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Miguel Cabrera swinging at an intentional ball.
Petescorner
Posts: 1,220 ✭
in Sports Talk
I don't know if this has been posted or not, but I saw the video and thought it was pretty cool!
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Petescorner
Posts: 1,220 ✭
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-- Yogi Berra
-- Yogi Berra
Forget blocking him; find out where he lives and go punch him in the nuts. --WalterSobchak 9/12/12
Looking for Al Hrabosky and any OPC Dave Campbells (the ESPN guy)
<< <i>I'll be surprised if Cabrera isn't intentionally hit by the next pitcher that wants to intentionally walk him... >>
Why? That wasn't showing up the pitcher. He had a chance to drive in a run and took it. Seeing as how he had just as much a chance of popping up as he did getting a hit, I would think it would be his manager who would be a little more concerned with what he did.
Still a cool play though.
<< <i>Tell me exactly why the pitcher couldnt throw it sidearm if he has difficulty throwing overhand ? >>
Look I don't know...I was simply repeating what I heard on sportscenter when they showed it.
Could be the same reason that some players have innate inabilities to make certain throws...I don't throw sidearm, so I can't speak to it, but I would think the throwing motion of sidearm doesn't lend itself well to those types of throws?
<< <i>
<< <i>Tell me exactly why the pitcher couldnt throw it sidearm if he has difficulty throwing overhand ? >>
Look I don't know...I was simply repeating what I heard on sportscenter when they showed it.
Could be the same reason that some players have innate inabilities to make certain throws...I don't throw sidearm, so I can't speak to it, but I would think the throwing motion of sidearm doesn't lend itself well to those types of throws? >>
So, a player who makes his living throwing the ball to the plate never practices a pitch out or intentional walk?
Doubt it.
Sidearm or no the guy blew the pitch.
BALTIMORE, June 22 -- In theory, intentionally walking Florida Marlins star Miguel Cabrera with a man on second and a base open in a tied extra-inning game is sound strategy -- except, perhaps, if you have a pitcher with a phobia about throwing the ball to home plate at a moderate speed. The Orioles, a bedeviled franchise these days, have just such a pitcher, and Todd Williams happened to be on the mound at just this moment.
"He has a little trouble with his intentional walks," Orioles Manager Sam Perlozzo said. "I don't know if it's a phobia or what."
As Williams tried to intentionally walk Cabrera, the reliever's arm turned wobbly and his pitch skied toward to the batter's box, but not nearly far enough away from home plate. Cabrera's simply swung at the limp pitch, sending it to center field for a single, which scored Florida's deciding run in the 10th inning of an 8-5 win over the Orioles.
"With my arm slot, if I throw medium to hard it tends to take off on me," Williams said. "I was just trying to walk him but he hit it."
Williams throws his pitches with a near sidearm delivery, so he said he's always had problems throwing balls so softly. Perlozzo said it's a problem that needed to be addressed. Williams said it's something that can't be fixed.
Cabrera said that he was surprised the ball had landed so close to the plate, but he had it in his mind for quite some time that if one day a pitcher came too close on an intentional walk, he would take one hack at it. This time Cabrera said it was close, "really close" to the plate, so he could not resist.
"It's something you don't have in your mind," Cabrera said. "It's a reaction."
Cabrera's heroics in the 10th wouldn't have been possible if not for the ninth-inning meltdown of Orioles closer Chris Ray, who had converted all 18 of his save opportunities. Ray entered Thursday's game with a four-run lead but with men on first and third. He allowed one inherited run to score on a sacrifice fly. Another scored on Joe Borchard's two-run home run. That had caused a hush at Oriole Park at Camden Yards but Baltimore still led 5-4 and Ray had proved infallible in such situations.
But on a 2-1 count, Ray left a ball too much over the plate and Marlins pinch hitter Wes Helms slammed it over the left field wall to tie the game at 5.
"I thought he had movement," Perlozzo said. "I just didn't think he located. Hung a breaking ball. But he's been great all year."
It was the first time in the short history of the Marlins they had hit two pinch-hit home runs in a game. It was the first time in Ray's short tenure as a closer he had blown a save. It was a sobering game for Ray, who blew starter Kris Benson's shot at a ninth win.
"It bothers me," Ray said. "Benson obviously deserved to win."
The pessimistic Orioles fan, the one most in vogue now, will scowl, look at the box score of Thursday's loss against the Marlins and lament how a loss to such a lowly team shows the sorry state of the franchise. But the optimistic Orioles fan, the one who clutches his team memorabilia in privacy, will celebrate that the Orioles may have finally solved their starting pitching woes.
"I'm just trying to put a string together for the rotation," Benson said.
Consecutive outings like what the Orioles have gotten from Benson on Thursday and Erik Bedard, who pitched eight shutout innings on Wednesday, have been rare. Benson allowed just one run in eight innings on Thursday.
"I think Kris pitched a heck of a game for not having his best stuff," Perlozzo said. "I thought he was outstanding and deserved to win."
Unfortunately for Benson, Ray threw too many pitches over the plate. The same could be said for Williams."
Link
Look:
Sidearm righthanders need to rotate their body farther to the left if pitching out to a right handed batter. Watch his feet.
Practice makes perfect.
He just blew it. Look at the slow motion replay. It looks like he glanced back at second, had the spot in his mind, then turned toward home and threw. He hesitates just before throwing because he knows the spot he prepared for was wrong.
Wrong spot in your head...bad throw. Happens often with pitchers with men on and some who have wacky wind ups ala Luis Tiant.
Knoblauch (spelling?) immediately comes to mind...and that pitcher, I think for St. Louis recently, who just couldn't throw to the plate at all.
Sounds like he truly has a mental block that prevents him from throwing medium speed pitches to an intentional walk.
The Cardinals pitcher who couldnt throw over the plate was Rick Ankiel. I heard he is actually trying to make it back to the bigs as a position player these days, working in the minors.
-- Yogi Berra
This Orioles pitcher has actually had some limited success, not a general pitching problem.
The throw was just bad.
Knobby, talk about a guy who couldn't play in the big show(I mean as in NYC) luckily Soraino stepped up and now the Yanks have Cano.
Mark Mulder rookies
Chipper Jones rookies
Orlando Cabrera rookies
Lawrence Taylor
Sam Huff
Lavar Arrington
NY Giants
NY Yankees
NJ Nets
NJ Devils
1950s-1960s Topps NY Giants Team cards
Looking for Topps rookies as well.
References:
GregM13
VintageJeff
<< <i>I remember Steve Sax of the Dodgers went through a similar thing where he couldn't throw the ball to 1st base. >>
Yeah I was trying to remember what his problem was, as his name was mentioned on the sportscenter where they showed the play.
It's definitely a strange phenomenon, and I can't think of any other sport where you see this. You don't see once-reliable WR's in the NFL suddenly get the dropsies, or machines at the charity stripe like Reggie Miller suddenly forget how to shoot free throws.... seems like it only happens in baseball. Very odd.