Fight Night In The Bronx

In the history of Major League Baseball, there have been only three men with the surname "Foreman" to play the game. None of them played for the Yankees, but Frank Foreman pitched for the Baltimore Orioles in 1901 and 1902. Following the '02 season, the Baltimore franchise relocated to New York, renamed the Highlanders, and a decade later, the Yankees.

There has been but one "Cotto" to play in the Major Leagues, Henry Cotto, pictured to the right. Cotto was born in the Bronx in 1961, but his family returned to their native Puerto Rico when Henry was just three months old. After breaking into the Majors with the Cubs in 1984, Cotto was traded to the Yankees. He spent the next three years shuttling between New York and Columbus, never really distinguishing himself.

After the 1987 season, Cotto was packaged with the highly unpopular Steve Trout and shipped to Seattle in exchange for Lee Guetterman, Clay Parker, and Wade Taylor. Cotto carved out a job for himself in Seattle as a reserve outfielder, base stealing specialist, and Junior Griffey's back up in center field. After washing out with the expansion Marlins in '93, Cotto surface as a replacement player during the '94-'95 strike, has been a coach in the Mariners' system since '96, and was the inspiration for the humorous Henry Cotto's Mustache.

Tomorrow night at Yankee Stadium another Foreman and another Cotto will be on the field. But despite the gloves on their hands, they won't be baseball players. Yuri Foreman and Miguel Cotto will take part in the first night of boxing at Yankee Stadium since September 28, 1976, when Muhammad Ali and Ken Norton had their third and final bout, one of the more controversial in history.

Despite the sweet science's long absence from River Ave, boxing has a rich and storied history at Yankee Stadia, with Gene Tunney, Jack Dempsey, Joe Louis, Rocky Marciano, Jake LaMotta, Sugar Ray Robinson, Floyd Patterson, and others joining Ali and Norton as some of the greats to have stepped in the ring in the House that Ruth Built.

I'm not crazy about the idea of turning Yankee Stadium into a multiuse facility, but with this fight, Army football, and the Pinstripe Bowl, it's clearly the direction in which the organization is leaning. But for tomorrow night at least, it'll be nice to see Yankee Stadium explore a different part of it's illustrious past.

For more on boxing's past at the Stadium, check out these links.

Monday Afternoon Linkdown

Why is it that no one ever bothers to think about the other side of the foam finger transaction?

Ross from NYYSI reconsiders some of the previous recommendations he made for standing room only and cafe seating tickets at Yankee Stadium.

I know the demolition of the Old Stadium is going on, but every time I see a new picture of it like this one over at Baseball Think Factory it's still hard to believe how little of it is left.

Quite relevant to these linkarounds, Dave Allen at Baseball Analysts put together a diagram displaying how the top 200 baseball blogs (according to Ball Hype) are related. We are mentioned in the post because of all the links we give out - one of just a few blogs that do a comprehensive round up of other sources. Here is the visual with all of the blogs named (we are "FY"). Allen plans to explore the interrelation of baseball blogs further and I'm looking forward to him continuing the series.

First Ozzie Guillen pulled the cheapshot move of making Javier Vazquez change his glove because it had three colors on it and then he complained about Nick Swisher pumping his first after he hit the go-ahead home run on Saturday (h/t BBTF). For good measure, Guillen also said that Swisher was a "horseshit player" for him in Chicago. In a related story, Ozzie Guillen is a petty bitch.

Did the '09 Yankees have an inflate fly ball rate because they were swinging for the fences at the New Stadium? Pat Andriola from THT revisits one of his old posts with some new data.

Tommy Rancel from Bloomberg Sports takes a look at what's wrong with Javy Vazquez. Frankie Pilere's opinon: probably something mechanical.

Tim Marchman thinks the same thing is causing Jake Peavy's struggles.

Why is Alfredo Aceves owned in 37% of Yahoo fantasy leagues but only 5% on CBS and 2% at ESPN?

What is it with old columnists starting an article with a one sentence sentence? In this case, it's a really, really bad one to begin with.

Who wants to tell Rob Parker that Austin Jackson is going to come crashing back to earth really soon so he probably shouldn't be gloating about the Curtis Granderson trade just yet.

Drunk Jays Fans uncovered video of people doing the wave at Wrigley Field. Is nothing sacred anymore?

Red Sox fans think their team has a better chance of winning the AL East than the Yankees (via Jonah). Alternate title: why text polls during baseball games are still terrible.

Ken Rosenthal wears little boy pants. Literally.

At Big League Stew, Dave Brown uses a dubious assumption to demonstrate the problems with a flawed statistic.

This seems like a pretty sweet option, but for $3000 you could buy you own pool table and have it for the rest of your life.

I'm not sure if he knows it, but Morgan Ensberg just FJM'd Tracy Ringolsby.

Andy from the Baseball-Reference blog reviewed the MLB At Bat iPhone app and comes out a little lukewarm on it. I don't have it, I just use the one from FanGraphs.

Tom Tango wonders how good scouts really are. Not baseball ones, the people who review and rate products for Consumer Reports.

Dan McQuade at Walkoff Walk lampoons the pointless "Keys to the Game" segment that seemingly every network does. I'm with you, Dan.

Spencer Hall did the Kentucky Derby and came back with some great pictures.

This probably came one leg of the Triple Crown too early considering the Preakness takes place in Baltimore, but Deadspin captured a fantastic phenomenon on Twitter: #WireDerbyHorseNames. My favorites from the ones that Deadspin mined out: Proposition Joe, Where's Wallace? Money Be Green, Much Obliged, 40 Degree Day, PAN-demic and Tweedy Impertinence.

I could probably spend on day on this, so here are a few of my suggestions:

Preach On Walon, Stringer's Bells, Brianna's Burden, Miss Anna, Yvette's Brisket, Wassup Latrice?, And I'm Not Even Greek, Cutty's Jim, The Western District Way, Come At The King, Butchie's Bar, Leakin' Park, No Lake No Trout, Girls In The Can, Mr. Lyon, Entrapping Bodie, McNulty's Lumina, The Boy Marlow, Trifilin' Bird, Ain't Gotta Dream No More, Goodnight Hoppers...

If I ever own a horse, I'm coming back to this post to name it.

Back in a while with the preview.

A Tier-fall Friday Afternoon Linkaround

These links are dedicated to the memory of the 2009-10 Syracuse Orange basketball team. Their epitaph will certainly mention the 18 turnovers they committed last night.

To their credit, River Ave. Blues is having a "No Joba, No Hughes" day.

Still need your fix? Dave Allen at FanGraphs thinks putting Joba in AAA is the right move.

Around the 17:00 mark on this podcast, Don LaGreca from the Michael Kay Show on 1050 ESPN Radio begins interviewing Dave Eiland. At about 23:00, Eiland explains that the Yankees most likely won't ask Joba to start this season because of the shoulder injury he suffered in 2008.

However, Brian Cashman claims that Joba is a "starter in the bullpen". Which is sort of like saying that someone is a lawyer working as a legal aide.

During his recap of last night's game, Cliff from Bronx Banter dropped this little gem:

Marcus Thames, meanwhile, is hitting .094 (3-for-32) with just one walk and no extra-base hits after going 0-for-4 with a pair of strikeouts. Joe Girardi keeps talking about Thames’ track record, and it still seems as though Thames will make the team. That should tell you just how much spring performances really matter.

Marc Carig asks how long the Yankees will wait for Thames to start hitting. Brian Cashman contends that he's "impacted the ball pretty hard", but his 13 to 1 K/BB ratio isn't terribly encouraging. In his defense, he hasn't faced many lefties, something he'll have a chance to do tonight against Jamie Moyer.

Chad Jennings was hoping to shoot Cashman today. With a paintball gun. During a game of paintball. No word on whether Jennings accomplished his mission, but Brian Hoch, Carig and Feinsand all hit the target.

Joel Sherman dares to argue that if A-Rod is found to have used HGH that it will ruin his legacy. Bold, I know, but he also offers up something that you probably didn't know: A-Rod turned down the chance to host Saturday Night Live several times this winter. Probably a good choice. I doubt A-Rod is a very good actor considering he isn't even good at being himself.

NYY Stadium Insider introduced a new author today, and he tells his story of what might be the ultimate Yankee Stadium Insider experience.

Another blow to the notion of "clogging the bases".

Wezen-ball ranks the worst seasons by an Opening Day starter in the last 50 years. Carl Pavano's 2007 isn't on there because Larry's bottom 10 are guys who stuck around long enough to compile a WAR of -2.2 or worse. You know who did make the list, though? Mr. Opening Day, Jack Morris.

Breaking news: Jonathan Papelbon can't grasp a simple concept. To those who think Yankees vs. Red Sox games are too long, he says:

If you don’t want to be there, don’t be there. Go home. Why are you complaining?

They want to be there, dummy, but they probably have to get up for work in the morning and want to see actual baseball instead of an endless parade mound visits, guys stepping out of the box to adjust their jock and asshat revilers who take so long to come into the game they get fucking fined for it. I'm not one to complain about the length of Yanks/Sox games, but can understand why people - especially fans of other teams - are irritated by a 5-4 game that takes 4 hours and 15 mins to complete.

Rob Iracane of Walkoff Walk rounds up two recent and rather pathetic some stories combining prostitution and baseball (attempted prostitution, that's an embarrassing charge to be tagged with). Had he expanded that to actresses potentially playing prostitutes in baseball-related movies, he might have included this. He wouldn't mind her for a rib, but before Megan Fox gets the part our buddy Old Hoss has requested to take a gander at her cat-heads.

And I know it's painful, but via 'Duk's Twitter feed, here is the last tier of the grandstand at the Old Stadium being torn down. Disclaimer: it's not for the elderly, nostalgic or faint of heart.

/sobs quietly on keyboard