Other Baseball

1.71 ERA / 0.85 WHIP / 20 K/BB% - These numbers aren't even in the same ballpark (sorry) as his Wichita numbers. Joe Ryan has been awesome, and the Twins are getting the production at the big league level. However, it definitely looks like any talk of "fleecing" may be premature.

This streak is ridiculous. How long can it continue, and does this mean they are more or less viable in the post season than previously thought?

When a season is lost, you begin to wonder what there is to look forward to. That could be player development, win streaks, or the draft. So, tanking. Credit to UrinatingTree for making that intro. As you all know, the draft order in the first round is basically the league’s standings in Win%, but reversed. Hence, the team with the worst record in baseball gets the first overall pick. The team with the 2nd worst record in baseball gets the 2nd overall pick, 3rd worst record gets the 3rd overall pick, and so on. Thus, some teams have gotten the idea to not play to win, but to play to improve their draft position (or in simple terms, play to lo…

Standings as of today (odds from FanGraphs) : TEAM W L PCT WCGB WC ODDS DIV. ODDS NY Yankees 72 52 .581 +2.5 61.8% 27.8% Boston 70 55 .560 - 62.8% 9.8% Oakland 70 55 .560 - 23.0% 7.1% Seattle 67 58 .536 3 2.5% …

I've been advocating for a pitch clock for about a decade now and why we don't have a hard pitch clock in MLB continues to baffle me. It fixes a bunch of problems in one fell swoop: pace of play, overall game length, max-effort pitching, increased action, and probably other stuff I'm not thinking of in the moment. Make it happen already, MLB. Stop sitting around, hoping that the game is going to magically fix itself, you ineffectual buffoons. If you don't subscribe to The Athletic, you should probably do so but here's a game length chart from the article. Yikes. 1981 2:33 1991 …

Eddie being Eddie! ? On another note, he's been on fire since coming off his injury. 1.171 OPS in his 20 games with the Braves...

As someone who likes the Pirates, this trade makes me want to cry. Even moreso now that Archer has rejoined Tampa Bay. This trade is the poster child for the risks of trading boatloads of high-end prospects for a pitcher where years of control is a primary reason for the price tag. I hope Falvine treads these waters with caution this off-season.

A thread for news from around Major League Baseball. Tonight in L.A., the Angels will forego their DH in order to let Shohei Ohtani both hit and pitch in the same game. Ohtani is starting pitcher and will bat second. I think this is his first time in a true two-way role? Has an American League team voluntarily given up their DH in a game, since the rule change in 1973? https://www.mlb.com/news/shohei-ohtani-pitching-batting-second So far hitting in 2021, Ohtani is 2-13 with a Homer and 6 K’s. Can’t wait to see how he does!

Recently MLB Audio has started included ads for paid subscribers. This is really annoying because every time you select an audio feed you must listed to a 30 second ad. If your internet connection is weak & the app stops audio due to low bandwidth you must listen to another ad to resume playback. If you switch feeds within the same game you must listen to an ad. If you switch games you must listen to an ad. It’s really annoying. I tried to submit feedback through their feedback page, but it has a very restrictive 360 character limit so you can’t write much. Is anyone else bothered by this? Does anyone have any alternative ideas of how to provide feedback to …

Nelson Cruz hit a “little league” inside the park HR with the sacks loaded, cutting the Red Sox 7-1 lead down significantly.

Recently, ESPN MLB “experts” came up with eight things they would do if they were commissioner for a day: 1. Shorten the season 2. expand and realign divisions 3. Add a pitch clock 4. Robo Umps 5. End blackouts and loosen video restrictions 6. Allow trading of draft picks 7. Pay minor leaguers a living wage 8. Rethink the role of the commissioner. Which so you agree with, which don’t you, and what would you add?

The Athletic is reporting MLB gave their first proposal to the MLBPA on team spending rules. Dropping luxury tax threshold to $180M and implementing a $100M payroll floor. Obviously very early on and nothing at all is even close to set, but if this is the starting point, and something being discussed, I have hope that this new CBA will address some real competitive balance issues in the league.

Jack Morris has drawn sharp criticism after delivering comments in an Asian accent. The Tigers broadcaster later apologized in the ninth inning of the game saying that he did not "intend for any offensive thing" and offered an apology to the Asian community. You can read more on the story on ESPN. Here are some reactions:

Reading the various forums and postings I started to think about how I got hooked on baseball. It was in the 1950s and there were not a lot of competing options. As I went through school there was no LaCrosse or Soccer, the options were limited and so was the TV exposure. The game of the week was an event and so was the annual trip that I took with my parents and grandparents to Milwaukee to watch the Braves play the Dodgers. I had my transistor radio under my pillow at night, the box scores were golden, and magic numbers like 60, 300, 400 were tantalizing. I watched players moving towards the magic numbers - 3000, 500 - and it mattered. Each game seemed to mat…

... in his first MLB appearance. Wow! A pitcher throwing a no-hitter in his first major league appearance hasn't happened since 1953. I remember thinking how exciting it was that Eddie Rosario hit a home run on the first pitch in his first at bat in the majors ... well, this is 1000 times that. Or more. I mean ... what would be comparable to this?

Big mistake letting this guy go

Tim Anderson - What's the script on that?

Since the Twins were our parent for almost 2 decades, thought perhaps some of you might be interested in this from your recent AAA farm team. Was at the game last night against Lehigh Valley, sitting right behind 3rd base. In the bottom of the 1st, right after a Wing blasted a 3 run homer, we saw our manager LeCroy (who coaches 3rd base) start running towards the IronPigs 3rd baseman Daniel Brito. At first we thought...is this going to be a fight..but quickly we saw LeCroy catch Brito as he was about to tumble to the ground. Easing him down and suddenly being surrounded by teammates, it was clear that Brito was in real trouble. He lay motionless for over 20 minutes w…

With the MLBPA union contract expiring this year and Manfred constantly tweaking the game, many have speculated that the National League will adopt the designated hitter next year. I am a die-hard, tried-and-true Twins fan forever. This season is proof. That being said, I really like watching National League ball. I like small-ball; with the bunting, stealing, pinch running and hitting, all the strategy and tactics, etc. Can we please, please, please, not have a universal DH? I thoughouly enjoy having a differentiation of styles and 2 leagues. It is history. It is competition; it is rivalry in itself (World Series and All-star game and inter-league play). …

Newly acquired Joe Ryan gets the start for Team USA as they play South Korea in the Olympic Semifinal. Win and they move into the Gold Medal Game and a rematch with Japan for the Gold, who they lost by 1 in extra innings in the Knockout Round for their only Olympic defeat. Lose and they play for the Bronze against Dominican Republic. The game starts at 5AM CT Thursday morning, August 5, and can be seen on USA Network (242 DirecTV), and probably some other streaming options. https://www.cbssports.com/mlb/news/usa-baseball-vs-south-korea-live-stream-tv-channel-start-time-for-2020-tokyo-olympics-semifinal/

They're running a promotion right now that's a little under 50% of the regular price, which was really handy for me because my subscription expired about ten days ago and I was debating whether to re-up. https://theathletic.com/checkout2/standard/60offpm?source=fbads&ad_id=23847968656390092&fbclid=IwAR26KWUfwWELKB2jjHz1auwl_G-Y6rgt-TT0St6BMB1PDE2kE4Q97dCVyLE $29/year for Gleeman and Hayes is a hell of a deal, never mind all their MLB-wide content such as Law and Rosenthal.

Thought we could use a thread here to post and discuss non-Twins deals around the league.

Sleeping in cars..... stop defending owners. Stop

What's up with this? On July 21, 2021, Mercedes announced his retirement from Major League Baseball via his Instagram account.

Mrs Ash brought to my attention the current meme about stars of The French Dispatch at the Cannes Film Festival, who clearly were not on the same page about their attire. Apropos of absolutely nothing, then, here is my humble attempt.

Who came up with the ugly uniforms for tonight’s game? One of the things I always loved was having everyone in their team’s regular uniforms. It was unique to baseball. These uniforms are terrible. Go back to tradition.

Recent headline in the New York Times: Why? Does he hit well against them, too? ⚾?

In an except from his new book, Sabathia talks a little about old school baseball and being Black in the modern game. There’s some interesting stuff in here to unpack and it’s worth posting but try to check your biases at the door. This is Sabathia’s perspective on the game, “right” or “wrong”. https://theundefeated.com/features/cc-sabathia-on-the-pressure-black-athletes-face-to-play-baseball-the-white-way/

I did not see this elsewhere in the forum. This is an article by Joel Sherman of the NY Post that suggests that many pitchers are cheating and he outlines what he thinks baseball should do about this. https://nypost.com/2021/06/02/mlb-must-put-a-stop-to-cheating-substances-epidemic-sherman/ From the article. “Then pick a start date, like July 1, to state that umpires are being ordered to aggressively check for foreign substances, and if one is proven to be used, then not just the pitcher, but the pitching coach, manager and head of baseball operations too will all be suspended for 10 games (the length Michael Pineda was suspended in 2014 for having pine tar on his…

During last night’s game vs Houston, Jose Altuve hit a home run that was initially called foul. After replay showed the ball hit the foul pole and was a home run, I assumed Altuve would then run around the bases and touch home plate. Not in today’s game. He didn’t have to. Just remained in the dugout. So I’m waiting for the next logical step in baseball’s march to ruin the game. When players hit home runs and they have finished their antics of flipping the bat and/or standing and admiring their feat, will they eventually just return to the dugout & not bother circling the bases. After all, it would, “speed up the game”.