Base Hits: Talking (Speaking) Baseball

With all the Derek Jeter record-breaking hoopla, you may have missed the fact that Ichiro broke Willie Keeler's 108 year old record for consecutive 200 hit seasons when he made 2009 his ninth.

But the press generally doesn't mention the team Keeler's played for and when they do, like Yahoo! Sports' David Brown, they only get it half right.

With another 200 in the hit bank, Ichiro surpasses a Hall of Famer who has one of the more famous nicknames in baseball history, "Wee" Willie Keeler, who did it from 1894-1901 for the Brooklyn Dodgers franchise.

That's only half true. In fact, it's only 3/8 true because Keeler only spent three of those eight seasons with Brooklyn. He spent the first five seasons of the streak (and his career) with the old National League Baltimore Orioles.

Just giving credit where credit is due.

*****

Speaking of records broken, a guy named Jeter moved to 53rd on the all-time hit list and this got a lot of attention. OK, he's now the Yankee hit king. But as you can see in this report I created at BaseballReference.com, Jeter is also the all-time Yankee leader in outs.

Where was ESPN as he approached that hallowed milestone?

*****

Speaking of the Yankees, the O's take the weekend series! This bodes well for Baltimore avoiding 100 losses. The toughest part of the September/October schedule is over. The rest of the season leaves only three games against the Red Sox. The rest of the schedule is Rays, Jays and Indians. The Indians stink. The Jays are not good. The Rays have turned back into a pumpkin and have lost 11 straight.

The O's went 4-6 against the toughest part of their schedule. It still won't all be pretty but I feel a lot better about it than I did a week or two ago.

*****

Speaking of the weekend series, Brian Matusz and Chris Tillman got the wins over the Yanks. The last two rookie pitchers to defeat the Yankees in New York in the same series? Bob Milacki and Dave Johnson on August 26th and 27th, 1989. Why not, indeed.

*****

Speaking of rookie pitchers, the Orioles are leaning towards shutting Brian Matusz down for the season and are expected to make a decision today. Caution is probably the best prescription for this team.

*****

Speaking of Brian Matusz, he was ranked #4 on Baseball America's year end Prospect Hot Sheet. Matusz impressed at all levels in 2009.