Chad ochoseis

He seemed to take over the Jon Niese role of staff lefty who had flashes of goodness, but had a hard time getting out of his own head. They would both get frustrated when outings went south, which too many times led to things getting out of control and giving up too many runs. And you just knew they'd develop into elite pitchers if you gave them a bit more time. Don't know if it was body language or what, but I got the sense that Niese got frustrated with his teammates and Matz got frustrated with himself. So for Matz, my thought is "good luck". With Niese, it was more "good riddance".

Edgy MD wrote: This begs the question (it really doesn't) of who the Mets' top similarly initialed RBI pair was. My first guess off the top of my head is M&M 1978, with Mazzilli (61) and Montanez (96) for a total of 157. Any others guesses? Brogna and Bonilla? Hundley and Huskey? 2000 Piazza (113) and Payton (62) probably win. I'd forgotten about Payton and was going with Piazza and Perez. But Piazza + any random P is a good bet.

=kcmets post_id=54587 time=1611330945 user_id=53] RIP, Hammerin' Hank. I remember rushing home on April 8 from Boy Scouts (we ended the meeting early) to hopefully get to see #715. He didn't disappoint! As Costas just said on MLB, the elite of the elite. Mt Rushmore elite.

Chad ochoseis wrote: ...and my lying eyes can't think of any particular plays that Nimmo missed that made me say "jeezus, a competent centerfuekder would have gotten that!" This is the DEREK JETER defense. Must...resist... arguing...on...internet... Oh, screw it. That's absolute nonsense. The "Derek Jeter defense" is this: "I know his stats are weak, and I've seen him play and he has no agility whatsoever and lacks the basic tools to play short, but he plays hard and is a leader and makes his team better just by his very jeterly jeterness." The "Derek Jeter defense" is as bad as, well, Derek Jeter's defense. What I've said is that I've seen Nimmo play and although it's clear he's not the second coming of Carlos Beltran, I don't see the same pathetic skills of, say, Daniel Murphy in left field (or even second base). I'm no baseball expert; I never even played Little League. So I may be wrong. I do know a hell of a lot about statistics. I've had a career in the field for 27 1/2 years and counting. Statistics are useful and valuable tools. But deifying statistics is as wrongheaded as ignoring them, particularly when you're looking at a field as newly developed as defensive metrics. Defensive measurements are the Amed Rosario of sabermetrics. They're new. They're raw. They're still young. They have a lot of potential, and if we stick with them they'll probably be great down the road, but right now they haven't proved a whole lot consistently and I wouldn't depend on them to carry a whole argument on their own.

I just wanted to acknowledge what is probably the first ever eponymous thread in the CPF. I'm in the minority here, but I'm fine with continuing to run Nimmo out there with a defensive specialist on the bench for late innings. I know what the defensive metrics say, but defensive metrics aren't as clear cut as offensive metrics, and my lying eyes can't think of any particular plays that Nimmo missed that made me say "jeezus, a competent centerfuekder would have gotten that!"

Was 3 supposed to be repeated twice? Looks like GIVE 'EM A HAND!

dWAR is interesting there. I never thought of Jeets as a bad SS early in his career, and I never thought of Ripken as ever being particularly good.

And that should be 1927-2021, correct?

I remember reading long ago in Sports Illustrated that he'd arranged to have the Dodgers schedule on his tombstone. Whether it's going to be updated annually or whether it's going to be the 2021 schedule for eternity is something I don't know. And, of course, he was famously responsible for giving Mike Piazza a chance as a favor to his buddy, Mike Sr., and was therefore indirectly partially responsible for getting the Mets to the 2000 World Series.

Deal done, according to Indians Twitter. The two Indians fans I've spoken to are pissed.

I'm more excited about Carrasco, a power pitcher who quietly became one of the best in the AL over the past five years. And he's relatively cheap - $12M through 2022, then $14M club option/$3M buyout. Downside - he missed half of 2019 with leukemia. Now in remission, of course. I'm suspicious that Lindor's 2020 wasn't a fluke.

Are you sure that was meant to be Indian dress? I look at that and I'm searching for a 1986 story about them considering a name change to "Village People". "Spiders" seems to be the consensus winner. "Rocks" is just too cute and corny. If an MLS franchise ever comes to Cleveland, they can be the Rocks. "Guardians" is getting some traction, but having to explain to out-of-towners that it's because the bridge next to the ballpark has some cool sculptures named the "Guardians of Traffic" is going to get old fast. The main argument against "Spiders" is that the 19th century version didn't end well. I imagine the trademark issue can be bargained into irrelevance or handled in some other way. In a country where public entities can legally take over privately-owned land for public benefit, there's got to be some kind of a way that intellectual property issues can be finessed as well. If they become the "Shaker Heights Spiders" and still play their games downtown, maybe that withstands a legal challenge. OE - I looked through the history of this thread and realized I posted this almost verbatim three months ago. I'm consistent, anyway.

Benjamin Grimm wrote: Dick Allen's similarity scores, according to Baseball Reference: I think that gets dicey with 60s-70s guys. In theory, the stats are adjusted for park effects and era, but I've never been very confident that it does a great job with extreme hitter-dominant or pitcher-dominant eras or ballparks. So I don't know that it gives guys like Dick Allen and Joe Torre enough credit, or adjusts the Lance Berkmans and Dante Bichettes of the world far enough downward.

I'm on vacation this week and COVID is keeping me close to home, so I was hiking not far from Dick Allen's hometown of Wampum, PA yesterday and was thinking about driving through to check it out. But PA has signs all over saying that out-of-staters need to quarantine, so I decided to just do my hike and get back home. I generally dislike the whole idea of a Veterans Committee. If you've had ten shots at the HoF and you haven't gotten in, that's a good sign that you don't belong. But Dick Allen is an exception. I posted this once and Edgy strenuously disagreed, and I can't prove my point with data, but I still say that a mouthy *white* guy who put up his numbers in that era would have made the Hall easily.

With the DH a better than even chance to become permanent in the NL, it would be great to have his bat in the lineup. [YOUTUBE]OVFsq9FQBlc[/YOUTUBE]

=smg58 post_id=49927 time=1604586676 user_id=62] he could be Billy Hamilton minus the big bat.

Speed, defense, era, yadda, yadda, yadda.

Benjamin Grimm wrote: cal sharpie wrote: Ad Al Kaline a few months ago and you surely have a record for most HOF passings in one year. There were seven Hall of Famers who died in 1972: Roberto Clemente Dave Bancroft George Weiss Jackie Robinson Zack Wheat Gabby Hartnett Pie Traynor But Clemente wasn't a Hall of Famer when he died. Morgan was the best middle infielder of the past 50 years, and probably in the top three or four ever. Jackie Robinson was better. Beyond that, I dunno. I guess Honus Wagner, based on the stats. ARod, maybe, even without the chemical assistance. Who else?

"Spiders" seems to be the favorite among people I know around here. Spiders don't get easily offended. "Rocks" and "Rockers" feel a little corny. "Guardians" is getting some traction, since the ballpark is located at the foot of a bridge whose pillars have four embedded gargoyles known collectively as the "Guardians of Transportation". But I wouldn't want to have to keep explaining that to out-of-towners. I like "Tribe", but that still has similar connotations to "Indians".

Edgy MD wrote: Jay Johnstone lives (lived) in the same room as Rick Monday in my head. Longtime white outfielders/former Dodgers who were good enough to start for a bad team and valuable part-timers for good teams. Both better known as characters than as sluggers. Fun fact that I found out as I went down this rabbit hole is that they were both born on the same day, November 20, 1945.

=G-Fafif post_id=47549 time=1601223405 user_id=55] My most-informed guess is Wayne was likely quoting the postseason probability percentages proffered by the likes of Baseball Prospectus. ”The Mets have a 1.1% chance of making the playoffs”, that sort of thing.

As usual, I root for my new home team once my old home team is eliminated. No matter that as far as I know, they're made up of Francisco Lindor, Carlos Santana, a fast guy named Oscar, and 27 other players who I understand are in the major leagues.

What numbers was he talking about?

But don't know what Alonso was thinking going home with a fast runner on third.

Yeah...just now.