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NEW YORK, N. Jerian Grant Jersey .Y. - Randy Johnson, Pedro Martinez and John Smoltz already consider themselves relics.Baseball transformed during the second half of their careers and has been revolutionized in the five years since their final pitches.Out: big boppers.In: strict pitch limits, a profusion of relief pitchers and sudden swell in defensive shifts.Old goats is what Martinez called the newest Hall of Famers, products of another age — remember back before high definition TVs and mobile Internet browsers were commonplace?So much has changed so quickly.The game has kind of gone to a Stratomatic-type baseball game, where hitting is difficult because youre facing nine and 10 pitchers combined per team, Smoltz said Wednesday. Guys are not going attain 3,000 innings. Theyre not going to get 3,000 strikeouts.Vive le difference! seemed to be the motto of their joint news conference.Smoltz, pretty much average for a pitcher at 6-foot-3, stood on a chair to drop a cap onto the head of Johnson, the tallest of 215 Hall of Fame players at 6-foot-10. All the while, the Big Unit struggled to button his cream-colored jersey with Hall of Fame in red script, unable to line up the buttons with the correct buttonholes.Those left-handers, Johnson quipped.At 5-foot-11 the shortest pitcher picked for Cooperstown since Whitey Ford in 1974, Martinez held both hands up with fingers raised and smiled broadly.The trio of pitchers, elected to the Hall on Tuesday along with Craig Biggio, are among the all-time greats statistically, given the era they pitched in.Martinezs 2.93 career ERA is 1.47 below the big league average during the years he pitched, easily the best margin in major league history among pitchers with 1,500 or more innings, according to STATS. The next best are Carl Hubbell and Lefty Grove at 1.15, Hoyt Wilheim at 1.14, Greg Maddux at 1.13 and Roger Clemens at 1.12.Johnsons 1.01 is 13th and Smoltzs 0.97 is 15th.Speaking at a Manhattan hotel, Johnson said the game is just starting to get back into whack. He thinks pitching became more onerous in the 1990s and early 2000s because smaller ballparks replaced multiuse stadiums and Major League Baseball introduced QuesTec, a computer system put in place in 2001 to evaluate ball-strike calls. Umpires responded by shrinking strike zones back toward the rule-book definition.When I watch old footage of pitchers throwing strikes from the letters to the knees, its black-and-white footage, back when dinosaurs roamed. Thats not the strike zone that I pitched in, he said. Things still are slighted towards offence. Offense is what creates fan base. But theres still well-pitched games out there, and things are starting to balance out now, yes, absolutely.Drug testing has played a part, too. Since urine samples started to be collected in 2003, offence has shrunk along with muscle mass. And the rise in computing capability has led to defensive shifts that take away hits, too.At the tail end of the Steroids Era in 2000, scoring rose to 5.14 runs per team per game and ERA to 4.76, the highest for both since 1930. By last year, runs dropped to 4.07 and ERA to 3.74, the lowest since the early 1970s.Every team seems to have hard-throwing relievers heading in from the bullpens in earlier and earlier innings.We never had a pitch limit, Smoltz said. Your managers eyes and pitching coach knew when your pitch limit reached the mechanical failures or the fact that you werent getting it done.Johnson won 303 games and struck out 4,875, second-most in major league history. Martinez was 219-100 and struck out 3,154. Smoltz went 213-155 with 154 saves and 3,084 strikeouts, the only pitcher with 200 wins and 150 saves.Martinez believes theres more of a level ground for every team these days because of changes such as revenue sharing and the luxury tax, which has created additional home-cooked product, made more teams contenders and heightened competition.I can only imagine, he said when asked whether his stats would be even better now. I dont know what it would be like. Im not going to try it. But Ill tell you what, I enjoyed the way I did it. I enjoyed my era. I enjoyed the way I competed. And thats the way I wanted it.Smoltz predicts additional evolution, perhaps a return to the era when starters went deeper into games. He thinks babying arms has led to more catastrophic injuries. He had a ligament replaced in 2000, then spent most of four seasons in the bullpen before returning to Atlantas rotation.Somethings got to change, he said. And I dont think condensing it and lowering the pitch limit is the reason that were going to save arms. Grant Hill Magic Jersey . Edwin Encarnacion carried the torch for two days at Fenway Park this week; Melky Cabrera and Jose Bautista have had their moments; lately Anthony Gose has contributed. Dwight Howard Magic Jersey . The freestyle skier from Calgary finished sixth in the qualification round with a total of 82.00 points. Groenewoud won a silver medal at the X Games last month, just over five weeks after undergoing double knee surgery. http://www.magicauthentic.com/kids-jonathan-isaac-magic-jersey/ . In this weeks Leaf Report podcast, James Mirtle and Jonas Siegel debate whether Toronto can continue their shootout dominance and discuss what Dave Nonis game plan should be heading into the trade deadline.Austin, TX (SportsNetwork.com) - Cliff Alexander led four Jayhawks in double figures with 15 points and No. 11 Kansas played a clean second half to take down 17th-ranked Texas 75-62 for a key road victory that could help determine the Big-12 regular season. Perry Ellis and Brannen Greene scored 14 points apiece and Frank Mason III had 12 for Kansas, which committed all three of its season-low three turnovers in the first half. Alexander scored all of his points and grabbed all nine of his rebounds in the final 21:54 of the game. Kansas (16-3, 5-1 Big 12) has won two straight since dropping a road game against Iowa State. The Jayhawks have won or held a share of a remarkable 10 straight Big 12 regular-season crowns, but many believed Texas had a chance to threaten that run this season. Isaiah Taylor had 23 points to pace the Longhorns (14-5, 3-3), who have dropped three of their last five games. Texas opened the game with an 11-2 run, but 3-pointers from Wayne Selden and Greene on consecutive possessions before the first media timeout had Kansas right back in the game. Mason assisted on both 3s. Greeene then scored five straight during a 9-0 run as Kansas climbed in front. Penny Hardaway Magic Jersey. Cameron Ridley netted five in a row to tie the game at 28 late in the first half, but Alexander answered with a pair of dunks and Kansas led 32-30 at halftime. Myles Turner hit a jumper 5 1/2 minutes into the second half, giving the Longhorns a 44-39 lead, but it quickly disappeared. Alexander threw down a jam on a feed from Perry Ellis, then kicked out to Selden for a 3 from the left wing. Greene followed with another triple, and the Jayhawks led by three. It was 53-50 with seven minutes to play when Greenes well-contested 3-ball from the corner sparked a 9-2 burst that just about put the game out of reach. Kansas went 6-for-6 from the foul line in the final two minutes to seal it. Game Notes Kansas has won seven of the last eight games in the series ... Kansas bench produced 31 points compared to just eight from the Texas reserves ... Texas went 3-for-18 from 3-point range ... Jonathan Holmes scored 14 points for UT ... The teams will meet again in Lawrence on Feb. 28. ' ' '