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Bertz

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Everything posted by Bertz

  1. Bertz
    Jack Neely's not a threat to make the team, but he's been interesting this spring. Throwing way more strikes than he has at any point since leaving the Yankees. Velocity is down, but movement is way up, and so he's still getting crazy amount of swing and miss. It looks like Hodge is dead but I feel much much better about Roberts, Little, and Neely than I did a month ago. Probably a worthwhile tradeoff.
  2. Bertz
    Presumably Shota will go in the opening series as well, as the Nats were horrendous against LHP last year and did nothing this winter to make you think they've meaningfully improved
  3. Bertz
    US has more or less clinched. I think the game has to go like 12 innings at this point.
  4. Bertz
    Did not realize Assad was starting this game. If you weren't already rooting for Mexico it feels even more obvious now.
  5. Bertz
    Ohhhh Hunter Harvey is sitting 98, I love it Prior to '25 Harvey sat 98 MPH in relief. Last year he was at 96, though still effective in SSS. Prior to today Harvey was sitting under 97, which was not a red flag like Taillon but certainly yellow.
  6. Bertz
    I am cautiously optimistic about Carlson. He's making Nico Hoerner levels of contact and it hasn't come at the expense of power or lift. Spring Training is not real life but these are the sorts of foundational level skills where there's likely some signal in the noise. On the flipside like you I'm not impressed with Conforto, but hey if they want to stash him on the last slot of the bench so they're not boned if Ian Happ breaks a leg I get it. Mo I'm hoping they give a dedicated SP to caddy for behind the plate. Pair Mo with like Matt Boyd plus let him be the true backup during the inevitable Kelly/Amaya IL stint. You can probably get him 40ish games behind the plate that way. And speaking of Kelly/Amaya, if they're hitting like they do when they're at their best then they warrant time in the DH/1B mix. If they aren't then they probably don't have a good argument against Mo encroaching on their turf.
  7. Bertz
    Shaw at 1B??
  8. Bertz
    Eh I'm not especially focused on production in spring training. What has been so exciting about Rojas has been the power. He's been hitting the ball eith authority, and even done so against a bit of velocity. This is a kid who has generally even at his nadir had healthy K/BB/GB rates. Basically he's always had good process but the hope has been that what he mainly needs is to grow a little bit more of his "man strength" and get the bat knocked out of his hands less. It's exciting because his sterling exit velos this spring make it appear that's exactly what's happened.
  9. Bertz
    I'm really curious to see what Conrad's deal is health-wise right now. We've gotten Hartshorn into three big league ST games, including a full 9 inning game at DH, and yet no Conrad. The takeaway for me is that even just in the batters box there is still some level of caution or restriction on him. There's nothing really positive to learn about Ethan until he gets to South Bend. So hopefully he's up there before Memorial Day.
  10. Bertz
  11. Bertz
    I'm pretty over the whole "our team has a quirky costume guys put on In the dugout after hitting a dong" trend but Vinnie Pasquantino making Team Italy do shots of espresso is absolutely beautiful
  12. Bertz
    Has to be a physical, right?
  13. Bertz
    Kade Snell with a 111 MPH double is nice He probably needs to make quick work of South Bend to stay on track. SSS but promising ST numbers make you hopeful he's about to do that.
  14. Bertz
    Velo was fine I wouldn't jump to any health related conclusions
  15. Bertz
    Small sample size, spring training, blah blah blah all fair but James Triantos walking more than 20% of the time and rocking a league average groundball rate is fun and super encouraging.
  16. Bertz
    Oh you know who else deserves a mention is Mo Baller. He's been catching a bunch and I find myself barely even noticing him behind the plate. Considering the discourse, "I forgot he was back there" is a win IMO.
  17. Bertz
    Probably one of the pitchers whose velo is way up? Shota comes to mind first but Assad, Brown, and Roberts are all up to a notable degree as well. On the position player side maybe Carlson or Triantos?
  18. Bertz
    Hunter Greene out until July with bone chips in his elbow. Really hard to see the Reds doing anything without getting monstrous results from their rotation.
  19. Bertz
    Jefferson Rojas has been the biggest positive surprise out of camp by a healthy margin. But Pedro has been #2 and he's got a healthy lead on #3. The power this spring looks like it's grown into being probably average-ish, but that's way better than what I was expecting coming into the spring. This is a guy with plus defense, plus plate discipline, and plus contact ability. Those pluses with 5-10 dong power is a quality bench guy or second division starter. With 15+ homer power? Now we're talking about a quality starter. Need to make sure he can keep the groundballs in check, and that the new power doesn't have a major contact tradeoff (it hasn't this spring), but it's exciting.
  20. Bertz
    FWIW Matt Lombardo reported this weekend that Evans is firmly in the wants to play for a contender is willing to leave some money on the table stage of his career. So this probably isn't completely off base.
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  24. Bertz
    We're getting a lot of Busch/Hoerner/Happ 1/2/3. Curious if that's the default lineup vs. RHP, or if it's just because Bregman and Seiya are at the WBC.
  25. Bertz
    I know he's had some impressive exit velos but if Pedro can go deep to the opposite field that kind of fundamentally changes how we should think about his ceiling.
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