WITH IT, AMERICA: IN 2006, YOU WERE OUT-KLASSED

You can't talk about Canadian success without acknowledging the U.S. of A.

So let's do that, if you care to be a little tongue-in-cheek. While this is one Canada's best sports years ever, at the same time is it one of America's worst?

Cindy Klassen, whose five medals were the highlight of this country's most successful Winter Olympics, was named the winner of the Lou Marsh Award just minutes ago as Canada's outstanding athlete. She symbolizes this year in Canadian sport, before Steve Nash and three other reigning MVPs -- soccer's Christine Sinclair as U.S. women's college athlete of the year, Justin Morneau in major-league baseball and Joe Thornton in the NHL.

Remember who was hyped to have a chance at winning five medals at Turin, and fell on his face -- fell on his face spectacularly? That was skiier Bode Miller, who turned in a craptacular Olympic performance.

Miller already had a biography and an eponymous video game by the time he got to Turin, but he went 0-for-5 on the ski hills in Italy and -- what was worse? -- had Bob Costas tear a strip off him on NBC for letting America down. Miller's public persona -- if not the young man himself -- became a symbol of America's Losing Year: Brash, self-indulgent and continually failing to live up to expectations.

The American hype machine had built up Miller into something he wasn't, just like it did with George W. Bush and his cronies back in early 2003. His Olympic showing wasn't historically bad for an American downhiller.

There is just no room for that kind of nuance when the forces of no-memory aim to trim the facts to suit their purposes -- just like they did with the cowboy coward in the White House in '03-04. Turns out Miller isn't Jean-Claude Killy, and Bush ain't Winston Churchill, no matter what anyone says.

The U.S. won one more Olympic medal than Canada (and nine golds to our seven), but you're comparing a large, sports-obsessed country of 300 million to a country of 32 million which has trouble funding any sport which isn't hockey. It just seemed that nearly anywhere you looked in '06, Canadians were enjoying more than our usual modest, thanks-for-comin'-out success and American athletes and teams were making like Bode Miller on his way out of a bar -- barely able to stand.

It went that way domestically and abroad for the U.S. The Super Bowl, America's biggest sporting event, was a lousy game that was forgotten immediately outside of the greater Pittsburgh and Seattle regions. The World Series was a mistake-fest that was won by a team which had fewer regular-season victories than the Toronto Blue Jays, not that St. Louis Cardinals fans should feel need to apologize for their unlikely victory.

Various Team USAs ate it big-time all year. Sweden, which has barely 3,000 female hockey players, beat the U.S. in the Olympic women's hockey semifinal.

World Baseball Classic? Canada, with a lineup of pros who earn less combined than Alex Rodriguez, who couldn't even decide what team he wanted to play for, beat Team USA, which was triumph enough. The powerhouse U.S. team couldn't even get to the semifinals.

A couple months after a very good NBA Finals, a team of U.S. bajillionaire basketball players failed to even reach the final at the world championship in Japan, losing to Greece -- which didn't have a single NBA player -- in the semis. Around that same time, it was coming to light that the cyclist who was supposed to retain North America's (imaginary) interest in cycling post-Lance Armstrong, Floyd Landis, may have been a drug cheat.

It's just as well the U.S. wasn't looking for redemption at the women's world basketball championship, since the Americans settled for a bronze medal there as well.

Soccer? The U.S. lost to tiny Ghana at the World Cup, and tying eventual winners Italy was pretty thin gruel after the No. 5-ranked Americans went winless and failed to advance out of group play. In tennis, American players failed to win a Grand Slam singles title. Only Andy Roddick, at the U.S. Open tellingly enough, was even able to make a final -- where he got blasted by Roger Federer.

Oh, but the Carolina Hurricanes did win the Stanley Cup, with an American coach in Peter Laviolette no less, which is great for U.S. hockey. Of course, it came at a time when the average American is fast losing interest in hockey, since ESPN has lost interest in hockey.

Most Americans wish now that their country had voted differently two years ago, granted. While you can't prove it, of course, it sure feels likes there's some karmic connection between the Bush era, America's low standing in the world and their teams and athletes getting their comeuppance. It's not all bad -- Americans always bounce back. Meantime, a down-on-its-luck America usually means better movies and music for Canadians and the rest of the world to devour.

Canada's sporting year wasn't perfect. The Grey Cup was a stinker. In terms of getting out of sports what one puts into it, we beat our southern neighbours but good.

Still, Americans, like people worldwide, turn to sports for an escape from the everyday world. It's a loose connection, but at a time when Bush has messed everything up so badly, they can't even count on that anymore -- regardless of whether or not they voted for him.

There's a lesson in there, not just for Americans but Canadians too. Many people in our country seem eager to move away from Bush's America, but a lot of the powers-that-be think we should emulate their example.

After all, where did our biggest sports disaster come this year? It was in men's hockey -- the one sport where we act all full of ourselves, behave obnoxiously, and are out to win at all costs... or as some Canadian almost always will inevitably (if wrongly) put it, like a bunch of Americans.

(This post was linked in Deadspin's "Blogdome" on Dec. 12, 2006. Click here to return to the main site.)

That's all for now. Send your thoughts to neatesager@yahoo.ca.

MORNEAU GLORY FOR CANUCK SLUGGER

Now that Canada's own Justin Morneau has won American League most valuable player honours after his stellar season for the Minnesota Twins, it means you can take him off the shortlist for the Lou Marsh Award, which goes to the country's athlete of the year.

Believe it or not, and this should tell you a lot about the Canadian character, winning a major individual award in major-league baseball is the kiss of the death so far as winning the Lou Marsh goes. None of the previous Hoser hardballers who won major awards -- the Cy Young or MVP -- won the Lou Marsh that same year, and all three were snubbed in favour of someone who participates in something that's barely a sport.

It's like winning acclaim from American sportswriters violates some coolness test. (Never mind that Morneau wasn't even the MVP of his own team, let alone the entire American League's. One baseball writer even calls it downright criminal that he and Ryan Howard won due to sportswriters' infantile obsession with runs batted in.)

In 2003, Eric Gagné won the National Cy Young Award with the L.A. Dodgers. Athlete of the year honours went to a golfer, Mike Weir.

Six years earlier, 1997, Larry Walker was National League MVP, but a race-car driver, Jacques Villenueve, was top athlete. Really? From here, it looked like the car was doing most of the work. (The next year, Walker won the award)

And that has nothing on 1971, when Ferguson Jenkins won the NL Cy Young Award, and the award went to Hervé Filion, a harness racing driver. Seriously. A harness racing driver was supposedly a better athlete than a future Hall of Fame baseball player.*

Ominously for Morneau, this was a Winter Olympics year, meaning there are all sorts of athletes in pseudo-sports who won gold medals: Duff Gibson in skeleton, Jennifer Heil in moguls skiing and, oh, don't forget Brad Gushue in curling. So he'll repeat this dubious bit of history.

Actually, in all seriousness, if Cindy Klassen doesn't receive the Lou Marsh Award after what she did in winning five medals in Turin, they ought to abolish the award.

DIGRESSIONS

(*Jenkins later won the Lou Marsh in 1974, but only after he was jobbed out of the American League Cy Young balloting. The sportswriters instead gave it to Catfish Hunter. Jenkins was better, but it was also his first year after changing leagues, and Hunter played on a pennant winner, and oh yeah, Hunter was white and the sportswriters back then were a bunch of prejudiced A-holes. Totally different from today. Otherwise, Jenkins would have been the first guy to win in both leagues and would have gone into Cooperstown on the first ballot, not the third. OK, maybe the second.)

Related:
Lou Marsh Trophy (Wikipedia)

That's all for now. Send your thoughts to neatesager@yahoo.ca.