It’s impossible for a baseball fan like myself to be blindsided by the news that a ballplayer staring at his 40th birthday, with 3,166 hits already in his back pocket, is retiring.
And yet, when I saw on Twitter at 7:15 a.m. today that the great Adrián Beltré has called it a career, my gut got punched in a way that I was totally unprepared for.
Clayton Kershaw makes his MLB debut on May 25, 2008.
By Jon Weisman
Clayton Kershaw is somehow 28 years old today, which is only slightly more believable than my youngest son turning 8 years old Sunday. My guess is that Kershaw isn’t renting a game truck this morning, though what do I know?
Anyway, just for fun, here are the youngest Dodgers to make their MLB debuts in the 2000s, with their ages at the time.
*First game of the 2000s — actually debuted June 24, 1998, at 19 years, 78 days
**Made MLB debut September 7, 2004 with Yankees, at 20 years, 211 days
Julio Urias, who was optioned to the minor leagues Thursday, turns 20 on August 12 this year. If he gets his big-league callup before then, he will move ahead of Jackson.
By Jon Weisman
Scott Schebler and Corey Seager are each making their second career starts tonight for the Dodgers, who continue to weather the longer absences of Yasiel Puig and Kiké Hernandez and the shorter ones of Andre Ethier and Jose Peraza.
Ethier, who fouled a ball off his knee Wednesday, and Peraza, who has been sidelined by hamstring tightness since Tuesday, are expected back to game action soon. Second baseman Howie Kendrick is also close to a return. But Puig and Hernandez look like they’ll be out until close to the end of the regular season.
The result is an interesting lineup that features Chase Utley (.752 OPS as a Dodger, six homers in 2015) batting cleanup and Seager, who wears No. 5, hitting fifth.
At 21 years and 130 days, Seager is the youngest Dodger to start a game batting fifth since Adrian Beltre in 2000. Before Beltre, the last Dodger this young to bat fifth in the starting lineup was Derrell Griffith in 1964.
For more photos from Saturday, visit LA Photog Blog.
By Jon Weisman
Fun while it lasts: 14 Dodgers have on-base percentages of .400 or greater so far, topped by Joc Pederson (5 for 7, .714) and Alex Guerrero (6 for 9, .667). O’Koyea Dickson (10), Guerrero (nine) and Scott Schebler (eight) lead the team in total bases.
Yasmani Grandal got in the act in a big way during Saturday’s 5-5 tie with the Indians, hitting a home run, a single, and a single that just missed being another home run.
Here’s what we can reflect on as we head into Brandon McCarthy’s first start as a Dodger exhibitioner:
Jon SooHoo/Los Angeles Dodgers
For more photos from today, visit LA Photog Blog.
By Jon Weisman
All my bags aren’t packed, I’m not ready to go. (Reference lost on anyone under 40 …)
Today’s short stack:
By Jon Weisman
It won’t be nearly as far as Sydney, but some Dodgers are taking a small detour in March.
Returning to the home of their Double-A team from 1977-2000, the Dodgers will take a split-squad team March 20-21 to San Antonio to play the Texas Rangers in the 2015 H-E-B Big League Weekend.
The two games will be played at the Alamodome in downtown San Antonio. Tickets go on sale Friday.
“We’re excited about this matchup,” said Hall of Fame pitcher Nolan Ryan, co-founder of Ryan Sanders Baseball, the owner of the Triple-A Round Rock Express and co-host of these exhibitions. “The Dodgers are one of the most successful franchises in baseball with some good, young players. For fans in San Antonio and all over the state, it’s a great opportunity to see play them since there is not a National League team in Texas anymore.”
Nearly 50,000 fans attended last year when the Rangers hosted in-state rival Houston for the two-game Big League Weekend at the Alamodome in 2014. The previous year brought the inaugural Big League Weekend, the first baseball event in the building’s 20-year-history, with more than 75,000 in attendance.
By Jon Weisman
Having the sun out at the ballpark is so nice, it looks like Dodger Stadium has done it twice.
An early set of pregame notes today …
Atlanta, St. Louis and Pittsburgh are sure doing what they can to keep alive the Dodgers’ hopes of playing past Oct. 3, even if only for one day. But it sure has been an ugly week.
On the bright side, Jaime Jarrin has signed a three-year deal with the Dodgers that will keep him in the broadcast booth for his 55th, 56th and 57th seasons.
Elsewhere …
How times have changed …
In this Dodger Thoughts piece from July 2003, you can see Ken Rosenthal (then with the Sporting News) report that “the Dodgers continue to target Melvin Mora, and the Orioles might be willing to take third baseman Adrian Beltre if they also received quality prospects in the deal.”
Mora was an All-Star from 2003-2005. Still, it’s amazing to contemplate the idea of needing to give up Beltre and top prospects for him.
What’s the deal with Adrian Beltre and people trying to touch his head? Amy K. Nelson of SB Nation investigates in the clip above.
Elsewhere …
Minor-league center fielder Alfredo Silverio, considered by some the Dodgers’ top position-player prospect, will be sidelined indefinitely as he recovers from a serious January car accident in the Dominican Republic. Eric Stephen of True Blue L.A. and Tony Jackson of ESPNLosAngeles.com reported initial details, and Jackson has a follow-up.
… In short, the kid is lucky. From talking to various people (still haven’t been able to talk to Silverio), this is what I have been able to cull: the accident happened on a stretch of road called Curva de la Muerte, which translates to Curve of Death. Apparently, he was going about 60 mph and lost control, the car going off the road and flipping several times. He temporarily lost consciousness, and the car was demolished. …
Silverio, 25 in May, had a .883 OPS for Double-A Chattanooga last year.
Meanwhile, Angelo Songco “is expected to miss the next two to three months after having a rod inserted into his lower right leg,” Jackson adds, the results of complications from a 2011 injury. Now 23, Songco had a .948 OPS for Single-A Rancho Cucamonga.
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Eric Nusbaum of Pitchers & Poets has paid loving tribute to former Dodger Adrian Beltre at Deadspin. I would excerpt a portion, but I couldn’t find one I was satisfied with – I kept wanting to take more. You really need to read the whole thing.
Adrian Beltre, who hit three home runs today in the Texas Rangers’ 4-3 victory over Tampa Bay (clinching their American League Division Series), has 2,033 hits and 310 home runs in his career at age 32, to go with a superb defensive reputation. How many of you think the former Dodger third baseman will play well enough, long enough, to win the favor of Hall of Fame voters?
Beltre is likely to finish in the top five all-time among third basemen in hits, though I imagine he’ll need to make it all the way to 3,000 to win enough Hall votes and avoid the fate of the Ron Santos of the world. When his time comes, would that number still be a golden ticket, or could something like Beltre’s relatively low on-base percentage hold him back?
Texas has Beltre under contract for four more seasons, with a vesting option for a fifth. If he can average 140 hits per season, he’d be in the 2,700 or 2,800 neighborhood when his contract expires.
Hopefully, we’ll learn Wednesday that Bert Blyleven has been elected to the Hall of Fame, capping what has to be the most effective grassroots campaigns for Cooperstown ever.
I’m speaking of the one led by Baseball Analysts blogger Rich Lederer, my former All-Baseball.com blogging colleague. Jon Paul Morosi of FoxSports.com has a nice profile of Lederer. Here’s the start of it:
Rich Lederer is an investment manager. Stock and bond portfolios are his thing. He is the president and chief investment officer of Lederer & Associates Investment Counsel in Long Beach, Calif.
But Lederer loved batting averages long before calculating his first P/E ratio. He is a baseball guy. His father, the late George Lederer, covered the Los Angeles Dodgers for the Long Beach Independent-Press-Telegram through their first 11 seasons on the West Coast.
Lederer has since taken up the family business — as a hobby. In 2003, he founded a baseball blog, now called BaseballAnalysts.com. He writes at night, after his real job is done. The website hasn’t made him rich or famous. Yet, his words may soon resonate through the game’s most hallowed corridors.
If Bert Blyleven is elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame on Wednesday, he will have Rich Lederer to thank.
Well . . . I suppose Blyleven should first thank his right arm — the one that produced 287 wins (more than Jim Palmer), 3,701 strikeouts (fifth all-time) and 60 shutouts (ninth all-time).
After that, the gratitude goes to Lederer’s noggin.
Blyleven has climbed steadily in the Baseball Writers’ Association of America voting since the founding of Lederer’s website. Blyleven, who polled below 30 percent on his first six times on the ballot, reached 74.2 percent last year. That did not happen by accident. …
* * *
Beltre is reportedly close to signing with Texas.
Tom Szczerbowski/US Presswire Adrian Beltre and J.D. Drew led the Dodgers in home runs in 2004 and 2006, respectively.Today in Boston, the Dodgers say a rare hello to former Boys in Blue Adrian Beltre and J.D. Drew.
Moving from Seattle’s pitcher-friendly ballpark Safeco Field to Fenway Park has revitalized Beltre offensively. The third baseman, now 31, has a .374 on-base percentage and .574 slugging percentage, his best numbers since he left the Dodgers. I’m not sure ballpark adjustments entirely account for his improvement from .304/.379 with the Mariners last season.
In six career games against the Dodgers, Beltre is 8 for 24 with two doubles, a homer, three walks and one strikeout. Beltre was 3 for 21 with three walks and a homer for the Dodgers against Boston.
Drew, 34, has declined so far this year, his OPS falling from .914 in 2009 to .807 while starting 60 of 68 games in right field. This weekend marks the first time he faces the Dodgers since opting out of his contract. Something tells me that Drew would get booed if he ever returned in a visiting uniform to Dodger Stadium, a shame considering his .905 OPS for Los Angeles.
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What happens when three old friends in crisis fall into an unexpected love triangle? In The Catch, Maya, Henry and Daniel embark upon an emotional journey that forces them to confront unresolved pain, present-day traumas and powerful desires, leading them to question the very meaning of love and fulfillment. The Catch tells a tale of ordinary people seeking the extraordinary – or, if that’s asking too much, some damn peace of mind.
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