The Futility Infielder

...three things that have very little to do with each other:

• This is idiotic. Due to last night's rainout in Boston, the Yanks are reshuffling their rotation. Shawn Chacon, who was supposed to pitch, has been bumped until Saturday to keep Randy Johnson and Mike Mussina on their five-day routines -- no problem there -- while Jaret Wright, who flew to Tampa ahead of the team, gets tonight's start.

Let's see here. Wright has made 15 starts as a Yankee, three of them actually qualifying as Quality Starts (six or more innings, three or fewer earned runs). This year' he's put up a 7.20 ERA in 10 innings, with four unearned runs tossed in there to boot. For his Yankee career, his ERA stands at 6.15, and he's walked as many as he struck out (38) in 74.2 innings. He sucks like an Electrolux, and stands to be a total waste of $17 million.

Chacon hasn't lived up to the 2.85 ERA he posted after coming over last year, but for comparison's sake, he's made 11 Quality Starts out of 16, his ERA on the year is 4.56, and for his Yankee career, it's 3.23, with a 57/40 K/BB ratio in 105.2 innings. At $3.6 million, he's a bargain if he can simply remain a League Average Inning Muncher.

There's no such thing as a sunk cost in Yankeeland. Grrrr.

• I have been invited to give a presentation at the Center for Inquiry - Long Island at 7 PM on May 19:

Guest speaker, Jay Jaffe, editor [sic] of Baseball Prospectus (www.BaseballProspectus.com) will present "Baseball for Freethinkers," an overview of Sabermetrics, the scientific approach to baseball. Jay will challenge the common wisdom or "religion" of baseball strategy and touch on the history of baseball mathematical analysis from Bill James to "Moneyball." Jay will also answer your questions about your favorite team's baseball policies. This is not your parent's baseball discussion! At the Plainview-Old Bethpage Public Library, 999 Old Country Road, Plainview, Nassau County, NY. For info call 516 742 1662 or email LISecHum@aol.com.

I may be joined by a couple of my area BP colleagues for this. The show, as I understand it, will be about 40-45 minutes of presentation, followed by a Q & A to round out to an hour, and it will be taped and edited for a cable access show whose name and airdate I don't know at the moment.

• One of my favorite baseball books of this year thus far is Mark Lamster's Spalding's World Tour: The Epic Adventure That Took Baseball Around the Globe -- and Made It America's Game, about Albert Spalding (the sporting goods magnate) and his round-the-world barnstorming tour of 1888-1889. It's a fascinating travelogue full of vivid characters and rich prose, humor and treachery, a story about a pivotal moment in history when baseball earned its niche as America's national pastime. Lamster is the pinstriped one at Yanksfan vs. Soxfan, and I've been meaning to give this book the writeup it deserves, but a million things keep getting in my way.

The least I can do -- beyond recommending that you grab a copy posthaste -- is give Lamster a plug for a free reading he's doing tonight, May 3, at the Happy Ending Lounge (305 Broome, between Forsythe and Eldridge) here in NYC. He's joined on the bill by Jeff Pearlman (Love Me, Hate Me: Barry Bonds and the Making of an Anti-Hero) and David Margolick (Beyond Glory: Joe Louis vs. Max Schmeling, and a World on the Brink). The reading is free and begins at 8 PM. For more details, see here.

Lamster is also on the bill for a reading at Coliseum Books (11 W. 42nd St. between 5th and 6th Aves.) on Saturday, May 6, for an event sponsored by the New York Chapter of SABR. He's joined on the bill by Brett Topel (The Boys Who Were Left Behind: The 1944 World Series Between the Hapless St. Louis Browns And the Legendary St. Louis Cardinals), and again, it's free. Check it out if you can.