Aaron_Kennelly

I saw some of the Cardinals fans on GRB talking about how they looked like a third-place team, but I'm not sure that's right. This Pirates team doesn't look too intimidating to me. Maybe I'm wrong. And I know they are a good bet to over-perform, thanks to Searage and the pitching-inside philosophy. They're a tough team to read. The outfield is, obviously, fantastic. But, the line-up, as a whole, has never really scared me. Liriano looks like horsefeathers right now. And I just don't believe Searage is enough of a wizard to make something out of Niese and Nicasio. I think the Cards might be considerably better. I might eat my words later on, though.

Wow! Two consecutive walk-less outings for Carl Edwards Jr.

Justin Steele with a nice start, after two rough ones to start the year. 5IP 4H 2ER 1BB 6K All four hits that he surrendered were singles, and he retired the side in both of his last two innings, with 2 K's in each inning.

Law is a dick, but he's not an on-air dick so few notice. I was trying -- and failed -- to make a joke about evolution by tying in Schilling, Law, and survival of the fittest. I don't like Keith Law. But he has done nothing to warrant being fired. And he is certainly not even in the same realm as Curt Schilling.

Oh... I like that.

And yet Keith Law survives at ESPN. Some might say he was more fit for the job as a baseball analyst.

Until there is more evidence to contradict this opinion, these games are just going to piss me off because it will mean we win 102 games instead of 103 this year. Last year, sure, the double whammy effect doubly pissed me off. But, I am just not scared of that team. I'm not either...I just want them buried in April I can get on board with that. I did want a five-game lead. So I will let this irrationally affect my disposition the rest of the week.

Until there is more evidence to contradict this opinion, these games are just going to piss me off because it will mean we win 102 games instead of 103 this year. Last year, sure, the double whammy effect doubly pissed me off. But, I am just not scared of that team.

meh

Hopefully Rosenthal is at his wildest.

we still got this OK. I'm back on board. Someone get on base and then someone dong.

They should have just called this stupid horsefeathering game so I didn't get my hopes up and waste my time.

If someone gets on, Dex will get a chance.

Eh... I'll take it.

Tiny cheeseburgers for everyone!

Attaboy, Rizzo!

Line drive right at a guy; haven't seen that before.

We've got something cooking!

BASEBALL!

Maybe someone in the dugout got some nachos.

I think that's something we can all agree on. And you might be right about the improvements in contact ability coming with age. The hope was probably that he would be able to retain some power, which he still hits for a little pop. But, yeah, seeing him do both would be amazing. Heyward's been an interesting player, though. The one constant with him has been the defense; he's fantastic annually. Well, actually, he's been a great base runner, too, except for his injury-plagued year. But, he's had a few thing come and go. And a few weird things have happened that might sap some value from ordinary players. For instance, the power has kinda fluctuated. It comes and goes in spurts. His ISO seems to go up and down from one year to the next. Last year, he hit an inordinate amount of ground balls. He had some bad BABIP luck in 2013. In 2014 he had some poor HR/FB luck. (2011 was different. He just wasn't good that year. He made a lot of weak contact. His soft-hit % was really high. His line-drive % was down big time, which might be random noise. But, his infield-fly ball % was astronomical. He just had a rough year at the plate.) But, besides 2011, even with certain aspects of his game coming and going, he always finds a way to put up a 5-6 win season. He always makes up for his deficiencies in other areas. If one thing isn't going right, well, he does everything else well, so something else will offset it.

His K% went down from 23.3% in 2012 to 14.8% last year. Not coincidentally, his OBP went up from .335 in 2012 to .359 last year. And despite those 27 homers, his wRC+ was 121 in both 2012 and last year. He traded pop for contact, and, as a result, he still provides about the same all-around value offensively. How did his advanced metrics look the next year when he hit 14 HR's in 100 games & had a pretty nice OBP still at .350? He'd already changed his approach by the next year. There is a pretty clear delineation between 2010-2012 and then from 2013-2015 for him. There's not much different in how he has hit balls. There's maybe a little difference. He did hit a lot more ground balls last year. But the two years before that seemed normal. He's going to the opposite field maybe a bit more, and not hitting as many hard-hit balls. But the differences there aren't hugely significant. As far as his approach, his swing%, both in and outside the zone have remained pretty steady. There is one big difference, though. And that is in how often he makes contact. In his first three years, he never had a contact% over 80%. He's been over 80% all three years since then. In 2012, when he set his career high in homers, he also had a career low 75.4% contact%. Last year, he had a career high 84.2% contact%. Those are clear and noticeable changes. And it appears he sacrificed some power in making those changes. His ISO from 2010-2012 was .186. From 2013-2015, his ISO was .141. However, his K% from 2010-2012 was 21.6%, and his K% from 2013-2015 was 15.4%. I'm not sure which Heyward I would rather have. I think, overall, he probably was a little better with the extra pop, despite the increased K-rate. But, I do like when guys make more contact. Ideally, he would be able to take the good parts from both approaches and somehow meld together Power Heyward and Contact Heyward into some amalgamation of a Super Beast.

he changed his swing/approach Is there any articles on this or info shedding light on this? His OBP hasn't changed too drastically. 22 year old Heyward looked like a monster especially when taking into count his glove. His K% went down from 23.3% in 2012 to 14.8% last year. Not coincidentally, his OBP went up from .335 in 2012 to .359 last year. And despite those 27 homers, his wRC+ was 121 in both 2012 and last year. He traded pop for contact, and, as a result, he still provides about the same all-around value offensively.

That's not a strike!

Well, Hendricks settled in nicely after that rough start. Now get me some damn runs.