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Hacksaw’s Monday Podcast..1-30pm
You Tube-Lee Hacksaw Hamilton
Hot Topics on Table..Stay for Fans Forum
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“PADRES-RIVALRY TIME”
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It’s time to really play ball.
It’s time for the Padres to play the Dodgers.
It’s time to renew what has become a really intense rivalry.
Hard to believe they haven’t played each other yet this season
Equally hard to believe there is only 1-game difference between the Dodgers-Padres-Giants in the NL West and we’re in June.

The Dodgers and Padres are embroiled in what likely will be a season long grudge match to see who can win the NL West-and-who will travel the Wildcard road to the postseason.

When last seen, there are so many flashbacks to remember:
..The Padres going 24-straight innings without scoring against LA in the playoffs
..The Dodgers using a bullpen day to save their season
..Manny Machado throwing a ball at the Dodgers dugout
..Dodgers pitcher Jack Flaherty, a real red-ass, screaming at the Padres
..Shohei Ohtani’s record 50-50 season
..The terrible decision to start Dylan Cease on short rest in the postseason
..The Dodgers analytics department beating the Padres smart guys
..The video board cartoon of Clayton Kershaw crying
..Michael Kopech-Blake Treinen-Evan Phillips star and glare into home plate
..Dave Roberts calling SD-LA their biggest rivalry
..The chants of Beat-LA..Beat-LA before they even exchanged lineup cards
..The look on Padres faces when it was over-knowing they choked the series away

That’s all the backdrop to what happens Monday-Tuesday-Wednesday, when they face each other again.

New season, sure, but lots of old issues here.

The Dodgers have put 17-pitchers on the disabled list already this season.  LA has gone thru 27-pitchers already on the mound this year.

There is no Blake Snell, Tyler Glasnow, nor Roki Sasaki to use in the rotation vs the Friars.

Shohei Ohtani has yet to make his return to the mound.

The Dodgers top 5-relievers are all on the disabled list.

LA’s bats are booming, slugging their way into a tenuous hold on 1st place.  Ohtani has 23-home runs.  Freddie Freeman was hitting (.343) into the weekend.  Teoscar Hernandez, Mookie Betts, Will Smith have all had good starts to the year.  Even young flychaser Andy Pages has become dangerous the plate.

There are issues with the Padres, trying to sell themselves that they can stay in a chase for first place with just Nick Pivetta and an up and down Dylan Cease at the front of the rotation.  Michael King is likely out 6-weeks with the shoulder.  Yu Darvish seems a month away barring a setback.

The bullpen is borderline burned out, as witnessed by the fact they asked Jason Adam to pitch ten times in a 16-day span.  They are holding up, but for how long.

Manny Machado is having a superstar season.
Luis Arreaez is slap hitting close to .300
Jackson Merrill has weathered a strange slump and is at (.314).
Fernando Tatis has hit (.188) since May 3rd’s beaning.
Jake Cronenworth has returned to being (.240) Jake Cronenworth.
Xander Bogaearts, his longterm contract, is stapled to a (.238) average.
The collective left fielders are hitting (.178).
The team is averaging an anemic (2.9) runs per game
The catchers combined average is under (.200)

Surely not a complete team right now either.

Won’t matter.  This is the first of 13-times they face each other, so it shapes up a ‘long hot summer of baseball’ between the two rivals.

But by first pitch today, you can forget the problems and just screech ‘Beat LA’.

But be realistic, the Dodgers don’t look like a World Series team.
The Padres seem a long ways away from being a 1st place team.
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Hacksaw’s Great Sports Weekend Podcast
You Tube-Lee Hacksaw Hamilton
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“HOT HEADLINES–HOT TAKES”
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OKLAHOMA CITY-INDIANA:
..What did you expect?  This shocking upset?  Not me-not anyone.  Probably not even Indiana.  Definitely not OKC.  Indiana comes from 15-points back, hits 18-3’s and wins on another Tyrese Haliburton desperation shot with 3/10th of a second to go, to win.  Amazing.  The Thunder took 98-shots in the game..but shot just 39%.  Alot of guys disappeared in that game, leaving Shai Alexander to score (38) and everyone else miss a ton of shots.  It only counts as 1-win, but Indiana out-toughed Oklahoma City and just never gave up.  The grinders upset the glitter guys.  Here I was about the write, Indiana scored a ‘Moral Victory’ by getting back into the game and nearly winning it.  Instead they scored a ‘Real Victory’ on the road in a hostile environment.  Something to see.  But maybe it shocks the OKC system into playing with more intensity.  No one expected this, except Haliburton, who has now hit 4-final second jump shots to win games in the playoffs this spring for Indiana.I expected a blowout much earlier.  Credit the Pacers grit that a double digit deficit early did not wind up a 30-point loss. They believe and they have a 1-0 lead in what was supposed to be a torch job series.

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EDMONTON-FLORIDA:
..Game two is Friday night and you ask can the Oilers-Panthers take it up another notch after the electric first game that went deep into overtime before Leon Draisaitl  won it for the Oilers.  Edmonton beat Florida at its own game, turning a 3-1 deficit into a tie game, hitting the Panthers, finishing their checks, disrupting the Florida forwards, and owning not only the final 20-minutes but also the overtime.  Yes it may only count as one win, but there is quite a message to be delivered there, the Oilers are deeper, tougher, griffier than the team that got taken out by Florida last spring in the Cup finals.  Game On-bring it on.

——-
PADRES:
..Is it an injury?  Is it a problem off the field?  No one is asking questions.  No one is talking, but this is not typical Fernando Tatis, an MVP candidate in April, a struggling veteran in May.  He has not been the same at-bat since getting hit on the forearm.  Has he lost power in his left forearm?  Is it a rib cage injury?  Is he trying to over compensate by changing his batting stance and mechanics?  Heading into the Milwaukee series on Friday, El Nino is (24-122) hitting (.196)…that’s right (.196). Not an MVP month is it?  And now Xander Bogaerts has pain in the same area he suffered a fractured shoulder last season.  And Luis Arraez seems to strain his knee reaching for a ground ball.  Looking for healthy players and some players to get hot on their road trip.

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Hacksaw’s Thursday Podcast-1:30-pm
You Tube-Lee Hacksaw Hamilton
Hot Topics on the Table-Stay for Fans Forum
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“IN NEED OF PITCHING–JUST ASKING”
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Your name is the San Diego Padres, or the Yankees, the Braves, or Angels, or the Reds, or the Pirates, or nearly half the teams in baseball.

Your pitching staffs have been ravaged by injuries.  Your bats cannot carry your teams the rest of the pennant race summer.

I study the stats in baseball constantly.  Baseball teams have a 26-man roster, and mandate the most pitchers you can have are 13-per team.  And that’s not enough.

So here we are into June, and some of the top teams are staggering because they have so many pitching injuries.  The bottom feeders don’t have enough pitching, and there seems to be no way to bridge the gap.

But there is, if a team’s GM is bold enough, the owners strong enough, to give a guy a second chance.

Modern day MLB baseball has allowed guys back into the game after serving suspensions for a wide variety of things.  PED violations, gun violations, domestic abuse incidents, DUIs, even gambling.

And so we sit in San Diego, at Yankees Stadium, and a number of other places, short on starting pitchers.  Not many solutions, nobody trades you a 20-game winner.  Few will deal a frontline pitcher even if he is on the brink of free agency.

AJ Preller, Brian Cashman and others need to be creative before the pennant race gets away from them.

The Padres have Nick Pivetta, a hot-cold Dylan Cease, an ailing Michael King.  Who knows if there will ever be another Yu Darvish sighting?  Who can really trust the likes of Randy Vasquez or Matt Waldon?  Do you really believe career minor leaguers Sean Reynolds or David Morgan or Ryan Berget can hold up in the heat of a pennant race.

At Yankees Stadium, it’s the same.  Aaron Judge can hit only so many home runs.  6-of his batting order teammates are hitting below (.240).  Ginacarlo Stanton has not returned.  There is no Gerritt Cole coming back this year.  Luis Gil is still on the DL as are a chunk of the bullpen.

Need I say more about the lowly Angels pitching staff, the faltering Orioles, the trashed Braves pitching staff or a wide variety of others.

Many solutions out there?  Not really.  Except one big gamble.

If you had the chance to pick up a starting pitcher who was (83-69), at a low level make good contract, wouldn’t you?  If you could take a flyer on a pitcher that was (20-4) pitching in Mexico and Japan, why would you not at least make a call?

Yes Trevor Bauer comes off as an intellectual sleaze, disciplined, exiled, suspended, blackballed for sexual misconduct with a groupie baseball fan.
He served his sentence, 190-games in all.  He lost some big bucks, (31M) in his Dodgers contract by virtue of his suspension.

His reputation seems shot, but we know this.  The ex-Indians-Reds-Dodgers starter can still pitch.  His records with the Yokohama Bay Stars and Mexico City Rojos prove that.

He has kept his mouth shut, let his pitching do his talking, and has stayed off the stupidity of social media that got him into hot water to begin with.

You can get him for the major league minimum for the rest of the season.  He is in game-shape.  Wants a second chance.  And would do almost anything to resurrect his career and rebuild his reputation.

Who gives a crap about what a columnist or a talkshow mouth or TV guy would say.  If you give him the ball every 5th day and he wins, you win, and that is what the game is all about.

As the old phrase goes, ‘nothing ventured-nothing gained’.

I’d take a chance on Trevor Bauer now, compared to some of the other pitchers some of these teams are dragging out there masquerading as starting pitchers.

It’s real simple. This is the veterans minimum contract.  Take the ball and pitch.  Keep you mouth shut aside from baseball.  Take a summer off from social media.  If you screw up, you repay us what we paid you after we gave you a chance.

2nd chance = last chance.  You are trying to get to the World Series aren’t you?
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“NHL-O Canada-Woe Canada”
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Game 1-of the NHL Stanley Cup finals is upon us.  The Edmonton Oilers are hoping to go where no Canadian team has gone in decades.

A skate around the ice with the Cup when this series is over with the Florida Panthers.

Canada, which invented the game, has been missing from the ceremonies.

Canada, which gave us the Flying Frenchmen, Maple Leaf Gardens, Gretzky-Messier-Kurri-Fuhr has not celebrated in a long time.

Canada, home to Foster Hewitt, Danny Gallivan, Don Cherry and Hockey Night in Canada, has been muzzle in saluting their sports with their flag with the Cup.

Why and How?  Will it end shortly?

A close up look at the Stanley Cup finals sans Canadian teams, courtesy of TSN:
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For a second straight spring, the Edmonton Oilers have a chance to bring the Stanley Cup back to Canada.

After coming agonizingly close last year by forcing a Game 7 with the Florida Panthers following a 3-0 series deficit only to come up short in the deciding game, Connor McDavid and co. have another shot at those very same Panthers. Whether or not the last Canadian team standing in the NHL playoffs will be rallied around by the rest of the country is always a matter of debate, but what isn’t is that the lengthy championship drought in Canada’s national sport has become a sore spot from coast-to-coast.

It’s been 11,682 days since a Canadian team has hoisted the Stanley Cup.

If you are 32 or younger, you have never seen a Canadian team win a Stanley Cup.

Since a Canadian team last won the Stanley Cup, Quebec City lost its team. Winnipeg lost its team, but then got another one back. Vancouver got a basketball team and then lost it. The Montreal Expos split time in Puerto Rico for a bit and then moved to Washington, DC.

Yes, the world has changed more than a great deal since that night when Gary Bettman handed the Stanley Cup over to Guy Carbonneau on June 9, 1993 after the Montreal Canadiens defeated the Los Angeles Kings in five games to make it 24 championships. Nobody knew that night would begin a drought for Canadian hockey that has lasted into a fourth decade. How could they? In the 32 years preceding the Canadiens’ Cup in 1993, a Canadian team had claimed Lord Stanley’s Mug on 20 occasions. Why wouldn’t that continue?

Well, for a couple of major reasons. Expansion, of course, was a big one. By 1993, there were 24 teams in the NHL. That was up four from the previous two seasons. Five years after that, it was 27 and now today, we’re at 32 with only seven of those playing north of the 49th parallel. When fewer than 25 per cent of the league’s teams are Canadian, your chances of winning have steeply declined.

The biggest factor, though, is money. Its American cousin has hammered the Canadian dollar’s purchasing power for much of the past 30-plus years. In 1991, the Canadian dollar reached nearly $0.90 USD. That would be the high point for the decade. It would nosedive for a majority of the next 10 years with the low point coming in 2002 when the Loonie bottomed out at $0.6179 USD. While the CDN flirted with parity at a number of points during the aughts and even went above the USD in 2011, it would crash back down again by 2015. Fluctuations have been relatively muted over the past 10 years with the CDN settling in around the $0.68-to-$0.75 USD range, but that still represents a steep surcharge for the seven teams who pay their players in American dollars and collect revenue in Canadian.

 

Still, the drought has almost ended a number of times over these past 32 years. When the Oilers take the ice on Wednesday night at Rogers Place, they will be the seventh Canadian team to skate in a final and just might be the best positioned to hang a banner in the Great White North come next fall. We all know what happened last year, but let’s take a look back at the other six teams that tried and failed since the Habs last won in 1993.

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Hacksaw’s Monday Bonus Podcast
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“PADRES-HELP WANTED”
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AJ Preller is about to do what AJ Preller is always doing…making another deal.

It’s not panic time in San Diego, but it might be getting  time to address the shortcoming on their rosters.

There’s a hole in leftfield.
The pitching staff is thinned out by injuries.
The catchers aren’t hitting.

And the bigger concern, the schedule is getting tougher and the Dodgers look as if they might be pullihg away in the NL-West.

The big decision as Preller makes these phone calls to other GMs, what’s his biggest need?  Is it a bat in the outfield, or an arm in the rotation?

The story confirmed out of Boston makes sense, pursuing LF-Jarran Durran.  Of course you don’t get talent unless you are willing to give up talent.

You are not going to trade away the top two prospects, Ethan Salas or Leo DeVries.

Do you move one of your set up relievers, Adrian Morejon or Jason Adam?
Would you make Jake Cronenworth available?

What do the Red Sox need that you have plenty of?  It does not seem enough.

The bulk of the Padres really talented young guys, are other places.  Just look at the Washington Nationals batting order these days?

There’s not much ready at El Paso or San Antonio that would help the people at Fenway Park right now, and if Duran is exiting, then someboyd must go to Bosto ready to contribute.

It’s a bit early to get into sellers mode around baseball.  Maybe a trusted veteran rental like Andrew McCutcheon might make a difference, coming out of Pittsburgh.  Low budget, has some power, good glove.

Maybe you search the Athletics last place roster, talk to Tampa Bay or disappointing Baltimore to see if there are deals out there.

Preller has contacts everywhere, so he knows what might be out there to be had.

Sorry, budget restrictions will prevent any phone calls to the Angels (Mike  Trout) or other established players.

But it might be time to start thinking about upgrades, because the Padres are playing the teeth of the schedule now.

Help Wanted, that’s the sign that should be hanging outside Petco Park right now.

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