gehringer_2

I would say yes and no. I didn't expect Olsen and Flaherty to be this good - didn't expect Lange to pretty much straighten out, but I also didn't expect the hitting to come out of the gate dead *again*. So therein lies the frustration - knowing that they are exceeding expectation on the mound and that if they were only meeting expectations in the batter's box they'd be pretty good. And TBF, it's not even that many guys - it's primarily Catcher, Javy, Torkelson, Keith and Meadows - and McKinstry is also down in the power dept. Perez has replaced Meadows, and so far is producing. As I've noted, Keith is having decent ABs and terrible BaBIP luck so I"m OK letting that play out more. So it comes down to what to do about Torkelson, Javy and the Catchers. Possible strategies? I'd like to see Jake get more AB because he seems to hit better when he plays more regularly and Kelly isn't giving us anything anyway, but that is no sure thing. With Torkelson? I don't know what they are asking him to do - but if it were me I'd tell him I was going to fine him every time he puts a ball to the left of the 3B whether it's a double or not until he starts using the whole field (and whole K zone) again. I don't know what else there is to do - he's totally frustrating right now with his pull craziness. It's easy to say send him down but they need him producing. They can start giving Canha PT at 1B but there is no high power roster replacement waiting at Toledo for 1B. And unfortunately the same is true at SS. I don't want to have to trust McKinstry's glove - and he's not hitting a lot either, and there isn't any obvious SS candidate available. So stuck. If they really wanted to take a flyer out of the box - they could let Perez try going back to SS. Maybe having made the big leagues he'll be over his throwing nerves. A real long shot but Javy is really looking cooked as a hitter and they are going to be forced to try something.

The change that the tech has produced is that something that in the past only a few guys could do because the optimum way for them to do it came to them 'naturally', a lot of guys can do now because the tech gives you immediate quantitative feed back on each thing you try, it's like you can do a whole career's worth of trial and error on mechanics/grips/releases in a single series of bullpens. So more guys can get to their highest ceilings. It is probably also allowing teams to sift through prospects more efficiently so they find the top ceiling guys faster and spend less system resource on guys with lower ceilings. When you narrow a distribution, its average can increase without its maximum increasing (the same can be true the other way of course). So even if today's best MLB pitchers are not doing things that no-one ever did, there are more guys doing those things and the worst pitchers are likely a lot better - so on a day to day average pitching has gotten tougher. I tend to think this same statistical truth is what underlies the live ball controversy. The league can claim they haven't changed the ball spec, but if the manufacturer over time has naturally started to produce balls with less variation, but that reduction has taken place mostly in the percentage of balls on the softer end of the specification range, the average outcome is a liver ball on average even if the the spec never changed and the livest balls in the distribution are the same as they ever were.

Raskin is a gem. I hope his health holds and he's around for many years.

I've had a suspicion for a long time that there is something wrong with the way the Tigers/Hinch manage and prep hitters, but the one thing I've almost never found my self wondering about with Hinch is his pitcher management. He is really damn good at it and if the Tigers have any chance at all that will be one of the reasons why.

Right now there is almost nothing to pick between Foley, Lange, Chafin and even Vest. Hinch has his match-up tables that's pretty much as complicated as it gets. Foley had a nice stretch early when he was lights out but in general he does gives up contact. He wanted LHP to close against a heavy LH team and the RH hitter in the mix got him. You can't use pitchers for one hitter anymore - that's life. There was nothing wrong with Hinch's decision matrix (haha - listen to me defend Hinch). He put them in a position to execute and they didn't. They gave up 2 errors and had 7 hits and no walks in 10 innings. You won't win many on the road against a 600 team with that output esp without the long ball.

Every run counts the same. Without looking it up , I'll guess no pitcher in MLB history has thrown for full season with a zero ERA. You can hope for shutouts from starters and and perfect innings from relievers but if you count on them you're gonna be in hurt. When you go 6 innings at a time without scoring a run you're going to lose a lot of games.

and Jake threw the ball into CF after Wentz stupidly threw over there a 2nd time. That run was just as costly as the HR into a short corner with the wind blowing out.

Tiger righthand power hitter won't go to right, makes an out. Cleveland hitter goes with the pitch and ties the game. Tigers lose the mental competition.

you could have bet the farm that the 3-1 pitch to Torkelson was going to be exactly what it was - outside fastball. But would Tork think the game and sit outside? Of course not - he gotta get something to pull. So instead he's forced to swing at 3-2 out of the zone that he can't get too. Baseball players have to be the dumbest athletes.

they keep hoping that with distance from the injury that they are going to start seeing Kelly circa 2019, but it doesn't seem to be happening. If they accept that it won't, Rogers' PT should go to more like 2/3. Or else Hinch will just be stubborn.

or maybe it was this guy -

all those years with Leyland, Ausmus and Gardenhire, the sky had to falling to see both catchers in the game. Hinch says - hold my beer, dummies. I remember Ausmus especially always drove me crazy - putting his team at a disadvantage to cover some incredibly small probability situation - apparently just to be able to prove he was smart enough to game out some scenario that was never going to happen anyway.

hard to figure whether it's worse if it's true or false....

Because he's given you 8 bases in the last 3 games. No-one in the system other than Riley can do what Torkelson can do at any time the switch flips for him, so you give him more rope than anyone else in the system short of Riley. Even with his head screwed on wrong right he is still hitting doubles. In Keith's case, his AB are pretty good, he's having absolutely terrible BaBIP luck. His expected BA is 240, which ain't great but passable for a 2B you need to let develop. Meadows needs mechanical work on his swing, he was swinging under everything. That's a good task to do in the minors, plus Perez is playing well so far.

On base twice was nice but to me it was still depressing to see Tork still so totally committed to pulling the ball so excessively. In fact, he is catching it so far in front it's going to be hard to ever get it in the air enough to get it out of the ball park - assuming that is what is trying in the worst way to do. For tomorrow, BP look OK. Holton is spent, Faedo: probably don't want to use but could (17P; 2-U&D); Lange maybe (20P), Chafin (11P and the rest are good to go.

Cle had 8 LH hitters in the line-up. If there was ever a night when an Opener would have been in order. Give Holton the 1st pass through the line-up - or the 1st two innings - whichever comes 1st, then go to Kenta. Might have been a different outcome for Maeda....or not. 🤷‍♂️

not losing ground feels like win.

Chafin, Foley and Miller have all had their issues recently, so Lange doesn't feel any worse. The 3 batter rule is the hard part for a guy prone to wildness - you can't yank him after the 1st walk and he's shown you he's clearly gonna be wild.

Well, I wanted to give you an opportunity for a plug...... Actually, you can get to his transaction page and so far it they haven't updated it, but I get the impression that is not unusual....

LOL - Can't check roster status for the Hens - the 'Roster Link' on their website has been broken for at least a few days.

I suppose the judge would be within his rights to convene the court and send Marshalls out to bring him in.

another point about Parker's swing vs his K's. He is so under the ball right now that if can make the adjustment to get closer to center, he is also going to end up cutting down on his absolute swing and miss, so while I wouldn't say I'm optimistic he eventually comes back as a MLB hitter, I can at least see a path for him to make the changes to get there.

exactly - it really doesn't matter if Daniels what says today is objectively true, all that matters to the case is whether she is accurately depicting what she would have said in 2016. As a practical matter any witness lying doesn't help the case of the side that presents them, but here the prosecution can still get a net positive spin if they can make the arg as given above work.

You are right - Parker is above average walk rate for the TIgers (they were 8.3% as a team last season) - he's keep around 12% even so far this season - but it is his BaBIP that's killing him - 132 for the season so far! Last season his FB rate was 42%, it's a whopping 75% so far this year and it's coming at the expense of his LD%, which is terrible (2.5%). To me this is exactly the kind of situation where you hope a guy can step back and reconstruct himself a little at AAA, whereas in contrast I think Tork's problems are all between his ears. Maybe facing easier pitchers would help him, but I don't think it improves the odds of him straightening out the way it could with Parker who may need more room to fail with a swing adjustment.

10 walks is optimistic for a guy with a 40% k rate, but sure, it just about doable, but sadly Parker’s other problem is a very high pop-up rate, which depresses his BaBIP! I’d picked Parker as the most likely demotion just because he needs a mechanical adjustment to get the ball down and that’s a good MiLB project.