Take Me Out To The Yakyu Game

I don't mean to depend on other people's writings for blog entries, but this bit from espn.com was too good not to share.

"For how well Cuba has performed in the World Baseball Classic, it's surprising to see how poorly its fans travel. Both in Puerto Rico and in San Diego, the Cuban team has been very underrepresented compared with the number of fans from other countries. If Cuba truly is the baseball-mad country it's claimed to be, you'd think a lot more people would get on a plane and fly here to support their team. So what gives, Cuba? Do you love baseball or not? It must be that you don't, because there's no other explanation for not showing up to cheer on your fellow countrymen."

And as inexcusable as it was for the U.S. to completely blow it against Mexico, it was nice seeing Japan beat Cuba to win the WBC. Lord knows they'll probably appreciate it a lot more than us, and I don't think I could handle the commies winning a baseball tournament on American soil.

Edit: Entrepreneurship continues to be the most boring class ever, so I'm adding to this post instead of worthlessly paying attention.

Red Sox trade Bronson Arroyo for Wily Mo Pena. I really like this deal for Boston, even if it probably means the end of Trot Nixon's days as a Sox after 2006. First, despite that old baseball mantra, the Sox actually did have too much pitching. Including Arroyo, there was seven pitchers vying for five spots in the rotation. I would have preferred getting rid of the treasonous David Wells, but he probably wouldn't have yielded a player like Pena, which leads me to my second point. Wily Mo is a very intriguing player. He's only 24, has seemingly unlimited potential for power hitting (45 home runs combined in the past two years while playing part time), but is very undisciplined at the plate (career .304 on-base percentage, 54/288 career walks-to-K's ratio). But like I said, he's only 24 and has the skills to develop into an incredible hitter.

Lastly, a Nixon/Pena platoon is downright scary. Nixon has .955 OPS vs. righties the past three years, Pena is .883 OPS vs. lefties. This is a very rough calculation, but assuming Boston faces 30% lefties, that comes out to a two-headed monster in rightfield with a .933 OPS, or better than the numbers Adam Dunn, Andruw Jones, Gary Sheffield, Bobby Abreu and Miguel Tejada put up last year. Also, the logical lefty/righty platoon does appear to be what the Sox are planning for in RF, and Wily Mo seems ok with it.

Hey, class is over. Whatyaknow.