What SPORTS did you watch today? (2018)

tohostudios wrote:

I'm only surprised by the timing. 

People have been calling for Matheny's head for the last several years and about halfway thru last year I joined them.  The guy is just too old school to relate to today's players.  I mean last year he got into it with Yadier Molina for crying out loud; that was the writing on the wall.  Then this year he's not on speaking terms with Dexter Fowler and the article about Bud Norris "hazing" rookie Jordan Hicks and Matheny basically saying today's players are too soft was the final straw.  The word is upper management was none to pleased with Matheny's comments in that article.  Couple that with the utter mediocrity of the last 3 years and the fact that multiple younger players this year are struggling and it was time for not only Matheny but also hitting coach Mabry to go.

The only thing that seems weird to me is that the didn't do it either during the past off-season or after this season since it's pretty much a lost cause this year.

I was surprised by the timing as well. I had kinda figured it would have happened before now.

What do you think of the rumors of Mark McGwire managing the team?

I'm not sure what his managing style would be but I'd like having him as hitting coach.  PEDs or not, the guy could hit.  But I think the stigma of PEDs would cloud people's opinion of him as a manager so I don't think he's a viable candidate.

People around here are talking about hiring Joe Girardi.  That makes no sense to me either because he was let go by the Yankees for exactly the same reason the Cardinals axed Matheny, inability to relate to younger players.

I expect it will be a hire from inside the organization.  Personally I'd love to see 3rd base coach Jose Oquendo get a shot but supposedly after he was passed over for Matheny after LaRussa moved on he's not interested in managing.

Watching the Cardinals just totally annihilate the Cubs.  It's 15-1 in the 6th.  Carpenter is 5 for 5 with two doubles, 3 homers and 7 RBI. They've now got Molina playing first.  What do you wanna bet we end up losing a bunch of games in the rest of this series by one run.


The Cubs now have Tommy La Stella pitching.  When was the last time you saw a position player pitch in the 6th inning?

This game has gotten quite entertaining.  The Cubs are now using a backup catcher as the pitcher and the Cardinals are using all their scrubs who naturally don't want to make an out against a position player pitching.  It's now 18-4.

EDIT:  aaaaaand the Cubs used OF Ian Happ to pitch the 9th.  When was the last time 3 position player were used as pitchers in the same game? 

This is all because the Cards and Cubs have a split doubleheader tomorrow.

^^^ I would have loved to see Maddon's face !

As predicted the Cardinals scored 18 runs yesterday and only managed 2 runs in the first game of today's split doubleheader.  They were actually in it until the 7th when the bullpen imploded again.  Final was 7-2 Shlubs.  But Carpenter homered AGAIN!  That's 5 straight games with a homer and he's hit 7 homers in those 5 games.  Holy crap is he RED HOT at the plate!

Maddon just got tossed in the 5th along with Baez for protesting a called 3rd strike.  It's 1-0 Cardinals so losing Baez is big for the Cubs.  And losing Maddon just makes it funnier.

WOW!

Matt Carpenter didn't even start this game but his first at bat in the 7th he hit another homerun.

He's now homered 6 games in a row.  It's still 3-2 Cubs because the Cardinal bullpen sucks but I've never seen a batter this hot.  He's already hit 5 homers in 3 games in this series.

AND it's now 6-3 Cardinals so it's up to our absolutely awful bullpen to hold on to the win.  Good luck...

The Cards bullpen imploded YET AGAIN today and we lost to the Maddons 7-2.  It was 2-2 after 6 but as usual our "bullpencil" coughed up 5 runs in 3 innings to put the game out of reach.  We're now behind the Pirates in the standings.  And Carlos Martinez is back on the DL so against the Reds this week we're starting 2 guys who have never started a major league game before.

Time to start selling.

I watched the British Open golf tournament for the entire weekend.

Wow 007, your Pirates are kickin' butt!

They've now pushed my Cardinals to 4th place which STL deserves.  Now pass up the Brewers.

Watching Daniel Poncedeleon make his MLB debut and so far he's through 5 innings and he's only allowed 2 baserunners, both on walks.

This is the guy who had to undergo emergency brain surgery after being hit in the head by a line drive in the minors last year.

tohostudios wrote:

Watching Daniel Poncedeleon make his MLB debut and so far he's through 5 innings and he's only allowed 2 baserunners, both on walks.

This is the guy who had to undergo emergency brain surgery after being hit in the head by a line drive in the minors last year.

It's good to see that he's healthy and made it up to the big leagues.

Arizona put up 5 runs in the top of the 1st against the Cubs.

tohostudios wrote:

Wow 007, your Pirates are kickin' butt!

They've now pushed my Cardinals to 4th place which STL deserves.  Now pass up the Brewers.

Yeah I'm not sure what's gotten into them. They put up 4 runs in Kluber and the Indians but are currently in a rain delay

nevermore wrote:

tohostudios wrote:

Watching Daniel Poncedeleon make his MLB debut and so far he's through 5 innings and he's only allowed 2 baserunners, both on walks.

This is the guy who had to undergo emergency brain surgery after being hit in the head by a line drive in the minors last year.

It's good to see that he's healthy and made it up to the big leagues.

Arizona put up 5 runs in the top of the 1st against the Cubs.

Poncedeleon threw 7 innings of no-hit baseball but he was pulled after that.  He'd thrown 116 pitches.  Now with one out in the 8th the Reds finally managed to get a hit off the bullpen so the no-hitter is out the window.
AND...as any 2018 Cardinal fan could have predicted, the pen (Bud Norris this time) coughed up another win.  Cards lost 2-1 as the Reds scored 2 in the bottom of the ninth. 

Defense and relief...the Cardinals have neither again this year.  FIX IT dammit!

7-0 ended up being the final between the Pirates and Indians, giving the Bucs their 10th straight win. The game was called on account of rain after 6 innings.

I don't understand how the Pirates are doing it.

I thought they were better than their record for most of this season but I don't see how they have the talent to pull off 10 straight.

Wow.

Second night in a row where a Cardinal rookie pitcher is on a no-hitter alert.  Last night Daniel Poncedeleon threw 7 no-hit innings in his first MLB start before being pulled and tonight Austin Gomber has thrown 6 no-hit innings in his first MLB start.

And just like last night the Cardinals have a measly 1-0 lead at this point.  The pen blew it last night; hopefully that doesn't happen tonight.


And I know these games are against the Reds but as I said a few days ago, that team can hit; it's their pitching that really sucks.

OK, now this is either bizarre or the Reds are pulling some really low crap.

With the Cardinals now leading 2-0 in the top of the 7th and Austin Gomber throwing a no-hitter through the first 6 innings, the fire alarms at Great American Ballpark "mysteriously" started going off before the inning could get started.  We've now had about a 10 minute delay before the kid Gomber has to face Scooter Gennett, Joey Votto and Eugenio Suarez; the heart of the Reds order.  Some "coincidence".

EDIT:  And after the "fire alarm" Gomber got Gennett out but then Votto singled and Suarez homered.  Nice "coincidence" Cincy.  Geez I sure hope that was just really REALLY crappy timing.

Watched the Pirates beat the Indians 9-4 for their 11th straight win. If I wasn't watching it, I wouldn't believe. They've somehow become an offensive juggernaut with superb starting pitching.

Apparently the Cardinals have finally decided to cut bait.   They DFA'd Greg Holland and Tyler Lyons today, traded Sam Tuivalala to Seattle for a minor leaguer and promoted several triple A guys to the big league roster.  They also placed Brett Cecil on the 10 DL hopefully as a precursor to also DFAing him.

Geez owner Bill Dewitt has to feel sick to his stomach.  We signed Holland to a guaranteed 1 year contract of $14.5M and he didn't even save one game.  But this was long overdue.  They need to shed some of the position players too.

Watched David Freese singlehandedly beat the Mets 5-4 last night. He went 3-3 with 2 walks and drive in all 5 runs. Quite a night for him.

Freese is still a hero round these parts.

Getting ready to watch the Cubs and Cardinals.

So was I but it's in a rain delay.