batmagadanleadoff

Pitcher or hitter? It depends. This discussion reminds me of the comment "Good pitching will always stop good hitting" Intuitively, I'd say that that comment's true. I know that watching the prime of Tom Seaver, I felt that the Mets could beat any team on the days that Seaver started. And they usually did. I know that the odds-makers recognize this notion that good pitching beats good hitting because baseball is the only sport that I can think of where the worst team in the league can be favored to beat the best team in the league, depending on the pitching match-ups. The 1988 Mets were the best team in baseball but came up short in their quest for the NL pennant because they couldn't get past an Orel Hershiser who was historically great in 1988. And if the Astros could've won just one playoff game that wasn't started by Mike Scott, there very likely wouldn't have been a Mets-Red Sox WS because at the end of the '86 season, Scott was unhittable. The Mets prevailed over the Astros probably because Scott pitched only two playoff games. The Mets were the better team but Scott was Koufaxian.

I do find it amusing that some in this exchange are challenging my thesis (of trading young pitching off good years for hitting) as being widely known in the baseball world (and so useless as a strategy) .... Me, I'm just noting the blowhardiness aspect of your post -- that it's your "thesis" -- that you imply that you invented this idea or thought of it first. I'm not challenging the as you say "usefullness of the idea. Just pointing out that any reasonably on-the-ball baseball fan and everybody in MLB upper management already knew this a long time ago and that all things equal, a hitter is preferable to a pitcher because a hitter is more predictable, more consistent. But are things ever equal given that a healthy pitcher has way more of an impact over his team's fortunes than a healthy hitter does over the course of a season? A healthy everyday playing position player will get about 700 PA's per season while a healthy starter will face about 800 or even 900 batters per season. This discrepancy was even more pronounced back in Tom Seaver's Mets days when pitchers threw more innings than they do today. Batters back then had about the same number of PA's as they do now but everyday healthy starting pitchers faced 1,200, 1,3000 and even 1,400 batters per season. Mickey Lolich, in 1971, faced 1538 batters. Pitchers were so much more valuable than hitters back then that they should've won their league's MVP awards way more often. There's a reason why good starting pitchers are generally more coveted than good position players. What exactly is it that you're suggesting in your "thesis"? That a team trade away all of its young pitching? Or to trade pitchers when they're no good anymore? (There's a huge market for washed up pitchers, I suppose. And a really good washed up pitcher could yield a team an Aaron Judge or a Barry Bonds in his prime. Is that what you're saying?) Or maybe a team needs a Delorean time machine to effectively implement your "thesis"? Because if I had one of those, I would've traded Matt Harvey about a month before it was discovered that he sustained an injury that would lead Harvey to opt for season ending TJ surgery. And if I really worked that time machine, I coulda sent Harvey back to 1992 and traded him for Barry Bonds and then flew Bonds back to 2013 to play for the Mets. Or maybe I'd have Bonds on the 2000 Mets and then maybe they beat the Yanks in that year's series. That's my thesis. I thought of it first. It's a brilliant idea. If I owned the Mets and head read your "thesis" years ago, woulda traded these pitchers as soon as this magazine cover hit the stands. [FIMG=333]https://i.ebayimg.com/images/g/vloAAOSwF~VhwkM1/s-l1600.jpg[/FIMG]

[deGrom's] very much a DeLand, Fla., guy. Folks around the team say this came out in the pandemic when he openly talked against northern rules and masks and vaccinations, even though it meant extra precautions and greater risk to the team (he wasn't alone there, as the Mets were one of the least vaccinated teams). https://nypost.com/2022/12/02/jacob-degrom-deal-shows-even-the-mistakes-are-bigger-in-texas/https://nypost.com/2022/12/02/jacob-degrom-deal-shows-even-the-mistakes-are-bigger-in-texas/ Now I'm practically certain he voted for Trump. Twice. Now I'm wondering if he's flying a Confederate flag inside his home. Northern rules? Did his great-great grandfather own a cotton plantation? And on another note, with deGrom now gone, if the Mets don't sign free agents Seth Lugo or Dom Smith, Tomas Nido will be the longest tenured active Met.

Edgy kinda beat me to this, but those pitchers led a Madoff-scandal ravaged and laughing stock baseball team that came out of nowhere and got to the World Series. (Those pitchers and Cespedes playing Babe Ruth for about a month and a half). Two of those pitchers were rookies. deGrom was a sophomore in his first full season. And Harvey had missed the season and a half preceeding the 2015 campaign. They were all essentially newbies. So you would've traded them all for different newbies? Is that what you're saying?

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Edgy MD wrote: trading partners probably know that. Some know it better than others. Give me a break, already. Pretty much everybody knows that hitters are more predictable, more consistent, more reliable and more dependable than pitchers. Certainly, everybody in MLB upper management. Could you spare us with these every other week posts you write about how you invented some idea or doctrine or "thesis" when all you're doing is rehashing the most obvious of baseball principles and passing it off as brilliant insight?

If trading's a coin flip, then I guess so is drafting. Me, I'm against absolute and inflexible rules that say you should always do this or never do that. I mean, it's pretty easy to pick out a pitcher's peak and thus, the optimal time to trade him 10 or 15 years after the fact. And as to your emotional but intellectually illogical attachment to all Mets just because they're Mets, such that you think they should never be traded, all I can say is that if the Mets drafted as little as a tenth as effective as you seem to think they draft, they'd be winning the pennant every single season.

I'm sure the Royals were thrilled to have traded Cone for Hearn.

Or Ryan for Fregosi.

Like Seaver for Henderson, Norman and Flynn.

Jake's played only five full seasons with the Mets: 2015-2019. He debuted in mid-May, 2014. 2020 was severely Covid-shortened. And his last two seasons were plagued by long-term injuries. There's so many ways to measure "best". deGrom's record isn't better than Seaver's. But if I had to win just one game for all the marbles, and could pick any pitcher from any era to start that game, I'd take the healthy Jake deGrom of the last two years. And I wouldn't have to ponder that decision for even a second. Better than peak Koufax. Better than peak Pedro. Better than any pitcher that ever was or is. Including "Tom".

=batmagadanleadoff post_id=113731 time=1670033190 user_id=68] =ashie62 post_id=113726 time=1670031175 user_id=90] =TransMonk post_id=113723 time=1670031025 user_id=71] He is the best pitcher I have ever rooted for.

=ashie62 post_id=113726 time=1670031175 user_id=90] =TransMonk post_id=113723 time=1670031025 user_id=71] He is the best pitcher I have ever rooted for.

=G-Fafif post_id=113694 time=1670012249 user_id=55] “Jimmy Yacabonis” has always sounded to me like an ancillary character from a mob movie or series is all.

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I don't get the joke at the top of the thread and I'm certain that I've seen every single Sopranos episode at least four times. At least. I googled "Jimmy the Yak" and "Jimmy the Yak Sopranos" and the most relevant hits I got were about recurring character Jimmy Altieri. Is that it?

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I've been really immersed in this stuff over the past few months. My research sez that the Rivingtons' Papa Oom Mow Mow is from 1962, not 1963. The Trashmen's Surfin' Bird single was released in late 1963 but was popular, and of the musical zeitgeist, mainly in 1964. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Papa-Oom-Mow-Mowhttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Papa-Oom-Mow-Mow https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surfin%27_Birdhttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surfin%27_Bird Both songs appear in Typewriter's Starling Marte subset. [FIMG=555]https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/52530277939_4eb6bb83e9_h.jpg[/FIMG] [media=youtube]9Gc4QTqslN4[/media] [media=youtube]KQEDojPZ7YI[/media] [media=youtube]494KkrD2GBY[/media] [media=youtube]dY3BHAz_IiU[/media]

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Edgy MD wrote: I've always loved that Sparkletones clip, and because of it, I always run around with crazy little mamas. It's from the Ed Sullivan show though ol' Ed appears to be cut out. I think Brian Setzer maybe got his whole act from that clip.

I guess we're voting for the events depicted on the back covers rather than the back covers themselves. Because, you know, there can't possibly be a nice back cover or awesome wordplay on a back cover unless that back cover depicts sheer happiness. Mr. Bluebird's on my shoulder.

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So how much "extra" are pitchers getting beyond their worth? And wouldn't Fangraphs' algorithms for determining just this take into account how many innings they're pitching? I would imagine that innings pitched would be the main variable. So what does it mean that pitchers aren't pitching enough innings to jsutify their pay? Because if they pitched more innings, they'd be worth more in the first place under Fangraphs' formulas before any teams even offer them new contracts. And how much would someone like Steve Cohen be overpaying? Because Cohen overpaying by like 20 or 30 or 50 million to bring home a pennant would be like asking me if I wanna pay an extra dollar or two to have some pepperoni topping on my slice of pizza. And maybe Verlander adds the psychic value of making the Mets more enticing for other free agents. Like degrom.