Running 2017 MLB regular season thread

Brad Ausmus deathwatch in full effect. Tigers preparing for everything-must-go fire sale.

 

I'm not sure why this surprises people.

 

Now 23-9 on the road and 16-25 at Target Field.

At this point, only two things are saving Ausmus's job. 1. The fact that there probably isn't anyone who could do any better with this load of crap roster and 2. the fact that it's probably more logistically feasible to just fire him at the All-Star Break. They're down 3-0 in the 3rd to the Padres because Jordan Zimmerman, though showing flashes of effectiveness in recent starts, has apparently been hanging his curveball again. They're six innings away from an 0-7 West Coast road trip that has included a walk-off, getting 2-hit by something called Luis Perdomo to lose a 1-0 game and getting the first decent start from Anibal Sanchez in two years last night and blowing it by giving up five in the eighth (and no, it wasn't K-Rod, they cut him a few days ago).

As usual, the bullpen has been a raging disaster. Here's some numbers from the trip:

Greene: 3.2 IP, 5 H, 8 ER, 6 BB, 2 K, 2 HR
Wilson: 2 IP, 5 H, 3 ER, BB, 4 K, HR
K-Rod: 1.2 IP, 4 H, 6 ER, BB, K, 2 HR

That's two of your three "best" relievers and the guy who was supposed to be the closer at the beginning of the year but should have been on his ass six weeks ago.

Bruce Rondon, who was supposed to have saved this bullpen three years ago, was sent home for "effort issues" late in 2015 and apparently reported to Lakeland way overweight. He came back up after they cut K-Rod, mostly because there's no one else but a couple of Quad-A guys like Warwick Saupold, the Aussie who got in a bar fight in AAA last year that got him briefly suspended, and Daniel Stumpf, who is not only a Phillies Rule 5'er but a Phillies Rule 5'er who got popped for PEDs.

The rotation is average to bad. Fulmer is a stud who they ripped off the Mets in the Cespedes deal. Verlander's out pitch disappeared a couple weeks ago, so everyone fouls off about 10 pitches per AB and then jumps on him when he starts nibbling. Daniel Norris is either really good or really bad, and he's normally only the former about once or twice a month (which is normally the night they don't hit for shit or the bullpen blows it or both). Zimmerman clearly wasn't right for about an 11-month span from this time last year to about Memorial Day. He's had a few moments lately to think that the roughly $80 MILLION FUCKING DOLLARS he is owed through 2020 won't be completely wasted. Management is demanding Sanchez get his 18th chance despite posting a -1.7 WAR over the last 2 1/2 years because they still owe him $16.8 million through the end of the season.

Speaking of people owed a lot of money, Miguel Cabrera has clearly been playing hurt for months now and was clearly declining anyway. Victor Martinez can't run, and that was before he developed an irregular heartbeat. They let their centerfielder walk for financial reasons in the offseason, then forgot to continue cutting the rest of the payroll, so they don't really have one.

This team is absolutely infuriating to watch.

 

Bucs can sweep in St. Louis for the first time since '91.

 

I don't know the rules to be in but he ended up playing 1,427 games in the majors. Seems like that would nullify whatever cardinal sin that barred his membership.

 

I covered that strike. I am not surprised the union stuck to its ban. Scabs are not popular with unions.

 

Once a scab always a scab.

 

After all ... it's their job ...

 

Why? He crossed the picket line. He showed what the union meant to him: Nothing.

 

Meh, he went back to the minors for long stretches between '97 and '99. And it's not like MLB cared for "rules" (unwritten!) when it brokered the deal to let the Red Sox get Millar instead of him honoring his purchase by the Chunichi Dragons.

Millar played for the Marlins from 1998 to 2002, and was later sold to the Japanese Central League Chunichi Dragons. In order for the transaction to be completed, he first had to clear the waivers requested by the Marlins, but the Red Sox broke an unwritten rule and blocked the deal with a waiver claim. In an unprecedented deal brokered by MLB, the Marlins later repaid the money that the Dragons had paid for Millar, and the Red Sox paid a similar sum to the Marlins in return for Millar. His clubhouse presence and offensive production helped spark the Red Sox to the 2003 American League Championship Series and the 2004 World Series.

 

Bellinger 2 more homers today (both 2-run shots) and is up to 24. Unless he hits the wall after the ASG, he's by far the frontrunner for MVP.

 

Paul Goldschmidt and a few others scoff at this assertion. He is certainly in the discussion, but I'm not even sure he is the front-runner, much less by a large margin as you suggest.