Hydrogen bomb (Dodgers) vs coughing baby (everyone else): 2025 MLB regular season thread!

Starting this now cos the Japan series is in like two days? And I wanted to link this article about Dave Roberts ahead of that.

https://www.latimes.com/sports/dodgers/story/2025-03-13/dave-roberts-japanese-heritage-tokyo-opening-day

The Dodgers’ acquisition of Japanese stars Shohei Ohtani, Yoshinobu Yamamoto and Roki Sasaki has made Roberts a baseball celebrity in Japan. It has exposed him to a culture he once rarely encountered, only at home through his mom and on occasional trips to Okinawa while growing up.

It also has come at a point in life where the 52-year-old skipper feels “more secure with who I am,” he said, and “much more confident in doing a deeper dive into where I came from.”

wait, shouldn’t the st. louis cardinals be in the thread title for the regular season? because they’re going all the way this year

jk about the cards, sadly, but i do honestly think the dodgers won’t win the WS this year though, even though of course on paper it seems like a foregone conclusion. why? baseball’s weird

Thread title jinx 😎

Oh should have linked in the original post, but Jeff Passan’s regular season preview is really good!

https://www.espn.com/mlb/insider/story/_/id/44195789/mlb-season-preview-2025-jeff-passan-bold-predictions-breakout-stars-fantasy-tips

Some interesting facts about various teams:

Twins:

The best thing I heard all spring: Cory Lewis' knuckleball is almost ready for the big leagues. A ninth-round pick in 2022, Lewis -- who finished last season at Triple-A -- has averaged 83.5 mph on 13 knuckleballs this spring.

It is by far the hardest version of the pitch ever seen at the professional level. San Diego's Matt Waldron averaged 77.6 mph on his knuckler last year. R.A. Dickey topped out at 77.3 mph. While Lewis mixes it with a 90 mph fastball as well as a slider, the knuckler will be the pitch that gets him to Minneapolis.

The best thing I heard all spring: The noise from the crowd outside the fencing on a Mariners backfield. Members of the team's front office had gathered with great anticipation to take in a one-of-a-kind live batting practice. When Jurrangelo Cijntje pitches, he can run one of his fastballs up to 98 mph and the other to 93. And this isn't a four-seamer/sinker situation. It's right hand and left hand.

In a moment where the best player in the world hits and pitches at an otherworldly level, the shock of a switch-pitcher -- not a slopmaster like Pat Venditte but a true-blue power arm -- shouldn't be quite as acute. Be forewarned: It is. Even if Cijntje, taken in the first round last year as the Mariners continue a tremendous run of draft classes, is a couple of years from the big leagues, the 21-year-old is no novelty. The stuff will play, and the power switch-pitcher will be a reality.

Something you might not know: Only five of MLB's 30 teams have never won a World Series: the Brewers, Mariners, Rays, Rockies and, yes, the Padres. (The Mariners are the lone team never to have even made it to one.)

I’m feeling good about the Cubs for the first time in a few years, though I haven’t been to bummed about their lack of success in the post World Series win era just because knowing that era is only nine years and not 117 is pretty nice.

Jeffers' response is the kindest shut the fuck up i have heard in a while. There was an interview with Cease on MLB Network a few days ago where he was talking shop - it's not hard to find alternatives to Bauer.

I’m feeling good about the Cubs for the first time in a few years, though I haven’t been to bummed about their lack of success in the post World Series win era just because knowing that era is only nine years and not 117 is pretty nice.

What a beautiful morning

Yama's last season opening Asia trip still in the memory but it's a new day! Ready for these splitter boys to do some splitting

Ohtani’s batting stance is so unusual looking from that straight on angle, looks almost like he’s threatening the pitcher. Maybe to make himself look more intimidating like goalies do during penalties.

Hopefully Freddie Freeman just has the clubhouse shits.

Dodgers first baseman Freddie Freeman was scratched from today’s lineup with left rib discomfort.

:|

Yama through 1 was all I asked for this game. Everything herein is a bonus.

Empty seats behind home plate wtf Japan?

Steele-Imanaga or Imanaga-Steele is such a sexy 1-2 and maybe the only LHP pair at the top of a rotation?

Ump in form

Joey Votto is there!
https://i.postimg.cc/T1DXNQKh/IMG-3077.jpg

Jed Hoyer: Shohei just coming out for batting practice was amazing, the reaction he’s like…
Commentator: Elvis
Jed Hoyer: Taylor Swift

That was a real "I'm getting a hit this ab whether you like it or not" swing from Ohtani

Just when you get hyped for the Cubs season...

you realize Counsell is involved in in-game management and that alone sucks all the wind out of your sails.

Tbf to Counsell the throwing philosopher managed to suppress the Dodgers last season & was doing a decent job again before he got taken out… probably on a pitch count limit. Iirc Passan mentioned Ben Brown as a real possibility for making this rotation but this probably isn’t the best evidence for that.

ah ok, finally there's movement in the bullpen

Also, Cubs taking Reese McGuire to Japan is an accident waiting to happen

“I can’t even look at King Tuck in another uniform” - the Astros fan I am married to

Commentator: I did not expect them to be playing EDM music…that’s a curveball…Tokyo, Japan never ceases to amaze

Who is this hayseed?!

guess i'm getting up early to watch tomorrow's

i only had to get up a little earlier than usual and it was pretty cool sipping my coffee and catching a few meaningful innings this morning.

Honestly it was pretty boring but Justin Steele has a new mountain man look & I haven’t watched a game he pitched in like ten months and I haven’t seen Sasaki at all so hoping it’s better. Also hope for good news on Freeman

i am also feeling mildly optimistic about the cubs but it's interesting that they don't have a starter who throws harder than ... 93?

thank god for baseball

xp soft contact merchant Imanaga has maybe one of the best middle infields in the game behind him, plus Imanaga and Taillon both finished top 10 in adjusted ERA+ for NL starters last year. Justin Steele is also a soft contact merchant and had the lowest HR/9 rate in the NL in 2023. It’s antithetical to the Rays or Dodgers but it works for them.

i am also curious if the white sox will actually be worse this year. it doesn't seem possible but they lost crochet and will presumably trade robert at some point.

i'm sure they have some young guys ready to prove themselves – but literally can't think of a single one off the top of my head.

They got Braden Montgomery off the Red Sox in the Crochet trade and Kyle Teel; both are top 100 prospects who’ll contribute to the rebuild significantly. Montgomery could have gone 1st overall if he didn’t break his ankle. Whoever they get for Robert Jr should too. Colson Montgomery is going to be a stud too.

Is Robert the only ChiSox player who got drafted in the fantasy league this year?

And their top pitching prospect in the system (16th overall) had this writeup:

Schultz has done a nice job honing an upper-80s changeup that can get a bit firm but is a solid offering that fades in an opposite direction from his slider. He has advanced body control for a pitcher who is so large and so young, and his control and command both grade as better than average. His frame, arm angle and slider prompt inevitable comparisons to Randy Johnson, but Schultz is a much more polished pitcher at the same stage of development.

Both Smith's fastball and slider are well-above-average pitches. His four-seamer works at 94-97 mph and reaches 100 mph, playing even better than its impressive velocity because his funky delivery and low release height create plenty of deception and carry. His slider is his best offering, an 83-87 mph beast with horizontal and vertical action that overwhelms lefties and also works against righties.

As a Cubs fan, I still hope the White Sox return to competitive relevance, Chicago is a lot more fun when both of those teams are doing well. And I’ve always had a soft spot for them because they kept my baseball fandom going in the immediate aftermath of the Cubs basically letting Greg Maddox walk because they didn’t want to cough up $35 million for his peak era. Those White Sox teams in the early to mid 90s were legitimately fun and awesome.

I mean, actually I think all the way through that 2000 season when Frank Thomas finished second in the MVP voting, they were just a blast.

I’m not sure Mookie Betts could afford to lose “a bunch of weight”!

Can’t believe I just had to hear a commentator say “Roki Sasaki is from a little town in Japan with a load of letters” in the age of pronunciation guides.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7KYS6xeoBnc

Steele looks like he just emerged from a cave in the mountains with that hair and unblinking stare, I would NOT be fumbling pitches at the plate if I was the catcher

Btw Roki Sasaki being considered a “prospect” is extremely stupid and bad

Ohtani’s walkup being Michael Bublé’s cover of Feelin’ Good is Bad For The Game.

are there any MLB stadiums that don't have dirt along the paths between bases? looks so strange.

48 pitches, 19 strikes for Roki. yikes

Could write a doestoevskian psychological novel on this inning

Love to see the crowd behind him. Nasty strike outs following the walks, glad Roberts left him in to figure it out

I don’t think the mound has seen a guy visibly sweating that much trying to find the zone since Lincecum

Mountain man Steele should be allowed to descend from the mound and dish out a few slaps if his godawful defence lets him down again

Embarrassing

Poor Dino Ebel

How ‘bout those Guardians?

Ohtani hit #55 -- possibly the first ever 55 HR season.

pretty big game in Milwaukee right now, Reds need to win to make the playoffs, if the Brewers win they set a franchise record for Ws with 97

Reds and Mets are both losing, but Reds hold the tiebreaker

the marlins exist in order to eliminate the Mets on the last day of the season

This is just a pathetic showing even by the Mets' standards.

No way this is the standard

Like I’ve lived through this exact script at least twice before

Ohtani is indeed the first player with 55 HR, very satisfying number imo

Playoff rooting: NL, anyone but Dodgers and Phils. AL, anyone but Yanks and Sox. It wouldn't hurt my feelings for the #1 seeds to play through and get a Jays-Brewers series.

If it ain't the Dodgers, then give me a Mariners/Brewers WS.

lol so the tigers get to play the guardians again in the WC?

Still can't believe the Mets didn't make it. I was trolling because I thought they were a lock and figured they would take the series, if they won the last two then their in.

rooting for brewers

As a Braves fan, the Mets do failure so much better

Sept 12 (!) was emailing with my uncle (diehard Cleveland fan) to determine the Guardians' fate. Fifteen games left -- 8.5 games behind Detroit. Just not realistic, we figured. In the end, Cleveland went 13-2, Detroit went 3-12. Amazing.

it is truly crazy

FUCK MAJOR LEAGUE BASEBALL!!! It’s the fucking postseason and they put the fucking Guardians games on at one o’clock during Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, all weekdays when everybody has to work. Because God forbid any postseason games overlap!

how many division winners, all-time, have had negative run differentials?

https://www.mlb.com/news/playoff-teams-with-negative-run-differential

2025 guardians (-6)
2007 dbacks (-20)
2005 padres (-42)
1997 giants (-9)
1987 twins (-20)
1984 royals (-13)

fact-checkin’ z

padres-cubs series is also all day games, which is fine with me since i wfh

isn't that fitting for wrigley field?

feel like playoff night games only become the norm in the CS/WS. WC/DS weekday daygames are abundant.

(should note it's been a longgggggggg time since i went to any playoff games.)

more day games the better for those of us on GMT (or BST, or indeed CET)

Or students on AEST.

There's an Athletic story up about Pujols being the Angels' #1 choice for manager...I didn't know he was pursuing a managerial career.

that may be news to him as well

Funny--yeah, it does say "sources." Here's the story:

https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/6680234/2025/10/01/albert-pujols-angels-manager/

“Yeah. I think why not,” Pujols said in March when asked if he’d like to manage in the big leagues. “I think if the opportunity is right one day, I think I’ll be ready for that.”

Pete Rose was 45 years old when he was player/manager for the Reds.

Albert Pujols (ret. '22) is supposedly 45...

do angels fans want to see pujols as manager? i don't really have a good grip on his popularity on the west coast. obv a legend but the angels got many of his very worst years

“why not” is not exactly a ringing recommendation for oneself to manage a Major League Baseball Club

That's basically how, at 30, I decided teaching was the way to go.

I'm never exposed to american tv so these medical ads during the playoff games are fuckin WILD, reading out the side effects all nonchalant

the doomsday prepper kit one took the cake for me.

Yeah that was crazy. Is that normal American tv these days?

I'm never exposed to american tv so these medical ads during the playoff games are fuckin WILD, reading out the side effects all nonchalant

The anti schizophrenia medication one? “Not an antipsychotic”. Who is this for?!

yeh that one and the weight loss one which reads out all the side effects for ages, "may cause suicidal thoughts" while happy old people joke about where they are going to hang the fishing trophy in their new house

is converting sasaki into a closer teh answer?

I mean, have you been watching LA's relief pitchers' performances? Hiring one of the churro or peanut vendors might be a step up.

no, i have too much ptsd from last year

I just have to keep saying it because I think I was the only one watching, but the Dodgers had an 8 run lead that turned into a save situation... on 2 hits by the Reds, who were arguably the worst playoff team in MLB history.

Wrong thread, I know. I'll keep it to the WC thread.

baseball is weird!

Dodgers converted three starters (Kersh, Roki, Sheehan) to relievers only for the post seasons which should tell you everything you need to know (BULLPEN BAD)

BASEBALL BAD

VERY BAD SPORT

but for real baseball is weird, it’s bad, and it’s a very bad sport, and it’ll break your heart if you’re expecting the better team to win on any given night

Not a strike

2025 Wild Card Round

Hector Gomez is reporting that Emmanuel Clase may never pitch in the MLB again following his gambling scandal. The evidence against him is allegedly too damning.

It appears that he's not allowed to play the Dominican Winter leagues as well.