This week in baseball blogs:
- The Sports Tank declares that Nationals ace Max Scherzer is the best pitcher in baseball.
- The Redbird Daily studies Cardinals right fielder Stephen Piscotty’s 2017 power outage.
- Infield Shift revisits the infamous Shelby Miller trade the Diamondbacks made with the Braves in 2015.
- Jays Journal breaks down Toronto’s non-Josh Donaldson trade candidates.
- Mets Daddy criticizes general manager Sandy Alderson for letting star infielders Daniel Murphy and Justin Turner go during his tenure.
- Outfield Fly Rule wants the Braves to trade second baseman Brandon Phillips and promote standout prospect Ozzie Albies.
- The Point of Pittsburgh and North Shore Nine focus on Pirates infielder Josh Harrison’s resurgence.
- Outside Pitch MLB lists five reasons the Red Sox shouldn’t trade for a third baseman.
- The Runner Sports (links: 1, 2, 3) looks at a couple key reasons for the Astros’ success, explores whether the Yankees should buy or sell at the deadline, and argues that Masahiro Tanaka has righted the ship.
- Rotisserie Duck analyzes which pitchers are overrated and which are underrated.
- Jays From the Couch doesn’t see the logic in Toronto potentially trading right-hander Marcus Stroman at the deadline.
- The First Out At Third believes Brewers third baseman Travis Shaw should’ve made the All-Star team.
- Phillies Nation reflects on the team’s short-lived union with outfielder Michael Saunders.
- Notes From The Sally scouts Cardinals shortstop prospect Delvin Perez.
- Sports Talk Philly wonders if there’s a growing disconnect between the Phillies’ front office and coaching staff.
- Mets Mind examines outfielder Curtis Granderson’s in-season turnaround.
- Big Three Sports expects this year’s home run derby to be the best since 2003.
- Call to the Pen ranks the 10 best players who never made it to the majors.
- Fueled By Sports names the best Braves of all-time.
- PhoulBallz (links: 1, 2, 3) chats with some of the Phillies’ minor league coaches.
- Pinstriped Prospects speaks with young Yankees hurler Austin DeCarr.
- The 3rd Man In profiles Brewers third-round pick Jacob Heatherly.
- The K Zone talks with Scott Braun of MLB Network.
- NatsGM has a podcast interview with Driveline Baseball’s founder, Kyle Boddy.
- Camden Depot notes that the Orioles have often been on the wrong end of blowouts this year.
- Pirates Breakdown flashes back to the 2008 trade deadline, GM Neal Huntington’s first with the Bucs.
- Everything Bluebirds advises the Blue Jays to learn from the mistakes they made in 1995.
- Call to the Pen suggests the Phillies are in the midst of an important psychological test.
- Extra Innings UK attends the first-ever home run derby on British soil, one featuring Carlos Pena, Shawn Green and Cliff Floyd.
Submissions: ZachBBWI @gmail.com.
Scherzer is not the best pitcher in baseball. That belongs to Kershaw…postseason is a different story.
True
So far both look good, but I’d give the edge to Scherzer. He’s having the best start of his career, partially because the NL East is so bad. With the West being so good, it’ll be interesting to see if Kershaw continues to reign.
Looking at Scherzer, he’s on pace to have career highs in everything, while including IPs. He’s on another level right now.
Check the stats, Scherzer isn’t even close to Kershaw lifetime. Both came in the league in 2008, Scherzer’s best full season ERA is 2.79 in 2015. Kershaw has beaten Scherzer’s best number 7 times and not by just a little. Scherzer’s lifetime ERA is 3.30. Kershaw’s lifetime ERA is 2.36 which is better than ANY single season Scherzer has ever posted.
Scherzer also pitched in the AL for five years though. If those 5 years are in the NL he might have an ERA that’s at least half a run lower.
I was speaking about this year and only this year. “Best pitcher in baseball” title to me speaks about the present day production. This year, Scherzer is the best SP. Obviously Kershaw has been better since he came into the league – no argument there.
Alex Wood is the best starting pitcher so far this year…10-0, 1.69 ERA. Scherzer 10-5, 2.10 ERA
I recently analyzed starting pitchers over the last five years to determine the best of the best (for a blog I write for). Kershaw and Scherzer are no brainers, and both are continuing to prove it this year. However, a big name missing from the discussion is Chris Sale. This year he is right there with Scherzer or ahead depending on the stat (DRA, SIERA, FIP, fWAR, WARP). Pretty much everything other than ERA, which isn’t off by much and less important.
Also, It’s hard to ignore what Wood has done so far, even though he doesn’t have the track record or the innings of the other three.
Yeah, I’m sure teams will be tripping over themselves to trade for Brandon Phillips.
They’ve had calls on him. They won’t get a haul, but I’d bet $1 they could unload him if they chose to before the deadline.
Spot on,but Braves fans will insist like Adams he will bring a huge haul.
Adams has actually been amazing in Atlanta though, Phillips doesn’t even have an average bat
No, he won’t bring that large of a haul.
However, there’s no real reason to trade him if it’s a lackluster swap.
Adams could bring a decent return, hopefully something including a 3b.
It’s not about getting a large haul for Phillips, but clearing space for Albies. He’s ready to start developing in the MLB.
We could get something relatively small for Phillips as a rental whose been roughly average (and unfortunately trending the wrong way). But the most important thing we’d get is his spot on the diamond freed up for a guy who could hold down the position for the next 6 years or more.
This was supposed to be a down year in the Bronx and if they finished around .500 then that would be a huge plus. The idea was to sprinkle in a few veterans to help the young players and see how it played out. Problem is they got off to a great start playing way above their heads and Judge emerged while a few players started off hot. Then things came crashing down to earth,injuries were horrendous and the pitching cooled,while the bullpen was an unseen weakness. They should definitely stick with the original plan and stay the course,no trades for rentals,play the kids and wait till the others come back in the spring. They can still finish above .500 and with the injured vets returning possibly still make the playoffs!
Oh oh, Aaron hacked into famine’s account.
Yea to busy celebrating Kyle breaking .170! Gonna be sick tomorrow..way to much spicy relish.
SSS be damned, Kyle’s got a 1.117 OPS since his recall.
It’s a shame MetsDaddy is the go-to “Baseball blog” attached to the Mets for this site. There are numerous blogs, far superior.
Lol just read the linked article about Murphy and Turner, the authors only point is “Sandy Anderson is the GM and he should have known these two were going to be stars.”
Which of course, is a crappy argument. No stats from the years prior, just that Alderson should be a fortune teller.
And to make one final point, no one in the industry foresaw what would happen to Turner and Murphy. Turner didn’t sign with the Dodgers until two months after the Mets non-tendered him and Murphy didn’t sign until Christmas Eve. So the demand for the two players wasn’t very high.
A small case could be made for Murphy. He had changed his swing prior to becoming amazing in the playoffs. Granted, lots of guys tweak something and get hot only to crash back to Earth. I can’t even make a case for Turner though.
Nobody in baseball foresaw what Turner has done. Not even LA, he is the ultimate outlier.
Murphy, on the other hand, had steadily progressed with the bat, and essentially carried the Mets through Sept. & Oct.
He didn’t sign until late, bc he wanted to return to NY. He only signed after the Walker trade. The only knock on Murph was his glove, but in retrospect, it shouldn’t have mattered.
He was a fan favorite and wanted to stay, he could have moved to 1B.
Duda could have been dealt to AL,
But Wilpons are cheap.
Suggesting that any GM has that kind of knowledge & insight is just nuts.
Jose Bautista played for the Pirates for a couple years before leaving for the AL. He hit a few HR’s, but nobody……Nobody……ever saw anything in him that would lead to what he has accomplished. Sometimes…..things just begin to click, and players become “much better than before”. It’s usually connected to “a change in something”…..although often takes a little while to work out.
Adams had the talent but was in a dead spot in St Louis. The new surroundings suited him well. Finally he does what everyone thought he should be doing. The Cards had told us for years that he was capable of exactly that.
Andrew Miller, Jake Arrieta, even Roy Halladay was traded…..and then was suddenly unbeatable. It Happens…..
Yeah MetsDaddy is just ridiculous on this one. The Mets should have tried to resign Murphy just because he was their only contact hitter besides Wright who was already starting to break down physically. Even if he didn’t become what he is now he would have been worth the money. It’s not like the Nationals knew they were getting this kind of production. And no one could have predicted Turner.
I mean the whole argument is weak
Pretty sure most of it is just who submits. I don’t think MLBTR is looking through blogs for content for this. They just choose the best from what they’re sent.
The third man in profiles reds* 3rd round pick Jacob Heatherly, not the Brewers
The Scherzer piece features poor spelling and grammar for something I assume the author wants me to take seriously, but that doesn’t really matter since the fact that Pimentel neglects to explain why Scherzer is better than Kershaw makes it worthless anyway. I’m not sure why MLBTR bothered to link to it.
Because it is the hottest of hot takes, of course. I’d have nothing but sheer satisfaction if Scherzer begins to even out to his career norms by the end of the year and everyone who proclaimed him the best started to backtrack like no tomorrow.
There’s been many players who improved or found themselves after chaning teams… Justin Turner, Daniel Murphy, JD Martinez, Jose Bautista, Jake Arrieta, Mark Melancon, David Ortiz, Carlos Guillen, Luis Gonzalez, Sammy Sosa, Dennis Eckersley, Rick Sutcliffe, Joe Morgan, Hal McRae, George Foster, Nolan Ryan, it has and always will happen.