#AskSpector: First manager fired? It's possible there won't be one

Jesse Spector

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#AskSpector: First manager fired? It's possible there won't be one image

It’s time once again for the #AskSpector tweetbag, where your questions about baseball and everything else under the sun are up for answering. If you want to get in on the act, it’s easy. Just head to your Twitter machine, and send a tweet with the #AskSpector hashtag. Told you it was easy. Now, will answering these questions be that easy?

 

 

I think it’s entirely possible that there won’t be any in-season managerial changes this year, but if there is going to be one, I don’t hate Kirk Gibson’s chances of getting the ax if Tony La Russa’s evaluation of his new organization is that a change at the helm is needed.

Working from the bottom of the standings up, the Cubs and Astros both know they stink, Clint Hurdle has last year’s good will in Pittsburgh, Joe Maddon isn’t going anywhere, and neither is Terry Francona. Bryan Price is in his first season. Everyone else is within three games of the .500 mark – hard to call for anyone to get canned that way.

 

 

Of course it’s waffles. Waffles give you the ability to control syrup flow to various parts of the doughy breakfast treat, while also providing a handy guide on cutting appropriate-sized bites. Want fruit on half of your breakfast and syrup on the other half? Good luck trying that with pancakes. Waffles’ versatility alone makes them better than pancakes, and that’s before you even get to the fact of waffles tasting better. Furthermore, when you put Nutella on waffles, you’re creating a tasty delight, while when you put Nutella on pancakes, you’re creating a bizarre layer cake that will lack structural integrity if left alone for more than three minutes.

 

 

Froot Loops and Rice Chex.

 

 

By all accounts, Dallas Keuchel is a real person who pitches for the Houston Astros and has 47 strikeouts in 53 innings this season, with an FIP of 3.02 over the course of eight starts in which he has gone 4-2 for a team that is 16-28. I have not met him, but enough people I know have met him for me to be confident that I am not the victim of an elaborate ruse regarding Keuchel’s realness.

 

 

I would rather have Dee Gordon, because he has shown more ability with the bat, has a bit more savvy as a baserunner, and since he is an infielder by trade, would have an easier time shifting to the outfield for some versatility than Hamilton would have moving to the infield.

 

 

No. Look at the FIP figures for Tampa Bay’s starting pitchers, then look at their ERAs. Then look at the numbers next to Evan Longoria’s name. The Rays are fortunate that nobody has run away with the American League East, because it will make their job of coming back easier, and they do have a comeback in them.

 

 

I can’t think of a terrifying one. Chief Wahoo is unsettling.

 

 

I’ve never played Super Smash Bros., but the answer is MarioKart, because MarioKart on N64 is a pantheon-level video game, right there with Tecmo Bowl and NHL 94.

 

 

The National League’s rules allow us to see Bartolo Colon hit. The American League’s rules allow us to see David Ortiz hit. These are both solid arguments in the “pro” column of the respective rule sets. Seriously, though, I do like seeing pitchers rewarded for being able to hit, and I like the element of strategy that is added by having pitchers in the batting order. But it’s far more likely that we will someday see the DH throughout baseball than it is that we will see the DH go away.

 

 

I hope he’s thinking about how awesome he is, but Jamey Carroll is a pretty humble guy, so maybe he’s thinking about sandwiches.

 

 

Well, Jeff Samardzija is a name you’ll hear a lot this summer, but I’m still not sure that the Blue Jays should be in the business of further mortgaging their future for a far-from-certain payoff in the near term. To me, the Blue Jays’ bigger problem is in the bullpen anyway.

 

 

I think Greg Dobbs is this player in today’s game, but generally, I think the disappearance of the long-term pinch hitter has to do with the way that the game has evolved, so that most often, the first batter off the bench is going to be somebody who is a semi-regular player, and not a pinch-hitting specialist. With more pitchers on major league rosters, substitute position players need to have more defensive value to merit their place – you’re not going to want to pinch run for a pinch hitter, for instance.

 

 

I’ll stick with my preseason American League pennant pick, the Texas Rangers, who can get healthier, are only two games under .500 now, and still have 13 games remaining against the Houston Astros. I don’t think the Rangers will necessarily catch the A’s, but I like their chances at getting a wild card. Also, the Red Sox.

 

 

I was amazed. Not that the Rangers could win a game in Montreal, but that they could go in there and so thoroughly dominate a very good Canadiens team in a place where they’ve struggled like crazy for years. It’s just one game, sure, but the Rangers and their fans can’t be blamed for feeling like something special is happening.

 

 

Ball Four, but everyone says that. Not that it isn’t deserved, because it is, but in the interest of giving you something else to read, get your hands on “One Pitch Away” by Mike Sowell, a tremendous oral history of the amazing 1986 playoffs.

 

 

I picked the Blackhawks before the season. I’m sticking with that pick.

 

 

Well, I have a piece coming soon that ranks all of the general managers in MLB. I assume that you think Amaro should be No. 30. He’s definitely in the running.

 

 

Grape, but let’s be clear on one thing here, and that is that Jolly Ranchers are not good. Someday, I will be an old man, and my candy dish will have Werther’s Original like a respectable old man, and not Jolly Ranchers like some old man who has lost touch with reality and now thinks that people are actively seeking out Jolly Ranchers. Of course you’ll have one if they’re in the candy dish, but the whole time, you’re wishing it was something better.

 

 

Ruben Tejada. I would have made it clear from the start that the job was his for this season, and that this was the audition to see if he was going to be the long-term solution. Then I would not have deviated from that plan. You’ve got a roster worth 72-79 wins anyway – an extra win or two is not the point of this year for the Mets. Continually jerking someone around accomplishes nothing.

 

 

According to the seminal 1977 biology text “Stork Spills The Beans,” babies come from mommies. Speaking from experience, this is true, as I have a daughter, and she came from her mommy. I was there in the hospital and saw it happen.

 

 

Well, in my hypothetical scenario of expansion and geographical realignment, I put Montreal and Toronto together in a division. Even in a world where the Expos come back and the current alignment stays the same, I think a built-in Canadian rivalry is a good idea.

 

 

Somehow, I haven’t been to AT&T Park. It’s at the top of my list of parks that I have not been to but want to go to. PNC is fantastic — to me, it’s the best of the group of parks that have opened in the last 20 years, among the ones I’ve been to anyway, and it’s not close. So, when I get to San Francisco, I’ll let you know!

 

 

I haven’t put any stock in the Oscars since the year Titanic won best picture. That was the only time I saw all the nominees — The Full Monty, As Good As It Gets, Good Will Hunting, and L.A. Confidential were the others — and I still don’t understand how Titanic was nominated for anything other than visual effects. Even DiCaprio wasn’t at his best in that movie. It was a waste of celluloid, and when I saw it in the theater, the only reason that I did not leave at intermission was that I wanted to see the boat go down. L.A. Confidential should have been best picture, by the way, but when it comes to Leo, I don’t know why he hasn’t won an Oscar, given that he’s great and everyone loves him.

 

 

The only problem would be for the more puritanical among us. In England, you can go to a betting window in the stadium and place wagers on the game you’re attending, who will score the first goal, the total number of goals, parlays with other games around the league, or nearly anything else you can think of. Yes, there are occasional match-fixing issues, but it’s not like that would come from the equivalent of having a team in Las Vegas. In short, I don’t see the Black Sox happening again just because there’s a team in Las Vegas, when that eventually happens. If there’s going to be a fixing scandal in baseball, it’s not coming because players are in a city that has casinos.

 

 

I think it’s hard to fire someone who puts together teams that consistently win in the regular season, then fail in the playoffs, because the playoffs are so heavily based on who’s hot at the right time, but the Penguins did not have the necessary depth to thrive if things did not go well for Sidney Crosby and Evgeni Malkin, and have not had that depth for quite some time. That’s on Shero, whose bottom-six and defense construction were suboptimal. I think it’s also smart to let the new GM determine Dan Bylsma’s fate, because Bylsma is too good of a coach to just let go because you’re cleaning house.

 

 

I’ve told the story before, but basically, the first time I went to a pub in Philadelphia to watch live soccer, Sunderland was playing Manchester United, I didn’t want to be a frontrunner, so I rooted for Sunderland, and I fell in love. As for this summer’s plans, midfielders who can play Gus Poyet’s system have to be the priority. Up front, I hope that Fabio Borini will return, but I’m not optimistic about that — I do think Jozy Altidore will be much better in his second season than he was in the first.

 

 

I can’t see the Mets trading young pitching for an incremental offensive upgrade during this season. If Sandy Alderson is willing to part with arms for bats, I think that happens in the winter, as the Mets get closer to putting together a roster they believe will be able to contend in 2015. If there was a real thought of “going for it” this year, Stephen Drew would be in Queens right now.

 

 

Of all the issues I have with Michael Kay’s play-by-play work, talking about defensive shifts is not one of them. It’s part of the game, and one on which there is a lot of room for discussion. It may grow tiresome, but it is worth some conversation.

 

 

Today, I’m wearing my T-shirt from the final season of Veterans Stadium. It’s very big on me, because I’ve lost weight in the last 11 years, so if I’m wearing a superhero costume, it’s Fat Spector, whose power was devouring an entire pizza. Who am I kidding, though? I can still do that.

 

 

I do remember, and while a pierogi is not a sausage, I don’t think they’re impossible to barbecue. Toasted ravioli exist, after all, and so does fried soda, so why not barbecued pierogi?

 

 

I successfully made it through last week without finding out what happened between Beyonce, her sister, and Jay-Z, and I’m not about to try to find out now, so my best guess is that Solange was angry about ABC canceling Happy Endings. Yes, it happened last year, but I’m still angry about it, so it’s fair to assume that Solange is, too.

Jesse Spector