Frobby

If I saw the O’s chasing a lot of pitches out of the zone, it would concern me. I haven’t noticed that. The team is 4th in MLB in runs per game and OPS+, so whatever the O’s are doing, it’s working well. It teams start trying to get them to swing at bad pitches, I expect the O’s will adjust and start walking more.

Jeez, tough crowd. I guess we’ll bring back Jim Hunter and his “modest three game hit streak.”

It’s amazing. Congrats to the Orioles on seeing his potential, and congrats to O’Hearn for making the adjustments necessary to improve. As a reminder, the O’s have an option on O’Hearn for 2025 at $7.5 mm.

Positioning doesn’t affect catch probability. It’s a function of hang time and distance.

Better players get used more often than players who aren’t as good. Most catchers aren’t good enough hitters to be used as DH regularly when they’re not catching. I thibk it’s about that simple.

It takes about 3 seconds to get up to speed. That’s why Statcast measures “jump” as the distance the fielder travels in the first three seconds (further divided into “reaction” in the first 1.5 seconds and “burst” in the second 1.5). Mullins is doing very well on jump this year, at +2.4 feet (covering 37.8 feet). He wasn’t as good last year. https://baseballsavant.mlb.com/leaderboard/outfield_jump

There’s only 3 possible explanations: 1. Mullins didn’t get a great jump. (Always hard to tell on a replay.) 2. Mullins isn’t that fast anymore and a speedier CF wouldn’t have had to dive for it. 3. The stat is flawed. Take your pick.

Roch on Bradish’s rehab start tonight: The Orioles want to get multiple innings out of Bradish. “I think we’re hoping somewhere between two and three innings, in between 40-50 pitches would be ideal,” said manager Brandon Hyde. “See how he feels after every inning, but that would be best-case scenario.”

It’s interesting to compare the careers of McFarland and Danny Coulombe. TJ debuted in 2013 and is 35; Danny debuted in 2014 and is 34. TJ has appeared in 362 big league games, throwing 480.1 innings at a 4.16 ERA (101 ERA+), and has been worth -0.1 rWAR; Danny has appeared in 262 games, throwing 250.1 IP aa 3.63 ERA (114 ERA+) and has been worth 3.1 rWAR. Going into this season, TJ had accrued 8.028 years of service and had been paid $10.5 mm; Danny had accrued 5.008 years and had been paid $5.2 mm. So I’d say at this point that McFatland has spent more time and bern used more heavily in the majors than Coulombe, and has been better paid, even though Coulombe has been more effective.

I don’t think his lack of command in the early going is going to be fixed by changing roles. Irvin typically has very good command. He didn’t at the beginning of last year, but recovered it after a stint in the minors. This year he’s having early problems again, but I think the reasons may be different. He’s gained velocity and he’s added a new pitch that moves well but he hadn’t quite figured out how to command. So, I don’t know if he’ll figure it out or not. If he does, he could emerge a better pitcher than at any previous time in his career. In any event, he will get at least two more starts before Means is ready to return. Hopefully he’ll make some progress, but he’s likely to find himself in the bullpen when Means returns regardless.

He’s been murdering a lot of balls. 99th percentile in average exit velocity, 97th in hard hit rate. He’s been a little unlucky, with a .331 xOBA, .361 xwOBA going into last night.

Where did you find that info?

His homer today was really a glorified pop fly, but hit in the perfect location, right down the line 345 feet. Per Statcast, that ball had an xBA of .040 based on EV and launch angle, and yet it would have been a homer in 24 of 30 ballparks.

I mean, he’s no Machado, but he gets the job done. We’ll probably see a few deep backhand throws he won’t make, but he should be solid otherwise. He gets rid of the ball very smoothly and doesn’t require a lot of time to load up.

Sally League player of the week!