Quotes, notes and comments

The tragic number remains frozen at 14 after Tuesday's games. It's been a while since it stayed steady.

---

"What have I seen from (Alex) Rios? A lot of outs. The only batting ninth guy making $5 million was me. This (blank-blank) is making $10, $12, $14 million, he ain't going to be batting ninth (in 2010). I'm going to make sure he earns his money. But right now I have to put him there because he's struggling. Next year, if we have Rios batting ninth we're in deep (bleep) once again.''

—Ozzie Guillen on outfielder Alex Rios, due some $60 million from the White Sox over the next five years.

Since the Blue Jays surprised the White Sox by handing over Rios and his lousy contract for the waiver price, Rios has hit .140 with a .153 on-base percentage and .215 slugging percentage. My previous entry pointed out how badly the Twins middle infielders have hit this year; Rios, as a White Sox, is making them look good.

Another take on Rios, this one from an unidentified scout for a National League team via the Chicago Tribune: "He's a teaser. He can get you fired."

---

Joe Mauer went 2-for-3 Tuesday, so over his last three games he's a mere 8-for-10. At this writing he leads the AL in batting average by 21 points over Ichiro Suzuki, in on-base percentage by 17 points over Kevin Youkilis, in slugging percentage by 40 points over Kendry Morales and in OPS by 61 points over Youkilis.

---

Following up on this afternoon's post about the Twins middle infield hitting: Nick Punto's 3-for-4 raised his batting average for the season over .230 for the first time since May 2.

And Orlando Cabrera had two hits, one a homer. On this day, the middle infield wasn't a drag.

Incidentally, when I wrote this afternoon's post, Punto had zero votes in my poll about which of the incumbents should be in the 2010 middle infield. Since then, there have been two added votes, both for Punto.

---

Cabrera, in Cleveland's big fourth inning — when the Tribe scored three runs — provided a good example of the difficulty of telling what's pitching and what's defense. With one out and a man on second, Jhonny Peralta hit a ground ball to the left on second base. Watching on TV, I thought: A perfect DP grounder. And then the ball rolled on into center field, Cabrera being nowhere near making a play on it.

I don't know what the deal was. Maybe Cabrera was playing Peralta to pull the ball. Maybe Cabrera, at age 34, doesn't have the range he once did. What I do know is that I've watched several hundred games, on the tube or in person, and I expected a ground ball hit in that location at that velocity to be fielded by a major league shortstop.

Bert Blyleven blamed Scott Baker for making a bad pitch; I blamed Cabrera for not making the play. I don't know that either of us can convince the other.

---

Rany Jazayerli's blog on the Kansas City Royals has a place on my blogroll, but he's shutting it down out of disgust with the K.C. organization. I'll leave it on the roll for now in case the winter eases Dr. Jazayerli's pain, but I suspect that eventually it will have to come down.

Quotes, notes and comments

"He doesn't like water coolers, how's that? I could have told you that before he got here."

— Brewers manager Ken Macha on Cubs outfielder Milton Bradley. Macha managed Bradley in 2006 with the Oakland Athletics.

* There are several contenders for the title of "worst run major league franchise" — Pittsburgh hasn't sniffed .500 in almost a couple of decades, San Diego appears to be a ball of confusion, and the disgraced Jim Bowden left a mess in Washington.

Then there's Kansas City, which responded to a blogger's lengthy examination of the Royals' longtime trainer's role in the franchise's sorry injury history by declaring the blogger persona non grata. Or something. And then retracting it. Or something.

The blog in question, "Rany on the Royals," is included on my blogroll.

The posting that started the fun is here. Then we have Rany on his banishment here. Then, just to show that this got the attention of mainstream types, we have the Kansas City Star's Joe Posanski on the topic here. (Joe Po offers an exhaustive breakdown of the handling if Gil Meche (photo above) in Wedneday's game against the Twins.) And then we have Rany saying things are back to normal here.

The thing is: Rany Jazayerli is not only a Royals fan, he's the biggest optimist about the Royals you'll find anywhere on the Net. He's a very smart guy, but he really, truly believed the Royals would contend this year.

And to the dunderheads runing the operation, he's a problem.

* The Texas Rangers didn't make payroll. Or they did make payroll, but had to get a multi-million loan from the commissioner's office to do it. Or all the commish is doing is helping them find a new owner. Or something in between.

I'm confident of this: Had the players not been paid, there would be no question about that. Scott Boras has a few clients on that team. If Kevin Millwood misses a paycheck, Boras is going to be screaming from the mountaintops. If anybody didn't get their money, it's the small fry, the ticket sellers and the secretaries and the scouts.

Somewhere in the fog of obscurity is this rock of fact: Tom Hicks is in big financial trouble.

Big enough trouble that it makes everything else about the organization suspect.

*Manny Ramirez returns today from his steroid suspension, as popular as ever. Which just underlines the reality: Fans don't care if their guy is on the juice, they just don't want the other guys to be.