where you need to finish

So my wife asked why I was happy today.  I told her the Brewers won another game, and are playing well.

Wife, "So what place are the Brewers in?"

Dan, "2nd place."

Wife, "No, I mean what place in the American League?"

Dan, "The Brewers have been in the National League since 1998, and their place in the league doesn't matter."

My point with this conversation is that the Brewers need to make the playoffs, that's all the matters for the regular season of 162 games.  There are three divisions in the National League, the East, Central, and West.  The winner of each of those divisions goes to the playoffs, as well as the 2nd place team with the best record.

Where the Brewers finish in the National League is irrelevant.  They just need to fall within the scenario above to have a successful season.

basketball game this weekend?

You may have heard that the Miami Heat defeated the Chicago Bulls last night.  With that win, the Heat advance to the NBA Finals to play against the Dallas Mavericks......on Tuesday night.

LeBron James shouts in celebration after the Heat win
photo from Associated Press

With that, we have 5 days to stew over who has the upper hand in this rematch of the 2006 NBA Finals.  To many who are anticipating this matchup, this is a huge letdown.  I know the NBA has scheduled the Finals for May 31 since the season started, but many people still have basketball on the mind, and would love it for Game 1 to be on Sunday night.

football on Sunday

At this moment, the National Football League (NFL) owners and players are having trouble agreeing on a new collective bargaining agreement to run their sport for the future.  As a result of this impasse, the owners have locked out the players from workout facilities, and contact between players and coaches is off limits.  The start of the season on time is in question.

So what are you going to do without professional football on Sunday?  How about some college football?

Andrew Luck of Stanford could be playing football on Sunday in 2011
photo from Sports Illustrated for Kids

With professional football being the biggest spectator sport in the country, the Pacific 10 (normally called the Pac-10) conference has started the process of scheduling some of their games on Sunday, hoping to draw in some of the eyeballs that would normally be watching the NFL.  If the NFL does come back, the Pac-10 can easily switch back to Saturday football.

why they don't want people on the field

One moment that absolutely made me chuckle this past week was the sight of a fan running onto Houston's Minute Maid Ballpark, and escaping the authorities by jumping over fences and scaling parts of the ballpark until he was out of the ballpark.  The link to watch the escape is here: http://youtu.be/X7B4gic1-qU

While this might seem amusing, there have been a few instances where the athletes and other officials on the field have been victims to fan attacks during a sporting event.  Tennis player Monica Seles was stabbed in the back on the court in 1993.  In 2002, Kansas City Royals coach Tom Gamboa was attacked on the field by a father and son.

Tom Gamboa being attacked in 2002
photo from ESPN

Since officials don't know the intent of fans, drastic actions, such as the tasing of a fan in Philadelphia might become more common.

a Philadelphia fan getting tasered
photo by Matt Slocum

a lasting tribute to Killebrew

Baseball Hall of Famer Harmon Killebrew died today at the age of 74.  Killebrew hit 573 home runs in his major league baseball career, most of it being with the Minnesota Twins.

One of the lasting tributes to Killebrew is a seat that you can find bolted to the wall at the Mall of America in Bloomington, MN.

seat on wall of Mall of America at right
photo from Yahoo! Sports

At the site of the Mall of America was the previous home of the Minnesota Twins, Metropolitan Stadium, which was demolished to make room for the shopping mall in the 1980's.

The site of the seat bolted to the wall at the Mall of America is the location where the longest home in Metropolitan Stadium history landed, which was hit by Killebrew in 1967.  The estimated distance of the home run is 522 feet.

The estimated distance of Killebrew's 522' home run
photo from Yahoo! Sports

being bad for a long time

I saw an interesting stat about the NFL today.  It stated that in the past 20 years, there have been 13 different Super Bowl winners.

The sport of baseball is the opposite, and is marked by some teams that are always competitive, and some that are historically just awful for long stretches of time. 

One of those horrible teams is the Pittsburgh Pirates.  The Pirates have not had a winning season since 1992.

The Pirates win a game in 2011
Photo Credit: Jared Wickerham/Getty Images)

One of the most interesting news stories from the Pirates this week is the fact that right now they have a winning record for the first time in May in 7 years.  There are certainly many more games to play in this season, but normally at this time in the season, the Pirates have fallen way to the bottom of the standings.

what is a no hitter?

This year, it appears that the pitchers are doing much better at their job that hitters are doing at theirs.  The case could be made when this past week there were two no-hitters thrown.  A no-hitter is when the opposing pitcher doesn't allow a single, double, triple or home run to any opposing players.

On Tuesday, Minnesota Twins pitcher, Francisco Liriano managed to walk 6 Chicago White Sox hitters, but didn't allow a hit to record his first no-hitter.  On Saturday, Detroit Tigers pitcher Justin Verlander threw a no-hitter against the Toronto Blue Jays.  It was Verlander's 2nd career no-hitter.

Justin Verlander throws a no-hitter on Saturday
photo courtesy of Toronto Globe and Mail

For a pitcher, a no-hitter is a tremendous accomplishment, as there have only been 271 no-hitters in the history of baseball going back to 1875.

The next best thing for a pitcher is to throw a perfect game, which is when a pitcher doesn't allow anyone on base.  This means the pitcher can't issue any walks, and no errors can be made by his teammates.  It would be a situation where the pitcher faced 27 batters, and retired all of them in order.  This has only been done 18 times in baseball history.

two balls

So my wife asked me the difference between baseball and softball today.  I know she probably knows many of the differences, but how would I know what she doesn't know?

The obvious difference is the size of the ball.  A baseball easily fits in the palm of any adult, whereas a softball is much larger.  A softball also doesn't fly as far as a baseball.  Centerfield in a baseball park is normally around 400', whereas the deepest part of a softball field is around 300'.

a baseball and a softball

With the smaller field comes shorter distances between bases.  In baseball the distance is 90' between each successive base.  In softball, the distance is 60'.

Another big difference is that a softball is pitched underhand, and a baseball is pitched overhand.  There are two types of softball, one being fastpitch, and one being slowpitch.  The difference is that in slow pitch the pitcher arcs the ball, trying to hit the plate or mat behind the plate to get a strike call.  In fastpitch, the pitcher throws the ball fast to hit a strike zone defined by the umpire.

These are some of the major differences I could think of offhand.  There are a few other ideas that are popping into my mind right now, but the point of this blog is to not get lost in the minutiae.

getting it done - everyday

Without a doubt, the story of the 2011 baseball season so far has been Los Angeles Dodgers outfielder Andre Ethier.

Ethier currently is in the midst of a 27-game hitting streak, meaning he has gotten at least a single, double, triple, or home run in every single game he has played in this year.  This is a great start by Ethier, and if he reaches base on Monday night, he will be exactly half way to Joe DiMaggio's all-time record of getting a hit in 56 consecutive games, which he did in 1941.

Dodgers rightfielder Andre Ethier

I expect that once Ethier gets past 30 games that he will start to receive national attention.  There have been a lot of 27 game hitting streaks, but once you get to 30, you start making history that people will remember.  Only 35 players have hitting streaks of greater than 30 games.