2019 MLB Regular Season running thread

No. I don’t know if players are illegally juiced or on PED against the rules. But no one is impersonating Brady Anderson or putting up Bonds, McGwire or Sosa numbers.

 

Jorge Soler's career high in home runs is 12. He has 35 this year with a month and a half to go, which is a pace for 46. Please note I am in no way suggesting that Soler is using PEDs, but isn't that similar to Anderson's power surge that came out of nowhere?

 

Anderson SLG went from .815 to 1.034 in the season he hit 16 to 50 HRs. Soler has merely has gone from .820 in 257 PA to .900 in 514 PA. Given the chance to be an everyday player may have something to do with it. OTOH ...

 

I hate siding with Abbott, but there's probably better guys to use against him than Soler. He's always had sick power; he just couldn't ever stay healthy, is poor on defense, and was blocked on the Cubs. It was between him and Schwarber and they chose Schwarber.

 

Max Kepler might be a better extreme example to use.

I think the biggest change comes at the smaller incriments. Guys who hit 5-10 homers are now hitting 20-25. There have been a lot of swings, regardless of the player, that in the past were flyouts, and not necessarily deep flyouts, but now go 15 rows deep.

Stevie Wilkerson is 27 years old. He made the majors last year and did not homer in 46 at-bats. In over 1,500 minor league at-bats, he hit 22.

He has 10 this year in 262 at-bats

 

Soler couldn’t stay healthy and was poor on defense so they went with schwarber?

 

Yes. They believed more in Schwarber's bat. Also, Soler has had multiple nagging injuries. Schwarber was hurt once during an outfield collision. Slight difference.

 

I understood what you meant, just thought it was funny.

 

*Shrugs* Baseball is weird, and it seems like this stuff happens over and over again. The Twins kept the combination of Mientkiewicz, Matt LeCroy, Bobby Kielty and Justin Morneau over David Ortiz, for their 1B/DH mix.

 

Morneau won an MVP (not that he deserved it, but still...), Doug M. Was a glove, Keilty had great peripheral stats - Aaron gleeman on his early, teenage blog picked him and johan Santana as the two underused rookies who just needed a chance, and LeCroy could catch. Most importantly, Ortiz started taking steroids.

 

Just saying, if you gave the Twins a redo on this, I think they keep Ortiz and jettison Minky. I'd put it in the "defensible, but ultimately wrong" category, to be clear, and not the "this is a bad decision immediately" category, like Bagwell-for-Anderson. (And, no clue if Schwarber or Soler will ultimately end up better, but it's defensible why the Cubs would have wanted Schwarber over Soler.)