Other Baseball

After six straight losing years, the New York Mets have punched their ticket to the World Series. The Mets GM, Sandy Alderson, built the team by drafting and acquiring key prospects. He kept the team's budget near or under $100 million for several years, waiting for the prospects to arrive. New York Times reporter Tyler Kepner has posted an interesting article about the progression from the Bernie Madoff scandal and bloated budgets to the World Series: http://www.nytimes.com/2015/10/23/sports/baseball/after-madoff-fraud-mets-altered-approach-for-pennant.html?hp&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&module=mini-moth&region=top-stories-below&WT.nav=top-storie…

And so it begins ... Murphy! Man ... that guy has the number of every ace in these playoffs so far! Homer off Lester to get it started in the bottom of the 1st.

http://deadspin.com/replay-is-turning-baseball-into-football-and-i-hate-it-1736111661 Kind of a fun rant. KC runner was called out after his momentum slightly carried him off the bag for a brief second. "This isn’t really the kind of mistake instant replay was meant to rectify. There are certainly moments in which replay is a very good thing to have—determining if a home run really cleared the top of the fence or whether a ball is fair or foul come to mind—but the game is not served well when it’s used as a tool to reverse plays based on a base runner’s momentum popping his foot off the bag for a fraction of a second. Bases are hard, and I bet that if you looked at …

Ladies and Gentlemen (and mods): Here's the announcement you've all been waiting for...the Second Annual Unofficial Twins Daily Forum Over/Under Contest. Below are 2015 MLB over/unders from Bovado. Take a crack...over this total, or under? Post your picks below (copy and paste the list, add "over" or "under" after each team.) You can edit and change your picks through 4/4/15, at which point the thread will be locked and no more picks/changes allowed. The person making the most correct picks will be declared THE WINNER and will recieve a fabulous prize package worth nearly 2 FIGURES!* In addition, this year TD owners have authorized me to award EVERY PARTICIPANT a…

Click and rank #1-#6. should take no longer than 30 seconds. Also, just testing this survey tool before I actually use it for more important questioning in school. Thank you. Let me know if something is amiss and I need to fix it. https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/WBDPG3M

Setting aside the unfortunate injury... I hope this provides the impetus for MLB to start enforcing rule 6.01 and/or 5.09 and declaring automatic DPs when runners clearly interfere rather than attempt to beat a force play with a "slide." Utley's slide was a clear violation of an existing rule. And the entire replay fiasco that followed was ridiculous.

As almost everyone is aware, the current MLB schedule is unbalanced. In 2015 every team played 19 games against each division opponent for a total of 76 games (except for one cancellation between Cleveland and Detroit), either 6 or 7 games against each team in the other two divisions of its league for a total of 66 games and either 3,4 or 6 games against teams from the other league for a total of 20 games. There has been some criticism of the unbalanced schedule. An unbalanced schedule means that teams competing for wild card berths in the postseason can have quite different strengths of schedule. Some feel that a lower number of intradivision games and the resulting incr…

Yay Mets! Now onto the Cubbies!

for those that questioned "who the heck is Kiley"......and why should we read him.....he is going to work for Atlanta pretty much what he dis for us/Fangraphs for free. Huge loss to those of us that like prospect talk. http://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/instagraphs/saying-farewell/#comment-5065497

After leading in statistical probability of advancing to the ALCS for most of the game, the Rangers and Hamels found themselves in virtual coin flip scenario partway through the 7th inning. After a lead-off single in the top of the 7th, the, the Rangers jumped to 56% favorites to win. A sacrifice bunt followed which actually dropped their odds of winning 2% historically. A ground out advancing Odor to 3rd put us back into a coin flip, with the Jays actually a slight favorite to win. Then one of the most bizarre plays I've ever seen. I love playoff baseball because every single pitch means so much. It could mean the season. But who could predict a throw back to t…

They got through the one game wild card game against the team with the 2nd best record in baseball. Now they have taken the best of five series against the team with the best record in baseball. Very good overall team primed to win. GO CUBBIES!!!

I didn't see anyone post anything, so here goes. After raking for the Jays AAA team in April and early May, Chris Colabello was called up and immediately inserted in the Jays LF spot for Tuesday's night's game with the Yankees (following Danny Valencia in LF for the Jays on Monday night- Valencia's played four positions for the Jays this year, and was a scratch for this game after spraining his ankle while tripping on the clubhouse stairs on Monday night). Meanwhile, back to Colabello, he's played all of one professional game in LF, back in 2013 for Rochester, but apparently survived out there, at least for one night. Oh.... Cola also went 2-4 with a single and a dou…

http://deadspin.com/lets-relive-the-time-sean-casey-got-thrown-out-at-first-1736560513 It's a funny play but Casey's explanation is even better.

The average MLB fastball has increased dramatically for both starting pitchers and relievers over the past 10-15 years. In 2007, 11 pitchers averaged 95+ on their fastball, in 2011 the number jumped to 35 pitchers, and in 2015 according to Fangraphs that number has increased to 87 pitchers. Check out the Velocity by Years charts from Pitchf/x. That is an increase in 2 mph for every fastball thrown in 6 years. What is behind this massive increase in velocity in such a short period of time? Here are some of my theories: 1. Statcast vs Older Radar Guns ~ Statcast measures the peak velocity of a pitch at any point from its release to the front edge of home pl…

http://sportsworld.nbcsports.com/the-pre-integration-committee/ Obviously, Poz loves the HOF and he's done a pretty good job of pointing out the problems of baseball's racist history. He points out that 127 of the 217 players in the HOF played during the "pre-integration" era. So while we may complain that Jim Rice or Jack Morris or Tim Raines don't belong in the HOF, there sure are a lot of players in the HOF that they were better than.

Sounds like Cleveland is willing to move Danny Salazar or Carlos Carrasco for hitting help. I don't know a lot about their farm system but they didn't get much production from CF or RF this year. There are also rumors that they might shop Carlos Santana but would prefer to add a bat to help him. Michael Bourn is their CFer and he's been a trainwreck for them since he signed his contract. I think Danny Salazar is sort of what we're all hoping Jose Berrios becomes although he might have some durability concerns. But he's under team control for a long time yet.

Royals win game two 5-4. Series tied at 1-1. Cueto was mediocre. Royals fell behind but battled back. Lots of funny weird plays. Game 3 in Houston at 3 PM Sunday. Keuchel has been unhittable at home for Houston.

Another managerial opening. http://www.cbssports.com/mlb/eye-on-baseball/25332957/mariners-fire-lloyd-mcclendon-as-manager-after-two-seasons

http://www.federalbaseball.com/2015/10/6/9460313/washington-nationals-fire-matt-williams-what-theyre-saying Tons of links on it but that's from the Nats SBNation page. Obviously, the Nats were a pretty common pick to make the WS this year yet they finished with the same record as the Twins. They had a lot of injuries and their starting pitching failed to meet expectations. Much of the blame has been put on Williams. Articles reported that he lost his clubhouse and his in-game managing was dubious, to say the least. Joe Posnanski had an article about how Williams is getting too much of the blame (can't find the link, sorry) and the main problems were the starting …

http://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/mlb/2015/09/30/mlb-bench-clearing-brawls-unwritten-rules-ethnic-backgrounds/73066892/ So the article I linked above, done with the backing of research, suggest that part of the reason there are so many confrontations at the major league level stems from cultural difference. Meaning that maybe the PLAYERS' cultural upbringing may effect why some players play the game one way in regards to unwritten rules and why others play it a different way. The study believes that many of the clashes between players happen because of this, because of a fundamental difference in how they were taught the game and how they played it where they come …

After the Astros shutout the Yankees last night in Yankees Stadium, tonight the baseball attention is shifting to the National League. The Cubs will take on the Pittsburgh Pirates. Consider this one-game Wild Card game will be comprised of two teams with 97 or more wins. It'll be a great pitching matchup too... Jake Arrieta, who has been the best pitcher in baseball in the second half, will take on Gerrit Cole in what should be a great pitchers' dual! Feel free to discuss here.

Watching the game. The Canadians are alive, but Texas doesn't seem phased. Elvis Andrus can also play a terrific shortstop.

At 7:08 Central Time, the Houston Astros and New York Yankees will begin the AL Wild Card game with the winner scheduled to play Game 1 of the ALDS on Thursday in Kansas City. It'll be Dallas Keuchel facing Masahiro Tanaka in the one game, winner advances playoff game. The Yankees obviously faced the announcement that CC Sabathia was going to enter alcohol rehab and will miss the playoffs. A-Rod has been their MVP this season. The Astros had a remarkable turn-around this season and won that 2nd Wild Card spot. Keuchel could win the Cy Young Award, but he has been much more effective at home. On the season, he is 20-8 with a 2.48 ERA overall. At home, he is 15-0 wit…

Why not?

http://deadspin.com/cc-sabathia-is-checking-into-alcohol-rehab-1734716045 Sounds like he was lined up to start a playoff game (if they beat the Astros) but checked into rehab instead. That sounds kind of serious. Hope he gets well.

Just saw an article saying that Mark Buehrle is going to retire after he pitched tomorrow. He said he just wants to pitch 2 innings so he can reach 200 innings. He has logged at least 200 innings since 2001. I always had great respect for Buehrle as a White Sox and wish him a happy retirement. Kind of sad that he will be left off the Toronto post season roster.

The exception is the St. Louis v Atlanta doubleheader, necessitated by yesterday's postponement. This is an interesting and positive approach taken by MLB to minimize any uncertainty involving game(s) that would take place on the 5th or 6th. As it applies to today, if the Angels beat Texas there will be a playoff game tomorrow. Without this scheduling rule I could easily picture the evil empire (a.k.a. Fox) dictating an evening start time for that game. Meanwhile, the Astros would need to know whether to travel to DFW (if they and LA both win), to Houston (if LA wins and they lose) or New York (if Texas wins).

The Angels rallied for 5 in the 9th inning versus the Rangers today, to pull off a wild 11-10 win at The Ballpark in Arlington- to keep things highly unsettled going into the last day of the regular season on Sunday, both in the AL West, and for who ultimately claims the 2nd spot in the Wild Card hunt. But the craziest thing was the fact that both clubs employed 9 pitchers each, in a 9-inning game. Combined, the two teams used 43 total players, including 4 pinch runners. Both starters went 4 innings, which means that each team used 8 pitchers to throw 5 innings apiece. Surprisingly, the game actually "only" took 4 hours and 7 minutes to complete- but as exciting as …

I just noticed the AL is going to finish the season with just one 90 loss team, Oakland. The NL is likely to have six. Crazy.

Parker, do your magic and tell us whether this kid has a future in the majors with his swing. http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x38auiq_this-japanese-high-school-baseball-player-might-have-the-best-pre-at-bat-routine-ever_sport