caulfield12

9. Patrick Corbin has personified that this year. Always second fiddle to Tyler Skaggs as return from the Dan Haren trade, Corbin has a power sinker with improved velocity, secondary pitches that have gone from questions to weapons and greater pitchability, as evidenced by throwing first-pitch strikes to 12 percent more batters. Scouts love what they see as a new-and-improved Corbin. "I thought he was a [No.] 4 or 5," an NL East scout said. "I've seen him twice now, and I think he's at worst a 3 and very easily could be a 2. He's got command, that sinker is a kamikaze and he's fearless." The numbers, on the other hand, speak of a different Corbin. They say his .259 BABIP is too low, especially for a groundball pitcher. (True.) And they say his strand rate – the percentage of players left on base at the end of innings – is absurd at 89.2 percent. (Yup. Only Jeremy Guthrie and Matt Moore's are higher.) And they worry his home runs-per-flyball rate is unsustainably low. In essence, while a 1.52 ERA and 6-0 record say Corbin is a much better pitcher than last season, the peripherals say otherwise. This is where the doobs meter gets tricky. In the majority of cases, stats and scouts agree on a player. With Corbin, they don't. Having seen Corbin, having heard effusive praise and knowing the rarity of an increase in velocity, I'll bet on his home run rate staying down and the strand rate dip and BABIP jump not derailing him. Verdict:1/5 passan/yahoosports.com

QUOTE (bbilek1 @ May 20, 2013 -> 10:12 PM) I was surprised by the choice but the Rookie ST Party is Wednesday. Anyone else going? If I could teleport like in Star Trek from China to USCF, I would gladly do it!! I'll try to make it to a game between June 16th and the end of July when I'm back home in Iowa.

Hopefully they get more than 21,000+ the next two nights, especially for the marquee match-up WED.

QUOTE (Chicago White Sox @ May 20, 2013 -> 08:19 PM) Probably, he doesn't turn 21 until the end of June. Also, the kid has actually improved his BB % this year while cutting his K % slightly. The power is down so maybe he's not hitting the ball as hard as he did last year, but take a look at his BABIP and that will show you he's been the victim of some bad luck this year. Way too early to worry to worry about him IMO. I agree that AAA was likely too aggressive of an assignment, but he's so young that he could spend another two seasons at AAA and still be young for the league. Give him some more time and hopefully he'll get back on track soon enough. The problem is that even at his highest upside, he's more of an Iguchi/complementary player and not an All-Star or electric game changer in the Reyes mold. Think Chris Getz with less speed/burst but a better fielder, more walks/patience, mix in 10-15 steals per year, bunting/sacrificing/hitting to the right side and a good all-around game...but it's dangerous to have too many hitters like that at USCF, especially when the major issue for the franchise right now (and in the future) would appear to be generating offense.

QUOTE (Chilihead90 @ May 20, 2013 -> 09:37 PM) Grown Ups 2 was my favorite Sandler movie in a LONG time. Maybe since Mr. Deeds. Seems there's really a niche now for those ensemble movies...like The Hot Tub Time Machine or Bridesmaids, "buddy" pictures if you're a guy, chick-bonding/reminiscing flicks if you're a woman. Well, maybe not the Hangover for the geriatic crowd trailer that was in the thread the last couple of pages, lol. Reminded me of "Space Cowboys."

Passan just wrote a long article (giving out "doobs" for dubious) for those players likely to revert back to form. Corbin was 1/5. 5/5 meant you were definitely coming back to earth. Worth reading. Talks about Goldschmidt's hot start, too.

QUOTE (flavum @ May 20, 2013 -> 09:05 PM) Axelrod vs Santiago- I was wrong. Axelrod has earned it for now. Short-term, maybe it's Axelrod. Still, Santiago's ERA for the season is well under 3.00 (obviously, part of that is from his excellent bullpen work, but it also includes the time he came in for Floyd and got hammered by CLE, just like Sale did). Axelrod isn't the type of pitcher who's often going to go out there and throw a shutout or 1-2 run game. But he keeps the team in games and doesn't give in....Mr. Bulldog. Keeps proving the doubters wrong, for now. And Danks hasn't exactly earned a spot based on his rehab results. One thing's for sure, they better not make him the replacement for Thornton/Veal next season. That would be a criminal misuse of him. Right now, after Sale, he's still arguably the 2nd most valuable trade value on the team...along with the "new and improved" Viciedo and finally Quintana.

Viciedo no BB's first 48 AB's. Then, 8 walks now in his last 35 (all in May, since returning from the DL). Only 5 K's. 856 OPS on the season. .229 walk per/AB would lead Votto, Choo (man, we could have used him now and in the future), Fielder and Upton if extrapolated over a full season.

Oh, Tyler... Not good. This sets up the nightmare scenario with so many memories from last July (and no Youk on our team).

And that's exactly what Keppinger has to do occasionally to take the intentional walk/pitching around Viciedo option off the table...

Wow. Thought Viciedo must have gone yard, lol. It's just the logical thing for any pitcher to do, which is walking him while he's hitting in front of Keppinger.

Or Adrian Gonzalez... What happened with the play in LF on the double? Viciedo just missed it? Bad route? It wasn't ruled an error...just curious about the explanation.

Is there some rule (the "Maddon Effect") that utility players for the Rays always suck once they leave Tampa?

QUOTE (fathom @ May 20, 2013 -> 07:10 PM) Surprised that the crowd isn't bigger tonight with the Red Sox in town and nice weather out. Blackhawks excuse. Do they still have higher ticket prices for Red Sox/Yankees games? We haven't heard the term "dynamic pricing" in the Sox lexicon much this year. That turned out to be a fiasco...although Brooks and Rongey tried "PR spinning" it all year long.

The Rangers have kept that home run music from "THE NATURAL" (when Redford hits the ball into the light standard) for at least 20 years now and it still sends shivers down your spine if you're a baseball fan.

Axelrod ERA at a 4.38. Still pretty decent for a 5th starter, where anything below 5 is more or less acceptable. Walks have been killing us recently. Solo homers, that's not so bad...because they tend to quiet down the really big innings with multiple base-runners on as happened with Santiago Saturday in the bottom of the 4th. (Although in that case, giving up a solo homer to Trumbo is what started everything going south, confidence-wise.)

Angel Sanchez at 3B, Carlos at 2B...not sure what to read (if anything) into that, with Beckham at SS. What do all the scouting reports say about Carlos Sanchez's arm for SS??

QUOTE (Soxfest @ May 20, 2013 -> 06:50 PM) Why not the Sox have nothing to lose to try it? Gordon defensively, and he's hitting well in his rehab. Phegley has never hit well for more than a 2 month stretch in his career (like Mitchell), so we'll see if he can extend it to 3 full months, PROBABLY. If things hold up, we'll be 4th place all alone for the first time in weeks.

QUOTE (Soxfest @ May 20, 2013 -> 06:47 PM) 40 pitches for Lester thru 2 innings love it. Just for fun, I'm going to guess Sale and Buchholz will both be bounced before they get out of the 5th on WED....when they have those "anticipated pitching match-ups" (like Darvish/Verlander last week), 85% of the time they never materialize. FWIW, the legend of Will Middlebrooks hasn't exactly carried over into 2013.

For about the UMPTEENTH time this season, hard to know what to make out of this team. Nights like this, when your fifth starter is posed to beat one of the better AL teams' aces, they look like they could compete for a playoff spot because of their pitching. Then you look at Konerko, Keppinger and Flowers and think, well, maybe not.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ May 20, 2013 -> 06:41 PM) There's an extra base hit in the worst offensive inning ever. See, it worked!! (Although the last 4-0 lead we held didn't end up so well).

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ May 20, 2013 -> 06:41 PM) There's an extra base hit in the worst offensive inning ever. Gimenez and Greene must realize there's some heat on them to hold their positions.

If we could "man up" Greene's defense, he should be able to take that role away from Angel Sanchez. The funny thing is that he was always known as a good fielding, poor hitting SS when he was a regular.

Hawk's "muscle memory" for Lester. Against Paulie, 3 out of 23 AB's have left the park (10/23=.435, 3 doubles, 3 homers, 7 RBI's, 3 BB's) Against Dunn, smaller sample size 1/6, 2 K's, 3 BB's

This next half-inning could be a lowlight in Sox offensive history. (Crosses fingers reverse-jinx is in place and we put up a crooked number somehow.)