gehringer_2

that's a major league fastball though - he had to throw a ton of them in hittable locations and they could not square him up. You can't teach that.

last batter for Beau?

lineup is just too short to sustain anything.

Kid is hanging in there. Umpire isn't giving him anything extra either. He's earning it.

agree they could not have turned it the way they were set up unless the runner had been a lot slower. I was just a little surprised, mostly because Muncy did get down there pretty well and made it not even close.

Of all the guys not to K against Kershaw...

if the speed is measured in the direction of travel, which I think it probably is, and say the ball is hit at a 20deg launch angle, then its forward velo is its absolute velo times the cos of 20 deg, (about 0.94). So for the sake of a hypothetical, if the the batter hits it on a rope line at 100ft/sec (88mph) to first and the 1b is exactly ten feet behind the bag (100 ft away), it gets there in exactly 1 sec. But the same ball hit at a 20deg launch angle passes over his head in ~1.06 seconds. Of course for a ball hit on the ground the bounce makes all the difference and that has all kinds of factors like spin and dirt vs grass and how much rain recently etc, so probably more complex than worth worrying about!

Kids got a decent FB

but speaking of exit velocity on stat cast - do you know if that is measured just in the direction of travel or the is that the vector in the forward level component? It would make difference on a ball at 20 deg angle to the ground and I've never thought about the question before in terms of the time to get a certain distance across the field.

still, you'd take 84 any time to turn a dp if you're at DP depth.

One run. Can I still hope?

I actually thought that was hit pretty good, and not close to turning the DP. But Schoop was deep, Muncy motored.

this could quickly get .....ugly.

tiger pitchers are getting hammered on change-ups. Maybe that suggests a change in strategy?

and behind in the 1st inning again.

I hadn't seen the Putin video with the hand tremors. That did not look good. If he has Parkinson's, and he is so vain he wants to appear in public with zero tremor to deny it, then he may be overdosing, which from close family experience I can tell you will absolutely cause mental impairment, daylight hallucination, fear and confusion episodes, etc. The rest of the gripping and twitching looks as much to me like episodes of intense pain, which if it's his back isn't necessarily anything immediately threatening, other than maybe to opiate addiction. But certainly a tumor/growth anywhere along the spine would be an equivalent to prolapsed discs or spinal stenosis as a source of that kind of pain. Another scenario that sort of fits is some kind of intestinal condition. Maybe COVID wasn't the only reason he was keeping strangers far away from him. You wouldn't want reports running through the grapevine that dear leader stank.

Yup, I'd definitely want to do my due diligence on Strong. His problems may be permanent but it would be worth it to be double sure.

You can't play a SS who can't field. You just can't. Well maybe at 900 OPS you might try, but Harold isn't close to that guy. Maybe with Baez back we will won't see him at SS much going forward but if they give Candy off days I don't think I want him at 3rd either - so yes I would prefer Short. And actually, I have been assuming Harold is of out of options, but according to this he is not, so given that I would swap him with Short like - yesterday. https://www.blessyouboys.com/2022/4/12/23019819/detroit-tigers-2022-roster-options-service-time-and-payroll

It does look to me that Harold's fielding, whatever it was, has fallen off a cliff. I do not think he is an asset. I know they don't want to lose him which I think is misdirected -it's time. Harold is one of those guys who can help a bad team, but not a good one.

I have no idea what Strongs medicals are other than 'multiple surgeries' but sure - if he's a guy that might get some physical recovery/benefit from a year on PUP just holding a clipboard he could be a steal.

has the Tiger side of the field been colder for some reason?

I still believe that once the team as a whole reaches a more average level of play that the better players will have much more chance to excel. But they did not get as close to that as I thought they might this season.

I've read and watched so many good pieces on Russia recently I've lost track but one description really sticks in my head - which was of Russia as a multi-tiered kleptocracy, where power was all about who you were allowed/expected to steal from, the limit on your power being basically the limit to the geography of where you could steal, and the quickest way to get in trouble is to accidentally steal from someone more privileged than yourself. Putin sits at the the top demanding his cut from everybody. Sort of a mafia'd up version of an ancient tribute system but all done via the normalization of theft/diversion rather than sending wagons of gold and virgins to the proconsul. And the result of course, is that everything ends up hollow, everywhere. Eaten up from the inside out.

that certainly didn't take long. Almost surprised Yzerman didn't have the new guy announced already - but I suppose he could be working for a team still playing.

Well, under normal circumstances, if Putin assumes room temperature, you would assume Patrushev would not have enough of a consolidated power base of his own and the whole thing would quickly collapse. But sometimes not -- Can you imagine if you end up with another Chavez/Maduro outcome and the new guy actually is worlds worse than the guy you didn't think it could be any worse than?