Darvish pitches Rangers past Blue Jays

Associated Press Sports

updated 10:40 p.m. ET April 30, 2012

TORONTO (AP) - Yu Darvish acknowledged it felt strange to face the Blue Jays. That didn't stop him from shutting down their lineup.

Darvish won his third straight start, Mitch Moreland and Craig Gentry homered and the Texas Rangers beat Toronto 4-1 on Monday night.

Pitching against a Blue Jays team that reportedly pursued him when his rights went up for auction last December made Darvish (4-0) a little uneasy as he took the mound.

"Honestly, it was kind of an awkward feeling because rumor has it that this was a team that might have posted for me and there was some chance that I might have played for this team," Darvish said through a translator. "Facing the Blue Jays, they could have been my teammates."

Toronto might have wished that themselves on this night, scratching out just one run and four hits in seven innings against the Japanese sensation, the first starting pitcher in Rangers history to win four of his first five games.

Blue Jays manager John Farrell said Darvish was "outstanding" and "as good as advertised," while Rangers skipper Ron Washington called him "electric."

"He had good stuff," Washington said. "Once again, the most impressive thing about him was when he got people on the bag, he made pitches. That's what good pitchers do."

Darvish allowed his first home run but remained unbeaten in five major league starts. He walked two and struck out nine.

"I don't expect him to go 32-0," Washington said, "but the thing about him is he will keep us in ballgames, and that's what we want."

In winning his past three starts, Darvish has allowed just two earned runs over 21 2-3 innings against Detroit, the New York Yankees and Toronto. His season ERA is 2.18.

"I'm very aware that all these hitters are seeing me for the first time," Darvish said. "It's only April. So I'm not thinking about how I did this month or being satisfied. Right now all I'm thinking about is preparing well for the next start."

Mike Adams worked the eighth and Joe Nathan finished for his sixth save in seven chances.

AL West-leading Texas won for the 17th time in April, matching the 1989 team for the second-most victories in the season's opening month. The Rangers won a record 18 April games in 1998.

Texas slugger Josh Hamilton was held out of the lineup with a sore back. Hamilton, who leads the AL with nine home runs and 25 RBIs, left Sunday night's loss to Tampa Bay in the third inning with back spasms. He is day to day.

Moreland and Gentry, the eighth and ninth hitters in Texas' lineup, swatted back-to-back solo shots off rookie left-hander Evan Crawford in the seventh, giving Darvish some extra cushion.

It was the third time this season the Rangers have hit consecutive home runs. Moreland's homer was his third while Gentry's drive was just his second in 213 career at-bats over parts of four seasons, and his first to clear the fence: His only other one was as an inside-the-park homer against Seattle last Sept. 23.

Texas opened the scoring in the second when Adrian Beltre led off with a double and scored one out later on a double by Nelson Cruz. The Rangers added one more in the third when Ian Kinsler drew a one-out walk and scored on Elvis Andrus' RBI double.

Darvish didn't allow a hit until the fourth but when he did, it was a big one. After being hit on the left elbow by a pitch in the second, Edwin Encarnacion responded by lining a two-out solo homer to left, his eighth of the year and fourth in four days.

It's the second time in his career that Encarnacion has homered in four straight games, something he also did in the final four games of 2010. Following his leadoff single in the seventh, Encarnacion had reached safely in nine straight plate appearances dating to Saturday, recording five hits, walking twice and twice being hit by a pitch. The streak ended when he struck out in the ninth.

The hard-luck loser was Blue Jays right-hander Kyle Drabek, who dropped his second straight start. Drabek (2-2) allowed two runs and five hits in six innings. He walked two and struck out a career-high eight, including five straight during one stretch.

"I was able to command my fastball a lot better than the last two outings," Drabek said. "I had my cutter working, that was probably my best pitch for me. Some hard-hit balls, but I'm happy with where my fastball command was at."

NOTES: Darvish threw 97 pitches, 62 strikes. ... Kinsler's run in the third was his AL-leading 24th, setting a Rangers record for April. ... Citing Toronto's artificial turf, Washington started Beltre at DH, with Michael Young taking over at third base. ... The Blue Jays turned their major league-leading 31st double play. ... Attendance was 21,945.

? 2012 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

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Remembering the workers: Workers' Memorial Day, 2012 | My legal ...

With Workers? Memorial Day in mind, partner Marcus Weatherby ? in?a considered piece for Employment Law magazine?- looks critically at the Government?s current misguided attack on ?excessive health and safety provision?.

?Help, master, help! Here?s a fish hangs in the net,?like a poor man?s right in the law.??(Pericles, 2.1.153), Fisherman

In Shakespeare?s time the working man was unlikely to ever have access to the machinery of the law, however wronged he might have been. All of us like to think that those days have gone, and that one of the basic pillars of our legal system is that the law is accessible to all, not just those who have the right connections or can afford it.

Workers? Memorial Day on 28^th April was an opportunity to highlight the preventable nature of most workplace accidents and ill health, and to promote safety campaigns and union organisation in the fight for improvements in workplace safety. Workers? Memorial Day was started by the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE) in 1984, but has become accepted as the focal point for remembrance on the calendar internationally. To mark it in the UK, a series of demonstrations were held throughout the country.

A total of 171 people were killed at work in Great Britain last year, compared to 147 deaths during 2009/10. More than 24,700 workers also suffered a major injury. In the year 2010/2011, statistics from HSE show around 26.4 million working days were lost in total ? 22.1 million due to work-related illness and 4.4 million due to workplace injuries. (http://www.hse.gov.uk/statistics/dayslost.htm.)

This year?s memorial day came at a time of great change. The coalition government is changing the legislative framework protecting workers. The funding and working practices of the watchdog of health and safety. The way that workplace injuries are reported. And even the system of compensation that injured workers use to enforce their rights against negligent employers .

The Government believes that there is an excessive health and safety culture in the UK, which is an albatross around the neck of British businesses, and which strangles profit and innovation.

To investigate this, the Government commissioned a specialist in risk management ? a Professor Lofstedt ? to report on putting ?the common sense back into health and safety?. His conclusions largely supported the status quo, his general observation on health and safety being that ?the problem lies less with the regulations themselves, and more with the way they are interpreted and applied.?

Since preparing the report, Professor Lofstedt has expressed concern about the extent to which his report is being ?misused? for political purposes. He has emphasised that it did not call for significant changes to regulatory policy, or recognise the ?compensation culture? that government ministers regularly condemn.

Notwithstanding this, the report has been used as an endorsement of the government programme of reforms aimed at ?reclaiming the reputation of health and safety.?

The Government proposes the abolition of large numbers of health and safety regulations. Its intention is that health and safety regulations will be reduced by a third ? rising to over a half ? over the next three years. The current consultation on this reduction ends on the 4/7/2012.

The watchdog of health and safety, the HSE, has also been ?restructured?. The HSE is facing reductions in its government funding by 35% for the period to 2015. Since 2012 the HSE now runs a telephone service for reporting fatal and major injuries only ? with all other reports having to be done online. Which, as many of those workers affected by accidents were making reports in writing or by phone, will mean fewer accident reports are made. Inspections are to be focused on those industries deemed to be ?key major hazard industries? aimed at reducing the number of proactive inspections by 11,000 a year.

Changes to the Reporting of Injuries, Diseases and Dangerous Occurrences Regulations (RIDDOR), brought on 6 April 2012, mean that the over-three-day injury reporting requirement has changed. The trigger point has increased from over three days? to over seven days? incapacitation (not counting the day on which the accident happened). We should therefore expect a reduction in the number of accidents reported. The HSE estimates there will, as a result, be 30,000 fewer reports a year.

At such a time it is relevant to ask:

1.)? Does current legislation safeguard people at work ?

Yes. The EU statistical authority, Eurostat, reveals that the fatal injury rate for Great Britain is consistently one of the lowest in Europe, and has been the lowest amongst the five largest EU countries for a six-year period.

The Lofstedt report itself states that health and safety regulations are broadly accepted to have been an important contributory factor in safer workplaces with the evidence showing that legislation is the primary driver for organisations to initiate changes to improve management of health and safety.

2.)? Is it too expensive ?

Unsurprisingly, it seems that it is accidents and ill health that cost businesses, and not a preoccupation with health and safety. The Institution of Occupational Safety and Health says work-related accidents and ill health cost businesses nearly ?8 billion a year, with absenteeism, low productivity and legal bills among the ?financial hits?.

There is no objective evidence of the financial effect of red tape, although there are estimates. The British Chamber of Commerce argues that the current raft of health and safety regulations ?distracts businesses from driving economic growth and creating employment.? However, the idea that business battles against a tide of risk assessment forms every year is not one that the evidence seems to support. The vast majority of employers are more than capable of following the easy-to-understand advice available from the Health and Safety Executive on how to do them. Over time, the assessments have become well established and familiar. It is worth looking at what the HSE states employers are broadly required to do [see HSE ?5 steps to risk assessment 6/11?]:

• Ascertain the dangers.
• Determine who can be harmed at work and how this would happen.
• Evaluate what can be done to counter it.
• Record the precautions as part of the policy and implement.
• Carry out a review.

Onerous?

3.)? If safeguards go wrong, how will the state support them?

Currently, where people have a serious accident at work, there is at least a safety net provided by the welfare benefits system to soften the impact of the financial changes caused. However, major changes to welfare entitlement in the now-approved Welfare Reform Act will affect the benefit entitlement of workers should injury prevent them from continuing in employment. People who have to take prolonged time off work will be negatively affected by the plans to replace Disability Living Allowance with Personal Independence Payment. By changes to Employment and Support Allowance. And will get less help from the Universal Credit during the first six months of their illness than they would get at present.

4.)? If employers break the law and workers are injured can they seek redress and how?

Currently there is a system of compensation which is based on the principle that the unsuccessful party will be ordered to pay the costs of the successful party. If a claim is proven, the wrong-doer pays the legal costs of their negligence. If it is not, then the claimant pays the employer?s costs of defending the claim. In other words, only if a worker was injured because of the negligence of their employer does the employer have to pay the legal costs and compensation of a civil action.

Within the current system, protection is in place for employers to prevent any excessive costs of litigation. Employers can, for example, prevent escalating costs by making a reasonable offer to the injured party. And, at the end of a case, can get the costs assessed by a judge, who will not allow the claimant to recover costs which have been unreasonably incurred, or are unreasonable in amount.

However under the LASPO bill changing this (now awaiting royal assent) the Government has undermined this principle by shifting the balance of legal payments on to claimants. So that they will have to surrender up to 25 per cent of their damages to cover costs, even when their former employer is found liable for their injury.

Worryingly for employers, under the bill there will seemingly be no way of recovering their costs of defending even the unsuccessful cases, unless they can show the claimant is either fraudulent or a millionaire. In which case there will be little to discourage litigants in person from ?chancing their arm? with a claim.

5.) If employers routinely break the law is there any censure or penalty?

With the cuts being made to the HSE, pro-active assessments of workplaces is going to be less likely. So bad employers will seemingly have less to fear from criminal prosecutions. The reduction in the number of accidents reported will no doubt suggest that an improvement in health and safety has occurred. The reality will be that health and safety will have been relegated below profit.

Government approval of the idea that that health and safety assessment has been getting in the way of business is the wrong message to be sending out a time when businesses are cutting back to deal with the financial effects of the recession. A recent survey of 600 heath and safety professionals found that the economic climate has already taken its toll on the safety sector. With 41% seeing their budget cut this year, and nearly half (45%) claiming that their company ?did not see health and safety as business critical? during a recession.

The fact is that if health and safety for employees suffers, then so too do the profits of healthy businesses. Health and safety is neglected at the peril of all.

There are two million people in the UK who have an illness or injury caused by their work ? the vast majority of which could have been prevented had their employer had taken the correct safety precautions. Never before has the slogan for Workers Memorial Day ?Remember the dead ? fight for the living? been more appropriate.

http://www.pattinsonbrewer.co.uk/

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Canon reported its Q1 2012 earnings this week, and things certainly appear to have gone better than the last time we checked in when it replaced the company president. While revenue declined slightly, net profit reached 61.54 billion yen ($766 million), up 11 percent from a year ago. There's no executive moves to report, however on the earnings call executive VP and CFO Toshizo Tanaka noted a unit sales increase of 30 percent for SLR cameras including the new EOS 5D Mark III as well as the cheaper T3i, Mark II and 60D models, combined with strong sales for WiFi-connected point-and-shoots. As far as new products, while its new cinema cameras got a glancing mention the plan this year includes compact cameras "offering the image qualities that approaches SLR cameras", with improved design and network connectivity features. All the numbers and earnings call talk are in black and white at the links below, although we prefer to spend our time speculating about the future of mirrorless cameras.

Canon reports slightly higher profits in Q1, teases new compact cameras on the way originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 28 Apr 2012 05:11:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink   |  Canon Q1 2012 earnings call, Q1 2012 results (PDF)  | Email this | Comments

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Sony's Alpha A37 and NEX-F3 pose for the camera, reveal more angles, details

Well, well, talk about déjà vu! It was just yesterday that a corner of Sony's 16.1 megapixel NEX-F3 leaked onto the interwebs and now more photos have surfaced, along with a previously unannounced shooter, the Alpha A37 SLT. The pictures come courtesy of Yang Canggih, which says it had chance to demo the two devices yesterday at Sony's Partner's Conference in Jakarta (Curiously, the NEX-F3 post isn't live as of this writing, but Sony Alpha Rumors has the images up.) Starting with the F3, the mirrorless camera has last some of the curves found on its older sibling, the C3, adopting the angular edges that once made the NEX-7 the badass standout in the lineup. You'll notice that the shutter button and grip have an uncanny resemblance to the 7's, not to mention that it's clearly gained a pop-up flash -- a first for the lower-end NEXs. Past that, the rumored -- and self-portrait friendly -- 180 degree tilt-screen is also present, which'll likely give the C3 an edge over its siblings when it comes to composing shots. Also worth note, some of the buttons on back have been slightly repositioned.

Moving along, those hoping for a successor to the A35 will apparently have their wish granted with the 16.1 megapixel A37, which is essentially an evolutionary update. According to Yang Canggih, it sports the articulating display from last generation of NEX cams, Auto Portrait Framing (first introduced with the A57), four more effect modes (up from 11) and an ergonomic grip in the vein of the A77. Sadly, that's about all that's currently known, so hopefully we'll get an official introduction to the cameras soon. Head past the break for a shot of the A37 and then check out the links below for even more of both.

Continue reading Sony's Alpha A37 and NEX-F3 pose for the camera, reveal more angles, details

Sony's Alpha A37 and NEX-F3 pose for the camera, reveal more angles, details originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 28 Apr 2012 21:03:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink Sony Alpha Rumors (1), (2)  |  Yang Canggih (translation)  | Email this | Comments

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