e16bball
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Posts posted by e16bball
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22 minutes ago, wildcard said:
I don't know if its getting his head screwed on straight as much has its learning to hit anything but a fastball. Pitchers have the book on him now and he has to adjust or he will just keep seeing off speed pitches that he can't hit.
What happened in April is old news for him as is his averages for the year. He is in a new adjustment period.
Not to nitpick you too much, because I think a substantial part of what you’re saying is true — but he’s absolutely destroyed sliders this year, and he’s also been good against cutters, so I don’t think it’s exactly accurate to say he can only hit fastballs. The problem has been specifically with the pitches that substantially change speed and/or present a lot of downward movement (changeups, primarily, but also curveballs).
They are definitely changing the way they pitch to him, and I think he’s hyper-aware of it — hence the late trigger (or no trigger at all) against fastballs recently. The next step for him is being able to spit on the downward breakers that aren’t strikes. If he can do that, he is going to be a terrific hitter.
That’s a huge step, obviously, and lots of guys can never do it. But I think it’s promising that he seems to have no issues at all hitting pitches with horizontal movement, because he clearly can recognize and adjust to spin/break.
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1 hour ago, DirtyBird said:
MLB Ranks
ERA - 21st
WHIP - 16th
FIP - 36th
That is with the benefit of facing KC (twice), Angels, Oakland, and Washington
If this is the standard we’re setting, then none of the SEA guys are aces either, so we may as well just shut the whole thread down. None of them rank particularly highly across the board in these metrics over the course of the first 10 starts of the season, either.
As the thread is getting at, the ace status requires sustained performance at a high level — not a hot start or even a hot season. When you start to look back over the last 2-3 seasons, each of the 3 legit aces that were referenced (Burnes, Castillo, Kirby) is sitting right around the top 10 in most/all of these metrics. It would be pretty surprising if that wasn’t the case come August and September.
It’s also a little weird to have to defend a starter with a 2.68 ERA. Would have been the 2nd-best SP ERA in the American League last year, and closer to Cole than to Gray/Bradish. And just for the record, the Royals are top 10 in runs scored so far, so that’s not a real advantage — and the Angels are top 15, and he had to face them while they still had Trout.
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If keeping McCann in the game to try to squeeze in Santander is the decision over PH-ing O’Hearn in that situation, then the Adley as DH strategy has to die.
There have now been multiple scenarios in which McCann should have been out of the game (PR at 1B in the 7th and now this AB), and they didn’t pull him because they feel they can’t. The first time, it absolutely cost us the game-tying run, and you’d have to imagine it probably did once again.
You can’t willfully tie your hands behind your back like that. Adley isn’t that good a hitter.
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What on earth were they thinking?
Treating Yimi Garcia like he’s prime Bob Gibson.
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5 minutes ago, oriolediehard said:
The bottom 5 batters are all automatic outs.
Yeah, in the sense that 3 of the 5 have already gotten on base by the 4th inning, with two of the three hits being over 100 MPH EV — I would agree strongly with this characterization.
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11 minutes ago, Rbiggs2525 said:
Hays has reverse splits for career. He’s a better defensive replacement.
He doesn’t have extreme platoon splits, but they’re still traditional splits. 111 wRC+ against lefties, 101 wRC+ against righties.
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8 minutes ago, interloper said:
What in the world is Hays here for if he's not playing against LHP?
Bad career numbers against Kikuchi, so I could see them thinking they want to ease him back in against a more favorable matchup. But we’ve got 8 RHPs in a row scheduled to start against us, including the three absolute studs from Seattle — so I’m not sure he’s got a better matchup coming in the near future.
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13 minutes ago, dystopia said:
This would make more sense if Kimbrel had been throwing strikes lately. Any batter can watch balls go by.
Doesnt look like we got that Kimbrel today but that doesn’t make the decision any less stupid.
I think it’s pretty much consensus that getting Kimbrel back on track is a top priority for the organization.
Top of the 7th against one of the weaker 3 hitter stretches we’ll probably see all month feels like a pretty ideal place to get your wayward closer a successful and quasi-meaningful inning under his belt.
If it was the ALDS, I think he sticks with Burnes. But it’s the middle of May. And a lot of us beat up on Hyde for not having a long-term lens — a little less stress on Burnes’s arm and a good opportunity for Kimbrel to get a clean inning is potentially doubly beneficial over the long haul.
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2 minutes ago, dystopia said:
Why is Burnes being yanked for Kimbrel
Does Hyde have money on the Jays today?
Yeah, I think Hyde is counting on IKF, Craig Biggio’s kid, and a dude named Ernie tagging Kimbrel with the runs to cash his bet against us.
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Noted flyball pitcher John Means reading the lineup:
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In all candor, I’m not sure what this means — and the answer is probably “not much” — but I found it interesting.
Since April 10, the day Jackson Holliday debuted, the top 4 most valuable position players in all of MLB (per fWAR) have been:
1. Gunnar Henderson (1.5 WAR)
2. Daulton Varsho (1.4 WAR)
3. Jordan Westburg (1.2 WAR)
4. Colton Cowser (1.1 WAR)
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1 hour ago, Malike said:
He said it tongue in cheek, but let's all get mad!
It was absolutely tongue in cheek. He laughed in the midst of saying it. He didn’t even know where Kimbrel sat in the all-time rankings.
Just busting the kid’s stones. Cowser’s that kind of goofball that folks mess with sometimes.
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Another pretty strong outing tonight.
4 IP, 2 H, 2 BB, 4 Ks. The two hits were singles, and not a man made it to second base alive against him.
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4 minutes ago, baltfan said:
Irvin left it in the middle of the plate. He deserved a bit better tonight though.
A “bit better”? One run comes in from first base on what could (generously to our fielders) be called a Bermuda Triangle popup. And then a totally missed strike 3 on a full count extends the inning to allow a can of corn Fenway homer to score two other runs.
Yeah, there was a little hard luck out there.
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13 minutes ago, Bahama O's Fan said:
These guys will probably play tomorrow in Hyde's "Sunday" lineup
I know that I, for one, look forward to some new and novel complaints about the idiocy of the management/lineups of this 101-win team that’s now scored 20 runs through the first 13 innings.
EDIT: 23 runs* through the first 13 innings.
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1 hour ago, Aristotelian said:
wow, I'm not watching but that's a great stat line. Very exciting. How many times did our starter get 11 K's in the last year? How about in the last 5 years. And Burnes has done it in his first start.
Not sure if this was rhetorical or not, but the answer is that we’ve had two games with 12 Ks (John Means x2) and three games with 11 Ks (Kyle Gibson x2 and Kyle Bradish) in the last 5 years.
Sort of wild seeing Kyle Gibson on that list twice. Not at the top of many “Corbin Burnes comps” lists…
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2 hours ago, CaptainRedbeard said:
Wasn’t facing a MLB lineup pitching at the end of the game, but looked like a MLB SP today.
At the beginning of his outing though, back-to-back Ks of Olson and Ozuna were pretty eye-catching.
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4 hours ago, sportsfan8703 said:
Yup. Like having Kjerstad take O’Hearn’s spot and free up that $3.5 million for one of Lorenzen/Clevinger. Also, as a current “payroll challenged” team, do we really have the luxury of an $8.3 million bench when we need a SP?
I have to say, if we’re still at a point where signing some SP5 has to be contingent in any way on dumping $3.5M of Ryan O’Hearn — that would be so very disheartening.
I get why folks want to see Kjerstad over O’Hearn. We all want to see Kjerstad. We all want to see the very exciting all-homegrown-prospect lineups we’ve been pontificating about ad nauseum for years now.
But we’re trying to win it all this season, and O’Hearn had a higher wRC+ in the bigs last year than Kjerstad did in AAA. Just dumping a guy who was a critical part of the lineup last year on blind faith seems a bit rash. And unnecessary.
Maybe O’Hearn regresses to his pre-2023 form. Maybe Kjerstad absolutely rakes. The nice thing is, we have the luxury of letting it all play out. It’s a very long season. If O’Hearn hits his way off the team — or Kjerstad hits his way onto it — then great. That’s a miscalculation we can easily (and happily) correct. But if you ship O’Hearn out and then Kjerstad can’t hack it (or gets hurt, that’s much tougher to un-do.
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9 minutes ago, rm5678 said:
According to the box score, he faced Nick Meyer, Curtis Mead, Junior Caminero, Jose Siri, Richie Palacios, Carson Williams, Kenny Piper, CJ Hinojosa, Ruben Cardenas, & Tanner Murray. So not many major league hitters, although Caminero is apparently their top prospect.
Yeah, Siri is a legit big leaguer and Palacios is sort of a fringy AAAA guy (McKenna type maybe).
But Caminero is their Holliday, Mead is kind of their Westburg, and Carson Williams is sort of poor man’s 20-year-old Gunnar — so there was a lot of talent in the batter’s box, just not many seasoned pros.
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Adley heard people talking about how it's Gunnar's team now...
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I guess that explains a lot of the news of the last few days. Once Trevor Bauer is interested in you, injuries are sure to follow.
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1 hour ago, Malike said:
I had ulnar nerve transposition surgery in 2015 or so. I was out of work for 2 weeks then back MDT (light duty) for 8 more weeks before I was back on full duty. I obviously don't throw a baseball 100 MPH but there are plenty of times when the job is quite physical.
Have also had one.
One of the more minor surgeries I’ve had — the only real long term “arm” effect has been that my actual elbow feels somewhat numb (I assume because one of the primary nerves is no longer there). I don’t feel as though I’ve lost any strength or dexterity in my arm.
I do have a bit more feeling in my hand, which was the point of doing the surgery because the nerve was impinged. I don’t think that would be a bad thing for Felix, but I guess any change could be an obstacle for someone who makes his living gripping and manipulating a ball with that hand?
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13 minutes ago, bpilktree said:
I know some are worried about the loss of Hall and the pen being a bit weak but we just turned a questionable number 5 starter into an ace in the rotation. If they stay healthy we have 3 horses that will give you 6+ innings almost every start if healthy. You don’t need a super deep pen if you have 3 great starters that consistently go deep in games.
For my money, the problem with the pen is the quality, moreso than the quantity.
I have full faith that Elias/Sig will be able to fill out a perfectly workable full-season bullpen with what they’ve got — particularly given that there will likely be a surprisingly effective addition or two to the personnel between now and summertime.
But my concern is the top 3-4 guys that will carry most of the weight in October. I’m not sure we have the high-end arms to lean on in those postseason matchups — in much the same way that our 2023 starting rotation seemed to have been built more for the long haul than for the short sprint. Bit of a bummer that our one Burnes year happens to be our one Bautista-less year.
Would really love to add one more power arm to the back-end of the pen. Maybe that’s more of a trade deadline move for Elias/Sig, though.
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1 minute ago, SteveA said:
Ohtani to Dodgers 10 years $700,000,000. Very significant deferrals said to be his idea so the team could spend more to be competitive.
I know that when I look at the Dodgers, I think “gosh, if they could just add a little salary, they might really have something there”…
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Baumann DFA
in Orioles Talk
Posted
Don’t really understand the amount of disrespect Cionel Perez gets here.
The guy posts a 1.54 ERA in 2021. He then scuffles a little (maybe a lot) to start last season, but closes the season with a 1.86 ERA from mid-June on. And even this year, since coming back from the injury in his season opener, he’s had scoreless outings in 6 of 7 appearances.
Cionel Perez has a 2.68 ERA as an Oriole, good for a 149 ERA+ — which would place him among the top 10 Orioles relievers ever. He has had a couple rough patches, but he’s also had multiple extended periods of elite performance.
But we’re saying we should have cut this guy loose in order to spare Mike Baumann, who is the definition of a replacement reliever? Unless you’re only considering the last week or so in your decision — which I do legitimately think is the case for some — I have trouble seeing how one would conclude Baumann is the one they should have kept. Perez has demonstrated, multiple times over a half-season or more, an elite level that Baumann has never come close to sustaining.