Posts tagged DmitriYoung at FanHouse - AOL Sports Blog

Our MLB editor provides weekly dispatches from major league games in Notes From the Clubhouse.

Let's get the obvious out of the way first: the Nationals are not a good baseball team. We knew that would be the case coming into the season. What seems clear after another devastating day for the club, is that they're also a pretty unlucky bunch.

Ryan Zimmerman is already out for most of the rest of the season with a tear in his labrum. Before Tuesday night's game against the Angels, Washington announced that first baseman Nick Johnson will miss the rest of 2008 with a wrist injury. Then pitcher Shawn Hill was torched for eight runs (six earned) by the Halos in three innings. Hill, looked physically broken down and has pitched with forearm pain all season. It was decided immediately after the game he would go to the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn. for a re-evaluation of his arm, an ominous decision considering his lengthy history of arm trouble.

If you're keeping score at home, the Nats have lost the cornerstone in their grand franchise rebuilding effort (Zimmerman), the player who led the team in VORP in 2006, the last time he was healthy for a full season (Johnson) and they might lose the pitcher who led all Washington starters in VORP last year (Hill). They already have the second fewest wins in the majors, and things are probably going to get worse. You almost have to feel bad for them.

I like Dan LeBatard. He doesn't take himself too seriously, he's a solid writer, and he seems to annoy the hell out of Mr. Tony. But while chatting it up with the The Big Lead yesterday, he gave quite possibly the most ridiculous answer to an honest question since Phil Mickelson insisted he's grown an inch in the last year.

Q: LeBatard, what's your views on Tiger and whether or not he's an athlete and if he is, where does he rank among other greats?

LEBATARD: not an athlete.....what he does is a skill, not a sport....it is like being a brain surgeon or a seamstress.....golf isn't a sport....you can't be eating an apple during key moments of athletic triumph.....that said, he's a better athlete than everyone else doing that.....but it isn't a sport when someone carries your stuff and the most grueling thing you do is walk

Wow, that's short-sighted. Maybe LeBatard was joking (Mr. Tony plays golf!), but let's assume he wasn't. What makes an athlete? That's kinda tough to answer, but does anybody consider Dmitri Young more of an athlete than Woods? And is baseball more of a "sport" than golf? I mean, didn't Manny take a water bottle with him to left field a few years ago? Is that any better than eating an apple (or in Young's case, a pizza)?

Instant replay. Baseball might have instant replay, but instant replay would require instant replay. The issue of instant replay has been an instant replay for years now, only complicating the matter of instant replay. On one hand, instant replay. Of course that raises the issue of instant replay. This, in turn, creates the problem of not being able to have instant replay without instant replay. Personally, I instant replay. I've instant replayed since I was a small instant replay. Instant replay is a completely natural and instant replay thing. Baseball purists who instant replay the issue need to instant replay themselves and stop instant replaying the matter at hand.

In case you haven't heard, instant replay.

Instant replay after the jump.

I think I know why Dmitri Young was compelled to run his ass off during yesterday's game against the Brewers. For an athlete, he sure doesn't run around very much, and he is still able to keep his body weight from vaulting him into the lofty pantheon of fellows who have to be carted around in a trailer. He's spent most of the season on the disabled list, and I assume he elected to make up his burned-calorie quota in the span of ten seconds.

That video really is something. It's as if he was punching the ground with every step. The man was born with four arms and no legs.

Tonight's Dugout is after the jump.

At the start of the video clip below, courtesy of the D.C. Sports Bog, you'll see Dmitri Young of the Nationals booting a play at first base. Keep watching, though, because he more than makes up for it in the at-bat that follows.

Watching him jiggle about while running is almost hypnotic. I can't believe he had the strength left to do his little hand dance at the end. And it's all for naught! Obviously another vote for instant replay on home runs but the best part is that, replay or no, we wouldn't be robbed of watching the Meat Hook willing himself to third base.

Had it been a triple, it would have been the 30th of Young's big league career. That would make him 73rd among active players, most of whom aren't forced to lug quite so much baggage around the bases with them. Nor are they quite as much fun to watch when they chug their way around the bases.

The Major League Baseball draft is only two weeks away, and, as Josh Alper reported earlier this month, the league is holding a ceremonial, voluntary draft of Negro League players before the actual draft begins. The idea is to honor the accomplishments of the guys we still have and throw a little money their way, and while that's nice enough, Jon expressed via (real live copy and pasted) Dugout our general malaise and disappointment. You shouldn't honor the Negro Leagues like this. You should honor the Negro Leagues by buying a big jacket with all of the teams' logos on it. All of them at once. I don't like any specific team, I just like the Negro Leagues!

Well, the official chatroom of Major League Baseball (that's us) couldn't let baseball have a fantasy draft without doing one of their own, and presented today post-jump is part 1 of the completely legitimate shoot conversations that went on during said draft.

Not featured: Joe Torre drafting Satchel Paige and then cutting him for being too flamboyant.

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Join host Mel Allen as he takes a look back at the stories that mattered in the world of Major League Baseball this week on "This Week in Baseball," conveniently presented in the form of a chatroom transcript for those of you reading AOL Sports' "Fanhouse" blog, and presented in HD on certain cable systems you live nowhere even close to getting.

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Nationals first baseman Dmitri Young hasn't had the chance to see much playing time this season. He's only made two plate appearances this season thanks to the presence of Nick Johnson, and more importantly, a very bad back he's had this season. In fact, his back had gotten so bad recently, that the Nationals actually contacted the Mayo Clinic in hopes of finding a second opinion on it.

Still, no matter where they turned, nothing they did improved the condition of Young's back. That is, until they sent him to the team's massage therapist, Tatiana Tchamouroff. After one session with Tatiana, Young's back felt fine and he was able to take batting practice on Thursday without experiencing any pain, and now he's going to Florida for extended spring training before rejoining the Nationals.

The team says it was Tatiana focusing more on Dmitri's hip flexor that's responsible for the sudden turnaround, but given general manager Jim Bowden's comment on the situation, I think "hip flexor" may be slang for something else.

"All of a sudden, he felt instant release," Bowden said. "She found the spot."

What an unfortunate quote from Bowden. Wait, did I say unfortunate? I meant to say what an incredibly hilarious unintentional response from Bowden. I don't know if he realizes it or not, but Bowden may have just made the Nationals the number one destination for every free agent on the market this winter. Sure, some teams have large and luxurious clubhouses, and some teams are better set to win, but only the Nationals are offering happy endings.

Our MLB editor provides weekly dispatches from major league games in Notes From the Clubhouse.

With nearly a month of the baseball season in the books, the Washington Nationals pretty much are what we thought they would be -- a bad team (9-17) wallowing in the cellar of the National League East. Just why they are struggling so much is more of a surprise.

The starting pitching has actually been very strong. Odalis Perez, John Lannan and Tuesday night's starter Tim Redding all have ERAs under 4.00. The offense, despite battle-tested pros like Ryan Zimmerman and Nick Johnson and young hitters with upside like Lastings Milledge, is really scuffling. Cristian Guzman is the only regular hitting over .300. Milledge is the only other player hitting over .255. Ouch.

That's especially hurt the Nationals in the power department. They have 14 home runs as a team, the second fewest in the NL. They rank 14th in the league in doubles (44) and 15th in slugging percentage (.334). And unlike last year, it doesn't appear they can blame the ballpark. Nationals Park seems to play a lot more neutral than RFK, which was a definite pitcher's park.

Manager Manny Acta, one of the more statistically-inclined skippers in the league, isn't worrying too much yet. "The power numbers will come," said Acta before tonight's game with the Braves. "The only reason [the middle-of-the-order hitters] don't have five, six, seven homers is because of the batting averages.

Major League Baseball has made intelligent, progressive decisions in the past (night games, racial integration, not ever letting Pete Rose do anything ever). The decisions to name Gatorade the official sports drink of Major League Baseball and to allow no player in the dugout (or The Dugout) to be seen drinking anything BUT Gatorade are perhaps baseball's greatest. Sugar water that tastes like Kool-Aid if you put too much water in it is sure to enhance the natural performance of a guy like Da Meat Hook.

What's next? Today's Dugout looks into the not-so-distant future to see where baseball refreshment is headed. Spoiler alert: It is headed to somewhere where they'd let Dmitri and Delmon Young be in commercials for children. After the jump, a commercial full of stars using words full of stars!