Who said it....

Interesting quote regarding VP....

(from http://www.salon.com/opinion/conason/2008/08/30/palin/)

Looking back on the [Geraldine] Ferraro nomination [in 1984], another well-known conservative wrote: "I believe that someday we are going to have a woman president, possibly during my life, and I've often thought the best way to pave the way for this was to first nominate and elect a woman as vice-president. But I think Mondale made a serious mistake when he picked Geraldine Ferraro as his running mate. In my view, he guessed wrong in deciding to take a congresswoman that almost nobody had ever heard of and try to put her in line for the presidency ... I don't know who among the Democrats might have been a better choice, but it was obvious Mondale picked Geraldine Ferraro simply because he believed there was a 'gender gap' where I was concerned and she was a woman."

Those are the words of Ronald Reagan in his 1991 memoir, "An American Life," pouring scorn on the nomination of a woman who had served six years in Congress working on foreign policy issues. In retrospect, he had a point. Only this Palin gambit could make the Ferraro mistake look responsible and wise.

Our Next VP.

yikes....

On the edge of... seventeen

From http://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/index.php/shoppach-showing-off/

Quick, name the catcher with the most home runs in the American League.

No, not him. Not him either. Give up?

Try Kelly Shoppach. Yea, I know, Kelly Shoppach. Last night he hit his 17th home run of the season, and if the Indians were looking for excuses for why their season hasn’t gone as expected, they can’t blame the injury to Victor Martinez, as Shoppach is filling his shoes quite nicely.

His home run last night was his 38th extra base hit, using his power to compensate for his strikeout rate that drives down his batting average. Shoppach actually has more XBH than singles (36), and his ISO of .250 puts him in the company of the more famous slugging backstops such as Brian McCann and Geovany Soto.

At 28, Shoppach is something of a late bloomer, but the ability to drive the ball makes up for the rest of his flaws. His command of the strike zone is pretty miserable (he makes contact like Jack Cust and walks like Robinson Cano), but when he makes contact, he makes it count - his batting average on contact is .399.

So, what do the Indians do next year when Martinez returns? It’s pretty clear that Shoppach is good enough to play regularly, but neither he nor Martinez would be nearly as valuable playing first base as they are behind the plate. The Indians might be best off shopping one of the two this winter, because while having two good catchers is a nice problem to have, it’s still a problem.

Former classmate....

From the front page of the Columbus Dispatch sports section....

Ohio State fencer, sister caught in fighting in Georgia

Mikhail Momtselidze flew to the Republic of Georgia last month to visit his roots, to see the mountains and lakes of his childhood, and to feel the tender touch of an elderly grandmother.

The Ohio State fencer's homecoming took an unexpected and perilous turn, however.

Momtselidze, 24, a Whetstone graduate, and his sister, Sofiya, 17, were trapped in Russian-occupied Georgia, trying to return to the United States, after fighting broke out there earlier this month. Both are U.S citizens.

They spent several days sequestered in their grandmother's house without electricity or water after Russian forces bombed areas surrounding the small village of Agara. Brother and sister, armed with only a cell phone, managed to find safe passage to the capital, Tbilisi, to stay with an uncle and await flights to the United States.

Sofiya flew home yesterday, and Mikhail, a member of the Buckeyes' NCAA champion fencing team, has booked a flight for Friday, his father said. "If all goes well, he will be back home in Columbus by Friday night at 10," Igor said.

http://dispatch.com/live/content/sports/stories/2008/08/28/osu_fencer.ART_ART_08-28-08_C1_PAB5IME.html?sid=101

Ten Club

10 wins a row...

Both Tom Hamilton and Matt Underwood (from TV) made comments about their place in the standings with Hamilton saying "for what it's worth" they are 10.5 games out of first, and Underwood saying, if they can get it down to single digits... you never know. Rick Manning, the other TV guy, said he wasn't going to say anything about it.

With 30 games left, if the Indians were to go, say, 20-10, they would end at 85-77, and that is not really a realistic number to make the playoffs, but if they could be a little better, or pull of a 2007 Rockies like ending where they won 14 of their last 15, than you never know. A rotation of Lee, Carmona, Reyes and Sowers in the playoffs sure would be fun.

17 of the last 30 games are against Seattle, Baltimore, Kansas City and Detroit, while the other 13 are games that actually matter, against the Red Sox, Twins and White Sox. But that brings up another interesting thing, that if the Indians go 6-0 against Chicago, and 3-0 against the Twins, or even 7-2 overall, they would make up some nice ground.

Anyways, one other interesting note from ESPN.com. Former pitcher Rick Sutclife wrote an article about tipping your pitches, and talked about Paul Byrd, and said,"He got a message from one of the visiting clubhouses from a team he wasn't going to play again this season, and they told him that he was tipping them off by fanning his glove wider on his breaking ball."

I found it pretty interesting that another team would go out of their way to help a guy out, but it could have been a former teammate or something, nice non-the-less. Byrd beat the Yankees last night to improve to 6-1 with a 2.61 ERA since the break.

Sizing Up The Competition.

Let's make some picks!

2008 College Football.

Week 1....
Ohio St. 39, YSU 6

ACC - Clemson
Big East - South Florida
Big Ten - Ohio State
Big 12 - Missouri
PAC 10 - Arizona State
SEC - Florida

Most Overrated - USC

Advice for life.