Davis Daniel struck out ten in six full innings in AFL action. Both of those numbers are first in the league so far this season.
Texas shut out the Astros to take the first game of the ALCS.
Alyssa Nakken got an interview for the vacant Giants managerial job. Yuki Matsui, closer of the Rakuten Golden Eagles, is an international free agent. He still might sign with a ball club in Japan but there is nothing standing in the way of him coming to the United States.
Rob Manfred wants to give it some time before he will agree that the playoff format is bad.
Photo credit: Rex Fregosi
Happy Trails
Red to send Suarez with Barria.
Need to send Suarez with Barria. Damn spell check.
Spell check should be curb stomped.
Finally. I’ve wanted barria’s worthless ass gone for years.
Robert Manfred is doing his job, raising the value of teams and their owners by any means possible at the expense of the Game itself and at the expense of the fans….sort of.
Baseball fans and non-baseball fans returned to the stadiums this season in droves. Why? Because of shorter game times and seeing more action. Have to give Manfraud credit for taking chances on rule changes and seeing them succeed.
Larger bases that are thinner increased base stealing. Allowing a pitcher 2 throws to pick off a runner was aided by the catcher trying to pick off the runner in the strategy part of holding the runner on. GPB grade B+
Time Clock was genius and accomplished it’s desired affect by shortening game times, which is what the fans wanted. Adding in the number of times a batter could step out of the box and a pitcher could step off the mound aided in faster game times. Have to give a grade of A+ here.
Eliminating the shift was a no-brainer and did add to the excitement value of the offense part of the game. GPB Grade is A.
I still do not like the Ghost runner in extras, but it is more than tolerated by younger fans as they seem to enjoy it.
I do not care for so many wild card teams being added as it takes away from having to win your division. Not a fan of the lowering in season games just to focus on the playoffs. 162 games are just fine. MLB is not a sprint, and it should not reward teams that do not win their division either by allowing so many Wild Cards.
Conceding that playing teams in division 18 times per season is a bit much, I have to take issue with playing every team in MLB every year as I would like to play more often against the teams in the American League Central and Eastern Divisions. There seems to be a “Let’s copy the NBA and NFL” instead of embracing what MLB has, and that is 2 separate individual leagues. We have the National and American Leagues; we do not have and do not need Conference’s.
So why the dislike for Manfred and disrespect by referring to him as Manfraud? It is in his handling of the sign stealing teams. with slapping the hands of a few teams and amnesty for the players who cheated. For not exposing all the teams that cheated thinking to rather save the face of MLB. Also allowing “Legalized” Gambling to be around the game. It’s just a matter of time until a scandal pops its ugly head up and taints the sport that it will not recover from. And lastly, not doing more sooner to solve the issues of Tampa – Oakland sooner. Next in line will be the Brewers and the Guardians needing to move as their cities are losing population fast. Is San Francisco going to be an issue with attendance down the road? How about the South side of Chicago? Inner city Baltimore?
Davis Daniel is a good story. Kid was a stud in high school and college until getting hit with the injury bug.
If he’s finally healthy, he could be a nice boost.
DD would be a great boost to the staff but he really needs to cut down on those walks
12 team playoff formats (ie 6 teams from each league) don’t really work well in baseball. The winners are actually losers having to sit around and wait for a 5 game series against a team that has just won a playoff series and has momentum.
If MLB truly wants to expand the playoffs they’d be better off following the NBA model and have 8 teams in each league make the playoffs and then do the following in 7 game series:
1 v 8
2 v 7
3 v 6
4 v 5
28 wins to win the Championship
Reduce the regular season to 144 games and start the playoffs in mid-September.
1st 2 rounds of playoff revenue split between all 32 teams to help make up for the shortened season
Actually the NBA is now a 10 team tournament per conference because they felt 8 teams just wasn’t enough so 6 of those teams wait around almost a week for the play in tournament to end. So not sure I’m seeing your point.
So should we adopt the same?
No – old NBA. 16 total teams, 8 from each league. It’s personally too many for me but makes sense if MLB really wants all these teams in the playoffs.
All 32 teams? If this plan is conditioned on expansion to 32 teams, then yes. 50% of the teams making the playoffs is excessive, but it’s better than bye weeks.
They should split the Leagues into two divisions (West/East) and take the top 2 from each division + 4 wild cards. The AL West takes KC, Minnesota and Portland expansion. The NL West gets St.Louis, Atlanta, and Nashville (or Miami if the expansion city is Charlotte).
If they don’t do expansions, I think 16 teams out of 30 making the playoffs is just too much.
16 teams. 8 from each league seeded by record but division winners are always in.
Not a fan of reducing the regular season to 144 games. At all. The marathon is part & parcel to a baseball campaign IMO.
If fatigue is the concern, MLB should expand the active roster allocation.
Agree on all points.
Only reason to go fewer games is 28 potential playoff games would be a second season.
for the halos iust means the season is 18 less games
I see your point, but I’d rather expand the rosters for the entirety of the season than reduce the regular season schedule.
Yeah, terrible idea. No reducing and this fatigue thing in professional sports is beyond obnoxious. Semien and Freeman have missed 1-game in the last 5-seasons.
I like 5 teams from each league making the playoffs.
The 1 seed gets the winner of the 4/5 series that is played under NPB rules: best 2 of 3 with the higher seed starting with a game in hand. Under this scenario the 4/5 matchup goes 2 games at most.
So the 2/3 series can start on Wednesday or Thursday with the 1/wild card series starting on Thursday or Friday.
That’s a nice bonus for the division winners and a big incentive to push for a division title rather then just a wild card.
And it benefits baseball by getting the series going on weekdays rather than immediately competing with football.
I would prefer 10 over 12 but MLB seems determined to get as many teams as possible competing for the post season.
One thing is for sure, waiting around in baseball is momentum poison. So any set up where the top seeds are waiting around for a few days for a team that just won a playoff series is a disadvantage. If there is going to be all these teams going to the playoffs, think all series should start at the same time which would require 8 from each League.
Then you do old school NBA tourney as discussed above.
We’re still not making the playoffs unless all 30 teams make the cut.
and even then maybe