Laika

Ah yes More 390 feet outs with men on base Splendid

That's very interesting and depressing. Finally we have the data to more specifically define why the Jays underperform on offense. We can put a finger on the systemic problem - the things that the Blue Jays have been intentionally or incidentally prioritizing that doesn't correlate optimally to runs scored. I mean we have known this problem for a few years, we just talked about it differently. It was obvious for a while that too many Jays would execute their A swing and have it result in a line drive or lower flyball to the opposite field - that is just not an efficient way to hit and produce given what we know in 2025. But maybe we all got too bogged down in groundball rates. I was hoping that Popkins would be the impetus for them to get the ball out in front more, but I guess it hasn't had that effect on the players. When you look at the entirety of Toronto's hard hit balls, a pattern emerges. The Jays rank 29th in average attack angle on hard hit balls, and 29th in avg swing tilt. Meaning, even when they hit the ball hard, Jays are often doing it with flat bat paths, and catching it late. Points of reference... MLB avg on hard hit balls: 32° tilt, 9° attack Dodgers: 35° tilt, 11° attack Jays: 29° tilt, 7° attack Intuitively, this all makes sense: If you're gonna hit the ball hard, you want to do it on the upswing a bit. League-wide numbers going back last couple years back this up.... It's far more productive to hit a ball hard with an attack angle >10° compared to <10° And that table is where you get to the answer to our original question: How can a team that hits the ball hard as often as the Jays score so few runs? Worth pointing out: While last night's examples are Guerrero & he's prob primary factor, it's not exclusive to him. Santander & Bichette each have 5° avg attack angle on their hard hit balls. Wagner, Roden, Heineman, Straw, Clase, Gimenez, Barger, Kirk all below MLB avg In fact, the only 2 Jays comfortably above the avg attack angle threshold on hard hit balls are the 2 Jays exceeding expectations offensively the most this year: Varsho & Springer.

If he's actually banged up, just IL him and bring Roden back for another stint. Santander playing hurt is actively hurting the team. He contributes nothing right now.

weird wording "his issues are helping him limit big swings which should help him make more contact" dude he has a .203 xBA and the highest K rate of his career what kind of senseless euphemism is this? it smells like some Ross A bull "we are excited that Anthony has the opportunity to progress into a different kind of hitter that has the chance to make more contact"

As explained, the projection systems are already downgrading him. It's not just recency bias - it's placing his player profile and age into a complex analysis system which can be either Steamer or ZiPS or my huge brain. If you just want to look at the last 2000 PA and trust the man, you are basically as smart as the "let's sign Kris Bryant" era Colorado Rockies

The Rangers don't have much lefty pop in their lineup so he has as good of a chance as he ever does to not get hammered. I guess!

careful man, you are evaluating a player based on "mid season performance metrics" you might want to check with max first this may not be kosher

In other Blue Jays Free Agent News It looks like Spooner Turnbull is getting starts in Dunedin and getting destroyed

Values go up and down. In this case, they have gone way down! Oops, Ross!

Stuff+ on his curveball also went from a 107 to a 93. Must be a shape change since the velo is the same. Splitter went from 102 to 91. Sadness. Dear god. 12 of 15 homers are to LHB. .415 wOBA by LHB. is that legal?

Bowden Francis needs to figure it out or buzz off!!!!

You have to be more nimble than this, Max. Adjust your perceptions when new information arrives. How much would Scherzer, Gimenez, and Santander attract on the open market today? A lot less than they are making!

okay but Santander Scherzer Gimenez have -0.5 WAR combined for like $49M AAV and Spencer Horwitz imagine if he didn't whiff on all three of those. could have just paid Gleyber Torres but nooooo defense fetish got in the way admittedly a lot of the other FA hitters are flopping and Alonso/Soto/Bregman never wanted to come here so hard to criticize the Santander whiff Toronto should sue Max Scherzer

Ryan Yarbrough is beasting. Four good starts in a row for the Yankees. Probably should have kept him lol.

Clay Holmes is performing well so far. Only 60 innings though. Hicks is probably a success story all things considered. It's NOT like he was even an elite reliever, remember. Just the remote possibility that you get something close to the Seth Lugo experience makes it worth trying for lots of guys who have the arsenal. There are some other guys who are essentially RP to SP conversions but you don't notice as much because of how they broke in or got their chance. I think Ronel Blanco and Zack Littell were essentially just relievers for several years before going back to starting. I guess teams are just better these days at figuring out which RP can probably do well as a starter because there are a lot of success stories.

I'm all for it if he gets through this year clean Even the way Toronto has used him this year kind of hints at it. Those two inning games.

I think the lack of command on it is the biggest problem Most of them are non competitive or down the middle

I wonder if there was some sort of assurance like "if you make it through 2025 healthy we will give a chance to start in 2026" so he is refusing to shrink his arsenal

Came here to say this again Judging from Gameday, he threw three splitters today with nearly disastrous results. Almost hit a batter, then gave up a long flyball on a middle middle splitter, then almost hit the next batter

The game plan isn't to let the Jays hit 100 mph groundballs, chief

Lots of bad luck last two games. Tons of 100+ mph groundouts or double plays like that one.

You think? I seem to remember him being a piece of s*** for a year+ before he got hurt

Baltimore v Boston is a weird series. I guess Baltimore is so far down the table at this point that we just cheer for them?

if this is average bat speed, surely some component of it is that guys like Walker and Adell just have no idea what is coming so they just put their A swing on everything 80 mph swing at a fastball to foul it off 80 mph swing at a curveball to miss it by two feet I don't think there is much hope for Walker or Adell at this point. They square up almost nothing.

walkoff 2 run HR time let's go