Baseball Miscellany

Rare that revenge comes so quickly / symmetrically in baseball.

Amazing. Not surprised these things are already selling for $250+ on eBay.

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Is it me or do the Astros have an inordinate amount of Monday off-days this season?

Monday off-days suck.

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No. Hell no, man. I reckon a guy could get his ass kicked, sayin something like that.

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Good for the D’Backs

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The Astros have used eleven starting pitchers so far this season. That’s equal to the Athletics and the Orioles, but is still behind six other teams:

Marlins - 12
Blue Jays - 12
Tigers - 12
Brewers - 13
White Sox - 14
Dodgers - 16

It makes it more impressive that the Tigers have the 3rd best ERA (3.44) in the league and the Astros are tied for 5th best (3.49). The league average is 4.04. The Brewers are the only other team of that average who’s ERA is above average (3.77)

Increasingly, I am convinced that a winning strategy is to have 1 or 2 established workhorses at the top and a back of the rotation 3 or 4 that are interchangeable parts. That 1 or 2 “ace” role swaps out every 3-4 years when they get too expensive and the 3 or 4 back end swaps out every 1 or 2 years when the league figures them out. With the occasional diamond in the rough moving from that back group to the front group. That is my laymans take on a sustained winning strategy with pitching rotations. It all falls apart if you are not any good at development.

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Or if the discomfort reaper comes for one of your workhorses. Not committing huge money to any pitcher these days is a defensible strategy if your development is good enough; also, being the Dodgers works too.

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Find the Brent Strom and Josh Miller’s of the world and pay them and do whatever it takes to keep them happy

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+1 for “discomfort reaper”.

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from Kawahara on twitter:

Hunter Brown was named AL Pitcher of the Month for June. He is the first Astro to receive the honor since Gerrit Cole in 2019. Josh Hader was named AL Reliever of the Month, the eighth monthly honor of his career.

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I’ll be sure to check for updates on the ESPNBet ticker

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Surely we can place bets on the length of the suspension…

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You can bet on it.

Maybe Shohei Otani might want in on some of the action, too?

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Passan reports more details:

The first alert, according to sources who reviewed them, was sent June 15 and triggered by action on Ortiz’s first pitch against the Seattle Mariners in the bottom of the second inning to be a ball or hit batsman. Ortiz opened the inning with a slider well outside the strike zone.

The second alert, sent June 27, referenced Ortiz’s first pitch against the St. Louis Cardinals in the top of the third inning being a ball or hit batsman. Ortiz opened the inning with a slider even farther outside the strike zone.

Every little fucking thing is a prop bet now. I hate this shit.

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Seems shaky. Even pitchers with good control miss badly with pitches sometimes, and that particular prop bet must get made thousands of times a season.

It may drive me away from sports altogether.

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Welp…