2021 Semi-Punctual Mathematical Eliminatory

cannonball 1729

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You know what? I know it's late, but let's do this!

My computer was in the shop for a while when the elimination season started, so I've missed the opening bell, but there's no reason we can't start this thing up again belatedly and see where it goes. I make no promises that I'll finish the thread this year, but I'm optimistic I'll get at least halfway there!

By my count we've got seven eliminated teams (Baltimore, Texas, KC, Minnesota, Arizona, Pittsburgh, and Washington) with the Marlins out in the WC but still with a game to give in the division (depending how the Braves do this afternoon). To start, let's take care of the three AL teams that were eliminated as of Thursday, and we'll get through the rest in the few days.

Anyway, enough prelude - let's get into it! As always, we start in Baltimore:

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At the beginning of the year, the Orioles were shockingly adequate. Sure, they weren’t exactly world-beaters, and no one was mistaking them for the Rays or Astros, but they weren’t pushovers, either. They began the year with a decisive three-game sweep of the Red Sox, outscoring the crimson hose by a combined 18-5 tally in the three games. That series kicked of a stretch wherein the O's went 15-16; while that’s not amazing – or even good – it was good enough to warrant attention from fans and baseball types as a team that might actually win some baseball games.

The pinnacle of the season came on May 5, when ace John Means threw a no-hitter that was a close to a perfect game as one could imagine without it actually being a perfect game. Twenty-eight men went to the plate; twenty-seven were retired, and the twenty-eighth struck out but was granted a reprieve on catcher Pedro Severino’s dropped third strike. In the year of the no-hitter, this was perhaps the most impressive one of all, and for a team in need of an ace, it appeared that Means had finally arrived.

Unfortunately (and oddly), this near-perfecto marked the beginning of the Orioles’ collapse. Over the next twenty-three games, they went 2-21, putting the season out of reach for good. By the All-Star break, they were dead and buried, lying 6.5 games below even the second-worst team in the AL. The Orioles have had two runs of semi-competence this year: their 15-16 start and a 10-5 stretch at the end of July; apart from those two stretches, they're 22-81, good for a .214 winning percentage. In August, the O's embarked on a losing streak that rivaled their longest ever; at 19 games, the streak only barely managed to avoid the ignominy of “besting” the 1988 Orioles and their 21-game record. The most impressive part was not the 19-game streak itself – it was the fact that they also had a 16-game losing streak earlier in the season that will now be ignored because of the latter streak.

Just as they have for most of the last twenty-five years, the Orioles find themselves again stuck in rebuilding purgatory. For O’s fans, this is a familiar movie; the names change, but the roles remain the same. They have the uber-prospect (Adley Rutschman), a couple of good players who may end up traded before the Orioles see another winning season (Cedric Mullins, John Means, Trey Mancini), the drek (much of the rest of the roster), and, of course, the albatross (Chris Davis). Veteran O’s fans might remember when the uber-prospect was Matt Wieters or Adam Loewen or Matt Riley, or when the tradeable player was Erik Bedard or Miguel Tejada or Manny Machado, or when the albatross was Albert Belle or Scott Erickson or Ubaldo Jimenez; for those fans, there’s a disappointing (if calming) familiarity to the whole process. Orioles fans can only hope that some sort of a plan comes together and that the arrival looks more like the brief 2012-2016 run of competence and less like the rest of the futile quarter-century.

But whatever happens, one thing is certain about the Orioles' future: Chris Davis will still be drawing paychecks from the Orioles until 2037.

The O’s last made the playoffs in 2016. Their last championship was in 1983.

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The deadline trade of Joey Gallo to the Yankees can mean only one thing: the first iteration of the rebuild has failed.

Five years ago, the Rangers were a shining example of the “right” way to build a franchise. They’d had back-to-back World Series appearances and three playoff appearances titles from 2010-12, then retooled for two years, then switched managers and made two more consecutive playoff appearances. It wasn’t an incredible run, but in the era of “three years of contending, seven years of rebuild,” making five playoffs in seven years was truly an accomplishment.

More impressively, however, they'd managed to put together the next core while the erstwhile core was still making the playoffs and getting into fights with the Blue Jays. The succession plan was in place; as greats like Adrian Beltre shuffled off into retirement, the next great Rangers team would be built around then-wunderkind Elvis Andrus and promising young prospects like Rougned Odor, Nomar Mazara, Jurickson Profar, and, of course, slugger Joey Gallo. Most prognosticators at the time were effusive with their praise of president Jon Daniels and his team construction, and for good reason – it’s no small feat to assemble a new core while you’re still enjoying the benefits of the previous one.

Unfortunately, that new core never materialized. Rougned Odor’s biggest highlight for the Rangers involved punching Jose Bautista; Rougy now plays for the Yankees. The Other Nomar never got over his astounding ability to swing at pitches and completely miss them; he was flipped to the White Sox in 2019 for an equally uninspiring prospect and has since been designated for assignment by two different teams. Andrus spent last year engaged in hand-to-hand combat with the Mendoza line; he has since moved to Oakland, where he continues to get on base less than 30% of the time. Jurickson Profar could never get over the hump and was eventually shipped to Oakland after his career year as a 3-win player; in return, the Rangers received some international cap money and a catcher who hits like a pitcher. Now, with Gallo gone, that promising core....that young team whose arrival was so perfectly timed to coincide with the opening of the new Globe Life Park...has proven to be little more than a mirage.

At the beginning of the year, Texas management used the term “evaluation year” to describe the upcoming 2021 season. If this was the goal, it was accomplished; the Rangers – and the rest of baseball – correctly ‘evaluated’ the team as terrible. They were five games under .500 by the end of April, suffered a nine-game losing streak at the end of May that pushed them to the fringes of the standings, and were firmly entrenched in the cellar by an eleven-game losing streak in July. They're far and away the worst-hitting team (by OPS+) in the American League, and their pitching is third-worst in the AL (by ERA+). Their lineup is below average at every position except center field, and their only good starting pitcher in 2021 now plays for the Phillies. Given that they can neither pitch nor hit, the surprise of the season isn't so much that the Rangers are bad - it's that there's an AL team that's somehow worse.

The good news is that there’s at least some new blood in the front office, as the Rangers hired former pitcher and veteran tall person Chris Young to be the new general manager. As far as good news...that’s pretty much it. If baseball became a dunking contest between general managers, the Rangers and their 6’10 GM would probably win; apart from that, there’s little to like about the Rangers - little in the bigs, little in the farm, and little in the way of hope. The rebuild has crashed and burned, and the Rangers are now, for the first time in a while, stuck in an honest-to-goodness tanking rebuild. If Daniels and Young are to right the ship, it will have to be the way that every other team now does it – by drafting high and flipping veterans for kids. It’s an achievable path, but for a team that once prided itself on its ability to walk the roads of developing and contending at the same time, the current path just seems so….pedestrian.

The Rangers have never won a World Series. Their last playoff appearance was in 2016.

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The Twins are the runaway winner of the 2021 Disappointment of the Year award. In the preseason, projections like PECOTA had the Twins winning the division, which makes sense; they’d won the division in 2020 and run away with it in 2019. The Twins were returning a solid middle of the lineup in Josh Donaldson, Byron Buxton, Eddie Rosario, Max Kepler, and Nelson Cruz, as well as perennial enigma Miguel Sano. They were returning a pitching staff that had come into its own, anchored by Kenta Maeta and Jose Berrios. Their incumbent manager (and native Rhode Islander) Rocco Baldelli was even a former manager of the year. To that core, they’d added dominant defender and sometimes hitter Andrelton Simmons to shore up the middle infield defense, and they’d added Alex Colome to strengthen the back of the bullpen. Sure, the White Sox and the Native American Traffic Watchers looked to be improved, but the Twins had every right to expect that when all was said and done, they’d walk away with the division crown.

What happened instead was...not that.

Instead, the Twins fell apart early. Starting in mid-April, the Twins embarked on a 2-13 stretch that pushed them to the edges of the playoff picture; a 3-12 stretch in early May pushed them even further out of contention, and by June 15 they were twelve games from the nearest playoff spot. Far from being contenders, the Twins were surprise sellers at the deadline; they sent Berrios and Cruz away to better teams, and they've spent the post-deadline months acting as a punching bag for playoff contenders.

What went wrong? The chief culprit was undoubtedly the pitching. In the rotation, only Jose Berrios gave a solid every-fifth-day effort; the rest were either injured, ineffective, or both. Kenta Maeda posted an ERA+ of 89 before heading to the IL with the dreaded “forearm tightness;” Michael Pineda battled all sorts of injuries (as he has for his entire career), including right elbow inflammation, an abscess in his thigh, and “side pain;” and J.A. Happ and Matt Shoemaker are cooked, as their 6 and 8 ERA’s might suggest. Meanwhile, Alex Colome was so bad as closer that he found himself ousted from the role in favor of Taylor Rodgers and Hansel Robles; the former suffered a finger injury, while the latter was uneven in his Twins appearances and was sent to the Red Sox to reprise his hot-and-cold routine for the Fenway faithful. All told, the Twins’ ERA+ is second-worst in the league, besting only the historically bad Orioles. The hitting was good, if un-clutch (.206 in late and close situations, but a 103 OPS+ overall), but the only way an offense can overcome a pitching staff giving up 5.2 runs a game is if that offense is playing in the steroid era or at Coors Field.

It’s been a weird, snakebitten year for the Twins. Spring training began in the worst way possible - they lost bench coach Mike Bell to cancer, casting a pall over the young season that never seems to have lifted. The Twins then suffered a Covid outbreak in April that forced them to postpone several games just as the season was kicking up. They’ve been ravaged by injuries – in addition to the pitching staff woes above, Byron Buxton’s hand fracture put a stop to an absolute monster season by the young slugger. For a team with so much promise, 2021 has been a long and miserable ride for the fans in the Twin Cities

The Twins are now faced with the thorny question of whether to rebuild or reload. They traded their only consistently good starter (Berrios) at the deadline, so they have to re-assemble the pitching staff from the ground up. On the other hand, their hitting - even without Cruz - can still be among the best in the league as long as the hitters stay healthy. With half the team good and half the team bad….what do they do? Your guess is as good as mine.

The Twins last won the World Series in 1991.
 

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DeadlySplitter

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Maeda had TJ earlier this month. I don't see how the Twins contend before 2024 with that pitching staff.
 

cannonball 1729

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Maeda had TJ earlier this month. I don't see how the Twins contend before 2024 with that pitching staff.
Dunno what to think about them. The arms are a mess, but they've got enough hitting talent on the team that they might be reluctant to blow things up. They've probably got enough in the farm that they can deal for another Maeda type, and they've only got about $50 mil committed to next year's salaries, so they could try to cobble together a rotation of mid-level guys and reclamation projects to supplement the Buxton core. Or they could just blow it up. I honestly don't know which direction they'll choose, but I really wouldn't blame them either way.

Also...thanks all! I'm always glad that these writeups are able to find an interested community. And it's good to be back - I didn't do these last year because Covid baseball wasn't real.
 

dynomite

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IT'S BACK IT'S BACK IT'S BACK YESSSSSSSssssssssssssssssssssss

Just great stuff. Thanks for giving us the best thread of the year yet again @cannonball 1729 .

Dunno what to think about them. The arms are a mess, but they've got enough hitting talent on the team that they might be reluctant to blow things up. They've probably got enough in the farm that they can deal for another Maeda type, and they've only got about $50 mil committed to next year's salaries, so they could try to cobble together a rotation of mid-level guys and reclamation projects to supplement the Buxton core. Or they could just blow it up. I honestly don't know which direction they'll choose, but I really wouldn't blame them either way.
Put me down for the Twins being moderate buyers this offseason.

My feeling is they just need to look at the Blue Jays to see an example of an organization that turned castoff starters (Ray, Matz) and a ridiculous offense into an AL Pennant contender. The salary situation, as you say, is insanely favorable, with only $51 million committed for next season (HOW?). And they have two top SS prospects in Royce Lewis and Austen Martin (from the Berrios trade) likely on their way in 2022 after the Super Two deadline. Plus, before his season ending injury, rookie Alex Kiriloff's underlying statcast numbers were wild (top 20 in MLB in xSLG, etc.).

To your point, we know they'll score runs with a Buxton/Donaldson/Sano/Kepler/Garver/Kiriloff/Polanco core, so the question is, who will pitch, especially given Maeda's injury?

To me, there's at least some hope. Joe Ryan (the return in the Cruz trade) looks like a #3/#4 starter. At least one of Bailey Ober and Griffin Jax will probably be serviceable end of the rotation filler, with a Canadian kid named Balazovic on his way next year.

Ultimately, I could absolutely see the Twins stocking up on a handful of mid-tier free agent SPs (Alex Wood? Alex Cobb? Kluber? Heaney?) and spending the 1st half of 2022 seeing how things play out.
 
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cannonball 1729

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Ultimately, I could absolutely see the Twins stocking up on a handful of mid-tier free agent SPs (Alex Wood? Alex Cobb? Kluber? Heaney?) and spending the 1st half of 2022 seeing how things play out.
If I had to guess, this would be my guess. I feel like if they really thought they were out of it, they would have flipped more than Cruz and Berrios at the deadline - Cruz is a FA at the end of the year, and Berrios is a FA after 2022 and was traded for two players who reach the majors in 2022 anyway, so....neither trade really signaled "rebuild." If the Twins' 2022 ends up looking like their 2021, they can always pull a 2021 Cubs and just tear down at the deadline.
 

cannonball 1729

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Miami joined the big eliminatory in the sky Sunday with the Braves' victory, and the Cubs went to Elimination Land with the Cardinals' win yesterday. We'll get to those two eventually, but first let's post some of the teams that have already gone. Today, let's hit the first three NL entrants.

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Yikes. Two years ago, the Diamondbacks were a fun, surprising team. Sure, they missed the playoffs, and, sure, they’d traded away their two biggest stars (Paul Goldschmidt and Zack Greinke), but they won 85 games and showcased breakout performances by young studs like Ketel Marte and Nick Ahmed. 2020 wasn’t nearly as good, but whatever – everyone gets a mulligan on whatever happened during Covidball.

This year, by contrast, has been an unmitigated disaster. An okay April gave way to a May and June that brought losing streaks of biblical proportions. A 17-game losing streak? A 24-game road losing streak? Sixty-two days between road wins? Those shouldn’t be the fortunes of a major league ballclub; those sorts of wanderings in the desert should be tales from the Book of Exodus. Madison Bumgarner couldn’t have known that his seven-inning no-hitter on April 25 would be the last time that the team would shake hands on an opponents’ field until late June, but from then on, the Snakes found every possible way to lose: close games, blowouts, walk-offs, leads blown by relievers, rallies that came up just short...basically everything except for locusts and frogs.

The biggest problem with the Diamondbacks is their pitching, which is horrible. The “ace” is Madison Bumgarner; unfortunately, that designation is based on his history and his salary, since his ERA+ is currently 92. The rest of the rotation isn’t any better, ranging from the below-league-average stylings of Merrill Kelly to the replacement-level pitches of whomever happens to pick up the ball on day 5. The bullpen is an absolute arson squad; they’ve averaged 2.40 runs allowed in the last four innings of a game, worst in baseball. Of the seventeen D-back pitchers with 20+ appearances, ten of those pitchers have an ERA over 4.90; six of those have an ERA over 6.

Only marginally less of a problem is the hitting, which is terrible, but slightly less so. Arizona hitters have an OPS+ of 86, which is good for fourth-worst in the NL. Ketel Marte has blossomed into the star that we thought he might be, but Nick Ahmed and the rest of the infield haven’t hit at all this year, and the non-Marte outfield has been just as bad. It’s too bad that the D-backs hitters and pitchers don’t get to face each other, because it would probably really help one group or the other.

It's clear that this year was a large step back for the D-Backs. On the plus side, they still have a promising farm system, they're still one of the youngest teams in baseball, and they did have that one no-hitter thrown by a rookie in his first start. Apart from that...there was a whole lot of disinterested, ugly baseball played by people who have regressed significantly. Unsurprisingly, manager Torey Lovullo appears to have run out of rope with the fans, especially given the sloppiness that has permeated the team's play for much of the year; Lovullo already threw his hitting coaches on the sword in June, so it's likely that Torey himself be the next to take the fall. It’s hard to believe that the fun 2019 season was just two years ago; for despondent Diamondback front-office officials who are frantically updating their resumes, those happy times may as well have been back in the days of the Old Testament.

The Diamondbacks' last playoff appearance was in 2017. Their last World Series win was in 2001.

Speaking of teams that had great 2019's....

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...it’s kind of hard to believe that the Nationals are the same franchise that had such a magical run in 2019, because they’ve been pretty bad ever since.

The problems this year were with both the pitching and the hitting, but in dramatically different ways. The pitching was bad in the traditional way of “allowing lots of runs and baserunners and not being good at pitching.” The Nationals ERA+ is 85, tied for second-worst in the NL. That, however, understates how uneven the staff was; the Nats got some great games out of Max Scherzer, Brad Hand, and even Pablo Espino...but they got a lot of awful appearances from the non-Scherzer starters (especially Patrick Corbin and Jon Lester) and the non-Hand relievers. The bullpen in particular has been terrible - they're tied for the NL lead in blown saves, and they're just one off of the lead in bullpen losses.

The hitting, on the other hand, has been good but unlucky. By OPS+, the hitting has posted a 106 mark, well above the league average. However, those hot bats had a penchant for going cold when the game got tight and late. They're 11th in the NL in runs scored during 7th to 9th innings of a game, and they're dead last in baseball in runs scored in extra innings. Coming into the seventh inning, the Nationals trailed in 65 games; they won exactly two of those 65. The late-game power outage was probably a fluke, but it unfortunately caused a whole lot real losses in real baseball games.

Faced with their second disappointing season in as many years, the Nationals decided that it was time to push the reset button. Anyone who was not young, on a long contract, or bolted down was shoved out the door, leading the Nationals to send Max Scherzer, Trea Turner, Daniel Hudson, Yan Gomes, Kyle Schwarber, Brad Hand, Josh Harrison and Jon Lester out into the league. In exchange, the Nats picked up no fewer than twelve prospects, including six who are now considered to be in the Nationals’ top 16 (according to MLB Pipeline). Unsurprisingly, the post-deadline Nationals have been terrible, going 13-32 and sealing the deal on their own elimination in short order.

It’s not clear what to expect from the Washingtonians. They’ll undoubtedly try to sign Scherzer again, and they may try to sign Rizzo as well. However, they’re still on the hook for $58 million a year to the perpetually-injured Stephen Strasburg and the perpetually underwhelming Patrick Corbin. Worse, the Nationals have a farm system that (until the deadline infusion) was considered to be among the worst in the league. Obviously, a team with money can certainly spend their way into contention, and they still have some key pieces like Juan Soto and Josh Bell, but with so many holes (including some newly-opened ones from the deadline deals), there’d have to be a lot that went right for the Nationals to find their way into contention next year.

The Nationals last played in the postseason - and last won a World Series - in 2019.

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They’re still not good, but at least they’re fun.

Stuck in the doldrums since their 2013-2015 window closed, they’ve been doing something like “rebuilding” for over half a decade. Their farm system is bubbling with activity - in part because they traded three of their best players (Jameson Taillon, Josh Bell, and Joe Musgrove) before the season started - but they’re still in that same purgatory of 90- or 100-loss seasons where they’ve lived for the last few years.

This year, though, the Bucs have certainly played a more entertaining style of baseball. There have been gaffes, like the time first baseman Will Craig chased batter Javy Baez back to home instead of stepping on first, a play that somehow resulted in Baez on second. There have been fan favorites, like journeyman-who-ran-into-a-hot-streak-and-became-a-cult-hero John "Big" Nogowski. There's the young star who is putting it all together, center fielder Bryan Reynolds; there are young potential stars who haven’t yet put it together, like third baseman Ke’Bryan Hayes and first baseman Colin Moran; and (up until the trade deadline) there was the surprise star playing for a trade to a contender, Adam Frazier (and his .324 batting average!).

The problem is that the Pirates, in between stretches of fun baseball, engaged in several stretches of absolutely terrible baseball that made things a bit less fun. Perhaps the most notable stretch was the ten-game losing streak that the Bucs saw in June, but they also suffered through a six-game losing streak in April and another in May, as well as a 1-13 stretch in August. On the season they’ve been outscored by a whopping 205 runs, largely because they have the worst pitching in the NL and the second-worst hitting. Really, they haven’t learned to do anything particularly well this year; the Fielding Bible even goes so far as to say that they’re the worst team in the majors at shifting infielders to places where balls might be hit.

In recent years, the Pirates have usually managed to string together a good couple of months before absolutely falling off a cliff; this year, however, they got the cliff-diving out of the way early. They managed to crawl to a winning record near the end of April (granted, it was only 12-11, but that’s good for Pittsburgh); however, a 1-8 stretch immediately thereafter pushed them out of contention, and a 1-9 stretch later in May slammed the door. They’re entertaining, sure, but the Pirates are still a ways from being interesting, and they’re even further from being threatening. But at least Bucs fans have their “Big Nogowski” shirts and their number 69 Nogowski jerseys (because of course that’s his number) that will someday remind them of a time that they had a fun, terrible team!

(Oh, and of course the Pirates released Nogowski yesterday.)

The Pirates last made the playoffs in 2015. Their last title was in 1979.
 

barbed wire Bob

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9 games of regular season left and the Royals have a mathematical chance to still make the playoffs???
No, they’re eliminated.
American League wild-card standings
  • WC1: Red Sox, 86-65 (.570)
  • WC2: Blue Jays, 84-66 (.560)


  • Yankees, 84-67 (.553), 0.5
  • Athletics, 82-68 (.550), 2 GB
  • Mariners, 81-69 (.540), 3 GB
  • Indians, 73-76 (.490), 10.5 GB
  • Tigers, 73-78 (.483), 11.5 GB
  • Angels, 72-78 (.480), 12 GB
  • Royals, 69-82 (.457), ELIMINATED
  • Twins, 65-85 (.433), ELIMINATED
  • Rangers, 55-95 (.367), ELIMINATED
  • Orioles, 48-102 (.320), ELIMINATED
National League wild card standings
  • WC1: Dodgers, 96-54 (.640)
  • WC2: Cardinals, 80-69 (.537)


  • Reds, 78-73 (.517), 3 GB
  • Padres, 76-73 (.510), 4 GB
  • Phillies, 76-74 (.507), 4.5 GB
  • Mets, 73-77 (.487), 7.5 GB
  • Rockies, 70-79 (.470), 10 GB
  • Cubs, 67-83 (.447), 13.5 GB
  • Marlins, 64-86 (.427), ELIMINATED
  • Nationals, 61-89 (.407), ELIMINATED
  • Pirates, 56-94 (.373), ELIMINATED
  • Diamondbacks, 48-102 (.320), ELIMINATED
https://www.sportingnews.com/us/mlb/news/mlb-standings-2021-playoffs-bracket-magic-numbers/dd18giguok8w1989dtb5vh14e
 

dynomite

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It probably deserves its own thread, but since Cannonball just wrote about the Pirates, it feels like a good moment to point out that the worst trade in modern baseball history just got worse:

7/31/18

Tampa Bay Rays traded Chris Archer to Pittsburgh Pirates in exchange for Austin Meadows, Tyler Glasnow and a player to be named later; Tampa Bay Rays received Shane Baz (August 14, 2018).
Glasnow and Meadows we know all about. Baz, now perhaps the top pitching prospect in baseball, came up Monday and mostly shut down the Blue Jays with 99 mph fastballs and filthy sliders. He’ll be playing a “David Price in 2008” swingman type role for the Rays this October.

The true cherry on top that makes us all realize that baseball Gods are real and/or we’re living in a simulation?

The Rays created a space on their roster for Baz… by putting Chris Archer on the IL. Seriously.

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cannonball 1729

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This week has added a three more eliminations: KC, LAA, and Detroit. By my count, we now have 11 eliminated teams - with Colorado and Cleveland dancing on the precipice - and we only have writeups for six, so it's time to get cracking! Let's finish out the NL teams for now and hit the AL later:

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The Marlins were one of the teams that benefitted most from 2020's shortened season, as they were able to make the playoffs for the first time in seventeen years. Better, they were even able to win a postseason series before losing to the Braves in the second round. Sure, they were probably more lucky than good (their record was 31-29 with a 26-34 Pythagorean), and they had no offense to speak of, and pretty much anyone with a pulse made the playoffs. Nevertheless, for a team that hadn't appeared in the postseason since the “Curse of the Bambino” was still a thing people cared about - and for a team that didn’t even break the 60-win mark in 2019 - 2020 was a fun surprise.

Despite their playoff appearance, expectations were obviously not terribly high for 2021. Pitching can only carry a team for so long; over a 162-game season, a lack of offense is eventually going to cause some problems. In the offseason, the Marlins did little in the free agent market to address this offense issue, signing only Adam Duvall and Starling Marte; instead, the plan was to let the younger Marlins' position players grow into their roles and perhaps find their strokes this year. If that doesn't sound like a plan to make the playoffs, well, it's likely that the Marlins didn't see the playoffs as a real possibility this year.

Needless to say, those strokes have not been found. The Marlins been shuffling around in the low-to-mid-80’s in team OPS+ all season; even their above-average pitching can’t cover for that. Their catchers couldn’t hit at all last year, and yet Miami hoped that signing Sandy Leon in the offseason would somehow fix that problem. (Spoiler: It did not. Marlins’ catchers have hit .199.) Second and third bases have also been black holes all season, and even their pinch hitters have only hit .186.

The biggest problem with the offense is that much of their young offensive talent has stalled out. Sure, Jazz Chisholm has lived up to the hype, but there is a whole laundry list of formerly-touted offensive players who are now struggling – a list that includes Lewis Brinson, Monte Harrison, Isan Diaz, Connor Scott, Kameron Misner, and JJ Bleday. Also, any time Sandy Leon is getting at bats...you're probably going to have a bad time.

Playoff dreams aside, it's probably fair to say that the rebuild is going about as well as can be expected. It’s now been four years since Derek Jeter brusquely introduced himself to the Marlins’ faithful by trading Giancarlo Stanton to the Yankees. (Shockingly, this trade does not look terrible in hindsight.) Usually, a well-run rebuild takes 5-7 years, so the Marlins are still a couple of years from "put up or shut up" time. This offseason, though, Jeter earned huge plaudits for bringing in Kim Ng as his general manager, partially because she broke a long-standing glass ceiling in the sport, but also because she was so ridiculously qualified for the position that it was an embarrassment that she had never been a GM before. (Fun fact: she was once the youngest assistant GM in baseball when Brian Cashman hired her at age 29....in 1998.) The hire was obviously Jeter's most important move to date - and probably also his best. Baseball got its first chance to see what Ng could do at the trade deadline, and she did not disappoint; the new general manager was able to acquire a slew of prospects - including former mega-talent Jesus Luzardo - for four short-term rental players.

The upcoming offseason, though, will be the one where Ng really begins to imprint her vision on the Marlins. In doing so, she must answer the key question: with a pitching staff to build around, how do the Marlins begin to make the transition from a promising team to a good one? This is the part of the rebuild where a team must move from prospect acquisition to player development and free agent acquisition, and we're still waiting to see how good Ng will be at these two tasks. Whatever else happens, though, we already say one thing about Ng: despite the Marlins' surprise success last year, Ng was smart enough to resist the siren song of accelerating the rebuild, choosing instead to stay the course. This may sound like damning with faint praise...until you remember that the Marlins' attempt to short-circuit the rebuild process in 2012 is one of the things that landed them in this situation in the first place. In this sense, Ng is already outperforming her predecessors, and for a franchise that's gone in circles for almost twenty years, fans have to be excited that they finally have an ownership capable of forging a new path.

The Marlins last won a World Series in 2003.
44481

For the first several months of 2021, the Cubs’ season puttered along like any other in recent memory. After a shaky first month, the Cubs found their stride in May and spent the next month and a half locked in a tight battle for pole position in the NL Central with the Brewers and Cardinals. They found themselves tied for first in the division on no fewer than thirteen days in June, and they were within a game and a half of the best non-Cubs team in the division for thirty-one consecutive days. They were by no means a dominant team, but they were certainly a good one, and they seemed to have the firepower to compete with the Cardinals and Brewers.

The pinnacle of the season came on June 24, when the Cubs accomplished a feat that looks increasingly impressive in hindsight; in the year of the no-hitter, the Cubs became the first team to throw a no-no after the imposition of the “no sticky substances on the ball” rules. Granted, it was a combined no-hitter, and none of the three relievers had any idea that they were coming into an historic game until after they’d finished their innings, and the baseball world issued a collective yawn at yet another no-hitter (the seventh of the year to that point), but nevertheless the Cubs had managed to accomplish the vaguely improbable.

Unfortunately, that no-hitter was the last time the Cubs would win a game for almost two weeks. Immediately after the no-no, the Cubs embarked on a ten-game losing streak in which everything went wrong; they hit .207, scored more than two runs exactly three times, endured an 8.65 ERA from the bullpen, and were outscored 68-25 over the abysmal stretch. It seemed as though the baseball gods were angry that the pitchers who threw the no-hitter were insufficiently reverential toward the event and decided to extract revenge. Whatever the reason, the Cubs went from “contender” to “toast” in short order, and by the time the All-Star break rolled around, the Cubs were done for the season.

The good news, if one can call it that, is that the Cubs June/July collapse made it easy for GM Jed Hoyer to figure out if the Cubs were buyers or sellers at the trade deadline; however, much of the baseball world was surprised at just how hard Hoyer hit the reset button. At the trade deadline, the Cubs decided on a full rebuild, sending out Javier Baez, Kris Bryant, Anthony Rizzo, Craig Kimbrel, Jake Marisnick, Joc Pederson, Andrew Chafin, Ryan Tepera, and Trevor Williams in one of the most complete roster turnovers in deadline history. In fairness to Hoyer, several of the players were due for free agency; moreover, since the now-departed core hadn’t won a playoff game since 2017, it’s understandable that Hoyer may have thought that re-upping with the current roster would be a mistake. Whatever the decision, the trades certainly didn’t make the roster better in the short term; the Cubs went 7-20 in August as players spent the month focused on more basic tasks such as learning the names of their teammates and trying to remember which team they now played for.

Whatever happens from here, July 30 definitively closed the book on the most important era in Cubs history. In some ways, the now-departed core was a bit of a disappointment; for as much hype as the players – and Joe Maddon and Theo Epstein – garnered over the years, they were basically only able to parlay that talent and hype into one WS appearance and two NLCS losses, and they now haven't won a playoff game in four years. In 2015, the sky was clearly the limit; by late 2019, Maddon was gone and the Cubs were a .500-dwelling also-ran. Nevertheless, for a team that hadn’t won a World Series championship since Ottomans had their own state and Arizonans did not, it’s safe to say that any iteration that made it over the hump would be remembered fondly.

The firesale, though, begins a new era for the Cubs. No longer do the Cubs have to care about words like “billy goat” or “Bartman” or numbers like 1969 or 1984 - for the first time in a century, the Cubs are now just another big market team in a rebuild.

The Cubs last made the playoffs in 2020. Their last title was in 2016.
 
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jon abbey

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“Nevertheless, for a team that appeared in the postseason”

You’re missing a ‘hadn’t’ here, I believe.
 

cannonball 1729

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It probably deserves its own thread, but since Cannonball just wrote about the Pirates, it feels like a good moment to point out that the worst trade in modern baseball history just got worse:
Nice! Worst Pirates trade might actually be an interesting thread on its own. The Rajai Davis-for-Matt Morris-and-his-contract trade might be neck-and-neck with the Archer abomination. Though the Giants never got Matt Morris back, so Archer has that over them. The Dick Groat for Julio Gotay and Don Cardwell might be a good choice, too. Or John Tudor for 69 games of George Hendrick.
 

dynomite

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Superb as usual.

The upcoming offseason, though, will be the one where Ng really begins to imprint her vision on the Marlins. In doing so, she must answer the key question: with a pitching staff to build around, how do the Marlins begin to make the transition from a promising team to a good one?
Great writeup. Fascinated to see what the Ng and the Marlins do this offseason. As you say, that rotation is going to be insane: Alcantara, Pablo Lopez, Trevor Rogers, Sixto Sanchez, and the talented but wildly inconsistent Jesus Luzardo behind them. That's a hell of a core to build around.

The firesale, though, begins a new era for the Cubs. No longer do the Cubs have to care about words like “billy goat” or “Bartman” or numbers like 1969 or 1984 - for the first time in a century, the Cubs are now just another big market team in a rebuild.
It's interesting. For the Cubs fans I know, 2016 was the most joyous pinnacle of sports fandom imaginable, one that will never be equaled and need not be. They won the World Series in the extra innings of Game 7. The city of Chicago hosted 5 million celebrants at their victory parade, allegedly one of the largest gatherings in human history. Their fanbase and team engaged in a months long celebration, including taking over SNL with Bill Murray and the Obama White House in one of his final public events.

I guess what I'm saying is that, at least for the Cubs fans I know, I get the sense they wouldn't change a thing and have no complaints. Losing is normal. Rebuilding is expected. But nothing will ever diminish the joy of winning in 2016.
 

simplicio

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One note on the Orioles: no idea what it means for his contract or general albatross designation, but Chris Davis did retire back in August. And you know it's a bad team when even Chris Davis doesn't want to be on it any more.
 

scottyno

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One note on the Orioles: no idea what it means for his contract or general albatross designation, but Chris Davis did retire back in August. And you know it's a bad team when even Chris Davis doesn't want to be on it any more.
He had 1 year left on his deal, he'll get the full amount and it counts fully towards the tax next year, but they deferred the actual cash over several years
 

cannonball 1729

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Today brought two more - the Rockies and the Clevelanders. I'm going to do something I don't usually do - I'm going to go out of order and skip the Royals because I haven't finished them yet. Instead, I'll finish up the NL and post the other two non-Cleveland-and-KC AL teams:


44536


Twelve years ago, the Angels drafted a high school student out of New Jersey late in the first round. He would go on to become the best player in the American League.

Ten years ago, the Angels signed the best hitter in baseball. His contract would go on to become one of the worst in baseball history.

These two transactions are the perfect encapsulation of the last decade of Angel-dom. When they’ve hit on a transaction, it’s been of the home run variety – their heist of Andrelton Simmons, their signing of Shohei Ohtani, their draft of the (until recently) best player in the AL. Meanwhile, they’ve had a propensity to throw large amounts of money at absolute albatrosses: Josh Hamilton, CJ Wilson, Juston Upton, Vernon Wells, and of course, Mr. Pujols himself.

As a result, the Angels have generally been a team with a handful of superstars and a whole bunch of placeholders who stand around the field waiting for the superstars to do something good. Usually, it’s been the Mike Trout and Friends Show, but this year the Angels’ season kicked up about thirty decibels with Shohei Ohtani and SHO-TIME!!!! For all of the fireworks of the Mike Trout show, Trout has failed to capture the public’s imagination, partly because he shies away from the spotlight, partly because his team has been terrible, and partly because “Mike” and “Trout” are two of the least exciting names in the English language. Ohtani, however has no such issues, and his season - the best two-way season since Babe Ruth – has been remarkable to watch as a fan. (Although I think we’re all getting sick of the “show”-related puns by lazy sportswriters...)

The problem, as it always is with the Angels, is the rest of the team. Sure, Jared Walsh was an All-Star, and they’ve gotten hot performances from Patrick Sandoval and Raisel Iglesias and Max Stassi (in limited action), but there’s been a whole lot of bad baseball elsewhere on the diamond. Pujols played badly enough that he was finally, mercifully let loose, sent to a league where “pinch hitter who hits better than a pitcher” is a viable path to employment. Justin Upton continues to honor his contract with negative WAR seasons; he’s cost the team either 0.3 wins or $23 million dollars, depending whether you ask the fans or the accountants. Anthony Rendon was ineffective before going out for the season with a hip injury – in the second year of his seven-year, $245 million contract. On the pitching side, Dylan Bundy, last year’s breakout star for the Angels, has reverted back to the inconsistent form that made him so frustrating to Orioles fans, while Alex Cobb and Griffin Canning have battled injuries and (in Canning’s case), inconsistency.

Last September, the Angels finally tired feast-or-famine rollercoaster and showed GM Billy Eppler the door; now, new GM Perry Minasian inherits a team in an interesting place. They’ve already got their Ruth and Gehrig - if Gehrig can stay healthy. (I assume Trout is Gehrig in this analogy? Ruth was a two-way player, after all.) Both are locked up for a little while; Ohtani isn’t a free agent until after the 2023 season, while Trout won’t be a FA for the forseeable future. They even have an ace for their pitching staff (also Ohtani), although the fact that they have to give up a DH once every five days is a little bit unfortunate. Other than the potential Rendon albatross, they don’t have a lot of money tied up, which means that they have an opportunity to put some money into the perennial holes in order to fill them once and for all. Of course, the Angels have been in “money to spend” mode recently and ended up with some millstone contracts, but the new administration has a chance to make their marks quickly since most of those contracts are coming to an end. There’s little help on the way from the meager farm system, but the team isn’t that far off, so a few good acquisitions could put them right into contention. In the meantime, Angels fans can enjoy the Ohtahni Experience and hope that maybe Ohtani can, er, “show” some of the other players how to pitch or hit...

The Angels last made the playoffs in 2014. Their last title was in 2002.


44538

One of the unusual things about baseball is that because the playoff field is so small, the hottest team at the end of the season is often left out of the postseason.

2018 Red Sox fans knew this well. For the Sox, there was little to fear from the Dodgers, Yankees, Astros, or any of the other playoff teams. The Rays, on the other hand – who finished just 90-72, 18 games back of the Sox – they were trouble. Something had snapped into place for the Rays in mid-August of that year, and they spent the last month-and-a-half of the season playing .700 ball, beating up on the Sox and everyone else, terrorizing the league...and then going home for October. In most professional sports, a hot month can portend a championship run; in baseball, a hot month is just a hot month.

This September, the hottest team may well be the Detroit Tigers. Sure, their September record is only 11-7, but they’ve posted that record against some of the best teams that baseball has to offer: of the six teams they’ve played, three have been division leaders (the White Sox, Rays, and Brewers) and two more have been wild-card contenders (the A’s and Reds). Craziest of all, they’ve gone 8-3 in their last 11, and every single one of those games was against a first-place team. The Rays and White Sox may not admit it, but deep down they are surely relieved that they don’t have to face the Tigers when the postseason begins next month.

For much of this year, the Tigers finally looked like the team that GM Alex Avila had envisioned since he began the teardown in 2017. Detroit’s hitting finally clicked; they’ve had good performances both from placeholders like Johnathan Schoop and from more integral parts of the future like Akil Baddoo and Jeimer Candelario. The pitching, too, has rounded into form; Casey Mize has begun to look like the ace they’ve been looking for (although his FIP may not agree), and he and Tarik Skubal make a potent 1-2 punch despite both only being 24. For Tiger fans who are used to a glorified Triple-A team, these new winning ways are a sight to behold; moreover, with a top-five farm system now bearing fruit, the future looks even brighter than the present.

In fact, the only reason that we’re not talking about the Tigers and playoffs this year is because of their absolutely atrocious April. From the beginning of the season until May 7, the Tigers went 9-24 while batting .207 and ERA-ing 5.22 (the latter being no small feat in the Spider Tack era). Since then, they’ve shaved a run off of their team ERA (4.09 ERA since May 7), hit .250, and gone 65-54. Take out that slow start and suddenly the Tigers would be knocking on the door to the playoffs.

The good news is that next year comes soon, and they’ll have a chance to start faster. The even better news is that much of the division appears to be weakening; the Royals and Twins are mired in the cellar, and the Traffic Statues appear to be going the wrong way. For now, though, the Tigers will have to content themselves with four more games against the White Sox; given how well the Tigers have been playing, one would have to imagine that they now see a series against a good team as yet another opportunity to prove that they've finally arrived.

Detroit last made the playoffs in 2014. Their last title was in 1984.



44540
This offseason, The Athletic wrote the following about Rockies then-general manager Jeff Bridich:

In more than six years running the team, the Rockies GM has committed more than $300 million in salary to 19 free agents on major-league deals. Those 19 free agents have collectively accounted for -3.4 wins above replacement while with the Rockies, according to FanGraphs.

I want Bridich to keep his job,” a rival executive said, tongue in cheek.

Bridich, though, is not the only problem. [Dick] Monfort’s continued involvement as a hands-on baseball executive also has raised questions, with some in the game believing he lacks the knowledge for such a role.


Dick Monfort thinks he’s Theo Epstein,” one person familiar with the Rockies’ operation said.

It’s not hard to understand why the Rockies are where they are. There are three things that make a team good: the ability to draft well, and the ability to effectively scout available major league talent, and the ability to spend copious amounts of money. Success in baseball usually requires a team to have at least two of those abilities. If you can do all three, you’ve got the 1998 Yankees or 2020’s Dodgers; do two of those and you’ve got a playoff team; hit on one and you’re an also-ran; hit none and you’ve got the early 2000’s Rays or Pirates. The Rockies draft well, but they’re not a big-money team, so the tiebreaker is their ability to scout major league talent...and as the quote above notes, they’ve not acquitted themselves well in that regard. Compounding the issue, the best signing that the Rockies actually completed in the Bridich era, an eight-year extension for Nolan Arenado, was undone in the offseason when a disillusioned Arenado prevailed on the Rockies to trade him to a more competitive team; Bridich then sent Nolan to the Cardinals in a trade that baseball insiders generally referred to as a “fleecing,” picking up third-starter Austin Gomber and four minor leaguers in exchange for a franchise cornerstone and $51 million.

This season, the Rockies’ front office situation somehow got worse when Bridich stepped down in April as the result of a “mutual agreement” that – oddly enough – appears to have been Bridich’s decision and not the Rockies’. It had been reported in the offseason that the Rockies felt they needed to choose between Bridich and Arenado and chose Bridich; unfortunately, by the end of April they had neither. Now, it may seem strange to say that the front office was made worse by the departure of a man who had wasted almost a third of a billion dollars in his tenure...but then the Rockies introduced his replacement: Vice President of Scouting Bill Schmidt. Schmidt may have been successful in the scouting department, but once he assumed the big chair, it became clear that Schmidt might not have a good sense of what the GM role is all about.

The most obvious manifestation of this problem appeared at the deadline. With Trevor Story and Jon Gray approaching free agency, and with contending teams happily shedding top prospects for mediocre players, the Rockies inexplicably decided to stand pat and make no moves at the deadline. Or rather (if rival GM’s are to be believed), the Rockies decided to ask for the moon and stars for Story (apparently forgetting he was a two-month rental), and when they got no interest, they held on to him. No one was more confused by this turn of events than Story, who was so annoyed with the Rox reluctance to deal him that he removed himself from the lineup the day after the deadline just to clear his head. Whatever the reason, the Rockies now have to hope that the draft pick they get for Story will somehow be better than the deadline deal they could have gotten from desperate teams.

What’s frustrating for Rockies fans is that they’re not abjectly horrible like some of the teams that have already appeared in the thread. The young pitching staff is particularly promising; the rotation runs four deep, and the one-two punch of German Marquez and Antonio Senzatela are a formidable pair whose dominance is only hidden by their Coors-inflated numbers. Infielder (and Trevor Story heir apparent) Brendan Rodgers has hit over .300 since the All-Star break and would probably be in the running for Rookie of the Year if not for 2020’s bizarre rules about service time; Rodgers has battled shoulder issues throughout his short career but has hit well when healthy. Sure, there are holes on the team, and the Daniel Bard experiment may be coming to an end, and Charlie Blackmon is on the wrong side of the aging curve, and they’d love it if one of their other outfielders might be able to hit something...but they’re not a bad team, and the problems would be fixable if the Rockies front office could actually sign free agents who would do something more than just cash prodigious paychecks and stand in the appropriate spot on the field.

To that end, though, it makes little sense to talk about prospects or development or players until we know what the front office is going to look like. Obviously, the next GM has to be picked, and unlike the last GM hiring, when Bridich was almost immediately promoted as Dan O’Dowd’s successor, this hiring search may be a bit more robust. On the other hand, Monfort himself isn’t going anywhere, and as long as he fancies himself to be the next Theo Epstein, we may just be watching the same movie over and over again, just waiting for the next face of the franchise - or general manager - to walk away…

The Rockies last made the playoffs in 2018. They have never won a World Series.
 

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cannonball 1729

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One note on the Orioles: no idea what it means for his contract or general albatross designation, but Chris Davis did retire back in August. And you know it's a bad team when even Chris Davis doesn't want to be on it any more.
I actually debated about mentioning his retirement but couldn't decide how to put it into the writeup. But it's a good point. And a good deal for both sides: they don't have to watch him hit again, and he doesn't have to watch them play. Wins all around!
He had 1 year left on his deal, he'll get the full amount and it counts fully towards the tax next year, but they deferred the actual cash over several years
I do wonder if we'll ever see another Gil Meche situation where an injured player just walks away from the money. I won't hold my breath, but I wouldn't have thought it would have happened the first time, either.

It's interesting. For the Cubs fans I know, 2016 was the most joyous pinnacle of sports fandom imaginable, one that will never be equaled and need not be. They won the World Series in the extra innings of Game 7. The city of Chicago hosted 5 million celebrants at their victory parade, allegedly one of the largest gatherings in human history. Their fanbase and team engaged in a months long celebration, including taking over SNL with Bill Murray and the Obama White House in one of his final public events.

I guess what I'm saying is that, at least for the Cubs fans I know, I get the sense they wouldn't change a thing and have no complaints. Losing is normal. Rebuilding is expected. But nothing will ever diminish the joy of winning in 2016.
Yeah - that makes sense. I have a feeling you would have gotten the same reaction from Red Sox fans in 2006.

Actually, one of the reasons I wrote that last paragraph is that I remember how fun it was for the Sox to finally be just another team - no clips of Buckner randomly popping up, no stupid curse talk, no crowbarring of "World Series drought!" into every FOX broadcast of an April game against the Royals, no 1918 chants - just another team that's trying to win ballgames. This rebuild might be the first time in a century where Cubs fans can sit back and just enjoy the process and the pressure-free games without overarching desperation or taunting pokes from rival fanbases.
 

cannonball 1729

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Well, this is unexpected. Since no one was eliminated last night, these are the last two outstanding writeups, so....today I'm all caught up! The Mets and Padres are on the chopping block (the Mets are out in the WC but alive in the division, and the Padres are almost out of the WC), but for today we have:


44574

The Royals’ season had more twists and turns than an episode of Days of Our Lives.

To begin the season, they went 16-9.

Then they lost 11 straight.

Then they went 13-6.

Then they lost 29 of their next 37.

Then they went 8-1, then 4-11, then 10-3, then 1-5, and finally an uncharacteristically mediocre 9-7.

The term “Jekyll and Hyde” is often used as a descriptor for teams, but the 2021 Royals have apparently adopted it as a mission statement. At their best, they’re a team with a "just-enough" lineup led by Salvador Perez and an a “go get it” outfield defense led by centerfielder Michael A. Taylor. At their worst, they’re a team with a disappointing rotation, a hole-riddled infield defense, and a parade of offensive ineptitude led by centerfielder Michael A. Taylor. The Royals flitted between these two personae with alarming regularity, leading one to wonder which team was actually the “real” Royals.

At this point, it’s safe to say that Dayton Moore’s Process 2.0 is not looking great. The Royals’ recent draft successes are basically limited to Nicky Lopez, a rookie who will likely cross the 5 career WAR threshold next year; before him, the last Royals’ draftee to accumulate 5 WAR in his career was Sean Manaea, who was traded to Oakland before ever throwing a major league pitch. The last draftee to actually amass 5 career WAR for the Royals? That would be Whit Merrifield, who was drafted in 2010. The Royals still hold out hope that their 2018 draft class will be their salvation, given that they’ve already tried out four of that year’s draftees in the rotation (Brady Singer, Kris Bubic, Daniel Lynch, and Jackson Kowar); however, since all of them are 24 and under and none of them have been particularly impressive, we’re still probably a few years off from knowing if that draft class was successful.

Speaking of salvation...any discussion of the 2021 Royals eventually has to turn to Salvador. Going into the season, there was some reason for concern about Salvador Perez; as helpful as he’d been in the World Series runs of 2014 and 2015, he hadn’t posted a 3-WAR season since 2014, and he’d lost his 2019 season to an elbow injury. Puzzlingly, the Royals decided to ignore these issues and instead inked Perez to a four-year, $82 million extension doesn’t even kick in until next year. Many felt that the deal might be ill-advised….until then the season started and Perez began to hit like a Venezuelan Johnny Bench. While the extension might still end up being a bad idea (Perez was already under contract for this year regardless – and he’s already 31), Perez’s almost-50 home run season has been a joy for Kansas City fans to watch, and Salvy’s ability to carry a team for a week at a time is a big part of the reason that the Royals have been up-and-down instead of just down-and-down. Perez's most pressing task now will be to try to round the pitching staff into form; if he can manage to help the Royals do that, his contract will have been a steal – and The Process 2.0 will have been a success.

The Royals’ last playoff appearance – and last title – were in 2015.

And for the last time ever, we post this logo:

44575
Shane Bieber, Zach Plesac, Aaron Civale, Logan Allen, Triston McKenzie. That was Cleveland's rotation on Opening Day.

If you want to know what went wrong with the season, look no further than the list above. Several years ago, Cleveland committed to building a “pitching factory” – a top-to-bottom, analytics-merged-with-scouting-based approach to developing pitching prospects that taught players how to read and incorporate data, encouraged them to experiment at the minor league level and develop pitches at the expense of results, and standardized the organization’s approach to messaging and pitcher development. Despite their low budget, the Indians have managed to use this “factory” to build themselves into contenders, churning out star pitchers like Corey Kluber, Carlos Carrasco, Mike Clevinger, Trevor Bauer, and now Shane Bieber.

Two years ago, the Indians were able to leverage their pitching prowess into a 93-win season despite having a lineup post just a 95 OPS+. Last year was even more impressive; the Indians were able to leverage their pitching prowess to a nearly .600 win percentage despite having the second-worst offense in the American League…and despite trading away their second-best starting pitcher in the middle of the season after he lied to the team about obeying Covid protocols. Punting on the offense may not be the best strategy, but Cleveland pitching has been so good that they’ve actually been able to get away with it.

Which brings us to 2021. With the lineup losing Frankie Lindor, the pitching would be leaned on even more heavily to keep the Indians afloat. But the starters were ready. As long as the rotation could put together their usual season, Cleveland had a chance.

Unfortunately, not one of the pitchers from the opening day rotation was still pitching for Cleveland by the end of June. Logan Allen was ineffective to start the season and was optioned to Columbus at the end of April. Tristan McKenzie joined him on the AAA bus at the end of May. Then the injuries struck, felling the remaining three pitchers in the rotation: first Zack Plesac broke his thumb at the end of May because he was “aggressively ripping off his shirt” in the clubhouse, then Bieber was sidelined with shoulder soreness in mid-June, and finally Civale went on the IL with a sprained finger in late-June. Once Civale went on the shelf, the floodgates opened; the Tribe, who had been hanging around the division lead up to that point, collapsed into a nine-game losing streak that put them squarely behind the White Sox for good. There’s probably not a baseball team on the planet that can survive losing its entire rotation, but for the Indians, whose whole path to contention depended on its stellar rotation plus a few well-timed home runs by Jose Ramirez and Franmail Reyes, there wasn’t much of a plan B.

The Indians/Guardians now hope that a new team name will remove whatever Native American curse afflicted the staff in 2021. Other than the change in uniform (and luck), though, it’s not clear that they’ll have much interest in changing much from the 2021 plan; sure, they might want to upgrade a lineup that has fallen from “below par” to “potential no-hitter,” but the pitching should still be good enough to carry them forward. Allen and McKenzie are still young, and the other three pitches are a ways from free agency...plus rotation sub Cal Quantrill has been a revelation in his first half-season as a starter. As long as the pitchers are careful about ripping off their shirts, and as long as the ghost of Louis Sockalexis forgives Cleveland for lampooning him and his people for a hundred years, the Guardians should be back into contention next year.

This all presupposes one other thing, however: that the manager comes back. Last year, manager Terry Francona missed the season due to gastrointestinal issues and blood clots; this year, Tito has missed much of the season due to needing surgery for a staph infection in his foot and then needing more surgery due to an injured hip. The biggest concern, of course, is Tito’s health, and baseball issues are certainly secondary. On the baseball side, though, Francona is either the winningest or second-winningest manager in Cleveland history depending whether he comes back (if he comes back, wins that accumulated in his absence actually count towards his win total – if he doesn’t, they may not), and his teams have had winning records in each of the past sixteen years that he’s managed, so his loss (if it were to happen) would be a big one for the organization. Hopefully, in casting their lot with the traffic statues, the Cleveland Baseball Team might see an improvement in their cosmic fortunes; perhaps their new Art Deco protectors might see fit to watch over Tito’s – and the pitching staff’s – health.

Cleveland last made the playoffs in 2020. They last won the World Series in 1948.
 

cannonball 1729

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Two more yesterday, both in the "collapse" category:

44605

This was supposed to be the year. After half a decade of rebuilding, of drafting and trading veterans for prospects and signing cheap fliers and occasionally falsifying medical information to make their veterans more attractive to other teams, the Padres had finally arrived. During 2020’s brief regular season, the Padres were a .600+ team who finally found themselves going toe-to-toe with the juggernaut in Los Angeles; we might have even seen an epic pennant race between the two teams except that 2020’s NCAA-style playoff system meant that both teams pulled back their efforts in early September. Unfortunately for the Padres, their postseason series against the Dodgers was a blowout, as the Dodgers quickly dispatched of the Padres on the way to a world title.

The 2020 outcome may have been disappointing, but it was the Padres’ first chance to measure themselves against the defending NL West Champions and see just much further they would need to go to compete. In the offseason, the Padres decided that to compete with a superteam, one must become a superteam. To that end, the Padres acquired no fewer than three potential All-Stars for the rotation alone (Joe Musgrove, Blake Snell, and Yu Darvish), including a former Cy Young Award winner and a former Cy Young Award runner-up (who were acquired on the same day). In 2020, the Padres’ pitching staff had an ERA+ of 109; most teams would be extremely happy with a line like that...but most teams aren't competing against a rival whose staff posted an ERA+ of 144. As the rest of baseball watched the NL West turn into the English Premier League, Preller’s moves made it abundantly clear that the division was now a two-team race.

An unexpected stroke of bad luck appeared at the beginning of the season when San Francisco surprised everyone by being really good. While much of baseball had heard about the two-team fight, apparently someone had forgotten to tell the Giants, and as they pushed their way into the division lead by the end of April, it became clear that the division was now a three-team race. No matter – two teams or three, the Padres had the horses to compete with anyone. For the first three months of the season, the Padres played their part in an exciting three-way battle with their California brethren.

Things started to go south in July when the Padres suffered injuries to two of their most important players: Yu Darvish and Fernando Tatis, Jr. Darvish was the first to hit the midseason IL when he suffered hip inflammation at the beginning of July. While Yu would return just a couple of weeks later, he hasn’t looked the same; since rejoining the team he’s gone 1-7 with a 6.28 ERA. Later that month, Tatis went on the IL with a shoulder dislocation; he had actually been dealing with a shoulder injury since the beginning of the season, and he’d spent some time on the IL back in April, but he’d managed to fight through it for much of the season before dislocating his shoulder for the third time at the end of July.

All of that said...the Padres still had more than enough talent to compete, and after Tatis returned on August 15, the Padres were three games clear of the second wildcard and five games clear of the first non-wildcard. Which is why it was so puzzling that the Padres just collapsed. From August 16 on, the Padres have scored fewer runs than any other team in baseball except the Marlins, and they’ve slashed a horrific .224/.299/.361, nearly 100 OPS points lower than their line up to that point in the season. Their pitching, too, has fallen apart; they’ve given up the sixth most runs in the NL over that time, which doesn’t sound bad until you realize that they play in one of the most pitcher-friendly parks in the league.

It’s been said that for a young manager, the hardest thing to do is to stop a losing streak. Every front office has an army of statisticians to help a manager deal with the ever-increasing mountains of data, and every front office has an army of scouts to help figure out who’s standing wrong and who’s opening their shoulder early, but when it comes to getting grown men to stop pressing or moping or floundering...that’s knowledge that only comes from trial and error. How hard do you push? Do you comfort struggling players? Challenge them? Flip over the buffet table? Call a team meeting? What do you do if your star shortstop is feeling uncomfortable because he’s playing center field? What do you do if your first baseman is upset about rumors of your team trying to dump his salary? What do you do if your star third baseman yells at your star shortstop in the dugout? It’s a tough test for a young manager...and a test that Padres’ manager Jayce Tingler has failed spectacularly. In mid-August, the Padres went through a rough stretch, as most teams do at some point – but from there, the Padres imploded, going 10-24 from 8/16 on and falling 8.5 games back in the wildcard.

So far, it’s been a tough century for Padres’ fans. Their last playoff appearance was in 2006, when they snuck into the playoffs with an 82-80 record, still the worst record by a playoff team in a non-Covid year; they were quickly swept by a more deserving playoff team. In 2007, they lost a one-game playoff to the Rockies despite having their closer on the mound with a two-run lead in the thirteenth (and despite the fact that the winning run never touched home plate). In 2010, they blew a 6.5-game lead in the division and missed the playoffs by losing to the Giants on the last day of the season. Then they spent a decade in the wilderness, including an ill-advised "go for it" year in 2014. Now we add 2021 to the ignominious list of recent Padres’ collapses. The Friars signed the best young player in baseball to a fourteen-year extension this offseason; he started having shoulder issues almost immediately after signing the extension. They have a former Cy Young Award winner and a former Cy Young Award runner-up; both of them are injured. Such is the life of a 21st century Padres fan. The offseason may see a new manager (or not), but for now, the Padres are yet again left to ponder what went wrong and what could have been. If nothing else, 2021 has at least taught the Padres a harsh lesson: offseason moves are fun, but pennants aren’t won in December.

And also: don’t falsify medical reports. The commissioner may forgive you, but the baseball gods won’t.

The Padres have still never won a World Series.

44606

It all started so promisingly.

Well, sort of, anyway. Maybe not the part where they hired Jared Porter (my college classmate!) to be general manager and then fired him a month later when we all discovered that he was an unadulterated creep. And probably not the part where we learned that the previous manager was also a creep of similar proportions. In Metstown, even the best of times are the worst of times.

But despite the general creepiness emanating from corners of the front office, there was renewed hope in Metsland. Having finally turned the page on the turbulent Wilpon ownership, the new management celebrated by firing the incumbent general manager and replacing him with a wunderkind who had excelled in all of his previous roles. (Including, unfortunately, the role of “texting pictures of his junk to uninterested women.”) Once they fired their second GM of the offseason, they further celebrated by inking newly-acquired Frankie Lindor to a ten-year deal extension worth roughly the GDP of Micronesia. The optimism spilled into the season, as the Mets started the year hot enough to capitalize on the weakness of the rest of the east; the Braves stumbled out of the gate, and the Phillies were doing their usual underachieving Phillies thing, leaving the Mets in the lead almost by default. The Flushing natives weren't world beaters, but they didn't have to be; the lineup, led by Pete Alonzo and Brandon Nimmo, and the rotation, led by the otherworldly Jacob de Grom and the this-worldly-but-still good Marcus Strohman, made the Mets competent enough to capitalize on the wide-openness of the division. By July, the Mets had established themselves as the clear team to beat in the NL East; through the beginning of the summer, even a resurgent Braves only found themselves looking up at the Metropolitans.

Things first began to go wrong in early July when Jacob de Grom suddenly went from being unhittable to unavailable. DeGrom, whose first three months defied even superlatives (as his 0.69 end-of-June ERA would attest), suddenly found himself ineffective in a July 7 game against the Brewers; shortly thereafter, deGrom headed to the disabled list with a nebulous case of “elbow inflammation” that Sandy Alderson later noted was a “small” tear of the UCL. Of course, that was later contradicted by deGrom himself, who said that his ligament is “perfectly fine,” lending a very Mets-ian player-versus-management twist to the story. Whatever the reason, the Mets haven’t had their ace since the beginning of July, and despite occasional updates of how he was throwing off the mound or his swelling had subsided, deGrom hasn’t been seen in action since that fateful July day.

Nevertheless, the Mets soldiered on. They fought through a successful July, winning fourteen games and even capturing the all-important Home Run Derby crown. At the trade deadline, interim GM Zack Scott made aggressive moves to solidify the team down the stretch, adding Javy Baez, Rich Hill, and Trevor Williams to the division leaders.

And….that’s when the wheels completely came off.

Starting on August 1, the Mets embarked on a 6-19 stretch that moved them from 4.5 games up on the Braves to 9 games out of any playoff spot. The hitters stopped hitting; the offense managed to score just 78 runs in those 75 games, and they batted about .170 with runners in scoring position. Their one-run luck reversed; the Mets, who had been 25-16 in one-run games up through July, suddenly found themselves 1-8 in such games in August. Javy Baez and Frankie Lindor, frustrated by the fans’ commitment to booing their own team, began using a “thumbs-down” gesture with teammates to mock the fans; naturally, Mets fans were incensed, as many of them apparently consider the opportunity to boo their own team to be a key reason for following the Mets. (Baez was later forced to apologize for not enjoying being booed.) A six-game win streak at the end of the month gave the fans some hope (though not too much – they’re still Mets fans), but an 8-15 September put an end to any thoughts of October. Having a third general manager kicked to the curb in September after being busted for a DUI somehow put an appropriate capper on one of the wildest seasons in recent Mets history.

Any questions about the Mets future now center on two main concerns: what’s going on with the pitching rotation's injuries, and what on Earth is going on in the front office. On the pitching side, deGrom is obviously the main concern, but right behind him is Noah Syndergaard; Noah’s return from Tommy John surgery faced one setback after another, possibly as a result of an over-aggressive Mets’ approach. The front office, meanwhile, is a mess. The Mets will soon be on their fourth general manager in the last twelve months; they’re led by a team president who has apparently long fostered a toxic front-office culture; and they’re owned by an eccentric billionaire who has decided that the best way to make his team aware of his displeasure is via Twitter. It’s hard to predict what will happen to such a dysfunctional, talented, bipolar team like the Mets, but one thing is clear – at least Mets fans still have their God-given right to boo.

The Mets last made the playoffs in 2016. Their last championship was in 1986.
 
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Leather

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Dunno what to think about them. The arms are a mess, but they've got enough hitting talent on the team that they might be reluctant to blow things up. They've probably got enough in the farm that they can deal for another Maeda type, and they've only got about $50 mil committed to next year's salaries, so they could try to cobble together a rotation of mid-level guys and reclamation projects to supplement the Buxton core. Or they could just blow it up. I honestly don't know which direction they'll choose, but I really wouldn't blame them either way.

Also...thanks all! I'm always glad that these writeups are able to find an interested community. And it's good to be back - I didn't do these last year because Covid baseball wasn't real.
You know what they'll do? They'll do what they've done for the past several years: make some splashy, if short-sighted, moves to keep fans coming but never spend enough to be a true contender.

That said: they are in an impossible situation with Buxton. He's arguably the most exciting player in baseball when he's healthy, but he's *never* fucking healthy. He's played more than 100 games once. That was fine when he was young and promising, but he'll be 28 in a few months. Do you shell out $20 MM+/year for a guy who might only play half of the games? No, but you better have some other plans with that money unless you want a pissed off fanbase (as much as Minnesota's languid fanbase can be pissed off). And I think it's far more likely they attempt a half-assed middle-ground where they trade Buxton for some middle-tier prospects and sign someone like Andrew McCutcheon on a 2 year deal for 2/3 what they would have paid Buxton so they can sell fans on another MVP on the team who will be good enough that people don't pine for Buxton while ownership saves $5 Million a season. Meanwhile, garbage heap pitching with 3 #3 starters and 2 #5 starters for the 12th year in a row. Best case, they take the division and lose the ALDS in 4 games.
 

LogansDad

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Thanks @cannonball 1729 for this great annual thread, it's one of my favorite reads every year.

I think the Royals have a chance to surprise some people next season, with another year of their young pitchers. I'm a pretty big fan of both Lynch and Cowar, and I think all four should show some improvement next year, especially because.... Bobby Witt Jr and Nick Pratto should both be ready to go. And they should be able to get a mid season return for MJ Melendez, if they don't want to hang onto him for the future.
 

cannonball 1729

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You know what they'll do? They'll do what they've done for the past several years: make some splashy, if short-sighted, moves to keep fans coming but never spend enough to be a true contender.

That said: they are in an impossible situation with Buxton. He's arguably the most exciting player in baseball when he's healthy, but he's *never* fucking healthy. He's played more than 100 games once. That was fine when he was young and promising, but he'll be 28 in a few months. Do you shell out $20 MM+/year for a guy who might only play half of the games? No, but you better have some other plans with that money unless you want a pissed off fanbase (as much as Minnesota's languid fanbase can be pissed off). And I think it's far more likely they attempt a half-assed middle-ground where they trade Buxton for some middle-tier prospects and sign someone like Andrew McCutcheon on a 2 year deal for 2/3 what they would have paid Buxton so they can sell fans on another MVP on the team who will be good enough that people don't pine for Buxton while ownership saves $5 Million a season. Meanwhile, garbage heap pitching with 3 #3 starters and 2 #5 starters for the 12th year in a row. Best case, they take the division and lose the ALDS in 4 games.
This seems about right.

I'm always fascinated by when a talented and not healthy player gets to free agency, because there's always some team willing to pay him, and I feel like it so rarely works out, and then that team is left trying to dump him on some other team.

I'd also love to see what the Twins' books actually look like. They've been crying poverty for 25 years - basically ever since Carl Pohlad tried to move the Twins to Raleigh in the late 90's and then tried to get them contracted in 2001 - and by now, Twins fans just kind of accept it as the price of following the Twins.

I think the Royals have a chance to surprise some people next season, with another year of their young pitchers. I'm a pretty big fan of both Lynch and Cowar, and I think all four should show some improvement next year, especially because.... Bobby Witt Jr and Nick Pratto should both be ready to go. And they should be able to get a mid season return for MJ Melendez, if they don't want to hang onto him for the future.
I agree with this. The Royals strike me as one of those teams where all of the pitchers are going to put it together at the same time - maybe next year, maybe in a year after that, and then they'll be a good team. They're fully capable of going the Indians route and living off their starting pitching. I think the limiting thing right now is that they have a defense that's decayed since the 2015 heyday. If they can shore up some of the corner positions where they've got absolute defensive butchers, the young pitchers will probably pitch a lot more confidently.
 

cannonball 1729

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Well, I think it goes without saying that when one team wins 17 straight in September, another usually gets eliminated. Yesterday, we added:

44706



Entering the season, expectations for the 2021 Reds were low. In their last full season, the Reds finished 75-87, a distant fourth behind three perennial contenders. Last year, they finished 31-29, but most believed that to be a fluke of the short season; certainly, a postseason series against the Braves where the Reds failed to score a single run did little to disabuse fans of the “fluke” notion. In the offseason, their major transaction was losing staff ace Trevor Bauer to the Dodgers and replacing him with nobody in particular. Worse, the ownership demanded payroll reduction in the offseason, forcing the Reds to weaken the bullpen with a Raisel Iglesias trade and an Archie Bradley non-tender. For a franchise that had been lost in the woods since their 2014 teardown, 2021 looked to be more of the same; PECOTA had the Reds projected at 79 wins, and most prognosticators felt that even that meager total was too high.

For Reds’ fans, then, 2021 has been a year of pleasant surprises.

The biggest surprise has undoubtedly been Wade Miley, the 34-year-old knockabout pitcher who has unexpectedly turned in a career year in Cincinnati. In May, Miley threw a no-hitter that prompted writers to proclaim how unlikely a candidate he was to throw a no-no and how happy they were for the journeyman. As the season progressed, however, we discovered that such a pitching performance from Miley was not unlikely at all; instead, the veteran had inexplicably transformed into an ace. Currently, Miley has 6 WAR for the season; that total places him second in the NL in WAR, just ahead of Corbin Burnes and Walker Buehler.

Other surprises also popped up around the field. Jonathan India surprised himself by making the big league club out of spring training, then surprised the rest of the league with a stellar inaugural big-league campaign that will likely end with him winning the Rookie of the Year Award. Joey Votto decided to forsake some of his trademark patience for more power; he’s now OPSing .950 and having his best year since his 2017 MVP runner-up performance. (And yes, you can read that as "Joey Votto decided to hit more home runs this year." Because he can do that.) The rotation now goes five starters deep: every single starter (Miley, Luis Castillo, Tyler Mahle, Sonny Gray, and Vladimir Guitierrez) turned in an ERA+ above 100, and all but Guitierrez posted a 118 or higher. Left fielder Jesse Winkler has (when healthy) solidified his power stroke; right fielder Nick Castellanos has emerged as a complete hitter (if not much of a fielder); reliever Art Warren has entertained the fans with his unusual mound routine...it's been a good time all around.

In fact, here’s a fun fact: the Reds have seven players with 3 WAR or more. That’s as many as the Dodgers, White Sox, or Brewers have - and it’s more than the Giants, Rays, or Astros. Simply put, the Reds' top players this year are as good as any team's in baseball.

So...if they had so many surprises, how come they’re still only at 82 wins? Well, these might have something to do with it:

Eugenio Suarez: -1.0 WAR
Mike Moustakas: -1.0 WAR (in just 206 PA!)
Shogo Akiyama: -1.0 WAR (in just 183 PA!!)

Sure, Akiyama and Moose have the excuse that they've been injured, but whatever the reason, a -1 WAR season is an impressive level of futility. Usually, a contending team will try not to let a struggling player get enough at-bats to garner a win of sub-replacement-ness; here, the Reds have three such players. Suarez’s number is particularly stunning given that a.) he has 30 home runs this year, and b.) he’s hit .373/.457/.831 in September…which tells you just how bad the rest of his year has been.

It’s not just those three, though – it’s also the bullpen. The two players who are currently tied for the team lead in saves (with 8) are Mychal Givens and...wait for it...Heath Hembree, who had a 6.38 ERA before being released by the team. So far this year, ten players have recorded saves for the Reds, which is never a good sign – especially since only five of those pitchers are still with the organization.

Toward the end of the season, the lack of bullpen just became too much. Although the rotation is five-deep, the starters all have battled intermittent injuries throughout the season, and when Wade Miley came down with a neck injury that torpedoed his September, the Reds no longer had the firepower left to compete. From late August to late September, the Reds lost eight series in a row; that, combined with the Cardinals absurd winning streak, portended the end for Cincinnati.

Nevertheless, there have been a number of positive developments for the Reds this year. Votto had flirted with the idea of retiring; now, he says he's having as much fun playing as he's ever had. Many of the young stars (including obviously Jonathan India) are under team control for a long time, and while Wade Miley is uncertain to repeat his 2021, much of the team is on the right side of the aging curve and has the potential to improve. Even the disappointing Eugenio Suarez appeared to turn the corner in September; Suarez has always struggled to hit breaking pitches, but he appears to have made an adjustment and is now scorching the ball. There are certainly worries with the way the Reds' season ended, but for the first time in a while, hope is on the horizon....as long as the management doesn't cheap out again.

The Reds last won a World Series in 1990.
 
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cannonball 1729

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44732


One of the impressive things about the Athletics this year is this: their starters stayed in the game longer than any other team in baseball. With three above-average starters, two average starters, and a gigantic ballpark, the A’s had no trouble getting into the sixth inning; in fact, their 5.5 IP/game started is tops in the major leagues this year.

Which is why it’s so puzzling that they completely burned out their bullpen.

Apparently, Bob Melvin decided early in the season that he would pick his favorite arms in the bullpen and ride them until those arms fell off. Game after game, the bullpen doors would swing open to reveal Lou Trivino, Yusmeiro Petit, Jake Diekman, Sergio Romo, or Deolis Guerra trotting onto the field; Birch Smith threw some mopup innings before being outrighted, and at the deadline Andrew Chafin was added to the mix, but...that was it. No other A’s pitcher made more than 12 relief appearances. In fact, of the seventeen AL pitchers who made the most appearances this year, four of those seventeen (Petit, Trivino, Diekman, and Romo) are on the A’s, including the #2 (Petit) and #9 (Trivino).

Now, it’s not unusual for a team to have seventh, eighth, and ninth inning guys and ride them into oblivion. But usually those pitchers only come in when there’s a lead - or at least a tie. The five (or six) A’s relievers came in in all situations; rain or shine, day or night, ahead or behind...no matter the scenario, those overworked relievers would come into the game. Trivino, Petit, Diekman, and Romo each came into four games where the A’s trailed by three runs or more at the time; Petit appeared in 22 games when the A’s were trailing, while Romo came into 28 such games and Diekman appeared in 19 of them. (Guerra appeared in 34 games where the A's were trailing and 17 games where they were down by three or more, but he was kind of a mop-up guy.) On the one hand, there’s something admirable about trying to win every game; on the other hand, a team that never thinks about tomorrow generally ends up with a tomorrow that’s not worth thinking about.

You can probably guess what happened next. After appearing in nearly every game for the first four-and-a-half months of the season, the six-man bullpen simply collapsed in mid-August. To wit: here are the key relievers in the A’s pen with their before/after August 16 ERAs:

Lou Trivino: 1.81/7.27
Yusmeiro Petit: 3.19/5.09
Jake Diekman: 3.07/6.19
Sergio Romo: 3.25/8.22
Delois Guerra: 3.70/4.50

That's right - everyone's ERA has shot up by multiple runs except the mop-up guy. Naturally, it’s hard to stay in contention when your relievers can no longer pitch. Since the bullpen collapse, the A’s are 17-24, fourth-worst in the AL; they've also given up more runs than any AL team except Baltimore and Texas, which is impressive when you consider that the Oakland Coliseum is one of the most pitcher-friendly parks in the league.

That said, Oakland might still have managed to glide into the playoffs had it not been for the Mariners. For whatever reason, Seattle has absolutely had the A’s number this season, and the M’s have now won twelve in a row against the Oaklanders – including nine since the bullpen collapse. Against teams who don’t play in Seattle, the A’s are 17-14 since the August 16 explosion; that’s not a great record, but it would have likely been good enough to cement a postseason appearance. Against Seattle, however, the worst of the A's bullpen has manifested itself; each of Trivino, Petit, Chafin, and Diekman has taken the loss in a game against the M's since mid-August, and the A's have lost seven of those nine games by three runs or less.

As winter approaches, the on-field disappointment may soon give way to some off-field disappointment for Oaklanders. The A’s have been in a contentious back-and-forth with the city of Oakland over a new stadium in the Howard Terminal area, and...it’s not going well. The city is concerned about clogging up a huge port area with a baseball stadium and, of course, about the large amounts of money that the project will end up costing the city. This has obviously made the A’s unhappy, and in typical pro sports fashion, the A’s have retaliated by making overtures to whichever city is the relocation threat du jour, which is currently Las Vegas. After the season, the A’s will announce potential Las Vegas sites in order to exert maximum pressure on the Oakland city council; what happens from there is anyone’s guess.

In the meantime, the A's now face their first A's-less postseason since 2017 with questions about their future in every facet of the game. With nearly everyone on the roster becoming a FA within the next two years, will the A's turn over the roster or extend players? Will the A's still be the cheap Moneyball A's in a new stadium or with a new market? Will the A's adapt to the era of the high-velocity reliever by stockpiling more relievers, or will they try to pioneer another method of pitching staff construction? These are uncertain times in Oaktown, and the months ahead will be interesting and nerve-wracking for the Coliseum faithful. In the meantime, though...at least the A's relievers will finally get some rest.

The A's last won a World Series in 1989.
 

cannonball 1729

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All right - as the day's games are starting, let's get the most recent elimination up:

44830


The Phillies’ purgatory continues. Last offseason, the Phillies decided to “re-assign” general manager Matt Klentak to a nebulous position in the front office that was most decidedly not general manager. The move was well-earned - Klentak was an analytics-driven GM who had a knack for putting together teams that looked great on paper but would collapse every September. Somehow, despite signing bigger and bigger free agents and stars, the Phillies never had a winning season in Klentak’s five-year tenure; worse, the farm system had atrophied to the point where any new talent had to come from outside the organization.

There’s an old saying about managers that when a team fires a manager, the next one they hire is the exact opposite. After firing the young, data-first Klentak, the Phillies hired Dave Dombrowski, who fits neither of those descriptions, to be team president. Dombrowski’s first tasks were to remake the bullpen, firm up the back of the rotation, find a shortstop, and re-sign J.T. Realmuto; after that, he figured he might look under the hood of the farm system to see what was wrong down there.

In typical Dombrowski fashion, Dave (and his GM Sam Fuld) moved quickly and decisively to shore up the major league roster. Realmuto was quickly inked to a five-year deal worth $115 million. Didi Gregorious was signed to fill the shortstop hole for two years and $28 million. Archie Bradley and Jose Alvarado would anchor the new-look ‘pen. Matt Moore and Chase Anderson were cheap veteran starters who could provide low-cost innings to the Phils. The farm system...well, that would take some more time, so Dombrowski told development director Bryan Minniti that he’d leave Minniti in charge for another year, after which Dombrowski would make his decision about the future of the organization.

Those acquisitions were a bit of a mixed bag. Both Moore and Anderson posted ERA’s in the sixes for the brief times that they were not on the IL; worse, the starter that they traded away, Cole Irvin, has been far better than either one. Didi has been awful all season, hitting .208 with sub-replacement fielding; big contract or no, the position where he has the most value above replacement is currently “bench.” Realmuto has put up a typically excellent Realmuto season, and the bullpen replacements have been fine if not stellar. For a playoff-caliber team looking to maintain their level, these moves would have been fine; for a sub-.500 team looking to make the playoffs, these moves didn’t quite give the Phillies the boost they needed to get to the next level.

What did give the Phillies a boost was the re-emergence of Bryce Harper and the emergence of Zack Wheeler. Harper may well be the most inconsistent superstar in the game; since his MVP season in 2015, he’s had OPS+’s ranging from 111 to 158, and he posted those in no particular order. This year, though, he had an elite first half of the season, settling into an excellent .282/.378/.520 line for a 149 OPS+...which he then destroyed with a ridiculous .336/.475/.715 line in the second half, good for a 219 OPS+. Wheeler, on the other hand, never really had a superstar pedigree until unexpectedly vaulting into the stratosphere in the shortened 2020 season. This year, Wheeler has posted a WAR of 7.7; NL pitchers who have a lower WAR than Wheeler include, well, all of them. Wheeler probably won’t win the Cy Young because he’s on a mediocre team, but he’s likely been the best pitcher in his league; posting a 2.78 ERA in a bandbox of a stadium is an incredible accomplishment.

Despite the dominance of Harper and Wheeler, the lack of help coming from the new acquisitions (and the faulty bullpen and back of the rotation) meant that if they were to make the playoffs, they'd need some improvements from key incumbent players....which is why the collapse of Aaron Nola was so devastating. Nola had been the ace of the Phillies’ staff for several years, and coming into this year, there was every reason to think that Nola and Wheeler would make a formidable one-two punch (in that order) that might help cover up the bullpen’s shortcomings. Unfortunately, Nola found himself oddly susceptible to the longball; hitters apparently went to the plate trying to lift the ball, causing his average launch angle to spike by almost 50% and his barrel rate to jump to the highest rate of his career. Weirder still, he became decidedly un-clutch; hitters only slashed .237/.296/.405 against Nola, but with RISP those numbers jumped to .290/.379/.524, and with RISP and two outs those numbers jumped all the way to .302/.383/.642. Fortunately, Nola's only 28, and his problems sound more mental than physical, but that’s little solace to a team that was likely one ace short of the playoffs.

Which brings us back to the farm system. Under Klentak, the Phillies had entered into a contract where Driveline basically dictated the philosophies of the minor league system. This led to absolute chaos in the minors, as the chain of command was muddled, philosophies were rigid, and coaches and scouts felt hamstrung and resorted to blaming each other for the failures of their players. The Phillies’ developmental system is so ineffective that the 2021 Minor League Pitcher of the Year was in a short-season league in the Caribbean and still hasn’t played a game in the United States. By August, Dave Dombrowski realized that things weren’t getting any better on the farm and fired everyone with the term “development” in their title, replacing Minniti with Don Mattingly’s son Preston. Fortunately, DD has had to rebuild teams before (most notably his stunning three-year rebuild with the Tigers), but there’s a whole lot of work to be done if the Phillies want to have a farm system that actually helps the big league team. For now, though, the Phillies are pretty close - a few good moves or rebounds next year will likely put them in the playoffs; a few bad ones will earn them another year in purgatory.

Philadelphia last made the playoffs in 2011. Their last title was in 2008.
 

cannonball 1729

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Wow! I have no idea how I missed that. Rangers in 2047!

Good news is if I live to be 102, I might be able to see the Pirates reach 86 years.
Well, the Pirates are certainly trying their hardest to do their part! I bet they'd be the most likely after the Indians to make it to 86. Though I'm not sure I'll be around to see it.
 

cannonball 1729

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Sep 8, 2005
3,572
The Sticks
And finally,

44886

This team doesn’t make any sense. By run differential, they’re -51. At the deadline, they traded away their closer and ostensibly destroyed their team chemistry. Their sparkplug center fielder is hitting .180. Their pitching staff is the ace Chris Flexen, the solid Marco Gonzales, and a 3-5 that ranges from "white-knuckle ride" to "potential disaster." By OPS+, they’re fourth-worst in the AL, just ahead of the woeful Orioles. By ERA+, they’re fifth-worst, just ahead of LAA’s one-man pitching crew. American League teams that finished ahead of Seattle in both categories included not just every playoff team but also Toronto, Oakland, Detroit, and Cleveland. Oh, and in the pre-season, they fired team president and CEO Kevin Mather after he was recorded saying pretty much everything a team president can’t say, including mocking his foreign players for their English skills and admitting to manipulating service time.

And yet...here they were.

For years, the Mariners have made hay with seemingly-unsustainable records in close games, although usually the gravity-defying act would only last for half a season or so before reality intervened. This year, though, they took that “close-game record” act to an extreme, going 33-19 in one-run games and 14-7 in extra-inning contests. The M’s only hit .226 all season, but they bumped that to .259 with RISP, and they hit an incredible .273 in high-leverage situations. The pitching was similar; opponents hit .252 normally but .235 in high-leverage situations. Somehow, the pitchers were even able to time their bad pitching to correspond with the M’s bouts of bad hitting; the staff ERA was 5.62 when Seattle hitters scored less than three runs but only 4.50 when the M’s scored three or more. Was that luck or skill? Well, if the end result was wins, it doesn’t really matter now, does it?

Despite the gravity-defying pitching and hitting, the M’s were mostly an afterthought in the pennant race until the middle of September. In August and early September, the M’s played largely uneven baseball and showed an unusual penchant for losing to bad teams, especially the underwhelming Royals. Fortunately for them, all of the other wildcard teams were having trouble stringing wins together, so Seattle stayed afloat in the race largely by default. The nadir came in mid-September – after the Mariners lost back-to-back series to the Astros and Diamondbacks, they entered a must-win series against the Red Sox...and lost that as well. On September 15, the M’s were four games out of the playoffs, having lost six of their last nine; their postseason dreams were clearly slipping away.

But then...the schedule gods smiled upon the seafarers. Their next thirteen games would feature three against the terrible Royals, three against the also-terrible Angels, and seven against the A’s….at the exact moment where the A’s bullpen collapse kicked into high gear. The M’s immediately embarked on a “hot” stretch, going 11-2 against the dregs of the league (including 7-0 against the A’s) and prompting the chattering classes to opine on how the Mariners were dangerous and unstoppable.

Coming into the final series, the Mariners were shockingly in control of their own destiny. If they could take care of the woeful Angels, they would at worst be in a one-game playoff with the Red Sox; if they could win that, they would reach the playoffs for the first time since Ichiro was a rookie. Instead, they lost the first game by a score of 2-1, a loss that was punctuated by the team going an un-Mariner-like 0 for 7 with runners in scoring position. They squeaked out a win in game two, but by this point they had ceded control of the wildcard to the Red Sox and Yankees, and when the Sox and Yanks took care of business on the final day, the Mariners were out of the playoffs for the twentieth year in a row.

The future is bright for the Mariners. Much like the Red Sox, who probably weren’t supposed to make the playoffs this year, the M’s are built for the long haul, not the present. They have a top-five farm system, plus several young players on the big league club who haven’t yet found their stride, which means that they could improve quite a bit in the next few years. They apparently have a miracle worker in manager Scott Servais; if he doesn’t win AL Manager of the Year, he certainly won’t be far behind. Sure, the fans are disappointed, but they’ve now glimpsed the future, and it looks like it will be fun. Besides, they’ve already waited twenty years...what’s one more?

The Mariners have never won a World Series. Their last playoff appearance was in 2001.



44885


Let’s play a game. Here are five numbers - tell me which of these things is not like the others:

+80, +42, +183, -51, +56

These, of course, are the run differentials for the top five finishers in the wildcard race.

I suppose there are two valid answers here. If you said that the unusual one was -51, well, that was Seattle. We already talked about them.

But just as jarring is that +183. That was Toronto. That +183 differential was more than the Sox, Yankees, and A’s combined. The Blue Jays’ differential was higher than even the division winning White Sox; the Rays and Astros were the only teams that had higher differentials, and both of those teams clinched their divisions a week ago.

Toronto was the hardest-hitting team in all the land. They were first in slugging, first in home runs, second in doubles, and a force to be reckoned with. They had an astonishing seven players with more than 20 home runs, including two with 45 or more. They scored ten or more runs 23 times, which basically works out an average of once per week. Now, some of that may have been park-aided – the Buffalo park is a bit of a bandbox – but the power was very real.

So how does a team that outscores its opponents by more than one run every game end up with the sixth-best record in the AL? It’s a good question. Usually, the chief culprit for a run-differential underperformance is the bullpen, and if you watched the Jays for the first several months, you know that Rafael Dolis-as-closer adventure was the sort of experience that can bend a team’s W/L record in the wrong direction. But Dolis wasn’t left in the role for long – the Blue Jays quickly tired of the Dolicoaster and removed him from the role by June - and his replacements have been pretty solid. In fact, the Jays are fourth in the AL in save percentage, and they’re fourth in earned runs allowed in innings 6-9 as well.

A better answer might be that their offensive success was very slugging-heavy. Toronto’s SLG was 15 points higher than the second-best-slugging AL team...but their OBP was only third in the league, and it was just two points ahead of the fourth-place Red Sox. This might lead one to conclude that Toronto was good at coming up with six runs in a flash but less good at coming up with one run when they needed it. The data does seem to bear this out; the Jays were 31-15 in blowouts (games where one team won by five runs or more) but only 15-15 in one run games – and just 3-9 in extra innings. The Pythagorean Hypothesis(TM) posits that blowouts are predictive of records in close games, but it’s possible that the author of that hypothesis didn’t have a disproportionately slugging-oriented team in mind.

(Some of it, too, may just be bad luck – or bad timing. The pitching staff had an ERA of 3.91, but it was 4.19 in games where the Jays scored three to five runs and 3.58 in all other situations.)

Whatever the reason, one thing seems clear - the Jays were a much better team when they got to play their home games at their actual home. Before their return to Canada, the Dunedin/Buffalo Jays were 51-48; after their Canadian return, the Toronto Blue Jays went 40-23, good for a .634 win percentage. It's certainly no surprise that this was the case - indeed, it's difficult to be a perpetual road team - but most fans were surprised by just how much of a turnaround the Canadian return caused. Within a month and a half of coming home, the Jays had vaulted over three teams to take sole possession of the second wildcard.

Unfortunately, the Blue Jays went cold at exactly the wrong time. On September 20, riding high on an 18-4 stretch of baseball, the Jays headed to Tampa to face the Rays...where they promptly lost two out of three, due in part to the Rays pitching and the fact that Kevin Kiermaier’s stole the Jays’ pitchers’ game plan. (Sorry, "accidentally picked it up off the ground and then kept it - but definitely didn't look at it!") That series was followed by a disappointing split with the Twins, which meant that the season would come down to a pivotal home series against the Yankees. The Yanks took the first game of the series and the Jays the second, setting up a huge matchup between Corey Kluber and Cy Young front-runner Robbie Ray for the rubber game. For the first five innings, Ray held the Yankees at bay, and Toronto eked out a lead in the bottom of the fifth to much jubilation. Then...disaster struck; with one out in the sixth, Ray gave up a home run, a home run, a walk, and another home run before finally being pulled in front of a stunned Rogers Center crowd. Although there were more games to be played, the Jays’ 2021 season truly ended that day; Toronto spent the rest of the season bludgeoning the Orioles and waiting for standings help that never arrived.

Obviously, the Jays are going to be a popular preseason pick to win the World Series next year; with a young core led by the likely Hank Aaron Award Winner, it’s easy to envision the Jays having success in 2022. However, this offseason may be a tricky one. Toronto will have to figure whether to re-sign Marcus Semien or Robbie Ray after the two posted career years worth a combined 14 WAR. The Jays also have to figure out what to do about George Springer, who signed a big contract last offseason but fought injuries for much of 2021. They might also have to start thinking about whether to extend their arb and pre-arb players - they may try to extend Jose Berrios before he hits free agency next year, and they may even want to lock up Vlad Jr. or Bo Bichette in their last pre-arb years in order to buy out their first couple years of free agency (or perhaps even ink them to decade-and-a-half-long contracts like Fernando Tatis, Jr.). Regardless, the youth movement has arrived, and Jays fans are understandably excited...especially since they'll have the opportunity to watch all of the home games in person next year.

The Blue Jays last made the playoffs 2020, though their last non-Covid playoff appearance was in 2016. Their last title came in 1993.
 
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cannonball 1729

Member
SoSH Member
Sep 8, 2005
3,572
The Sticks
Magnificent recaps, cannonball, and thank you for gracing us with your musings.
Thanks! I'm always surprised there's an interested audience for my random thoughts about baseball teams. But I'm glad y'all enjoy it!

Anyway, thus concludes 2021's elimination season. See you all next year when we begin again with the Orioles!