April 22, 2013 12:55 pm
Sam Miller
About pain and sorrow and happiness and joy.
April 22, 2013 10:20 am
Ben Lindbergh and Sam Miller
Ben and Sam discuss the short-lived success of starters without great stuff who rely on deception, then talk about Matt Harvey and the Blue Jays' use (or abuse) of the waiver system.
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April 22, 2013 5:04 am
Sam Miller
Dissecting three matchups between two of baseball's most must-watch players.
On Friday, the pitcher with the second-best ERA in the NL took on the batter with the second-most home runs in the NL. Neither player was old enough to drink remember the TV show California Dreams. Because of the first sentence, and because of the second sentence, the two players might be the most Flip to Their Game players in baseball right now. Who would win the three matchups between Bryce Harper and Matt Harvey? Please don’t say “all of us,” please don’t say “all of us,” please don’t say “all of us,” please don’t say “all o
Previous history
The two were drafted in the same first round, and the two debuted in the majors within a couple months of each other, so as you might imagine, they played in the same league a couple times as they moved up the ladder. Harper and Harvey both played in the Double-A Eastern League during the second half of 2011, and both played in the Triple-A International League to start the 2012 season. While they were in Triple-A, they faced off at least once, the video tells us. The super sexy conclusion:
April 19, 2013 5:00 am
Ben Lindbergh and Sam Miller
Ben and Sam discuss the implications of teams' ability to trade international bonus pool space, and whether it makes sense to enforce the rule about time between pitches.
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April 19, 2013 5:00 am
Sam Miller
Stolen bases are down so far this season. Why?
There was a time when goliaths roamed the Earth. Runs were plentiful, and with few natural enemies, these behemoths could grow larger and larger, more and more sedentary. They had no need to run, so they lumbered about, leisurely returning home unmolested by predator or foe.
But the metaphor could not last forever. Eventually, offense in baseball went back down to more typical levels, and the game once again welcomed back the singles hitter, the glove man, the productive out. And, as runs went down, stolen bases went up. I gave the following graph, showing leaguewide scoring and stolen base totals by year, a pun title.
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April 18, 2013 5:00 am
Ben Lindbergh and Sam Miller
Ben and Sam discuss Brett Gardner's new approach at the plate, and how hitters adjust to pitchers.
April 17, 2013 3:04 pm
Sam Miller
Albert Pujols is having a hard time running
In case you missed Albert Pujols getting thrown out at first to end the game last night, don't worry, it's not too late to catch him running the final few yards.
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April 17, 2013 5:00 am
Sam Miller
What we see when looking at leaderboards, maybe before we should be.
Back when I was a community news reporter, editors were always stressing the idea that “everybody has a story.” Not everybody is powerful, or newsworthy, or “good,” but everybody has a story. And so it is with early-season leaderboards. Obviously they’re lousy for analysis and their lifespans are short, but they exist, if only for a few moments, and we should acknowledge that they existed, if only for a few moments.
Or, put another way, early season leaderboards are God’s way of showing us how much crazy ish is happening all the time and we don’t even notice it.
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April 17, 2013 5:00 am
Ben Lindbergh and Sam Miller
Ben and Sam answer listener emails about the future of the DH role, whether teams rest starters in games they expect to lose, whether it makes sense to bat Giancarlo Stanton leadoff, and more.
April 16, 2013 5:00 am
Ben Lindbergh and Sam Miller
Ben and Sam discuss how big a signing bonus Mark Appel will get in the amateur draft, then assess Mike Scioscia's job security.
April 15, 2013 2:50 pm
Sam Miller
Joe Maddon does something quirky.
Before we write a post at Baseball Prospectus about a Joe Maddon eccentricity, we always run it through the Joe Maddon Newsworthiness Checklist, adapted from a similar checklist useful to many entertainment reporters. Let's see whether this GIF of Joe Maddon having an actual conversation with a fan in the middle of play during the bottom of the sixth inning of a one-run game Monday applies.
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April 15, 2013 10:15 am
Ben Lindbergh and Sam Miller
Can Giancarlo Stanton succeed without a good cleanup hitting behind him?
A few days before the season started, I wrote about Marlins manager Mike Redmond’s decision to consider batting Placido Polanco in the cleanup slot. Most of the article was about where Polanco would rank among historically terrible cleanup hitters, but it ended with this:
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Pebble Hunting: Extreme Strikeout Matchups
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