Laika

yes but andre jiminiz is horrendous it's like walking the pitcher

You could even describe it as a tourist trap.

Yeah Sewald would have been sweet there

Well, at least Varland didn't have to throw many

50% chance he still needs to close this out lol

Is this the Toronto Blue Jays? Weird to see

Yawn

Vlad did not even hit that ball hard. The pitch beat him. His bat is just weak and not on time. Pool noodle season. Also missed the pitch to hit and then put ball 4 in play... Yes, unlucky to line out but still dogshit process and mechanics A broken man

Riley Greene to the IL The odds are now 12.9%

It is comical that there was even a point in time when trading Eric Lauer made sense.

The front office obviously thinks they have almost no realistic chance of getting in, judging from the lineups being fielded. Tonight: No Lukes, instead we get Bateman in RF. Playing the guy you want to get a look at over the reliable veteran makes sense if 2027 is the focus. You could also argue for Lukes over Sanchez. No Springer against a LHP. Sure they want Okamoto to DH because he's banged up but where is the f***ing urgency?

Scouting high school and international PITCHERS should be easier because they are the first mover on the field. You don't care about their reads and reactions and stuff. You can measure spin and velo and biomechanics. The injury risk and attrition makes them volatile assets but scouting and evaluating them is easier. This is why I have always thought there was good logic in drafting lots of pitchers. People always say TINSTAAPP and they want dynasty bats, but they don't recognize that scouting those bat talents is harder at the initial stage. And you can always just invest in MLB free agent bats and put them around your pitching pipeline - your little brigade of pitching mosquitos who will all die at some point, hopefully after 6 years of MLB service time.

Yeah the issue is just the data. The source information. The amateur info. Guys in college have solid enough data if they were healthy and played. Their competition was decent, and measurable, and you can see their swing speeds and velo and stuff. The high school and international guys, nothing like that exists. They play a bunch of other kids who are not in fact peers of them. Not pro prospects. Even at the elite combines and stuff, a good portion of the opponents are not relevant challenges. You could DESIGN a new way to measure what would be helpful. Mobile trajekt style things for hitters. Put the 17 year old in the trailer for 30 minutes and measure everything you can - his bat speed, swing path, his ability to adjust and make contact with various pitch types, recognize pitch type and location...

Blue Jays claim Paul Sewald Honestly, worth a shot based on K-BB alone

If they enter September within a game of the 3WC they need to do some of this stuff Can't just roll SWR out there and give Chase Lee leverage innings

It is a high variance game and luck is a huge part of it, but you can still be good at it. It's very technical. The game evolves, baseball science evolves, you need to constantly be chasing improved amateur draft models. There is a technological arms race going on that you could compare to some kind of high risk, high upside financial market. And then some influence of the human talent as well (scouts and executives would have varying talents). My gut says that at any given time there are probably 5 teams that are ahead of the curve in some respect, 5 teams behind the times, and then 20 teams who are kind of just reading water and participating in the draft casino.

Realistically having a good complex is just an "extra 2%" thing These players get high level development in college and prep and privately. Pitching labs are everywhere. The real gold is made in the draft and international signing arenas. Tolle, Early, and Eyanson were draft steals by Boston, not development wins.

Batman is pretty good. An organizational history of superhero centrefielders would certainly be nice... Bateman has not had a chance yet at a 3 star or higher catch. But he has had a couple of really good jumps on 2 star catches.

Stanifer was a 19th round pick, the fact that he is even on the radar as a relief of SP6 prospect is promising. Messina was a 12th rounder signed for $550k and was known the be injured. It's great to see him on the mound, healthy, and flashing some stuff. His walk rate is not alarming to me. They NAILED the 2024 draft with Yesavage, Stephan, and then Johnny King. And then Messina and Troy Guthrie (a lower upside but somewhat interesting command - starter profile) later on. It feels, to me, like the org is coming into its own when it comes to drafting and developing pitchers. But they still need to put the finishing touches on guys and that has often been the issue. That and keeping them healthy. If you go from like 2023 backwards you can put together such a long, sad list of guys who were very promising, or at time looked like value draft picks, or were high draft picks, but either could not stay healthy or could never get over the MLB development bump or just sucked right away: Landen Maroudis (2023) Brandon Barriera (2022) Connor Cooke (2021) briefly looked like a future RP Ace Juenger Irv Carter Tiedeman Hoglund CJ Van Eyk (2020) Manoah (2019) Kendall Williams Kloff (2018) Joey Murray (2018) Pearson (2017) Hagen Danner (2017) Zeuch (2016) ZOINKS! Jon Harris (2015) Justin Maese (2015) Hoffman (2014) SRF Bickford (2013) and Hollon and Patrick Murphy From 2020 on, you can understand because they were trading away lots of guys like Hoglund and there was some bad luck in there with Tiedeman and Barriera and some others. Also in the last few years lots of promise emerging, like Nolan Perry was a 2022 pick so the book is still open on most of these years. Barriera could still be a good reliever or something. Tiedemann just has to be a setup man to be worth it. BUT in between say 2014 and 2019 it was very bad. Basically just produced Alek Manoah and he was an 11th overall pick which SHOULD be something, and even he could not stay healthy. Whiffed on a ton of first round arms. And the infamous run of Jon Harris and TJ Zeuch. Pearson never being a thing really hurt. Hoffman, flopped as a SP prospect. These were dark times. They had some chops before that. Matt Boyd in 2013, Stroman the year before. Some other good picks sprinkled in here and there like Deslafani and Mayza and the huge 2010 draft with Sanchez and Syndergaard.

The projected final records don't tell you much. Astros 82-80 (Division) White Sox 81-81 (Division) Rangers 81-81 (WC3) Tigers 80-82 Twins 79-83 Guardians 79-83 Mariners 79-83 Orioles 79-83 Blue Jays 78-84 The "strength of schedule" metric is different on various websites. On the tankathon site they actually have Toronto's remaining schedule as relatively easy. But the easiest in baseball still belong to Cleveland, Seattle, and Houston. I think we need the A's and Angels to get hot. LOL. The Rangers, Twins, Guardians, Mariners, and Astros play those two teams a lot, collectively. If they just roll over and lose every series, it will be hard to catch everybody, especially considering that these teams still play each other a fair amount so they will be trading wins and it will be mathematically impossible for all of them to just tank. At a BARE MINIMUM Toronto needs to go 23-18 to finish .500. That seems entirely possible... until you realize that the rotation is Cease, Soriano, and then almost nothing. It is far too wishful. Like, how can a team that is rolling out Max Scherzer, this version of Shane Bieber, and then some unholy bullpen game featuring SWR and Matt Waldron for like, 25 more games, hope to do that? With no offense... Pray

Yes the story on the minor league pitching side this year has been mostly positive Also, the team in the last two years has shown some big improvements in MLB pitching development. Finding relievers, acquiring fringe guys, helping veterans get better. Lots of positives there too.

Just a total ZERO of a ballplayer

Kirk asleep at the wheel

Pull the baseball, idiot.

Yup and they should have Kind of a lack of veteran presents on display If some old vet was at 3B he probably would have been screaming for the ball to be thrown over