Bryants Disco Ball

Have to admit, I'm starting to think you guys might be right about Almora.

I........am impressed Kyle Ryan got some high leverage, big outs.

Man, it would have been crazy to think a year ago that people would pick Javy over KB if they could only keep one. That gap has narrowed a bit.

I heard they mentioned his changup, but somebody give me a breakdown as to why suddenly Q is pitching like the ace he was for the White Sox.

Actually, I'm pretty sure he doesn't when you aren't watching as well.

Holy horsefeathers, Cody Bellinger's numbers are insane.

What's everybody gotta say about Schwarber now????

Hahahha. You can't do that, can you??

Theo excels when you don't give him money to blow.

What a first inning performance. What great two-out hitting.

Now, THAT'S how you do it.

Willy, you need to come through here. Must come away with run(s).

That was the most bizarre at-bat of Javy's career.

I'd even take his BB/9 to go back in line with his career before the Cubs. That would make him solid enough.

Good finds and memories, everyone.

One of our guys (I think it actually was Javy) got pissed at Amir Garret last season, if I remember correctly.

His exit velocity looks fine, in fact it's currently better than it was in 2017. That's hopefully a sign his shoulder is fine. And if his shoulder is fine, this is most likely just a slump. His two problems have been that he's been making too much contact on pitches out of the zone and swinging and missing too much on pitches over the heart of the plate. Those *should* just be normal slump problems. These are his heatmaps for contact rate in 2017 vs 2019 https://www.fangraphs.com/zonegrid.aspx?playerid=15429&position=3B&ss=&se=&type=3&hand=&count=&blur=0&grid=5&view=&pitch=&season=2017&data=pi https://www.fangraphs.com/zonegrid.aspx?playerid=15429&position=3B&ss=&se=&type=3&hand=&count=&blur=0&grid=5&view=&pitch=&season=2019&data=pi Notice all that extra orange on the left in 2019? That means pitchers that this year when pitchers have jammed him he's still made contact, likely crap contact. Whereas in 2017 he would have swung and missed through those pitches and the AB would continue. Also, the box in the bottom right (low and away out of the zone) is much lighter. Those are extra pitches he's lunging at and rolling over. Conversely, all that white right down the middle and down and in in 2019 means he's swinging through a lot more pitches in zones that he used to hit the hell out of. So if KB's bad now it doesn't look to be because his shoulder has been turned into hamburger meat. (if there was a heatmap of exit velocity by zone that would really help check this). I personally have a really hard time imagining him continuing to struggle if he's healthy, but we'll see. This is a Duker-in-his-prime level breakdown. Great job. I did see Duker had a great breakdown on David Bote via Twitter, though. I have no breakdowns, other than to say that I think KB is sort of broken down and I'm not sure he is ever going to come close to that $300 million contract. But if he's still actually good, this is the proper time for him to suck so he has 2 1/2 seasons to rebound and get GM's excited again.

Do the Dodgers still have bad splits vs lefties? Not sure. Wasn't that just a 2017 thing, though? I can't remember.

Great execution. Clean win on a day when the offense didn't do much. Great job by Chatwood and the bullpen to limit them to one run in nine innings. Upcoming series against the Dodgers will be difficult. But let's enjoy another series win.

No excuse not to win now. Zero. Get it done.

I feel like some of you are being a bit harsh here. You pitch to Jarod Dyson and you dare him to hit in the air. He did, really deep. Oh, well.

Wow. Jarod Dyson. That sucks. Hopefully, we can walk this off. Those are always fun.

Nope. Dude was real good today.

Since he hasn't started yet this year, maybe he was getting fatigued or they didn't want to push him. Not saying that's why, but maybe a reason.

He's obviously really good anywhere, but it's funny to look at his home/away splits so far this season.