April Lunch Meeting

We will be gathering for our first in-season lunch of 2016 at the County Line BBQ at 5204 Ranch Rd 2222 (just east of RR 2222 and Hwy 360) on Saturday, April 30 starting at 12:30 p.m.  We will have some exciting news about the chapter website.  Please RSVP so we can provide an accurate headcount for seating purposes to Jan Larson at jan.a.larson@gmail.com.

Serie del Caribe and Dominican Baseball 2016

 Serie del Caribe y Beisbol Dominicano 2016

(presented at the monthly chapter meeting on Feb. 20, 2016)

(Move the mouse over the blank space to see the answer)
1. The stadium in Santo Domingo was recently renamed to honor the first Dominican player to enter the U.S. Baseball Hall of Fame.  Name him.

Juan Marichal
2.

A second Dominican player was recently inducted into the U.S. Hall of Fame.  Name him.

 Pedro Martinez
3.

Match the 2016 Serie del Caribe teams with the countries that they represent:

Teams:  Leones del Escogido, Venados de Mazatlan, Tigres de Ciego de Avila, Cangrejeros de Santurce, Tigres de Aragua

Countries:  Venezuela, Puerto Rico, Mexico, Cuba, Dominican Republic

Leones del Escogido, DR

Venados de Mazatlan, Mexico

Tigres de Ciego de Avila, Cuba

Cangrejeros de Santurce, PR

Tigres de Aragua, Ven.

 
4.

The Dominican manager, Luis Rojas, is a member of a Dominican royal family of baseball.  His father was a three-time all-star during a 17 year MLB career.  His brother was a six-time all-star that also played 17 years in MLB, plus had a close encounter with a fan named Steve.

Name Luis Rojas’ father and brother.

Felipe Alou Rojas 

and

Moises Alou
5.

No hablan ingles a la Serie del Caribe.  There are six teams in the Dominican winter league.  Match the Dominican team name with its meaning (or synonym) in English.

Team names:  Licey, Estrellas Orientales, Escogio, Aguilas Cibaenas, Gigantes del Cibao, Toros del Este

(Loose) translations:  The Chosen Ones; The Big Ones in the Valley; Bright lights from the East; Bulls from the East; A river in the Dominican; A Majestic Bird over the Valley

Licey – a river

Estrellas – bright lights

Escogido – the Chosen Ones

Aguilas – majestic bird

Gigantes – big ones

Toros – bulls
6. Gigantes del Cibao play in San Francisco de Macoris, in central Dominicana.  Their stadium is named after a former MLB second baseman, a native of that city, who was a two-time all-star and played in the 1964, ’67, ’68, and ’72 World Series.  Name him. Julian Javier
7. Two well-known MLB relievers, pitching for the Dominicans, combined for two blown saves and a loss as the Dominican team was swept from Serie del Caribe 2016.  Name them. Fernando Rodney and either Rafael Soriano or Joel Peralta
8. Which team won Serie del Caribe 2016 ?  Which team was the runner-up ?

Venados de Mazatlan, Mexico

Tigres de Aragua, Venezuela
  — 20 total points —  
  Tie breaker (if needed) – The two Dominican pitchers in the U.S. Baseball Hall of Fame have combined for how many regular season pitching wins?  (hint – they each had between 200 and 250 career wins)

462

Juan Marichal 243 

and

Pedro Martinez 219

March meeting summary

Ten chapter members gathered in southwest Austin on Saturday to discuss a wide range of baseball topics – from the Chisox brouhaha involving Adam LaRoche to Goose Gossage’s recent comments about sabermetrics and bat flipping.

 

Also, Bill Gilbert gave an update and shared impressive statistics from his grandson, Caleb Gilbert, a freshman right-handed reliever for Louisiana State University.  

 

The group also discussed the new slide rules implemented last month, spurred in part by Chase Utley’s leg-breaking slide in last year’s National League Division Series between the Los Angeles Dodgers and the New York Mets.

 

Gilbert and Raeanne Martinez shared that they’ll be in St. Petersburg in June for a journalism teaching workshop. Coincidentally, the Rays will host the Houston Astros that weekend, so one can be sure that the Martinezes will catch a game or two.

 

The chapter is planning an outing to the Dell Diamond in June to see the Round Rock Express; more details to come.

 

Meanwhile, the next chapter meeting will be at County Line on the Lake (2222 and 360) on Saturday, April 30. More details as we get closer to the date.

February Meeting Recap

Fifteen SABR Rogers Hornsby Chapter members and family met at Hoover’s in east Austin, Texas, on Saturday, February 20, 2016, for our monthly meeting.

With Spring Training upon us, everyone is looking forward to the rapidly approaching baseball season.  A few topics of discussion included:

Astros’ reliever/closer controversy precipitated by recent published comments from Luke Gregerson.

The possibility of Ichiro Suzuki reaching the 3000 hit plateau this season.  He currently has 2935 MLB hits.

Barry Bonds’ appearance at Miami Marlins spring training as hitting coach.

Monte Cely’s recent trip to la Serie del Caribe – the Caribbean World Series – in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic.  Monte presented a quiz on the Series and Dominican Beisbol.  You can take the quiz here.  Jim Baker took the grand prize, a Dominican national team ball cap, with a near-perfect score of 19 out-of-20.

Our next chapter meeting will be Saturday, March 19 at 12:30pm at Serranos-Mopac in South Austin, 5030 Highway 290 West, Austin, TX 78735 (near intersection of MoPac & 290).  More details will be forthcoming.

February Lunch Meeting

We are going to check out a new venue for our February lunch meeting.  Join us at Hoover’s at 2002 Manor Rd in Austin on Saturday February 20 at 11:00 a.m.    We are meeting at 11:00 a.m. for two reasons, (1) the weekend brunch menu is served until 11:30 in case anyone would prefer a breakfast item, and (2) the restaurant is less crowded before noon which increases our chances of getting a large table for our group in a timely manner.

Please RSVP so we can provide an accurate headcount for seating purposes to Jan Larson at jan.a.larson@gmail.com.

SABR Day 2016 summary

Seven chapter members joined SABR members across the nation and around the world to recognize SABR Day on Saturday, Jan. 30.

 

We talked about the Astros’ recent pickup of Doug Fister, weighing the pros (proven record with the Tigers and Nationals) and the cons (struggled last season when he was demoted to the Nats’ bullpen). Fister has incentive to do well in this one-year contract, but if he doesn’t, the Astros still have other options at starting pitching.

 

Meanwhile, Jim Baker, Predictatron impresario, shared that he wasn’t surprised when the winter meeting predicted the Astros to win the World Series later this year. He said he figured this would happen because of the many Astros fans in the group. Jan Larson added that the Astros have improved enough as a team that the prediction shouldn’t come as a surprise. Whatever happens, the humble author of this summary hopes we’re right!

 

Also, Monte Cely missed our SABR Day lunch for good reason – he traveled to Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic, the home of 58th Serie del Caribe. Follow his updates by clicking on this link: http://chapters.sabr.org/hornsby/research/papers/394-serie-del-caribe-2016-in-santo-domingo

 

If you’d like to see what other SABR chapters did for SABR Day, check out this link: http://sabr.org/sabrday

 

Our next monthly meeting is scheduled for lunch on Saturday, Feb. 20. Details and email invitation to follow in the coming weeks.

 

 

2016 Hornsby Winter Meeting Quiz

2016 Hornsby Winter Meeting Quiz

by Ryan Pollack

(Presented at the Hornsby Winter Meeting on Saturday, Jan. 9, 2016)

30 teams, 30 answers; each team is the answer to one of the questions

(Move the mouse over the blank space to see the answer)

AMERICAN LEAGUE

1. The worst player to qualify for the 2015 batting title was worth ­2 WAR and played for this team. Red Sox: Pablo Sandoval
2. This team did not win its division despite having a run differential 93 runs better than the team that won it. Astros

3. This team had two relievers get AL Cy Young votes.

Yankees: Andrew Miller, Dellin Betances

4. 

This team played against the Orioles on April 29th when no fans were allowed in the stadium due to riots in downtown Baltimore.

White Sox
5. This team played against the Orioles on April 29th when no fans were allowed in the stadium due to riots in downtown Baltimore. Royals: Omar Infante

6. A starter for this team placed third in the AL Cy Young voting behind Dallas Keuchel and David Price.

A’s: Sonny Gray

7. The 2014 MLB home run leader played for this team in 2015. He hit 44 home runs, second­most in the majors.

Mariners: Nelson Cruz
 

8. A starting pitcher for this team finished with a 5.05 ERA, worst among all qualified starters.

Tigers: Alfredo Simon
9. Against the closer for this team, batters put 79.1% of batted balls on the ground, the highest rate in the major leagues against qualified relievers.

Orioles: Zach Britton

10. This playoff team had a run differential of +18, worse than four teams that did not make the playoffs.

Rangers: Orioles, Indians, Nationals, Giants

11. A rookie for this team was a subject of the documentary "Ballplayer: Pelotero" in 2011.

Twins: Miguel Sano

12. This team averaged 15,403 fans per game in 2015, the fewest in Major League Baseball.

Rays

13. This team combined to hit not only the most home runs, but also the most doubles.

Blue Jays

14. The runner­up to the AL Rookie of the Year made his major­league debut for this team on June 14th.

Indians: Francisco Lindor

15. A starting pitcher for this team had the fastest average four­seam fastball velocity (95.7 MPH) among qualified starters.

Angels: Garrett Richards

NATIONAL LEAGUE

16. A starter for this team threw two no­hitters in 2015, becoming the 5th player in history to do so.

Nationals: Max Scherzer

17. This team fired its manager on May 3rd after it began the season 7­18. On August 11th, the general manager was fired, too.

Brewers: Ron Roenicke; Doug Melvin

18. The first baseman for this team finished second in the NL MVP voting.

Diamondbacks: Paul Goldschmidt

19. This team ranked second­to­last in the majors in home runs with 120 despite having a player who hit 27, another with 23, and three players with 10.

Marlins: Giancarlo Stanton, Justin Bour, Ozuna/Realmuto/Dietrich

20. This team’s starting rotation notched a 5.27 ERA, worst in the majors. The team also allowed 5.21 runs per game, worst in the majors.

Rockies
 

21. This team played in its third straight Wild Card game in 2015.

 

Pirates
22. The runner up for the NL Rookie of the Year was primarily a third baseman for this team  

Giants: Matt Duffy
23. This team had three players in the NL MVP voting. One of these players was also in the 
NL Cy Young Vote; another was also in the NL Rookie of the Year vote.  

Cubs: 
Arrieta/Bryant/Rizzo; Arrieta; Bryant
24. The general manager for this team was fired on September 10th. He has since become 
a first­base coach for another team.  

Phillies: Ruben Amaro Jr.
25. This team’s bullpen led the majors in Win Probability Added, meaning they excelled in 
pitching the team out of tight spots.  

Cardinals
26. This team had two pitchers finish in the top three spots in the 2015 Cy Young voting. 
Neither won.  

Dodgers: Clayton Kershaw, Zack Greinke
27. This team trailed all others in run differential, getting outscored by 187 runs over the 
course of the season.  

Braves
28. This team’s closer struck out 41.7% of the batters he faced, the highest rate in the 
majors.  

Reds: Aroldis Chapman
29. This team finished 74­88 despite trading for several big­name players prior to the 
season.  

Padres
30. On October 3rd, this team was no­hit by the pitcher who threw two no­hitters this year.  

Mets