Dodgers Blue Heaven: Jun 3, 2013

Monday, June 03, 2013

Blog Kiosk: 6/3/2013 - Dodgers Links

"It's Kersh-Awesome Baby!" Check out Dick Vitale with Clayton Kershaw, pic via @Dodgers on twitter.

Stephen Fife is expected to pitch today, in place of ailing Chris Capuano. Via Ken Gurnick at MLB.com.

It will be the second consecutive game in which the Dodgers need to promote a Minor Leaguer as an emergency replacement for an injured starting pitcher. On Sunday, Matt Magill took the loss, filling in for Hyun-Jin Ryu, who has a sore foot.

Congrats, Elian Herrera. Via a tweet from the Isotopes GM John Traub.

Via Josie Becker at True Blue LA, "Walter O'Malley's 1957 minor league purchase: A pictorial essay".
Jon Weisman at Dodger Thoughts puts together another must read, entitled "Saviors".

Seven years ago, Kemp was Puig – the raw kid with talent to burn and lessons to learn. Puig, like Kemp did when he hit the majors at age 21 in 2006, has a hugely bright future. But anyone putting their faith in Puig will almost certainly at some point need a level of patience that many fans have denied Kemp whenever he has struggled, no matter how much he has done for his team.

Via Jeff Passan at Yahoo Sports, "10 Degrees: Will Carlos Quentin get comeuppance sooner than later against the Dodgers?" Stoking those fires, eh?

"We will get him," he said. "It may not be next time we see him. It may not be the time after that. It may not be two times after that. But we will get him. I promise."

Baseball has a very long memory. One former player loves to tell the story about holding a grudge for a decade, letting it fester, exacting his vengeance with a strategic elbow to the groin on a takeout slide and walking away from the doubled-over second baseman saying, "That was for 10 years ago."

Via Josh Vitale at MLB.com, A 111-year old fan visits Yankee Stadium and chats about Baseball. This man remembers shaking Babe Ruth's hand.

"I shook his hand and he said, 'My greatest admirer, my youngest admirer,'" LaPallo said. "I remember that like yesterday."

Here's a funny video. During a Collegiate NCAA Baseball tournament game in Fullerton this weekend a big husky invaded the field for his 15 minutes of fame. Check it out here at Beer Mug Sports. Oh... And, Go Titans!!! CSU, Fullerton won that game, 1 to 0.
Wow. Via Tony Mangia at The Other Paper we find out that Pete Rose pulls $1Mil a year signing his autograph in Las Vegas.

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Welcome to the Blue, Yasiel Puig!

Here comes the big kid from Cienfuegos, Cuba.

He stands 6' 3", weighs a linebacker-like 245 lbs and is 22-years old. As you may recall, Yasiel Puig signed a free agent contract with the Dodgers on June 28, 2012 for a mind-boggling $42Mil over 7 years after defecting and establishing residency in Mexico. At the time, many folks wondered, "wha...?" After all, Puig was an unknown and it seemed foolish to throw that kind of money at a kid, who by virtue of his defection, hadn't played much Baseball at that time.

Nevertheless, I think most fans liked that the Dodgers brass appeared to be following through with their promise to rebuild the farm system - even if the money spent at the time appeared foolish. Thankfully, Puig took the bull by the horns and showed why he was valued so highly.

After signing he was quickly sent to the Arizona Fall League and demolished the ball. Then, Puig appeared in 14 games for the Rancho Cucamonga Quakes and continued to impress. After the 2012 season, Yasiel had minor surgery in his right elbow for a staph infection, then opted to play Winter League Ball in Puerto Rico to push along his development.

During Spring Training this year he continued to kill the ball as he hit .517 in 27 games. Puig slammed 3 home runs, knocked in 11 RBI's and recorded a OPS of 1.328. As the season began he was sent to the Dodgers AA team, Chattanooga Lookouts. While there, he batted .313 with 8 home runs and 33 RBI's in 40 games.

Yasiel Puig figures on starting for the Dodgers tonight. In case you're wondering, Puig will wear #66 in his Major League debut tonight.

(twitter link)

Welcome to LA, Puig!

BTW, although the excitement of having this kid in LA is obvious, it cannot be overstated that you should not expect him to be Superman. He still has a way to go before anyone can anoint him the "next big thing".

(pic link: Dodgers tumblr)

Here are some videos of Puig at bat.

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Here's a home run bat flip by Puig

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2013 Topps Archives - Dodgers Base Cards

One of the more popular Topps Baseball sets of the year was released last week. It is the 2013 Topps Archives set. This set pays homage to past vintage Topps sets that most of us still love and adore. This year they borrow the designs from 1972, 1982, 1985 and 1990.

Check out all of the Dodgers base cards below.