MLB '24 Regular Season Thread

It’s a play a major league player should be able to make and it hit him in the glove. When the first baseman gets that ball to throw, the runner should have been out. It was a slightly bad throw and a worse attempt to actually catch it.

But agree to disagree. It was the Orioles scorer who called it a hit.

 

Yeah but they also threw much softer. It's impossible to expect a generation of pitchers to adjust on the fly like this. There was no right way to do this, but the closest option would have been to install it at the minor leagues over a five-year period before it became a major league rule. That way, all the prospects would be adjusted to it and the veterans would have plenty of time to begin preparing. Would they be fully ready in 2029? No, because most guys aren't going to work faster until they have to. But they'd have off-seasons to work out with the clock and get an idea of what to expect. Alas, building something incrementally like this would require a commissioner who didn't hate the sport and its players. Maybe next time.

 

The thing -- and this is the biggest thing I took away from my days as an official scorer -- whether the fielder touched the ball is not a rule of thumb. I mean, you don't chalk up hits when a ground ball goes between a second baseman's legs untouched.

I adjust just a little on Chris' take. For me, it's entirely dependent on whether it would have been an outstanding play had it been made.

That, and (unrelated to this) you make damn sure a team's first hit is a good one, because you don't want a firestorm after the final pitch.

 

They've had a pitch clock in the minor leagues since 2015.

 

Never change, Angel Hernandez. Never change.

 

And that’s where I am. It would have been a great play but it was fielded cleanly which then takes it to would the runner have beaten the throw without a great throw. The throw was there. The catch wasn’t. That’s my deal.

And yeah just fielding it doesn’t mean one thing or the other. We’ve seen a bunch of guys to the ball but hang no hope of making a play and it’s a hit. Here I don’t think that. But that’s one person’s opinion. If it stayed as a hit, I’d have shrugged and gone on with my day.

 

Yeah, all the arm injuries aren’t because of the pitch clock. It’s been heading this way for more than a decade. Starting with kids.

The 100 mph gets you drafted high and millions of bucks. With multiple surgeries. But that’s worth it to lots and lots of pitchers, their families, their coaches and their agents.

Throwing hard is taught. Leaning to pitch is secondary.

I can think of no better example than Noah Syndergaard. Could throw a million miles per hour. But really had no idea how to pitch after Tommy John.

I wonder how tough a time Greg Maddux would have getting to the majors these days.

 

Spin rates are probably just as much to blame as velo (I want to nut punch the guy who started that). It isn’t enough to throw hard, the spin on breaking balls has to be a certain RPM. That torque on an arm—especially a developing arm—just isn’t healthy.

The game just cares about high speed pitches and launch angle. Having an approach at the plate and knowing how to hit corners are going the way of the dinosaur. Add to Maddux, where would Gwynn be with his refusing to strike out swinging with both cheeks with two strikes?

 

I don’t know. When doesn’t .330 play? Guys like Gwynn are timeless.

 

Yeah, I realized this spring I've been to more defunct FSL parks -- Osceola, Brevard, Vero Beach, West Palm Beach, Pompano Beach and Fort Lauderdale -- than current ones.

There's nothing really within walking distance of McKechnie ... LECOM Park, unfortunately. The decent food options are closer to the river. I had the option of parking in an auto glass warehouse lot or a crematorium. For the Pirates exhibition game, we wound up way down at the county water treatment plant, where they had golf cart shuttles.

 

Extreme example to make a point. When guys are being taught launch angles and exit velocities over two strike approaches or going opposite field, we may not see another guy like Gwynn for a while.