Roy Halladay perfect game links

“He’s a different kind of creature than just about anyone else in his profession these days. He’s a pitching monster who seems to have popped out of a time machine, transported into the year 2010 with the mindset of a guy who’d have been very comfortable pitching in 1910.” – Jayson Stark

So did you hear about Roy Halladay’s perfect game by now? Obviously you have because I have no clue how anyone could have missed it. My 10-year-old nephew knew about it, which usually means that’s a pretty big story if he was able to take 10 minutes out of his 18 straight hours of his PSP to watch the event.

Anyway, one of the things I like to do after a historic event like Halladay’s perfect game is to see how all the sports outlets and blogs covered it and the angle they took. Here’s a rundown of numerous links from around the internet baseball world and blogosphere:

ESPN: Jayson Stark writes about how it was a Halladay weekend (get it?). By the way am I the only one who is annoyed by the videos that instantly start running even though you only clicked on the game STORY? I’m supposed to read a story, not hear an ad and then a play. If I want to view the video, I’ll click it, but don’t allow it to automatically start! Ugh, OK I digress.

Yahoo! Sports: This article uses the most hyphens I have ever seen in the lead.

MLB.com writes about how Halladay’s teammates began giving him the cold shoulder about 2pm that afternoon. They also did a great piece on the losing pitcher Saturday night, which is something you usually don’t see when you have someone toss a perfect game. But Marlins starter Josh Johnson pitched great and probably didn’t deserve to lose with the game’s only run being scored on an error, his strong outing will get overshadowed forever because he was not perfect.

SI.com focuses on how Saturday’s perfect game may have only been Halladay’s fourth-best performance ever.

Of course I can’t put together a links post without the great insight from the Baseball-Reference Blog. Their post focuses on some of the overall game scores from Halladay’s career and the other perfect games.

Big League Stew puts together a great (and long) read of 27 thoughts and factoids from the perfecto. My personal favorite was the number two thought: I’m also glad he got out of the postgame mob without breaking a leg. Indeed.

Also, I just want to throw out there that I actually called this perfect game for Halladay—only I called it last week when he was pitching at home against the Pirates. Of course he would lose to the Pirates and Red Sox and then shake those losses off with a perfect game.

 

Afternoon Links

Here are some afternoon links from around Major League Baseball and the blog world:

Twins fans can rest easy. The Twins have officially locked Joe Mauer up for a century after working out an eight-year, $184 million extension to their hometown catcher. This was the move the Twins had to make  before they lost him to free agency at the end of this year to the deep pockets of New York or Boston. Some people out there believe this signing was a mistake. In one of his ridiculous columns, Ron Cook of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette actually goes as far to compare the Mauer deal to when the Pirates spent a ton of money on Jason Kendall. Come on, seriously? Kendall’s been a solid catcher for years, but in what world is he on the same level with the reigning AL MVP at any point in his career. Insanity. Thanks for the rules of baseball, this was the move the Twins had to make to avoid seeing him in pinstripes.

Opening day is just two weeks away. Thank God.

Speaking of Jason Kendall above, Baseball-Reference Stat of the Day blog used the play index game finder to come up with a list that shows Kendall owns a pretty interesting record that might not be broken for a long time. By the way, not only do I love BR’s regular website as my computer continuously has it loaded up throughout the day, but the Stat of the Day blog and some of the things they research and look up are truly amazing.

Sticking with the blogs, Two Seam Fastball explains why their shouldn’t be a salary cap in baseball. Also, if you scroll down to the post before that, he also rings in on the Mauer extension that includes an old-school picture of Kendall! And yes, Kendall hasn’t been good since about 2001.

Big League Stew says Shaun Marcum, who hasn’t thrown a competitive pitch since 2008, will be the Jays opening day starter. This struck me as different because those Jays used to have some pretty good pitcher starting every opening day for them before moving on to Philadelphia. Seriously, I love the Jays but this team is really going with a young and risky rotation that starts with Marcum at the top apparently. Could be a long season in the Sky Dome (Rogers Centre blah).

Did I mention we’re less than two weeks away from Opening Day? I already have my Pirates-Dodgers tickets ready to go for April 5th.

 

Afternoon Links

Lazy Tuesday here in Western Pennsylvania, but I’m eagerly packing my suitcase ready for my annual spring training Florida trip on Thursday. More on that trip later, but I wanted to take a break from packing to list some quick links.

Unfortunately a lot of the news that goes down in spring training is the injury bug. No bigger injury news around baseball right now than Joe Nathan’s ligament tear in his right elbow. Nathan is planning on seeking a second opinion from Dr. Andrews. Twins fans have to be holding their collective breath on this development. Athletes heading down south to see Dr. Andrews rarely turns out well—his name is synonymous with season-ending surgery. Not a good sign for Nathan and the Twins, who open their new, dome-less ballpark and are expected to compete for the AL Central crown.

Some guy named Stephen Strasburg made his professional exhibition debut today. Strasburg didn’t take long making a strong impression as he struck out Miguel Cabrera and didn’t throw a fastball under 96 MPH. Not bad. Though mark it down that the first hit Strasburg gave up was to Don Kelly! The former Bucco and pride of Butler, Pa. singled off the 2009 first overall pick in the second inning. If Strasburg continues to pitch effectively in camp, I don’t see a scenario happening that doesn’t include SS in Washington to start the season. The Nationals need hope now, and he’ll at least put butts in the seats right away.

C.C. Sabathia struggled for his second straight start this spring, but this time it came against the Pirates. He was rocked for five runs, four in the first inning thanks to a three-run blast by Garrett Jones. Even though it was the Pirates, I don’t read much into CC’s early struggles. Then again, Yankees fans were ready to jump into the Hudson River last year when he struggled in his first couple starts as a Yankee.

Last up today, Baseball Reference’s Stat of the Day looks into the death of the extreme contact pitcher. I’m real surprised Zach Duke didn’t show up on this list.

That’s it, now back to packing!