John Means 2021

[bobmc]

3 minutes ago, Ruzious said:

The people want butter on their asparaguy! 

And they surely don't want their asparagus f@rts to stink!!!!

[Can_of_corn]

33 minutes ago, DrungoHazewood said:

 

Paraphrasing from a book on cricket I've been reading: "You don't change cricket to make it more fun and engaging.  That's not cricket.  Cricket is what it was 150 years ago.  It's not supposed to be more fun.  It's part of the culture.  It's good for you, like medicine and religion."

Yep, no reason to change baseball to make it more exciting and engaging.  That's not the point.  The point is even if nobody is watching it's good for you, like eating your boiled asparagus.

Someone has obviously never tried microwaved canned asparagus. 

That was fancy night at the house growing up.

[bobmc]

9 hours ago, Ruzious said:

Thank you!

Every one of the 27 outs!

https://www.mlb.com/gameday/orioles-vs-mariners/2021/05/05/634220?bt_ee=WGbiRq7Wy0SczUkZ0h2PTX60N1IHrRp1ogb3wjOCOo%2BmjRNYj0ijvO8GdYcN4Ey1&bt_ts=1620252503987&partnerId=zh-20210505-228243-BAL-1-A&qid=132&utm_id=zh-20210505-228243-BAL-1-A#game_tab=videos,game_state=final,game=634220

[Frobby]

8 hours ago, LocoChris said:

But there’s a runner on base. I agree it’s probably still a perfect game but there’s still an inconsistency. What if the runner scores on a stolen base and then a sac fly? Is it a perfect game? It’s now possible for a pitcher to pitch a perfect game and lose. That runner should not be on second base. He did nothing to achieve it. 

The second to last sentence is your opinion.   

I do think it would be awful for a pitcher to throw a perfect game and lose in the 10th inning in the way you suggest.    But now let’s consider the odds of that happening.   There have only been two perfect game bids that went to extra innings in baseball history.   So yeah it might happen some day, but it could be decades from now, if ever.   And the way games are managed these days, you’d have to wonder whether a manager would send his pitcher out there for a tenth inning even if he had a perfect game through nine.   If it ever does happen, it’ll be part of baseball lore that everyone will remember.  

Or, we can just make a rule that the runner on 2B rule doesn’t apply in a perfect game.   It will only come up once every 50 years, at most.  Kind of like when leap year is skipped.    
 

[TommyPickles]

Baseball Reference just updated the stats to reflect yesterday's games. Enjoy:

The Case for John Means' 2021 AL Cy Young Award:

WAR for pitchers- 2.3 (1st)

WHIP- 0.674 (1st)

ERA- 1.37 (2nd)

Hits per 9 IP- 4.109 (1st) 

Win-Probability Added- 1.8 (1st)

Innings Pitched- 46 (2nd)

Games Started- 7 (1st)

Wins- 4 (1st)

Complete Games- 1 (1st)

Strikeouts- 50 (4th)

Ace.

[LocoChris]

Just now, Frobby said:

The last two sentences are your opinion.   

I do think it would be awful for a pitcher to throw a perfect game and lose in the 10th inning in the way you suggest.    But now let’s consider the odds of that happening.   There have only been two perfect game bids that went to extra innings in baseball history.   So yeah it might happen some day, but it could be decades from now, if ever.   And the way games are managed these days, you’d have to wonder whether a manager would send his pitcher out there for a tenth inning even if he had a perfect game through nine.   If it ever does happen, it’ll be part of baseball lore that everyone will remember.  

I guess my point is that the rule changes the game in a fundamental way and that’s really the big thing that sticks in my craw with this. Even if the runner gets on from a dropped third strike or interference, that’s still the result of a mistake by the opposing team. 

[LocoChris]

1 minute ago, TommyPickles said:

Baseball Reference just updated the stats to reflect yesterday's games. Enjoy:

The Case for John Means' 2021 AL Cy Young Award:

WAR for pitchers- 2.3 (1st)

WHIP- 0.674 (1st)

ERA- 1.37 (2nd)

Hits per 9 IP- 4.109 (1st) 

Win-Probablity Added- 1.8 (1st)

Innings Pitched- 46 (2nd)

Games Started- 7 (1st)

Complete Games- 1 (1st)

Strikeouts- 50 (4th)

Ace.

Now the tricky part: keeping it up for 25 more starts!

[bobmc]

59 minutes ago, Can_of_corn said:

Someone has obviously never tried microwaved canned asparagus. 

That was fancy night at the house growing up.

When that metal can exploded (Explosivo?) in the nuke, that must have been each week's highlight for sure!  When I was growing up, we finally had a refrigerator vs an "ice box", coal was still delivered under the house into the basement and some guy came by to sharpen our knives and scissors!!!!  I never walked ten miles barefoot to school but I did walk a mile each way.  

[Oriole1940]

Baseball is killing the goose that  laid the golden egg.  They will find that out.  Hope not too late.  

[Just Regular]

Echoing Tommy this morning, here's the refresh of my favorite cherrypick, starting from September 8, his first great game last year.   I suppose May 5 will be hard to top as an arbitrary endpoint.

https://www.fangraphs.com/leaders.aspx?pos=all&stats=pit&lg=all&qual=y&type=1&season=2021&month=1000&season1=2020&ind=0&team=0&rost=0&age=0&filter=&players=0&startdate=2020-09-08&enddate=2021-12-31&sort=9,d

He's leapfrogged the Twins guys, the Bundys, the wobbly Giolitos as far as the sum of the last 2 months' performance.    I suppose yesterday I can't even goof about his 100% LOB rate keeping his ERA artificially low - that wasn't affected yesterday!

He wasn't coming from nearly zero like Mullins, but his improvement alongside Mullins' makes two good April things bigger than any bad things that have happened.   I'd peg the odds about 1% but from here it still isn't impossible Means, Baumann, Hall, Bradish (I'll go with Blood's exuberance for a second at Kremer's expense) and Rodriguez pitch 5 straight to Rutschman in September if Elias wants to maximize attention for good Next Year FA's.

Means' career is now ~250 IP of ~3.50 ERA.   So, 1980 Scott McGregor, approximately.

Buck and Harold on MLB in primetime had an interesting take on his deception, highlighting the contrast how he steps toward 3rd base side (big guy "coming right towards" RHH as Reynolds phrased it) but then the changeup fades.   Like Valdez throwing slow, the Inside/Outside something batters don't see much in the Up/Down world of Bradish/Glasnow/Astros Verlander.

[Moose Milligan]

55 minutes ago, TommyPickles said:

Baseball Reference just updated the stats to reflect yesterday's games. Enjoy:

The Case for John Means' 2021 AL Cy Young Award:

WAR for pitchers- 2.3 (1st)

WHIP- 0.674 (1st)

ERA- 1.37 (2nd)

Hits per 9 IP- 4.109 (1st) 

Win-Probability Added- 1.8 (1st)

Innings Pitched- 46 (2nd)

Games Started- 7 (1st)

Wins- 4 (1st)

Complete Games- 1 (1st)

Strikeouts- 50 (4th)

Ace.

This is going to be interesting to see as the summer goes on.  If Means can keep throwing like he's throwing, he will have a good chance to win the Cy Young.  Obviously, it's too early to tell but he's got to be the frontrunner right now.

Bieber is 3-2 with a 2.98 ERA and a 1.076 WHIP.  He leads the league in strikeouts so far with 77.  His WAR is 1.5.

Cole is 4-1 with a 1.43 ERA, 0.717 WHIP. And he's striking out an absurd 14.8 per 9.  Only 37.2 innings pitched.  1.6 WAR

Didn't realized Danny Duffy was the ERA leader at 0.60.  

 

[connja]

From Roch article this morning.....just love this comment from Means.  I think a lot of us can relate.

“I think it’s a good thing all around,” he said. “I’ll probably shrug it off as much as I can, but I just love baseball, man. I just love it. I just want to go out there every fifth day and compete. That’s all I care about. As long as I’m playing this game I’m happy.”

[interloper]

That was so much fun to watch. I honestly didn't think I'd see an Orioles no-hitter ever. I love John Means!

[Moshagge3]

1 hour ago, LocoChris said:

I guess my point is that the rule changes the game in a fundamental way and that’s really the big thing that sticks in my craw with this. Even if the runner gets on from a dropped third strike or interference, that’s still the result of a mistake by the opposing team. 

There's already a thread to argue about this.

[Moshagge3]

Watching the rerun of this game, I'm struck by how stingy the home plate umpire was. Means could have finished this in 100 pitches with even a slightly bigger zone. I wonder if he's going to get friendlier more Glavine-like umpiring now that his fame and reputation is blowing up around the league.