One of the Fan's greatest frustrations is having a lifetime of more baseball knowledge than baseball skill. I've always known a lot about the game. I have to say that I was a pretty darn good little league manager. When I was young, I could field very well and run very well, but I couldn't stop bailing out on a curveball. But I always knew a lot. For example, I know enough about baseball to tell you that the best way to hit a knuckleball is to wait until the last minute and then try to shoot the ball to the opposite field. Pitchers like Tim Wakefield flourish because Major League hitters don't know as much as I do.

Tonight, Tim Wakefield succeeded again to throw his junk because the Yankee hitters couldn't stay back long enough and shoot the ball to the opposite field. If there is any difference in the current Yankee team to the glory years of 1996-2000, it is that those Yankees were much better situational hitters than the current group of superstars. Those Yankees would kill Wakefield. These can't.

Many of you probably played slow pitch softball. The hardest thing about slow pitch softball is waiting for the pitch to get there. But the really good softball hitters wait until the last minute and by concentrating to hit the ball late and shoot it to the opposite field, they end up hitting the ball harder when it goes up the middle or gets pulled. Staying back on that darn slow pitch is hard, but if you force yourself, you can get great results. Hitting the knuckleball is no different. Too bad the current Yankees never played slow pitch softball.


The Marlins finally gave up a run and it's no surprise that their weakest pitcher, Darren Oliver, was the one to do it. Oliver blew two leads and the Marlins lost to the Braves, 5-4. Darren Oliver is the pitching equivalent to Brian Hunter. I look at both players and wonder how they have stayed in baseball for so long by being so marginal. They must be really good Spring Training players.

Although Oliver has a lifetime winning record, he also has a lifetime ERA over 5.00. In his 1341 career innings pitched, he's given up 1512 hits and 563 walks. That means that he has given up 2075 baserunners in those 1341 innings. Yeesh. And yet he is in his eleventh year in the majors. At least he is cheap at $750,000. Not a bad living though for a really mediocre pitcher.


What about Brian Hunter? Hunter is with his eighth team in ten years. He has a lifetime average of .264. But that doesn't tell the mediocrity story. His lifetime OBP is .313, which is really low and even worse is his lifetime slugging percentage: .346. Yeesh. Oh yeah...and he once made twelve errors as a centerfielder. How do you do that? Ten years of successful mediocrity. Only in America.


One of the most overrated aspects of any pitching staff is games won by a team on games with the rotation's fifth starter pitching. Let me demonstrate. Say that in an 162 game season, each of the top four pitchers on the staff are going to get 33 starts and the fifth starter will get 30 (due to rainouts and off days). If your top four are good, like the Yankee, Red Sox, Cubs or A's staffs, they will win sixty percent of their games or 79 games. They won't actually win all those games, but they will keep their teams in the game long enough for the team to win 79 games.

Now say that same team can win only half the games the fifth starter pitches. That brings you up to 94 wins and 94 wins can bring you the division title. If you have no viable fifth starter (like the Yankees right now) and only win twenty-five percent of those fifth starter games, you only have seven or eight more wins and you are a blah 86-76 team that will probably come in third place.

With all that said...maybe Darren Oliver can win half his games and be his bad old self but still be enough to win the Marlins a division title. That might be worth that $750,000 after all.