The Morning Edition (May 11, 2013)
From Last Night:
- Jon Lester delivers a 1 hit CGSO as the Sox beat the Jays 5-0
- Alex Cobb strikes out 13 Padres in 4.2 inning, including 4 in one inning…an inning in which he allowed a run on 2 SB and a balk…and fails to pitch deep enough to win
- Miller is brilliant again against the Rockies, retiring 27 straight after allowing a leadoff hit (CG, 1 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 13K)
What I’m Watching Today:
- Buchholz welcomes the Blue Jays to Fenway (130p Eastern)
- Wainwright gets a challenge from the Rockies (2p Eastern)
- Strasburg gets the Cubs offense (4p Eastern)
- Darvish faces the Astros (7p Eastern)
- Cliff Lee starts in the desert (8p Eastern)
The Big Question:
- Which of the six Appointment Television starters who pitch today will you be watching?
Often in this space, I highlight a player who is performing well. Today, who is performing poorly? On the pitching side of things, the winner is Mark Buehrle who owns a -0.5 WAR and 7.02 ERA and 6.34 FIP. His strikeout and walk rates are about on par with career norms, but he’s getting fewer groundballs and allowing an insane amount of homeruns. The homerun rate will regress, but a low strikeout control type guy like Buehrle has a pretty small margin for error and his number can balloon quickly. The league’s worst position player, just barely, is Jeff Keppinger who is worth -1.0 WAR and boasts and impressive .195/.191/.212 line in 27 games, good for a -3 wRC+. This means a couple things. First, he’s taken zero walks, so his sacrifice flies make his OBP lower than his batting average and he is 103% worse at the plate right now than league average. Just to give you an entire of what that indicates, the worst offensive season since WWII belongs to Billy Hunter and his 29 wRC+ for the St. Louis Browns. Not that he won’t pick up a little, but if Keppinger keeps this up, (he’ll get benched) he’ll have the worst season relative to league average by 32% since 1946. Impressive.
The Morning Edition (May 10, 2013)
From Last Night:
- Mike Baxter hits a pinch hit walk off single to lift the Mets over the Pirates
- Scott Kazmir, that Scott Kazmir, struck out 10 and walked none in 6 innings to beat the A’s
- Price pitches well, Dickey pitches well enough as the Rays get a walk off walk in St. Pete
What I’m Watching Today:
- Fast starter Alex Cobb gets the Padres at home (7p Eastern)
- Jon Lester takes the hill against the Jays (7p Eastern)
- Shelby Miller welcomes the Rockies to St. Louis (8p Eastern)
- Hudson and Cain compete in a groundball off in San Fran (10p Eastern)
The Big Question:
- How will Greinke’s rehab start go?
Here comes Evan Longoria! For many years, I’ve been saying he’s one of the best players in the sport, but he’s struggled to stay on the field. Fingers crossed, he’s having a great season and if he keeps himself in the lineup, he might sniff out his first MVP award (in one of the few years I didn’t predict he’d win). Right now, he’s hitting .331/.397/.600, good for a 176 wRC+. He’s not quite outhitting Cabrera (186 wRC+), but he’s in the ballpark and outfielding him handily. At this moment, he leads AL position players in Wins Above Replacement with 2.3 and trails only Carlos Gomez (!) for the major league lead.
The Morning Edition (May 6, 2013)
From Last Night:
- Darvish K’s 14 Red Sox as the Rangers win in the bottom of the 9th
- The Marlins shell Halladay and get a clean outing from Slowey in a 14-2 win
- Garcia goes 8 and allows 1 run in front of a huge offensive outburst for the Cards
- Gordon’s walk-off single leads the Royals over the White Sox
What I’m Watching Today:
- Sale and Shields duel in KC (2p Eastern)
- Buchholz welcomes the Twins to town in search of his 7th win (7p Eastern)
- Lefties Lee and Bumgarner face off on the left coast (10p Eastern)
The Big Question:
- Is this the end for Doc?
When the season began, I left Roy Halladay off my list of The Nine best NL starters for 2013, but did so with great reservations. Sure Halladay was coming of a rough, injury plagued 2012, but the guy was easily the best and most consistent pitcher of the previous ten seasons, so I didn’t want to write him off too quickly. He opened the season with two rough outings against the Braves and Mets, but then got back on track for three against the Marlins, Cardinals, and Pirates before blowing a gasket against the Indians and Marlins. After the most recent start, he finally admitted to shoulder pain and will see Dr. Yocum this week. He’s likely headed for the DL and will likely never be the brilliant ace he once was. From 2002-2011, Halladay was the best pitcher in the sport and it wasn’t close. Not even a little bit. His 60.9 WAR during the time frame was first ahead of Sabathia by 9.6 WAR despite making 19 fewer starts. Only one starter with more than 1000 IP in the same time frame had a lower ERA: Johan Santana and he threw 400 fewer innings. As of now, he’s 33rd all time in pitcher WAR. He doesn’t have some of the counting stats one likes to see to make the Hall of Fame, but his peak is extremely solid. He has my vote if he never throws another pitch, and it’s not entirely certain that he ever will.
The Morning Edition (May 5, 2013)
From Last Night:
- Lorenzo Cain drives in 2 in the first to back Guthrie’s CGSO against the White Sox
- Jose Fernandez allows 1 hit in 7 innings while striking out 9 Phillies in his first ML win
- Strasburg gives up 2 homeruns in 7 innings, but the Nats score 1 in the top of the 9th to outlast the Bucs
- Wainwright struggles for the first time (5 ER in 5.1 IP), but the Cards deliver in the 9th to win
- Dickey gets lit up by the Mariners, Blue Jays fall 8-1
- Hughes throws 8 scoreless as the Yanks top the A’s
What I’m Watching Today:
- Hudson tries to an encore to his 200th win against Niese and the Mets (1p Eastern)
- Halladay looks to straighten out again against the Marlins (230p Eastern)
- Jon Lester. Yu Darvish. Arlington, Texas. (3p Eastern)
- Alex Cobb takes his hot start to Coors Field (4p Eastern)
- Strikeout happy Ryu gets struggling ace Matt Cain at AT&T (8p Eastern)
The Big Question:
- On a day in which Strasburg and Wainwright were on the mound, how did Guthrie, Fernandez, and Hughes headline the night? (Well, Scherzer did his part!)
R.A. Dickey…what’s going on? I certainly expected some regression from the 2012 peak in moving to the AL and a hitter friendly park, but this is pretty serious so far. We’re not deep enough into the season to totally dismiss a small sample size issue, but it’s getting to the point where it just doesn’t look like he’s going to pitch at or around ace levels for the foreseeable future. He’s 2-5 in 7 starts over 42 IP with a 7.07 K/9 and 3.64 BB/9 to go with a 5.36 ERA and 5.19 FIP. Granted, FIP isn’t a great judge of knuckleballers, but the other numbers don’t exactly hearten Blue Jays fans or Dickey fantasy owners (the present author included). If you go back to the much more reasonable 2010-2011 seasons, Dickey’s numbers this year don’t match those either. His strikeouts are up, but his walks are too. His ERA is way up, but his groundball rate is down considerably. That’s the item on the list that catches my attention the most. I haven’t watch Dickey enough to know, but I’m curious if this is the league figuring him out. Maybe he’s not much different and hitters are just getting smarter. I’m not sure, and I know there is some injury talk, but either way, the Mets are starting to look like even better for the offseason deal. The Jays can still turn it around if Dickey finds his groove, but I’m starting to wonder if he will.
The Morning Edition (May 4, 2013)
From Last Night:
- Holliday and Beltran homer behind a smooth performance by Shelby Miller
- Derek Holland dominates the Red Sox enroute to a 7-0 win
- David Wright homers off Kimbrel to send it to extras where the Mets win 7-5
- Felix Hernandez throws 8 shutout innings in Toronto
- AJ Burnett sharp again in 3-2 win over the Nats
- Kershaw flirts with a no-hitter, but loses it in the 6th ahead of a Posey walk-off
What I’m Watching Today:
- Adam Wainwright takes the Cardinals north to face the Crew (4p Eastern)
- Strasburg faces the Pirates in his first start since experiencing forearm tightness (4p Eastern)
- Patrick Corbin and his 1.91 ERA head to SD to face the Padres (830p Eastern)
The Big Question:
- Which pitching performance did you most enjoy on Friday?
It probably wouldn’t surprise the astute fan that Carlos Santana is crushing the baseball right now. His .383/.468/.679 line produces a 215 wRC+. That’s pretty awesome. To give you a sense of how good that is, Babe Ruth only had a wRC+ higher than 215 four times and his career wRC+ is 197. Probably not sustainable, but damn impressive as he is a 130 wRC+ career hitter. Man, the Indians can hit. They’d be good if their rotation wasn’t terrible.
The Morning Edition (May 3, 2013)
From Last Night:
- Haren cruises through 8 to lead the Nats over the Braves 3-1
- Brewers try to rally back from a 6-0 deficit and come up short against the Cards
- Kendrick stays solid to push the Phils past the Fish
What I’m Watching Today:
- Felix faces the Jays (7p Eastern)
- Shelby Miller and Kyle Lohse do battle in the beer city (8p Eastern)
- Clayton Kershaw on the hill against the Giants (10p Eastern)
The Big Question:
- Can you believe who leads the league in WAR?
The answer is Carlos Gomez who is trying to sustain a breakout campaign with a .372/.427/.638 line, good for 198 wRC+ and 2.0 WAR thanks to a 3.2 UZR. A good amount of the success is BABIP driven, but it’s still pretty impressive. How impressive? He’s only ever posted more than 2.0 WAR in a full season twice. It took him 26 games to do it in 2013.
The Morning Edition (May 2, 2013)
From Last Night:
- Zimmermann strikes out 8 and walks none across eight shutout innings as the Nats beat the Braves 2-0
- Red Sox bats rock the Jays as Buchholz dominates again
- Raburn has 4 more hits to power Bauer to his first win despite 6 walks in 5 innings against Cliff Lee
- Feldman K’s 12 in a CG win over the Padres
What I’m Watching Today:
- Ervin Santana looks to keep his early season success going against the Rays (2p Eastern)
- Haren tries to stay on track as Medlen tries to bounce back in Atlanta (7p Eastern)
- Jake Westbrook’s 0.98 ERA on display against the Brewers (8p Eastern)
The Big Question:
- How series is Bryce Harper’s injury?
Ryan Raburn was always fun to watch in my opinion, even though most Tigers fans didn’t feel that way. He’s up to his old tricks in Cleveland destroying the baseball over the last three days (11 for 13, 4HR). This is his updated line: .364/.407/.655 with a 193 wRC+ and a positive 1.9 UZR which is good for 1.0 WAR in just 16 games. Obviously he won’t keep that up, but Ryan Raburn is basically Babe Ruth so far this season. He’s capable of amazing things and from 2009-2011 was incredible in the 2nd half of the season. He’s doing it early this year. Watch out.
The Morning Edition (May 1, 2013)
From Last Night:
- Garcia leads the Cards past the Reds with 8 strong
- Shields leads the Royals past his former team 8-2
- The Indians hit 7 HR including 2 more from Ryan Raburn as they rough up Halladay and the Phils
- More than 46 HR hit across MLB
What I’m Watching Today:
- Control savant Cliff Lee faces wild and exciting Trevor Bauer in Cleveland (7p Eastern)
- Buchholz tries to stay hot against the Jays (7p Eastern)
- Zimmermann tries to stay hot as Maholm tries to bounce back at Turner Field (7p Eastern)
The Big Question:
- Seriously, what was up with all the runs scored last night?
The Indians offense pummeled the Phillies and Roy Halladay who did not look like the guy who tossed a couple good starts in a row. He’s not going to be a 6.00 ERA guy, but I don’t know that we’ll ever see the surgeon of the strikezone again. Ryan Raburn is being Ryan Raburn. He’s 7-8 with 4 HR in his last two games and is just crushing the ball right now. He’s the most engaging, streaky hitter I’ve ever seen. When it’s going good, he’s Babe Ruth and when it’s going bad he’s a reasonably good middle schooler. I just can’t look away. It’s a lot of fun.
The Morning Edition (April 30, 2013)
From Last Night:
- The Reds and Latos edge the Cards and Wainwright 2-1
- Ryan Raburn’s 4 hits and 2 HR power a strong Ubaldo past the Royals 9-0
- Braves slip past the Nats 3-2 thanks to a Simmons sac fly
- Marlins and Mets play deep into the night as Harvey goes 5.1 and allows 1 run and Stanton leaves with an injury
What I’m Watching Today:
- Halladay looks to stay hot against the Tribe (7p Eastern)
- Lester and Morrow face off in Toronto (7p Eastern)
- Gio and Hudson duel in Atlanta (7p Eastern)
- Yu Darvish gets the White Sox (8p Eastern)
- Shields faces Cobb and his old team in KC (8p Eastern)
The Big Question:
- How do you choose what to watch tomorrow? (Verlander at 7p too!)
Matt Harvey limited the Marlins to 1 run in 5.1 innings with 7 K’s on Monday, but it took him 121 pitches in his least efficient outing to date. Yes, we’re disappointed in a 1 run performance. Thanks for setting that bar, Harvey. Carl Crawford is also having a solid start to his first season with the Dodgers after I said he’d be a platoon player by the Dog Days. He’s got 4 homers and 4 steals in 102 PA (at 12:07am on April 30) to go with his .311/.392/.522 line and 1.4 WAR. I’m not ready to say he’s back to being the Crawford who reigned in Tampa, but he’s certainly better than I expected him to be this year. And don’t look now, but even after tonight’s loss to the Reds, Adam Wainwright has vaulted above 2 WAR in April (2.1) and guys who provide that kind of value in April, usually have big years. I predicted he’d be a top 5 NL starter this year, but if I could do it all over again, he’d be in my top 3.
The Morning Edition (April 29, 2013)
From Last Night:
- Kershaw tosses 8 innings, 12 K’s, and no walks as Crawford homers twice to push the Dodgers over the Crew
- Stanton homers twice as the Marlins beat the Cubs
- Price wins his first of the year, but gets into it with the home plate umpire about the umpires use of language
What I’m Watching Today:
- Matt Harvey gets the Marlins, many strikeouts possible (7p Eastern)
- Strasburg takes the hill as the Nats and Braves begin a series in Atlanta (7p Eastern)
- Wainwright faces Latos in an NL Central clash (8p Eastern)
- Cain and Kennedy battle in the desert (9p Eastern)
The Big Question:
- How will Wainwright counter Kershaw’s excellent Sunday?
I don’t think you can judge a team’s future performance based on how they play in April, but the games in April count in the standings and you don’t want to get too far behind. The Angels are allowing it to happen again. They enter the final two days of April ahead of only 3 teams in the win column: Cleveland, Miami, and Houston. They’re already 6.5 games back on April 29th. I didn’t think they’d win the West to begin with, but man, you can’t afford to give Texas and Oakland that type of early lead. Maybe if they had spent money on starting pitching this offseason instead of Josh Hamilton, who is hitting .219./.267/.323 so far. They’ll play better, but I don’t think they’re good enough to overcome this deficit and the inherent talent deficit they face.
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