squally1313

Just daring Almora to get thrown out at second to end the the inning

Make it 4. Honestly, the last couple years the CL seems staged.

[tweet] [/tweet] This pitcher is actually pretty decent, despite his MLB The Show minor league filler name. Almora is probably like our 6th best hitter against lefties when he's playing well, which he isn't, and when it's a normal lefty, which it isn't (lefties hit him a good amount better last year, and a little bit better this year). So of course, he will be getting the most PAs tonight.

Yeah but he couldnt even hit a 2 run HR in the 9th yesterday. We needed 2 runs and he could only give us 1. But in all seriousness, its good to see him turning around after a slow start. Every player has slumps and historically KB has been streaky at times. Assuming he's turning it around it was just awful timing for him to start out the season in a bad slump after last season. (which as you are sort of pointing out was aided a lot by bad luck). Yeah I mean, the start wasn't great for reasons beyond luck...from what I can tell his BABIP has actually gone down since the first couple weeks. But even then, it was still a .690 OPS. I'm going to bet just about every player in baseball has a two week stretch like that. Since then, he's been unreal (.965 OPS on a .260 BABIP).

Kris Bryant, who is bad, now has the following: The best walk rate (14.8%) of his career. The best strike out rate (19.0%) of his career. The best hard hit rate (41.6%) of his career. The best soft hit rate (11.2%) of his career. A .274 BABIP, which is 67 points lower than his career average, and 58 points lower than his next worst BABIP year.

The last few wins have been too easy. Let’s make this one fun.

I’m glad it seems like they’re gonna be sticking Zobrist in the OF more when he plays, he looked pretty bad at 2B so far this year. Especially since Bote/KB are plus defenders on the IF to replace him. And more Zobrist in the outfield = less Almora.

God I love that line up so much.

Rizzo going into May 3rd last year: .171/.269/.280 He finished with a .846 OPS.

Three straight hitters on the Cardinals have now attempted bunting.

Hendricks has thrown 16 pitches, all of them between 85 and 87 MPH, and gotten 6 outs.

I'd take the under on Matt Carpenter for like $5 I'd take the under on Chris Carpenter for $1000000

Aren't we all?

[tweet] [/tweet] Flaherty has been slightly better against lefties than righties since last year, so not sure why Descalso over Bote. But other than that, no Almora = good line up.

I don't really care why offense is down? This whole thing started because you said it'd be nice to have Burnitz's slash line in left field. You were then told that Schwarber basically already gives you that, with better defense. And then you were told that a roughly .800 OPS is more valuable in 2019, when the average OPS is .740ish, than literally every year Burnitz played, where the average OPS was higher. So...Schwarber > Burnitz, agreed? First, any discussion about Schwarber and Burnitz should never be about defense because both should be described as "adequate" defensively. As I posted before, Schwarber wouldn't be removed so often for defensive reasons if he was "above average" as many of you claim. Defensive statistics are questionable at best (i.e. Schwarber could be rated better than Griffey JR. according to some stats. You don't really believe Schwarber > Griffey JR. defensively, do you?) Secondly, Burnitz had an avg. .826 OPS and 138 runs scored over a 14 year career, while Schwarber's avg. numbers are .803 with 86 runs scored in his career. Also, Schwarber's numbers include more platooning against lefties. Obviously there are many players I would have in LF over Burnitz or Schwarber, but since Burnitz' name was brought up in jest, I would pick Burnitz over Schwarber. Regarding defense: Schwarber is at a 0.9 defensive rating for his career per FG. Burnitz, for his career, is at -44.3. We can split hairs on Schwarber's defense ("is he adequate or acceptable???") even more if you want, but dismissing it outright is wrong. Modern baseball teams, and the Cubs in general, put a premium on defense, and have usually had at least one of Almora or Heyward sitting on the bench to come in late. This also ignores the fact in those situations Schwarber is still playing 7ish innings of defense, and as discussed above, doing it better than Jeremy Burnitz. Burnitz's career high in runs scored (which, nice stat in general) is 104, so...yeah. They have stats that compare offensive output to the rest of the league. Burnitz for his career has a 110 wRC+. Schwarber has a 112. Again, that solely values hitting, see above for defense. FG also has Schwarber as the better baserunner. What am I doing with my life.

Yeah, they'll save it for a home game to really rile up the red hat crowd down there.

And...what does that have to do with anything? Are we really just at juiced ball vs juiced players after all of this? Who cares? Offense is down compared to where it was 20 years ago. By every meaningful measure. Juiced ball means more HRs. We are at record-setting era with the number of HRs. Maybe offense is down because everybody is swinging for the fences because the ball is juiced and you're rewarded handsomely for hitting .230 with 25 HRs and striking out 160 times a year. I don't really care why offense is down? This whole thing started because you said it'd be nice to have Burnitz's slash line in left field. You were then told that Schwarber basically already gives you that, with better defense. And then you were told that a roughly .800 OPS is more valuable in 2019, when the average OPS is .740ish, than literally every year Burnitz played, where the average OPS was higher. So...Schwarber > Burnitz, agreed?

You want another rainout? You know what I mean. Fine, I'll settle for it being really cool if it could just be tomorrow.

It'd be really cool if they wanted to move one of these games up to today.

That’s ironic since he spent three years grounding out to second. This is just complete perception. When Heyward was with the Braves and Cards I always thought he was most dangerous when he was pitched away and sending balls to center and left center. It felt like that never happened his 1st 3 yrs here Yep...even though by October Arrieta wasn't in god mode anymore, I remember being just in awe of this home run (2:27 mark if it doesn't start right). Bonus: this was the game the Cubs went dong crazy, so stick around and watch the whole thing. [bbvideo=560,315] [/bbvideo]

What are you even arguing at this point? Semantics? That line Tim referenced is better today than it was in Burnitz' era because the average production today is worse than the average production then. The HR rate is skyrocketing now as compared to the steroid era when we know players were using steroids to hit HRs which sounds to me like the ball is juiced now. And...what does that have to do with anything? Are we really just at juiced ball vs juiced players after all of this? Who cares? Offense is down compared to where it was 20 years ago. By every meaningful measure.

Current OPS league wide is .742 (245/321/421), which is 18th in the last 30 years. Jeremy Burnitz played over 100 games every year from 1997 to 2006. All 10 of those years had a higher league wide OPS than 2019. 2000 was the highest, at .782. Of course steroids had nothing to do with the statistics in those years. Look at the numbers of HRs hit 6105 in 2017, 5610 in 2016, and 5585 in 2018 while the ball is juiced. The other top years 5693 in 2000, 5528 in 1999, and 5458 in 2001 the players were juiced more than the balls. What are you even arguing at this point? Semantics? That line Tim referenced is better today than it was in Burnitz' era because the average production today is worse than the average production then.

The guy who has 7 home runs in 90 PAs after 10 in the previous 947? Sure? I don't think it's a hot take to say you'd rather have LaStella's April over Descalso's, but I remain pretty confident that we'll have the better player going forward. I looked at LaStella's stats a few days ago, and he's doing this with a pretty absurdly low BABIP, if I remember correctly. .188, so yeah. I mean, obviously you discount the HR/FB rate given his career/stature, but everything is really impressive, given the sample size...walk rate is double the K rate, hard hit rate is triple the soft hit rate, etc. But...90 PAs. We know what he is. Good for him/the Angels...god knows they need it. But I'll take Descalso.

Please somebody, anybody, explain why Almora should be getting more PAs than Bote right now. Why does Zagunis exist if he isn't in this game.

Fine - How about Schwarber's actual 2018 production of .238/.356/.467? Considering most of Burnitz's best seasons came during the juiced ball era, that Schwarber line from last year is more than comparable. He's also rating as an above average defender again, no matter how many times you try to claim that he's best served as a DH. Oh, but I'm sorry. Go ahead and keep banging your head against this one. In case you haven't noticed we're in the juiciest of the juice ball eras right now. Current OPS league wide is .742 (245/321/421), which is 18th in the last 30 years. Jeremy Burnitz played over 100 games every year from 1997 to 2006. All 10 of those years had a higher league wide OPS than 2019. 2000 was the highest, at .782.