2024 MLB Thread

[1776]

The Pinellas County Commissioners voted to approve the bonds tonight to move the needle forward on the Rays new park. 

[chasfh]

13 hours ago, 1776 said:

The Pinellas County Commissioners voted to approve the bonds tonight to move the needle forward on the Rays new park. 

The guy holding it up just needs to get his beak wet to the right degree. Then it will all go through.

[gehringer_2]

https://www.espn.com/mlb/story/_/id/43026688/mlb-study-identifies-factors-rise-pitching-injuries

Nothing too surprising here, but good that they are trying to get a better handle on what is going on.

It does make you wonder/worry about Skubal though. JV could hit triple digits and he's had a long career, but JV would mostly build up to it during a game, or show it here and there. He used to add and subtract from his FB a lot so he wasn't always throwing pedal to the metal all the time. I think if Skubal expects to pitch for very long he benefit from learning to do the same.

Edited December 18, 2024 by gehringer_2

[Tiger337]

On 12/9/2024 at 9:25 AM, Hongbit said:

I fear this sport is doomed.   There is no way the market can handle this type of drastic salary increase.    

People have been saying that since free agency started back in the 70s.    

[papalawrence]

1 hour ago, Tiger337 said:

People have been saying that since free agency started back in the 70s.    

But now we are seeing elite teams in large markets (Houston) dump stars on the cusp of big paydays. I agree people have panicked before, but this feels different to me. 

 

[gehringer_2]

6 yrs of control and high comp picks for losing top FAs in the CBA will continue to give smaller market teams the opportunity to be competitive if they draft and develop well, but unless something changes the rich teams will continue to collect a larger and larger share of the good older players. All but 5 or 6 teams are going to be "Tampa Bay". The game can survive that in a fashion, but it's increasingly crappy for the fan bases of the teams that can't keep their players.

Edited December 20, 2024 by gehringer_2

[Tiger337]

4 minutes ago, gehringer_2 said:

6 yrs of control and high comp picks for losing top FAs in the CBA will continue to give smaller market teams the opportunity to be competitive if they draft and develop well, but unless something changes the rich teams will continue to collect a larger and larger share of the good older players. All but 5 or 6 teams are going to be "Tampa Bay". The game can survive that in a fashion, but it's increasingly crappy for the fan bases of the teams that can't keep their players.

I  won't like that if it happens, but I think a lot of new fans won't mind that.  It would be like college sports where players stay with their teams for four years and new ones are coming all the time.  All anybody cares about is the playoffs now anyway.  During the season, it's all gambling and fantasy baseball.  

[casimir]

On 12/18/2024 at 9:52 AM, gehringer_2 said:

https://www.espn.com/mlb/story/_/id/43026688/mlb-study-identifies-factors-rise-pitching-injuries

Nothing too surprising here, but good that they are trying to get a better handle on what is going on.

It does make you wonder/worry about Skubal though. JV could hit triple digits and he's had a long career, but JV would mostly build up to it during a game, or show it here and there. He used to add and subtract from his FB a lot so he wasn't always throwing pedal to the metal all the time. I think if Skubal expects to pitch for very long he benefit from learning to do the same.

I think we all knew what the likely culprits of pitching injuries were.  But what can be and/or is going to be done about it?

[Tenacious D]

 

[RandyMarsh]

On 12/18/2024 at 9:52 AM, gehringer_2 said:

https://www.espn.com/mlb/story/_/id/43026688/mlb-study-identifies-factors-rise-pitching-injuries

Nothing too surprising here, but good that they are trying to get a better handle on what is going on.

It does make you wonder/worry about Skubal though. JV could hit triple digits and he's had a long career, but JV would mostly build up to it during a game, or show it here and there. He used to add and subtract from his FB a lot so he wasn't always throwing pedal to the metal all the time. I think if Skubal expects to pitch for very long he benefit from learning to do the same.

JV also could throw a 100 as a teenager, between his natural delivery and God given talent he essentially always had it. Same with Nolan Ryan and the other hard throwers that had longevity. Gerrit Cole is starting to break down but he is another guy who threw hard since college who stayed relatively healthy most of his career until finally breaking down a bit.

Today you have guys who "naturally" may be low 90s guys go through extreme workout regimes to get to the upper 90s/triple digits. I think guys like that are the ones more likely to get injured, of course there is no hard and set rule cause Stephen Strasburg fit the first criteria and now he struggles to even play catch with his kids. 

[1776]

Walker to Houston is being reported.
 

After hitting 26 home runs and recording 84 RBIs in 2024, first baseman Christian Walker reportedly signs with the Houston Astros

[Tigermojo]

5 minutes ago, 1776 said:

Walker to Houston is being reported.
 

After hitting 26 home runs and recording 84 RBIs in 2024, first baseman Christian Walker reportedly signs with the Houston Astros

3 years $60 mil

[RatkoVarda]

20M is totally reasonable, 3 years is some risk, he'll be 36 the last year; Tigers would have forfeited pick #63.

Astros roll the dice again on an older FA first baseman

[Tenacious D]

4 hours ago, RatkoVarda said:

20M is totally reasonable, 3 years is some risk, he'll be 36 the last year; Tigers would have forfeited pick #63.

Astros roll the dice again on an older FA first baseman

Speaking of rolling the dice, anyone think Jose Abreu can be salvaged?

[Tiger337]

So, I guess the Phillies are getting Sasaki!

 

[chasfh]

On 12/19/2024 at 9:01 PM, gehringer_2 said:

6 yrs of control and high comp picks for losing top FAs in the CBA will continue to give smaller market teams the opportunity to be competitive if they draft and develop well, but unless something changes the rich teams will continue to collect a larger and larger share of the good older players. All but 5 or 6 teams are going to be "Tampa Bay". The game can survive that in a fashion, but it's increasingly crappy for the fan bases of the teams that can't keep their players.

Fortunately, small market teams that sneak into the back door of the playoffs have a chance to win rings because of the way players and pitchers can slump, or the way the ball bounces, at inopportune times for everyone, including big spenders.

[chasfh]

On 12/19/2024 at 9:09 PM, Tiger337 said:

I  won't like that if it happens, but I think a lot of new fans won't mind that.  It would be like college sports where players stay with their teams for four years and new ones are coming all the time.  All anybody cares about is the playoffs now anyway.  During the season, it's all gambling and fantasy baseball.  

Yes, and the way Baseball has turned toward marketing individual stars over teams, or over the game writ large. Exhibit A for years was how Baseball tried to strip as many vestiges of which team a player played for as they could during the All-Star Game. Fortunately, focus groups or something threw water on that idea. Even with this walking back, the more I look at Savant, the harder it is for me to tell which teams the players I see listed in tables play for.

[chasfh]

On 12/18/2024 at 8:52 AM, gehringer_2 said:

https://www.espn.com/mlb/story/_/id/43026688/mlb-study-identifies-factors-rise-pitching-injuries

Nothing too surprising here, but good that they are trying to get a better handle on what is going on.

It does make you wonder/worry about Skubal though. JV could hit triple digits and he's had a long career, but JV would mostly build up to it during a game, or show it here and there. He used to add and subtract from his FB a lot so he wasn't always throwing pedal to the metal all the time. I think if Skubal expects to pitch for very long he benefit from learning to do the same.

I’d been assured repeatedly that the problem was that today’s pitchers are pussies.

Seriously, we have talked about all this here. I had thought years ago the problem was pitcher torquing their elbows in unnatural ways to get maximum spin, as well as expending maximum effort on every pitch. The smarty-pants at the analytical websites were putting the entire blame on increased velocity for a while. Turns out it was all of it, doesn’t it?

What I hadn’t considered enough was how kids throw a bazillion pitches at their own version of max effort throughout their preteens and teens in a bid to advance as far as possible, increasing the possibility of injuring their still immature arms; and what I hadn’t considered at all was how the way pitchers train during the offseason to work on stuff, and then come in ill-prepared for spring training, contribute to injuries in March. That was a new idea for me.

I found this graphic to be really interesting:

I had never considered injury by time of year. It is super high in spring training, when pitchers are still cold vis a vis game-condition throwing, leading to way more injuries, probably especially to guys who want to impress and are fighting for big-league jobs in the first place, so this makes sense. A lot of attrition in spring, and then it dissipates once they get to April, probably because all the vulnerable guys got exposed right away, and plus now that the remaining pitchers made the team for sure, they can lay up a little. Plus it’s April, it’s cold, the games might even be perceived as mattering a little less, so maybe pitchers take it a little easier in April than in spring, or in later months.

But take a look at the August bump, and then September drop. My initial take is how pitchers move from bad teams to contenders, so in an attempt to prove themselves and win games that are more important practically single-handedly, they amp the effort up, which lead to more injuries; and then, in September, pitchers start laying up on effort as either their team already makes the playoffs and they consciously save themselves for October, or else their team falls out of contention early and so what’s the point of going max effort anymore? I would love to see this data broken out by pitchers on teams whose fates are decided early, versus those teams who have to fight all the way to October 1 for a playoff spot.

But by far the most interesting revelation to me is how restricting workloads could be leading to more injuries, as even starting pitchers have switched their training regimen from endurance-based in a bid to get 24 or 27 outs, to short-burst strength training to max out effort because you know you’re only getting either 15 outs or 18 batters anyway. Even the idea of pitchers getting injured less after the implementation of the pitch timer is interesting, the suggestion being that pre-pitch timer, pitchers could take as much time as they wanted to gather strength to pitch another max-effort pitch, whereas now they are forced to pitch less than max effort because they have fewer seconds to recover before they are compelled to throw. What a fascinating concept.

So really, a lion’s share of the reason pitchers get injured appears to have to do with the incentives they’re chasing, and their approach to pitching given the particular set of circumstances they’re experiencing at the given moment.

This must be by far the best research study on the subject that’s ever been released. The $64 question, then, is: what now? 

 

Edited December 21, 2024 by chasfh

[gehringer_2]

1 hour ago, chasfh said:

Even the idea of pitchers getting injured less after the implementation of the pitch timer is interesting, the suggestion being that pre-pitch timer, pitchers could take as much time as they wanted to gather strength to pitch another max-effort pitch, whereas now they are forced to pitch less than max effort because they have fewer seconds to recover before they are compelled to throw. What a fascinating concept.

I had thought from the beginning that the idea floated that the pitch clock would make pitching injuries worse flew in the face of the real world epidemiology that they continued to get worse as the games got slower. I think beside the logic of more time leading to greater effort, it is also conceivable that just spreading the effort out over longer clock time leads to a deeper level of molecular tissue exhaustion then being done quickly and getting the body back into recovery mode though that piece certainly could not apply to short relievers, who seem to be injured as much as starters.

Edited December 21, 2024 by gehringer_2

[CMRivdogs]

Damn

 

[monkeytargets39]

Wow.  RIP.  Rickey was so much fun to watch.  

[Mr.TaterSalad]

Henderson's speed and athletic ability was off the charts. There may have been better players to play the game, but he has to be one the fastest and most athletic to do it. RIP Ricky Henderson.

[gehringer_2]

everyone at his funeral service should speak as Rickey in the 1st person, as the symmetry to the fact that he never did....

😢

[casimir]

12 minutes ago, gehringer_2 said:

everyone at his funeral service should speak as Rickey in the 1st person, as the symmetry to the fact that he never did....

😢

It’s too bad he didn’t go 3rd person when he took to the microphone after becoming the all time stolen base leader.

It just occurred to me that this was the last season of Rickey Henderson Field in Oakland.

[papalawrence]

Truly and all time great. So fun to watch. Terribly sad news! RIP Rickey