NL CENTRAL PREDICTATRON 2019

for all the years

dan maclaughlin keeps saying "you are going to love him saint louis! you are gonna LOVE him!"

he did it after 2 home runs in Spring Training, and predictatronably he did it after his first regular season HR

i just saw someone say that Yelich has a 42% HR/FB rate in Miller Park. is that right?!

lol brewers just IBB'd goldschmidt

down 5-9 in the 9th. i get it, but

i thought the brewers were cool

Maclaughlin just said “folks you’re gonna love him” as it went to the post-game crew

christian yelich is on fire

*shakes fist*

YELIIIIIICH

This might have been the greatest trade in Milwaukee Brewers history

only other players to HR in first 4 games:

Willie Mays, Mark McGwire, Nelson Cruz, Chris Davis and Trevor Story.

he's been absolutely on fire since like...august 2018?

And a walk-off double...He's obviously already clinched another MVP.

On base all 5 times

lolcubs

I don't remember the STL announcers being as annoying/repetitive as they are on the call for the Goldschmidt homers.

i am going to LOVE him in st louis!

you guys are REALLY not gonna make team threads? so weird

in this age of robot umpires, all sense of boundary has been erased and we just mingle around to different food stands, watching baseball

cubs scored 28 runs in the rangers series and still went 1-2

Opposite: Jays held the Tigers to 6 runs in 4 games (only 3 runs in the regulation 36 innings) and went 2-2.

33 pitches in the first for waino; 14 of them strikes : /

yadi is playing 3B

Says something for the Reds to give up two weekend home games soon against the Cardinals to play in Mexico. I do hope they break out the 'Los Rojos' uniforms they used last year.

With the injury to Hunter Greene, it just ads to the bad luck and ineptitude the Reds have had developing pitching. Reds have pretty bad luck drafting and developing starting pitching for decades, even just average ones.

They had one short window when they had Cueto, Bailey and Mike Leake (who was drafted and went straight to the big leagues) and other than that Brett Tomko (who was traded for Griffey) and not all that hot going back to the late 90s. I think the next best self drafted and developed starter by the Reds you have to go back to Tom Browning in the 80s.

There cannot be that many clubs that have done worse and this is the primary reason the Reds have been mostly terrible for 25+ years.

I picked those four guys as they had at least had a couple seasons as a league average starter. Still that is only 4 starting pitchers in like 30 years developed out of the draft! Not good.

Freddy Peralta today: 8 IP, 11 K, 0 BB. not bad

fire joe morgan maddon

Lindbergh on Yelich

https://www.theringer.com/mlb/2019/4/3/18293271/christian-yelich-milwaukee-brewers-mvp-regression

Reds slow start has to be causing some grumbles already in the front office and fan base, especially with FC Cincy absolutely packing the joint everytime they play and the Reds drawing like the Dayton Dragons.

https://www.cincinnati.com/story/sports/mlb/reds/2019/04/02/reds-set-new-low-attendance-record-great-american-ball-park/3339552002/

to be fair, the dayton dragons have sold out every single home game for like 20 years

haha, yeah! i went to a game there once, it was excellent

holy shit, there was a season highlight by bader just now, i'll try to post a clip when i see one. he played a machado hit to deep CF off the wall so perfectly, it was incredible. he grabbed it off the bounce with one fluid motion from glove to the throw, which was a perfect strong throw to 2B. the play would have been close, but no one was there to make it (should have been paul dejong but he wasn't covering because 99.999% of the time there's no chance to make that play in the first place.

yadi just passed curt flood and ken boyer for 8th place in career hits for the Cardinals.
some future Yadi trivia: wIth another 254 hits, he’ll pass Rogers Hornsby for 3rd all-time for the Cardinals in hits, with 2111. Could happen as early as late-2020 season, or early 2021 season.

If this were a renaissance painting what would it be called? pic.twitter.com/EroGuK7W69

— Sean Lahman (@seanlahman) April 7, 2019

is that clint hurdle trying to hold back puig? smh

One thing lost in the melee was that towering shot Josh Bell hit to center yesterday. That was a heck of a blast.

Derek Dietrich seems like a pretty nice waiver pickup for nothing, as it does seem he can hit a bit and at least stand in a few positions ok with a glove.

“Everybody In” includes Cubs limited partner Betsy DeVos. pic.twitter.com/NUbhw7oVSy

— Paul Sullivan (@PWSullivan) April 8, 2019

2-3x a year I put a Cards game on mlb.tv and say "CHRIST, IT'S McCARVER" before switching feeds.

KM, is Fowler going to lose his starting job? Need to know for the reverse fantasy team.

he should lose it, but he probably won't fully lose it until May. It's too bad, because even the version of Jose Martinez that isn't hitting well is probably better overall than Fowler (even though he's somehow even worse at fielding than Fowler), and if Tyler O'Neill ever gets a chance to figure out how to not strikeout 35% of the time he could be very good. but he's a veteran and everyone likes him and he has two years left on his contract, so. today on the broadcast, the announcers enthused about how fowler has been unlucky, and how he has the 3rd highest line drive rate in MLB at the moment. so people are looking for reasons to keep him in. if he manages to provide even a brief glimpse of a good string of at bats, he'll buy himself another month or two

i feel bad for fowler, he seems like a good guy and he had to deal with so much bullshit when he came over the the cardinals

cardinals are extending matt carpenter ('s contract)

Carpenter is solid, be handy if the DH were to happen in 2020-21.

Mythical NL cardinals DH spot is reserved for J. Martinez, imo

Trevor Richards threw a really nice game for the Fish tonight until they lost it on a couple of Great American bonus HRs in the bottom of the 8th for the Reds.

what a shocking development

Tyler Glasnow in Pittsburgh: 5.79 ERA, 5.8 BB/9, 71 ERA+
Tyler Glasnow in Tampa Bay: 3.34 ERA, 2.7 BB/9, 123 ERA+ pic.twitter.com/cGeEJSe0hh

— Baseball Reference (@baseball_ref) April 11, 2019

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5IlxnBiEsC4

as he intended, he made the highlight reel

Reds had an outfield of Matt Kemp in left, future first baseman Jesse Winker in CF and Puig in right. That has to be one of the slowest/worst coverage combos in left and center in the league. Winker is SLOW and cumbersome. Dude is like young Kent Hrbek.

http://www.fox19.com/resizer/74_mfplAMYmVzKQ2X21EDm0H_WA=/1200x600/arc-anglerfish-arc2-prod-raycom.s3.amazonaws.com/public/VE2QVWTTRJG6BOIW7QPACLY3WI.jpg

Puig is sporting one of these t-shirts on the Reuters article. Can't link picture.

https://www.reuters.com/article/baseball-mlb-cin-stl/reds-top-cardinals-in-mexico-earn-4th-straight-win-idUSMTZXEF4EXJFE3R

I was wondering why Puig was trending right now. I guess he needs that bobblehead money.

This piece on him on the LA Times today is pretty good:

https://www.latimes.com/sports/dodgers/la-sp-yasiel-puig-dodgers-legacy-reds-20190414-story.html

It says a lot about him that he was so reckless while with the Dodgers and has recently said he wasn't trying hard during his time there, whereas now with the Reds he is.

Red's running out a bizarro Spring Training split lineup tonight against Kershaw.

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/D4N9-PSW4AEoyF_.jpg:large

david ross is the new cubs manager

pirates have fired team president frank coonelly

It sucks he won't be on ESPN anymore.

what do we think about Ross on the Cubs? felt a little out of left field to me, but i don't follow them too closely.

Apparently everyone in baseball loves Ross. Definitely a cubs legend due to 2016 WS heroics. He was ok as a broadcaster/analyst, I guess.

Honestly, feels like the manager’s main impact on games is to just avoid doing incredibly dumb and unnecessary stuff. The rest is just serving as a figurehead for people like me to yell at when they’re frustrated at the organization for not better decisions years ago

supposedly maddon was thought (by the cubs) to be too much of a players' coach? it kinda seems like ross would be as well, especially when dealing with so many former teammates, but maybe not. that's the only drawback i can think of

there had been talks of the cubs possibly trading bryant or baez or contreras (or...) and i wonder if this hiring makes shedding any of those core players from the 2016 world series team less likely

i'd be surprised if it made any difference -- theo et al reserve that power for themselves and seem sufficiently unsentimental.

apparently kris bryant's service-time grievance is finally to be ruled on this week; if bryant wins, he'll become a free agent after next season.

hard to imagine Ross being a better manager than Maddon but I agree with y'all, it's probably not gonna make much of a difference. I mean the Brewers hire of Counsell worked out pretty well and that was someone I could easily see being too much of an "old-school baseball" sort of guy

we joked about mathenaging -- and matheny did not, in fact, seem very good at managing his bullpen or making strategic decisions -- but for me the fact that he played favorites and let assholes like bud norris shit on rookies daily is much more damaging.

playing basically every day for six months while travelling all over the continent is pretty hard, and even more so when you hate your boss or don't get along with your co-workers. apart from building the strategy of using relievers based on leverage rather than inning, counsell had to sell the idea to players who'd been doing it differently their entire lives. he's able to do that because he's a good manager of people, and i imagine ross is as well.

(joe torre got a lot of shit for things like personally destroying scott proctor's right arm, but the fact that he was able to get his highly paid yankees teams to perform so consistently well is v. impressive to me. i mean, the a-rod/jeter thing, gary sheffield, clemens -- that's a lot of ego to massage.)

rumor has it that pirates gm neal huntington will also be canned, which is unusual because he has two years left on his contract and the team is so fucking cheap

attn karl

https://www.mlb.com/news/memories-of-david-freese-2011-world-series

thank you, i didn't see that! the will leitch story (about the story) is legendary

The Pirates spelled their interim GM’s name incorrectly in their press release. It is Kevan Graves.

— Stephen J. Nesbitt (@stephenjnesbitt) October 28, 2019

“It’s back to the future,” Mark Attanasio says. Here is the new primary Brewers logo. pic.twitter.com/Tw4pDAaWIx

— Adam McCalvy (@AdamMcCalvy) November 19, 2019

Awesome

All the gear I have has that logo anyway so no problem for me

Love the old logo - not a fan of the font.

same

Lots of people today are pointing out something I missed: The Brewers' new alternate road uni looks a lot like a Wolf Cub Scout uniform. pic.twitter.com/ZaHnOBXuvH

— Paul Lukas (@UniWatch) November 19, 2019

i quit on the same day i got my webelos badge

BIRDS OF A DIFFERENT GAME: THE '80S CARDINALS PREMIERES TUESDAY, JANUARY 28 AT 8:00 P.M. ET ON MLB NETWORK

MLB Network Presents Documentary Looks Back on How The 1980s St. Louis Cardinals Dominated the National League

i'm not a MLB network subscriber...are those documentaries usually pretty good? i will definitely try to track it down after it airs because :D