Frayed Knot

Signed by the Yanx

No more fitting way to end this disaster than a Soto K I believe that's his 32nd in the last 3 games.

Nats get a meaningless insurance run. One run is enough to beat this team. They have more runs off our pen in the last three innings than we have baserunners off theirs across two games.

Mets now have 2 BBs in 24 plate appearances agains the worst in the NL bullpen. Just none of those hit things that I hear about other teams getting late in games against inferior pitching.

Nats have three hits (and 3 RBI) in five ABs vs Rogers, The Mets have had 18 ABs vs the Nats pen (one of the worst in MLB) over two games and have one walk and 5-2/3 scoreless to show for it.

Nats: four runs on four hits, all singles. But we threw in a walk, two HBPs, a K/PB, and a really bad decision by Pete.

22 pitches for Manaea thru the first two innings. But 69 more for innings 3, 4, and an incomplete 5th

Jeeeez! If we're going to lose to bad teams can we at least make them hit in order to do it? In each of the last two innings the Nats have loaded the bases with/one out on just one single in each.

And the 4th inning issues continue even with the opposition doing much hitting: K/PB, F-7, soft single, HBP, weak ground out/RBI But Manaea gets the 3rd out so just one run. Could have been better, but smelled like it was going to get worse for a minute there.

Nice start for Manaea: K, LO-7, K --- K, K, K

Thought it was a 4:10 start but they went all 4:05 on me. Fortunately I literally turned on the set seconds before first pitch.

Lindor starts things off quickly, and Gore can cry if he wants to.

So I'm doing a little numerical doodling here on what a schedule might look like with a 32 team league and either a 4x8 or 8x4 set up. 4x8 (4 divisions of 8 teams each) - 15 'league' opponents @ 3 series each (each season would have to be one home/two away or vice versa) totaling 138 games. Since 15 x 9 (the normal size of three series) = 135 then three of those series would need to be four games on a random basis. - then a three games series vs only half of the 16 teams in the other 'league' = 24. You'd play a series vs the other half of that league the next year. Plusses: 85% of the games are in-league games/15% out, compared to about 70/30 in the current format Minuses: a visit from teams in the opposite league to your town only once in a four year period 8x4 (8 divisions of 4 teams) - 3 division opponents x 22 games* = 66 - 12 league but not division opponents x 6 games = 96 That, right there, is your 162 so no IL play in this scenario. You could cut down to one series per non-division opponent (alternate year home/away) if you want to add IL play but that's 48 games vs them also or the same one series each and if you're playing them as much as your in-league/non-div opponents then there's no difference between in-league or out- Minuses: - barely 40% of games in-division which is actually slightly more than now (~56/162 = 35%) yet still a very high proportion of your sked devoted to just three teams (nearly 1/7th of your entire sked to each of the three). So it's like 22/per is both too low and too high at the same time (there's familiarity and then there's overkill). - Then there's ~60% of the sked devoted to out of division and/or league. Is that really want we want? And the only way to reduce that is to increase the already huge number of in-division games. Plusses: I'll let you know when I come up with one * 22 games/yr vs each opponent was actually the number that reigned for more than a half-century [22 x 7 = 154] until the 1961/62 expansion bumped up the number of teams to 10 per/lg, but you saw everyone that amount. This would be swinging between 'these guys again?' vs 'who are these dudes?'

They're challenging but that's just a formality.

=Gwreck post_id=201853 time=1755738893 user_id=56] Tough call on hitting Mauricio against a lefty. I guess Taylor could hit for Torrens but not sure that's any movement.

So far 20 (to get two outs), 10, and 9 pitches from the Nats pen to get eight outs.

Or he may PH this coming inning: Baty, Mullins, Torrens due up in the 9th.

Score four to close to within one, load the bases with one out ... and the next eight batters go down in order.

Well, presumably there'll still be two leagues [conferences? halves?] just maybe not with the teams in each that we're used to. But Interleague play ("A gift to the fans" -- Bud Selig) and the universal DH effectively eliminated any remaining difference between the leagues, differences that had slowly disappearing for decades even before all that. So if/when expansion happens it's going to mean a reshuffling of the deck, the only question is how it's going to get done. Manfred [read: the owners] certainly hinted that he/they want realignment more along geographic lines: western teams mostly in one 'league' and eastern teams in another (whatever those leagues wind up being called) in order to create less travel during the season and more regional matchups/better TV times in the early playoff rounds. My point was that if these realignment plans are only going to sort of change things by only moving two or four (or six or eight) teams, then what are we really holding on to here?

And another 5 inning start by a NYM pitcher.

=Centerfield post_id=201823 time=1755733279 user_id=65] This game feels like a loss. All the breaks going against us.

A NYM fan in the stands seemed to be yelling at Soto for not scoring (or maybe at the coach for not sending him). ... and now he scores anyway and so does Pete behind him. Looks like the Lord was fallible after all tonight.

I don't even care if they keep the names. But if you're going to 'only' shuffle around 8 or10 teams -- as the FOX plan Irish linked does even as they boast about how few teams they displaced to come up with their scenario -- then you're not really preserving much and so, in my mind, it becomes little different than realigning with zero regard to what leagues/divisions teams are or were once connected to.

deGrom to miss next start due to "shoulder fatigue". We've seen some pretty long absences from JdG that began with that sort of generality.

Mid-Atlantic? When do we play Bermuda?