The Braves had big hopes for left field last year. Matt Kemp, who came over in a 2016 trade filled with the pomp and circumstance of his very own The Player’s Tribune proclaiming his long-standing love for the Braves, hit .280/.336/.519 down the stretch that year. The blemish on his 2017 prospects was that he needed to shed some weight, but those concerns were quelled when he came to camp in in better shape. But the season didn’t turn out how he or the Braves would like as he missed time to injury, gained weight, and finished the season playing 115 games and hitting .276/.318/.463 while playing mostly poor defense.
2018 may not be any better in left field than 2017 was, but it will sure be different. The Braves traded Kemp this past offseason to open the door for mega prospect Ronald Acuna (or Rrrrrrrrronald Acuuuuuuuuuuna, as he’s known in our home). There has been lots written about Acuna, most of it tantalyzing hype, but what should we expect from Acuna? First, don’t expect to see him the full season. They’ll undoubtedly keep him down long enough to avoid Super-2, but he still should make 450+ plate appearances assuming he’s healthy. Second, don’t expect him to win the MVP. Acuna is probably a future centerfielder, and has played centerfield mostly in the minors, so you should expect to see strong defense in left field. Kemp somehow managed to post a -13.9 fWAR last year in only those 115 games, so expect left field defense to be vastly improved from the previous year. Between offense and defense of all positions on the diamond, left field defense will see, by far, the biggest improvement. It won’t turn the Braves into a contender, but our young pitchers benefiting from even more defensive improvement will go a long way.
It’s also no stretch to say that you should see more speed out of that spot in the lineup. Kemp stole no bases, but surprisingly attempted to do so unsuccessfully twice (how bad were those catchers?), and only managed one triple in his 467 PAs. Acuna stole 44 bases at his three stops last year, but he did get caught 20 times as well. So while we should see some stolen bases, we won’t see those lofty stolen base numbers until he improves his reads and success rate. At the end of the day, we should see several instances where Acuna finishes a base ahead of where the incumbent would have. How many additional runs that creates, no one knows.
Offensively, we may not see much difference between Acuna and Kemp in his rookie season. That .276/.318/.463 line Kemp put up last year would be a perfectly acceptance line for Acuna to manage, and it’d be unreasonable to expect much more. But just like with second base, we will undoubtedly see better speed and defense from the replacement, but the offense may be more on par with 2017’s counterpart.
Another improvement we should expect to see is at the backup position. Last year, Danny Santana, Emilio Bonifacio, and Jace Peterson all logged innings in left field, all of which were sub-replacement level in production. Lane Adams was the lone player to produce in the positive in left field, but he only got 122 PAs across all 3 outfield positions. And he accumulated 0.7 fWAR, so if he is able to continue that production and make the roster, the backup position should be improved. Preston Tucker will battle Lane for a backup position, and while Tucker has a better prospect pedigree, he has not been productive since his 2015 rookie season. In 467 career PAs, Tucker has a -0.4 fWAR. Neither option is exciting if an injury were to occur to Acuna, but if you believe Lane’s sample in 2017, he may be the better option going forward. Tucker or Adams will most likely be an improvement over Santana, Bonifacio, and Jace, at least.
But like I said, left field may not better, but it will be very different.
JC’d
blazon Says:
“We all have this need to come back to our convictions. There’s a quiet calm in doing so, after weary hours and the world on our backs, it is as much comforting as it is pleasant to look back and think that everything we knew was right. Basking in the glow of our singular beliefs, we rummage around in the memory of our day, for little bits, some pieces of proof to acknowledge that we were right all along. We hold these fragments close to our heart, till it is all our heart knows. And what our heart knows is what our eyes see, and what our brains remember. Our lives are but a cycle of memories rehashed for satiety.”
So what do you make of that? It comes from this morning’s Guardian, a reader’s comment on a game just ended where a piece of Messi magic denied Chelsea victory. It purports to summate and describe the sporting life as lived by us non participants who can get little of it out of our minds. It could as well have Andruw at its core as Lionel. It is over the top of course and so are we.
Its first and last sentences, if original, are brilliant- the sum total of a sporting life on the sidelines. Would be most interested to hear how it went down with you. Guff? We, unraveled?
lazon Says:
“We all have this need to come back to our convictions. There’s a quiet calm in doing so, after weary hours and the world on our backs, it is as much comforting as it is pleasant to look back and think that everything we knew was right. Basking in the glow of our singular beliefs, we rummage around in the memory of our day, for little bits, some pieces of proof to acknowledge that we were right all along. We hold these fragments close to our heart, till it is all our heart knows. And what our heart knows is what our eyes see, and what our brains remember. Our lives are but a cycle of memories rehashed for satiety.”
So what do you make of that? It comes from this morning’s Guardian, a reader’s comment on a game just ended where a piece of Messi magic denied Chelsea victory. It purports to summate and describe the sporting life as lived by us non participants who can get little of it out of our minds. It could as well have Andruw at its core as Lionel. It is over the top of course and so are we.
Its first and last sentences, if original, are brilliant- the sum total of a sporting life on the sidelines. Would be most interested to hear how it went down with you. Guff? We, unraveled?
lazon Says:
“We all have this need to come back to our convictions. There’s a quiet calm in doing so, after weary hours and the world on our backs, it is as much comforting as it is pleasant to look back and think that everything we knew was right. Basking in the glow of our singular beliefs, we rummage around in the memory of our day, for little bits, some pieces of proof to acknowledge that we were right all along. We hold these fragments close to our heart, till it is all our heart knows. And what our heart knows is what our eyes see, and what our brains remember. Our lives are but a cycle of memories rehashed for satiety.”
So what do you make of that? It comes from this morning’s Guardian, a reader’s comment on a game just ended where a piece of Messi magic denied Chelsea victory. It purports to summate and describe the sporting life as lived by us non participants who can get little of it out of our minds. It could as well have Andruw at its core as Lionel. It is over the top of course and so are we.
Its first and last sentences, if original, are brilliant- the sum total of a sporting life on the sidelines. Would be most interested to hear how it went down with you. Guff? We, unraveled?
My apologies for the triple header. It was JC’d earlier this morning and i was trying to bring it back to life.
JC’d
Cutter Dyals
for this relief we see your stutter, smiles
for you to be named after your best pitch
is either silly or prescient, we can’t decide which.
I don’t think they’ll wait long enough to avoid Super Two with Acuna — that would keep him down until maybe June, right? All the indications have been more like late April. Enough for the extra year of control, but not enough to necessarily avoid Super Two.
Anyway, put me down as expecting LF to be improved this year.
Does anyone else think that Snitker’s talk about analytics being almost like a novel concept that he’s never heard of is a little scary. The article that I read yesterday was frankly, frightening to me if he’s being sincere, etc. How could any organization/manager in 2018 seemingly have just heard about this? Please tell me he’s joking/exaggerating, etc.
All Snitker needs to know is how to use a life jacket, because at some point before this time next year, he’s going to be thrown overboard.
I’m not sure how I feel about a Retire #25 campaign right now.
If we’re going to do it, there has to be more unanimity and more spirit around doing it. Not everybody has to agree, but we can’t get bogged down all the time in arguments over whether centerfield is an important defensive position. And people have to be ready to do something, like post on your social media accounts, rather than speculate endlessly as to why the Braves haven’t taken action. We don’t know the answer. We may find out, we may not. The important thing is, we have leverage to change their calculations.
I would be worried that a half-assed effort could actually damage Andruw’s chances of one day having his number retired (or perhaps even the ultimate honor of HOF enshrinement). But I’d be willing to put effort into this because:
– Andruw was awesome, and he deserves it
– With the right message, this effort is helpful to the Braves franchise at a time when fan pride is at a low.
– Given the level of deep dissatisfaction among hardcore baseball fans on the internet around the HOF, this is an opportunity to help shift people’s understanding and enjoyment of the game in what I would consider to be a better direction
– if people are into the idea, it could be fun
– The chances of winning are better than you might think (These last two points are where the whimsy comes in, blazon.)
I think the people who said “I’m in” probably know what that entails. So, what I want to know is:
– are you willing to make the effort visible on Facebook/Twitter/Instagram, etc?
– are you willing to recruit a friend or two to do the same?
– are you willing to use some of your creative energy to come up with other easy/low-resource ways to make the effort visible?
@4 Snitker is just a placeholder. I think the narrative is they rewarded him with the big-league job partly as a way of thanking him for a lifetime of service, but mostly to keep the seat warm in an unobtrusive way until the rebuild is over. Once it’s time to contend they’ll hire a real manager.
I actually kind of like Snitker in that he’s almost a caricature of a hardheaded old baseball man, and the players really seem to like / respect him. Agreed that he is totally out of his depth for a big-league manager in 2018 though.
I’m in for Andruw.
I also.
@4 What does it actually matter whether he’s heard of it or not?
@6 What real manager is on your radar that will have a meaningful impact beyond what Snitker is doing?
I’m of the belief that a manager’s in-game decisions don’t amount to a whole lot of W/L difference over a whole season, but how they manage the clubhouse and handle the players can have a meaningful impact on the team.
All this cooing over sabermetrics… so that we can do a bunch of substitutions and stretch the game to 4 hours.
Because if he hasn’t, then the Braves are WOEFULLY behind the curve. I can somewhat agree that the W/L difference may not be huge but I think there is SOME difference. And when you’re an organization that is cheap, you have to maximize these sort of little differences. IMO.
I understand a lot of stuff (DOB, Peanut, etc.) keeps talking about Acuna in left field. I absolutely wish that Markakis WOULD get miffed about moving to left, so he can sit. Acuna has a far better arm and covers more ground. I know there is actually a little more ground in left at SunTrust, but still, management should see that the TEAM is better off with Acuna in right and Markakis in left.
A manager may not make a big difference in W-L record over the course of the regular season…but tell Orioles fans that manager decisions don’t matter in the wild card game.
IRL if a miracle occurred, we made the playoffs this season, and it would appear too unseemly to remove Snitker before the playoffs under those circumstances, I bet AA would do what it seemed like the Astros and Dodgers’ front offices did and just tell Snitker how to manage every aspect of every playoff game.
@10 They probably are behind the curve, but I believe such things are directed mostly from above (the front office). I don’t believe that a manager really drives an organization’s approach, and employing the use of sabermetrics on the field requires a lot of individuals to be working together.
I argue whether Snitker is really any sort of road block to that.
@9 Who knows? I always figured Terry Pendleton was next up. Now it will probably be Walt Weiss, I guess, or someone they don’t have to pay very much.
I’ve always liked Clint Hurdle, and even if he isn’t a “saber guy” himself he seems at least not to be a roadblock to what the FO guys give him in that area.
MoCab cleared waivers. I’m surprised no one wanted to stash him on their 40-man to see if he can learn to throw strikes. I mean, the players on our 40-man these past few years…
@12, 13 – Adam R raises a good point, I wonder to what extent manager autonomy across the league is being infringed on by smartypants front office guys dictating in-game strategy.
It definitely seems like Snitker has a limited leash and is on some level just doing what he’s told.
That’s part of why managers are increasingly younger former players. They’re not there for their brains. In fact, the lesser stature they have, the better, so they aren’t going up against the front office on anything. They’re just there to keep the clubhouse happy.
I would like to point out that Danny Santana is a NRI and there’s a decent chance he makes the team, so don’t celebrate that just yet.
https://www.cbssports.com/mlb/news/mlb-to-allow-any-player-to-bat-in-9th-lets-discuss-the-dumbest-rule-proposal-ever/
If you young people manage to kill the one thing in my life outside my kids and family that I’ve ever loved, I STG…
These rule changes MUST STOP NOW. It’s getting absolutely ridiculous.
Rays got Carlos Gomez on 1 year @ 4 million.
Brian McCann’s feelings aside, one could make the argument the Braves could use a righthanded bat who can play all 3 outfield spots with some power…and I doubt it’ll come out he’s had a special long-term affinity for the Tampa Bay/Rays.
Does every sport have the people vehemently against any and all rule changes simply because their cheese is being moved or is that just baseball?
Also, a little housekeeping. In an effort to make this place is a little bit more consistent with its content, you might see that we’ve got a post going up at least every couple-few days and here lately every day. To make this place a little bit more set-and-forget than it otherwise could be, I’ll try to write 3-4 at a time, mix it in with the fantastic posts of our contributors, schedule the posts, and they just go up when they’re scheduled. In other words, it’s automatic. Accordingly, you’re not always seeing the “new thread” comment before/when a new post goes on.
So, if you put a comment up right before a new thread posts, and you like the post (of course you do; you wrote it!), then just re-post it in the comments of the new thread, if you don’t mind. You may remember this phenomenon popularized by world-famous Sabernomics author J.C. Bradbury when this would happen with his comments (hence when other people say, “JC’ed on other thread”).
@24
Thank you for that explanation.
You can’t convince me that managers don’t matter. Bobby Cox lost us more playoff games than statistics and probability would have ever thought possible. All I really ask is that the managers put the best 9 on the field, and he often didn’t in the most high leverage situations.
Snitker vs whoever doesn’t matter, b/c the team sucks. If and when we don’t suck, I want the smartest dude in the room.
Braves vs Mets will be broadcast on mlb.tv on Friday. So happy that the longest offseason ever is finally over.
Managers’ decisions over the course of a season don’t matter that much because we’re talking about relatively small potential upgrades in win probability from move to move that then get washed over by the randomness of baseball from play to play. It very well could be that a manager could sit on his hands the whole season and while the outcomes of some games may change, the team’s W-L record at season’s end could be the same or almost. In a way, the manager is there to signal to the media and fans that the team is trying, even if process and results don’t line up. It may be more for us and our mental well-being and not the team that they’re there making moves in games throughout the season. I suppose it matters to some of the players that it looks like the manager is trying to win.
But no one is going to argue that managers don’t matter in the playoffs, right? The only way that’s not the case is, again, if it becomes widely accepted that managers get the script from on high beforehand.
Bobby Cox would be the nightmare of front offices of today’s playoff-bound teams. The players’ manager with enough stature to dictate his own strategy and ignore the GM — the former GM himself. And very arguably, we would’ve won more championships with 2016-17 Terry Francona in our dugout, so I can’t say that the smarter front offices out there are wrong.
On Snitker:
With Walt Weiss in tow, I wouldn’t necessarily call Snitker a placeholder before this season plays out. If Snitker can go away from his gut, manage his players, and listen to the sound advice of Weiss on PH/pitching changes, those 2 could make quite a match as Snitker is beloved by the player.
On Acuna: Should be a vast improvement over Kemp in LF…at least 3fWAR difference, IMO.
On the “13.9 fWAR” stat used in breakdown:
The 13.9 isn’t representative of Kemp’s defensive fWAR, rather it’s a piece in the formula that creates the fWAR grade. In that particular stat, there are positions that already start in the red (offensive 1st positions such as corner OF, 1B, 3B) and have to provide above average defense to get out the red. Other positions (SS, CF, C) start out above 0 and have to play below average defense to shrink to 0 and well below average to go below. In short, Fangraphs uses the defensive positional adjustment to balance the offensive grade of which is same for all positions.
Wrote a piece that I thought would bring discussion here: https://walkoffwalk.net/2018/02/20/will-the-2018-atlanta-braves-offseason-be-known-as-the-one-that-got-away/
Also, Walk Off Walk has a new female writer in Brittni Swanson and this was her first piece: https://walkoffwalk.net/2018/02/21/will-hype-get-acuna/
But I thought the consensus was that the playoffs are a crapshoot? Now we debate how much a manager’s decisions impact the outcome of the playoffs.
I don’t believe most managers’ decisions break for better or for worse beyond some standard deviation from dead center (ie. coaches get some right and get some wrong). I’m not saying a manager can’t make some reckless decisions that set the team up to lose. Baseball is a game of probable outcomes, and like rolling dice there are going to be series of outcomes that defy expectation. You could hand me 9 dice with different probabilities of getting certain values, and I could opt to substitute one of those for one with a worse probability and go on a tear with it. This also isn’t unlike the game Settlers of Catan, either, where those 6’s or 8’s (it’s always one) almost never get rolled for an entire game. And someone at the table will set themselves up with some 1’s and 2’s and are raking in the resources (#$%^ them). Baseball is neither dice nor Settlers, but it is a game of players with different probabilities (at the plate, in the field, on the mound) and in most cases those probabilities don’t differ by as much as we seem to think it does. In most cases, we’re upset because coach is opting for a player with a 26.2% chance of avoiding an out over the guy with a 32.2% chance. Whether it’s regular season or playoffs, both guys do get the job done some of the time.
I admit to some oversimplification of the sport up above, but we also have no feel for the actual game as it’s being played. We have no idea how one guy is feeling versus another, for instance. I think how the players perform collectively has the most bearing on the outcome of games and series. If the guys on the field happen to play well, the team advances. When they don’t, I suspect the manager won’t be able to do enough substitutions to change the outcome. He might, however, in a close game put in a player who does the thing that causes them to win or to lose. It’s a gamble.
I think in some regard, managerial decisions will never really be able to be scientifically quantified because there are things that are part of their decisionmaking that will always be unknown.
Let’s say, that a manager has a LHR that holds LHB to a .111 BA. But we, nor fangraphs, or anyone else has no idea that the manager knows that before coming to the park that day that the pitcher got into a huge argument with his wife and that his mind isn’t right. While I understand that this happens for all players etc. its hard to look at these situations in a vacuum.
I think that this is the beauty of sports. They’re the mixture of the known, what we can measure with statistics, lasers and other things combined with humanity, heart, desire, etc. For all the crap that Tim Tebow gets, there aren’t many people on earth that could not play baseball for ~10 years, show up in miLB and even bat .225, much less hit 5 HRs and not embarrass themselves.
This is my periodic reminder that I’m really excited to see our defense a lot better this year. I watched a little over 100 games last year, a personal record, and I’m so glad to not see Brandon Phillips and Matt Kemp play defense anymore. In terms of run margin, Acuna being able to catch a ball that would otherwise be a bases-clearing double that Kemp couldn’t get to is just as valuable as someone hitting a 3-run homer. And since you had to use Lane Adams as a defensive replacement for Kemp, you can now use Adams as a defensive replacement for Markakis. After the 7th inning, you could see 3 CFs playing the 3 OF spots, and that is just jazzy. THEN, if Camargo is your 3B, you have 3 SS playing those 3 spots. For around a third of the game, you’ll have 3 SS and 3 CFs on the diamond with a quality 1B. It’s so hard to see in the box score, but that’s going to make a huge impact on our SPs. We were 23rd in runs allowed last year, and if we could shave just 60 runs off of our 821 runs allowed last year through the starters staying in longer, the pen not getting exposed, and the defense keeping some runs off the board, we’d be 13th in runs allowed. That’d be huge for the win total.
@32: great post. Thank you.
Another interesting roster construction note is that Ruiz has been working out at 1B. Let’s say the rotation is better next year. They can pitch deeper into ballgames, you don’t have Bartolo Colon’s 13 starts with a 8.04 ERA destroying the bullpen for 2-3 days for a third of the season, and you can carry one less reliever. If Ruiz can be a 5th bench member to play 3B/1B, the Braves have no reason but to let Lane Adams be a defensive replacement. If your bench is Adams, Ruiz, Culberson, Someone Who Can Also Play OF (please, Lord, no Santana), and the catcher, you have no reason to keep Adams on the bench, even if it means taking an at bat from Markakis (please do). You’ll have another outfielder somewhere. And since Acuna is a CF too, and Kemp wasn’t, you don’t have to worry about burning your only center fielder on the bench for a third of the game. You will also have an additional pinch-hitter, which is another reason to not worry about burning Adams.
Perhaps it’s harder than it is, and perhaps it was an unrealistic expectation for a rebuilding team, but having an actual 25-man roster of major league players really scratches out a non-insignificant amount of wins over a full season. We carried 3-5 AAA players on our major league roster at times these last few years, and this is a big thing for the 2018 win total.
But I thought the consensus was that the playoffs are a crapshoot?
I think this is something we as Braves fans tell ourselves to make ourselves feel better.
I don’t know how to create the right analogy here because how is it even possible to do something as dumb in a crapshoot as pitch Ubaldo Jimenez against Edwin Encarnacion in a do-or-die game when you have Zach Britton on the bench? Did Showalter forget to roll the dice? Did he swallow the dice?
Over the course of a season, stuff like this all comes out in the wash. In a very small sample, any potential edge matters, and you want to let Kimbrel start the WC ga–err, do the thing that maximizes your chance of winning at all times.
There was that story this past year about Hart ripping Snitker a new one for bringing in JJ when the only other reliever that was rested was Minter, who had not appeared in a game yet. I don’t see why the FO just can’t be more heavy-handed (not like that though) in the decision-making processes of the manager. Do they really need to give managers the level of autonomy that lets Showalter keep Britton in the pen?
Fan Graphs has a story up about one of our former players. Rob Whalen discusses his problems with an anxiety disorder. I do hope things come out well for him.
Fangraphs also has a story about the Reds trying Senzel at short.
(It’s not going to work because his hair is only meh.)
Corey Dickerson to the Pirates.
@38,
Yes, front offices really need to give managers that level of autonomy. Unfortunately for the Orioles in this instance.
@21
There’s a difference between good changes (at least in my opinion) that keep catchers from going out to the mound between every pitch and wasting a half-hour per game because they’re paranoid that everybody in the ballpark is trying to steal the signs, and stupid-assed changes that seemingly some NBA-fan intern in the MLB offices came up with.
That utter nonsense and the international first-and-second rule are dumb, mostly because they change the very nature of the game. They essentially let teams legally cheat the rules to try to make things more “exciting” or get the game “over quicker.” Both of these proposals should be lit on fire and never discussed again.
Ideas to keep the game from slowing to a crawl that shouldn’t overtly affect how the game is played are OK by me, but MLB should probably lose the ideas that seem like they came out of a focus group of middle-schoolers.
I do not believe that the FO should have any decision-making input regarding managerial decisions, other than roster construction and overall philospophy. How the manager uses that roster should be up to him/her. LOOGY/ROOGY usage should be the manager’s prerogative.
@38, @44 I agree that these decisions belong to (and should stay with) the manager and his assistants. I also don’t believe that a decision like that is made by the manager in a silo, unless he truly is a bad manager. I like to think that Snitker is leaning on his pitching coach to keep him informed on the status of his relievers. If Minter was slipping through the cracks and not getting any playtime, I would think that decision is coming from a combination of opinions from the coaches and not some Sniter blindly going to his favorite time-and-again.
But what do I know? I try to give people the benefit of the doubt until they prove otherwise.
Yes if those in the front office want someone to manage like they would, they could always, you know, hire someone who will manage like they would.
I will say, it would be surprising Snitker and AA could not come to a compromise or agreement about how Snitker ought to use the roster AA is assembled. It makes for good Hollywood when Billy Beane and Art Howe fight over Carlos Pena (which is not how it happened in real life), but is Snitker entrenched enough in his position that he could buck the horse that much?
John Coppolella is banned from baseball, and John Hart is on MLB Network talking about the Braves. What in the flying eff? #NotMyVPofBBOps
Every manager in baseball has free rein to manage as he sees fit. Every front office has the option of firing their field manager and hiring another one.
@27 – I know. Even the fact that it’s a Mets broadcast and (especially with all the young pitching we have) we chose Matt Wisler to start can’t bring me down.
Brent Honeywell, the Rays’ best prospect and a top-15 prospect across ball, needs TJ. Part of the justification for the Rays’ sell off was to open up rotation spots for Snell and Honeywell. One thing we can definitely say about the rebuild is that we’re been remarkably healthy for such a risky proposition of grabbing 20 pitching prospects. I don’t believe in jinxes, but imagine if Wisler and Blair and Folty all still disappointed but Newcomb and Fried went down to TJs. The odds weren’t in our favor, and we’ve been ok so far. They must be doing something right in their development process.
1.10
Spring Training
with winter’s enthusiasm waning
has to be the essential boost
the search for greatness, or something like it that can be deduced.
Albies with a leadoff single to start spring training.
On a comebacker between first and the mound, Ruiz, playing first today, did a good job to get back to the bag and then barehand a poor feed from Wisler. Pretty athletic play.
Cool Jonny Venters story:
https://tinyurl.com/ybwonayz
@54 agree, Rio looks good at first.
Apparently Gohara has some groin tightness. No reason to rush him.
@57 Cue jokes about Gohara’s injury resulting from his first ever attempts at running.
“Oop… I almost forgot. I won’t be able to make it, fellas. Veronica and I are trying this new fad called, uh, jogging. I believe it’s ‘jogging’ or ‘yogging.’ it might be a soft j. I’m not sure but apparently you just run for an extended period of time! It’s supposed to be wild.”
Christian Pache with the RBI single then almost scoring because of his speed. I bet you guys that have questioned his ability to be a great major leaguer are embarrassed now!
@59 Suckers!
Miguel Socolovich didn’t do much to boost his chances of making the opening day roster. In a very small sample size he actually did well for the Cardinals in 2015 and 2016. Given the importance of this 1st spring game it will be his fault if we tank the rest of the season. Thanks a lot Miguel!
0-190 boys! Here we GOOOOO!
Thank God baseball is back!
Pache put a good swing on the ball today. It did not leave the park. But it scored us a run just the same.
Swanson off to a 0-3 with 2Ks start and AAAA Rio was 0-3 with 3K.
It’s SPRING…
Ruiz looks to be in mid season form already.
Allard topped out at 89 mph today. First spring training action and all that, but given one of the concerns with him was a reduced velocity last year it’ll bear watching.
Anyelo Gomez looked legit.
Gomez’s inning was just on MLB Network, which has the game. He definitely looks legit.
Not sure I saw it here yet but Talking Chop has the Spring Training broadcast schedule up. Since Rob just indicated the game from yesterday was being replayed on MLB network, does anyone know if there is a schedule of delayed broadcasts for the games?
This drills down. His follow up to his quoted tweet leads me to believe there isn’t a set schedule to when they’re replayed. You just have to check the listings, I guess.
New thread.