Frobby

I’d be okay if he hit .240 with 35 homers, especially with a good walk rate. I’m glad he’s pushing for more than that, but that would play well.

His free swinging isn’t any worse than previous years, in fact it’s slightly better than in previous years. But his results weren’t just bad, they were off the charts awful. Way worse than the second half of last year. Worse than Cowser’s current slump or his 2023 debut. So, it’s reasonable to suspect that his health issues were the reason. Bottom line, he’ll perform better now or he won’t.

Though still very bad, the Shorebirds have been a little more competitive of late. After starting off, 2-12, they’ve gone 7-11 since then to sit at 9-23. The biggest problem is the offense, last in the Carolina League at 3.09 R/G (league average is 4.54) and OPS at .578 (.654 is average). The second biggest problem is defense, second worst in the Carolina League at 52 errors, .955 Fldg %. A full 25% of the runs allowed by the Shorebirds have been unearned (41 of 161), also 2nd worst in the league. The pitching is respectable, 8th of 12 teams at 3.83 ERA (just above the 3.74 league average), but because of the defense, the team ranks 10th in runs allowed per game at 5.06 (4.55 league average). One encouraging marker is that the staff is 2nd in K/9 at 11.1 and ranks 4th in. K/BB at 2.57. I think it would be reasonable to infer that the staff ERA would be better if the defense were better. Individually, the only players who top the league average of .654 OPS are 20-year old Angel Tejada at .676 (.266/.393/.383) and 19-year old Thomas Sosa at .656 (.220/.325/.330). However, keep your eye on 19-year old Aron Estrada, who after an awful start, has a .944 OPS in May to reach .601 on the season. Tejada also has been hot in May at .876. Struggling prospect Braylin Tavera (.478) hasn’t played in the last three games; I’m not sure if he’s banged up or just getting a breather. Starting pitchers who are below the league average 3.74 ERA include 21-year old Luis De Leon (2.16 ERA, 0.880 WHIP), 14.0 K/9), 22-year old Nestor German (1.48 ERA, 0.986 WHIP, 10.7 K/9), and 20-year old Michael Forret (3.22 ERA, 1.030 WHIP, 12.1 K/9). Riley Cooper (22)(2.06 ERA, 1.062 WHIP, 12.9 K/9) and Braxton Bragg (23)(2.70 ERA, 1.000 WHIP, 12.6 K/9) have spot started but pitched mostly in relief so far. There are a few other pitchers who are interesting despite slightly higher ERAs but I’ll omit them in the interests of brevity. Overall, still a lot of work to do here, but at least there are signs of life.

Some defensive numbers at the quarter pole: Henderson +4 Rdrs, +4 Rtot, +4 OAA, -0.1 UZR Mountcastle +4 Rdrs, 0 Rtot, -1 OAA, -0.6 UZR Mateo +3 Rdrs, +4 Rtot, -1 OAA, 0.0 UZR Rutschman +2 Rdrs, +3 Rtot, -1 CS, -1 FR, +1 BL Mullins +2 Rdrs, -1 Rtot, +2 OAA, +1.4 UZR Urias +1 Rdrs, -1 Rtot, 0 OAA, -0.5 UZR Westburg +1 Rdrs, -1 Rtot, +1 OAA, -0.3 UZR Cowser 0 Rdrs, +1 Rtot, +4 OAA, +1.5 UZR O’Hearn 0 Rdrs, -2 Rtot, 0 OAA, -0.6 UZR Santander -2 Rdrs, +1 Rtot, 0 OAA, -0.2 UZR Hays -2 Rdrs, -2 Rtot, -1 OAA, + 0.4 UZR McCannn -4 Rdrs, -1 Rtot, 0 CS, -2 FR, -1 BL Cano +2 Rdrs TEAM: +11 Rdrs (11th in MLB) +5 Rtot (10th), +9 OAA (6th),+0.6 UZR (13th)

Weston had his third straight solid outing for Bowie, allowing one run in 3.1 innings. He’s carrying a 1.74 ERA at Bowie since his promotion.

Bradfield has shown some signs of heating up since returning from the IL. Tonight, he singled and tripled in 5 PA to raise his BA to .247 and his OPS to .715. Not where you’d want them but moving north a bit in May. He also stole a base, but then got picked off 2B.

Honestly, it’s all pretty arbitrary. The key is, whenever the streak ends, we hopefully will nevertheless continue to play consistently winning baseball.

Oh, I understand that. I didn’t have time to post both rWAR and fWAR when I wrote my post, so I just posted rWAR. But fWAR feels more in line with my impressions of Mountcastle’s season so far. That’s totally subjective on my part. I feel like a .797 OPS for a 1B is good, not great, even in a down offensive year league wide. Anyway, I’d be quite happy if the rest of Mountcastle’s year went like the first quarter has gone. He’s played really good defense this year too.

He’s basically 2-3 hits under what he did last year so I cut him a break. I think rWAR feels a bit harsh to me. He’s at -0.2 fWAR.

fWAR only has him at 0.7, so on pace for 2.8. I don’t feel like he’s having a 5 WAR season, but I do think he’s having an above average season by his standards. Not quite far enough above average for me to put him in the exceeding expectations category, but I can see the case for it.

Obviously, there’s a line somewhere between being a slight disappointment and failing to meet expectations. This is a down year offensively around the league, so Santander’s .731 OPS is still good for a 112 OPS+, not as good as 2022-23 but above his career mark of 109. He’s on pace for 28 HR and 100 RBI. So, I gave him the benefit of the doubt. I can understand why some would put him on the other side of that line.

You realize that’s totally misleading, right? The O’s have had 22 save opportunities this year and Kimbrel’s had 11 of them. That’s because any time a reliever enters a game in the 6th inning or later, if he gives up the lead that’s a “save opportunity” that was blown, even though that reliever would never have been in the game later to get the save.

Who is publishing favorites to win the Cy Young Award? If Burnes is 2nd, it’s not because he’s been the second best pitcher in the league so far, it’s because he’s done reasonably well and people think he’ll do even better for the rest of the year. Anyway, if you expect a guy to be among the top 5-6 pitchers in the league and he does that, then he’s meeting expectations.

Peyton Burdick was DFA and claimed by the Reds several weeks ago. Anyway, I’m not going to spend a lot of time defending McKenna, I just thought some of the comments here and elsewhere were a little mean and personal.

Not a surprise, +0.99 runs in favor of the Blue Jays last night, mostly on balls that were called strikes.

Here are my votes. I didn’t include anyone with less than 50 PA or 15 IP. Exceeding expectations Henderson .892 OPS, 2.7 rWAR Westburg .871 OPS, 1.8 rWAR Cowser .831 OPS, 0.7 rWAR (ignoring recency bias) O’Hearn .883 OPS, 1.0 rWAR Mateo .706 OPS, 0.6 rWAR Irvin 4-1, 2.90 ERA, 0.9 rWAR Suarez 2-0, 1.96 ERA, 0.8 rWAR Webb 0-2, 1.47 ERA, 0.4 rWAR Akin 1-0, 3.00 ERA, 0.2 rWAR Coulombe, 0-0, 2.30 ERA, 0.5 rWAR Meeting expectations Rutschman .834 OPS, 1.7 rWAR Mountcastle .797 OPS, 1.2 rWAR Santander .731 OPS, 0.5 rWAR McCann .541 OPS, - 0.5 rWAR Burnes 3-2, 2.68 ERA, 1.0 rWAR Kremer 3-3, 3.73 ERA, -0.2 rWAR Rodriguez 4-1, 3.71 ERA, 0.3 rWAR Cano 2-1, 2.21 ERA, 0.4 rWAR Baumann 1-0, 4.02 ERA, -0.1 rWAR Failing to meet expectations Mullins .592 OPS, 0.4 rWAR Urias .492 OPS, 0.0 rWAR Hays .311 OPS, -0.9 rWAR Wells 0-2, 5.87 ERA, -0.3 rWAR Kimbrel 4-1, 3.86 ERA, 8 saves, 3 blown saves, 0.0 rWAR Obviously, many of these are debatable, and largely depend what your expectations were to begin with. For example, Adley is having an excellent season, but I expect excellence from him. He’s probably exceeding my expectations a little, but not enough to put him in the exceeding expectations category. My expectations for Baumann were low, and he’s doing about what I expected. Bottom line, we have more guys exceeding expectations than failing to meet them, but there’s plenty of room for improvement

Yes, good point, 8 out of 154 people voted that way, though I suspect at least a couple of them were just being contrarian for the hell of it.

No offense, but what difference does it make who was pitching for the other team? Sometimes a mediocre pitcher has a good game. If you’re the opposing pitcher, that’s not your fault. Are we blaming Burnes that we got shut out by Williams and Gil? You can’t win a game in which you score zero runs, last I checked. I will grant you that Burnes so far has looked very good, not great, in most of his starts. Still, he hasn’t thrown a single stinker. We’ve had a good chance to win every time he’s pitched. The bullpen blew two saves for him, and we were shut out twice. I really can’t fault him for any of it.

Who is saying anyone should just accept it? Is anyone arguing for McKenna to stay on the roster? If they are, it’s only because they don’t want Stowers sitting on the bench and would rather have a worse player doing that.

McKenna is pretty much the definition of a replacement level player. It’s not like we’ve given him tons of playing time. I agree that every team has guys like this.

Three homers as a LHB in the last two games, and suddenly Adley’s on pace for 32 homers and 101 RBI. He now has 4 homers from each side of the plate. His LHB split is still well below normal for him, but it’s nice to see him getting it rolling. .309/.343/.491 at the quarter-pole. On pace for 6.8 rWAR, 5.6 fWAR. I think he’s still trying to find the right balance between patience and aggressiveness.

If it happened a lot, I’d be concerned. Something to keep an eye on, but feeling a bit gassed one game is going to happen.

It wax a poorly executed pitch. It happens. Even excellent pitchers make some mistakes in key spots. I’ll take one run in six innings every time.

6-4 (54 RS, 34 RA) 7-3 (63 RS, 59 RA) 6-4 (40 RS, 28 RA) 7-3 (43 RS, 31 RA) 1-0 vs. NYY, 3-0 at CIN, 1-1 at WSN, 2-1 vs. ARI, 0-1 vs. TOR It’s amazing how sour we can get about losing two games in a row.

I’m mostly in this camp. Burnes is on pace to throw throw 197 innings at a 2.68 ERA, and people are complaining? I’ve been mildly disappointed that he hasn’t gotten deeper into a few games, but I’d take 197 innings any day. And you’re right that he’s gotten very little run support of late. 4 runs in the last 4 games.