You can’t spell ‘no big contracts’ without RSN: 2024 regular MLB season thread!

Had no idea he was up to .390 (which also tells you how much I've been paying attention to the Jays, who he just finished playing).

KWAN-WATCH!

i didn't know either - i suppose because he only has 49 games, 222 PAs - will he qualify for the batting title if he stays healthy?

probably - you need 502 PAs i think

I'm just in awe at this guy's ability to make contact. freaky shit.

You need 500 ABs to qualify for the batting title and he’s got 222. He hits leadoff so you’d expect him to get to 500 if healthy.

Sorry, plate appearances, not ABs!

Just to get annoyingly technical (unless this has changed), it was always 3.1 PA per team game played--so if your team lost a couple of games to weather, your floor would drop accordingly. And if they add an 0-for-however-many-PA-you're-short and you still have the highest BA, you win.

"You're right--that's annoyingly technical."

“You won’t believe how annoyingly technical this ILB gets, and that’s ok.”

In a strange coincidence, not one of these guys is on my fantasy team:

https://i.postimg.cc/z3Zt47xh/ballot.jpg

Probably my least defensible pick: Mountcastle over Josh Naylor. Not a big Naylor fan, even though he is Canadian.

AL first base is not a great position right now--there was a time when that was filled with MVP candidates.

Naylor for me in the absence of better (but less healthy) candidates. Though his season hasn’t lived up to his 2023 yet. Kyle Tucker is injured btw.

Edwin Diaz has received a 10-game suspension. He is allowed to appeal.

— Jon Heyman (@JonHeyman) June 24, 2024

Feel perfectly stupid for leaving Soto off. One of those things where I quickly skimmed the list, picked out Judge, Kwan, and Tucker right away, and said "That was easy." I'll vote again, removing Tucker (not because of the injury, though; I vote for who I think should start, whether they can or not).

CLE are #1 in W% (51-26) & #26th in payroll.

Astros' preaseason (3/19/24) odds* to win the WS: 7-1 (3rd only to LAD 3.2-1 & ATL 4.5-1)

They are currently 7-18, in last place in the ALW, 3 games behind LAA & 2 games behind OAK.

* #freeippei

― citation needed (Steve Shasta), Thursday, April 25, 2024 6:01 AM (two months ago)

It took almost half the season but the Astros are now @ .500

guess who else is now @ .500 :-)

whoa and look who we’re playing next. thunderdome .500 - two teams enter one team leaves

What an awful prick.

Interesting timing for this right before tonight’s game. pic.twitter.com/x9gcBTqY89

— Bird’s Eye View - O's Pod ⚾️ 🎙️ (@BirdsEyeViewBal) June 27, 2024

Stunting like he's Aragorn, and this guy doesn't even have the strength required to lay off enough mid pitches to draw walks.

well i for one am impressed that someone of hays’ beliefs and profile is coming out so vocally around the issue of wearing protection during anal sex

Honestly the Mets clear every other team when it comes to Pride. Always multiple players wearing the shirts and Lindor leads by example.

Celebrating Pride 🏳️‍🌈 pic.twitter.com/wsobs33uDS

— New York Mets (@Mets) June 28, 2024

this rockies-white sox matchup is #elite

dakota hudson (2-10, 5.63) vs. drew thorpe (1-1, 5.02, fourth career start)

andrew benintendi (.199/.245/.308) batting second for the sox

tbf the only chicago starter with an OBP over .300 is tommy pham (.340) and he's leading off

classic matchup between the the stoppable force and the moveable object; anything could happen

Mitch Garver was catching for the Mariners today with Cal Raleigh DHing and Garver got hbp and had to leave the game. That meant Raleigh had to move to catcher, meaning the pitcher (Luis Castillo) entered the batting order.

A few nuggets on Luis Castillo’s at-bat, via @alexmayer34...

• It’s the first plate appearance by a Mariners pitcher since Chris Flexen on Sept. 5, 2021, at Arizona
• It’s the first plate appearance by a pitcher at T-Mobile Park since Oakland's Jason Hammel on Sept. 12, 2014 pic.twitter.com/FGihhJSv3s

— Daniel Kramer (@DKramer_) June 30, 2024

Luis Castillo's full at bat pic.twitter.com/gSnr0ixveR

— Cam 🔱 (@Camd3n_10) June 30, 2024

Didn't catch up with the whole Stroman/Torres/Judge thing from yesterday until today. Curious as to what mookieproof thought about that.

i am completely unaware of it

Okay. There are clips on YouTube if you search "Stroman Judge."

happy bobby bonilla (and canada) day

god that luis castillo a/b made me nostalgic. roll back the NL DH rule please

Otm

looks like James Wood will be making his MLB debut today

tim anderson dfa’d

can’t remember somebody who dropped off as hard as he did. i know he got hurt, but to go from the starting all-star SS and leading the league in BA to getting DFA’d in like what, the space of two years?

Jose Abreu was MVP in 2020 (proof that that season shouldn’t count? You decide ) and he got DFAed this year. Manoah?

yeah Abreu a good comp.

feel like this happens with pitchers all the time actually. but batting seems like less of a magical skill. anderson was really, REALLY good for a number of years and he’s still young!

i have no idea what the record is, but kolton ingram has been a part of 6 orgs this year:

The Giants have claimed lefty reliever Kolton Ingram off waivers from the Cardinals and optioned him to Double-A Richmond, the team announced. San Francisco also reinstated outfielder Mike Yastrzemski from the 10-day injured list and optioned right-hander Landon Roupp. The Giants had an opening on the 40-man roster after designating Spencer Howard for assignment over the weekend. St. Louis had DFA Ingram on Sunday.

So continues a nomadic year for Ingram, who hasn’t actually pitched in the majors this season. The 27-year-old southpaw has nevertheless been a part of six organizations this calendar year. Since being designated for assignment by the Angels when the Halos signed Aaron Hicks in January, he has gone to the Tigers, Mets, Rangers, Cardinals and now Giants via waivers.

xp abreu is at least legitimately old; anderson turned 31 two weeks ago and absolutely fell off a cliff 15 months ago

not that he ever really hit for power, but he had 50 hits for the marlins this year and 53 total bases

i guess he can still field his position so maybe someone will take a flyer, but damn

good time to bring up that Corbin Carroll is only at 0.4 WAR so far. it's such a dropoff you have to think he's hurt but he's played nearly every game and is on pace for 700 ABs so I dunno what's going on. can't think of another dropoff like that after winning Rookie of the Year the prior season. then again that's not really the sort of baseball trivia I know, could be an obvious answer I'm missing

seems like he's being BABIPed pretty hard and i don't think it's too unusual for rookies to regress

but yeah the drastic power dropoff is not ideal

WAR accounts for bad BABIP luck though. I thought he'd probably regress but more to like a 3-4 WAR very good dude instead he looks like someone who maybe needs to get sent back down

Some Carroll posting from late May:

You can’t spell ‘no big contracts’ without RSN: 2024 regular MLB season thread!

(Including from you!)

I like this photo:

https://i.postimg.cc/J7jVmRkX/teoscar.jpg

Led me to check in on Biggio--brutal start in L.A. for whatever playing time he's getting.

Are the Rays officially selling?

Source confirms: Brewers acquiring Aaron Civale from Rays for a minor-league infielder. First: @JonHeyman

— Ken Rosenthal (@Ken_Rosenthal) July 3, 2024

Trying to search that, but all I can find are 10 worst ROY seasons or 10 worst careers for ROYs, nothing about follow-up seasons.

Found at least one without too much trouble--unlike Carroll, I don't think anybody thought he had an especially brilliant career in store (and he won in a strike season): Bob Hamelin's 1995 season, .168/.278/.313.

― clemenza, Monday, 27 May 2024

i asked chatgpt to figure it out. here's what it suggested:

Bob Hamelin (1994 Kansas City Royals)

Rookie Year (1994):
bWAR: 2.6
wRC+: 136
OPS: .987
Second Year (1995):
bWAR: -1.6
wRC+: 37
OPS: .557

Jerome Walton (1989 Chicago Cubs)

Rookie Year (1989):
bWAR: 2.8
wRC+: 106
OPS: .721
Second Year (1990):
bWAR: 0.1
wRC+: 67
OPS: .644

Pat Listach (1992 Milwaukee Brewers)

Rookie Year (1992):
bWAR: 4.1
wRC+: 100
OPS: .741
Second Year (1993):
bWAR: 1.2
wRC+: 69
OPS: .585

Angel Berroa (2003 Kansas City Royals)

Rookie Year (2003):
bWAR: 2.9
wRC+: 91
OPS: .789
Second Year (2004):
bWAR: 0.2
wRC+: 74
OPS: .660

Chris Coghlan (2009 Florida Marlins)

Rookie Year (2009):
bWAR: 2.7
wRC+: 125
OPS: .850
Second Year (2010):
bWAR: 0.7
wRC+: 95
OPS: .718

---

i asked for another five and it suggested Mark Fidrych, Joe Charboneau, Kerry Wood (who was just injured in 1999), Ron Kittle, and Hideo Nomo (which it preemptively got defensive about said "although he did perform well, his ERA and WHIP slightly increased and he had fewer strikeouts per nine innings")

i double-checked to see if the players listed actually won the ROY, and they did. didn't check all the individual stats. while it's true that chatgpt is an LLM and it can definitely just make up shit by trying to "fill in" what it thinks should go in a sentence, it also had an upgrade recently that allows it to browse the internet and refer to databases and statistics and stuff. it's a really fucking horrible idea, i think, and it will go badly. but for now at least i can see how it works with baseball

Willie McCovey spent a good part of his season in triple A the year after he won

I'm pretty sure neither of the main WARs (bb-ref and fangraphs) factor in BABIP to their WAR for hitters (fangraphs kinda does for pitchers, in that their WAR is based on walks, hits, and homers, while bb-ref's is based on runs allowed)

Thanks, KM. I have to memorize that group--great Immaculate Grid fodder. (I've used Hamlin and Walton but not the other three.)