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June 2009
Bring on the (ugh) Nationals
As with everyone else under the sun, I figured the Yankees could take two of three games from a poorly planned and injury-depleted Mets team, I just figured they would win Game 1 on their own merits and Game 2 by feasting on a journeyman starter before losing Game 3 to one of the best pitchers in baseball. I didn't figure on them winning Game 1 because a veteran made a Little League misplay, losing game two by being shut down by the fringe-y guy, and then annihilating the Cy Young winner in Game 3. Let's not even predict what the Yankees might do against the Nats… Then again, it's sort of my job, so let's give 'er a go.
The Nationals are obviously a miserable ballclub, one with a chance to rank with the worst of all time. Their current .262 winning percentage works out to 42-118 over a full season. Just a few teams have been that bad. Here's the bottom 10 since 1900:
|1 A's
|2 Braves
|3 Mets
|4 Senators
|5 A's
|6 Tigers
|7 Pirates
|8 Senators
|9 Phillies
|T10 Red Sox
|T10 Phillies
|T10 Browns
If they continue along their present path, the Nats would slot in right next to the 2003 Tigers. However, the Nationals are not like the 2003 Tigers. Those Tigers couldn't hit, pitch, or field. The Nats are bad at two out of three, but they have average hitting. They don't catch the ball, their starting pitching is the worst in the league, allowing nearly six runs per game, and their bullpen may yet prove to be the worst in the history of relief pitching.
That doesn't necessarily mean the Yankees will get off easy. Their best bet for an easy win is Tuesday, when CC Sabathia takes on the Curacao-born 22-year-old Shairon Martis (with a name like Shairon, I keep thinking he must be Israeli). As the Nationals go, he's pitched very well, with five quality starts in 12 tries, including a complete game, one-run win over the Cardinals. What works in the Yankees' favor, particularly because this series is being contested in New York, is that Martis gives up a lot of fly balls and has a low strikeout rate. That suggests the Yankees making good contact and hitting balls in the air, and we know what happens when they do that at home. In addition, two of their three best hitters, Nick Johnson and Adam Dunn, are left-handed, which should be helpful to Mr. Sabathia.
Wednesday's game has to be rated a toss-up. First, Washington lefty John Lannan can actually pitch. He's not an extreme ground ball pitcher, but he gets enough of them to keep the ball in the park. On the downside, he doesn't get a lot of strikeouts, meaning (again) those deadly balls in play. Lefties have also hit him well, slugging .493 against him in his career with a home run every 21.2 at-bats. The Yankees, who list seven left-handers or switch-hitters most days, should be able to do some damage. Unfortunately, much will also depend on whether Chien-Ming Wang can overcome his mechanical difficulties and put in a good start. Thursday's match-up should again favor the Yankees, as the rookie Craig Stammen will face Joba Chamberlain. Of course, much will depend on Chamberlain throwing strikes. Stammen is no pistol (please pardon the bad horticultural pun), but does have good control. Like Lannon, he has an above-average groundball rate and his strikeout rate is on the low side.
The great thing about the Nationals from the point of view of the opposition is that they can blow a lead at any time. Even if the Yankees trail in these games, they have more than a fair chance at coming back against the bullpen. Their relievers have an aggregate ERA of 5.59. Reliever ERA isn't the most accurate way to look at bullpen performance, but in this case, it makes a fine proxy for better measures, as it fairly depicts how miserable they've been. That should take some pressure off of Wang and Chamberlain — though not all of it, particularly for Wang. One question that arises out of Joe Girardi's "pitch well or else" edict to Wang is, what about the start after?
We finally get to the mats with reader comments, and Wholesome Reading (Warning! Politics!) continues to be updated.
The around (and about)
Quick style:
? Tony Gwynn, Jr. was a mediocre prospect for years. Traded to the Padres, he's hitting .344. It would be nice if that kind of magic were real.
? Chone Figgins went 3-for-5 on Friday, continuing a nice hot streak in which he's batted .400 (32-for-80) over his last 20 games. He's also thrown in a 3-for-7 in stolen bases, which doesn't help.
? Friday was one of the few occasions all year when the Diamondbacks gave Dan Haren any offensive support. He's 5-4 with a 2.20 ERA, but in a fair world he would have ten wins. I'm reminded of Nolan Ryan's 1987.
? Bad news from the Mariners as Erik Bedard skips a start with shoulder soreness. Scratch one prospect from the ultimate trade package, should they choose to go that way–they may yet convince themselves that their league-leading pitching staff is good enough to overcome their league-lagging offense and get them to the top of a weak division. They might be right, too.
? It was shocking to see that Luke Hochevar had a four-pitch first inning against the Reds until the Reds' batting order was consulted. The combination of injuries and poor planning has left Dusty Baker with a lineup that's just not Major League quality right now. Still viable in their division, a trade for any kind of bat at almost any position would be decisive.
? This is stating the obvious, but let's state it: when the Dodgers are being shut out in homer-happy Arlington, when they have just 44 home runs as a team, then what Manny Ramirez did wasn't just cheating, it was an act of treason.
? With ultra-prospect Gordon Beckham just 2-for-28 in the Majors, you wonder how long the White Sox will continue to be patient.
? Two former Yankees key to the ending of the Nats-Rays game (there's an interleague rivalry for you), as Nick Johnson dropped Gabe Kapler's foul pop-up off of Ron Villone with two outs in the eighth, and Kapler came back and knocked Villone's next pitch into the seats to swing the score in his team's favor. Villone actually fell to his knees as the ball went out. It's not always big failures that make a bad team historically bad.
? Roy Halladay leaves with a groin strain, next start in jeopardy. And if he's compromised at all, the Jays' chances of hanging around the fringes of the AL East race just went "poof."
Irony is such a lovely word
If you dig irony, the conclusion of Friday night's game had to be an instant favorite. In November 2007, Mets General Manager Omar Minaya handed out one of the more foolish contracts in recent memory, signing Luis Castillo to a four-year, $25 million contract. Moreno thus assured the Mets of having Castillo's company from age 32 through 35 when the second baseman's speed, defense, and durability had already declined due to a set of bad knees. His power was always minimal, so even when at his best his offensive contributions have been minor. The most you can say of him at this point is that he's selective and that when he does run, he picks his spots well. If you add up the 87 games he played last year with the 50 he's played this year, you get a .258/.362/.318 hitter with 13 doubles, three triples, and three home runs. He's also walked 77 times and stolen 23 bases in 27 attempts. He's not completely without value, but what's there isn't something that the Mets needed to lock themselves into, especially when Castillo has so little leeway in his skills; if he slips even slightly, he's rowing the team backwards.
That this player, of all players, dropped a seeming can of corn to give away a game to the Yankees seems highly appropriate. It would be inhuman not to observe that it's also a little sad. There is no joy in seeing a 14-season veteran of the Major Leagues humiliated. Still, poor decision-making has a way of coming back to haunt you, and Castillo's Fumble is the most visible example of a GM's misevaluation of a player biting his team in the buttocks.
Joba Chamberlain's start was not pretty and might be better characterized as bizarre, as he left in the fourth having allowed just one hit but walked five and hit two batters. No doubt the Joba-to-the-Pen crowd will again get hyped up, but let's be realistic: throwing strikes has been a staff-wide problem for the Yankees this year. With nine walks in nine innings last night, the club raised its rate of ball fours to 4.1 per nine innings. In doing so, they passed the Cleveland Indians for the league lead.
I've seen a great deal of hostility expressed towards Dave Eiland in reader comments here and elsewhere, but I'm not sure that you can put the blame on him exclusively. When a team has young, hard throwing pitchers, control problems often have to be worked through. A great deal of frustration usually accompanies this. Those of you kicking around long enough might recall that back in the mid-1980s, Bobby Valentine promulgated an ill-considered get-tough program with his wild Rangers pitchers, vowing that if any of his starters walked two consecutive batters he would be instantaneously yanked from the game. All this accomplished was to make his pitchers nervous. Bobby Witt remained Bobby Witt even with a metaphorical gun to his head. The Yankees can change pitching coaches, but the new guy is unlikely to bring a magic bullet to go with that gun.
Joe Girardi has not had a sure touch with the bullpen this year. His reluctance to use Mariano Rivera for a long save in Boston, followed by his usage of him in the eighth inning of Friday's game, is a frustrating inconsistency. The usage of Brett Tomko ahead of David Robertson (more on this below) makes very little sense. When Girardi finally did get around to using Robertson, the horse was out of the barn. He then tried to push Robertson into a second inning, which would have pushed his pitch count up to 40 or so pitches, more than he typically throws. Instead, he allowed a leadoff hit to Gary Sheffield, which led to a panicky call to Phil Coke.
One interesting aspect of Girardi's bullpen usage is the frequency with which relievers have pitched; Yankees relievers lead the league in appearances in consecutive games. Phil Coke leads the pack with nine such appearances each. This is in large part a reflection of Girardi's reluctance to turn to anyone in the pen except for Coke, Mariano Rivera, and lately Al Aceves. As we've seen before, particularly in the Joe Torre years, this can lead to burnout of select pitchers. Given that the Yankees have other options in the minors, it would make far more sense for the Yankees to try something new than to continue to burden Girardi with options he's already discarded.
The one positive to come out of last night's bullpen mishmash was that Phil Coke had a long outing. The former starter's splits this year have been backwards: .195/.327/.366 with one home run in 41 at-bats against righties, .216/.245/.523 with four home runs in 44 at-bats against lefties, suggesting that Coke is miscast in the LOOGY role.
Finally, it's great to see a Yankees manager finally using the team's closer in tight eighth-inning situations instead of already-settled ninth innings, but it is unfortunate that it took until Rivera was 39, when he may no longer be mentally or physically adaptable to the change.
Nick Swisher is just not having a good week for mental acuity. Neither are the official scorers. That the official scorer called the ball that bounced off his mitt a double is just one more illustration of how badly baseball needs to professionalize official scoring. Millions of dollars in salaries are affected by performance statistics, and too often those statistics are perverted by scorers who display something less than objectivity.
Of course, nothing Swisher did this week compares to Milton Bradley's actions on Friday, when he forgot the number of outs and tossed a live ball into the stands, allowing the Twins to trot around the bases.
I'm still not clear on what Brett Tomko is adding to the roster, particularly when the Yankees could be getting Tony Claggett or Mark Melancon established in the Majors. He and Angel Berroa (three at-bats this month, seven total since April) are mysteries worthy of a Leonard Nimoy In Search Of… revival. Tomko has been around a long time, bas rarely been any good, and his 10.2 innings out of the Yankees pen going into Friday night's debacle were deceptive. Sure, the ERA was only 2.53, but he'd walked four and struck out only five. He was always prone to giving up the home run, had already given up one, and with that low strikeout rate it was inevitable that he'd give up another. I'm all for teams fishing in the discard pile for diamonds in the rough, but the Yankees have viable relievers in the minors who might be good for the next five years, not the next five minutes. David Robertson is one of those, and yet he followed Tomko, coming in three-runs down instead of up by one. Veteran Tomkoism is counterproductive in the extreme.
I'm sure someone will write that the Yankees were looking for "length" with Chamberlain out of the game early, but length remains theoretical when the pitcher you choose can't actually pitch.
Linked here, a very perceptive bit on Kyle Farnsworth from Joe Posnanski. He illustrates that the Royals have discovered what the Yankees (and Braves, and everyone else) already knew: Farnsworth is to be used in low leverage situations ONLY. "There's no crying in baseball, except when Kyle Farnsworth comes in." The Yankees pretended this wasn't true for two and a half years.
An average bullpen and an average Cano
A brief note marking the passing of one-time Yankee Woody Held. Held was signed by the Yankees and had a couple of brief trials with the big club, but the team looked at his limitations — strikeouts, low batting average, shaky defense at short — and ignored the fact that he had a ton of power for a shortstop of the day. In a move that Casey Stengel later acknowledged was a mistake, Held was spun off to the Kansas City A's in one of the many trades the Yankees made with that ballclub (they got back Ryne Duren) and not retrieved. He went on to hit 179 Major League home runs in a 14-season career during which he played everywhere on the field except first base and catcher. His versatility made him a Stengel-type player, but Casey never got the chance. Regrets from this page to Mr. Held's family and friends.
Nothing I haven't said before, but it's current: Ken Rosenthal reports that the Yankees will be looking to trade for a setup man. They might give Mark Melancon another try first. It would be far cheaper to have him succeed than to deal off Jesus Montero for Huston Street. Melancon hasn't pitched all that well lately, but has maintained great control in the Minors, walking just under two batters per nine innings, and of course he's still striking out more than a man per inning. I'm not exactly sure why the folks at Scranton felt they had to let him pitch three innings on Tuesday, but we'll assume that was an aberration.
As frustrating as the Yankees' pen has been at time this year, it has overall been about average in its performance. Deleting Jonathan Albaladejo and Edwar Ramirez was a huge step in the right direction. David Robertson has been quite good the second time around, having allowed no runs in his seven appearances since returning. That said, four of those seven appearances have been in losses, and two others were in games in which the Yankees were leading by a large margin. It might be time for Joe Girardi to try entrusting Robertson with a higher leverage role. Al Aceves has also been quite the discovery, last night's disappointing outing notwithstanding. If Brian Bruney finally returns and is healthy, a lot of the pressure to seek outside help should lift. At least, that's the theory.
Seems to me that Robinson Cano's latest slump is not getting a lot of play. While a certain segment of fandom wants to see Nick Swisher benched every time he strikes out with runners on, Cano gets a pass, because periods of extreme pointlessness is part of what we're used to with Robby. Yet, Cano really hasn't been hitting on all cylinders since April's .366/.400/.581. While he hit for good power in May, his batting average dropped to .272, and since the six walks he took in April stayed in April, his on-base percentage for the month was under .300. This month he hasn't hit anything at all. Despite 13 multi-hit games since the end of the season's first month, Cano has batted only .248/.281/.392 in his last 38 games. The average American League second baseman is hitting .271/.333/.410, so as always with Cano, Hot Robby is a real contributor and Cold Robbie is a real problem.
Unfortunately, you can't platoon Robbie against himself. Since a manager never knows when he's going to be hot or cold, he can't bench him only on the cold nights, plus there's the traditional school of baseball thought, possibly correct, that claims that a hitter has to hit his way out of a slump (usually, if you listen to broadcasters, by bunting, but never mind). That leaves the team with a player who has some months out of the Rogers Hornsby catalogue and others that even Cody Ransom wouldn't sniff at. Well, maybe Ransom, but you get the idea.
Cano has valuable, of course, especially in the absence of an obvious replacement. There's no argument here that he be summarily dispensed with. Yet, his overall production for the season is sliding to the point where he's closer to last year's numbers than to the good stuff of the previous two seasons. He is, in essence, a tease. I've said this before: At some point, the Yankees may need to confront the reality that a player with lower highs and higher lows might be give them more value. Fortunately for Cano, that player is not yet part of the organization. Unfortunately for the Yankees, Cano's contract escalates to $9- and then $10 million over the next two seasons, so their options may be very limited.
… And of course Cano is batting fifth tonight. Sometimes I don't understand what Joe Girardi is thinking. If he's thinking that Cano has a career batting average of .333 against tonight's starter Livan Hernandez, he might want to consider that Cano has only had six at-bats against him. We've seen these kinds of small samples cited in lineup decisions before.
I realize he made a key baserunning error last night, but the guy does have an OBP just under .400, is slugging .538, and is second in the league in walks drawn. He just misses making the league top 10 in whatever overall hitting metric you chose. He's been a very potent hitter for the Yankees, and to run the guy out of town over one mental error is … a mental error.
They're still coming, eventually … I had a few other things on my mind I wanted to get to first. I'll also be updating Wholesome Reading throughout the weekend, so stay tuned.
Wangery X
The first thing to note is that before you begin arguing that Chien-Ming Wang can make another start because his opponent would be the historically poor Nationals, take a moment to peruse their lineup.
The Nats' problem is not hitting, but pitching, particularly bullpen pitching. Washington pitching is allowing almost six runs per game (5.88), which bodes well for Yankees hitters, but they're also scoring 4.55 runs per game, a hair above average. Nick Johnson, Christian Guzman, Ryan Zimmerman, Adam Dunn, Josh Willingham and Elijah Dukes have hit quite well this year.
Second base has been a season-long problem for Washington, as the team's keystoners have been miserable, and a potentially season-ending injury to Jesus Flores has left catcher in the hands of ex-Yankee Wil Nieves, which is a problem given that Nieves is not a replacement level player, but whatever comes after that. It's the floor on the elevator that doesn't get a number, just a black button. The point being belabored here is that Washington can mash a struggling Wang just as well as any other team.
The second argument that should be dispensed with is "Wang won 19 games twice, three and two years ago." Two years ago, George W. Bush was president. Three years ago, the economy was, if not cooking, looking a whole lot healthier than it is now. Three years ago GM and Chrysler were not bankrupt. Three years ago has zero relevance to what is happening now. Two years ago has only slightly more relevance. Ron Guidry won over 20 games three times, so surely he must have the right to get a few cracks at the Major League rotation. Obviously that's not realistic — Guidry could do it back in the 1970s and 80s but he's 59 now. He can no longer do it. Exactly. There is also a chance that, because of his injury, a loss of mechanics, or a loss of confidence, Wang can no longer do it either. At the very best, he can't do it right now.
Wang is now 0-4. For all intents and purposes he is the difference in the American League East race. Yes, the Yankees have lost every game they've played to the Red Sox, but they've outplayed the Sox everywhere except head-to-head — their records independent of each other are 34-18 for the Yankees and 28-24 for the Red Sox. Sure, there have been injuries and some other burps along the way. The point here is not to fix blame, but only to underscore the fact that in a close race, and this race should continue to be close, every decision the team makes can have an outsized impact. The Yankees can continue to gamble with Wang and maybe they'll win that gamble. Wang maintains velocity, so there's always a chance.
On the other hand, Phil Hughes waits behind door number two, and it's possible that, with the very good strikeout rate he's shown thus far, he can make huge strides. All it would take is a slight uptick in his command and some new pitching patterns against lefties, who are having little trouble thwacking him (righties have barely laid a glove on him). That makes it sound all too easy — there are few more loaded phrases in life than, "All that needs to happen is" — but if you have two pitchers, Wang and Hughes, both needing to make adjustments, you might want prefer the guy with the big-time upside who you have to get established anyway because Andy Pettitte might not pitch forever. Or to put it another way, you might choose the pitcher who has had at least one quality start versus the guy who has yet to survive the fourth inning.
Let us be clear that no one knows what will happen. Dave Eiland has insisted that Wang can come back. We can take his word for that, that Wang CAN. That he will come back is a different matter. Things might click for him or they might not. Hughes too might take a step forward, a step back, or a step into the old Yankee Stadium construction site and vanish into the spot where all the construction animals were killed in a cave-in back in 1922. (Don't do it, Phil. That's not the way to become a winner.) Anyone who claims to have a definitive answer is lying. What remains is really a question, and then, perhaps, an argument: Can the Yankees afford to give Wang more chances?
I have to credit Kyle Farnsworth for having had a nice little stretch of pitching for the Royals. New York's favorite reliever has seemingly turned a corner. In a run of 17 appearances going back to April 21, Farnsworth has pitched 17.2 scoreless innings. He's allowed nine hits, two walks, and struck out 17. Obviously those pesky home runs have not been a problem. Don't know where this version of Farnsworth was in New York. Perhaps KC is more his speed. I figure I've been picking on the guy for years, so it's only fair to acknowledge it when he does well.
Wholesome Reading has some new bits, with more to come. Warning, innocents! Politics!
In a baseball vein, those with a pass to Baseball Prospectus can check out some historical notes about the draft.
The draft is upon us
We're just a few hours away now. The Yankees pick 29th in the first round, the result of Gerrit Cole stiffing them last year. The thing to remember here is that you don't get a third try — if the Yankees swing and miss here, they go hungry. Mock drafts are only worth so much, particularly when you're talking about a team that's picking 29th, but both Baseball America's Jim Callis and Baseball Prospectus' Kevin Goldstein have linked the Yankees to Texas high school outfielder Slade Heathcott (not Heath Sladecott, as my brain insists on remembering it).
Again, this is all guesswork because any of 28 prior decisions could dramatically alter who is available at the bottom of the round. Because he's a local product, I'd like to see Millville High, New Jersey outfielder Mike Trout become available to the Yankees, but he's been a rising commodity these past few weeks and it seems unlikely. "Local" is kind of stretching it — Millville is closer to Delaware than New York — but you don't get too many high first-round picks out of the Garden State, though we can balance out such illustrious overdrafts as Willie Banks, Jeff Kunkel and Pat Pacillo with Mo Vaughn, Craig Biggio, and Willie Wilson. Also, I figure that fate owes the Yankees something on players named "Trout."
The last time the Yankees bought a fish it didn't go so well. It was 22 years ago, but the wounds have yet to heal — if you weren't there, it was something like all three years of Carl Pavano packed into a season-destroying 14 games. Maybe they'd be better off with Sladecott, or Heathcliffe, or whatever his name is, so long as he represents a land-based species.
To "land-based" we should add "position-based." Though teams draft (or should draft) the best available talent rather than for need, the Yankees' system is still overbalanced on the pitching side. Given that the Yankees even taste some early picks because of the Cole debacle, it's probably best just to say "good luck" and, paraphrasing Woody Guthrie, "Take it easy, but for gosh sakes, take something!"
Notes from around the league
What a drag. Although it would have been nice if they Ernie Banks-ed it on Saturday, they pushed the sucker off into the future instead. And thus, a few quick notes on the landscape:
? It was a great week for youth, with Andrew McCutchen, and Gordon Beckham coming up, and Tommy Hanson officially due up on Sunday, and let's throw in Matt Wieters, who made his debut a week ago today. All ranked among the top 50 or so prospects in the game, and three of the four are closer to the top than the bottom (McCutchen is the least promising of the bunch, but it's a tough crowd).
? It was more than past time for the Indians to send Fausto Carmona to the Minors. He was wonderful in 2007, but his 2008 was bad and his 2009 has been miserable, with the former's five walks per nine innings turning into six walks per nine. Carmona can still induce those grounders, but he wasn't getting the double plays when he needed them, perhaps because he was more likely to pass the batter than get him out. Resultantly, just two of his 12 starts have earned the quality start seal of approval. His 2008 and 2009 combined: 10-13 in 34 starts, 6.10 ERA (including a shutout!), 181.1 innings, 195 hits, 111 walks, 94 strikeouts.
? Billy Butler of the Royals is batting .288/.348/.440, which would be great if he were a shortstop, but it's not that exciting coming from a first baseman/designated hitter. Butler is only 23, so he could find another gear, but right now he's Shea Hillenbrand.
? If the Yankees were to bail out on Hideki Matsui before the end of the year, would you be comfortable with it if the reason were that it would allow them to block the Red Sox off of Nick Johnson? Part two of that question is, would it be worth it for the Yankees to get into a prospect bidding war with the Red Sox in order to accomplish that goal?
? It's sad that the era of making "great man" movies ended 60 years ago, before Paul Muni or Edward G. Robinson could portray Branch Rickey.
? As much as the Orioles have improved their club of late with graduates of the farm system and the occasional perspicacious trade acquisitions (Adam Jones, this means you), they're still desperate for a quality shortstop. Whoever the next great, or even decent, Orioles shortstop is, he's not presently in the organization.
? Rumor has the Braves wanting to add Brad Penny, which seems like insurance for the kids. Their rotation has been the least of their problems. Nate McClouth isn't a great bat; the reason he was a great add for the Braves is that despite this he's still leaps and bounds above any other outfielder the Braves have played.
? Given their many injuries and lack of organizational depth, by the time the Yankees see the Mets next week they might be starting Wayne Garrett and John Milner again. Parenthetically, Omar Minaya was nuts to put so much faith in former Yankees farmhand Omir Santos. He's going to be far below the replacement level with the bat when all is said and done. He's close now, actually … The Mets have played 12 games since Jose Reyes left the lineup, and though they're 7-5 in those games, they've hit .252/.336/.378. We should probably only give them half-credit for their three-game sweep of the Nationals.
? I keep hearing how after Randy Johnson there will be no more 300 game winners forever, but with health (the big caveat for everyone) CC Sabathia is going to have a shot at it. If he averages only 15 wins a year over the duration of his Yankees contract, he'll hit his mid-30s with something like 220 wins. It would be a steep climb to 300 from there, but not any steeper than Johnson's. As with the Big Unit, Sabathia is a weird physical specimen, so it's hard to project his chances of staying healthy into old age.
? "Up" was a terrific picture, and one that will speak more to the adults than the kids, though the kids will dig it, too. Next spring, when people are debating the Academy Awards and this film has been ghettoized in the "Best Animated Film" category, it's a good bet that no, erm, inanimate film will have been better.
Wholesome Reading has been updated with new entries, and there will be more throughout the weekend. Warning: Politics and fish! I'll be back here if breaking news demands it, or if I just feel lonely for you.
The around (and about)
Red Sox 5, Tigers 1: The Tigers loaded the bases with no outs in the bottom of the ninth, but Jon Papelbon struck out the side to get out of it. Not much new there, but Daisuke Matsuzaka's solid start (five innings, one run) bodes well for the Sox in the future. Throw in four scoreless innings of relief overall, and it was a big day for Boston.
Blue Jays 6, Angels 4: Fourteen strikeouts for Roy Halliday on 133 pitches. That's a career high for the good Doctor, surpassing a 130-pitch effort last August 9. If it bothered him then, he didn't show it–his ERA was 2.77 going in and 2.95 after… With this loss, the Angels once again get sucked back to .500. Halladay can make any team look bad, but this is a woeful offensive team. A healthy Vlad Guerrero, or one 10 years younger, would solve a lot of problems, as would a basic hitting reeducation course for Howie Kendrick, who has taken the Mickey Hatcher not-walking-as-your-path-to-Nirvana program way too seriously.
Rays 6, Royals 2: In which Andy Sonnanstine shows he can pitch a little, allowing two solo shots but no free passes. The Rays' bullpen even showed up for this one. Ben Zobrist keeps on hitting at second, and Matt Joyce has done quite well in his return from the minors, so the Rays are covering all their injuries but shortstop, and Reid Brignac might show a little bit of pop yet–his translations for this year at Triple-A say .268/.335/.451, while PECOTA… Well, PECOTA isn't nearly as cheerful. At least everyone agrees the kid can field.
Twins 4, Indians 3: The Indians might have lost Asdrubal Cabrera for awhile when he bent his left shoulder on Brandon Harris's buttocks. And this just in: I've run out of superlatives for Joe Mauer, who went 3-for-3 with a home run and is now batting .431/.516/.873.
Athletics 5, White Sox 0: Another rookie pitcher comes up for the A's, doesn't pitch well exactly, but doesn't allow a run. Beware of next time. The Sox were damaged on their end by a Wilson Betemit error, and we know what that's all about in these parts.
Mariners 8, Orioles 2: Erick Bedard raises his trade profile a bit more with another solid outing, Ichiro gets another couple of hits (26 straight), and Junior Griffey finds a good day left in his kit bag… In his last 20 games, Nick Markakis is 18-for-85 (.212).
Braves 6, Cubs 5: Definition of a heartbreaking loss: your starter throws nearly seven innings of no-hit ball, that goes by the boards, as does the lead, as does, well, everything, and at the end of 12 innings you get to watch the Braves dance at home plate. Jeff Francoeur's home run moves his OBP up to .275. Georgia rejoice. Gregor Blanco replaced Jordan Schafer in center field, checking a rookie checker's attempt to jump a few squares.
Pirates 3, Mets 1: Johan Santana pitched well, but not up to his usual standards, while Zach Duke held a depressingly anorexic Mets lineup to eight singles and a whole lot of outs on balls in play–the Mets didn't strike out once, but a few quality defensive plays kept them honest, including a Nate McLouth throw to get Jeremy Reed at home that tailed well up the line, exactly where it needed to be. Sometimes it's better to be lucky than good.
Nationals 10, Giants 6: Busy day for Washington, as the Nats fired pitching coach Randy St. Claire and also got word that starting catcher Jesus Flores might miss the rest of the season. Finally, the staged a come-for-behind win courtesy of the Bay Area Bullpen Collective. As for the Jints, they can look in the mirror. Tim Lincecum on the mound, six runs in the bank, that's like '27 Yankees time for this offense–they need to win on nights like that.
Marlins 10, Brewers 3: Dan Uggla hit his 100th home run, becoming the fastest second baseman to reach the century mark. Uggla isn't a great player, nor is he having a good year. Still, this is a guy who few thought could play, and he has 100 career home runs, about 100 more than several prospects with higher profiles.
Astros 3, Rockies 2: Third straight win for Houston, as they tie it up against Huston Street and Miguel Tejada hits a walk-off against Fogg in the 11th, as if Fogg had any business pitching in an important spot, or any spot, in the Major Leagues. At .362/.388/.546, you have to admit that Tejada is having a heck of a season for a 35-year-old with a questionable chemical history.
Cardinals 5, Reds 2: Four strong innings of relief from the Cards' pen, one of those off days for Bonson Arroyo, and a Reds' offense that was hurting from the loss of Joey Votto goes 5-for-30. Willy "E. Coyote" Taveras: .260/.318/.328 and a career leadoff man who has never scored more than 83 runs in a season. Who thought that was a good idea?
Phillies 10, Padres 5: A potentially season-saving debut by starting pitcher Antonio Bastardo (Got Bastardo?), who could bolster a rotation that has lost Brett Myers for the year and isn't getting quite what it had planned from Cole Hamels… Another huge night for Raul Ibanez, two home runs, and Ibanez is now slugging a Ruthian .716–Great Scott. On the Padres' side, Adrian Gonzalez hit yet another home run, and Jake Peavy leaves after one with the flu, which sounds like a cover for his bad ankle or might really be the flu… And hopefully not THAT flu.
Dodgers 6, Diamondbacks 5: A win for Jeff Weaver out of the pen as the Dodgers, absolutely neutered by Dan Haren, came back. As I've said before, it's an unfair universe.
One more chance for Wang
Chien-Ming Wang has been sprung from the bullpen. He will start on Thursday against the Rangers. Phil Hughes will take his place in the bullpen. At this writing, the reasoning behind the decision has yet to be reported, but we can safely assume that the Yankees have been sufficiently intrigued by Wang's work in relief to give him the shot. At the same time, Hughes gets the benefit of a little more experience working in relief and remains on hand to pitch if Wang's return needs to be aborted.
The upside of the move is clear: at his best, Wang was a consistent starting pitcher who gave the Yankees a fair chance to win about 60 percent of the time. As I have written many times here, the secret of Wang's success is that his sinker has been so good that not only do batters hit very few home runs off of him, they hit relatively few extra-base hits at any time. If Wang's control is sharp and he keeps the walks to a minimum, the opposition has to pile up many singles in a row to score more than one run in an inning.
That said, Wang's very low strikeout rates mean that everything has to be working right for him to win, including the inner defense. As we've seen this year, if he's not at his best, batters don't swing and miss, they swing and annihilate. Very few pitchers have had any kind of long-term success with Wang's strikeout rates–a reader in the comments for yesterday's entry cited Rick Reuschel, Jamie Moyer, Greg Maddux and Paul Splitorff, but all of them except Splitorff had decisively higher strikeout rates in leagues in which batters were harder to strike out (and I'm betting that Spitorff would edge ahead as well given a similar era adjustment), and in any case these are outliers, four pitchers out of, well, everybody.
Hughes has been fascinating so far. He's averaging eight strikeouts per nine innings, one of the reasons that the Yankees are second in the league in strikeout rate. His walk rate has been a tad high. He has not been consistent, of course, and the Yankees are looking for consistency in a close race. All Yankees tyro pitchers are on an inning-to-inning lease, but given the highly competitive nature of the AL East this change can't be looked at as a symptom of the team's typical impatience. Though the Red Sox have had an indifferent record of late, the Blue Jays have been in a tail spin, and the Rays are still struggling to find consistency, you can't assume that these clubs are just going to fall away and leave the Yankees alone in first place. It makes sense to reach for the arm that you think is going to give you a quality start six out of ten tries instead of four or five times out of ten tries.
Regardless of what Wang does now, the future belongs to Hughes and his strikeouts, to the way that a high-strikeout pitcher can take the weight off of a defense (with an aging Jeter and a crippled A-Rod, this is only going to become more of an issue over time). Eventually the Yankees are going to have to make a commitment to him and let him mature enough to find that consistency, or decide that he's not going to find it and move on.
They also need to be prepared to abandon this experiment just as quickly as they started it, and for the same reasons. Wang has pitched six times this year. He was creamed the first four times and pitched well the last two. This is not exactly a plethora of evidence that Wang is ready to be a dominating starter. If the AL East is too competitive to let Phil Hughes grow up in public, then it's also too competitive to let Wang try to reestablish himself as a starter. Forget the two 19-win seasons. They have little relevance to 2009. That was then, this was now, and if Wang isn't the same guy then there's no room to let him flounder based on a memory. All luck to him, of course, and all respect for past accomplishments as well, but just like Hughes, Wang should be guilty until proven innocent.
Having hit in sixteen straight games (.429/.487/.600), Derek Jeter's overall numbers have risen to the point that, if he simply maintains his current overall level of production, he will have enjoyed a very nice comeback season, his best with the bat in three years. There are, of course, many games yet to go, so you can't count on that happening, but after last year's injuries, the concomitant decline in production, and rapidly encroaching old age, it's good to see that this future Hall of Famer may have another top-quality season in him.
Actually, top-quality is a bit of a misnomer as Jeter's current level of production doesn't stand out from any of several other seasons he's had–he's always been a consistent player, with a couple of notable exceptions. One of those, of course, was 1999, when Jeter had what was one of the top five or so seasons by a shortstop since the 1950s. There's Alex Rodriguez's 1996 and 2000, Nomar's 1999 and 2000, Robin Yount's 1982, Alan Trammel's 1987, and Jeter's 1999.
Note that with the exception of Yount, the MVP voters missed on every dang one of them.
Show some love for the glove
The Yankees' new record for consecutive games without an error doesn't mean much to me, because official scoring in baseball has spectacularly low standards and has become almost totally subjective. What is interesting about the record is the way the Yankees have been climbing the defensive efficiency ladder. Defensive efficiency is the percentage of balls in play that a team turns into outs. Over the last several seasons, almost uniformly going back to the last century, the Yankees have ranked toward the bottom of the Majors in this category. Their players had so little range that the pitchers were giving up hits on balls that other teams might have put in the back pockets. Everything gets distorted: The pitchers look worse than they really are, the team goes crazy trying to sign pitchers when it really needs fielders and hitters, and the whole club spins off its axis.
If memory serves, the last time the Yankees led the league in this category was 1998. Since then, there's been a lot of "Past a diving [your name here]!" in the play by play. That has changed a great deal this season, particularly due to the addition of Mark Teixeira, who is a revelation on the fielding job after so many years of Jason Giambi. Another key factor has been Nick Swisher, who hasn't made many spectacular plays but gets to many more balls than Bobby Abreu was inclined to pursue in right field. Right now, the Yankees are fourth in the American League at 70.7 percent, a number almost indistinguishable from that of the league-leading Rangers (71.3 percent; the Brewers lead the Majors at 72.4 percent). It's an old but true baseball adage that you can't win by giving the opposition extra outs. Usually, that adage refers to errors, but it should apply to every ball hit within the fences and between the lines. The Yankees haven't cared much about this in the recent past, but with Teixeira's help a change has come. It and the team's current hot streak are not coincidental.
And that's all I have to say about that. He won't get there in most starts, of course, but the point is that if he is capable of this kind of upside, the Yankees owe it to themselves to keep running him out there until he gives some definitive reason that he can't. The performance of OTHER pitchers, like the eighth-inning relievers, have nothing to do with him. The bullpen is its own problem with its own solution set. You don't take a pitcher who is capable of giving you 21 or even 24 outs a night with an ERA below 4.00 out of the rotation because you can't find another guy who can give you three, no matter how "important" the spot. That's idiotic. All of the outs are important. We just perceive protecting late leads to somehow be a bigger deal than holding the opposition scoreless in the first or the third or the sixth, but a run is a run is a run, and you never know which one is going to beat you. More to the point, you can't protect leads you don't have, and a strong starting pitching staff is the tool that is most likely to buy you the time to generate that lead. Secondary point: It's much easier to find a guy to give you three outs than it is to find the one that will give you 21, even if the Yankees are having trouble finding that guy right now.
And yet another point, one that I alluded to yesterday: As good as Chien-Ming Wang has been as a starter in his career, his stuff and approach do not correlate with long-term success. I don't care if you have a sinker so heavy that Superman can't lift it — eventually the lack of strikeouts, the lack of a solid inner defense, or both is going to eat you alive. In Wang's case, his injury of last season may have altered his delivery, stuff or strength in a minute way, hard to perceive with the naked eye, but significant enough that he can no longer balance on the point of a needle the way he used to. Putting him in the bullpen, while perceived by many fans and commentators as a waste or an insult of some kind, may in fact allow him to make changes in his approach that will save his effectiveness and ultimately his career. A Wang who isn't worried about marshalling his stuff and can throw harder over a shorter span of time while still getting groundballs may be able to get outs in a way that a six- or seven-inning version of Wang can no longer aspire to.
Right now, there's no reason for the Yankees to make a change except that some people are arguing for it. Wang is pitching well in the bullpen, they say, so let's make him a starter. Chamberlain is pitching well as a starter, so let's make him a reliever. That way lies madness.
Parenthetically, I was pleased that Joel Sherman made very much the same argument I did yesterday about using Mariano Rivera in a tied game on the road. Within that piece there's also a promising note about the Yankees vowing not to resign Hideki Matsui after the season, 100 percent the correct decision.


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Dodge Dart Short Shifter
Fits Models
Please make sure the product fits your car model.
In order to reduce errors in orders, please make sure the product you are ordering fits your vehicle model.
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Made is the USA!
Designed specifically for the Dodge Dart.
This shifter will shorten the throw on your Dodge Dart stick and change the way you feel about shifting. Every movement is so much more precise that you will fall in love with driving manual all over again. This shifter will reduce your throws by approximately 34%!
This shifter is perfect for you if:
This shifter is perfect for you if:
- Feel like the stock DART unit is a just a bit sloppy
- Want to be able to shift a little faster
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- Want to buy a USA made product for Dodge Dart
Only The Best Will Do
Of course, Craven Speed are not the first to invent the idea of the short shifter. They are not even the first to make one for the new Dodge Dart, but this kit is definately the best. Craven Speed has been making high end shifting solutions for long enough to know that there is no sense in going half way. They have designed this shifter out of far superior materials to the stock unit and any other competing product. A stainless steel shaft and pivot handling all the force and machined aircraft aluminum.
The install involves only work inside your Dart and can be done by anyone with very little mechanical background. Most should be installed in less than 1 hour.
This shifter works on all Dodge Dart Models with standard transmissions.
For even better feel and response please check out the matching Weighted Gear Shift Knob and our MADNESS GOPedal.
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Spring has sprung with a vengeance. Foxtails are already putting up seeds stalks. Sprouting crab grass cannot be far behind. It's time to mulch your lawn.
Last year, I started mulching crab grass in Dad's lawn when it started sprouting, which was a bit late for the amount of mulch I was using, an inch of compost. Sprouting crab grass is very small, and can be hard to see before it gets big enough to grow out of the mulch. The seed is very fine and easy to smother. Not that the effort was wasted; the compost still stopped a lot of crab grass, and the lawn is looking much healthier and greener than last spring.
Even though it is early March, lawns are growing and being mowed. Lawn grasses can readily grow through an inch of compost and will be much happier for it. If your grass is perennial rye, a clumping grass, it's a good time to seed it into the compost where it is patchy. Dad's lawn is mainly fine fescue, a rhizomatous grass, and white Dutch clover, both of which fill in when given sufficient organic matter, nutrients and neutral soil. I also spread blood meal and ashes, bringing up the nitrogen, iron, and Ph to help kill the moss and feed the grass.
Crab grass is a clumping relative of Bermuda grass that also roots along its stems, but it's tender, and dies with the first frost. It is a tender perennial, as it does not die from making seed, but only spreads and makes more seed until it freezes. It roots deeply with thin, wiry roots where it is well watered, and hardly roots at all where it is not watered well, living on dust and dew collected on its hairy leaves.
Bermuda grows rhizomes that can travel under sidewalks and go 18″ deep and goes dormant about 6 months of the year in Oregon, making it a lawn weed, not good grass. Bermuda and crab grass show their family relationship in the shape of their seed stalks, and the size of their seed, which is, thankfully, small and easily smothered with mulch. So the same mulching that stops crab grass can also prevent Bermuda from germinating.
Ironically, in Arizona, where they use Bermuda as lawn grass, they mulch their lawns with steer manure every spring, which keeps them thick and green in the summer heat, and crab grass is rare. Here in southern Oregon, I don't recall seeing anyone else using steer manure or other compost on their lawns, and crab grass has spread all over town and down our country roads in the last 20 years. Chemical fertilizers don't smother weed seeds.
It doesn't pay to spray crab grass with Roundup (glyphosate salts). It kills the plant, but feeds the soil; it comes back from seed greener every time.
Even if you mulch, it is unlikely that you will stop all the crab grass in your lawn, since the seed is everywhere. Unlike annual grasses, the roots of crab grass are tough and wiry, and where they go deep from good watering, it is nearly impossible to pull after it flowers. But it can be cut off its roots with Kengyu garden scissors, and it won't grow back, as it has no food in those wiry roots.
Published in GardenGrantsPass.blogspot.com. Read The Litter Cleaner Blog at GPgardener.com.
Gardening is easy, if you do it naturally.


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Anthony Campbell
Anthony Campbell was born in Liverpool U.K. He was awarded an educational scholarship to Liverpool Art High School age thirteen. Emigrated to Canada 1982 and fell in love with the work of Emily Carr and the Group of Seven. Obtained a B.A Sociology and a B.A Social work at McMaster University and later worked with Young Offenders at Hamilton Detention Centre. He studied the Graphic Arts, Photolithography, and Photography while still honing his drawing and painting skills. He has exhibited work at The Bluecoat and Walker Art Gallery in Liverpool.
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Nearly 16,000 Nebraskans file unemployment claims due to COVID-19
Nearly 16,000 Nebraskans filed unemployment claims in the week ending March 21, according to non seasonally adjusted figures from the Department of Labor.
The Department of Labor released the data on Thursday morning, showing there were 15,668 initial claims filed in Nebraska. There were 795 claims filed the week prior -- a difference of 14,873 claims in one week.
The Department of Labor said, "Nearly every state providing comments cited the COVID-19 virus impacts. States continued to cite services industries broadly, particularly accommodation and food services."
Nationally, an unprecedented 3.3 million Americans filed unemployment claims in the week ending March 21. That figure is 2.9 million claims for non seasonally adjusted data.
Governor Pete Ricketts is holding a press conference at 2:00 p.m. Thursday when he is likely to address Nebraska's increase in unemployment claims.
You can read the full report from the Department of Labor


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Iran's Supreme National Security Council shrugged off the fuss US politicians have made about Tehran's testing of missiles, stressing that it will continue to improve its military deterrence for warding any possible threat.
"The Islamic Republic of Iran is busy preserving its deterrent power within the framework of its defense interests, no matter what others say about it," Ali Shamkhani, secretary of the council, told reporters in Tehran on Saturday, Tasnim News Agency reported.
His comments came in reaction to the recent US rhetoric of imposing fresh anti-Iran sanctions over a ballistic long-range missile that Tehran tested in October 2015.
Asked if US plans to impose new sanctions on Iran are tantamount to the breach of a July nuclear deal between Tehran and P5+1 (Russia, China, the US, Britain, France and Germany), Shamkhani said, "We will make the proportionate decision about any move that is a breach of the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action and reaches the implementation stage."
On December 31, 2015, a few days after the US Treasury Department unveiled plans for imposing fresh sanctions on Iran due to the testing of Emad missile, President Hassan Rouhani ordered the Defense Ministry to continue production of missiles needed by the armed forces "more quickly and seriously."


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I am pleased to announce that the paper "Pricing Quality Attributes of Internet Domain Names: A Hedonic Model for Words" has been accepted for the 2014 Americas Conference on Information Systems. It is joint work with Prof. Claudia Loebbecke from Cologne University.
The study develops a hedonic pricing model for domain names. The core findings are:
- Domain prices depend on quality attributes and can be partially predicted based on factors like TLD, domain length, number of searches for keywords and many more. The model presented in the paper is far from being useful for practioners trying to value individual domains – it shows, however, that it is possible to build such models.
- Domains that are sold at fixed prices are, on average, of lower quality than domains that are sold in negotiated deals. Sellers concentrate their attention on the high value targets. The study does not make any claims on which sales form provides better results for sellers.
- It is difficult to predict which domains will be developed into full websites after a sale. Still, domains that are developed sell for higher prices than those that are not used or parked after the sale.
- The price premium for domains that are later developed has the same magnitude for fixed price and negotiated deals. We find no evidence of sellers being able to discriminate between domain investors and domain end users.
The full paper can be downloaded here: Hedonic Prices For Words


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Sports » Latest News
Posted: Nov 07, 2019 12:13 PMUpdated: Nov 07, 2019 1:15 PM
Wesleyan Christian Seniors Sendoff on Friday
If you are not in the playoffs - Friday will be the final week of high school football – Wesleyan Christian School in in that boat.
The Mustangs (3-5) have been eliminated from playoff contention, and have lost four games in a row heading into a bout with a winless Olive (0-9) for senior night.
It is a large group of seniors that have ushered in a new era of WCS football. Head coach Curt Cloud talks about the bunch playing their final high school football game tomorrow.
Mustangs host Olive at 7:00 on Friday night just off Silver Lake in Bartlesville for Wesleyan Christian's senior night.
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In February 2014, our alumni inside completed their inside trainings. In our 2013- 2014 school year, we conducted three trainings on the constitution. The trainers were SDC alumni: Gay Gorio, Na Ree, Aye Aung and Saw Maung.
35 local villagers attended each of the trainings. The first training was in Pruso; the second was in Demoso (LeeWoo); the final training was in Demoso (Kwaingei). Each project required substantial on the ground planning because of the unpredictable situation inside Karenni State.
Our alumni planned and organised the projects by firstly informing the village heads of their intentions to run trainings. This was important in order to get permission and enable people to attend. The trainings were on the subjects of democracy, government, human rights and the rule of law.
During the trainings, the feedback from participants was that the knowledge was useful. One measure of success has been the requests we have received from people in Pruso for further trainings. There have also been specific requests for support and information about land confiscation issues.


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PHILSSA Holds 28th General Assembly
PHILSSA held its 28th General Assembly last June 21-22, 2018 at the Walter Hogan Building in Ateneo de Manila University in Quezon City that was attended by 45 of its 60 member NGOs.
The two-day event formally opened with the welcome message of PHILSSA Chair, Rosemarie Johnson- Herrera. In her message, she recognized the milestones that the PHILSSA network has achieved in terms of its development goals and its contributions in promoting an inclusive and sustainable urban development for the past 28 years. She mentioned the need for the network members to pause and reflect on the impact of their work in terms of their contribution to nation-building given the challenges of the present political dispensations. She also encouraged everyone to continuously persevere in creating a just, peaceful and nurturing society for the next generations.
The first learning session was a Video Presentation on the Disaster Risk Reduction- Climate Change Adaptation and Land and Housing Projects of PHILSSA and select member NGOs. This session was organized to showcase the projects of the members and to appreciate videos as a medium for project promotion, dissemination and knowledge sharing. The project videos that were shown were the following:
- Integrated and Inclusive Humanitarian Actions for Community and Home-Based Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) of the Marawi Siege (ALTERPLAN with ICES-DEV, PHILSSA)
- Urban Disaster Preparedness, Response, and Resilience ( ALTERPLAN-PHILSSA with 8 other member NGOs)
- Barangay Disaster Risk Sensitive Shelter Planning Project ( ALTERPLAN with KPS, ICES-DEV, A2D, and SAC-Legazpi)
- Community Organizing in Times of Disaster (UPA)
- City Wide Planning (World Bank with FDUP, MDF, ALTERPLAN)
- Institutionalizing Local and National Partnerships to Address Urban Poverty and Homelessness in the Philippines DFID Project (PHILSSA with many member NGOs
- Project Pagbangon (PMPI with SIKAT & TAO-Pilipinas)
This was followed by the Learning Session on Innovative Technologies on Water. Professor Carlos Oppus of the Ateneo Innovation Center (AIC) presented their innovative water technologies that could be used especially in times of disasters such as the Solar Powered Rain Water Catchment, Mobile Water System and Clean Water Kit with DIY PVC Pump. Mr. Rommel Laxamana, President of the Del Rosario Compound Homeowner's Neighborhood Association, Inc. (DRCNAI) shared about the experience and learnings of their association in managing the Solar Powered Rainwater Catchment that was designed by the AIC. According to him, the rainwater catchment will be very helpful to their community as a source of clean drinking water during floods and a source of livelihood for their association. DRCNAI is a partner community of the Foundation for the Development of the Urban Poor in Valenzuela City. The last presenter for the session was Ms. Cecile Alcantara of Coca-Cola Foundation. She shared about their Hydraulic Ram Pump Projects that were implemented in far-flung areas of the country that do not have access to water.
The last topic for the first day was the Sharing on the Learnings from the World Urban Forum (WUF9) that was held last February 2018. Arch. Sarah Redoblado of ALTERPLAN shared that WUF9 was relevant as it was the key platform to gather inputs on the implementation of the New Urban Agenda. She also emphasized the gains for NGOS of setting up a booth in the WUF. Mr. Jojo Carandang from the Social Housing and Finance Corporation (SHFC) talked about the government's perspective on the WUF. He said that the government can't do it all. It needs the help of every sector to achieve the new urban agenda through participatory governance. Mr. Cipriano Fampulme of Aksyon sa Kahandaan sa Kalamidad at Klima (AKKMA), representing the peoples' organizations to the WUF shared that one of his learnings is the importance of collecting data about the urban poor communities that they can use especially in times of disasters.
The second day of the General Assembly was allocated for another learning session and the business meeting. The learning session was about NGO Sustainability. The first resource speaker was Ms. Joji Abot-Camelon of the Association of Foundations. She discussed the Study on Leadership Transition in the Philippine NGO Sector. Results of the study revealed that there are some doubts about the ability of the NGO sector to continue attracting sufficient quality and quantity of Executive Directors in the future. She emphasized that NGOs need to exert efforts now if they want to be strategic and proactive in dealing with leadership transition challenges. Ms. Gigi Arroyo, the next speaker talked about the type of resources, sources of funding and financial challenges of NGOs. Lastly, Ms. Roselle Rasay, Executive Director of CODE-NGO shared about the network's sustainability plans and initiatives.
The business meeting in the afternoon provided an opportunity to discuss network matters. The Chairperson and Treasurer's Reports were presented and approved by the body as well as the Board resolutions of 2017. Ms. Ivy Panganiban of CODE-NGO also presented the results of the Impact Assessment of the member networks including PHILSSA that was conducted by Meraki Consulting. PHILSSA scored high in terms of the evaluation framework used such as relevance, effectiveness, efficiency, and sustainability. Scoring high means that there is a stable presence of criteria despite internal changes in the organization and challenges from the external environment. Regional caucuses were also part of the business meeting to discuss resolutions that will be proposed to the GA. Among the resolutions approved are as follows:
- PHILSSA members to participate in the consultations about the Manila Bay Sustainable Development Plan.
- PHILSSA as a network must not enter into a partnership with the junk food industry.
- PHILSSA to issue a statement in support of Mr. Boy Olarte and KPS.
- PHILSSA Board to take up the policy on the Secretariat's engagement with AKKMA.
- PHILSSA Regional Clusters to conduct reflection sessions on the current national situation.
- PHILSSA to provide support to strengthen and share innovative socio-economic projects that will promote the sustainability of its members.
- PHILSSA to assist CMP mobilizers to be provided with copies of the Social Housing and Finance Corporation's (SHFC) Grassroots Special Action Team (GSAT) scope and limitations.
- PHILSSA Secretariat to circulate the guidelines for the Quick Response Fund.
The General Assembly concluded with the awarding of outstanding members and election of new set of Board Members.
This article is also published in the CODE-NGO Website
( http://code-ngo.org/2018/07/philssa-holds-28th-general-assembly/)


text:
Exam: Information Systems Security Architecture Professional
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text:
Why make a Menu? One very good reason is when you have so many binds and scripts for all your tweaks, movie making, and whatever else, you just run out of keyboard keys! Another is some people prefer a graphical button and a mouse click…to each his own.
I was making a menu for my favorite DoD bot program ShrikeBot one day and came across something that may make the laborious… and sometimes confusing task of making a Half Life menu…easy. Well easier anyway.
More on that latter, if you are totally new to making a menu, please take the time to read just a little more before looking at the "Menu Making with Anselm Fohrs editor" page.
If you know a fair bit about Half Life menus or even scripting already go there now by pressing next at the bottom.
This information will also work on other Steam Half-Life Mods, I have not tried others myself just yet.
It's not difficult to make a menu. Anyone who knows how to make a script will have little trouble. But I noticed when I was learning there is not much info for users who are new to messing around with config files and such.
So, armed with what I found out along the way a while back, I thought putting it down somewhere may help someone… here goes.
The standard DoD menu is controlled by a small file called a "commandmenu.txt". Like the contents in a userconfig.cfg file it has to conform to a certain layout to function correctly. Get one bit wrong and it breaks. Don't let this worry you, faults are not that hard to fix.
The first thing that you will notice is that you will not have a commandmenu.txt in your dod folder. Steam holds this file locked up in its .gcf file (Game Cache File). This is actually a good idea, if you "break" your command menu when making it, just move out or delete the one in the dod folder and Steam will replace it with a standard one.
When you place a file called commandmenu.txt in your dod folder, that file will be used instead of the one in the C:\Program Files\Steam\SteamApps\day of defeat.gcf.
Steam also works this way when handling custom files like sprites and sounds, the custom content you place in the dod folder overrides the standard file... until it is removed.
There are many good guides already on how to assemble a command menu and mostly they will suit all. I will show you the long "traditional" way…then a shorter, clearer, less complicated way. There is a reason for this, it will help fault finding latter.
The Short way I speak of involves using a purpose built Commandmenu-Editor made by Anselm Föhr. It will display the layout a lot clearer and looks a lot like the left pane in Windows Explorer… a directory tree view we are all familiar with…
More on the use of that program latter, to continue....
The above layout in Notepad looks like this... (Any text in italics is for description only)
"1" "First column Button #1"
"1" "Second column Button"
"1" "Third column Button #1"
"1" "Fourth column Button #1" "Fourth Button command #1"
"2" "Fourth column Button #2" "Fourth Button command #2"
"2" "Third column Button #2"
"1" "Fourth column Button #1" "Fourth Button command #1"
"2" "Fourth column Button #2" "Fourth Button command #2"
"2" "First column Button #2"
(This is the start of the standard menu, "Help" is usually "1" change these numbers as you add more)
If you are looking at all that text in the example and saying "it's a mess", I quite agree.
That's why Anselm Föhrs editor is needed, it takes away the need to learn how to place all the "{" that arrange where all the buttons sit inside a particular column.
It is more like adding new folders/sub folders of a directory tree inside Windows Explorer.
The buttons act like the folders in the editor... complete with a plus and minus action on every button that expands out to others.
The program does have its limits like coping and pasting more than one line ...or looking at it graphically... "button".
This will still have to be done one by one in the editor or copy/paste as a group in Notepad, an inexperienced user may find building their menu in Notepad a little difficult, far better to start in the editor.
The example I made above is just a dummy menu, it sits on top of the standard DoD menu and ends up looking like this on your screen...
If you make a mistake the menu will "break". It will still work, but parts of it will be misplaced or jumbled up!
When this happens you need to find the place where things started to go wrong, check you have not made an error.
The following is just for an example so you can spot the mistake...
"1" "Fourth column Button #1" "Fourth Button command #1"
The above format will work, all the spaces and " are in the right place, lets make a mistake...
"1" "Fourth column Button #1 "Fourth Button command #1"
There is a " missing after... "1" "Fourth column Button #1 <----- " missing!
Look what happens now....
It got messed up because I didn't put a " in the right place. But notice how the menu shows you where you went wrong. At least you can narrow down the area or line the mistake occurs.
Don't give up just yet because it looks too complicated, it's all in the learning process, if you build something you better know how to fix it first.
The next section is about building the Menu, it is actually easier than the pages you have completed.
Press Next... Menu Making with Anselm Fohrs Commandmenu Editor
{mospagebreak title=Menu Making with Anselm Fohrs editor&heading=Menu Making with Anselm Fohrs editor}
Start by downloading Anselm Fohrs Commandmenu-Editor. I have made a package for all you will need next, download here.
Next you will want a standard DoD menu, a commandmenu.txt, one is included in my download of the editor. If you want to see where your "locked up" commandmenu.txt is on your drive, you will need a special program to extract it from the...
C:\Program Files\Steam\SteamApps\day of defeat.gcf.
The program is called GCFScape. You don't need to do this. I just put this info here if you are the curious type.
Run the editor.
It will be a good time to read the help section "?" for familiarizing yourself with the basic functions now. Open the dod standard commandmenu.txt file in the "dod standard command text" of the download…
As you can see, it is the same layout as you will see on your game screen. Now lets say you want to add a section for adjusting your graphics quickly while in-game. You may also want to have other sections like audio controls.
This is where you have to plan a bit, you could make another button on top of "HELP" called "Graphics" then another below or inserted (the editor has a "Insert" button too), called "Audio". This is where planning comes in to it. You may want to group them under a button called "Controls". It's up to you… and how much screen area you use up!
Click on the word "HELP" once. Click on the "Insert" icon…
The new button is made!
Now you want to give it a name and decide if you are going to branch more buttons off this one or it just finishes here by inserting a command after the name.
In this case we will name this "Audio" and we want to put in a command that stops all ambient sounds while in-game the next button will be called "Quiet Mode" the command when the button is pressed is called "stopsound".
Naming a button is easy the format looks like this…
"1" "Audio"
(1 = this is the first button in the column, Audio = the name of the button).
What you have just made is a button that, when your mouse hovers over it another column will "pop up", let's make that next column button now…
Click on the word "Audio" once.
Click on the "New Subnode" icon….
Type this in the new button… "1" "Quiet Mode" "stopsound"
That format is now a button ("1" "Quiet Mode") added to that is a command ("stopsound"), when you click on this button in the game the ambient sounds will stop!
You now have your new buttons and a command off one of them. You have to do a little tidying up now, the number before "HELP" is not #1 anymore in that first column it is #2. Same goes for all the buttons below that, edit those now…
Click on the word "HELP" once.
Right Click behind the "1" before the word "HELP", press backspace key and change it to a "2".
Repeat this for all the ones that branch off that first column as well. Now it will look like this…
You're done with editing for now, time to save it… Don't press the save icon just yet! You don't want to overwrite the standard menu it comes in handy latter, still call it "commandmenu.txt" but save it to another folder and give that folder another name, I have made an empty folder in the download called "MY Command Menus" that will do for now.
Select "File" "Save as" drop down the "Save in" address box find the "MY Command Menus" folder and name it "commandmenu.txt" select save. The menu is ready for a test, all you have to do now is put it in the dod folder.
Some Steam installs are in…
C:\Valve\Steam\SteamApps\your-email-address\day of defeat\dod
Some are in…
C:\Program Files\Steam\SteamApps\ your-email-address \day of defeat\dod
The important thing is, it's the "dod" folder you want. The one with your config.cfg files the same place your screenshots go, demo files, sprites, models and such. After it is in, run the game and try it. It will look like this…
If you have done everything correctly, you now have the basics over with and you can move onto more complicated arrangements to suit yourself… use your imagination.
Press Next… Advanced Menus Information
{mospagebreak title=Advanced Menus Information&heading=Advanced Menus Information}
Advanced Menus Information
You must be neat!
Naming a button and adding commands to it must follow a set format or you're in trouble....
The above section in my menu are a "High and Low quality graphics" buttons set using seven commands to select, low quality and then, turn them back again by altering the variable in each command.
If you get one thing wrong there it will not work, well part of it will break anyway. Every space and " is important if you want it to work...be neat!
There are limits to the amount of items in a menu.
- Maximum of 40 menus.
- Maximum of 100 buttons per menu.
That's more than enough, the other limits are governed by...
How wide you make your buttons...
The width is set by how long the word is when you name your new button, the longer the name, the bigger the button. Name it carefully.
How big your screen is...
If you are going to share your menus and you have a 21 inch screen, it will look OK on yours but give it to a friend with a 17 inch screen and the buttons may start to "return" on top of each other. If you are planning to make one for others keep this in mind and test it first on a smaller screen.
The basic lay out...
Some buttons can have about 10 buttons coming off them in a new column, then expanding out again to another column, those buttons that have more coming off them need height... or they will disappear off the bottom of your screen!
Let your imagination run wild, a menu is a personal thing, making your own to suit your needs can be rewarding and save you a lot of time while playing online instead of typing commands in the console. DoD is for fun not frustration.


text:
North Northumberland Coast Neighbourhood Development Plan for the North Northumberland Coastal Area neighbourhood area
1. A Referendum will be held on THURSDAY 24 May 2018 to decide on the question below:
"Do you want Northumberland County Council to use the neighbourhood plan for the North Northumberland Coastal Area to help it decide planning applications in the neighbourhood area?"
2. Poll cards will be sent out to all residents of the Parishes of Bamburgh, Beadnell and North Sunderland who currently feature upon Northumberland County Council's Electoral Register. Residents who are currently registered to vote by post will be sent a postal vote pack.
3. Any residents of Bamburgh, Beadnell or North Sunderland who are unsure as to whether they are registered or not or wish to register to vote or to vote by post or proxy should contact Electoral Services, Northumberland County Council, County Hall, Morpeth, Northumberland, NE61 2EF or ring on 01670 624811 based on the deadlines set out below:
|Deadline for Receipt
|New Applications to register to Vote
|Tuesday 8th May
|New applications to vote by post or to cancel
or amend an existing postal/proxy vote
|5pm on Wednesday 9 May 2018
|New applications to vote by proxy
|5pm Wednesday 16 May 2018
|Applications for an emergency proxy vote on
the grounds of physical incapacity or
work/service reasons - The physical
incapacity must have occurred after 5pm on
Wednesday 16 May 2018. To apply on the
grounds of work/service, the person must
have become aware that they cannot go to
the polling station in person after 5pm on
Wednesday 16 May 2018.
|5pm Thursday 24 May 2018
Geoff Paul
Counting Officer
18 April 2018
Published and printed by the Elections Office, Northumberland County Council, Morpeth Northumberland, NE61 2EF


text: PORT-OF-SPAIN, Trinidad (CMC): Dashing left-hander Evin Lewis stroked an entertaining unbeaten half-century to set up an interesting finish, but rain proved the spoiler, forcing a tie under Duckworth/Lewis in the day/night one-day game between the WICB President's XI and South Africa on Sunday night. Man of the Match Hashim Amla stroked 92 to propel the tourists up to 280 for nine, after they won the toss and opted to bat first at Queen's Park Oval. But opener Lewis answered with an authoritative 71 off 61 deliveries and the President's XI were 127 for three at the start of the 25th over when the rains arrived to end the contest prematurely, with both teams level on Duckworth/Lewis. The game is the only warm-up one for the Proteas before the start of the Tri-Nations Series in Guyana on Friday, and several players grabbed the opportunity to spend time in the middle. Kyle Abbott chimed in with 43 from 38 balls, Farhaan Behardien scored 36, Aaron Phangiso hit 34 not out, while Chris Morris got 31. Opener Rilee Roussouw (0) and captain JP Duminy (6) were not among these as both fell cheaply to leave South Africa on 20 for two in the sixth over. The right-handed Amla revived the innings in a 106-run, third-wicket stand with Behardien, striking 10 fours and a six in an 83-ball knock. He was eventually lbw to leg-spinner Damion Jacobs in the 29th over, during a period when South Africa lost three wickets for 25 runs to slip to 151 for five in the 31st over. Morris then added 47 for the sixth wicket with Trinidadian Stephen Katwaroo (21), who turned out for the Proteas before Abbott and Phangiso put on 69 for the eighth wicket. In reply, the President's XI lost captain Kraigg Brathwaite (9) and Test teammate Jermaine Blackwood (7) cheaply, before Lewis and Shimron Hetmyer combined in an exciting 90-run partnership for the third wicket. Lewis hammered six fours and four sixes while Hetmyer, the successful Under-19 West Indies captain, stroked 29 from 45 balls with four fours. With the rain on the way, Hetmyer was bowled by leg-spinner Imran Tahir in the 24th over. The Tri-Nations Series, which also involves Australia, runs from June 3-26 in Guyana, St Kitts and Barbados.


text:
Severe criticism of the "deplorable" broadband coverage suffered by rural areas such as Cumbria has brought further calls for action.
Almost 30,000 homes in the county are currently without adequate broadband connections.
Now Lord Adonis, head of the National Infrastructure Commission, has criticised the state of the UK's mobile and broadband services, demanding that telecom regulator Ofcom to take urgent steps.
It follows a report that one million homes have poor broadband and large parts of the UK have no 4G coverage.
Jonathan Harris is aiming to deliver superfast broadband to 93 per cent of residents and businesses in the county by September next year through Connecting Cumbria, a partnership between Cumbria County Council and BT.
Despite a government target to have a national average of 95 per cent homes and businesses on superfast broadband coverage by the end of the year, the figure in Cumbria is just 88.5 per cent.
Superfast broadband counts as any connection above 24 mbps, which is fast enough to facilitate services such as Netflix.
Mr Harris, senior programme manager with Connecting Cumbria, said: "There is nothing new in what Lord Adonis is saying. We all know the situation.
"My worry is that central government ticks boxes with these targets. We in Cumbria have a long way to go to meet these."
As part of his role Mr Harris lobbies government for the money to bring Cumbria's broadband up to standard and has acknowledged the difficulties caused by the terrain and low density of properties.
"It is good that there is awareness of the problem in rural parts of the UK but whether it is backed up by funding at national level remains to be seen," he added.
Connecting Cumbria has already overcome major engineering challenges to service remote communities. The most recent was at Howtown on Ullswater which is more than a mile from the nearest telephone exchange.
With community help, engineers from Openreach were able to lift a series of specially built telegraph poles up a hill to connect fibre optic cable to 15 homes and businesses including the Howtown Hotel and Ullswater Steamers.
Chris Conder, founder member of B4RN and volunteer, a community benefit broadband provider, said: "Lord Adonis is quite right, the UK infrastructure has not been upgraded for decades and Openreach is a virtual monopoly leaching the assets of a Victorian phone network instead of investing in bringing it up to date.
"Using old phone lines and branding them as fibre fools many people, but it doesn't fool those living and working in the countryside or on long lines or exchange only lines in cities.
"We are falling behind third world countries who are storming ahead laying real fibre."
Lord Adonis said Ofcom and the Government needed to "put all options on the table" to tackle coverage black spots which left four out of five rural homes without any 4G service indoors. These should include possible legal and regulatory changes.
"In an age when access to a mobile signal is regarded as a must-have, it is deplorable that even in areas previously considered to have strong coverage, operators are still delivering such poor services that customers can struggle to make a quick phone call," he said.
"It demonstrates the need for urgent and radical action to tackle this issue immediately, ahead of new mobile spectrum being auctioned and 5G technology being rolled out."
The former Labour transport secretary said significantly higher signal strengths were required to improve customer service and mobile phone companies should share masts where appropriate.
Matt Hancock, minister for digital, said there was a "clear need" for rapid improvements to mobile coverage.
"We've recently removed outdated restrictions, giving mobile operators more freedom to improve their networks including hard-to-reach rural areas," he said.
"But industry needs to play its part too through continued investment and improvement in their networks, making sure that customers are not paying for services they don't receive."
Ofcom said it agreed that mobile coverage should urgently improve and it was setting new rules for operators' licences.
Dave Millett, an independent telecoms expert, said: "Given the statement by Lord Adonis, will the Government now revisit the 2014 deal agreed with the network operators to improve coverage?
"Under the agreement all four of the mobile networks collectively agreed, amongst other things, to guarantee voice and text coverage from each operator across 90 percent of the UK geographic area by 2017, halving the areas currently blighted by patchy coverage as a result of partial 'not-spots'.
"The networks have obviously failed to deliver their side of the bargain – so will the Government now enforce free roaming within the UK at no cost to users?
In its Connected Nations 2017 report, Ofcom found around one million homes and offices unable to get enough broadband to meet their needs.
About 230,000 small and medium sized enterprises were hampered by slow internet connections with the situation worse in rural areas where 17 per cent of homes had slow connections compared with just two per cent in urban areas.
But Ofcom said coverage was improving, with the number of homes unable to get good broadband falling from 1.6 million premises last year.


text:
Futureproof: Best Practice Installation for Rooflights - Bristol
About the session
The Green Register in association with VELUX is providing this training session outlining the basic principles of rooflight installation in retrofit projects as part of our Futureproof training programme, designed especially for builders wishing to understand the key aspects of sustainable building practices.
We will be offering a best practice demonstration with focus around robust detailing and the replacement of an existing VELUX Rooflight, alongside a presentation to support providing the correct solution to the client. The speakers will also illustrate how to identify the correct replacement product and any possible alternative upgrade where appropriate.
Lucy Pedler, director of The Green Register will also be explaining how to upgrade windows (and rooflights) in older, more traditional buildings to improve energy efficiency without significantly altering the appearance of the building.
This is hands-on training for attendees so please bring appropriate PPE (safety footwear) as this really helps to reinforce the learning.
Velux will also give a brief overview of the VELUX company and their social commitment to better internal living environments. They will also discuss the support services available from VELUX for installers and specifiers within the industry.
About the Trainers
Adrian Baylis has wored for VELUX for over 15 years as a Service Technician providing product support and information across the Southwest. Adrian is also involved in the VELUX Certified installer project team and provides College Training, Site Toolboxes and Best Practice Audits.
Phil Smith has been with VELUX for over 13 years in the sales and specification side of the business working with Architects Contractors and Merchants. He has also been involved in the Commercial Modular Glazing business for 2 years providing support to major contractors on larger commercial projects.
If you are a builder / contractor and are interested in the Futureproof initiative please get in touch for more information: firstname.lastname@example.com
More details of Futureproof at: www.futureproof.uk.net
Group Head Office, Olympus House
Britannia Road Patchway
Bristol, BS34 5TA
United Kingdom
|£ 19.00
|£ 35.00


text:
This week brought the opportunity to hang out with with a longtime friend over a couple of beers and then enjoy a ZZ Ward concert at Portland's Revolution Hall. My buddy Bob Ehlers and I were among a sold-out crowd of 850 who enjoyed a 90-minute set by Ward, described on her website as a "Fedora-rocking, guitar-shredding, harmonica-wielding blues siren."
Yeah, a little overstated, but there's definitely some talent there. ZZ plays guitar and keyboards and a damn-good harmonica. She also sings (duh) and writes her own lyrics.
If you don't know her, ZZ is Zsuzsanna Ward, a Pennsylvania native who grew up in Roseburg, an Oregon timber town, and is now based in Los Angeles. Thursday's show was part of a national tour to support her just-released second full-length CD called "The Storm." Already, the CD has risen to No. 1 on the Billboard Blues Albums chart.
ZZ played more than 20 songs, delivering a high-energy performance that had dozens of young people in front of the stage dancing and jumping up like human pogo sticks. She attracted an all-ages crowd, so Bob and I fit in just fine.
ZZ is billed primarily as a blues artist, but her music incorporates hip-hop and, in my mind, makes it really hard to slot her into a single genre.
I'd heard a few songs of hers on Pandora and was intrigued enough to check her out in a live show. ZZ is nowhere near the level of Susan Tedeschi, an accomplished blues guitarist and vocalist, but she's got potential and I definitely felt I got my money's worth.
Check her out and see if you agree:
Before the show, Bob and I spent a couple hours at a rooftop bar, enjoying the great view on a perfect summer evening. The concert venue is actually a refurbished high school auditorium housed in the former Washington High School in Southeast Portland's Buckman neighborhood.
There's a ground-level brewpub, plus another bar on the second floor, the auditorium on the second and third floors, commercial offices and community meeting rooms scattered throughout the four-story building, and lots of room on the roof to have a drink.
Just as the McMenamin Brothers have turned other schools and absolute buildings into thriving restaurants and brewpubs, so too did a private developer convert this tired old building into something imaginative and vibrant.
The grounds also feature an old athletic field that now serves as a dog park. In fact, this is where my little dog and I were attacked by a couple of unleashed big dogs during a visit here late last year.
On Thursday, a couple of dogs were there with their owners. Seeing them romping around on the grass made me feel a little sad, wishing I could bring Charlotte back for a visit.
On the other hand, I left feeling good about introducing my friend to a new venue and a new artist. Good food, good beer, good conversation, good music. Hard to beat.
Photograph of ZZ Ward by Bob Ehlers.