(Long time gone) Two more former Expos leave D.C.

I have not been following baseball like last year, and especially prior to that. Anyway, point being this blog is not dead. On with the show.

Two more former Expos have left the District of Columbia. The whole deal was as follows: the Nationals Acquired OF Austin Kearns, SS Felipe Lopez and RHP Ryan Wagner from the Cincinnati Reds, while the Reds received RHP Gary Majewski, LHP Bill Bray, INF Brendan Harris, SS Royce Clayton and RHP Daryl Thompson from the Nationals.

The former Expos in question would be Brendan Harris, and Gary Majewski. Combined they only had 36 games of experience with the big club, however they did don the Expos uniform. LHP Bill Bray was drafted 13th overall in 2004 by the Expos, however in 2004 he was with the Brevard County Manatees.

Since my last post, way back on April 16th, the Nationals reacquired Zach Day. He was dealt before the trade deadline last year, read about it from mlb.com. On July 13th, 2005, the Nationals acquired Preston Wilson from the Colorado Rockies for Zach Day, J.J. Davis and a player to be named later (PTBN) or cash. He was reacquired by being claimed off of waivers April 26th. Reason being the Nationals were in need of pitchers. He was taken out of rotation last year after turning his back on Frank Robinson when he came to the mound to replace him. He was then used as a reliever which he did not like. I'm sure both of those reasons caused him to be traded, and time heals all wounds, so Frobby wanted him back knowing he is a good pitcher. Since returning to D.C. he has started five games, one in April after being reacquired, and four in May. He left his last game started with shoulder soreness, and has not been back since. He was almost dealt May 31st of last year, but had to go on the DL with a fractured right wrist.

More former Expos that may go before the trade deadline include, Livan Hernandez, Tony Armas Jr., and Jose Vidro.

Opening day aces

To differentiate this blog from others I try to post some interesting things, stuff that is not normally out there, or at least not easily found. So I thought it would be interesting to compare opening day pitching matchups for every team. This will show who is the team's ace, or at least for opening day, or the time being.

There were many sub par starts, especially from C.C. Sabathia and Mark Buehrle, going only 6.1 innings combined! Must be the pressure of being the very first game of the 2006 season!

The best pitchers duel belonged to Dontrelle Willis and Roy Oswalt in Houston, where neither starter gave up any runs. Oswalt won the duel, going 8 innings, and giving up only 5 hits, one base on balls, and striking out 8. Willis went 5 innings only allowing one hit, however he gave up 3 base on balls, and only struck out three. Aside from the difference in hits, Willis threw 107 pitches (61 strikes), while Oswalt threw 91 (62 strikes). Check out the wrap and box score.

The next best duel went to Brandon Webb and Jason Jennings in Colorado. They both went 7 innings, Webb gave up 5 hits, while Jennings gave up 6. They each gave up one run, both earned. Webb walked 2, Jennings walked 1. Webb struck out 2, while Jennings struck out 6. Both faced 27 batters. Both pitched 98, 66 strikes for Webb, 62 for Jennings. So all in all they both pitched pretty evenly.

Some other good starts went to Kenny Rogers, Randy Johnson, Jake Peavy, and Roy Halladay. Not a good start for Barry Zito, only pitching 1.1 innings, and giving up 7 runs, all earned. Not a great start for Jon Lieber either going 3.1 and giving up 8 runs, again, all earned.

So below, see the matchups, and numbers for yourself. The statistical abbreviations are at the top only. Mind the formatting, as it wasn't easy, putting all the data in!

                           IP H R ER BB SO HR ERA

April 2nd

Cleveland Indians at Chicago White Sox

C.C. Sabathia 2.1 3 3 3 1 3 0 11.57
Mark Buehrle 4.0 4 3 3 1 1 1 6.75

April 3rd

Boston Red Sox at Texas Rangers

Curt Schilling    (W, 1-0) 7.0 5 2 2 1 5 1 2.57
Kevin Millwood (L, 0-1) 5.0 7 5 5 1 3 1 9.00

Tampa Bay Devil Rays at Baltimore Orioles

Scott Kazmir   (L, 0-1) 4.0 8 6 6 3 4 3 13.50
Rodrigo Lopez (W, 1-0) 7.0 7 6 5 1 2 2 6.43

Detroit Tigers at Kansas City Royals

Kenny Rogers (W, 1-0) 6.0 3 1 1 0 5 0 1.50
Scott Elarton (L, 0-1) 5.2 7 2 2 3 3 2 3.18

Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim at Seattle Mariners

Bartolo Colon 5.0 8 3 3 1 4 1 5.40
Jamie Moyer  6.2 9 3 3 1 2 1 4.05

New York Yankees at Oakland Athletics

Randy Johnson (W, 1-0) 7.0 5 1 1 0 3 1 1.29
Barry Zito         (L, 0-1) 1.1 4 7 7 4 3 1 47.25

Washington Nationals at New York Mets

Livan Hernandez (L, 0-1) 6.0 8 3 3 1 4 1 4.50
Tom Glavine        (W, 1-0) 6.0 6 1 1 3 5 0 1.50

Pittsburgh Pirates at Milwaukee Brewers

Oliver Perez 5.1 3 1 1 3 9 1 1.69
Doug Davis  6.0 6 2 2 4 6 0 3.00

Chicago Cubs at Cincinnati Reds

Carlos Zambrano 4.2 7 5 5 5 5 2 9.64
Aaron Harang      (L, 0-1) 5.0 9 9 6 3 3 1 10.80

St. Louis Cardinals at Philadelphia Phillies

Chris Carpenter (W, 1-0) 5.0 9 4 4 1 4 2 7.20
Jon Lieber          (L, 0-1) 3.1 9 8 8 1 3 1 21.60

Arizona Diamondbacks at Colorado Rockies

Brandon Webb 7.0 5 1 1 2 2 0 1.29
Jason Jennings 7.0 6 1 1 1 6 0 1.29

Atlanta Braves at Los Angeles Dodgers

Tim Hudson             4.0 6 5 5 3 3 0 11.25
Derek Lowe (L, 0-1) 5.0 9 8 7 1 2 2 12.60

Florida Marlins at Houston Astros

Dontrelle Willis         5.0 1 0 0 3 3 0 0.00
Roy Oswalt (W, 1-0) 8.0 5 0 0 1 8 0 0.00

San Francisco Giants at San Diego Padres

Jason Schmidt (L, 0-1) 7.0 7 4 4 1 2 2 5.14
Jake Peavy      (W, 1-0) 7.0 4 1 1 1 5 0 1.29

April 4th

Minnesota Twins at Toronoto Blue Jays

Johan Santana (L, 0-1) 5.2 10 4 4 1 3 1 6.35
Roy Halladay  (W, 1-0) 7.2 5 3 2 0 4 2 2.35

Links aplenty!

Lots of new links can be found to the right!

I have added links to online newspapers, and their respective sections for their MLB team. The idea came to me while I was checking out one of the sites sections for their MLB team. I believe I was on the Miami Herald site for the Marlins, looking for new news about their possible future relocation. Anyway, for those people out there that are like me (maybe two or three!), they should enjoy all of the links. Seriously though, when the Expos were still around, and if they beat so and so, I'd like to see the local viewpoint on that loss. Also, generally reading about a team from the local perspective is of interest as well. Nowadays with the information superhighway as popular as it is, there is a wealth of information to be found, so that is also why I added the links. Many people probably wouldn't think of going to say kansascity.com to check out their viewpoint on the Royals. The next big player is probably there waiting to be traded, a la Johnny Damon, or Carlos Beltran. Also, many people are fans of more than one sport, so going to said kansascity.com, can also yield local information on the Kansas City Chiefs.

I also added a few general links, such as Field of Schemes, which is a good site to see status of future ballparks, as well as other places to get MLB stats, such as Yahoo. More links to come too!

Former Expos, Leaving D.C.

So, finally, as promised, the post where I show former Montreal Expos that have left the Nationals, along with the ones sticking around.

I'll start with players that left the organisation before they became the Nationals. More specifically, after the 2004 trade dealine. It was the day of the deadline that Boston received Orlando Cabrera, but I won't get into that one. In one of my first blog entries, I talk about that trade. So, the first deal that went down after that was sending Alex Gonzalez to San Diego, when they needed a shortstop badly to hopefully get them to the postseason. Khalil Greene had broken his right index finger. Alex Gonzalez played only 35 games with Montreal. He is now a free agent after having a season with the Devil Rays. Details on that deal were as follows:

9/16/04: Traded SS Alex Gonzalez to the Padres for a player to be named later or cash considerations.

That was before they were officially destined to the U.S. Capital. The rest until their inaugural return to DC goes as follows:

10/6/04: Declined the club option on C Einar Diaz, making him a free agent.

11/8/04: Released RHP Rocky Biddle.

11/19/04: Acquired OF Jose Guillen from the Angels in exchange for OF Juan Rivera and INF Maicer Izturis.

12/8/04: Sold the contract of OF Valentino Pascucci to the Chiba Lotte Marines of the Japanese Pacific League.

12/11/04: Released LHP Chad Bentz.

12/13/04: Signed 1B Wil Cordero to a one-year contract and designated OF Ron Calloway for assignment.

1/19/05: Designated RHP Sun-Woo Kim for assignment.

3/17/05: Re-assigned RHP Sun-woo Kim to minor league camp.

Einar Diaz had 55 games as an Expo. He went on to be the backup catcher in St. Louis,not playing once in the postseason. Now he is back with Cleveland, albeit a minor league deal, and an invitation to srping trainging.

Rocky Biddle, I imagine is waiting for his phone to ring. That is, waiting for some sort of deal to get back in the majors. He had plenty of ups and downs with the Expos, mostly as a closer. However in 2004, towards the end of the season, injuries to the pitching staff forced him to become a starter, as he should have been all along. Anyway, he excelled as a starter for the first few starts, but then he started struggling again. Check out this October 12th, 2005 blog entry (fifth paragraph down) of mine for a paragraph about how the Expos getting Rocky Biddle was one of Omar Minaya's bad trades (had Orlando Hernandez pitched for the Expos in a 1-2 punch along with his brother, it may have been a different story!).

Juan Rivera just signed a two year deal with the Los Angeles Angels, and Maicer Izturis is still with the Angles.

Valentino Pascucci played in a mere 32 games with the Expos, which amounted to 62 at bats. He only started 17 games.

Chad Bentz had 36 games as an Expo. He was born with a deformed right hand, similar to Jim Abbott. He was signed to the Marlins with a minor league contract, and played only 4 games, or 2 innings with the big club. On January 19th, he was signed to a minor league contract with the 2005 World Series champion Chicago White Sox.

Wil Cordero was resigned. Along with Joey Eischen, they are the only two who were with the team in 1994, when they should have been contenders for the World Series. Joey Eischen, however stayed with the team as they moved. Wil Cordero left after the 2003 season. Ron Calloway played in 172 games over 2003 and 2004, 126 and 46 respectively. With Omar Minaya in charge with the Mets, he found himself with a minor league deal with the Mets in 2005, however played no games with them, and at the end of 2005 opted for minor league free agency.

Sun-woo Kim, I imagine they weren't able to deal him. He pitched in 4 games in 2002, 4 in 2003, and 43 in 2004, after starting his MLB career in Boston in 2001. 2004 being the year the Expos went downhill without Vladimir Guerrero, among others.

Onto much more recent times. Players that stuck around with the Expos/Nationals during the move, only to be shipped out in time.

5/14/05: Acquired CF Marlon Byrd from Phillies in exchange for CF Endy Chavez.

5/26/05: Designated RHP Claudio Vargas for assignment.

6/10/05: Acquired 2B Junior Spivey from the Milwaukee Brewers in exchange for RHP Tomo Ohka.

7/13/05: Acquired OF Preston Wilson from the Colorado Rockies for RHP Zach Day, OF J.J. Davis and a PTBN or cash.

7/25/05: Released 1B/OF Wil Cordero. He had been designated for assignment on July 20.

8/5/05: Announced RHP Sun-Woo Kim was claimed off waivers by the Colorado Rockies.

8/8/05: Designated OF Matt Cepicky for assignment.

12/13/05: Acquired INF Alfonso Soriano in exchange for OF Brad Wilkerson, OF Terrmel Sledge and RHP Armando Galarraga from the Texas Rangers.

Sticking around:

12/13/05: Signed 1B/OF/C Robert Fick and LHP Joey Eischen to one-year contracts

12/29/05: Signed RHP Tony Armas Jr. to a one-year contract.

1/5/06: Signed INF Jamey Carroll to a one-year contract.

1/9/06: Signed RHP Luis Ayala to a two-year contract

1/17/06: Signed C Brian Schneider to a four-year contract and 1B Nick Johnson to a one-year contract.

Endy Chavez, after being a bench warmer in Philadelphia, is now with the Mets, having been signed by Omar Minaya.

Claudio Vargas was claimed off waivers by Arizona, and he was just re-signed with the Diamondbacks to a one year deal.

Tomo Ohka is still with the Milwaukee Brewers.

Zach Day is still with the Colorado Rockies.

Wil Cordero is a minor league free agent as stated above.

Sun Woo Kim is still with the Colorado Rockies.

Matt Cepicky is still in limbo.

Brad Wilkerson stayed in Texas, as that is who they wanted, however Terrmel Sledge (who got the final home out in Montreal Expos history) was dealt to San Diego in a trade that sent three players each way, including Adam Eaton to Texas.

The players sticking around are pretty self explanatory.

So former Expos still with the Nationals include:
Joey Eischen, Tony Armas Jr., Jamey Carroll, Luis Ayala, Brian Schneider, Nick Johnson, Francis Beltran, Chad Cordero, Livan Hernandez, Gary Majewski, John Patterson, Jon Rauch, Brendan Harris, Jose Vidro, and Ryan Church.

However with most of those players they weren't Expos long enough for most people to be too attached in any way.

Finally, a couple others to note, 3B Tony Batista went to play in Japan, after the 2004 season. And LHP Rigo Beltran, who only had 2 games with the Expos, was signed to a minor league contract and invitation to spring training, by the Brewers December 1st, 2004, only to be released March 18th, 2005. During spring training I'd imagine.

I'm sure I must have seen a website with spring training stats around, I'll have to go looking for it, or any other! So I'll end on that note! Feel free to comment, or link back to this post on your website/blog, as I am guessing this is probably one of the better lists out there of recent Expos leaving the Nationals. No ego there, just happily accepting plugs for my work!