The Sports Curmudgeon

On September 8 2006, I did a Topical Rant regarding the situation involving two reporters for the San Francisco Chronicle who faced prison time because they would not reveal the name of the person who leaked grand jury testimony to them. At the time, I said I did not want these reporters to languish in jail but I did not favor a Federal Shield Law to protect journalists from any kind of accountability, as was the common call of that day. And most of all, I decried the inability of the Federal investigators/prosecutors to discover the “leaker” on their own. Well, now it appears as if they have done just that.

A Colorado attorney, Troy Ellerman, has admitted that he made the testimony available to the reporters and allowed them to take verbatim notes from the testimony. Ellerman represented one of the officers of BALCO and it seems as if the leaking of this testimony was a ploy to derail the prosecution of his client. I’ll leave it to the lawyers to explain how that was the logical consequence of his actions but that seems to be the accepted motivation here. According to the plea agreement, Ellerman would spend 2 years in prison and face a fine up to $250K – although the judge in the case has the option to send him to prison for up to 15 years. And he faces disbarment, which isn’t all that surprising even to this layman.

I think there are two interesting items here:

Even with a two year sentence, Ellerman will spend more time in jail than any of the folks I called the “BALCO Bad Guys” last September. I believe the longest sentence handed out so far in this entire matter is 4 months in a “Club Fed” jail.

The prosecutors/investigators solved this mystery on their own; good for them; that’s what the citizenry pays them to do. It would be inappropriate for anyone to use that fact as a justification for a Federal Shield Law on the basis that testimony from these two journalists was unnecessary to solve this particular case.

Since the BALCO matter has a huge connection to baseball, it’s ironic that this break in the case comes just as pitchers and catchers are reporting to spring training camps. It’s that time of year when fans can fantasize about the upcoming achievements of their favorite baseball teams. Of course, for some fans, fantasy may simply mean a .500 season since those are not all that common in cities such as Pittsburgh or Kansas City; in other cases, it may mean a playoff berth; in Chicago, the fantasy may mean three full months without an injury to Kerry Wood. Ooops, looks like that last fantasy is in trouble already. According to an AP report, Kerry Wood slipped and fell getting out of a hot tub in his home and fell on “his stomach and chest”; as a result, he will not throw from a mound “for a few days”.

In Al Capp’s classic comic strip, L’il Abner, there was a character named Joe Btfsplk. He walked around with a rain cloud perpetually over his head; anything that could go wrong for him – and those around him – always did; he was the world’s worst jinx; he wasn’t even lucky enough to have any vowels in his name. Folks, we are getting mighty close to the day when Kerry Wood will be identified as the embodiment of Joe Btfsplk.

It’s interesting that baseball teams have pitchers and catchers report to spring training before everyone else because pitching is critical to success in baseball. And so, as I look at the upper echelon teams from last season and their pitching, I see some strange things:

The Yankees pitching seems to get older and older with every staff they put together. Yes, I know Roger Clemens can still pitch, but when he was a rookie, were the Red Sox playing in Fenway yet or was their home still Jurassic Park?

What happened to the pitching staff in St. Louis? Chris Carpenter is still there at the top of the rotation; but after that, there’s Kip Wells, Anthony Reyes and perhaps Braden Looper. Excuse me; Braden Looper is potentially in the starting rotation for the defending World Series Champions?

The Twins lost Brad Radke to retirement and Francisco Liriano is still recuperating from elbow surgery. As in St. Louis, there’s lots of quality at the top of the rotation with Johan Santana, but after that, you’re talking about the rest of the rotation including Carlos Silva, Boof Bonser and Sidney Ponson. Wow! The good news in Minnesota is that Liriano will report to spring training with the pitchers and the catchers even if he is a long way from being able to pitch again; he’s going to be with the team and not off somewhere on his own waiting to rejoin the club when he thinks that’s a worthwhile journey to make.

Let me give you an example of how valuable a commodity pitching is in modern baseball. According to loads of reports, the Boston Red Sox had the chance to trade for Todd Helton. In nine full seasons, the worst Helton has ever hit was last year when he “only” hit .302; he’s a career .333 hitter; he’s a quality player. The trade supposedly fell through because the Red Sox would not part with either of their two prize pitching prospects, Manny Delcarmen and Craig Hansen. If these two pitchers become the anchors of the Red Sox pitching staff for several years, this will be one of those trades that the Sox will be glad they didn’t make. But if they turn out to be the latter day Kerry Wood and Mark Prior …

Finally a note about pitching from Greg Cote in the Miami Herald:

“With spring training but a month away, the Marlins moved to shore their bullpen by signing veteran reliever Felix Rodriguez, who last year with Washington allowed 25 runs in 29 innings. It’s in keeping with the club’s 2007 marketing slogan: Never a Dull Ninth Inning.”

But don’t get me wrong, I love sports…