I watched OKC last night and while Clayton Kershaw was obviously a little rusty, he was throwing free and easy. While they don’t show the radar gun in AAA, it looked to me that Clayton was around 90 MPH. He’s ready and I think he will be pitching for the LA Dodgers in 5 days. If Edwin Rios can hit at the Major League level (I am not convinced he…
I would venture that they could give anyone on this board 10 strikes against a MLB pitcher, and they would strike out every time. Hitting a baseball is one of the hardest things for a human to do. Puig could not hit LHP, although it was not always that way. Andre Ethier could not hit lefties very well. Joc has proven he cannot hit lefties. These things don’t go away…
It has already been established by Doc Roberts that left field, first base and catcher will be manned by a platoon. Well, actually, catcher is not so much of a platoon but rather a way to keep Barnes from being overworked, so Russ Martin will catch about 3 days a week or something thereabouts. Since Right-Handers make up about 70% of the pitchers, that means that at 1B, Max Muncy…
Some fans thought the Dodgers would miss the almost 70 HR they lost in three players… I can’t seem to remember who they were. Ha! The team is on pace to hit 696 HR. They might cool off a bit. (eyes rolling) The outlook after the first four games are promising, but we played the Little Sisters of the Poor and will continue with the Littler Sisters of the Poorer…
Pedro Moura had a Q & A on The Athletic yesterday about the Dodgers. Some moron named Edward V. asked this: How long till Friedman and co are kicked out by Dodger fans for not delivering a championship? Pedro Moura wrote: Fans are not the bosses of big league executives, Edward. So, Edward came back and said: Fair. How about how long till Dodger fans turn on the executives for…
Dodger fans complained that the Dodger’s platooned too much last season, so Andrew Friedman got rid of the logjam in the outfield and announced that there would be less platooning. Of course many fans lost their minds because the Dodgers “gave away” Puig, Kemp and Wood and Kyle Farmer is a “Freaking All-Star! They conveniently forget about the two highly rated prospects the Dodgers got back… both Downs and Gray…
I have been doing a lot of thinking and analysis and while I am a believer in analytics, I do not think that stats are the end all, be all. Humans play the game of baseball and no human can be fully captured with a single stat. However, there are a few statistics that just totally jump out at me. For example, when a batter has two strikes on them,…
None of this counts. Idaho Al was wondering why 31 year-old Ezequiel Carrera was playing LF yesterday. Here’s the answer: I don’t know! However, since Taylor, Pederson or Verdugo did not play and Miller opted out, I would suspect that yesterday was a scheduled off day for the three players mentioned or maybe they had a little tweek… like Rich Hill. If it were the regular season one of the…
Brad Miller turned some heads, this Spring with a .348 BA and .400 OB% in 23 AB’s, but it turns out the Dodgers were committed to Alex Verdugo and had no room for another LH hitting utilityman. I am sure he is happy the Dodgers gave him the opportunity – he would have made the team had Corey Seager not been ready to answer the bell. Andrew Friedman likes to…
We all look at the stats and sometimes believe that the stats tell you “you are what your stats say you are,” and while that is sometimes true, players can grow in their skill set or regress. However, the progression (or regression) is not always linear. Witness one Enrique “Kike” Hernandez. About this time last year (March 15, 2018, to be exact) I wrote this, while referring back to a…