moonslav59

How do you personally spot "instinct?" What does it look like?

3 to PIT, too. It seems we played them at the wrong time of their season.

I think our best chance at passing someone ahead of us is BAL. TOR might be second. Maybe TEX imploses, despite all the top talent they added, recently. NYY has a putrid offense and is almost always injury prone. HOU is too good to realistically hope we can pass. The Rays are in a class by themselves. For those who call us TB North, I wish!

Perhaps what I, and perhaps others, have always thought of as "instincts" was not really so.

It's hard to think out rotation can't or won't improve over the first quarter's results. Possible? Yes. Probably? No. In a way, that is not optimism but something that should be expected. How much it improves will be the key. The offense should be strong. If some surprise players fall off, others that are underperforming (Casas, Kike, Arroyo & Devers) and returning players (Story & Duvall) should take up the slack or even improve the offense. Pens are always tough to project. We improved it, on paper, and that is really all a GM can do. Now, we have to just hope the expectations are met.

Just don't call it "realism."

Too bad there aren't 4 WC teams, because whoever finishes last in the vaunted ALE will miss out, no matter how much better they might be over another division winner or two. In this sense, all ALE teams were helped, equally by the changes made, but it will help us beat out any non ALE team threatening to squeeze out an ALE team for a WC slot. Right now, TEX and HOU are looking pretty good and should win a WC slot, so the ALE 4th and 5th place teams may miss out.

When 12 of the top 13 seasons from our pitchers since 1999, which is almost a quarter of a century, are from pitchers we traded for, it is pretty shocking. There seems to be two obvious solutions that are not mutually excluding of each other: 1. Create a better system at identifying and developing young pitchers via the draft and IFA signings. (The ERod trade was great, too, as was the Whitlock Rule 5 addition, but we need to up the traditional way.) 2. Keep trading for aces from a farm system we seem to do very well loading up with quality everyday players.

I'm saying the improvement seems like it is not just related to tracking better. It seems like his instincts have improved. Anticipation, quickness of first step and the direction of that first step.

It's only mid May, but it is interesting to note we are just... 4.5 GB the second best record in MLB (BAL) 4.0 behind the 3rd (LAD) 3.5 the 4th (ATL) 2.5 the 5th (TEX) 1.5 the 6th (TOR) 1.0 the 7th (AZ) 0.5 the 8th (HOU, MIL, NYY) That being said, parity has also created us being only... 4.5 GA of 23rd (CHC) 4.0 ahead of 22nd (CLE & SDP) 3.5 ahead of 18-20th (DET, SFG & PHI) 3.0 of 17th (NYM) 2.5 of 16th (SEA) 2.0 of 15th (LAA) 1.5 of 14th (MIA) 0.5 of 13th (PIT) 0.0 of 12th (MIN)

A look at our top OPS+ leaders is an eye-opener. I included those with small sample sizes by noting their PA totals. All others are over 90 PAs: 303 Duvall 37 176 Reyes 20 168 Duran 136 Yoshida 135 Verdugo 118 Devers 115 Turner 110 Valdez 59 104 Refsnyder 78 90 Casas 86 Wong 81 McGuire 74 81 Tapia 64 77 Arroyo 79 74 Kike 38 Dalbec 13 35 Chang 47 OPS+ Against (PAs Against if under 45) -100 Garza 6 48 Sheriff 8 66 Martin 66 Wink 68 Paxton 20 70 Craford 88 Schreiber 92 Houck 105 Sale 110 Jansen 112 Bernardino 117 Brasier (DFA'd) 117 Joely 6 125 Bleier 127 Littell (Gone) 129 Bello 130 Kelly 34 (may be lost for the season w injury) 137 Kluber 141 Pivetta 155 Whitlock 161 Ort 176 Reyes 7

The dreaded west coast road trip is upon us, one of three this year, but is is not our typical left coast trip. The AL teams are split up into three trips: This one: 3 SDP, 3 LAA, off day 3 AZ Mid July (a short one): 3 CWS & 3 OAK End July: 3 SFG & 3 SEA (at the trade deadline)

All other SP'ers have an ERA over 5.00 as a starter.

I do miss the steadiness that Bogey brought to the team. It's no secret I prefer great defensive SSs, but the guy was a clear plus to the team. Last year, I questioned the clubhouse leadership as appearing to come up short, but it's hard to know exactly what was going on and who was most at fault. Many were upset when we traded Vaz and mentioned his leadership qualities and how trading him (and the way we handled telling him about the trade) took the steam out of clubhouse morale. I was thinking, "what morale?" I think the team needed a change, and my views on Cora are such that I don't think he was a major reason we flopped, last year. It looks like the team is more cohesive and energetic. As bad as the defense has been, it does not seem to be from a lack of focus and effort. There seem to be a few less mental blunders on the basepaths and defense, but that is not supported by any data I know of. I have a better gut feeling about this team than 2022, and it's not just based on that 8 game streak. Had we gone 4-4 in that stretch, we'd be at .500 and I'd still have optimism. I lost my optimism very early, last year. It's not something I'm proud of, but it just seemed like the writing was on the wall. It was like the team expected to be snake-bitten every night.

To me, a big part about instincts is sensing, perhaps by seeing pitch location and bat angle, where the ball is going to be hit and already leaning towards that direction or getting a lightning quick jump on the ball hit while also choosing the exact right path from your first step. It seems Duran has improved on this, but it's hard to see from a TV. I'm not arguing he was taught instincts, but they sure seem to have improved. "Aggressiveness" can explain some of it, like going all out after sinking line drives or balls hit behind you, but it seems to be more than that.

No doubt. It's not like he's a rookie after one goos 5 IP game, either.

Agreed. I hope it wasn't all the hype and talk and ST'ing invite going to his head. He still has time to work it out, but it is concerning, now.

I've heard this, often, and sometimes long swingers can excel in the minors and are exposed in the majors, but I'm not so sure his swing is extremely long. He does have 109 non homer hits in the minors to go along with those 33 bombs. A .268 BA is not all that bad, these days. I seriously doubt he can come close to his .440 OBP in the minors at the ML level, but .350 and 30 bombs per 650 PAs would make him a keeper. Hell, .333 and 24 bombs would, too.

If you had to win tonight's game to make the playoffs, who would you want? A. Kluber B. Pivetta C. Paxton (Maybe, if we knew Whitlock was healthy, I'd vote D. Whitlock.)

Normally, I'd totally agree and am a champion of not using small sample size for anything, but the rest are so horrible, he's #3 on my list by default.

Then, what happened? It can't be just learning how to track flying objects.

Some questioned the lack of clubhouse leadership, last season. I know stat geeks are not supposed to even talk about human element stuff, but the team seems to be in better hands, this year. No knock on JD, Vaz, Nate & Bogey, but it did seem like the 2022 team lacked something, and that falls on Cora, too.

It might have some effect on the total numbers, but it is not likely to be as major as people down here seem to think it is. BTW, the Astros SP'ers have been dropping like flies, but they keep bringing up young studs that end up not being a downtick.

As "meh" as he looked in AA, last year, after his call-up, he still had an awesome season in the minors- one of the best. He still has more to prove, but it is good to see him finding a groove at a much tougher level on the farm.

Who taught Duran better instincts and how to better track flyballs?