"Mitch Kramer" Edges Out Two Cards for N.L. Cy

That's Dazed and Confused look-a-like Tim Lincecum of the Giants edging out Chris Carpenter and Adam Wainwright.

Lincecum won his second straight N.L. Cy Young Award today, beating the pair of St. Louis starters by the slimmest of margins. Only 10 total points separated Lincecum from Carpenter and Wainwright in the voting. Lincecum actually had fewer first place votes than Carpenter or Wainwright, becoming just the second winner to not finish with the most first place votes. He also became the first pitcher ever to win the award in each of his first two seasons in the Majors.

Lincecum only won 15 games for the third place Giants, but he had a solid 2.48 ERA and struck out a league-high 261 hitters. His 15 wins is the lowest win total ever for starter by a Cy Young Award winner. Kansas City's Zack Greinke won the A.L. award just two days ago for the last place Royals with just 16 wins.

In comparing the stats of the top three finalists, Wainwright led the league in wins with 19, and Carpenter led the league with a 2.24 ERA. But it was Lincecum's dominance in strikeouts and in some of the other statistical categories such as K/9 IP and K/BB ratios that won over the voters.

Lincecum was actually better this year than he was last year as far as the numbers are concerned. He posted a lower ERA, a higher ERA+, a much lower WHIP, a much lower BAA, and a much higher K/BB ratio in 2009 than he did in 2008, all in just about the same number of innings pitched. His strikeout totals were just about the same from 2008 to 2009, and he posted an almost identical K/9 IP ratio both seasons. The only real difference that favored 2008 to 2009 were the wins (18 to 15).

And while I personally didn't say it here because I was pretty sure that the voters would see the lack of wins as a reason to give the honor to either Carpenter or Wainwright, I do think the voters got it right. And if they were going to vote for Greinke even though he only won 16 games but dominated the league in just about every other major statistical category, it would have almost been hypocritical of them if they also didn't vote for Lincecum.

But they did. And they got it right.

Dodgers Announce NLDS Starters

Update (3:09 PM PT): Game 1 has just been announced to start at 6:37 PM PT on Wednesday, with Game 2 slated for 3:07 PM PT on Thursday.

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Vin Scully just announced that the Dodgers have announced that Randy Wolf will pitch Wednesday's opener against St. Louis at Dodger Stadium, and Clayton Kershaw will start Game 2 on Thursday. We haven't heard anything from St. Louis regarding their starters, but we can assume it will be Chris Carpenter and Adam Wainwright the first two games.

As for today's game, Brad Ausmus is the acting manager in a trend started by Joe Torre to allow one of his players to manage the final game of the regular season. Mike Borzello is the acting pitching coach today, with Mark Loretta as the acting bench coach, Jim Thome and Juan Castro the duo-hitting coaches and Jeff Weaver today's bullpen coach.

Also for got to mention this yesterday. J.P. Ricciardi and Kevin Towers were both relieved of all of their duties, including GM, by Toronto and San Diego, respectively.

Individual Season Awards... Again

About a month ago, I wrote here my choices for the four main awards handed out each year for each league heading into the final month of season. Well a lot has changed since, so with 10 days left in the regular season beginning with tonight's games, I thought I'd revisit my choices.

MVP:

No change here from my choices a month ago. I'm sticking with Albert Pujols in the N.L. and Joe Mauer in the A.L. Pujols continues to put up ridiculously consistent power numbers across the board, while Mauer hasn't really let up much in his quest to complete one of the greatest offensive seasons ever by a catcher, sans Mike Piazza.

Cy Young:

While the candidates haven't really changed, there's still a lot of debate as to who should win the award in both leagues. The N.L. choices are still Tim Lincecum, Chris Carpenter and Adam Wainwright. Who wins is still anyone's guess. Carpenter leads the league in ERA, Wainwright leads the league in wins and Lincecum is blowing away the pack in strikeouts. Other than the strikeouts, and the fact Lincecum only has 14 wins, the three are pretty close overall, leaving the voters with a tough task. At this point, I'd have to give the award to Wainwright. In the A.L., there's still a lot of debate, as well, but my vote goes to Zack Greinke. His minuscule 2.08 ERA is very impressive in the A.L. and he's second in the league in strikeouts. Two more wins in his final two starts should seal the deal for the naysayers.

Manager:

Jim Tracy should be a lock in the N.L. with his Rockies inching toward a playoff berth after a horrid start under former manager Clint Hurdle. And even though his team is out of race with a rough past couple of weeks, I'm still very impressed with what the Rangers were able to accomplish this year under Ron Washington.

Rookie:

I'm still on the fence with this one in both leagues. None of the candidates stick out as clear cut favorites. At this point, I'll stick with my picks back then: J.A. Happ in the N.L. and Jeff Niemann in the A.L.

Giants Return Favor, Rout Dodgers

All you really need to know is Chad Billingsley was awful today (more on him later) and Brad Penny was not. The game wasn't really as close as the 7-2 final indicated, and even that's not really close either. Russ Martin provided the only Dodger offense today with a two-run homer in the seventh inning.

No real change in the standings from this morning other than the Giants picking up a game on the Dodgers and Rockies. Dodger lead is still three games over the Rockies in the division, and one over the Cards for best record in the N.L. Cards got blown out today and swept at home this weekend by the Braves. Chris Carpenter allowed six runs in the third inning of his start today.

All that said, Dodgers head home to face the Pirates for the first time this season, followed by the Giants next weekend. Giants host the Rockies this week. Last time the Rockies were in the Bay Area, the Giants swept them.

Been A While...

Since I last had a chance to write in this space, a lot has happened in relation to the Blue. That said, here's a brief bullet-point rundown/recap of the key highlights of the last two and a half weeks that started on August 1st:

• The Dodgers took two of three in Atlanta, beating two promising young pitchers for the Braves, Jair Jurrjens and Tommy Hanson. Matt Kemp had a five RBI game in an ESPN Sunday night win.
• Tempers flared in a home game against the Brewers. In a Dodger blowout game, Manny was unintentionally grazed by a pitch with a nine-run lead. With the game all but over with two out in the ninth inning, Guillermo Mota took matters into his own hands, plunked Prince Fielder in the upper quad area. Mota, knowing he did it on purpose, was ejected as he was already walking off the field. Fielder stood at home plate wondering why he was hit, and when the last out was made, he bolted into the Brewers clubhouse, through the tunnel that connects to the Dodger clubhouse, and went looking for Mota. He was restrained by several teammates and Dodger Stadium security just outside the Dodger clubhouse. The Dodgers would lose two of the three games.
• After another walk-off homerun by Andre Ethier, his fifth walk-off of the season, the third as a homerun, that gave the Dodgers a series-opener win against the Braves, the Dodgers wound up losing the next three games to Atlanta, one in the ninth inning, and the other two in extra innings. The Dodgers would lose five of seven on the homestand.
• The Blue hit the road to the Bay Area and took the first two of three against the Hated-Ones-to-the-North. Down by a run to Tim Lincecum in the ninth inning with two outs in the third game, Ethier did his magic again, and had an RBI-single to tie the game. Just when it looked like the Dodgers were gonna eek one out against one of the league's best pitchers, Juan Uribe hit a walk-off in the 10th inning for the Giants to avoid a Dodger three-game sweep.
• After losing the opener to the D-backs in Arizona this past weekend, a scary incident took place on Saturday night. Dodger hurler Hiroki Kuroda was hit in the head by a batted ball off the bat of D-Backs rookie Rusty Ryal. After Kuroda threw the pitch, Ryal swung and hit the ball back up the middle. The ball caromed off the right side of Kuroda's head and hit an empty seat behind the D-Backs on-deck circle before landing back on the field near the backstop. Kuroda was motionless on the front slope of the mound for several minutes before beeing carted off. He would spend the night in a Phoenix-area hospital before being released the next morning. Kuroda was placed on the DL today with a concussion and post-concussion symptoms. There's no telling how long he will be out of action. As for the game, Jonathan Broxton would give up back-to-back solo homeruns in the ninth inning to blow a 3-1 lead, and the Dodgers would eventually lose in 10 innings. They won in a rout the following day, 9-3, behind 7+ strong innings from Randy Wolf, who struck out 10, and went three for four with the bat, including a two-run homerun and an RBI double. They avoided what would have been an embarassing sweep.
• With Kuroda out indefinitely, and the team desperate for arms in the rotation, the Dodgers signed veteran pitcher Vicente Padilla to a minor league deal today. Padilla was designated for assignment last week by the Rangers. He was released Monday and cleared waivers today. Padilla will report to AAA-Albuquerque for one or two starts before being called back up to start next Thursday's game in Colorado.

As for tonight's game, the Dodgers and Cards are scoreless in the 4th inning. The Cards won the opener behind a stellar start by Chris Carpenter, but the Dodgers got even last night winning 7-3 behind six strong innings by Chad Billingsley, who returned to the mound after missing two starts with a sore hamstring.

That should get us back up-to-date...