As the Phillies take a 2-1 lead over the Braves in the NLDS, let’s check out some other news from around the NL East…
- Jacob Stallings’ offense declined in his first season with the Marlins, and public defensive metrics from Statcast and Fangraphs indicate that his framing and overall defense also dropped off in 2022. However, Derrick Goold of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch hears that the Marlins didn’t have any interest in moving Stallings earlier this season, though there is a possibility Miami’s feelings may have changed since Goold’s last inquiry. Nick Fortes played well in part-time action last season, and could be viewed as a candidate for a larger role if the Marlins did indeed move Stallings.
- Nationals outfield prospect Robert Hassell III underwent surgery to fix a broken hamate bone in his right hand, MLB.com’s Jonathan Mayo reports. The Talk Nats blog reported last week that Hassell seemed to suffer the injury on a swing in Arizona Fall League play. Since hamate surgeries typically take roughly 6-8 weeks of recovery time, the Nats expect Hassell to be ready for the start of Spring Training. Hassell was one of the key pieces of the six-player package Washington received in the Juan Soto/Josh Bell trade with the Padres, as the outfielder entered the season as a consensus top-40 prospect in baseball. While he struggled after the trade and the move to the Nats farm system, the 21-year-old is expected to begin the 2023 season at Double-A ball.
- Guardians GM Mike Chernoff was on the Mets’ radar when they were looking for a new front office leader following the 2020 season, but Chernoff rejected an interview request and still doesn’t seem interested in a move away from Cleveland, as he told the New York Post’s Jon Heyman. Both Chernoff and Guards president of baseball operations Chris Antonetti reiterated how much they like their current positions, and Antonetti has also frequent turned down other interview requests from rival teams over the years. With current Mets GM Billy Eppler building a 101-game winner, it would seem a little unusual if the Mets hired another baseball-focused executive as their next team president, and the club might just hire a business-focused executive and leave Eppler in charge of baseball ops. However, the Mets have been linked to so many notable front office names over the last two years that it can’t be ruled out that owner Steve Cohen might finally land a big target.
Broncos Country, Let’s Ride!!!
Still waiting to hear how important winning the division and the bye is. When Philly inevitably wins the series, people are going to look at them as a model of constructing a team that’s good enough to make the postseason and hope to get hot. Winning a division is irrelevant now. Time off is a detriment to a team.
Any time a league, professional or otherwise, waters down the playoffs with additional teams, the regular season loses more and more meaning, with or without divisions.
The NBA regular season has been reduced to basically an 82 game seeding process. The NCAA is on its way to eliminating the value of a football conference championship.
In Ohio, where I live, HS football playoffs used to involve four teams each in three divisions. That has evolved into 64 teams each in seven divisions. Qualifying for a playoff spot is now little more than a participation trophy.
Because regular season baseball is vastly different than post season, short series baseball, there will always be a disconnect between results between one and the other.
In the regular season a team needs eight or more starting pitchers to navigate 162 games. A rotation with a big two, a decent #3, and two stiffs has no advantage over one with five solid, if unspectacular, starters. But come playoff time….
The best formula for success in the post season is going in hot and healthy….but I’m not sure a bye is a bad thing. After all, there is no guarantee that any team will win an opening three game series…and there’s almost no chance a team will go into a second round with its rotation set up optimally.
The Guardians swept the first two games of the first round. Thats as good as it can possibly get. In spite of that, their best starter is available for one game..unless he goes on very short rest. Meanwhile, the Yanks get to use their ace twice.
A guaranteed spot in the second round plus the advantage of using your ace in two games is too much to turn down. Every team gets a break for the All Star game. If managed correctly, it shouldn’t be that big of a deal.
CATS44;
The best breakdown of playoffs in all sports written here.
It’s why the smarter FO’s recognize that the regular season means building their teams – not just in the offseason but throughout the year – to give their manager a flexible roster that can win games multiple ways no matter who the competition is in the playoffs.
I have no idea what the Nats fascination is with promoting players. Robles, Garcia, and Abrams, as I mentioned many times, should be in AAA.
Now I am looking at Hassell. He had a 12/6 K/W in A+, with -0- HRs in 38 ABs. That’s is, of course, a small sample size. But why promote a kid to AA if he can’t it A+?
Joe;
Because minor league baseball is for players working on things as opposed to running up their statistics?
For the most part, ‘working on things’ equals ‘running up their statistics’. I saw this in LAA with Adell & Marsh, and I am seeing it in Washington with Garcia, Robles, Abrams, and now Hassell.
If you can’t hit the guys at your current level, I’m not sure how promoting you is going to help. In Hassell’s case, they aren’t wasting service time, but in the case of the three formers names, they are using service time to teach them the things that they should be teaching them in AAA.
Congrats to the fightin Phils!! GO FOR IT !!
Mahalo sir!
Congrats to the Phillies! Glad to see the Braves lose as their fans did nothing but troll other teams posts all year. No luck this year like last year when the Dodgers and Giants wore each other out. This time the Mets took you down to the wire and wore you out.
The Mets fans are the angriest little trolls on this site. They’re overjoyed when other team’s have injuries, etc. Plenty of Braves fans like me don’t “troll other teams posts all year.” Most of us are here to engage in civil discussions. So do many Mets, Phils, Angels, Yanks, Dodger fans, etc. I give credit to the Phils for being fired up and playing better baseball than my Braves. That’s baseball. It’s happened countless times in the past and will again. The playoffs are a crapshoot.
“With current Mets GM Billy Eppler building a 101-game winner,…”
—The lack of context is hilarious. It’s the second most expensive team in baseball, and the oldest team as well that, no real surprise, was chased off the field in late September and in the wild card round and will be saddled with an even older lineup in 2023, with just 9 players signed for $148m.
As awkward as its prospects will be, imagine these Mets if deGrom *hadn’t* done them the favor of opting out.
Imagine believing that with Eppler you’ve locked in a top baseball man.
What does expense have to do with it? That counts too.
Remember, friend: Context matters.
A 92-win team put together largely from scratch with, say, a $48m payroll (let’s call them, oh… the Guardians) will have been assembled far more intelligently, on average, than a 101-win team with, say, a $299m payroll that inherited an extremely cheap 40 WAR core and beggared its chances in 2023 by locking in an extremely old roster.
Self-evident, no?
LOL
Man I remember when Marlins fan base got on us Pirates fans about the Stallings trade. I heard we “got fleeced” or even “your front office gave him away and we should be embarrassed”. Those Miami fans are so silent about that trade now. I still can’t believe Marlins thought he was a Yodi Molina type catcher with better offense and was going to the promise land with him. I was waiting for him to come back to earth and glad Pirates got something for him. Still early, but Marlins may have gotten fleeced on that trade.
The early returns don’t suggest ‘fleeced.’ None of the the three minor leaguers ‘irates got took a meaningful step forward, and the Marlins have Stallings for arb money in 2023-24.
Still, he was brutal in 2022. Everything fell apart. Might be that most common of trades: No winners.
A couple pieces from that marlins trade are sitting in AAA now. One of them should see the majors next year.