gusguyman

Cool article on TA7 at fangrapghs, a follow-up to their August 2019 article on his breakout last year. https://blogs.fangraphs.com/tim-andersons-second-quieter-breakout/ Some highlights: For the first time ever, TA7's average exit velocity is above the MLB average. His chase rate is down 6.5 points. He has the 10th highest hard-hit% in baseball His GB rate this year is up to 59%, but historically his rolling GB% has fluctuated a ton, so it would not be surprising to see him go on a streak of elevating the baseball soon.

They felt the same way apparently

For all the boomers playing along, this means "Wow! Amazing Power!" Don't worry my golden oldies, I got you covered.

Just want to thank everyone who shat on Grandal today and clearly were the direct cause of his outburst

Cease's wildness reminds me more of 2018 Giolito than 2019 ReyLo. ReyLo would miss every pitch by 6 inches, whereas Gio and Cease seem to to have half their pitches hit their spots and half miss by 2 feet. Just like Gio, Cease's battle is finding repeatability, either through practice or tweaking his mechanics

I haven't seen a dong that big since the last time I took a little TT, but that was a very different type of video.

So are the leg and PCFS related? It almost sounds like they are independent issues here, and he did play well after coming back from COVID early in the season. It wasn't until he started coming up lame every time he runs that his performance went off the cliff. I wonder if PCFS has prevented him from being able to properly take care of his muscles (no energy for warm ups, conditioning, etc)

Not sure whose framing stat you were checking (since there are a few out there now), but fangraphs has Grandal tied for 4th in their framing stat (FRM). FWIW rSZ is the framing stat from SIS, and they actually have Grandal 1st in the league right now. Grandal's fWAR would be even higher, in fact, if he wasn't getting demolished in rCERA right now, and I think he has gotten pretty unlucky there.

Weirdly, if this happens I think its only because they played so poorly to start the year. Preseason we had so much "dark horse" or "breakout" contender hype that I think even a tight division win doesn't do much for RR. But then we shit the bed so badly for a while that everyone (many of us included lol) gave up on us and assumed we sucked again this year. So now if we win the division it'll look like the miraculous bad team breaking out that wins managers awards from people who aren't really paying attention anyway.

Grandal hasn't been amazing but his 106 wrc+ is enough that you are not losing much batting him 2 or 3, especially since the only other L/S hitting option is a seriously struggling Moncada, and I don't think you want to bat 4 or 5 straight righties at the top of the order.

Where'd all the pregame ReyLo optimists go?? You were wrong about something completely beyond your control and now I want to punish you by making you feel bad!!!!!

Good ReyLo is never coming back, but shit, I'll settle for getting unsustainable head-scratchingly lucky ReyLo back

I'm fine with bunting to punish the shift but only if you can, ya know, bunt. I'm not sure I can think of a single time that Moncada has actually pulled that off successfully.

For what its worth, that .1 runs per game over the course of a season is the difference between an optimal lineup and a typical lineup. The drop-off to bad or worst-case lineups is significantly more. Examples of worst-case lineups are things like pitchers batting leadoff, so even RR isn't that bad, but there is an argument that batting people like EE so high makes his lineups much worse than typical.

lol bro I think you need to take Stoney's advice and put a triangle on your keyboard to stare at for a few seconds before you post hot takes

Ok maybe Fulmer is halfway decent if you never do delivery changes, but Giolito is also the worst pitcher in the league, if he's even still in it. It's baseball, the only blanket statement that isn't dumb is that blanket statements are dumb

That... that seems pretty reasonable though right? Some of us were the same way with Eloy, or arguing that TA7 was a legit batting title contender, or Moncada/Giolito being in MVP/Cy Young award discussions. After the last 5 years, I am not going to begrudge a cursed fanbase their efforts to cling to a rare bright spot (especially since Kyle Lewis absolutely has an argument for ROY right now).

If the Twins find a way to lose this one, I may start to agree with their fans that they are actually broken. Man, that would fun as hell.

A high quantity of one can often follow a high quantity of the other

Steve Stone - "The thing about Nomar, if he can hit one pitch out, its gonna be a slider that catches too much of the plate" Its gotten to the point that Steve is talking about Mazara like he is Nick Madrigal

I'll never understand people who think the only reason to win the division is playoff seeding. You win the division because its winning the fucking division. You beat the god damn royals. You beat the god damn tigers. You beat the god damn Indians. And most importantly of all, you beat the god damn twins. Why would you need any more reasons for that to matter? Miss me with the "World series or nothing" attitude.

Everyone needs some Triangle Time now and then

Let's ignore for a moment that Jason only has the TV feed so all he saw was EE absolutely blister that ball and then admire it like he was watching his GF come out of the shower Even beyond that, imagine complaining that an announcer put too much excitement into a call on a ball that was still, in fact, a homerun, if not for an incredible defensive play.

Am I reading too much into his comments, or has Steve Stone been giving a lot of veiled criticisms of Ricky's slow hook for pitchers lately?

random aside but does anyone know if sox talk has a dark mode setting somewhere? The only thing brighter than reading this website is Luis Robert's future.