Laika
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Everything posted by Laika
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I died of cringe when Paul Skenes said his thing about always wanting to join the military but this felt similar and filled his void or whatever Meanwhile, the Japanese fans are giving standing ovations to a random Czech pitcher And then of course the extra cringe from their being an actual war and none of these morons reading the room properly
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Weird spot for Canada, eh? Tonight doesn't really matter unless you want to entertain the pie in the sky idea of going 3-1 and winning the entire pool If they beat PR but lose to Cuba, I'll cry Should be able to dispose of Cuba, on paper the offenses should not be close at all
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Canada doesn't deserve it but having to simply beat Cuba or PR to advance seems fine by me
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You'd think so. Guys like Mitch Bratt. Who knows how many were asked. The Aumont and Paxton things are weird. Canada should not be that desperate. I'd rather have just about any active professional. Like, Matt Wilkinson throws 90 but with good shape and he looked effective for his two batters yesterday. Paxton had enough velo but no command, just rust. https://www.canadianbaseballnetwork.com/canadian-baseball-network-canadians-in-the-minors
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Hilarious loss Naylor with the worst error you can make Why did Paxton cut the throw anyway? Woof
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Scherzer is a bit more interesting to me after seeing how in shape his stuff was, and how built up he already is. It's not vintage Scherzer but it might be a tick better than we saw most of last year.
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Wait why is a 91.5 mph 4 seamer getting a 102 Stuff number? That makes no sense
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He looks great
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Kasevich > Leo Jimenez
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Berrios 93 today and already eating innings
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Hopefully the Jays: Never let a pitcher challenge. Hard rule against this. Quickly identify who is good at challenging and who is not, so they can red light / green light dudes. It really could be a notable value boost for players with good eyes. I wonder how it will translate to run values / WAR.
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Hard to see how he has any value. $4.4M and last year of control. I know he was worth 1.4 WAR last year but with his lack of pure stuff, he really does profile as a swingman and nothing more. If he repeats 2025 and then enters free agency what does he get, $7M?
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Eric Lauer begins his audition for the Padres/Athletics/Diamondbacks today.
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Fact check People laughed at the notion of Lauer requesting a trade, which remains hilarious even if he did or does do it. Nobody laughed at you for suggesting he might. Nobody cares. About you.
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Okay so it's not good shape on the Little 4 seamer (expected) but it is gas. He doesn't need a third plus pitch. He might just need something he can surprise people with 15 to 20% of the time. And maybe land for strikes the odd time. Perhaps the 4 seamer or cutter can do that. Another tool to set up the life stealing knuckle curve.
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Okay, maybe. Now say you run a team and one of your players is a 4 win loser on an expiring contract... -
Brendon Little appears to have new pitches. Last year he was almost exclusively sinker slider. I few cutters at the same velo as his sinker. Today per Gameday he has thrown some four seamers which are noticeably harder than his sinker (up to 98.1!) and some cutters that are more differentiated in velo (90 and 91) His existing sinker/slider combo was nasty as f*** and his only issue was strikes. What if he can zone the 4 seamer or cutter? What if the four seamer is a plus pitch? Is he the best reliever on the team? lol by slider I mean knuckle curve, whatever it is
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Blue Jays Discussion Thread (2026)
Laika replied to Ryu In My House's topic in Toronto Blue Jays Talk
A Legend is born.
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Disgruntlement could have caused him to just suck in 2025, or ruin the vibes. Lots of reasons to want a star player to be happy for one year even if you probably aren't retaining them.
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I think the Jays OBVIOUSLY would have preferred to switch Bo and Gimenez from day 1 and the only reason they did not was that they didn't want to disgruntle their star. Which is fine logic, honestly. Positional adjustment theory would tell you that moving a player from one spot to another is assumed neutral for overall value. So swapping Bo and Gimenez would not change their individual production or the team's WAR. But it's so complicated and the assumptions fail at some point, otherwise it would not matter where anybody plays, at all.
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But it was the right move. The Jays got solid production from the SS position throughout Bo Bichette's tenure. SS is the hardest position to fill so sliding Bo to 2B at 24 just to force yourself to backfill SS is just playing the game on hard mode because you like to suffer. The Jays probably played it correctly. He was never a good shortstop but he wasn't so bad that he was costing them games or completely tanking the team. He was good enough there to be an offense-first SS and worth a bunch of WAR. 2023 is a good example. 3.9 WAR from Bo at SS, and Matt Chapman at 3B, and then 2.6 WAR pieces together at 2B mostly from what Whit and Schneider did. You can't just plug a SS hole with guys like Whit Merrifield and Davis Schneider and expect 2.6 WAR out of it. But you can do it for second base! And they did! And Bo had a +4 DRS and -3 OAA that year. Dude was fine.
