Not sure this is the right forum, but as a baseball fan, nothing is better than these questions. How about Randy Johnson vs. Bob Gibson?
I’d have to go with the Big Unit. In context, his peak was basically just as good, and he has a few more elite seasons.
Obviously, Gibson was rather a more impressive all around athlete. Johnson was just weird, couldn’t hit, and fielded his position like Stevie Wonder. Hard to compare them.
Nats lost to the Braves 8-4, but we made it interesting in the bottom of the 9th. We scored two runs, and had the tying run in the batter’s box at the end of the game.
Mariners get their 12th in a row.
And it’s partially because of their first grand slam of the season, done by rookie All-Star Julio Rodriguez (it was of course his first career MLB grand slam).
Looking forward to Julio in the Home Run Derby.
Incidentally, I have to follow this up by noting I went with wins above AVERAGE because I think there’s value in looking at that, rather than just wins above REPLACEMENT, when discussing greatness and Hall of Fame cases.
I’m not suggesting Nolan Ryan isn’t a Hall of Famer, but if you go by WAR, he is well ahead of, say, Justin Verlander, 81 to 73. But it seems obvious to me that’s because he compiled numbers for a long time. I’m not saying there isn’t value in just-average seasons like he had in 1978 or 1980 or 1983, but if we’re discussing greatness I’d at least look at stuff like being above average, and I think most people would agree Verlander, who has two Cy Youngs and an MVP Award, seems to have hit greater heighs of actual pitching effectiveness, so that above average stat is, I think, meaningful.
Consider also two hitters with similar WAR; Pete Rose and Joe DiMaggio. Rose, of course, compiled his 80 WAR over 24 seasons, while DiMaggio assembled his in 13. (Let’s momentarily not consider giving DiMaggio specific credit for wartime service.) As one might expect, if you go by WAA, DiMaggio is WAY WAY ahead 55 to 29.
OK so those guys are both Hall of Famers too, but I find this number particularly interesting when examining borderline cases. Jim Kaat, who recently got in, was just 7 games above average - he is pretty much only in for having a long career. (He peaked at 15.3 before deciding to stay on as a mediocre relief pitcher for a long time.) By way of comparison, David Cone is at 35.5, an extremely high total. Which is greater?
The Dodgers’ Clayton Kershaw had a perfect game through seven innings against the Angels before Luis Rengifo broke it up with a leadoff double in the 8th.
O’s streak ends at 10 after 4-5 one-run loss to Tampa Bay tonight.
Clearly they had just hit a particularly soft spot in the schedule, but it was fun while it lasted.
Still, everyone now knows, they’re not just going to lay down anymore. It was still a close game tonight, they were ahead early, got behind, and almost pulled off the comeback.
Yanks are in the worst part of their season currently. 1-5 in the last 6 games. Failures in Starting Pitching, Bullpen and Judge in a slump. 2 more games to the All Star Break.
Juan Soto turns down a mega deal with the Nats and may be traded.
Blue Jays: Get him. Whatever it takes.
Brewers closer Josh Hader, who was practically untouchable for the first three months of the season (and had a 0.00 ERA well into late May) has had a bad week. In the past few days, he’s given up two game-winning home runs, including a walk-off grand slam, last night, to the Giants’ Mike Yastzremski. He gave up three home runs, in total, in that game, and his ERA has ballooned to 4.50.
Hader in his last two games: one third of an inning pitched, four homers, nine earned runs.
Hader last YEAR only gave up three homers and eight earned runs.
Ouch.
UGH. He’s my favorite player. I wanna keep him.
He must still be dealing with some serious sleep deprivation from his paternity leave.
Funny Yankees tweet that went viral.
Another example of the screwy schedule has the Angels and Dodgers off on a Sunday. It’s not for the All Star Game since they’ve been playing in Anaheim, a quick Google doesn’t show a huge concert or anything today.
Cubs fans get screwed with the non stop battle of the streaming services. Coming back from the all star break, they first have their Friday night game on Apple TV and then the Sunday game is one of those early start for Peacock games.
Mariners go into the All-Star break riding a 14 game winning streak.
That’s one shy of the franchise record, and the longest streak into the All-Star break in MLB history.
And while they are still 9 games behind Houston in the AL West, they now hold the second wild-card position, just 1/2 game behind Tampa Bay for the top spot.