What to make of Jean Segura - Beyond the Box Score

Jean Segura under the microscope.

Baseball needs to adopt the loan system

Imagine a scenario in which the Orioles are in need of a left fielder, like this season began, but where they could borrow a player much closer to the majors than Joey Rickard. Maybe a veteran being forced out of his starting position (like Desmond Jennings), or a prospect who might have had a few call-ups, but was protected on the 40-man roster when the Rule-5 draft occurred.

For example, Rays outfielder Mikie Mahtook has shown major league competence, but was blocked by Brandon Guyer and ...

The Impact of Injuries on Player Valuation – The Hardball Times

I just skimmed the article but it doesn’t look like he’s factoring in the quality of the player. That’s a pretty big factor. Did I miss something?

As a field, player health in baseball is ripe with research opportunities. This article is historical in nature, but future research could take a predictive angle, projecting which players are most likely to get injured, which injuries are most harmful and how injured players are likely to recover and preform. This sort of analysis would enable teams ...

How will voters rob Mike Trout of the MVP this year?

It’s going to happen. I can feel it’s going to happen. And while I understand why it’s going to happen, we need to stop inventing reasons to elect someone other than Trout, the Angels’ brilliant center fielder. We are making ourselves look dumb.

Trout, 25, has been the best player in baseball for five seasons now, yet he has won only one MVP, finishing second three times. The reason to rob him this year — there’s always a reason, some new narrative — is that the Angels stink. As if that is ...

Who Was George Wright? « Our Game

The Wright brothers had become infatuated with baseball, too. Both had been exposed to the American game and played with verve on fields adjoining the cricket grounds at the Elysian Fields. “There were, of course,” George recalled in 1888, “other base ball dubs in existence in Brooklyn, notably the old Atlantics, Stars, Excelsiors, Enterprise, etc., but the real center of base ball was at Hoboken. Here there were located three grounds, where from six to eight clubs would play practice ...

Texas Rangers: After Jeff Banister is ejected, Rangers steal another late-inning win and, they hope, some Cowboys fans too | SportsDay

Ejection by Joe West put Banister on the sidelines. The Rangers’ magic number is three. Joe West continues to embarrass MLB.

Rangers manager Jeff Banister missed another bit of last-swing heroics from his playoff-bound club Monday night.
With Banister in exile after an ejection in the sixth inning, the Rangers came up with their specialty: a one-run win. Ian Desmond produced the third consecutive hit to start the ninth inning to drive in Elvis Andrus for a 3-2 victory.

The win cut the Rangers’ ...

Estrada masterful, Osuna shuts the door as Blue Jays fend off Seattle Mariners for crucial win | National Post

The Blue Jays aren’t done yet.

The Blue Jays needed a stopper. On this night, Marco Estrada and Roberto Osuna shared the job.

Dodgers beat Giants, cut magic number to 7 | MLB.com

Giants bullpen ruins pitchers duel.

OMNICHATTER 9-20-16

The Most Magical OMNICHATTER On Earth

Padres honor Yangervis Solarte’s late wife during loss to Rockies

Adam Rosales knew the ball was going out, and he knew how to celebrate the home run—with a tribute to his mourning teammate.

Rosales’ homer in the second inning was a small highlight in an otherwise tough day for San Diego. The Padres played with heavy hearts a day after Yangervis Solarte lost his wife, Yuliett, to cancer.

The 6-3 loss to the Colorado Rockies on Sunday was the least of their worries….

Rosales paid tribute to his teammate with a jump and a clap at home plate after his homer, ...

Despite injuries, the Indians aren’t panicking just yet. | Sports on Earth

At this point they are just breathing into paper bags and ordering anxiety meds.

The Dodgers’ Best Young Pitcher Is a Pickoff Master

Which takes us to what might be the most unfair thing about Urias: On top of everything else, he leads the league in pickoffs. Last week, Urias — who’s totaled only 72 innings in the majors — notched his sixth big league pickoff of 2016. No other pitcher has five. Urias had five pickoffs this season in Triple-A alone, despite allowing only 40 combined hits, walks, and hit by pitches in 45 frames. And according to data from Baseball Prospectus, he’d also displayed his talent for ...

Arizona Diamondbacks to cut ties with De Jon Watson

The Diamondbacks informed De Jon Watson, the club’s senior vice president of baseball operations, that he will not have his contract option picked up for 2017, the first of what could be several dominos to fall in leadership positions within the organization.

Though Chief Baseball Officer Tony La Russa made the announcement Sunday evening, he stressed that the Watson dismissal in no way clarified La Russa’s own situation for next season, nor that of General Manager Dave Stewart.

Both La ...

Sporcle: MLB Players, By Statue

24 statues, 5 minutes. Go!

Reds offense good enough to win now

On the year, the offense is nothing special. The Reds are No. 9 in NL runs scored. But as anyone still following the once-miserable Redlegs can attest, it’s a different team from the first half.

The post-All-Star break Reds rank top-five in runs scored, having plated more runs than both the Chicago Cubs and the Los Angeles Dodgers.

Of course, runs scored is hardly a tell-all metric. But even a more granular look into the Reds offense reveals more evidence of the team’s ability to score ...

Mets playoff watch: Where they stand in postseason race | Newsday

Can the Mets hold on with this ragtag bunch?

With 13 games left on their schedule, the Mets (80-69) moved one game ahead of the San Francisco Giants at the top of the NL Wild Card standings with a 3-2 win over the Twins. The St. Louis Cardinals sit in third place, two games behind the Mets after a 3-0 win over the Giants on Sunday.

Rangers owners say if city builds them new stadium, old one can be stores or something | Field of Schemes

This is just insane. The current park is only 22 years old.

And this is just bizarre:

In an letter released Sunday on WFAA/Channel 8 Inside Texas Politics, Rangers managing partner Ray Davis said the team is working with the Baltimore-based Cordish Cos. to develop retail shops along the Randol Mill Road side of Globe Life Park: “It is the Rangers’ intent to preserve the beautiful exterior facade.”

So if the Texas Rangers owners get more than half a billion dollars in public money to ...

Joe Girardi manages by the book and it’s tanking Yankees’ season | New York Post

Binder talk? Really?

Girardi let Sabathia pitch to Ramirez. He also let Sabathia start the sixth inning. And Girardi elected to pitch to Ramirez again in the seventh — and Clippard surrendered the go-ahead home run.

Bad Binder decisions.

Goold: Cardinals running behind in wild-card race, on bases | St. Louis Cardinals | stltoday.com

This is silly. The Cardinals are 6th in runs scored in MLB. While it’s true a team should try to be great at every facet of the game, the Cardinals baserunning isn’t a real issue.

Rays’ Longoria answers questions with bounceback season | Tampa Bay Times

It’s better when the voices whisper but don’t yell.

“At the end of every year when the numbers don’t look like they have in the past, there are always questions of can you repeat it, are you still the player you were,” Longoria said.

“I’ve never been one to pay attention to what other people say. I don’t read a lot into what people write or listen to what people say.

“But there are always voices in your own head, and to be able to answer those questions to yourself is the most important ...

Constructing Heat Maps for AVG | Exploring Baseball Data with R

Heat maps for all my friends.

Primer Dugout (and link of the day) 9-19-2016

New York Sun, September 19, 1916:

The Giants gained another full line of trenches on the Polo Grounds yesterday and ran their September string of victories to a full dozen. Ferdie Schupp painted kalsomine over the Pirates by a score of 2 to 0 in the first tiff of a twin bill.
...
A young man from Dixie named Burleigh Grimes pitched a well regarded spitter at the Giants so skilfully in the second bout that they knocked it back for only three hits…the score was 1 to 1 when Will Klem, the bald ...

OTP 2016 Sep 19 - Race for the White House: The Greatest Circus on Earth

But is the volume of inches of news space and on-air minutes that are devoted to the U.S. presidential race internationally any longer justified?

I believe it isn’t. It is but a quaint habit by now.The near-interminable, grinding race for the White House has degenerated into a self-feeding media circus. Worse, the event has largely become a severe obstacle in global affairs.

Hanley Ramirez homers twice as Sox sweep Yanks | MLB.com

Porcello has 20 wins. Hanley has put the Red Sox on his back this week. When does the Panda get activated?

Ben Zobrist lived every ‘Sandlot’ fan’s dream and biked to Wrigley in his uniform | MLB.com

OK.

Trevor Bauer labels beat writer Paul Hoynes a “coward”

Saturday afternoon Carlos Carrasco suffered a fractured finger when his second pitch of the game was lined back up the middle. The injury almost certainly means his season over, a tough break for the pitcher and for the Cleveland Indians, whose starting rotation will also be without All-Star Danny Salazar the rest of the way. Paul Hoynes, Indians beat writer for the Cleveland Plain Dealer (and its internet arm, Cleveland.com), tweeted “Sept. 17: Remember the date because that’s when Indians’ ...

Baseball’s First 300-Game Winner was Also the Game’s First “Juicer”

In the August 13 game, Galvin played like a man possessed. “Old Jeems once more was a youngster full of fun, power and tricks,” the Pittsburgh Dispatch reported in its story headlined: “Galvin, the Great.”

Bonds, McGwire, A-Rod, and… Pud?

OMNICHATTER 9-19-16

The OMNICHATTER did not win a Emmy.

Stephen Colbert goes incognito at Cubs game as hot dog vendor - Chicago Tribune

How much did he make in tips?

Jacob deGrom leaves, as does Mets’ best route through playoffs | New York Post

More bad news for the Mets.

Instead, the Mets’ GM said Jacob deGrom had experienced renewed pain in his right elbow. DeGrom would not start Sunday for the first time since Sept. 1, as hoped. He almost certainly is done for the season, heading for an offseason surgery to relocate his ulnar nerve away from an area in which it is being compressed, likely by scar tissue.

DeGrom said doctors informed him the ligament — on which he already has had Tommy John surgery — was sound. The procedure ...