Maverick Hiker
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Posts posted by Maverick Hiker
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In the late 1990's and early 2000's when the HR totals shot up, people naively speculated about the baseballs being juiced. Of course, it turned out that the players were on steroids and HGH, and that is what caused the HR totals to go up.
In my opinion, the exact same thing is happening now. The HR totals are going up,, and people are naively speculating about the baseballs being juiced. History is quite simply repeating itself. The players have found ways to get around the testing and as Segui said in today's USA article, the great majority of MLB players are taking something to improve their performance. (Segui says at least 60% of current MLB players are on PED).
https://www.baseball-reference.com/players/v/verlaju01.shtml
To be talking about the balls being juiced and Verlander's speculations, I think you are wasting your time on a red herring. The PED use in MLB is getting out of control, and the results of the games are being distorted by such stats as the HR totals (and strikeouts).
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14 minutes ago, DrungoHazewood said:
That's fine in laying out a theoretical case where PEDs might have an impact. But there's no evidence. No failed tests. No one admitting taking anything. Mainly a bunch of guys from the early 2000s talking about how it has to be PEDs just like back in their day.
The AAA homer rate means that perhaps PEDs are part of this, but absolutely, without any doubt the ball is a huge piece of it.
Segui seemed to indicate he keeps in touch with current players and he said easily 60% of todays players are juiced. He also indicated the ball is "hot", but that the main cause of this is players on PED.
The article also explained that players who were caught are usually not caught by MLB's testing program, but they make other mistakes that lead to them being caught. There are so many ways to get around the MLB PED testing, it's just not working well.
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Excellent article about possible doping in MLB, in today's USA today.
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David Segui says in a current USA Today article published 07/08/19 that at least 60% of current MLB players are on the juice.
I'd disagree with him there. I think it's at least 90%,
(For some reason the URL won't copy)
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9 minutes ago, El_Duderino said:
Just stopping by to note that these little “hot streaks” have happened every year for him. No one should be fooled.
Yeah but he had some big years when he stayed hot much of the year. .286, 53, 138,
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21 minutes ago, GuidoSarducci said:
My proposal would be with the bases empty, allow a batter to run to either 1st or 3rd base on a ball in play, which they must declare prior to the first pitch. In the event of a single or triple, at the conclusion of the play the player would migrate to the proper default base. That would at least keep the 3rd baseman honest, of course this wouldn't prevent the SS/2B from migrating. But at least this way left handed pull hitters aren't disadvantaged in ways that right handed pull hitters are not.
To make it simpler and preserve the historical tradition of the game, , why not just change the rulebook to say there must be two fielders on each side of 2nd base. Also no infielder can play deep into the outfield, and no outfielder can play the infield.
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I know they used the shift against Williams, I read his book My Turn at Bat.
However the shift has gotten out of hand in today's game. Having these infielders out of position , four outfielders, It takes away from the tradition and the majesty of the game. Actually I think I read MLB is thinking about banning the shift.
(But perhaps this discussion is better left for its own thread as I don't want to distract or go off topic from the Chris Davis thread.)
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I suspect the players are juiced, rather than the baseballs.
Remember the last time there was an unexplained surge in HR like this in MLB. McGwire, Canseco,, Bonds, Sosa, all of them turned out to be on the juice. As I get older, I see that history often repeats itself.
Here is what I suspect is happening. The majority of MLB hitters and pitchers are now on PED. Only it's different from the old McGwire days, today's PED don't bulk the players up to look like the Incredible Hulk. Also the drug makers are so far ahead of the weak testing program in MLB that players will very rarely get caught. '
The pitchers are throwing faster fastballs, because they are on PED,. Because the batters are also on PED, when they do connect ,the ball leaves the bat with greater velocity and often leaves the park. Hence strikeouts are up due increased velocity of pitchers on PED, and the HR are up due to batters on PED.
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7 minutes ago, Roll Tide said:
The one hit looked like a pop up that fell into left field. Sometimes you get lucky and take it.
That's one way for Davis to beat the shift.
(Actually I hope they make the shift illegal also 4 outfielders like the Rays used against the Yankees today. )
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2 hours ago, atomic said:
I didn’t see the game today but a double and a single and his OPS is over .600. I hope he keeps hitting and proves us all wrong about him.
2 for 3 and still only .189. It's too bad that he dug himself into such a deep hole with his average, but wouldn't it be something if he hit something like his old self after the all star break.
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1 hour ago, OsFanSinceThe80s said:
Go out on top like Ted William hitting a home run in his final at bat.
I wonder if the pitcher grooved the pitch, like Denny McClain grooved one to Mickey Mantle near the end of Mantle's career.
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1 hour ago, atomic said:
He is hitting .182. Are you rooting for him to do poorly.
Yes .182 it is, and it's a hard .182.
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5 hours ago, accinfo said:
I am wondering if the All-Star break could see a decision on Chris Davis. He is in the starting line-up today and maybe this weekend could be the last hurrah. You have DJ Stewart probably ready to come back from his injury. The probably want to keep Wilkerson has the utility player.
HR tonight by Davis and 2 RBI, they are not going to release him now by the all star break. He is hitting better lately I never thought he would cross the Mendoza line but he's .175 and rising now, I could have been wrong.
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2 hours ago, DrungoHazewood said:
I'll concede that there was a brief period where money wasn't that a big of a deal, because there really wasn't anything to spend money on. The owners had successfully held off challenges to the reserve clause, and they'd successfully stopped the only free agency of the pre-1970s era: amateurs. There was about a decade where no player had any say in where he played or how much he made.
That is never coming back. Never ever. It wouldn't last 30 seconds in the courts. If you think that competitive balance is messed up and market size and resources are skewing baseball you're going to have to come up with a different solution. Free agency is here to stay.
And if you did go back to a 1970 setup you'd have players fleeing from baseball to other sports where they could make much more money and have choice in employers. The salary Frank Robinson made in 1965 was the equivalent of about $500k today, or what is now the MLB minimum. Many players of that era made today's equivalent of less than $100k. Any top young athlete and his parents would see that and steer their kids to all the other sports where they could make ten or 100 times that. I'm sure soccer and football and basketball and hockey would love the influx of talent.
I grew up and became a MLB fan, during that brief period when money didn't mean much, so I suppose that's why I think that's the way it should be today. Especially since the Orioles thrived during that period.
There is an argument to be made that it's better for the sport to have the rich big market teams like the Yankees and Dodgers dominate. Nationally, they have far more fans than do the Orioles, the Reds, or the Royals.
I don't really believe that it is good, however, to have competitive imbalance like we do today.
Getting back to Chris Davis, I wonder if the new batting stance is doing him good, it does seem like he's hit a little better lately.
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4 minutes ago, DrungoHazewood said:
Who were the players the Yanks missed out on in the '65 draft who would have immediately vaulted them back into contention? A quick perusal of the first round indicated that only one or two players taken that year played at all in the majors in '65 or '66, and those were brief cups of coffee.
Reggie Jackson came out of the draft in '66 and was a MLB star for the A's by 1969. If the Yankees had been able to sign him (with no draft as they used to do pre-1965)
then that would've shifted the balance of power in the AL East 8 years before the Yankees did acquire him in 1977.
The point of all this is that the present system is not really working and it has not worked since free agency started in MLB. The big market Yankees have a big competitive advantage. When the Orioles waste money on a signing like Chris Davis they cannot shake it off as easily as the Yankees can do.
MLB did have a much better system for achieving competitive balance in the 1965-75 period. To me, this was truly the golden age of MLB, with the major league draft starting in 1965, and and prior to free agency starting in 1976. In 1965-75 all teams had a fair chance, no team had. a big competitive advantage based on market size, and the Orioles dominated that period like no other team in MLB(most wins).
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3 hours ago, DrungoHazewood said:
Yes, it's a coincidence. The effects of a draft take hold 3, 4, 5 years afterwards. Adley Rutschman is a very advanced college hitter and will not be a regular in Baltimore until at least 2021. Most of the rest of the Orioles' most recent draft class won't be in the majors until 2023 or later. The Yanks had their first losing record in 40 years in 1965, the year of the first draft. There's no cause-and-effect there.
And with all of the supposed limiting effects of the draft they were back to .500 by '68, and back to 93 wins by 1970. Looking through the transaction logs none of the 1976 World Series team was acquired by free agency.
The Yankees demise in the late 60's was indeed connected to the start of the free agent draft, which evened the playing field for all MLB teams with attaining young players.. Remember some players make an impact right away after they are drafted. For example, Mickey Mantle was a Yankee star by age 20. Joe DiMaggio, age 21. The Yankees no longer could fill their vacancies with the best young talent starting in 1965 without the other teams having a fair chance at those players.
The Yankees had an overall losing record in the 1965-69 period and were mediocre through the early 70's (they fell from 93 wins in 1970, an aberration, back a mediocre 82-80 record in 1971). Some called this the "Horace Clarke" era for the Yankees, named after the mediocre .250 hitting infielder.
While the Yankees made the WS in 1976, they got swept by the Reds in a humiliating manner and were outscored 22-8.
With 1977 and the advent of free agency, the Yankees signed Reggie Jackson as a free agent and he led the Yankees to a world championship, hitting 3 HR against the Dodgers in the final game of the WS. Without Jackson they would not even have made the playoffs that year.
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59 minutes ago, DrungoHazewood said:
1. The Bonilla and Davis contracts cost their teams less overall by using deferred money. Teams could have said no deferred money and the players probably would have high-fived, because deferred equals less.
2. The last few years competitive balance has declined a bit, but that's mostly because team realized there's little benefit to winning 78 games instead of 58. But prior to that competitive balance was higher than in the 1960s. Competitive balance generally just goes up, and it consistently has throughout baseball history. From 1920-1965, all prior to free agency, the Yankees were in the World Series 29 times in 45 years. Seven separate times they made the WS at least three consecutive years. During that entire period the Yanks had one year with a losing record.
And during that same general period the Browns were in one Series, during the war, and had five winning records. They had seasons where they drew under 100k fans. The Phillies had a run where they lost 100+ games in a 154 game schedule 12 times in 25 years, including five straight. From 1935-68 the A's had one winning record. From 1917 through 1946 the Braves never finished higher than 4th. From 1935 until they moved in 1960 the Senators finished 6th, 7th or 8th 19 times, never won the AL pennant, and only finished as high as 2nd twice. Most of those teams moved because they were uncompetitive for generations and their fanbases withered away.
Do the math - there is a smaller average distance from first to last over the last 20 years than there was from 1940-60, and we simply don't have the situation where the Yanks are in the World Series two out of three years any more. Yes, that's because of expanded playoffs, as much as better competitive balance, but the result is the same. The Yanks cannot win the Series every year, or even close
3. Keeping your team together as long as the owner decides to sounds great. Unless maybe you're the 1930, 40, 50s Braves or Browns or Phils or A's or Senators. Doesn't accomplish a lot to have a team of indefinitely indentured (but happy and contented!) servants who win 63 games a year.
4. We're not going back to 1960. It just isn't happening. Every team sport I know of has free agency. Even the Russian hockey league has free agency. And that's good, because free agency is a good thing.
I didn't say we should go back to 1960 or 1940. I said 1968, or more specifically the late 60's through early 70's. Before 1965, the Yankees had huge competitive advantages due to a flawed system. They used to sign almost any young players they wanted using their large market and revenue advantages.
In 1965 baseball instituted the free agent draft which was a fair process, with the worst teams picking first, for the best high school and college players. This eliminated the Yankees advantages.
Is it a coincidence that the Yankees gravitated towards the basement in 1965-75? Or that the small market Orioles dominated those years? I think not. The Yankees lost their advantages during those years. They regained their advantage big time with the advent of free agency which I believe started in 1976. By 1977 the Yankees were winning the WS with the help of free agent stars
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14 minutes ago, UpstateNYfan said:
2037?? I wonder how many pages this thread will be by then??
It'll set the record.
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1 hour ago, thezeroes said:
3 more years after this one. 2022 will be the last of it. Hopefully before that.
The deferred money will be going to Davis to the tune of more than a million a year through 2037, unless he agrees to a deal to retire for less (ideal but unlikely),. Thus the Davis contract will continue to weigh down the Orioles for 18 more years.
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The engineer analogy is not really a true analogy to the situation in MLB in the 1960s. The game was thriving back then and yes players were for the most part happy and content. Besides player happiness isn't paramount. What is more important is what's good for the fans and the game. Paying millions to players like Bonilla and Davis extending into their 50's, that isn't right for fans to have to pay for that.
Also the competitive balance of the game isn't what it used to be in the 1960's. Market size and payroll was not as important as today. The Orioles won the AL East 3 straight years by 69-71 by large margins, I think by like 18 games in 1969, not possible today for a smaller market team going against the Yankees.
Better system then. Maybe we can't go back to the way it was but a few steps in that direction would help.
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2 hours ago, OFFNY said:
o
Joe DiMaggio had several salary holdouts when he played for the Yankees. In the first of these disputes, not only did the Yankees not give him a dime more than their original $25,000 offer, but they fined him $100 per day for each day that he held out in Spring Training.
DiMaggio eventually cracked, and reported to Spring Training for the Yankees' original offer (minus the several hundred dollars that Yankee management fined him for the missed days.)
25K was a lot of money back then. Sometimes the holdouts worked sometimes they didn't but at least the contracts were not for millions of dollars into players' 50's as the Davis contract is.
That being said I'm glad to see Chris is hitting better the last few games. He is still an Oriole and I regret booing him this year when I went to a game. I can't blame him for signing the contract they offered him, although I do think he should take a buyout if his performance does not improve.
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6 hours ago, DrungoHazewood said:
There are pluses and minuses to making MLB more like other North American sports. There's an argument that the lower percentage of revenues is because of MLB's vast minor league systems, which leads me to wonder if having vast minor league systems make sense. The shared TV revenue seems like a good idea, but many teams have established long-term agreements that are of great benefit to them; you would have to convince them to give up massive amounts of revenue, with a hit to their bottom line and franchise values. A hard cap and a floor sometimes sounds good, but the cap would probably be high enough so that it only impacts a few teams, and a floor keeps the O's from really doing an accelerated rebuild. A floor basically forces them to an atomic-style rebuild, where they sign Kevin Millars and Jay Paytons every offseason to meet the floor number.
I'm not against earlier free agency. What I really like is how I understand the NHL does it - you're a free agent at 28. Or 27 or something. None of this stuff where a guy doesn't get established until he's in his late 20s and is basically retired before he hits free agency.
I really don't get the appeal of eliminating long contracts. Contracts will be loosely based on market value. If you say that no contract can be more than five years you're basically telling everyone the average annual value has to go up. Instead of Harper signing a 10-330 deal, he'd sign a 5/250 deal. And this might eliminate the deferred money that helps smaller market teams afford big deals. Capping contract lengths is just a way to keep owners from going overboard. An alternate solution would be to have owners and management make better decisions.
Ideally MLB should just go back to a 1960's- early 70's type of structure. NO free agency at all would , solve a lot of these problems.
The Orioles of 1968 would not have given a player like Chris Davis a contract that would pay him over a million dollars a year into his 50's. They would not have had to worry about him walking out the door and signing with another team.
The 1968 Orioles would've offered him a fair but not a ridiculous contract, and if Davis didn't like it he has the option of holding out for more money (Like Koufax and Drysdale did one year, it worked for them as I recall). Or he could always walk out of MLB. But players wouldn't quit t because they made far more in MLB even in the 60's than they could have made elsewhere.
Free agency is the root of the cause of so many problems in MLB.
*Contracts like Davis' are unfair to the teams, the owners, and especially to the fans who end up paying for it. Also free agency favors the big market teams who can afford free agents and who. can afford to keep their home gown talent.
*Free agency means players can walk out on hometown fans, in the old days there was much more affection for players who stayed their whole career and the fans would know their strengths, weaknesses, even their gait.
*Outrageous contracts have raised the ante for players to succeed at all costs, and if that includes going on the juice (steroids or HGH) the richest players can afford to get the best stuff which can't be detected.
All these and more problems can be traced to free agency. If the MLBPA won't budge then the owners could sit out a strike until they do.
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7 hours ago, DrungoHazewood said:
I'll tell you what I tell my kids... if you're bored, we'll find you some work to do.
LOL. Also if he finds it so boring he is free to go elsewhere.
It'll set the record.
Are Baseballs "Juiced" This Season?
in Orioles Talk
Posted
Strikeouts are up and pitchers are getting bigger. I think both batters (more HR) and pitchers (strikeouts going up) are on PED.
If the baseball being juiced is causing more HR, then how do you explain the larger sized pitchers and the increased strikeout totals? If the ball is juiced then batters would presumably not have to swing as hard, just make contact, and there would be fewer strikeouts not more.
Also if the ball is juiced and flying off the bat faster, I would expect there would be more incidents of pitchers getting hurt by line drives hit back up the middle and hitting the pitcher before he could react. I have not heard of any such increase.