Orioles (Bradish) vs Blue Jays (Miles/Arrighetti): 9/12/26, 3:07pm

[G-Snarls]

22 minutes ago, SeranthonySantander said:

Playoff bound 

Hoffman in to try and hold the 1 run lead for Minnesota

[SeranthonySantander]

Indians announcers are whining about Hoffman getting a ball called a strike.  Shouldn’t have lost your challenges 

[SeranthonySantander]

Hoffman is a god 

[G-Snarls]

1 minute ago, SeranthonySantander said:

Indians announcers are whining about Hoffman getting a ball called a strike.  Shouldn’t have lost your challenges 

Ramirez K

Delauter BB

Adell K

Martinez K

And he's out of it...

[G-Snarls]

Hoffman with the solid high leverage hold in the 8th

<insert Hoffman 9th inning joke here>

[glory]

Guardians lose. 

[Spanky__99]

Twinkies win...

 

[G-Snarls]

Woohoo!!!

[SeranthonySantander]

Well we finally made the playoffs 

Bibee is auto lose cease is auto win 

playoffs 

[hanton]

Batemans exit velo on his 2 home runs, 100 and 102.  That's really low

[Eat My Shatkins]

Spencer Miles is an absolute weapon.

Obviously the best case scenario would be that he (and Tiedemann too) not only stay healthy, but eventually get stretched out and become really good MLB SP's

But I salivate at the thought of what the bullpen could look like next year with Varland, Rogers, Miles, Tiedemann, Winckowski, and new & improved Little. Flu and Fish aren't terrible either,

[Eat My Shatkins]

6 minutes ago, hanton said:

Batemans exit velo on his 2 home runs, 100 and 102.  That's really low

Yeah, it's been well established that the guy doesn't have power. Any home runs from him at all are just a bonus.

[hanton]

absolutely love Spencer Miles

[Laika]

34 minutes ago, hanton said:

Batemans exit velo on his 2 home runs, 100 and 102.  That's really low

It's interesting to see him yank two out so close together but the MaxEV between AAA and MLB really makes you think he's a 10 HR guy at the most. 

I guess 15 is possible but not with his batter ball profile. 

[bendera3]

30 minutes ago, Laika said:

It's interesting to see him yank two out so close together but the MaxEV between AAA and MLB really makes you think he's a 10 HR guy at the most. 

I guess 15 is possible but not with his batter ball profile. 

He seems to be able to handle himself fairly well in center and seems to have been a pretty good baserunner in the minors.  If he can translate that into the majors I'd be alright with his 10 homers.  I know it's SSS but in 29 games he has almost twice as much WAR as Vlad.  Hopefully he doesn't follow in the footsteps of Davis Schneider.

[G-Snarls]

1 hour ago, hanton said:

Batemans exit velo on his 2 home runs, 100 and 102.  That's really low

Wall scrapers 

Kyle Schwarber he is not 

[max silver]

21 minutes ago, G-Snarls said:

Wall scrapers 

Kyle Schwarber he is not 

He's certainly no Schwarber but he hit each of these homes 403 feet which isn't something I'd characterize as a wall scraper.

[max silver]

1 hour ago, Eat My Shatkins said:

Yeah, it's been well established that the guy doesn't have power. Any home runs from him at all are just a bonus.

I think with Bateman there might be a bit more juice in the bat than we were initially led to believe. He's not an exit velocity monster by any means but he's been squaring up a ton of pitches in the majors and his primary issue regarding power output was the ground ball heavy profile. He produced decent enough average exit velocities in the minors and he's shown that he can launch the ball with authority in recent games with the appropriate swing path. I'm encouraged that he's cleaned up the plate discipline in recent weeks as his chase rate has improved to very close to the 20% rate he was producing in AAA, and the quality of contact has been improving as a direct result.

[John_Havok]

28 minutes ago, max silver said:

I think with Bateman there might be a bit more juice in the bat than we were initially led to believe. He's not an exit velocity monster by any means but he's been squaring up a ton of pitches in the majors and his primary issue regarding power output was the ground ball heavy profile. He produced decent enough average exit velocities in the minors and he's shown that he can launch the ball with authority in recent games with the appropriate swing path. I'm encouraged that he's cleaned up the plate discipline in recent weeks as his chase rate has improved to very close to the 20% rate he was producing in AAA, and the quality of contact has been improving as a direct result.

Yes, in general an improvement in LA would translate to more power in theory, but... LA is only 1 part of the barrel rate. Barrell rate also incLudes EV, and his avg EV is still 3rd percentile, which is probably strongly incluenced by his bottom 10 percentile swing speed. So, his LA is actualky pretty ok, butvhis barrel rate is garbage becasue he swings woth pool.noodle intent.

He can square up and get a good laucnch angle 35% of the time all he wants (which is where he is now, and its above average) but until more of those swings are swung with more damage intent ... yeah 10 HRs over the season is probably even reaching.

I don't even think his problem is getting his A swing off, the problem is his A swing is a regular players B or C swing.

The question going forward is how much swing speed he can coached and/or bulked into without detrimentally impacting other underlying metrics.

[Masterbather]

I think Bateman can run into 6-10 bombs, and that's plenty for him.

He just has to hit enough balls hard enough to keep outfield defenses honest so they don't play him like a pitcher hitting and take away the soft liners and bloopers.

[hanton]

1 hour ago, Laika said:

It's interesting to see him yank two out so close together but the MaxEV between AAA and MLB really makes you think he's a 10 HR guy at the most. 

I guess 15 is possible but not with his batter ball profile. 

both times they tried coming inside to him - slider from Bassitt and FB from Bradish - and he homered on both

[Stangstag]

5 hours ago, ComeTogether said:

Dumb base running affects the entire team. 

Goes back to Game 6 WS. 

You mean game 3 of the WS?? Also game 7? 

[max silver]

15 minutes ago, John_Havok said:

Yes, in general an improvement in LA woukd translate to more power in theory, but... his avg EV is still 3rd percentile, which is probably strongly incluenced by his bottom 10 percentile swing speed. 

He can square up and get an avg LA at 35% all he wants (which is where he is now) but until more of those swings are swung with more damage intent ... yeah 10 HRs over the season is probably even reaching.

I don't even think his problem is getting his A swing off, the problem is his A swing is a regular players B or C swing.

The question going forward is how much more swing speed he can be coached or bulked into without compromising the contact rate and barrel rate to the point where it's detrimental

Yeah these are fair enough points. Bateman only managed about 73 MPH swing speed on today's home run, but that's plenty if you manage to find the barrel with an optimized swing path. I could see him hitting 10 home runs in a good year, but for Bateman I expect more of his power production would come in the form of a few extra doubles and triples over time vs launching balls over the fence. I think he possesses similar physical tools to Andres Gimenez as they are within a few ticks of each other in terms of average swing speed, and with Gimenez he did manage to smack 15 and 17 home runs at points of his career so it is possible to produce solid power output with lesser swing speed if you can unload on the baseball with your best swing and sufficiently find the barrel. In the early going Bateman has been showcasing an excellent hit tool which should allow for a high floor given his speed. I don't know if he necessarily "needs" to add a ton of swing speed to his game as he's been producing a ton offensive impact with the toolset he currently possesses, albeit with regression sure to come at some point.

[G-Snarls]

22 minutes ago, Masterbather said:

I think Bateman can run into 6-10 bombs, and that's plenty for him.

He just has to hit enough balls hard enough to keep outfield defenses honest so they don't play him like a pitcher hitting and take away the soft liners and bloopers.

I think so too 

And I'll take the bat to ball skills, baserunning and defense as a great package even with minimal HR totals. 

He must be so happy he's not blocked by Pete Crow-Armsrong now 

[SeranthonySantander]

He is like a cross of ichiro and Barry bonds.  Sure he is a great lead off hitter 200 hits a year .300 hitter world class arm but he can also hit some home runs.  He might hit 10 might hit 60.  But like a young Barry bonds so maybe only 35-40 hr a year while playing elite outfield.

he could be what we thought Vlad would be

give him 10 years 150m

[hanton]

1 hour ago, G-Snarls said:

Wall scrapers 

Kyle Schwarber he is not 

out in 21/30 and 29/30 both a little over 400'

I'll let you decide

Like others, I had doubts when the trade was made but he just keeps on impressing us

[ComeTogether]

2 hours ago, Stangstag said:

You mean game 3 of the WS?? Also game 7? 

Game 6 and 7. Both winnable games.  Game 3 was junk too. 

[Laika]

1 hour ago, max silver said:

Yeah these are fair enough points. Bateman only managed about 73 MPH swing speed on today's home run, but that's plenty if you manage to find the barrel with an optimized swing path. I could see him hitting 10 home runs in a good year, but for Bateman I expect more of his power production would come in the form of a few extra doubles and triples over time vs launching balls over the fence. I think he possesses similar physical tools to Andres Gimenez as they are within a few ticks of each other in terms of average swing speed, and with Gimenez he did manage to smack 15 and 17 home runs at points of his career so it is possible to produce solid power output with lesser swing speed if you can unload on the baseball with your best swing and sufficiently find the barrel. In the early going Bateman has been showcasing an excellent hit tool which should allow for a high floor given his speed. I don't know if he necessarily "needs" to add a ton of swing speed to his game as he's been producing a ton offensive impact with the toolset he currently possesses, albeit with regression sure to come at some point.

I thought of guys like Gimenez or Kirk as Blue Jays comps but even they have MaxEVs that are several mph higher than anything Bateman has ever hit, measurably. 

His MaxEV so far really does put him down with the guys with almost no power at all, David Fletcher and Chandler Simpson and Arraez etc. Taylor Walla. And MaxEV is something that is relatively stable soon, I think. It's sort of like fastball velo. 

Of course MaxEV isn't everything and of course if you can launch a ball at 98mph it can still get over the fence. This is why Arraez hits 8 homers annually.

But even the lower raw power, extreme pull air dudes like Paredes and Bregman can hit the thing like 109mph sometimes. 

He's a shrimp even compared to Andres Gimenez, lol. But a better "hitter"!

I'm ecstatic if he hits 8 homers in a season because that means everything else is working and he's a 650 PA guy.

[max silver]

26 minutes ago, Laika said:

I thought of guys like Gimenez or Kirk as Blue Jays comps but even they have MaxEVs that are several mph higher than anything Bateman has ever hit, measurably. 

His MaxEV so far really does put him down with the guys with almost no power at all, David Fletcher and Chandler Simpson and Arraez etc. Taylor Walla. And MaxEV is something that is relatively stable soon, I think. It's sort of like fastball velo. 

Of course MaxEV isn't everything and of course if you can launch a ball at 98mph it can still get over the fence. This is why Arraez hits 8 homers annually.

But even the lower raw power, extreme pull air dudes like Paredes and Bregman can hit the thing like 109mph sometimes. 

He's a shrimp even compared to Andres Gimenez, lol. But a better "hitter"!

I'm ecstatic if he hits 8 homers in a season because that means everything else is working and he's a 650 PA guy.

Kirk swings a much faster bat on average and at maximum than Bateman so they aren't a great comparison. I examined Gimenez's swing speed plot and it appears as though he's capable of producing the occasional 80+ MPH swing when he lets it rip vs Bateman who appears to max out at closer to 78 MPH so that likely explains the difference in top end exit velocities. Popkins and the Blue Jays offensive coaching group have been pretty effective at unleashing higher top end swing speeds in their hitters so fingers crossed they can do something similar with Bateman. Bateman does appear to be a high end athlete in every aspect aside from raw swing speed (sprint speed/outfield burst/hit tool/throwing arm) but I think this is teachable to a degree through maximized biomechanical efficiency, and I and others have stated that Bateman is a prime candidate to spend an offseason working out in the PDC weight room to improve his raw strength. It sucks that there is an impending lockout as this will lead to the Blue Jays losing the massive advantage that the best in MLB PDC offers to their players.