The acquisition of Miguel Cabrera helped push the Tigers payroll to the second highest in MLB, behind the Yankees.

A couple of days ago, I wrote in this space that I thought the best place to get information on baseball and fantasy baseball was from box scores.  That got me to wondering about where the box score came from.  I figured it must have been something that someone in the newspaper business came up with, considering that’s where they have always appeared.  So I decided to do a little research, just because I’m the type of guy who has to know these things when a question like this gets raised.  My guess turned out to be close, though not completely right.  The man credited with inventing the box score is Henry Chadwick, who is also known as the “father or baseball.”  [No!  It is not Abner Doubleday!]  Chadwick was a writer from England, who came to the U.S. in 1836, when he was all of 12 years old.  In the 1850’s, he was a cricket reporter for the Long Island Star, and he came across his first baseball game, then called ‘rounders’ around 1856.  He spent the next 50 years as one of the country’s first sports journalists, a member of the baseball rules committee, and promoter of the game.  He developed the box score from the cricket score card as a way for people writing about the sport to record every detail of a game, in a thorough, easy to read manner.  He is the guy who came up with some of the odd symbols that are used in scorekeeping, like the letter “K” for a strikeout.  (Chadwick chose “K” because it was the last letter of the word “struck” – as in struck out”)  Chadwick was also an amateur statistician, who came up with batting averages, ERA, and many of the other statistics that are still used in the game today.  He went on to write the first hard cover book about baseball, as well as a guide to the game called “Beadle’s Dime Baseball Player.”  If you would like to read more about the man who is responsible for bringing us our favorite pastime, you can find information about him on the Baseball Hall of Fame website, and in the Wikipedia, here.  So endeth today’s lesson…now let’s move on to some box score surfing.

The Detroit Tigers have leapfrogged over the Mets and Red Sox, to become the team with the second highest payroll in baseball this season at $138.7 Million.  The acquisition of Miguel Cabrera, Dontrelle Willis, and Edgar Renteria, along with contract extensions to several players led to the increased payroll.  They are winless after the first four games of the season.  The newly minted lineup is batting a robust .233, with 30 strikeouts in their four games against the Royals and White Sox.  On a slightly brighter note; Miguel Cabrera played Friday as the DH, after missing two games with a sore quadriceps.  Brandon Inge has been playing third base for him. 

Speaking of the Royals, they got some pretty darn good pitching from the top three starters in that Detroit series.  Gil Meche, Brian Bannister, and Zack Greinke combined to garner a 1.55 ERA and strike out 24 batters in winning the three games.  Only two other teams in the AL have struck out more batters, and both of those clubs have played 4 games each.  If the Royals offense can keep cranking out hits, they could contend in the AL Central, especially if Detroit’s pitching doesn’t shape up.  At 4-0, the Royals are the only undefeated team in the major leagues.

Milwaukee Brewers manager Ned Yost is taking a page out of Tony LaRussa’s managing manual and batting catcher Jason Kendall ninth, after his pitcher.  It’s working for Kendall so far, he’s batting .455 (5 for 11) with 2 runs, 2 RBI, and a stolen base.  Speaking of stolen bases… there has already been seven steal attempts against Kendall in the first three games he played, six of which were successful.  Last season, Kendall had one of the lowest percentages of runners caught stealing for a catcher in the major leagues, as he threw out just 10% of attempted base stealers.  If the Brewers coaching staff is smart, they will work with their pitchers to perfect their pickoff moves, and speeding up their windups from the stretch. 

Felipe Lopez played left field for the Nationals in their last two games.  He has lost the second base job to Ronnie Belliard, and Cristian Guzman has been tearing it up at shortstop, so this may be the only way Lopez gets into the lineup.  There is a good possibility that Lopez gets traded.  The problem will be finding someone willing to take his fat contract. 

Bill Hall, whom I proudly pimped in my last “Waiver Wire Wonders” column, went 3 for 5 last night, with 2 homeruns and 6 RBI, helping the Brewers beat up on the lowly Giants, 13-4.  The Brew Crew had 16 hits in the game, none of them by Ryan Braun, who went 0-5 with two strikeouts.  Ouch.  He wasn’t alone though, as J.J. Hardy went 0-4.

Lou Pinella’s plot to keep Alfonso Soriano from stealing by batting him second, is over I guess.  He’s been the leadoff batter in the last two games.  Soriano was also moved over to play second base during the game. 

The Yankees have to be at least a little nervous, after Ian Kennedy got smacked around by the Rays last night to the tune of 6 runs on 4 hits, with 4 walks and two strikeouts in just 2 1/3 innings.  While that is bad in and of itself, the part they are nervous about is that he threw 70 pitches in his 2 1/3 innings, but just 32 were for strikes.  His ERA opens the season at 23.14.  As if that weren’t bad enough, LaTroy Hawkins also gave up 6 runs on 6 hits, but he needed only 24 pitches and lasted only 1/3 of an inning.  How long before we see Joba Chamberlain starting games?  By the way, Jorge Posada did play last night, as the DH, after missing two games with a stiff shoulder.  He went 0-4, and is hitless so far this season.

That’s all from me today, folks.  Shake it easy!

If you have comments, questions, or suggestions, email me at TimM@SportsGrumblings.com