Daily Feature, Second Attempt

Yesterday, in these electronic pages, I suggested that a daily feature might be an appropriate addition to the site. In particular, I noted that, owing to the pretty serious amount of content we’re generating here these days, it might make sense to include a digest of the previous day’s posts.

What follows represents a second attempt at the daily feature. Mostly what’s different is, per Joe Tetreault’s advice, I assigned each of the previous day’s articles to subject headings (which, in some cases, I took liberties in defining).

Moreover, if I’ve done it correctly, these links should bring you directly to the relevant portions of this post:

Yesterday at FanGraphs
Notable Tweets
One Night Only: Weekend Edition

As yesterday, feel free to make suggestions in the comment section, which I’ll read with bated breath.

Yesterday at FanGraphs
File Under: Current Events, Ruminations On
Roger Clemens Indicted; Steroid Era on Trial by Alex Remington

File Under: Draft Coverage, Present Day
2010 Draft Review: AL West by Bryan Smith
2010 Draft Review: NL West by Bryan Smith

File Under: Draft Coverage, Past Day
First Round Compensation (Part One) by R.J. Anderson
First Round Compensation (Part Two) R.J. Anderson

File Under: Player Analysis, Game-Specific
Just Octavio Being Octavio by Jack Moore

File Under: Player Analysis, General
Niese a Nice Find for the Mets by David Golebiewski

File Under: Transaction Analysis, Ad Hoc
Brad Hawpe Hits Free Agency a Few Weeks Early by Joe Pawlikowski

File Under: Transaction Analysis, Ex Post Facto
Free Agent Signings That Worked by Dave Cameron

Notable Tweets
From AnswerDave Syzyn Wyldmyn: “I’m in Rawjah Clemens’ jury box.”

From KenTremendous: Seems like Roger Clemens is in the twilight of his “not-in-jail” career. http://es.pn/boRvZT

One Night Only: Friday, August 19th
WAS (Jason Marquis, N/A) at PHI (Roy Halladay, 10) | 7:05pm ET
• Given his druthers, our Full-Time Employee would start a franchise with Ryan Zimmerman. Consecutive 6+ WAR seasons is a pretty good reason why.
• Given my druthers, I’d start a franchise with Chase Utley. The cut of his jib is an even better reason why.
• If I had my druthers: My jib would be cut a lot like Chase Utley’s.

SD (Wade LeBlanc, 4) at MIL (Yovani Gallardo, 8) | 8:10pm ET
• Q. Hey, Marc Frigging Normandin — the sort of joy the Padres are bringing you these days, what’s it like?
• A. Like a baby tiger and a baby panda holding hands together in a meadow full of flowers — and both of them hate the Dodgers.
• Yes, Marc Normandin emailed me those words. No, he’s not a 14-year-old Japanese girl. (Or, at least, to the best of my knowledge he’s not.)

One Night Only: Saturday, August 20th
TEX (Cliff Lee, 10) at BAL (Brad Bergesen, 4) | 4:10pm ET
• Oriole coach Buck Showalter versus comedian Michael Showalter — who would win???
• Left-hander Cliff Lee versus General Robert E. Lee — who would win???
• “Probably Cliff Lee” is the answer — to both questions.

NYM (Jonathon Niese, 7) at PIT (James McDonald, 10) | 7:05pm ET
• James McDonald will very probably not maintain the 10.19 K/9 and 2.66 xFIP that he’s posted through his first three Pirate starts. But the possibility of something like a front-line starter — make that a young front-line starter — on a Pittsburgh team populated almost exclusively by tiny babies is excellent.
• If I had my druthers: GM Neal Huntington would actually sign tiny babies to play for the Pittsburgh Pirates.

One Night Only: Sunday, August 21st
ATL (Mike Minor, N/A) at CHC (Randy Wells, 6) | 2:20pm ET
• Carson Cistulli isn’t qualified to tell you about Mike Minor. Luckily, Bryan Smith is — and he wrote this whole post about Minor’s major league debut, etc.
• If you’re too lazy to read that article, something you should know is this: Mike Minor went seventh overall in the 2009 draft.
• Another thing is this: the pick was soundly criticized at the time, on account of Minor’s lack of velo, which generally settled in the upper-80s at Vanderbilt.
• In 33.1 Triple-A innings this year, Minor posted 37 K against only 12 BB.
• He’s currently throwing somewhere in the low-90s — and just generally bringing the pain.

LAA (Jered Weaver, 8) at MIN (Scott Baker, 8) | 8:10pm ET
• Baker’s strange: his 9.5% swinging-strike rate is above average for a starting pitcher, but none of his particular offerings (fastball, slider, curve, change) are really particularly whifftastic. Per Texas Leaguers, his slider is best, with a 15.7% swinging-strike rate. League average is 13.6%.
• “Peter Bourjos is a great fielder”: this is what I used ca. 1000 words to say the other day.
• There’s a strong chance Jim Thome will never, ever, never, ever get bad at hitting. Here’re his nerd numbers at the moment: .269/.389/.585, .412 wOBA, 162 wRC+, 2.2 WAR. That’s a guy who signed for $1.5 million.