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ashbury

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Everything posted by ashbury

  1. ashbury
    I wasn't making fun of you. I just thought it was funny, tying in with the headline.
  2. ashbury
    Throws: Price, L, Graterol, R Bats: Price, L, Graterol, R Born: Price, USA, Graterol, Venezuela Age at signing: Price, 22, Graterol, 16 Birth year: Price, 1985, Graterol, 1998 Birth date: Price, August 26, Graterol, August 26 Career: Price, has been good, Graterol, might be good It's uncanny - like THEY ARE IDENTICAL!
  3. ashbury
    While Schoop has two minor league options remaining, he has enough major league service time that he can refuse a demotion, and my guess is that he would exercise that right.
  4. ashbury
    Gratifying that someone went to the trouble of reading to the end.
  5. ashbury
    I'd pump the brakes on that. He is currently a King of BABip. Batting Average on Balls In Play normally stabilizes around .300. Jake built his fine 2018 on a BABip of .363, and his major league numbers in 2019 are built on an even more outlandish BABip of .400. Now, I (as a player) would not achieve .300 - BABip is meaningful only for a decent level of skill. One could speculate that a high BABip represents skill itself. Let me dig into that. Jake has a career MLB BABip of .374 across 457 plate appearances. Do you know who has had a BABIp that high across an entire career (3000+ PA)? Just Ty Cobb. Not Babe Ruth, not Ted Williams, not... nobody. Reduce the threshold to just the 457 PA that Jake has. Who now makes the cut? Just 2 more, besides Jake and Ty. Luminaries named Jorge Alfaro and Austin Slater, both of whom are 26 and currently playing, along with Cave. Alfaro's carving out a decent career as a young catcher (Philly, now Miami after a big trade). Slater's trying to reach "decent" with the Giants. Seems a good bet that the BABip of these three contemporary players, early in their careers, will descend below .374 just like every other major league player not named Tyrus Raymond. These guys are extreme outliers. A high BABip of .374 doesn't look like a skill. Which is the long way of saying, no, I'm far from convinced the bat is for real. With normal luck of balls falling in, he's Jason Tyner.
  6. ashbury
    I'm one, and I'm still here. My complaints about Cave generally are about his decision making, both on defense and on the basepaths. Yesterday's excellent catch late in the game was more athleticism than decision making, i.e. "can he reach the ball" rather than "should he try", and it was fun to watch. If the homers continue to come, he might work his way out of my doghouse. But I still don't trust him on sinking line drives, or which base to throw to, or trying to nab an extra base himself.
  7. ashbury
    KC was just toying with Cleveland, forcing them to go deeper in their bullpen. Thanks Royals!
  8. ashbury
    A single season's hitting or pitching stats contain a vastly greater number of tests of the player's skill in those areas, than fielding. An outfielder has had a busy season if he collects 300+ total chances. Many of those chances are absolute cans o' corn. Conversely, and unfortunately, many other opportunities to excel (or to fail) are never recorded as total chances, and are recorded simply as "hits" for the opposing batter, even though the ball came into an area of the field where under other circumstances a play might have been successfully made. Other "hits" are truly unreachable by even the fastest player - the distinction is not noted in the traditional fielding stats. Analogously, a batter faces a certain percentage of pitches that essentially every batter would do the same on - 55-foot breaking pitches, fastballs that sail three feet outside, strikes taken on 3-0, and so forth. Those are like the cans o' corn, and/or the balls hit totally out of reach of a fielder. But a busy season at bat consists of nearly 3000 individual pitches; these chances to excel or fail get combined into hits and outs and eventually the slash-line. So when you slice and dice, "cans o' corn" versus more challenging plays (fielding and batting analogues to one another), there is 10 times the quantity of data to judge the hitter (or pitcher) on, than for fielding. (Shortstop is slightly less troublesome, with about 2X the total chances of center field.) We are accustomed to looking skeptically at Small Sample Sizes of batting stats - 100 PA may not tell you much about the player. More than 400 pitches might be involved in that. A season of defensive data is inherently SSS. Robbie Grossman may have suddenly gotten better in the outfield. Or, more likely, his 2019 has been the fielding equivalent of Hurricane Hazle (or our Danny Santana), hitting amazingly for a quarter of a season, until suddenly the pixie dust disappears.
  9. ashbury
    Guy like Soto and Acuña put up numbers that positively demanded they be called up. Acuña destroyed the Arizona Fall League and was brought up to the majors the next spring, while Soto kept OPSing .900 every time they promoted him mid-season and finally the team "gave up" trying to keep him challenged and double-jumped him to the majors. Rare is the player who performs like them before age 20. If we had anyone performing like them, there would be something to discuss.
  10. ashbury
    It's what shows in the box score. Presumably it means he muffed a ball hit at him, as opposed to an error on a throw.
  11. ashbury
    Minor would not have pushed Berrios out of the starting rotation. Neither would Stroman, or whatever savior one was hoping to be acquired. So last night's game was not affected, whichever way that FO decision went. Why bring it up in a game recap? Also, with regard to exactly when to pull Berrios last night, look at the spotty outcome from the bullpen when they did get brought in, and ask what difference it would have made in the game. It would have been different, because that's the nature of baseball, but it's not obvious that any choice would have resulted in a win. Is Berrios tipping his pitches? What is Wes Johnson doing, and are his short-season college-ball tactics getting exposed during the long grind of a major league season? Those are questions I'd rather find answers to.
  12. ashbury
    Does Rocco ask rhetorical questions, and then answer them? Why yes. Yes he does.
  13. ashbury
    Would Pedro Muñoz have been brave enough (or allowed?) to use the nickname Kent Hrbek hung on him back in the day? Booger. (Hrbek Logic went as follows: Muñoz = My Nose = Booger.) I've always been leery of Buck and Big Mike as nicknames, so it's reassuring to know if the players themselves embrace those publicly. Among the others, the ones that aren't already genuine nicknames seem pretty contrived, or else are so specialized (honoring hometown) that it wouldn't stick. So I guess Regadera, which Google Translate renders as Watering Can among other things, gets my vote as well, as the oddest among the not-too-odd.
  14. ashbury
    Did FG identify Arraez before he reached the majors, as anyone special? I don't have a lot of patience with bandwagon jumpers, TBH.
  15. ashbury
    http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-MjLKhHyfb-0/T9dywpnN9mI/AAAAAAAAAlM/b5IDTVP5vW0/s1600/Baseball+Bugs+(24).jpg
  16. ashbury
    I want to add, it's not because of some special rule regarding September. It's just that you "option" a guy when he's on the 40-man roster and you want to send him to a minor league team. There's no minor league games in September, so nobody gets sent down, and that's why a 40-man add this time of year will preserve all three options. They don't even have to wait until September to add a player, either, just so long as they don't change their mind and assign him to Rochester because of some 25-man roster crunch just before rosters expand.
  17. ashbury
    Malique Ziegler, the guy we got for him, appears to be beset by injuries this year, and got demoted to Gulf Coast League rookie ball, where he is still struggling. It's possible we still lost this trade!
  18. ashbury
    Keep working.
  19. ashbury
    "Cage closed," I'm pretty sure you meant.
  20. ashbury
    Don't Don't Don't Don't Don't Don't.
  21. ashbury
    I've had that same experience. For Happy Birthday.
  22. ashbury
    Moderator's note: Starting to feel a little overly personal, even if meant in good fun on both sides.
  23. ashbury
    It's been a rough season for bases-loaded performance, but the past few games have included a couple of clutch hits in that situation.
  24. ashbury
    Had to go back to look at the video, after your recommendation. I LOLed out loud, even knowing what was coming. Minor league game, minor league technical director in the broadcast booth. Live and learn, I hope.
  25. ashbury
    I've launched a Kickstarter on your behalf, to fund your attendance to future Twins games. Everyone, please give generously. httsp://www.kikcstrater.com/projects/helpthebaseballfamily/all-funds-property-of-ashbury
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