MLB '24 Postseason thread

Not that it REALLY matters, but Francisco Lindor isn’t deemed worthy of being a Gold Glove finalist. That’s ridiculous. And he somehow wasn’t an All-Star. Dude has done it all this year and will finish second in the MVP race.

I really don’t understand.

 

PCA wasn't nominated despite being the best defensive outfielder in baseball. Rawlings wants who they want. Does Lindor wear a Rawlings glove?

 

Apparently he does. I would not have known without looking at pictures.

Regardless, it’s ridiculous.

 

And yet they are also viewed as more disposable than ever. Clayton Kershaw is going to get 95%+ of the vote when he's eligible for the Hall of Fame, but he's injured this fall and the Dodgers have decided there's no difference between him and 37-year-old Ryan Brasier--the fringiest of fringe middle relievers--starting playoff games. The nerds have turned starting pitching into a matter of getting outs, not accumulating innings. And expansion and creeping LaRussa-isms has deepened the reliever pool to the point where GMs know they can greatly increase their odds of success by gathering a bunch of guys and hoping two or three have career years.

 

I very much agree that pitchers are coddled too much now. But it's also hard to ignore that the velocity meter has jumped roughly 10 mph, or 10 percent, since the '60s. There are about as many guys throwing 100 now as were throwing 90 then. There might be more throwing 100 now.

It simply makes sense that the strain from that has a direct correlation to pitcher breakdowns.

 

I wouldn’t change when the All Star game is held because before or after season isn’t entirely feasible, but it is unfortunate the voting takes place when it does. You have people who have consistent seasons and are good but not in your face good, they get pushed out.

 

I'm sure there are several examples but Chipper Jones wasn't an All-Star when he was MVP, hit a career high 45 homers and was an All-Star the three years before and the two years after.

It's funny to look at guys' careers and see years they weren't All-Stars

 

All-Stars are almost always due to the performance the first 3 mos (except for legacy votes) OR only respectable player on a horrid team (hello Wayne Gross, Bryan Reynolds, etc.)

 

Wasn't around the board much this weekend. Not too worked up about Saturday, mostly because I'm still not sure the last couple weeks happened.

This renaissance coincided almost exactly with the end of the Paris Olympics, so at first it felt nice that the Tigers weren't embarrassing. I kept track of their record on a whiteboard behind my desk. At the beginning of the season I said I just wanted them to finish .500, and then that I was just happy they were relevant, and suddenly the Twins and Royals faceplanted and the 2024 Tigers were a playoff team.

I didn't think they could win a series in Houston, and then they did, and I was only cautiously optimistic they could win in Cleveland, and then they did, and then they had Tarik Skubal pitching in a winner-take-all game ... and they didn't.
There are absolutists who will tell you that a World Series championship season is fundamentally different from one that isn't. There are the romantics who'll tell you that the final outcome doesn't matter. They're probably both wrong, though it is very odd to be both pleased and unfulfilled. It's not like there was a lot they could have done differently. They put Skubal out there, went all in and lost. The whole season feels like finding a $100 bill in your coat pocket the first time you go out to shovel in the winter. I was keeping track of the Tigers' W's on my whiteboard, and Saturday night I erased them and wrote down the date of Opening Day 2025 (March 27 in Los Angeles). Nothing's ever guaranteed, but it seems like it can only get better from here. I even have a new hat for the collection in mind.

My favorite moment came in the evening immediately after the Tigers closed out the Astros, when I got a Facebook message from a Giants fan and friend in California who I haven't seen since we were both going to Methodist student conferences in college, offering congratulations (and thanks for finishing off the morally dubious Astros). I don't think this sort of thing happens in any other sport. I can't think of a time I was relatively content with a Packers playoff loss or the Red Wings getting bounced from the Stanley Cup playoffs. Non-Michigan fans weren't coming out of the woodwork last January.

Baseball is a different kind of journey, one best traveled with friends. It's just nice to feel like we're going somewhere for once.

 

Great point Re: disposable. In 1948, there were only 16 MLB teams, but those teams averaged 16 minor league affiliates apiece. Range: 10 to 26 with median of 16.5. Absurd.

 

Bye, Cleveland. So it’s either Mets or Dodgers against the fucking Yankees? Hard pass on any of those World Series. See you next spring.