First of, I would like to respond to a comment made by padres2050 a few days ago on my entry Baseball Q and A. The first question was, why do I think that we are improved enough to make the postseason this year? I think that we’ll make the postseason this year because of what we saw in the second half of the season last year. If we had played like that all year, we would have either been in the postseason or very, very close. Now, things are going to be a little different than they were last year, with the addition of the Hairston brothers and the subtraction of Kevin Kouzmanoff, but I still think that we’re going to be very good this year.

Plus, these are tough times for a San Diego sports fan. The Chargers have failed us for 50 years, and the Padres have failed us for 40. Thankfully, the Little League kids were finally able to do something big for San Diego, but I think we’re all getting just a little frustrated with the Chargers and Padres. We need to have some kind of hope and something’s gotta give here. Really soon.  

Buddy Black is a great manager, and I personally think that he is one of the very best. I believe that it’s not his fault that we did so terribly the past two season, but that the stupid front office didn’t give him the pieces that he needed to make this team good. I know that in some cases you can blame the state of the team on the manager, but I don’t believe that that’s applicable in this situation. I love Buddy because he doesn’t yell at his players, he’s got a great relationship with them, and he plays smart baseball. He knows when to get fired up if he has to, but most of the time he just stays quiet. I think that a good quality of a manager is to keep the attention and focus on his players, and not on his fiery temper.

Number 1, I am a Padres fan. My loyalties go to the Padres first before anything. But I also am a huge fan of the game of baseball. It’s so amazing! Unfortunately, my family does not believe in watching TV of any sort, so the only way for me to follow sports is to listen to the games or check things out on the internet. Believe me, if I was able to, I would have to MLB Network and be watching it 24/7!!

I read many, many blogs here as much as possible. The blogosphere has been growing so much that it’s getting hard to read all of them! In terms of Padres blogs, Perpetual Padres Saga, Gaslamp Ball, RJ’s Fro, and The Friar Faithful are essential daily reading.

I can’t thank you guys enough for all your support!!!

So Kouz settled his contract with the A’s yesterday. He’s getting $3.1 million for the year!

Last year with the Padres, he made $432,000. 

Jeff Moorad said that trading him had nothing to do with money, but I don’t believe it. There is absolutely no way the Padres would have given him that much money this year. Oh well.

I guess I should talk a little about the Hairston Brothers! We got Scotty Hairston back when we traded Kouz, which was kind of weird for me. I absolutely love Scotty. He was one of the best players in ’07 and ’08. I’ll never forget his walk-off homers after we got him in the middle of 2007 from the Diamondbacks. That was definitely a mistake on Arizona’s part. Because of him, we almost overtook them for the NL West!

Anyways, he is just a really amazing player. I always got so excited when he came up to bat late in a game with the score really close. I was pretty sad when we traded him to the A’s last season.

Now, I’m glad that we have him back, but you know, I lost Kouz. It’s just not as exciting as it would have been if the circumstances were different.

So then the next day we find out that we signed Jerry Hairston Jr.!! The Padres are kind of like the team of family reunions. We’ve had a lot of brother combinations on this team, most recently including Brian and Marcus Giles and Adrian and Edgar Gonzalez.

The GilesBros. only lasted a year. The GonzoBros. only lasted a year too. Let’s see how long the HairBros. last.

It’s going to be pretty cool to see them together, though. I’m really excited. I’m huge HairBros. fans, so it’s going to be so sweet to see them on the same team. Those guys are adorable.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I can’t believe the stupid Chargers!! It’s so crazy how they had the 11 game winning streak and it’s our year and all that and then they go a lose the very first playoff game. So stupid!!!!! Argh. I am just so frustrated about that. Not cool at all. San Diego needs some major help, that’s for sure. Goodness.

Well, I think that’s all I have for today. Miss you, Kouz 😦

GO PADRES!!! GO KOUZ!!!!!