Honesty compels me to report that Games Three and Four of the American League Championship Series were sort of boring. Sure, Game Three stayed tied until the bottom of the sixth inning, and sure, both… Read more »
Arm Side Run
Pitchers Make Mistakes The first 15 pitches St. Louis Cardinals starting pitcher John Lackey threw to San Francisco Giants batters on Tuesday were four-seam fastballs. It was the darnedest thing. Lackey isn’t a guy who… Read more »
In American sport, the playoffs are always a time for heroes. I should amend that. The playoffs are the time for heroes. A tremendous player can be cast as somehow deficient if he never meets his usual… Read more »
There’s one 30-game hot streak to which the Kansas City Royals owe their presence in the 2014 MLB Postseason. It came in late July, after a brief stumble out of the All-Star break, when the… Read more »
While I’m warming to the idea of the dual Wild Card system (this may be some A’s-Royals afterglow; forgive me), I’m not wild about the concept of reducing an entire baseball season to a single… Read more »
I’m not a fan of the second Wild Card. I dislike the feeling of artificial drama, and for a long season of baseball games to come down to one arbitrary contest feels wrong to me…. Read more »
If you’ve had a conversation about baseball during the last year, you have probably heard some variation on a too-common theme: “God, and the games are SOOOO LOOOONNNNGGGG. What are we gonna DO?” First of… Read more »
The Detroit Tigers are fighting for their playoff lives, hoping an impressive in-season transaction will be enough to wash out the ill effects of an off-season move they never should have made. The Seattle Mariners… Read more »
In 2013, at age 27, Chris Davis created 142.8 runs for the Baltimore Orioles, according to Baseball-Reference. That was a shockingly good number. In fact, it’s the 14th-highest number posted by any age-27 player since… Read more »
Jose Fernandez is hurt, and Baseball Twitter is in tears. Jose Fernandez is hurt, and the Miami Marlins’ hope of contending this season is gone. Jose Fernandez is hurt, and everyone is sad. Except me. Honestly, I’ve felt… Read more »
As is my wont, I’m giving Friday over to some rapid-fire observations and notes, from all over the place: Every batter’s optimal plate approach is different. Some guys should swing much more often, especially in… Read more »
By now, you know the drill. These are my weekly power rankings, my best estimate of the relative strength of all 30 teams (NOT their playoff chances, mind you, but their actual, bedrock quality). The… Read more »
The life of a two-pitch starting pitcher is a difficult one. If either of your go-to offerings isn’t working on a given night, you’re in deep trouble, trying to pitch around a fundamental weakness and… Read more »
I hate the qualifying offer, because it dampens the market for perfectly good players, and forces teams to choose between the near and long term, instead of trying to improve both at the same time…. Read more »
This is Chicago Cubs outfield prospect Jacob Hannemann. He’s off to a strong, if somewhat short of dazzling, start for the Kane County Cougars of the Midwest League. Hannemann was the Cubs’ third-round choice in… Read more »
Mike Olt was one of the dozen best prospects in baseball, then a bust, then a great recovery story. Now, he’s in danger of washing out of baseball.
The worst starting rotation in baseball is that of the Diamondbacks, but their ineptitude doesn’t show up early in starts.
“I hope you’re happy, everyone. You’ve used up all the baseball. Like Social Security and gasoline, baseball will be dried up and gone before you retire, before your kids graduate high school.” Keith Olbermann glowers at you… Read more »
April is finally over, and we’ve come to what, to me, is often the toughest time to be a baseball fan. The weather hasn’t yet turned. Your schedule isn’t yet relaxed for the summer. The… Read more »
Forty-one years ago, a group of desperate men made a desperate decision. The American League lagged far behind the National League, in terms of average attendance, perceived quality of play and number of star players…. Read more »
Most teams throughout Major League Baseball will play 79 intradivisional games this season. A handful will play 80. Now that the leagues are of equal size and each division contains five teams, there’s less variation in… Read more »
I could probably make three articles from this, but I’ll run through the condensed version of each finding here instead, for concision’s sake: -Late last week, Dave Cameron of FanGraphs wrote a quick post about the… Read more »
In late August 1993, police responded to a 911 call from the home of Barry Bonds. It was Bonds’s wife, Sun, who had called, and she told the responding officers that, among other things, Bonds… Read more »
Regular readers (all four of you) will be familiar with this exercise. I began it last week. These are power rankings, my best estimate of true, relative team quality, listed from last to first, with… Read more »
With some terrible teams, it’s fascinating to go through all the varied and excruciating ways in which they lose games. The 2014 Arizona Diamondbacks are not such a team. Unlike, say, the most recent Houston… Read more »
The Arizona Diamondbacks’ season is essentially over. The sooner they recognize that, the better off they will be. On Tuesday night, the Chicago Cubs thumped Arizona 9-2, pushing the Diamondbacks to 5-18 on the season…. Read more »
I’m a guest on Tuesday’s edition of Effectively Wild, the daily podcast from Baseball Prospectus. It was a thrill for me, as one who has listened to all 430-plus episodes of the podcast thus far. Co-hosts Ben Lindbergh… Read more »
Believe it or not, I don’t spend all of my time expanding a meager idea into a 2,500-word blah-fest. I learn plenty of new things about baseball every day, so once a week, I’m going… Read more »
Look, MLB power rankings are stupid. I could broaden that and say that all power rankings are stupid, but: At least in football, one can take the time to smartly build a list, without having… Read more »
The Houston Astros completed a senseless development process for a top prospect Tuesday, announcing that they will promote George Springer to the Major Leagues Wednesday. Springer, 24, was their first-round pick in 2011, and hasn’t stopped… Read more »
