The Worst Part of Baseball

I'd like to preface this discussion by stating that I love the sport of baseball, I've been a die hard Yankees fan my entire life and follow it more closely than I ever have before. 

That being said, it's no bold statement to say that baseball has a problem: its popularity is decreasing and its demographic age is increasing. Most think that the length of games and amount of downtime between pitches is causing the sport to suffer. I agree, but there is an underlying problem in the sport that isn't discussed much in the mainstream sports news cycle. 

The problem that I'm talking about is: intentionally throwing at a batter. Whether it be for looking at a home run too long or retaliation for an action earlier in a game or even in the series beforehand, a pitcher intentionally beaning a batter is one of the most disgusting acts in all of sports. 

Baseball is a sport ruled by underlying unwritten rules and a constant talk of "playing the game the right way". In baseball it's considered okay for a pitcher to hurl a baseball 90mph at a batter's body because he celebrated his home run too much. In any other sport this would be absolutely outlawed, in football if a defensive tackle sacks the quarterback and celebrates his sack it's not considered okay for an offensive lineman to attack the DT for celebrating. Yet in baseball a flip of the bat or admiring your own home run means you deserve to get hit with a ball flying at 90mph. It's savage, vile and needs to be taken out of the sport. 

Beaning someone intentionally should be considered a criminal act, think about it, if a pitcher hits a batter in the face and forces the batter to need surgery to repair the damage, shouldn't the pitcher be held responsible? If you were on the street and you gloated about something to someone and they decided to throw a baseball 90mph directly at you, that would be assault with a weapon but in the confines of a ballpark it's normal and in most cases "justified"

Taking intentional beanings out of the sport is nearly impossible because it's nearly impossible to prove intent. But if A-Rod hits a home run in the 2nd inning and at his next at bat in the 5th inning takes a baseball to the back, it can be assumed that was intentional. 

Things like this are not "playing the game the right way" and just because this has been an unwritten rule for some time now doesn't mean that it's okay. Beanballs are outrageous and makes those who partake in it look like animals. Baseball has always been a sport predicated around class and the "right way" and beanings are destroying the fabric of the sport and it needs to be dealt with. 

New York Yankees Semi-Midseason Report Card

The New York Yankees were faced with low expectations in from the baseball community and lower expectations from their fans (relative to the usual playoff expectations). The Yankees have been the standard of excellence for quite some time now even though the Giants and Cardinals have been among the best teams in recent years as well. 

Here in 2015, the Yankees are playing without any of the Core Four that defined the team for nearly 20 years and instead are being led by new faces and veterans with the longest tenured Yankees being CC Sabathia, Brett Gardner and the returning Alex Rodriguez. 

63 games into the 2015 season and the Yankees are currently 34-29 (.540) which for most is a little better than expected. What helps the most is how abysmal the AL East is, Tampa holds the top spot but the Yanks are a game back and Toronto (fresh off of an 11 game winning streak) are a game and a half behind TB. If the season were to end today the Yankees would play a one game playoff against the Twins for the last spot in the playoffs. If the Yankees can keep up this pace then they're well on their way to a successful season. 

How is This Happening? The Yanks have gotten production from some unexpected sources. A-Rod so far has been better than most hoped hitting .268, .371 OBP and 12 home runs to go with it. Tex has been hitting like he time traveled back to 2009 leading the team in home runs (18) and RBIs (48). Brian McCann is looking more like himself as well. Tanaka was out with an injury but has come back and been lights out as of late and while Pineda has struggled his last few starts, he's proven himself to be an ace. The most impressive piece of the Yankees roster is the bullpen, mostly the stars in Dellin Betances and Andrew Miller, they've been as perfect as can. Betances has an ERA of 0.27 over 33.1 innings pitched and Miller has an ERA of 1.03 over 26.1 innings pitched. Andrew Miller is also the first Yankee in history to convert his first 17 save opportunities. It's safe to say that 99 times out of 100, if the Yankees have a lead and they send in Betances to set up Miller in the 9th, that's a Yankees win. 

A Bit Over a Third into this season the Yankees look pretty good and with this roster that's good enough. The pitching staff is really the star of the team having been as good as any really, specifically the bullpen. As stated earlier, if the Yankees continue on the path they've started on we could once again see the pinstripes in the playoffs, maybe not deep into the playoffs but it seems like the team could be on an upward trend. 

Yankees Semi-Midseason Grade: B+

Mayweather vs Pacquiao

Finally, after 6 years and more speculation than we knew what to do with, Floyd Mayweather and Manny Pacquiao finally fought. Just over an hour ago the fighters came out and were introduced and The Fight of the Century began. 

Going in, I was rooting for Pacquiao but my head told me that Mayweather would win. 

By unanimous decision after 12 rounds Floyd Money Mayweather was victorious extending his undefeated streak to 48-0  and Manny Pacquiao was left wondering where he went wrong. 

I'll start by saying that I think that Mayweather did in fact win the fight, contrary to Pacquiao and Skip Bayless' belief. At the same time I think it was closer than the announcers and Max  Kellerman led us to believe. They seemed to themselves be rooting against Pacquiao and were over critical of him while praising Mayweather throughout the fight. 

It was a good fight and really a good event, never did I think I'd be in a room with nearly 20 people watching boxing, I can't get that many people to watch a game of the NBA Finals. 

In the end, this was just another Floyd Mayweather fight and went just like all of his other fights do but this time, there was a bigger name than usual fighting back. Pacquiao fought hard and fought well but Mayweather won and won definitely, no other way about it. 

2015 NBA Playoff Preview

The 2014-2015 NBA season has come to a close and we've seen the biggest markets teams with the Knicks and Lakers were some of the worst teams of the season. Some of the biggest stars in Paul George, Derrick Rose, Kevin Durant and Dwight Howard saw long injuries that kept them out of the game. We saw young players take over the league in Steph Curry, James Harden, Anthony Davis and rookies Andrew Wiggins, Nerlens Noel and Zach LaVine. It was a great season that saw the titans of the past, Kobe and the Heat fell off and passed the torch to younger guys and has led to the tightest MVP race in recent years with it being between at least 4 players (Curry, Harden, LeBron, Westbrook).

The playoffs start Saturday in what is sure to be another great year, especially in the Western Conference. Below is my playoff prediction for how I think things will go down.

First Roung:

EAST:

1ATL<6> in 6
8BKN

4TOR in 5
5WAS

3CHI in 5
6MIL

2CLE in 4
7BOS



WEST:


1GS in 5
8NO

4POR in 6
5MEM

3LAC
6SA in 7

2HOU in 5
7DAL

Conference Semifinals:

1ATL in 6
4TOR

3CHI
2CLE in 6

1GS in 6
4POR

6SA 6
2HOU

Conference Finals:

1ATL
2CLE in 6

1GS in 7
6SA

NBA FINALS: 1GS vs 2CLE

FINALS WINNER Golden State Warriors in 7.

FINALS MVP: Stephen Curry

The Allure of Opening Day

What is it about Opening Day? 

It's the first game in a 162 game season that stretches from April to September. In the long run, the Opening Day game means absolutely nothing but every year we look forward to it like it's Christmas Day in April. 

Opening Day is by far the best timed start of the season of all of the big four sports. Once football starts, school starts up, summer's ending, it's starting to get cold and you start to realize you'll be shoveling a foot of snow in a month, football season sucks. Contrast that with baseball season and it's getting warmer, you can go outside without being in pain because of the cold, summer and vacations are on the way, baseball season is great. 

But nevermind the weather, the one thing that Opening Day brings year after year is: Hope. 

During the NFL preseason I point out everything the Giants are doing wrong and what they need to improve on, during Spring Training I look into everything the Yankees are doing well and ignore the bad and then when Opening Day comes, I could almost convince myself that a 162-0 season is possible. 

April 6, 2015: The day is here and as I watched the Yankees announce their lineups and the players run on to the field in transported back to the days of being a child and looking at these guys as being giants and gods amongst men. While football may have become the most popular sport in America, it's moments like this that show that baseball really is America's pastime and isn't going anywhere. 

Yesterday the Yankees took a beating from the Blue Jays and Tanaka got lit up in the third inning and the Yankees couldn't hit water if they fell out of boat. The Mets on the other hand took down the much praised Nationals in an early division matchup. 

Even with the Yankees poor first game I'm still extremely optimistic about this season and the first thing I said after the game was that we're going 161-1; jokingly of course. 

That's the allure of Opening Day, believing the impossible is not out of reach. 

The Case for the 2015 New York Yankees

The New York Yankees are a historically great team that growing up I was able to watch the Core Four dominate for nearly 20 years and that came full circle and ended last year in 2014. It was Derek Jeter's farewell tour and the season itself and more importantly the team was hidden away by Derek Jeter's tour. The team ended with an 84-78 record that left them 4 games out of the Wild Card. Looking at how the individual players performed and how the team was riddled with injury, 84-78 was a pretty solid record. It's easy to tell that the Yankees are in a rebuilding stage which is something they really haven't done in my lifetime (since 1993) so the team is in relative new world. 2014 was the beginning of this stage and now that Jeter has retired they are officially rebuilding.

Now to 2015: there are quite a few questions left with this team, who's the face of the team? Is anyone gonna stay healthy? Is there hope for this season? Obviously Derek Jeter was The Captain and the face of the Yankees since 2003. After his departure the Yankees made a trade for Arizona Diamondbacks shortstop Didi Gregorious, a 25 year old player out of the Netherlands. While this is hard to say because Jeter is my favorite player of all time, I believe we've upgraded at the position. Didi's defense is much better than Jeter's and while Didi's hitting isn't spectacular he can still be effective in the batter's box.

The Face of the 2015 New York Yankees: I would love to say Brett Gardner, he's been my favorite player behind Jeter the past few years but he doesn't have that leadership role like Jeter did. The first person I think most people would think of when they think of this team is probably Alex Rodriguez or maybe Mark Texeira. If pitcher Masahiro Tanaka can stay healthy all year and plays to level he did last year, he could definitely become the face of the franchise moving forward.

Is Anyone Gonna Stay Healthy?: Probably not. While the team as a whole has gotten younger, much of the Yankees key players are pretty up there in age. CC is 34, Tex is 34, A-Rod is 39, Beltran is 37 and McCann is 31 and these guys aren't getting any younger. The team seems to be almost more injury prone than anyone else, losing Tanaka and Nova last year for the season. If the team can stay healthy overall, they can do big things.

Is There Hope for This Season?: Most of the forecasts and projections have the Yankees ending 4th in the division and well out of the playoff race. I have a bit more hope for the season. The team has a lot of question marks, whether anyone can stay healthy, whether Tanaka can pitch at the level he did last year, and most importantly can anyone hit well. I think the young guys can really bring a lot to the team and if the pitching rotation stays healthy I think the team can do pretty well.

Prediction: Las Vegas has the Yankees win total at 81.5 which is just above .500, considering the team clocked in at .519 last year and the fact that I believe the team got better instead of worse I'm putting their record at 85-77 and in the hunt for second place in the division and just a few games out of the Wild Card. I think the Orioles will win the division again and while the Red Sox got better, I think the hype will outweigh their performance on the field. 2nd place and having a better record than last year is a good season in my mind, if players get injured to the extent of last year the team could suffer quite a bit but if everyone stays healthy, the outlook is good.

A Welcome Message

Hi, and welcome to No Offseason. This blog is run by me, Dominick Mascitelli, I also have a Film blog if you're interested in that as well (goodfellareviews.blogspot.com). I'm not a sports writer or even a journalism major, just a guy who loves sports and loves to talk about sports.

My favorite sports are football and basketball, I follow these sports near religiously. Third comes baseball, it's a sport I loved as a kid then lost some interest in but I'm currently attempting to be a much better fan. I pay attention to hockey and soccer about the same as each other tying them for the fourth spot.

An elephant in the room may be my team affiliations. Any good writer of sports should stay objective and that's my plan but, that being said my love for my sports teams tends to blur the lines of objectivity and subjectivity. All of that being said here are my favorite sports teams separated by sport and yes I will be writing about other teams besides my favorites and about sports in general.

Baseball: New York Yankees

Basketball: New York Knicks

Football: New York Giants

Hockey: New Jersey Devils

Olympics: USA

Soccer: AC Milan

World Cup Soccer: USA & Italy

As you can tell, I'm a New Yorker, from this list you can tell which teams I'm not the biggest fans of. I like to tell you guys who my favorite teams are so that you guys can get a basis of who I am and the point of view I'm coming from. If I write a post that I feel is overly subjective I will put in a disclaimer saying so, if not, I believe it's mostly an unbiased view. If you feel differently, feel free to yell at me in the comments and I'll try to fix things around.

Thanks for checking us out and welcome to No Offseason!