vladimir guerrero.

also, theoretically there's this thing with athletes "filling" out in their early 20s and getting stronger. personally, i have found that my body is like a coughed bird skeleton, but these are pro athletes so

maybe i’m cynical but i always chalked up the “filling out” to young athletes meeting “trainers” with very specific cutting edge uh nutritional regimes that dance on the edge of legality

it makes sense to be cynical when the words "a physical specimen" come up so often in baseball writing

“a UCLA product”

Vlad had actually dropped weight going into the season. he showed up last year a little heavier and didn't perform like people had hoped so there was some pressure there.
i think it helped his fielding a lot – but with his hitting he's just stopped chasing every other pitch. i think he was way too aggressive when he came up and was wiffing on too many major league caliber pitches.
i also think moving to 1B helped, kinda like with encarnacion. i feel like playing a position you are better suited for seems to make the hitting part easier.

A Triple Crown for Vlad is again not entirely out of reach. (It seemed so a few weeks ago). He's regained the lead in BA, is three HR behind Ohtani and five RBI behind Abreu. He's got 24 games to make that up.

If it ever happened, a Triple Crown vs. Ohtani would be a great MVP story.

ohtani has been awful at the plate for the past month, I don’t think the MVP is completely wrapped up yet

Yesterday Posnanski said it is, unanimous even, but I agree, Vlad still has a shot.

Assuming he doesn't get the Triple Crown, though, he'd probably have to hit lights out in some key games, and the Jays would probably have to make the playoffs to sway some voters. (Not looking to open up that argument, but I suspect it still factors in if the vote is close.)

Triple Crown stuff:

https://www.mlb.com/news/vladimir-guerrero-jr-triple-crown-watch-2021

Not only is Guerrero contending for an AL Triple Crown, but he also has an opportunity to become the first player in 65 years (since Mickey Mantle in 1956) to lead both the AL and NL in all three categories.

• Batting average: second in MLB (two points behind Trea Turner)
• Home runs: tied for second in MLB (one behind Shohei Ohtani)
• RBIs: fourth in MLB (four behind José Abreu and Salvador Perez)

Should a mod change the name to “vladimir guerreros.”?!

vladimirs guerrero imo

Vladimi

There is only ONE Vladimir Guerreros thread

Important Vladimir Guerreros.

Home runs:
1. Vladimir Guerrero Jr. -- 44
2. Shohei Ohtani -- 44
3. Salvador Perez -- 42

Batting average:
1. Vladimir Guerrero Jr. -- .319
2. Yuli Gurriel -- .315
3. Michael Brantley -- .315

RBIs:
1. José Abreu -- 107
2. Salvador Perez -- 105
T-3. Vladimir Guerrero Jr. -- 102
T-3. Rafael Devers -- 102
T-3. Teoscar Hernández -- 102

back off, teoscar

Baseball Reference WAR says two things: that one of Vladimir Guerrero's teammates was actually more valuable than Vlad was, and (2) that Carlos Correa was the best defensive player in the AL. I believe ONE of these conclusions. The other one is bat shit crazy.

— Bill James Online (@billjamesonline) October 6, 2021

Doubt he'd have such strong feelings on Correa's defensive value.

lol Vladdy hit this 427 feet pic.twitter.com/GZef4HU0y1

— Andrew Mearns (@MearnsPSA) April 14, 2022

Blood-Stained Hand of the Vlad

The Jays radio guys were saying how remarkably similar father and son are statistically to this point in their careers (404 games going into play today).

Senior: .312/.365/.562, 87 HR, 267 RBI

Junior: .284/.364/.513, 87 HR, 250 RBI

Seeing as Sr.'s numbers were compiled from 1996 into 2000--big hitting years--you'd have to adjust those slash stats downward, so yeah, probably pretty close. As is, unadjusted, dead on in HR and OBP.

(Sr.'s OPS+ through the completion of the 2000 season--i.e., to his 418th GP, is 146; Jr.'s is presently 136.)

They also pointed out Jr is doing this about two years younger!!

One of Posnanski's shareable posts:

https://joeposnanski.substack.com/p/ten-who-missed-no-10-vladimir-guerrero?r=1jtu0&s=r&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=email

Yes, it is much, much, much too early to be talking about Vladimir Guerrero Jr. and the Hall of Fame. As I write these words, he’s only 23 years old and has played fewer than 400 big-league games. But maybe it’s not too early to dream about something that seems impossible — a father and a son both ending up in the Baseball Hall of Fame...But even cooler — with all due respect to the Griffeys and Bondses, the Alous and Boones, Alomars and Witts, Fielders and Bells and Biggios and Bichettes — I think the Guerreros are already the most fun father-son duo in baseball history.

<3

Asked in NY about off-season comments in which he said he’d never sign with the Yankees, “not even dead,” Vlad Guerrero Jr. doubled down, saying he has personal/family reasons for preferring not to play for the Yankees and would “never” change his mind

— Ben Nicholson-Smith (@bnicholsonsmith) April 21, 2023

BEST SHAPE OF HIS CAREER

Vladimir Guerrero Jr. Looks incredible holy shit pic.twitter.com/XpPUb0k8Xm

— Gate 14 Podcast (@Gate14Pod) February 9, 2024

Looks v trim fwiw

The man absolutely has to pop-off. It's in the stars

.172/.276/.314. (Not his father's Sunday-beer-league line.)

I feel like I like Vladdy more than you do, and it’s still very early! Took a long at his unqualified (cos it’s early) 24 statcast numbers.

https://i.postimg.cc/KYWyN08j/IMG-8699.jpg

Is he pressing? He’s smoking the ball when he’s making contact and he’s walking a lot so his eye’s still great and the chase rate is too but he’s striking out well above his normal rate - he’s not normally a high strikeout guy. The sweet spot % (basically hitting the ball with a good launch angle that gets it off the ground and more likely to find grass rather than a glove) makes me think he’s missing his spots because he’s behind and maybe it’s a timing issue?

Assuming I’ve understood xwOBA correctly (I will welcome correction cos expected stats & me are not a happy match), he’s making good quality contact when he does make contact, maybe he’s just unlucky?

https://www.mlb.com/glossary/statcast/expected-woba

You probably do at this point--the closer you are, the more exasperating he can be. It was the same last year: all his advanced metrics suggested he was hitting in bad luck. All year we heard that. I'm like Jeff Blair (local radio guy) at this point: enough. (Directing that at Vlad, not you.) The thing that really changed me with regards to Vlad was learning how dispropotionately his big year was driven by those minor-league parks.

He's definitely pressing. And I'm sure he's got a few dozen people whispering in his ear what he needs to do, from his father on down, and they're all telling him different things.

Vlad has hit another homer today. I've been pretty merciless about him the past couple of years, and even as his average started to steadily climb this year, I started calling him Mark Grace with less defense. But now his power is starting to catch up a bit; he's had a great almost two-and-a-half months. Since May 8: 14 HR, .336/.393/.557.

And this is where it gets tricky. The team seems to have made it clear he's again the cornerstone of the franchise and not on the market. I kind of hope they're still listening, though. Through April, that was easy: most everybody, me included, had had enough. But you weren't going to get fair value when he was struggling. Right now, though, I think you could get more than fair value if you're not convinced he's ever going to have another season like 2021. Even if he were to keep this up for another three or four seasons--.300, 25-30 HR, 4.0-5.0 WAR--which I don't think is a sure thing at all, you're probably going to have to sign him for twice that long.

I'd be listening.

Hot, yes--didn't realize how hot (still a small sample):

Best post-All Star Break OPS in a season (min. 120 PA):
1.455- Barry Bonds (2001)
1.449- Ted Williams (1957)
1.432- Bonds ('02)
1.421- Bonds ('04)
1.393- Bonds ('03)
1.373- Williams ('41)
Note: Vladimir Guerrero Jr. currently at mark of 1.617 through his first 61 such PA (14 GP) pic.twitter.com/om4MFL6eOg

— StatsCentre (@StatsCentre) August 3, 2024

3-3 with a HR and a double--what the hell has happened? Did he and the hitting coaches actually figure something out that took them two years?

Low leverage hitting

That stings

He's such a conundrum, and I don't envy management trying to figure out what to do going forward (he'll require an eight-year committment, I imagine). He comes up as a generational 20-year-old, has a pretty good season-and-a-half; not quite as advertised, but he's still really young. Has a monster season at 22, and people like me start putting up message-board polls compaing him to Soto and Acuna. Tails off quite a bit at 23, and it turns out--someone had to point this out to me--that his monster season had a lot to do with his 200 PA in minor-league parks. He drifts along through 2022 and 2023, still young and playing at a near- (but not) AS-level, then he's terrible for the first few weeks of 2024. Now he's back to 2021 Vlad for the past three months. Not unusual for pitchers to be so unpredictable, position players much less so.

"comparing"

That stings

Didn't see it, but double, triple, homer tonight and four RBI. The conundrum gets more conundrummy.

the bullpen really put some work towards tying to get him that last at bat so he could go for the cycle

Thermo, NoTime, Francis: what should be the ceiling on what they resign him for next year (if they do)? $200M? $250M? 8 years? 10 years? I keep using the word conundrum because who will you be committing all that money to: the ~ 12 months of Vlad the Generational Bat, or the ~ 45 months of Vlad the Pretty Good Everyday Player? And what happens when he hits 30?

Just passing by but you guys will know the answer to this: am I right in thinking that Rogers see him as the unambiguous face of the franchise and will be wanting to keep him to rebuild around? I see a lot of talk about trading him, but that seems far likelier with Bichette?

I think they're (to use a cliche) all-in now. I'm just curious what will happen if there are other suitors. (Yes, Bichette seems to be on much shakier ground--and has also, unlike Vlad, given out subtle signals that he'd rather be elsewhere.)

From Sportsnet: "Vladimir Guerrero Jr. says his home run in the Blue Jays’ 7-6 win over the Orioles was the first in MLB that his father, Vladimir Guerrero, witnessed in person." At 153 and counting, that seems pretty remarkable.

I know this is a real Rube Goldberg contraption, but the list sure is impressive:

Players with 35+ hits, 10+ doubles, 10+ homers & 10+ walks over a 20-game span in MLB's modern era:

Babe Ruth, Yankees (1922)
Rogers Hornsby, Braves (1928)
Lou Gehrig, Yankees (1936)
Joe DiMaggio, Yankees (1937)
Vladimir Guerrero Jr. (2024)

xp on the re-sign - idk much at all about this stuff, but i'm thinking they go for $240/8 but i'd still be happy at like $280/10? would def do 10. They could spend a billion if they wanted to, that's why i'm just not sure

i mean he's technically Canadian, potential monster, fun-lovin face of the franchise. if he at all is willing to sign that's a major loss if they don't

I suppose 10 years down the road $28M/year won't be all that much. Anyway, they pretty much have to sign him now or the fanbase will revolt.

I suppose 10 years down the road $28M/year won't be all that much. Anyway, they pretty much have to sign him now or the fanbase will revolt.