AROUND THE HORN

HOW IMPORTANT ARE COACHES?
If you listen to a lot of Yankee games on YES Network, you hear about the exploits of hitting coach, Kevin Long. He supposedly turned Granderson from an automatic out against left-handers into a feared home run threat. He spent one day with Casey McGehee and straightened out his swing. Maybe he is that effective, maybe he's not, but he is mentioned as being helpful all the time. What you don't hear is how helpful pitching coach Larry Rothschild is. Hughes is prone to giving up homers, Nova has lost his command, Garcia was so bad in the beginning of the year that he was sentenced to the bullpen for a month until the Yanks had no choice but to put him back into the rotation. Where is Rothschild while all this is going on? No tales of miraculous cures, no kudoes from the pitchers themselves and no praise from Girardi. Where is Mel Stottlemeyer when you need him?

WHO DO YOU BELIEVE?
The drama continues in Boston. Last night, the ESPN announcers told the audience that a decision on when Carl Crawford would have season-ending surgery would be made in a meeting on Tuesday. Then, a couple of innings later, they said the decision had already been made, that the surgery was scheduled for Tuesday. Two innings later, we were back where we started; a Tuesday decision was still the plan.
The July infamous owner/players meeting request came from Adrian Gonzalez. Well, not really, it just came from his cell phone. Three players were involved in making the request, they just used Gonzalez's phone. Wait, it was Kelly Shoppach who made up the request and used Gonzalez's phone without his knowledge. But Gonzalez MAY have know about it. And finally, Shoppach says the team was in New York and he was in Texas when that happened.
Who do you believe?  Nobody.

THE DISASTER THAT IS THE HOUSTON ASTROS
The Astros have the worst record in baseball (39-83 .320) and new owner, Jim Crane is determined to change that. It appears he's trying to do that by becoming the worst owner in baseball and take the pressure off the team. The manager, Brad Mills, and two of his coaches were fired in the locker room after a 12-4 loss to the Arizona Diamondbacks. Okay, the team wasn't doing very well. They began the year with arguably the worst team in baseball and management has traded away most of the experienced, senior players, turning, what one analyst says is a Triple A team into a Double A team. But still, they had to do that in the locker room after a game? I hope they at least let Mills  take a shower before he left the stadium.
In a related story, Bobby Valentine was quoted as saying, "Some guys get all the breaks."

I FOUND HIM
I mentioned a few days ago that Nomar Garciaparra hadn't been seen in a while. Well, he has been spotted doing the color analysis for the Little League World Series on ESPN. How appropriate.

.Speaking of the ESPN announcers, did anyone else notice the difference between the two color commentators last night during the Red Sox-Yankee game? Terry Francona was almost giddy during the game, perhaps as a reaction to the state of the Red Sox. Orel Hersheiser, on the other hand, sounded like he was having trouble staying awake. If he had fallen asleep, it would have been all right with me.
Josh Beckett was taking so long in the stretch position before pitching, I thought Valentine might send the pitching coach to the mound to make sure Beckett hadn't fallen asleep.

THEY SAID IT
"Hundreds of fans lined the streets of Moffat to see Scotland's first-ever sheep race. Sadly, no one was awake to see the finish."  -- RJ Currie
"Deer Camp," a musical about deer hunting, opens Sept. 14 at the New Century Theatre in Minneapolis. Now comes the tough part: Lining up Bambi for some cameo shots."  -- Dwight Perry
"The Houston Astros, with MLB’s worst record at 39-82, fired manager Brad Mills and two coaches last night. Could have been worse, they could have made Mills stay for the whole year."  -- Janice Hough
"Diana Nyad is again attempting to swim from Cuba to Florida. Is it a good idea to show 11 million Cubans that this is even possible?"  -- Brad Dickson
"The Los Angeles Lakers pulled off a trade for the NBA's top center, Dwight Howard of Orlando.  The trade was delayed three months until a Kardashian could be brought in to perform the physical."  -- Argus Hamilton 

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