TWiB Notes -- April 30 - May 6

[Frayed Knot]

- LAD SS Corey Seager to undergo TJ surgery on his elbow and will miss the remainder of the season. Looks like TJS for non-pitchers is the new trend.
The Dodgers, coming off their 104 win NL Pennant season last year, were already off to a rough start this year (12-15) so this won't help.
Since Seager's debut in his RoY season of 2016, the Dodgers are sub-.500 when he's not in the lineup despite being nearly 60 games above the break-even mark overall during that time.


-- in the NL East during the beginning of this week, the Nats (6.0 games back) are hosting the hot Pirates (17-11, 5 wins in a row), while Philly (-1.5) goes to Miami (-8.5)


-- outside of our division, the biggest series this week in the Yanx four-gamer in Houston starting tonight.

[Frayed Knot]

Nice "old school" (I hate that term) save by Milwaukee's Josh Hader last night.

In case you don't remember him, he's the tall, long-haired lefty that shut us down [2 IP - 5 K] during one game of our earlier series at CitiField.
Anyway, he came in Monday night with one out/bases empty in the 7th and got the remaining eight outs of the game (39 pitches) all on strikeouts. He actually faced nine batters, tossing in a walk
just to make things interesting.

Hader wasn't even the Brews' first choice for closer. Corey Knebel was the 'DC' (designated closer) but was DL'd out of ST and so the Brews went through a bunch games early on when they blew saves
after Hader had held the opposition in the 6th or 7th innings. Since then, he's finished 4 games, has 4 saves (1st was against us) and entered the game in the 7th or 8th innings in each of those
appearances.

2018 stats to-date for a guy who didn't make his ML debut last June and didn't turn 24 until a week into this season: 11 G, 18 IP, 3 R (2 earned), 4 hits, 1 HR (Tommy Pham), 5 Walks, 39 Ks, 1.00 ERA; 0.50 WHIP
He's like Andrew Miller only without the high price tag and without having to give your top 17 prospects to the Yanquis just to get him.
Not bad for a 19th round draft pick (2012) out of a Maryland HS

[Frayed Knot]

And just to make this night even more fuckin' perfect than it is already, Houston has now run their consecutive scoreless innings streak to 16
Fuck you Astros!

[G-Fafif]

Ichiro calling it a career, moving into the Mariners' front office to assist the chairman immediately, says GM and ex-Met Jerry DiPoto. Taking Ichiro's place on the M's roster: ex-Met Erik Goeddel.

[Benjamin Grimm]

Any updates on Esther Williams?

[Edgy MD]

That pretty much guarantees that José Reyes gets to retire as the active steal leader. Ichiro was five behind him and nobody else is within 100. Active triples leader too.

[Frayed Knot]

Fuck you AGAIN Astros!!!

They FINALLY scored some runs in this series (following [u:1c3b09ul]28[/u:1c3b09ul] consecutive scoreless innings) and take a 5-3 lead into the 9th, at which point the Yanx go Walk, Single, Single, Single (2 RBI) -- all guys at the bottom of the order -- then a fly-up and a groundout scored another.
They used three different closers in this series and they all sucked, and now all they have to do is score against Chapman just to send this into extras.

[Frayed Knot]

Frayed Knot wrote: Fuck you AGAIN Astros!!! They FINALLY scored some runs in this series (following 28 consecutive scoreless innings) and take a 5-3 lead into the 9th, at which point the Yanx go Walk, Single, Single, Single (2 RBI) -- all guys at the bottom of the order -- then a fly-up and a groundout scored another. They used three different closers in this series and they all sucked, and now all they have to do is score against Chapman just to send this into extras.

And now three strike-outs (plus a single and passed ball) later, Houston coughs up their third straight to the evil empire.
The "strikeout averse" Astros K'd 37 times (vs 25 hits) while scoring just 7 times in a four game series, five of those runs coming today which they then promptly wasted.

Fuck you fuckers!

[MFS62]

You don't like to see a player get hurt.
But then there's THIS:
https://www.yahoo.com/sports/yadier-molina-lives-every-catchers-worst-nightmare-foul-tip-102-mph-pitch-215841118.html

Love ya', Yaddy.

Later

[Frayed Knot]

In what is probably a sign of things to come, the Dodgers completed a four-pitcher no-hitter vs the Padres Friday night in Mexico.
Not that the 'in Mexico' part is a sign of things to come (although maybe) but the multiple pitchers part and the part where I hadn't even heard of two of the four.

2nd year player/3rd start ever Walker Buehler [insert joke here] was the starter and went six: 8 Ks, 3 BBs, 93 pitches (about average for 6 IP)
Next came former Cincy Red Tony Cingrani [1.0 IP, 2 BBs - 24 pitches], then Yimi Garcia(?) for the 8th [2 K, 14 pitches], and finally Adam Libatore in the 9th (2 K) ... not even Kensley Jansen! (was a 4-0 run game)

[bmfc1]

Darn shame:
[tweet:26hb5bx2]

[/tweet:26hb5bx2]

[Frayed Knot]

"pelvic injury with traumatic hematoma" -- aka: took one in the nuts. See MFS's post above.



300th career save for Craig Kimbrel on Saturday, still three weeks shy of turning 30. By contrast, M. Rivera had 129 at the same age, before eventually winding up at 652
Kimbrel's advantage was that he started closing games at age 22 as opposed to Rivera who was 27. Now the question will be how much longer he can keep it up.
Rivera, except for his penultimate season which he missed almost entirely with a knee injury, saved between 28 & 53 games from 1997 until 2013 when he was 43.

[Frayed Knot]

Frayed Knot wrote: In what is probably a sign of things to come, the Dodgers completed a four-pitcher no-hitter vs the Padres Friday night in Mexico.

As if on cue, the Yanx have a combined no-no thru 7 vs Cleveland.
Only two pitchers so far: Domingo German (13th ML game, 1st ever start) for the first six, then Bettances for the 7th and now 8th

**and now the no-hitter disappears just as I'm typing**

The Yanx, btw, have only one hit and the game is still scoreless. I have to mention that last part seeing as how Cleveland handed them 4 runs on 1 hit in Friday's game

[Frayed Knot]

Ooooh, I should publicly announce in-progress MFY no-hitters more often as the seriously, I just used a racist word when I really meant "Guardians" wind up hanging a 4-spot on the Yanx pen in the top of the 8th.

[Frayed Knot]

Annnnnd the Yanquis come back to win, getting 3 in the 8th and 4 in the 9th via four XBHs from their final six batters of the game.

I really hat baseball right about now.

[MFS62]

Frayed Knot wrote: Annnnnd the Yanquis come back to win, getting 3 in the 8th and 4 in the 9th via four XBHs from their final six batters of the game. I really hat baseball right about now.

And YLDBs around the world are getting even more DB-ey.

Later

[TransMonk]

MFS62 wrote: And YLDBs around the world are getting even more DB-ey.

Yup. My Twitter feed (which rarely has baseball related content) exploded with Yankee love this afternoon.

[DocTee]

The Molina injury just increased the price of renting JT Realmuto.

[Benjamin Grimm]

Realmuto would not be a rental. He has three years of team control remaining. He wasn't going to come cheap no matter what.