MLB prospects from Cuba are trapped by a dream

There isn’t always a pot of gold at the end of a rainbow.

Clayton Kershaw Has a Home Run Problem

A few innings later, he chased the Dodgers ace with another homer, his second of the night — and, more distressingly for the pitcher, Kershaw’s fourth allowed of the game (a career worst) and 17th allowed of the season (also a career worst, already, in mid-June). Only six pitchers have surrendered more homers this season than Kershaw, who — despite maintaining a top-five ERA, K%, and BB% in the NL — is exhibiting an unprecedented problem. In 263 starts before 2017, Kershaw ...

Phillies Designate Jeanmar Gomez, Michael Saunders

The Phillies made a rather dramatic roster move today, announcing that righty Jeanmar Gomez and outfielder Michael Saunders have been designated for assignment. Lefty Hoby Milner and outfielder Cameron Perkins have had their contracts purchased.

While there were never realistic hopes of contention in 2017, the Phillies’ worst-in-baseball 22-and-46 record nevertheless represents a considerable disappointment. These two veterans are hardly the only poor performers, but their pronounced ...

The Brewers Are Winning by Being the Anti-Astros – The Ringer

A bunch of good stuff in this article.

“Depth isn’t often talked about,” Stearns says. “But I think we’re seeing throughout the industry how important depth can be within an organization, and certainly it’s something that we’ve talked about internally. And as we look at our roster this year, one of the really rewarding things for us and for our organization as a whole is how many different guys have contributed.”

We can quantify depth. Adam Guttridge and David Ogren, cofounders ...

Baseball’s pressing question: What happens to a sport when nothing happens?

Over the course of three minutes shy of four hours, 90 batters came to the plate and only 40 of them put the ball in play, or once every six minutes. Nine pitchers, all of whom hit 93 to 99 mph on the radar gun, including L.A. starter Clayton Kershaw, paraded to the mound to strike out a National League–record 42 batters. Nobody managed a hit in 13 tries with runners in scoring position. All three runs scored on solo home runs.

Unlike most sports, baseball’s beauty is not only in its ...

Padres manager calls out Cubs’ Anthony Rizzo after home plate collision with Austin Hedges

San Diego Padres manager Andy Green did little to conceal his feelings about the home-plate collision that knocked Austin Hedges out of Monday night’s 3-2 loss to the Chicago Cubs, calling Anthony Rizzo’s hit on the Padres catcher “a cheap shot” in his postgame news conference.

“I think you look at that play and it’s a fairly egregious violation of the rule,’’ Green said. “The rule exists to protect the catcher. The safety of the catcher is more in jeopardy now when you have the rule to ...

Primer Dugout (and link of the day) 6-20-2017

Washington Herald, June 20, 1917:

Ban Johnson, sweating under the published announcement that the Washington American League club was about to be removed, probably to Brooklyn, has denied that such a thought has entered his mind or the minds of his club owners.

In spite of Johnson’s statements, it may be stated with some authority that negotiations for the removal of the club not only have been started, but probably will be carried out next winter.

This is at least the second mention I’ve seen ...

Cody Bellinger tied for fastest to 20 homers | MLB.com

Wow!

FiveThirtyEight: Aaron Judge Is The Most Out-Of-Nowhere MVP Candidate Since Ichiro

All Rise!

If Judge does end up winning that piece of individual hardware, he’d be its most unheralded winner ever. Not only has no single-season WAR leader ever gone into a season with fewer than zero career WAR before, but no eventual MVP has ever entered the year with fewer WAR to his name than Judge’s -0.4 mark.

The only MVPs who started from a place similarly close to nowhere were Ichiro Suzuki, who won the award in 2001 in his first year in the (American) majors — he played in Japan ...

Tigers debate lively baseballs, stolen signs

In the past, when the technology wasn’t as sharp, when there wasn’t HD capability and every facial tick or expression could be seen from the center-field camera, stealing signs was a respected art in the game.

Technology has taken the art out of it.

“It’s not about gamesmanship anymore,” Verlander said. “It used to be, if you got my sign, good for you. When you are standing on second base, before HD and all of that, you couldn’t see specific signs the catcher was throwing down ...

OMNICHATTER was socially relevant, and so was my rebellion against it, for June 19, 2017

Yankees prospect Gleyber Torres injured | MLB.com

Freak injury.

Cleveland Indians’ Terry Francona on lefty Andrew Miller: “I think I pitched him too much’’ | cleveland.com

How can he stop?

Peter Gammons: Agents, scouts, prospects, changing trends, and the MLB Draft - GammonsDaily.com

Gammons on changes to the draft and the Red Sox approach to pitching prospects.

Putting the future in focus: The blueprint for baseball in 20 years

In 20 years, all players will be monitored to an intense degree. Heart rate and brain function will be watched in several ways, including through the bloodstream, and will detect when the stress level, among other levels, is too high. The monitors will determine when a player reaches failure capacity, which could reduce the risk of injury and alert a performance risk. It’s a paradox: Players are bigger, stronger and fitter today, but they get hurt more often. There will be far more healthy ...

Five young pitchers who are aces in the making. | Sports on Earth

Is there a new Sports On Earth jinx?

Ray is tied for second in the NL in strikeouts, but this now comes with a 2.62 ERA heading into the weekend, trailing only Scherzer and Clayton Kershaw. Ray has also given up only eight home runs on the season. At one point, he even had a scoreless streak going of 27 2/3 innings, a mark that trailed only Brandon Webb in franchise history.

Goold: New Cards coach Shildt keeping Kissell’s ideas alive | St. Louis Cardinals | stltoday.com

Each of the Double-A Springfield managers before Shildt had received the little black book with “GK” on the cover. Ron “Pop” Warner, now in the majors as an assistant coach, keeps his in a safe. He returns to it to be reminded of George, or when he finds himself repeating words he heard from George as a player. (“Being a baseball player means you need to be a sponge,” Warner repeated recently. “If you’re not, you’re a rock, and you sink. We can’t be rocks.”) There are ...

Have the Rockies Found Answers at Altitude? | FanGraphs Baseball

Just when you think you’ve got it all figured out life will throw you a curveball.

Primer Dugout (and link of the day) 6-19-2017

Pittsburgh Press, June 19, 1917:

WEST PENN UMPIRE NOT THROWN INTO THE CREEK

In the published account of the baseball game played between the Irwin and Pitcairn clubs in the West Penn league Saturday at the former place, it was stated that Umpire Scanlin was thrown into a creek by the fans.

Although there was a disturbance at the close of the game during which the Irwin fans rushed upon the field, no violence was done to the umpire…

I’ve done a bit of umpiring before and I know how difficult it ...

The Babe Ruth Epidemic in Baseball – Our Game

The Babe was a one man home run boom.

The Yankees’ skid pushed Aroldis Chapman’s return up | New York Post

In fact, Chapman said before the game that if the team hadn’t been immersed in a losing streak, he would’ve perhaps taken another minor league rehab game instead of flying out West for the one contest. “But I am here now,” he concluded.

“If you are a player being paid to play, and you are eligible, you show up,” Girardi said. “How many divisions are lost by one game? How many playoff spots have not been guaranteed by one game? It’s not ideal to be all the way out here, I get ...

What are the odds the Pirates trade Andrew McCutchen? Probably good | FOX Sports

Rosenthal’s latest.

Chicago Cubs’ Joe Maddon invests in resting stars now to win big later - Chicago Cubs Blog- ESPN

“‘Patience’ is a really big word right now and keeping a clear head about what’s going on and how you’ve done [it] in the past,” Maddon explained before Sunday’s victory in Pittsburgh. “I do believe having rested, healthy people by August matters a lot. I have to be more mindful of that for another six weeks. I have to be mindful of not pushing anyone over their limits. ... If you do, right now, I promise you, you will be toast by Aug. 15. You will not see that wonderful finish ...

Bronson Arroyo admits comeback could be over | MLB.com

“I think my arm is probably going to be checkmate,” Arroyo said. “I’ve got some tears in my shoulder that we’ve been masking with cortisone for a while. It held up for the first three months. I got another shot, the second has disappeared after like three weeks.”
...
“The elbow—Tommy John [surgery] is like a chain out on a bicycle. It doesn’t matter how bad the chain is, if the rest of the bike is OK, you change out the chain and you continue to move forward,” Arroyo said. “But a shoulder is ...

SABR 47: Research Presentations | Society for American Baseball Research

It’s just around the corner. Here’s the schedule of presentations including quite a few from longtime Primates.

Beisbol Experience MLB 50-man interview

Interesting stuff here.

The Game You Knew Is Gone - WSJ

I guess he liked it.

‘Philosophy,’ wrote Ludwig Wittgenstein, “is a battle against the bewitchment of our intelligence by means of language.” Baseball has found its Wittgenstein.

Or, more precisely, another Wittgenstein. Keith Law, a senior baseball writer and analyst for ESPN, is a member of the growing cohort of exasperated baseball analysts who persuasively argue against what they consider the bewitchment of the sport’s intelligence by outdated or ill-considered metrics.

OTP 19 June 2017: Bipartisan baseball: Dems best GOP, give trophy to wounded Scalise

The game at Nationals Park carried on a century-old bipartisan ritual, this one tinged with worry about Louisiana Rep. Steve Scalise and their determination to answer the attack by coming together in sport. Democrats won in an 11-2 blowout.

In a final flourish of bipartisan camaraderie for the night, Democratic Rep. Mike Doyle of Pennsylvania, his team’s manager, accepted the trophy, then gave it to his GOP counterpart, Rep. Joe Barton of Texas, to put in Scalise’s office on behalf of the ...

OMNICHATTER is your daddy now, for June 18, 2017

Matt Adams is showing he can hit lefties | MLB.com

What’s going to happen to Adams when Freeman comes back?

“I know that I hit lefties all the way up through the [Minor League levels],” Adams said. “Up here, it’s just been about getting everyday [at-bats] against them. That’s the nice thing here, knowing I’m going to be in there against a lefty or a righty. That confidence helps big time for sure.”