So not too much meaning into this post but the Cardinals are on a 2 game slide right now, which has actually dropped them a game behind the Pirates, who conversely, are red hot and are riding a 7 game winning streak. Then the Orioles are the one up team as they've picked themselves back up since the sweep that the Blue Jays applied a week or so back and their pitching hasn't been blowing up like it did a couple times during that sweep (ie. the 13-5 loss). Then on the final side my home team the Blue Jays are keeling over again, now again I don't think this is going to last because bad streaks come just as often, if not more, than winning streaks. However the Jays are currently at a make or break moment, they've held above .500 for a decent time now but this latest loss throws them a game behind and they still have 2 more games against the Red Sox and then have to face the Tigers.
Alright so for a little more detail on each. The Cardinals in my opinion have nothing to worry about, and thats because even if they don't win the NL Central they have a high enough winning percentage to take the wild card without issue. In addition to this the trade deadline is coming up soon and since the Cardinals have this jacked up farm system they could easily secure any player that could be the difference maker for them. Now there is a positive even from the losses the Cardinals have suffered and that is that the runs allowed were only given up during one inning meaning that both pitchers (Lance Lynn and Shelby Miller) only lost sight of things for one inning but were solid for the rest of the game. Though while this may be true the scores of the games are worrying as in both losses the Cardinals had less than normal number of hits, and not against stellar pitchers either (Bedard and Colon, thats pronounced like the perfume not the part of your ass) and they didn't score that many runs (3 in the Houston game and 1 in todays against Oakland). Now again I will reiterate what I said earlier though, it's just a bad streak and these things come and go so don't get too worried, if the Cardinals somehow fall behind the Reds as well then it might be time to look more closely at the issues but for now I expect they will be back to their winning ways soon.
As for the Orioles even though I labelled them as a 'one up' team, not much has changed as their players are still playing at the level they were last few weeks, the only change is that they haven't been allowing as many runs as they did in the sweep by the Jays. The only thing I can comment on is that since the Jays sweep they have been playing much closer games against the Indians and Yankees to the point were they were winning or loosing these games by one run, which is a tiny bit worrying as no one expects them to continue the one game winning percentage they had last year, especially when pitchers like Jason Hammel, who were amazing last year, are back to their normal mediocre selves. Now as for trade deadline moves I expect the Orioles to do the same as last year, look for bargain trades as I don't think they'd be willing to give up a Dylan Bundy or a Kevin Gausman level prospect for one of the bigger trade bait players out there, not to mention theres a bit of a gap in their farm system (they have prospects that are near major league ready and then there next best guys are at High or Low A). Overall though the AL East is still a war zone and anyone can come out on top so don't count the Orioles out.
Now the most frustrating of all the Blue Jays.They are on a 2 game loosing streak, though unlike the Cardinals it seems that the offence are just turning off after the 11 game winning streak as well as their starting pitching, which has been chugging the team along since they started the streak. They lost 2/3 against the Rays, which I said was sad because the offence was swinging at any pitch they felt like, which killed walk opportunities that could have gotten them ahead of the Rays. Then they have now lost 2 of the 2 games against the Red Sox, of a 4 game series. Now again in both of these cases the offence swung at lots of pitches outside of the zone despite Lester being not nearly in top form and a lot of trouble that Webster was having the following game. Now on the other side of the coin those games against the Rays and these couple games against the Red Sox were poorly pitched by our team as hit after hit was allowed by our pitchers and in some cases pitches weren't being thrown well (ie. Wang's sinker, which was doing anything BUT sinking). Overall the offence needs to gear it back up, especially Bautista and Arencibia, I know I've said it a million times but SOMEONE needs to talk to J.P about his plate approach because having a guy in the middle of the order who strikes out 31% of the time, has a large % of ground outs and air outs, has a home run/fly ball % of 12.5 and who NEVER seems to walk (not to mention he has the 9th worst batting avg and the 2nd worst on base percentage in the MLB and shows no signs of improvement). Now trade deadline wise I have no clue what their going to do as most of the off season acquisitions they made were through trades and so their farm system is a bit lacking, though not terrible, right now. What I think they need to do is get a quality 2nd baseman, as Izturis and Bonifacio are lacking at one area or the other (offensively for Bonifacio and defensively for Izturis) and grab a difference making starter like Matt Garza. So wait and see what they do to improve the team.
-Eric
Friday, June 28, 2013
Wednesday, June 26, 2013
Bird Watch: A Whole Lot Of Somethin
The Blue Jays are once again confusing the crap out of me. Now they got Jose Reyes back from the DL for Wednesdays game against Tampa, despite loosing to them the 2 previous days, and I'll go over the latest loss in a bit. The first notable change however is not Reyes returning but having Munenori Kawasaki sent down to AAA Buffalo. Now I realize this was the best move strategically since all the other players are out of minor league options and would most likely get snagged by another team if they went through waivers but it is bittersweet because Kawasaki has been a driving force support wise in the club house and with fans. He managed to become the fan favourite in just a couple weeks in the majors and even veterans really appreciated what he did for the team, so much so that Mark Buerhle said that he was "The best teammate I've played with". Now by no means does this mark the end of Kawasaki's major league career, I know for certain he'll be back come September at the latest if no one in the infield gets injured and I'm sure he'll work wonders for the morale of the Jay's AAA affiliate. The best thing I think he can do is play multiple positions because that is truly what set him out from the rest of the potential hitters that could have been sent down since he has only ever played short stop and wouldn't have worked as a utility man.
Now quickly I'm going to go over the waiver system since I know a good chunk of fans may not understand how it all works or need some kind of reasoning as to why the Jays would send down Kawasaki. Ok so heres how it goes, every player at the minor league level, when first called up to the majors, has a specific number of times they can be sent back down to the minors before they have to clear waivers before they can be sent to the minor league destination intended. Once a player is based through waivers, every team gets a shot to pick up said player if they wish, though there is a specific order to this. It goes from last to first in the league the original team is in, then again in the opposing league (ie. if the Jays have a player pass through waivers he must pass by the Astros all the way up to the Red Sox, and then from the Marlins all the way up to the Cardinals). If no team tries to claim the player then and only then will they be able to go down to the AAA affiliate of their original team. So in case of Kawasaki, the reason they chose him was because firstly he didn't have enough usefulness to keep around in terms of ability on the field (he wasn't a great pinch hitter like DeRosa, he didn't play enough positions to be a utility infielder like Bonifacio or Izturis, he wasn't exceptionally east as a pinch runner like Davis and wasn't better defensively than the starting player at his position, in which he could have shared time with Reyes). Secondly with the exception of Kawasaki there was only 1 other player than had minor league options available, and that was Neil Wagner (the Buffalo Bison's closer), however he has proven to be very useful in the bullpen so it would be hard to send him down in favour of a player that would be warming the bench for the majority of the time. All in all I suggest you read this article as it explains the major options the Jays had in some good detail.
Now onto the games, so what's confused me about the Jays was their game on Tuesday in which the opposing pitcher, Matt Moore, had one of the strangest pitching stat lines I've seen striking out 11 over 6 innings, throwing 120 pitches, allowing 1 earned run on 4 hits and 6 walks. Basically what this says is that the Moore's control was all over the fucking place and yet the Jays were swinging at anything that moved. On our hand Buerhle pitched an alright as nearly all of the runs he allowed were from one inning, and the home plate umpire was really strict with the strike zone and because Buerhle doesn't as precise control as he used to he allowed a few walks. Then unfortunately the Jays offence fell into their old habits striking out constantly and they were terrible hitting with runners in scoring position going 1 for 8 (.125). That of course was their downfall as they had 3 innings where they had 2 or 3 runners on with 1 or less outs and they were unable to capitalize on the situation.
Now heres where the confusion really sets in because the previous game the team basically did the opposite of what they did in during their 11 game winning streak but then Wednesdays game came around Dickey took the mound and threw a complete game 2 hit shut out, his first complete game of the season. Now he was AMAZING, not only did he allow just 2 hits and 1 walk while striking out 6, but he only threw 93 pitches and only 25 of which were balls, which just goes to show when his knuckleball is floating right, he's a force to be reckoned with. On the offensive side they did a bit better going 1-6 (.167) but not by a lot. Though I expect that to improve once Reyes gets back on top of things being back from the DL.
The next series starting Thursday is agains the Boston Red Sox, now again I've said I expect at least 2/3 games to go to the Jays because of their struggles in pitching, especially with the loss of Clay Buchholz and the cooling off of their offence. But then again I was proved wrong about the Tampa series so we'll just have to wait and see.
-Eric
Now quickly I'm going to go over the waiver system since I know a good chunk of fans may not understand how it all works or need some kind of reasoning as to why the Jays would send down Kawasaki. Ok so heres how it goes, every player at the minor league level, when first called up to the majors, has a specific number of times they can be sent back down to the minors before they have to clear waivers before they can be sent to the minor league destination intended. Once a player is based through waivers, every team gets a shot to pick up said player if they wish, though there is a specific order to this. It goes from last to first in the league the original team is in, then again in the opposing league (ie. if the Jays have a player pass through waivers he must pass by the Astros all the way up to the Red Sox, and then from the Marlins all the way up to the Cardinals). If no team tries to claim the player then and only then will they be able to go down to the AAA affiliate of their original team. So in case of Kawasaki, the reason they chose him was because firstly he didn't have enough usefulness to keep around in terms of ability on the field (he wasn't a great pinch hitter like DeRosa, he didn't play enough positions to be a utility infielder like Bonifacio or Izturis, he wasn't exceptionally east as a pinch runner like Davis and wasn't better defensively than the starting player at his position, in which he could have shared time with Reyes). Secondly with the exception of Kawasaki there was only 1 other player than had minor league options available, and that was Neil Wagner (the Buffalo Bison's closer), however he has proven to be very useful in the bullpen so it would be hard to send him down in favour of a player that would be warming the bench for the majority of the time. All in all I suggest you read this article as it explains the major options the Jays had in some good detail.
Now onto the games, so what's confused me about the Jays was their game on Tuesday in which the opposing pitcher, Matt Moore, had one of the strangest pitching stat lines I've seen striking out 11 over 6 innings, throwing 120 pitches, allowing 1 earned run on 4 hits and 6 walks. Basically what this says is that the Moore's control was all over the fucking place and yet the Jays were swinging at anything that moved. On our hand Buerhle pitched an alright as nearly all of the runs he allowed were from one inning, and the home plate umpire was really strict with the strike zone and because Buerhle doesn't as precise control as he used to he allowed a few walks. Then unfortunately the Jays offence fell into their old habits striking out constantly and they were terrible hitting with runners in scoring position going 1 for 8 (.125). That of course was their downfall as they had 3 innings where they had 2 or 3 runners on with 1 or less outs and they were unable to capitalize on the situation.
Now heres where the confusion really sets in because the previous game the team basically did the opposite of what they did in during their 11 game winning streak but then Wednesdays game came around Dickey took the mound and threw a complete game 2 hit shut out, his first complete game of the season. Now he was AMAZING, not only did he allow just 2 hits and 1 walk while striking out 6, but he only threw 93 pitches and only 25 of which were balls, which just goes to show when his knuckleball is floating right, he's a force to be reckoned with. On the offensive side they did a bit better going 1-6 (.167) but not by a lot. Though I expect that to improve once Reyes gets back on top of things being back from the DL.
The next series starting Thursday is agains the Boston Red Sox, now again I've said I expect at least 2/3 games to go to the Jays because of their struggles in pitching, especially with the loss of Clay Buchholz and the cooling off of their offence. But then again I was proved wrong about the Tampa series so we'll just have to wait and see.
-Eric
Tuesday, June 25, 2013
Bird Watch: The Streak Ends
So the Jays faced off in their first game of a 3 game series against the Rays with the potential to beat the current club winning streak record, however they were unable to continue the winning streak. In terms of the performance it was rather odd, when one looks at the pitching line for both Esmil Rogers and Jeremy Hellickson it would seem rather strange as Rogers allowed 3 home runs, and Hellickson walked 4. More would think that both Rogers and Hellickson lacked control of their pitches however in the case of Rogers, all 3 home runs were in the second inning, and he only allowed 1 run then none the rest of the game. Then Hellickson walked 4, however 3 out of the 4 walks were of the same player Colby Rasmus, now I just take that as Colby having better plate discipline and getting a bit lucky in terms of what pitches were thrown. And due to this, on the Rays side they were able to save their bullpen and only needed to call upon 2 pitchers including their closer Fernando Rodney. Though the Jays were able to do that as well since Rogers managed to salvage things after the2nd and 3rd innings.
Now when we look at the offence of both teams they both performed well, though again outside of the 3 home run inning for the Rays there wasn't much in the way of offensive production though both teams hit fairly well each with runners in scoring position, which as I've said time and time again is the hallmark of a good offence. Though the home runs hit by the Rays definitely puts them up top in terms of rating their offence because it still takes a good hitter to take advantage of a pitch thats left in the 'sweet spot' of the strike zone.
On the defensive side both teams were fairly even as they both managed to pull off double plays, Toronto 1 and Tampa 2, and in addition the Jays defence managed to catch Wil Myers while he was trying to steal a base. and no errors were committed by either side.
Overall the game was a good one, though with the exception of those 3 home runs, but still I stand by what I said in that I believe the Jays are likely to take 2 out of 3 of the games in this series, and that is even more forward in my mind since Jose Reyes is scheduled to start for the Jays again on Wednesday.
-Eric
Now when we look at the offence of both teams they both performed well, though again outside of the 3 home run inning for the Rays there wasn't much in the way of offensive production though both teams hit fairly well each with runners in scoring position, which as I've said time and time again is the hallmark of a good offence. Though the home runs hit by the Rays definitely puts them up top in terms of rating their offence because it still takes a good hitter to take advantage of a pitch thats left in the 'sweet spot' of the strike zone.
On the defensive side both teams were fairly even as they both managed to pull off double plays, Toronto 1 and Tampa 2, and in addition the Jays defence managed to catch Wil Myers while he was trying to steal a base. and no errors were committed by either side.
Overall the game was a good one, though with the exception of those 3 home runs, but still I stand by what I said in that I believe the Jays are likely to take 2 out of 3 of the games in this series, and that is even more forward in my mind since Jose Reyes is scheduled to start for the Jays again on Wednesday.
-Eric
Monday, June 24, 2013
Bird Watch: Finale
So the last game of the Orioles vs Blue Jays game happened and the Jays won it by a long shot. Now to be honest there isn't much to say about this match, seriously Josh Johnson was fantastic for the Jays, and the defence and offence for the team was spot on, little issues from all of the hitters who were rather quiet over the last few games woke up and delivered in a big way. Then on the Orioles side the pitching was just what I expected, Freddy Garcia was pretty bad (though that was expected considering he hasn't had a consistent year of production in ages), and the bullpen was pretty bad again again which was expected, if they didn't get to Jim Johnson. On the offensive side their team had a fairly consistent run of hits, the Jays pitching just kept them off of the bases when they needed to be but despite that they still scored 5 runs in the last 4 innings, which is admirable considering what kind of lead the Jays had on them at that point. Now defensively there wasn't anything to write home about, they had some great plays and no errors so nothing to complain about at all.
Overall the series went pretty close to what I expected though I didn't see the Jays getting such a blow out win on the last game and in addition to that it seems that Jose Reyes will be rejoining the team on Thursday for their game against Boston. Now, since this is a rather short post I'll quickly go over the next match ups for the Jays especially since one more win puts them over the club record for winning streaks.
Alright so the next 3 games the Jays face off against the Rays, now I expect this to go over similarly to the Orioles series and thats because, while the Rays offence has been playing well as of late their starters are in a bit of shambles at the moment. Alex Cobb is on the DL with a concussion, David Price is still rehabbing his injury, Matt Moore and Jeremy Hellickson have both been faltering as of late and haven't been playing nearly as good as expected and finally Roberto Hernandez is not exactly a fantastic or consistent pitcher and has been pretty much a standard 5th spot in the rotation starter, which isn't enough to keep down the Jays offence in it's current state. And like the Orioles their bullpen has been rather weak and inconsistent and their closer, Fernando Rodney, has been much less than he was last year. Now I'm not sure I'd say their going to sweep the Rays but I am positive they will win at least 2 out of the 3 games.
After that series they open up 4 games in Boston and the way this one goes in my mind will depend on how well the Red Sox pitchers are able to recover as their top of the line starter, Clay Buchholz, is on the DL and Jon Lester, their supposed ace, has been sinking like a stone as of late. Then add in the fact that Ryan Dempster and Alex Webster have been inconsistent as hell and not all that great against big time offences and you've got a potential disaster of a rotation if it butts heads with a potent offence. It's a scary thought when you think that their most consistent pitcher not on the DL is John Lackey *shivers*. Now in addition to this again, like the Orioles their bullpen is in a state of flux, now it's not as bad as the Orioles but they have the 2 that they thought were potential closers either injured or have been coughing up runs left and right. Then theres the offence for the Red Sox, which in my opinion has been getting really lucky as when you look at the career stats of players like Shane Victorino, Stephen Drew, Jarrod Saltalamachia, Daniel Nava and Johnny Gomes theres nothing to be impressed with and with Napoli in a bit of a slump they will have an issue keeping up with the Jays if their pitching stays at this level. Again I believe the end of this series will be the same as the Rays series in that I expect them to win 3 out of the 4 games and if everything clicks then they could sweep the whole thing.
-Eric
Overall the series went pretty close to what I expected though I didn't see the Jays getting such a blow out win on the last game and in addition to that it seems that Jose Reyes will be rejoining the team on Thursday for their game against Boston. Now, since this is a rather short post I'll quickly go over the next match ups for the Jays especially since one more win puts them over the club record for winning streaks.
Alright so the next 3 games the Jays face off against the Rays, now I expect this to go over similarly to the Orioles series and thats because, while the Rays offence has been playing well as of late their starters are in a bit of shambles at the moment. Alex Cobb is on the DL with a concussion, David Price is still rehabbing his injury, Matt Moore and Jeremy Hellickson have both been faltering as of late and haven't been playing nearly as good as expected and finally Roberto Hernandez is not exactly a fantastic or consistent pitcher and has been pretty much a standard 5th spot in the rotation starter, which isn't enough to keep down the Jays offence in it's current state. And like the Orioles their bullpen has been rather weak and inconsistent and their closer, Fernando Rodney, has been much less than he was last year. Now I'm not sure I'd say their going to sweep the Rays but I am positive they will win at least 2 out of the 3 games.
After that series they open up 4 games in Boston and the way this one goes in my mind will depend on how well the Red Sox pitchers are able to recover as their top of the line starter, Clay Buchholz, is on the DL and Jon Lester, their supposed ace, has been sinking like a stone as of late. Then add in the fact that Ryan Dempster and Alex Webster have been inconsistent as hell and not all that great against big time offences and you've got a potential disaster of a rotation if it butts heads with a potent offence. It's a scary thought when you think that their most consistent pitcher not on the DL is John Lackey *shivers*. Now in addition to this again, like the Orioles their bullpen is in a state of flux, now it's not as bad as the Orioles but they have the 2 that they thought were potential closers either injured or have been coughing up runs left and right. Then theres the offence for the Red Sox, which in my opinion has been getting really lucky as when you look at the career stats of players like Shane Victorino, Stephen Drew, Jarrod Saltalamachia, Daniel Nava and Johnny Gomes theres nothing to be impressed with and with Napoli in a bit of a slump they will have an issue keeping up with the Jays if their pitching stays at this level. Again I believe the end of this series will be the same as the Rays series in that I expect them to win 3 out of the 4 games and if everything clicks then they could sweep the whole thing.
-Eric
Sunday, June 23, 2013
Bird Watch: Round 2!
Ok so Saturday there was the 2nd game of the 3 game series between the Blue Jays and the Orioles. So again, like the previous game, I'm going to break down performances of both teams and give an overall verdict on where they stand starting with Baltimore.
Ok so the Orioles started this game throwing their right handed pitcher Miguel Gonzalez onto the mound, no up until now Gonzalez has had a fair amount of success despite being a relatively young pitcher in the Orioles staff with a stat line of 5-3 (W-L), 3.75 (ERA), 1.21 (WHIP) and 59 strikeouts over 81.2 innings. Now this is only makes his situation better as he has a 3-0 record against the Jays with an ERA under 3.00, which is a fantastic stat to have against a heavy hitting team and to be honest he performed to that level in the game as he only allowed 3 runs, 3 hits, 5 strikeouts and 3 walks on 7.1 innings. Now this is good because he struck out a good deal and didn't allow a huge amount of hits/walks but he also had very good control of his pitches over the first 4 innings, as he painted the outside of the strike zone very well and definitely took advantage of the home plate umpire having a slightly shifted strike zone. Overall their starter did a great job, though all of the runs allowed were of his own making and one in particular could have been avoided, I'm referring to the run scored by Melky Cabrera on a wild pitch by Gonzalez. Now the bullpen for the Orioles had it's same troubles as Darren O'Day didn't have great control of his pitches as he allowed Rajai Davis on base and then gave up a long home run to Jose Bautista to give the lead to the Blue Jays, which they took to the end of the game with Casey Janssen shutting down the last 3 batters. Now on the side of the offence there wasn't much special about it as they didn't have many hits on the day then only managed to score one run in the 5th inning and only did so due to a fielding error on the part of Emilio Bonifacio, otherwise it is likely they wouldn't have had any base runners that inning. Then their second and only other run was from a solo home run by Taylor Teagarden (who has been batting under .100). And as I've previously preached they had a very low batting average with runners in scoring position this game (1-6) or .167, which as I've said about the Blue Jays is not something an offence needs to be high in order to be potent enough to beat out heavy hitting teams. Now the last thing to look at is the defence by the fielders and base running, which there isn't really anything to complain about as they made a double play, had no errors, and Nate McClouth was caught stealing once in the 8th. Overall nothing bad on the defence but like I said in the previous post the Orioles biggest weakness in this series and future ones is their bullpen and without significant improvement in that area they could face trouble in getting to the playoffs. As well it seems their forte for clutch hitting has been diminishing a bit as well so they need to have their offence starting to get out of the slump their working themselves into if their going to continue being at or near the top of the AL East.
Now on to the Blue Jays, much like the Orioles the pitcher they threw onto the mound, Chien-Ming Wang, pitched a fantastic game as he threw 6.1 innings, allowed only 1 run that was unearned and struck out 2 on only 4 hits and no walks. Now Wang has been fantastic in his starts with the Blue Jays ever since being signed and he continues to deliver with above average control and a propensity for good ground ball outs that have allowed him to stay on top. Though unlike Gonzalez, Wang doesn't have much relevant data against the Orioles as he was with Washington in 2012 and 2011 for a brief time, was in the minors from mid 2012 till a couple weeks ago and in 2010 so he's been out of the majors for a fair amount of time, meaning even if he hasn't improved on his previous repertoire then it'll at least take some time for hitters to adjust to him. Now the bullpen was as dominant as ever with only a couple exceptions, the first being that Aaron Loup, who I've raved about being close to the worst of their bullpen, hit Chris Davis with a pitch and the home run allowed by Darren Oliver. Though those two were fairly minuscule as the batter Loup allowed on base didn't get hit in and the home run given up by Oliver was quickly thrown back when the Jays scored 2 in the next inning. Now on to the offence, the Jays managed to accumulate 4 runs over the course of the game with 4 hits and 3 walks, now the same ups and downs on the offence were present, Bautista, Arencibia and Rasmus were a bit inconsistent at the plate and as a result got themselves out a fair number of times when they could have scored runs or got on base (they combined for a total of 4 runners left on base). Though like nearly all the games during this winning streak the rest of the offence has contributed well to make up for the lack of plate discipline of Rasmus, Arencibia and Bautista. In addition to this the troubles of Bonifacio continue as he made another couple fantastic defensive plays but his lack of ability at the plate might lose him his starting spot like I discussed in the previous post. Now on the defensive side there is just as little to talk about as with the Orioles the only defensive hiccup was the error made by Bonifacio but that was made up by Darren Oliver picking off Nate McClouth. The through this I pretty much come to the same conclusion I came to after the last post, if the Jays can continue this level of production from the entire lineup they can easily take this series and given that the Rays are having issues with their pitching, with David Price and Alex Cobb on the DL and Hellickson and others having issues with their delivery. Now one thing to take into account towards the finale against the Orioles is that Baltimore has yet to announce their starter for the game, it is expected to be either Freddy Garcia or Zach Britton. Now if it is the first then it'll be more difficult for the Jays than if it's Britton and that's because first Garcia is a much more experienced pitcher and has spent the previous 2 years with the Yankees and has more experience with the major AL East hitters. Overall though I still believe that the Jays can win, not just because of their performance but because they are reaching their clubs winning streak record, which is 11 wins and they are at 10 wins.
-Eric
Ok so the Orioles started this game throwing their right handed pitcher Miguel Gonzalez onto the mound, no up until now Gonzalez has had a fair amount of success despite being a relatively young pitcher in the Orioles staff with a stat line of 5-3 (W-L), 3.75 (ERA), 1.21 (WHIP) and 59 strikeouts over 81.2 innings. Now this is only makes his situation better as he has a 3-0 record against the Jays with an ERA under 3.00, which is a fantastic stat to have against a heavy hitting team and to be honest he performed to that level in the game as he only allowed 3 runs, 3 hits, 5 strikeouts and 3 walks on 7.1 innings. Now this is good because he struck out a good deal and didn't allow a huge amount of hits/walks but he also had very good control of his pitches over the first 4 innings, as he painted the outside of the strike zone very well and definitely took advantage of the home plate umpire having a slightly shifted strike zone. Overall their starter did a great job, though all of the runs allowed were of his own making and one in particular could have been avoided, I'm referring to the run scored by Melky Cabrera on a wild pitch by Gonzalez. Now the bullpen for the Orioles had it's same troubles as Darren O'Day didn't have great control of his pitches as he allowed Rajai Davis on base and then gave up a long home run to Jose Bautista to give the lead to the Blue Jays, which they took to the end of the game with Casey Janssen shutting down the last 3 batters. Now on the side of the offence there wasn't much special about it as they didn't have many hits on the day then only managed to score one run in the 5th inning and only did so due to a fielding error on the part of Emilio Bonifacio, otherwise it is likely they wouldn't have had any base runners that inning. Then their second and only other run was from a solo home run by Taylor Teagarden (who has been batting under .100). And as I've previously preached they had a very low batting average with runners in scoring position this game (1-6) or .167, which as I've said about the Blue Jays is not something an offence needs to be high in order to be potent enough to beat out heavy hitting teams. Now the last thing to look at is the defence by the fielders and base running, which there isn't really anything to complain about as they made a double play, had no errors, and Nate McClouth was caught stealing once in the 8th. Overall nothing bad on the defence but like I said in the previous post the Orioles biggest weakness in this series and future ones is their bullpen and without significant improvement in that area they could face trouble in getting to the playoffs. As well it seems their forte for clutch hitting has been diminishing a bit as well so they need to have their offence starting to get out of the slump their working themselves into if their going to continue being at or near the top of the AL East.
Now on to the Blue Jays, much like the Orioles the pitcher they threw onto the mound, Chien-Ming Wang, pitched a fantastic game as he threw 6.1 innings, allowed only 1 run that was unearned and struck out 2 on only 4 hits and no walks. Now Wang has been fantastic in his starts with the Blue Jays ever since being signed and he continues to deliver with above average control and a propensity for good ground ball outs that have allowed him to stay on top. Though unlike Gonzalez, Wang doesn't have much relevant data against the Orioles as he was with Washington in 2012 and 2011 for a brief time, was in the minors from mid 2012 till a couple weeks ago and in 2010 so he's been out of the majors for a fair amount of time, meaning even if he hasn't improved on his previous repertoire then it'll at least take some time for hitters to adjust to him. Now the bullpen was as dominant as ever with only a couple exceptions, the first being that Aaron Loup, who I've raved about being close to the worst of their bullpen, hit Chris Davis with a pitch and the home run allowed by Darren Oliver. Though those two were fairly minuscule as the batter Loup allowed on base didn't get hit in and the home run given up by Oliver was quickly thrown back when the Jays scored 2 in the next inning. Now on to the offence, the Jays managed to accumulate 4 runs over the course of the game with 4 hits and 3 walks, now the same ups and downs on the offence were present, Bautista, Arencibia and Rasmus were a bit inconsistent at the plate and as a result got themselves out a fair number of times when they could have scored runs or got on base (they combined for a total of 4 runners left on base). Though like nearly all the games during this winning streak the rest of the offence has contributed well to make up for the lack of plate discipline of Rasmus, Arencibia and Bautista. In addition to this the troubles of Bonifacio continue as he made another couple fantastic defensive plays but his lack of ability at the plate might lose him his starting spot like I discussed in the previous post. Now on the defensive side there is just as little to talk about as with the Orioles the only defensive hiccup was the error made by Bonifacio but that was made up by Darren Oliver picking off Nate McClouth. The through this I pretty much come to the same conclusion I came to after the last post, if the Jays can continue this level of production from the entire lineup they can easily take this series and given that the Rays are having issues with their pitching, with David Price and Alex Cobb on the DL and Hellickson and others having issues with their delivery. Now one thing to take into account towards the finale against the Orioles is that Baltimore has yet to announce their starter for the game, it is expected to be either Freddy Garcia or Zach Britton. Now if it is the first then it'll be more difficult for the Jays than if it's Britton and that's because first Garcia is a much more experienced pitcher and has spent the previous 2 years with the Yankees and has more experience with the major AL East hitters. Overall though I still believe that the Jays can win, not just because of their performance but because they are reaching their clubs winning streak record, which is 11 wins and they are at 10 wins.
-Eric
Saturday, June 22, 2013
Bird Watch: FIGHT!
Well today seems like a good time to start a daily vs. post because Friday and the weekend games for the Blue Jays are against the Orioles. So I'm just going to give my run down of the game on both sides, positives, negatives and what to look the outlook for each team as the weekend continues.
Ok so lets start with the Orioles, so these guys had a pretty good outing, plenty of good plays made by the defence in the outfield and the infield, with exception to that line drive by Maicer Izturis in the bottom of the 9th that got by Flaherty and Markakis. Now this game seemed like a home run competition for both teams as both of them hit 3 of them over the course of the game, in the case of the Orioles Chris Davis, Ryan Flaherty and J.J. Hardy mashed one a piece out of the field. Their hitting overall was good quality as well since they managed to get a good number of hits off R.A Dickey (7) until the Jays bullpen came into play. On the mound Jason Hammel did a quality job despite the problems he's been having giving consistent outings but managed to only allow 4 hits, 4 runs, 1 walk and striking out 7, now the only issue he had was with the long ball, which is honestly what a lot of pitchers have problems with the Blue Jays as even counting the 2011 and 2010 seasons they had the most home runs as a team. The chink in the Orioles that drove them to defeat in the bottom of the 9th wasn't their defence it was their lack of a solid bullpen, with the exception of Jim Johnson of course. Now before anyone jumps on me about this look at the stats over the last few years for each of Baltimore's relievers used, all of them can be akin to broken toys as many of them were either relievers for bigger teams that gave up on them or starters that got moved in a trade to Baltimore. The first is the case of Tommy Hunter, and Brian Matusz, then the second refers to Darren O'Day and Pedro Strop. Now Tommy Hunter, a couple years ago, was the #5 starter for the Rangers and his performance as a starter definitely kept him in that position as he never really had a year with them with a above average, ERA or WHIP and the same goes for Brian Matusz as he was a starter for the Minnesota Twins but got dropped from the lineup and eventually let go. Then Darren O'Day and Pedro Strop were both relievers for the Rangers that got traded over in a deal that sent more senior relievers, like Koji Uehara and Mike Gonzalez, over to them and O'Day and Strop, the younger pitchers, over the Baltimore to develop and hopefully shine in the future. Now this strategy is not a bad one by any means, the Orioles aren't exactly a big market team but they do have a stellar manager in Buck Showalter and it seems like a good coaching staff as well, plus a great set of young players either making their way up or currently mashing in the majors. Overall the future looks bright for the Orioles, though the issue for them as of now is just that, getting more solid starting pitchers. Last year they managed to make the playoffs due to Buck's great managing in addition to their young pitching staff playing way above their heads, which can be seen in those same pitchers not having that level of success this year. So I don't hold out much hope for them to take this 3 game series against the Jays this weekend primarily because of this pitching deficiency and yea I know Miguel Gonzalez has been great but he doesn't have the track record to convince me he's going to continue this, however if they do get a solid number 1 starter by the trade deadline and get Wei Yin Chen back in the fold they could very well make the playoffs by either winning the division or by wild card given how close the AL East has been.
Now onto the Jays side, their improvements stayed in place, the offence was consistently hitting and getting on base then the rest of the team went 3 for 6 with runners in scoring position, which is just what they need to continue doing offensively to keep up this winning streak. The only gripes I have with their offence are Bautista, Rasmus and Bonifacio, now Bautista I've talked about before and it still seems he hasn't gotten it through his head that he needs to be more selective at the plate, I will however give him credit as he wasn't nearly as bad as the last few games but he still has a long way to go to get back to his usual self, luckily Encarnacion seems to be delivering what we expect from Bautista and more to make up for it. Then we have Colby Rasmus, now he's not as much of an issue in terms of bad plate discipline anymore because he has been showing some great improvement with making contact and striking out less however he still hasn't been very consistent with that change, as he went 1/3 with a walk and a home run in Wednesdays game and then went 0/4 Friday striking out once and hitting bad balls the other 3 times, not much that can be done as he more than likely will find that consistent form eventually just hope it's sooner rather than later. Finally we have Bonifacio, now he's the one that has been driving me insane and thats because I saw watched him play for the Marlins for a few years, hell I had him on fantasy teams strictly for the stolen base production, unfortunately for him he needs to be on base to start that, which he hasn't been doing well. Now this would sit fine with me if he wasn't killing it defensively at 2nd base, he's begun to prove that he can handle the position from a defensive stand point but because he's been showing nothing at the plate, and Izturis has, he might get knocked back into a Utility role and I'd hate to see a HUGE source of speed on their team go to waste like that. Thats all for the offence as the rest of the team played fantastically and it's worth while to note that, while he may not be the best offensive player, Munenori Kawasaki has brought this ridiculous energy to the Jays and has battled at every at bat he's had and then today he got rewarded as he belted a 2 run homer, the first of his career, to tie the game. In addition we had Lind and Encarnacion go yard on seperate occasions as well at key times in the game. Now the pitching, R.A Dickey collapsed again, started off strong but then the 6th rolled around and he gave up 4 runs one of which, was a 3 run home run by Chris Davis, to be honest it seems that Dickey is the lone starter that is still having trouble adjusting. Though I don't think we should be giving up on him, I think he will regain SOME of his form, thats right SOME but not all, when people looked at the trade for him they thought we'd be getting the numbers he posted in 2012 with the Mets, but thats very short sighted as he's moving for a fairly light hitting division, yea the Nationals have a crap offence, the Braves last year didn't have a potent offence, the Phillies had little to no run production from their stars last year, and the Marlins......well they were the Marlins, and he moved to the AL East the hardest hitting division. So there was some regression to be expected and honestly knuckleballers haven't really thrived in the AL East, though they can survive and produce above average results as we saw through all that Tim Wakefield did with the Red Sox. Before I go further I'd like to recommend that everyone reading this watch the documentary 'Knuckleball!' to better understand these types of pitchers as it'll give you a better idea of what to expect from Dickey, and just keep in mind he's a resilient guy whose fought for a place in the lineup for countless years and I doubt he's just going to perform like crap and not do anything about it. Ok thats enough about Dickey, the other side of the pitching is of course the bullpen for the Jays, which again was lights out, Cecil and Janssen went a total of 3 innings and didn't allow a baserunner and Cecil struck out 2 of the 6 hitters he faced. Now the Jays continue to look like they are going to roll with this streak they've got going and given that their more proven pitchers are coming up for the last games against the Orioles I think their in good shape to potentially sweep the series, if this game has demonstrated anything it's that the offence is in go mode and even if their down or the starter allows a fair number of runs they have the muscle to get back into and win the game.
-Eric
Ok so lets start with the Orioles, so these guys had a pretty good outing, plenty of good plays made by the defence in the outfield and the infield, with exception to that line drive by Maicer Izturis in the bottom of the 9th that got by Flaherty and Markakis. Now this game seemed like a home run competition for both teams as both of them hit 3 of them over the course of the game, in the case of the Orioles Chris Davis, Ryan Flaherty and J.J. Hardy mashed one a piece out of the field. Their hitting overall was good quality as well since they managed to get a good number of hits off R.A Dickey (7) until the Jays bullpen came into play. On the mound Jason Hammel did a quality job despite the problems he's been having giving consistent outings but managed to only allow 4 hits, 4 runs, 1 walk and striking out 7, now the only issue he had was with the long ball, which is honestly what a lot of pitchers have problems with the Blue Jays as even counting the 2011 and 2010 seasons they had the most home runs as a team. The chink in the Orioles that drove them to defeat in the bottom of the 9th wasn't their defence it was their lack of a solid bullpen, with the exception of Jim Johnson of course. Now before anyone jumps on me about this look at the stats over the last few years for each of Baltimore's relievers used, all of them can be akin to broken toys as many of them were either relievers for bigger teams that gave up on them or starters that got moved in a trade to Baltimore. The first is the case of Tommy Hunter, and Brian Matusz, then the second refers to Darren O'Day and Pedro Strop. Now Tommy Hunter, a couple years ago, was the #5 starter for the Rangers and his performance as a starter definitely kept him in that position as he never really had a year with them with a above average, ERA or WHIP and the same goes for Brian Matusz as he was a starter for the Minnesota Twins but got dropped from the lineup and eventually let go. Then Darren O'Day and Pedro Strop were both relievers for the Rangers that got traded over in a deal that sent more senior relievers, like Koji Uehara and Mike Gonzalez, over to them and O'Day and Strop, the younger pitchers, over the Baltimore to develop and hopefully shine in the future. Now this strategy is not a bad one by any means, the Orioles aren't exactly a big market team but they do have a stellar manager in Buck Showalter and it seems like a good coaching staff as well, plus a great set of young players either making their way up or currently mashing in the majors. Overall the future looks bright for the Orioles, though the issue for them as of now is just that, getting more solid starting pitchers. Last year they managed to make the playoffs due to Buck's great managing in addition to their young pitching staff playing way above their heads, which can be seen in those same pitchers not having that level of success this year. So I don't hold out much hope for them to take this 3 game series against the Jays this weekend primarily because of this pitching deficiency and yea I know Miguel Gonzalez has been great but he doesn't have the track record to convince me he's going to continue this, however if they do get a solid number 1 starter by the trade deadline and get Wei Yin Chen back in the fold they could very well make the playoffs by either winning the division or by wild card given how close the AL East has been.
Now onto the Jays side, their improvements stayed in place, the offence was consistently hitting and getting on base then the rest of the team went 3 for 6 with runners in scoring position, which is just what they need to continue doing offensively to keep up this winning streak. The only gripes I have with their offence are Bautista, Rasmus and Bonifacio, now Bautista I've talked about before and it still seems he hasn't gotten it through his head that he needs to be more selective at the plate, I will however give him credit as he wasn't nearly as bad as the last few games but he still has a long way to go to get back to his usual self, luckily Encarnacion seems to be delivering what we expect from Bautista and more to make up for it. Then we have Colby Rasmus, now he's not as much of an issue in terms of bad plate discipline anymore because he has been showing some great improvement with making contact and striking out less however he still hasn't been very consistent with that change, as he went 1/3 with a walk and a home run in Wednesdays game and then went 0/4 Friday striking out once and hitting bad balls the other 3 times, not much that can be done as he more than likely will find that consistent form eventually just hope it's sooner rather than later. Finally we have Bonifacio, now he's the one that has been driving me insane and thats because I saw watched him play for the Marlins for a few years, hell I had him on fantasy teams strictly for the stolen base production, unfortunately for him he needs to be on base to start that, which he hasn't been doing well. Now this would sit fine with me if he wasn't killing it defensively at 2nd base, he's begun to prove that he can handle the position from a defensive stand point but because he's been showing nothing at the plate, and Izturis has, he might get knocked back into a Utility role and I'd hate to see a HUGE source of speed on their team go to waste like that. Thats all for the offence as the rest of the team played fantastically and it's worth while to note that, while he may not be the best offensive player, Munenori Kawasaki has brought this ridiculous energy to the Jays and has battled at every at bat he's had and then today he got rewarded as he belted a 2 run homer, the first of his career, to tie the game. In addition we had Lind and Encarnacion go yard on seperate occasions as well at key times in the game. Now the pitching, R.A Dickey collapsed again, started off strong but then the 6th rolled around and he gave up 4 runs one of which, was a 3 run home run by Chris Davis, to be honest it seems that Dickey is the lone starter that is still having trouble adjusting. Though I don't think we should be giving up on him, I think he will regain SOME of his form, thats right SOME but not all, when people looked at the trade for him they thought we'd be getting the numbers he posted in 2012 with the Mets, but thats very short sighted as he's moving for a fairly light hitting division, yea the Nationals have a crap offence, the Braves last year didn't have a potent offence, the Phillies had little to no run production from their stars last year, and the Marlins......well they were the Marlins, and he moved to the AL East the hardest hitting division. So there was some regression to be expected and honestly knuckleballers haven't really thrived in the AL East, though they can survive and produce above average results as we saw through all that Tim Wakefield did with the Red Sox. Before I go further I'd like to recommend that everyone reading this watch the documentary 'Knuckleball!' to better understand these types of pitchers as it'll give you a better idea of what to expect from Dickey, and just keep in mind he's a resilient guy whose fought for a place in the lineup for countless years and I doubt he's just going to perform like crap and not do anything about it. Ok thats enough about Dickey, the other side of the pitching is of course the bullpen for the Jays, which again was lights out, Cecil and Janssen went a total of 3 innings and didn't allow a baserunner and Cecil struck out 2 of the 6 hitters he faced. Now the Jays continue to look like they are going to roll with this streak they've got going and given that their more proven pitchers are coming up for the last games against the Orioles I think their in good shape to potentially sweep the series, if this game has demonstrated anything it's that the offence is in go mode and even if their down or the starter allows a fair number of runs they have the muscle to get back into and win the game.
-Eric
Thursday, June 20, 2013
Bird Watch: Improvement On All Sides
Ok so I was waiting until the final game of the Colorado vs. Toronto series until I posted this so it was more evident that what they were doing was for real and not just a one or two game thing. Ok so whats happened to the Jays in the last week? Well they seem to have turned things completely around in all areas. First off over the last month the Jays have the most hard worked bullpen, however they are also the best bullpen in baseball at the moment now too. In the last month both Steve Delabar and Brett Cecil have an ERA of under 1.50, which is amazing to have in two guys who aren't the set closer or 8th inning pitchers. In addition to this ever since the 13th their starters have been playing the way we expected, giving up about an average of 2 runs per game. Now I don't take the games against Chicago into account here because when you look at the box score you can see that both sides had a large number of hits and some of the runs that the Jays got were due to errors made by the Chicago defence. Now for months now I have been preaching that Toronto was having a hard time because they had such a horrible average with runners in scoring position, meaning they hadn't been able to take advantage of when runners were on second.
Well that is not the case any more, if we look at the series' against the White Sox and the Rangers (home series) , which covered 5 games the Jays went 8/47 with runners in scoring position, which equates to an average of .170, which is pretty bad considering how many innings were played and how many times runners were in scoring position. Then if we look at the previous 7 games, the series against the Rangers (away series) and Colorado it seems like the Jays have completely flipped over completely going 15/42, which translates to an average of .357 yeah thats more than two times better than before. Now whats even more surprising about this is that Bautista is still swinging at bad pitches and Arencibia is still playing in his terrible 'swing at whatever the fuck I feel like' approach, meaning two of our high output hitters aren't hitting well and we're still doing this well.
Now this outcome was nice but not terribly surprising when they knocked the Rangers down a rung and the reason for this was because they were in a slump and had lost 4 games before they came to face Toronto. On the other hand the Rockies series was much more impressive for a few reasons, first being that the Rockies were on a winning streak hitting very well leading up to their games against the Jays, second reason is that like the hitters of the Rockies the pitchers all season have been playing MUCH better than they were expected too, as could be seen in the very close first game with Jorge De La Rosa on the mound against Josh Johnson. The third and final reason is because our starting pitchers have turned it around, as the starters for these 7 games all limited the opponents to 2 runners per game and 10 hits over the entire game, this as well was done by only 3 of our start of the season starters (Dickey, Buerhle and Johnson) in addition to Chien-Ming Wang and Esmil Rogers, both of which haven't started in a long time and the former not having played in the majors for years..
Now the most impressive one was Josh Johnson's return where he went 7.1 innings, striking out 10 and only allowing 5 hits and no runs, which is vintage Josh Johnson and what we were seeing in spring training. And this doesn't seem to be going down anytime soon as like I've said several times they have several players on the mend and likely to return soon, especially Kyle Drabek and Drew Hutchinson. Jose Reyes as well has played in one rehab game so far and went 3-5 in the first game and is moving up to a AAA start within the next couple days and could very well be back by the start/middle of next week. Now what does this mean? Better defence and better offence at the shortstop position, not to knock Munenori Kawasaki, and in addition we will have our true lead off hitter back despite Melky doing a have decent job (Reyes is just at a much more elite level). So for Jays fans out there keep tuned in because if the Jays can continue to play at this rate they will be in an exceptional position given that their next few series are against other AL East teams.
-Eric
Well that is not the case any more, if we look at the series' against the White Sox and the Rangers (home series) , which covered 5 games the Jays went 8/47 with runners in scoring position, which equates to an average of .170, which is pretty bad considering how many innings were played and how many times runners were in scoring position. Then if we look at the previous 7 games, the series against the Rangers (away series) and Colorado it seems like the Jays have completely flipped over completely going 15/42, which translates to an average of .357 yeah thats more than two times better than before. Now whats even more surprising about this is that Bautista is still swinging at bad pitches and Arencibia is still playing in his terrible 'swing at whatever the fuck I feel like' approach, meaning two of our high output hitters aren't hitting well and we're still doing this well.
Now this outcome was nice but not terribly surprising when they knocked the Rangers down a rung and the reason for this was because they were in a slump and had lost 4 games before they came to face Toronto. On the other hand the Rockies series was much more impressive for a few reasons, first being that the Rockies were on a winning streak hitting very well leading up to their games against the Jays, second reason is that like the hitters of the Rockies the pitchers all season have been playing MUCH better than they were expected too, as could be seen in the very close first game with Jorge De La Rosa on the mound against Josh Johnson. The third and final reason is because our starting pitchers have turned it around, as the starters for these 7 games all limited the opponents to 2 runners per game and 10 hits over the entire game, this as well was done by only 3 of our start of the season starters (Dickey, Buerhle and Johnson) in addition to Chien-Ming Wang and Esmil Rogers, both of which haven't started in a long time and the former not having played in the majors for years..
Now the most impressive one was Josh Johnson's return where he went 7.1 innings, striking out 10 and only allowing 5 hits and no runs, which is vintage Josh Johnson and what we were seeing in spring training. And this doesn't seem to be going down anytime soon as like I've said several times they have several players on the mend and likely to return soon, especially Kyle Drabek and Drew Hutchinson. Jose Reyes as well has played in one rehab game so far and went 3-5 in the first game and is moving up to a AAA start within the next couple days and could very well be back by the start/middle of next week. Now what does this mean? Better defence and better offence at the shortstop position, not to knock Munenori Kawasaki, and in addition we will have our true lead off hitter back despite Melky doing a have decent job (Reyes is just at a much more elite level). So for Jays fans out there keep tuned in because if the Jays can continue to play at this rate they will be in an exceptional position given that their next few series are against other AL East teams.
-Eric
Saturday, June 15, 2013
Bird Watch: Some Changes
Ok so there have been some important developments both good and bad on each of the 3 birds recently from returning/soon to return injured players, good outings from unexpected players and optioning players back to the minors. Well as usual we'll separate it out into 3 sections one for each team, and we'll go at it alphabetically.
Baltimore:
So the biggest change in their roster lately has been sending Kevin Gausman back to the minors, now this isn't a huge surprise as he's had a bit of trouble adjusting to the majors, now he hasn't been horrible or anything but he hasn't stellar either and with the depth they have in starters it's not a terrible idea to send him back to work things out and bring up another starter to gamble on (Jake Arrieta in this case). In addition their replacement for Wei Yin Chen, Freddy Garcia, has actually been playing pretty well (that is for how he usually plays) and is holding his own against some good offence from the AL East. Now while their pitching luck just never seems to run out their offence has begun cooling down, Chris Davis has been cooling down a bit, which is kind of what we come to expect of him, though not as often as he has become a whole different offensive player. You can see this just in the box scores as more than the last week of games for them has rendered only 4 or less runs scored and a good majority of these games are being won by only 1-2 runs, which seems to indicate their returning to what they did during the 2012 season, winning extremely close games all the time. In terms of the upcoming future they have a bit of an up and down schedule with a couple more games against Boston now then a series against Detroit, but then they take on Toronto and Cleveland before returning to face the Yankees. So from that it would seem they may need to right their offence sooner rather than later since they have some tough competition and most of their upcoming series are against division rivals.
St. Louis:
Once again the Cardinals are still at the top of the MLB and still by a fair distance. Now one notable move they've made was sending down Michael Wacha in order to make room for Jake Westbrook as he just game off the DL and pitched a game recently. Now while Westbrook is obviously owed more money and the Cardinals thus have more reason to get him on the mound I'm not sure it was the best of ideas to send Wacha down. The reason for this is because this would have been a good time to get him some more experience in the majors since the future of Chris Carpenter as a starter is still in flux and Westbrook's skill has been on the decline and who knows how much longer he'll be a viable starter. Now theres no use crying over spilt milk so we'll all just have to take this as it is.Though they had a bit of a hiccup over the last 3 games since they haven't been giving much run support as these games ended in a loss 1-5, win 2-1 and loss 4-5 respectively with the first 2 games against the Mets and the last against the Marlins who both have pretty terrible offences. Now I don't expect this trend to continue but it's something to note considering how tight the race for first in the NL Central is between the Pirates, Reds and the Cardinals.
Toronto:
Not much new since my last post on them, their average with runners in scoring position is still crap in most games, J.P. Arencibia is still killing our chances at runs as he gets out at the most inopportune times and the back end of the batting order isn't doing much hitting wise. Now I can't completely apply this to Friday's game and thats because the team went 3 for 5 with runners in scoring position, the middle infield (Bonifacio and Kawasaki) made 3 great double plays over the game and there weren't many left on base to begin with. Though J.P. still didn't do anything different as he left the most people on base and struck out once as well, despite being moved down to the 7th spot in the order and unfortunately Bautista swung at some pretty crappy pitches as well and didn't get on base once. Now one of the new problems that has come up is just that, Bautista. He's been using worse and worse plate discipline lately and his childish actions of getting pissed at umpires isn't helping him or the team at all (it's probably making it worse for him as I'm sure Umps don't take kindly to that shit) and it's sad because we've got some potential future stars in guys like Rasmus and Lawrie but our senior who's supposed to be setting a good example is Bautista. Overall someone needs to smack him upside the head and tell him to calm the fuck down because he SHOULD be playing at the same rate that Encarnacion is playing at, that's what his usual play looks like. On the positive side Buerhle continues to string together quality start after quality start, which was surprising since it was against the Rangers hefty offence and at their home run friendly home stadium and the fact that their starting Lind now against lefties now is great since he's been hitting the ball all over the place lately. Now there is one thing I wanted to bring up involving the Jays, I recently read an article on a Blue Jays news site saying that no one was to blame for their recent struggles, now I don't completely agree with this I realize that pitching coach Pete Walker is doing a good job, despite what you see with Dickey, because Buerhle is throwing quality outings, Johnson has been half decent and all the new starters being slotted in that Walker has to work on have been terrific for at least 2 or more starts. Gibbons I don't think can be blamed too much here as well since he's juggled the lineup every way he can to light up our hitters and got the Bonifacio-Kawasaki pair to take some defensive lessons from Roberto Alomar. On the other hand I DO believe that some blame has to be placed on the shoulders of hitting coach Chad Mottola, now there are specific reasons for this. First being that the Jays have been extremely inconsistent in terms of hitting with runners in scoring position (a lot of the time with poor plate discipline) then Secondly is Bautista and Arencibia hitting as terrible as they are. Now some may not think much of this but it's a hitting coaches responsibility to talk to hitters when they've hit slumps to help correct the way they are doing things and get them back on track. Now if they continue playing like they did on Friday I will take that first point back but the second stuff is something that he needs to take action on NOW, Baustista's attitude in my opinion will eventually become toxic and cause problems for the entire team and it's causing him to make bad judgement at the plate (and more than likely umpires aren't cutting him as much slack). Now Arencibia has been always like this but there was an article that had an interview with him basically saying to improve he just stopped caring about striking out, now this is something an idiot would do because NO player out there can just swing at whatever the fuck he feels like and expect to come out ahead, I mean his on base percentage is almost the same as his average (which is extremely low as is). Basically in my opinion Mottola needs to correct both of these players way of thinking for the betterment of the team and maybe then we can start improving as we have pitchers coming back soon and Reyes' return on the horizon.
-Eric
Baltimore:
So the biggest change in their roster lately has been sending Kevin Gausman back to the minors, now this isn't a huge surprise as he's had a bit of trouble adjusting to the majors, now he hasn't been horrible or anything but he hasn't stellar either and with the depth they have in starters it's not a terrible idea to send him back to work things out and bring up another starter to gamble on (Jake Arrieta in this case). In addition their replacement for Wei Yin Chen, Freddy Garcia, has actually been playing pretty well (that is for how he usually plays) and is holding his own against some good offence from the AL East. Now while their pitching luck just never seems to run out their offence has begun cooling down, Chris Davis has been cooling down a bit, which is kind of what we come to expect of him, though not as often as he has become a whole different offensive player. You can see this just in the box scores as more than the last week of games for them has rendered only 4 or less runs scored and a good majority of these games are being won by only 1-2 runs, which seems to indicate their returning to what they did during the 2012 season, winning extremely close games all the time. In terms of the upcoming future they have a bit of an up and down schedule with a couple more games against Boston now then a series against Detroit, but then they take on Toronto and Cleveland before returning to face the Yankees. So from that it would seem they may need to right their offence sooner rather than later since they have some tough competition and most of their upcoming series are against division rivals.
St. Louis:
Once again the Cardinals are still at the top of the MLB and still by a fair distance. Now one notable move they've made was sending down Michael Wacha in order to make room for Jake Westbrook as he just game off the DL and pitched a game recently. Now while Westbrook is obviously owed more money and the Cardinals thus have more reason to get him on the mound I'm not sure it was the best of ideas to send Wacha down. The reason for this is because this would have been a good time to get him some more experience in the majors since the future of Chris Carpenter as a starter is still in flux and Westbrook's skill has been on the decline and who knows how much longer he'll be a viable starter. Now theres no use crying over spilt milk so we'll all just have to take this as it is.Though they had a bit of a hiccup over the last 3 games since they haven't been giving much run support as these games ended in a loss 1-5, win 2-1 and loss 4-5 respectively with the first 2 games against the Mets and the last against the Marlins who both have pretty terrible offences. Now I don't expect this trend to continue but it's something to note considering how tight the race for first in the NL Central is between the Pirates, Reds and the Cardinals.
Toronto:
Not much new since my last post on them, their average with runners in scoring position is still crap in most games, J.P. Arencibia is still killing our chances at runs as he gets out at the most inopportune times and the back end of the batting order isn't doing much hitting wise. Now I can't completely apply this to Friday's game and thats because the team went 3 for 5 with runners in scoring position, the middle infield (Bonifacio and Kawasaki) made 3 great double plays over the game and there weren't many left on base to begin with. Though J.P. still didn't do anything different as he left the most people on base and struck out once as well, despite being moved down to the 7th spot in the order and unfortunately Bautista swung at some pretty crappy pitches as well and didn't get on base once. Now one of the new problems that has come up is just that, Bautista. He's been using worse and worse plate discipline lately and his childish actions of getting pissed at umpires isn't helping him or the team at all (it's probably making it worse for him as I'm sure Umps don't take kindly to that shit) and it's sad because we've got some potential future stars in guys like Rasmus and Lawrie but our senior who's supposed to be setting a good example is Bautista. Overall someone needs to smack him upside the head and tell him to calm the fuck down because he SHOULD be playing at the same rate that Encarnacion is playing at, that's what his usual play looks like. On the positive side Buerhle continues to string together quality start after quality start, which was surprising since it was against the Rangers hefty offence and at their home run friendly home stadium and the fact that their starting Lind now against lefties now is great since he's been hitting the ball all over the place lately. Now there is one thing I wanted to bring up involving the Jays, I recently read an article on a Blue Jays news site saying that no one was to blame for their recent struggles, now I don't completely agree with this I realize that pitching coach Pete Walker is doing a good job, despite what you see with Dickey, because Buerhle is throwing quality outings, Johnson has been half decent and all the new starters being slotted in that Walker has to work on have been terrific for at least 2 or more starts. Gibbons I don't think can be blamed too much here as well since he's juggled the lineup every way he can to light up our hitters and got the Bonifacio-Kawasaki pair to take some defensive lessons from Roberto Alomar. On the other hand I DO believe that some blame has to be placed on the shoulders of hitting coach Chad Mottola, now there are specific reasons for this. First being that the Jays have been extremely inconsistent in terms of hitting with runners in scoring position (a lot of the time with poor plate discipline) then Secondly is Bautista and Arencibia hitting as terrible as they are. Now some may not think much of this but it's a hitting coaches responsibility to talk to hitters when they've hit slumps to help correct the way they are doing things and get them back on track. Now if they continue playing like they did on Friday I will take that first point back but the second stuff is something that he needs to take action on NOW, Baustista's attitude in my opinion will eventually become toxic and cause problems for the entire team and it's causing him to make bad judgement at the plate (and more than likely umpires aren't cutting him as much slack). Now Arencibia has been always like this but there was an article that had an interview with him basically saying to improve he just stopped caring about striking out, now this is something an idiot would do because NO player out there can just swing at whatever the fuck he feels like and expect to come out ahead, I mean his on base percentage is almost the same as his average (which is extremely low as is). Basically in my opinion Mottola needs to correct both of these players way of thinking for the betterment of the team and maybe then we can start improving as we have pitchers coming back soon and Reyes' return on the horizon.
-Eric
Tuesday, June 11, 2013
Bird Watch: They Just Keep Streaming Along
So not much has changed in the past couple weeks for the 3 bird teams. The Cardinals continue to dominate, the Orioles are continuing their usual pace keeping them in the running for a playoff spot and the Jays are winning a decent amount of games but doing it with fairly poor offence.
Now the expanded version? Well for the Cardinals and the Orioles there isn't really one. When looking at the Cardinals their pitching and hitting has been as dominant as ever, even so much as to score 10 runs against Cincinnati in their last game and considering how well thought off the Reds are that is an accomplishment in and of itself. On the Orioles front we are seeing their same method of winning, pulling out older pitchers and flipping them into at least semi-reliable starters and backing them with their killer offence, specifically composed of Adam Jones, Nick Markakis and Manny Machado (though I'd be an idiot to say that the rest of the team isn't doing anything hitting wise). Their pace of winning will easily place them at or near a playoff spot with ease and if the Yankees and Red Sox let up in their performance even a little bit the Orioles will over take them, not much breathing room is being given to those at the top in the AL East.
Now on the Blue Jays side there is a little more to it, most fans just look at the results of each game, see a decent number of runs scored and a win then think 'HEY, our team is playing well!'. However they couldn't be more wrong about that. If you were to look at one stat you would discover that the Jays wins haven't been all that clean or good on the offensive side. Now what stat is that? Well its the teams batting avg with runnings in scoring position. Now defines a 'runner in scoring position' is when a runner is at 2nd base or 3rd and could potentially be driven in by any type of hit. Now if you look at the last series against Texas and the latest game against the White Sox you will see that the Jays have had an avg with RISP of 1/1, 2/17, 2/7 and 1/11. So in essence their not hitting the ball when it counts, which is a problem because a good deal of these games can be close in score an if the team was to make it to the playoffs I can guarantee that close wouldn't cut it in facing teams like the Cardinals or the Tigers, especially considering how good their pitching has been. Not to mention having J.P. Arencibia in the dead centre of the batting order has pretty much guaranteed an out for the other team with his TERRIBLE plate discipline and since our back end of the order isn't that strong at the plate, what with Lawrie and Reyes injured, they are all more or less fairly easy outs as well (their plate discipline isn't all that great either). So basically fans need to re-evaluate what they think is the Jays playing well.
What we can draw from this is that the Cardinals and the Orioles are pretty much a shoe in for a spot in the playoffs, though at current situation the Orioles are more likely to make it through the Wild Card. The other thing is that unless there is an improvement in offence for the Jays they can kiss their playoff dreams for this year good bye.
-Eric
Now the expanded version? Well for the Cardinals and the Orioles there isn't really one. When looking at the Cardinals their pitching and hitting has been as dominant as ever, even so much as to score 10 runs against Cincinnati in their last game and considering how well thought off the Reds are that is an accomplishment in and of itself. On the Orioles front we are seeing their same method of winning, pulling out older pitchers and flipping them into at least semi-reliable starters and backing them with their killer offence, specifically composed of Adam Jones, Nick Markakis and Manny Machado (though I'd be an idiot to say that the rest of the team isn't doing anything hitting wise). Their pace of winning will easily place them at or near a playoff spot with ease and if the Yankees and Red Sox let up in their performance even a little bit the Orioles will over take them, not much breathing room is being given to those at the top in the AL East.
Now on the Blue Jays side there is a little more to it, most fans just look at the results of each game, see a decent number of runs scored and a win then think 'HEY, our team is playing well!'. However they couldn't be more wrong about that. If you were to look at one stat you would discover that the Jays wins haven't been all that clean or good on the offensive side. Now what stat is that? Well its the teams batting avg with runnings in scoring position. Now defines a 'runner in scoring position' is when a runner is at 2nd base or 3rd and could potentially be driven in by any type of hit. Now if you look at the last series against Texas and the latest game against the White Sox you will see that the Jays have had an avg with RISP of 1/1, 2/17, 2/7 and 1/11. So in essence their not hitting the ball when it counts, which is a problem because a good deal of these games can be close in score an if the team was to make it to the playoffs I can guarantee that close wouldn't cut it in facing teams like the Cardinals or the Tigers, especially considering how good their pitching has been. Not to mention having J.P. Arencibia in the dead centre of the batting order has pretty much guaranteed an out for the other team with his TERRIBLE plate discipline and since our back end of the order isn't that strong at the plate, what with Lawrie and Reyes injured, they are all more or less fairly easy outs as well (their plate discipline isn't all that great either). So basically fans need to re-evaluate what they think is the Jays playing well.
What we can draw from this is that the Cardinals and the Orioles are pretty much a shoe in for a spot in the playoffs, though at current situation the Orioles are more likely to make it through the Wild Card. The other thing is that unless there is an improvement in offence for the Jays they can kiss their playoff dreams for this year good bye.
-Eric
Thursday, June 6, 2013
Bird Watch: Progress? What Progress? and More Prospects
Well in terms of the last week for the Cardinals and the Blue Jays it's been a mixed bag for Toronto and nothing but good news for the Cardinals. The Cards continue to dominate baseball and for some reason all of their pitching prospects they call up just begin to succeed in a big way right off the bat, where as the Jays prospects have a couple outings of positive pitching then kinda collapse. Now the one thing this speaks volumes about is the pitcher development crew in St. Louis, just like Tampa Bay they are top notch. I mean nearly every one of their pitchers called up in the last 2-3 years have been fantastic. Especially when you look at guys like Jaimie Garcia, Lance Lynn, Shelby Miller, Trevor Rosenthal and now Michael Wacha. The Jays on the other hand have been calling up every prospect or AAA pitcher that is showing positive signs in hopes of turning just one or two good outings for the team, though guys like Chad Jenkins have had prolonged success and with a good chunk of our starting vanguard returning within a month or so theres hope for the pitching (McGowan, Drabek and Hutchison).
So again there isn't honestly much to say about the Cardinals, their prospects they've called up to replace their injured starting rotation have been performing as expected or better, sitting them still with the best record in baseball. And considering how much work goes into properly developing pitchers as they go through the minor leagues I tip my hat to them. Now so far Michael Wacha has only had 2 starts, 1 stellar and 1 not so great, though both ended up loses for him. Though just like in the case of Gausman with the Orioles you've got to look closer at the stats, overall he's only walked 1 batter, which is usually something struggling rookies have problems with, keeping the ball in the strike zone. But if Wacha doesn't have that issue chances are when he gets a feel for major league hitters (which should happen soon) he'll become a pretty dominant force in that rotation. Another thing that tells you that you can't just let a score line explain everything for you is that he had a large amount of fly balls (12) in his bad outing, 5 more than his debut, and of course whether those get turned into outs has more to do with the outfielders defensive prowess than his pitching ability. Now am I talking out of ass about that? Well with a 2.72 FIP and a 3.32 xFIP, which are field independent pitching stats basically indicating what his ERA is estimated at if fielding needs were taken out of the picture, we can see he got quite a bit unlucky in that last outing and if he continues to pitch the way he did in his debut he'll be able to rebound no problem. Added to the fact that his next start is against the Mets and then they face the Cubs and Marlins says he'll be able to work out any problems since the Cardinals will be playing pretty crappy teams.
Now the Blue Jays, just when you see one glimmer of hope you notice another stain appear. Now what I'm referring to is the great performances by Josh Johnson and R.A Dickey the last 2 days, both of these pitchers did fantastic. However their offence was asleep again, in the first game they were facing Lincecum a guy who doesn't really have his best stuff this year and has had problems with his control, someone who a strong offence should pounce on. But we were only able to score 1 run and get 5 hits over the game and then there was that throwing error by Edwin that cost the winning run. Though I just think that was a poor choice to put Edwin at 3rd to begin with, I mean theres a reason fans called him E5 when he was with Cincinnati. Though I can't blame him because he was both him and Cabrera were good at the plate, meanwhile Bautista was reaching out of the zone for bad pitches and Arencibia was striking out at an alarming rate as usual and the rest of the team wasn't doing such a great job with their plate discipline either. Now theres a couple things that bothered me when I heard baseball analysts and news reporters say, the first being that apparently J.P Arencibia talked with a reporter and said that he just stopped caring about strikeouts because thinking about them was messing up his approach at the plate. Now thats all well and done if your not striking out nearly 50% of the time, the other thing that scared me a bit was when Buck Martines said, during a broadcast, that Munenori Kawasaki has the most average number of pitches seen each at bat for the entire team with 4.8. Now why is this disturbing? Well thats because it means that at most our hitters are seeing 5 pitchers per appearance, thats not even enough to get a strike out or walk when the count is full. This means that some of our hitters, including Arencibia, are swinging at poor pitches, not being selective on when they swing and are getting themselves out in a hurry. Everyone just needs to watch one of Kawasaki's at bats, he may not have power but he's very selective at the plate, he makes the pitchers throw him lots of pitches (I've seen times where he gets 10-12 pitches in one at bat), which will no doubt tire the pitcher out. Same goes for yesterday's game, Dickey pitched great but it was over shadowed by the poor offence, their avg with RISP was 2 for 7, which again is very poor considering who is on the team. and despite the score saying 4 runs were scored, that was all done in one inning and most that got on base were from walks or hitting from the less power guys int he line up (Dickey, DeRosa and Lind). The pitching is getting better but the offence now needs to get it's shit together again, like I always say if they can get above .500 in a hurry and stay within striking distance of first they can make the playoffs (5-7 games) but they still need to DO that. So here's hoping.
-Eric
So again there isn't honestly much to say about the Cardinals, their prospects they've called up to replace their injured starting rotation have been performing as expected or better, sitting them still with the best record in baseball. And considering how much work goes into properly developing pitchers as they go through the minor leagues I tip my hat to them. Now so far Michael Wacha has only had 2 starts, 1 stellar and 1 not so great, though both ended up loses for him. Though just like in the case of Gausman with the Orioles you've got to look closer at the stats, overall he's only walked 1 batter, which is usually something struggling rookies have problems with, keeping the ball in the strike zone. But if Wacha doesn't have that issue chances are when he gets a feel for major league hitters (which should happen soon) he'll become a pretty dominant force in that rotation. Another thing that tells you that you can't just let a score line explain everything for you is that he had a large amount of fly balls (12) in his bad outing, 5 more than his debut, and of course whether those get turned into outs has more to do with the outfielders defensive prowess than his pitching ability. Now am I talking out of ass about that? Well with a 2.72 FIP and a 3.32 xFIP, which are field independent pitching stats basically indicating what his ERA is estimated at if fielding needs were taken out of the picture, we can see he got quite a bit unlucky in that last outing and if he continues to pitch the way he did in his debut he'll be able to rebound no problem. Added to the fact that his next start is against the Mets and then they face the Cubs and Marlins says he'll be able to work out any problems since the Cardinals will be playing pretty crappy teams.
Now the Blue Jays, just when you see one glimmer of hope you notice another stain appear. Now what I'm referring to is the great performances by Josh Johnson and R.A Dickey the last 2 days, both of these pitchers did fantastic. However their offence was asleep again, in the first game they were facing Lincecum a guy who doesn't really have his best stuff this year and has had problems with his control, someone who a strong offence should pounce on. But we were only able to score 1 run and get 5 hits over the game and then there was that throwing error by Edwin that cost the winning run. Though I just think that was a poor choice to put Edwin at 3rd to begin with, I mean theres a reason fans called him E5 when he was with Cincinnati. Though I can't blame him because he was both him and Cabrera were good at the plate, meanwhile Bautista was reaching out of the zone for bad pitches and Arencibia was striking out at an alarming rate as usual and the rest of the team wasn't doing such a great job with their plate discipline either. Now theres a couple things that bothered me when I heard baseball analysts and news reporters say, the first being that apparently J.P Arencibia talked with a reporter and said that he just stopped caring about strikeouts because thinking about them was messing up his approach at the plate. Now thats all well and done if your not striking out nearly 50% of the time, the other thing that scared me a bit was when Buck Martines said, during a broadcast, that Munenori Kawasaki has the most average number of pitches seen each at bat for the entire team with 4.8. Now why is this disturbing? Well thats because it means that at most our hitters are seeing 5 pitchers per appearance, thats not even enough to get a strike out or walk when the count is full. This means that some of our hitters, including Arencibia, are swinging at poor pitches, not being selective on when they swing and are getting themselves out in a hurry. Everyone just needs to watch one of Kawasaki's at bats, he may not have power but he's very selective at the plate, he makes the pitchers throw him lots of pitches (I've seen times where he gets 10-12 pitches in one at bat), which will no doubt tire the pitcher out. Same goes for yesterday's game, Dickey pitched great but it was over shadowed by the poor offence, their avg with RISP was 2 for 7, which again is very poor considering who is on the team. and despite the score saying 4 runs were scored, that was all done in one inning and most that got on base were from walks or hitting from the less power guys int he line up (Dickey, DeRosa and Lind). The pitching is getting better but the offence now needs to get it's shit together again, like I always say if they can get above .500 in a hurry and stay within striking distance of first they can make the playoffs (5-7 games) but they still need to DO that. So here's hoping.
-Eric
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