The State of Pitching

OMG, a post about sports!!!!

MLB needs to hold a summit meeting in the off-season to discuss the state of pitching, particularly starters. I got this idea after hearing the news about Stephen Strasburg's latest injury.

 I've never seen a season where there were so many early exits, skipped starts, innings limit issues, pitchers shut down for the season, multiple times on the disabled list, etc. This has led to what seems to be an endless stream of pitchers called up to make their major league debuts...and then shortly after that they're on the DL as well.

Baseball has a lot of problems, but this is a crisis to me. They need to evaluate their training and workout programs as well as how they handle pitch counts and innings limits (face it, not only did the Nationals screw up their playoff hopes in 2012 with how they handled their end-of-season Strasburg shutdown, the last two seasons he's been oft-injured.)

What do you think of my idea?

Holy Cow, A Sports Blog Post!

I was planning to write a little post about the Eagles, with their season beginning tomorrow and all, but events have inspired me to make this post about a few different topics.

For one, the Phillies are 6 1/2 games behind St. Louis for the second NL Wild Card because the Cards lost while the Phils, after a long delay, were rained out. People think of last year, when other teams made huge comebacks to get into the playoffs -- that very same St. Louis team not only got in, but eliminated the Phillies and won the World Series -- and think that the Phils could do the same.

But it's so extremely unlikely. The Phils have to pass not only the Cards, but the Dodgers, Diamondbacks, Pirates and Brewers. The Pirates are fading fast. (Sorry, Kurt.) They're 9-19 over the last month. But the Brewers are on fire, 15-4 in their last 19. In addition, the Phils have no games left against any of these teams, which means even if they finish strong, they'll have to rely on all of these other teams losing enough games to get the Phils in. So there's really no reason at this point to get excited.

On another baseball note, normally I'd enjoy a team that's been an underdog for so long making a strong run at a championship. But then there's the Washington Nationals. From this spring's sad attempt to keep Phils fans out of their ballpark, to Jayson Werth's various comments since he left town, to their butthead general manager whining like a baby when Cole Hamels hit their hyped rookie Bryce Harper with a pitch, to their continued mediocre attendance despite a new ballpark and a winning team, I've developed a bit of a dislike for the Nats.

And the last straw is how they've completely mishandled Stephen Strasburg.