Hey, the Reds didn’t lose today!
With their current .120 winning percentage carried over a full season, the Reds would win fewer than 20 games, challenging the legendary 1899 Cleveland Spiders for the worst major league record in Ohio history.
Arguably the worst record in MLB for any state. The 19-41 Pirates in 2020 hardly count and other worse teams all had much shorter seasons as well.
The Reds were rained out tonight, which for them is a victory.
I think it was 6 games rained out yesterday. Pretty rare to see that many.
Cleveland’s doubleheader today is their third of the year and second in four days. If you wanna play ball in northern Ohio maybe invest in a roof.
It’s been just ridiculously rainy here in the Midwest this spring. It’s sunny and dry here in Chicago today, which is pretty much the first time I’ve been able to say that this week.
It’s been so rainy in the Midwest that I am now in the north of England on vacation and the weather is much better.
The Mets released 2B Robinson Cano today, eating the $45 million that Cano is still owed on his contract.
Cano is 39, and was hitting .195, with an OPS of .501 this season; he missed last season, due to being suspended by the league for PEDs.
I’m starting to think the Nats should release Patrick Corbin, too.
Thank you for 2019, Patrick; now kindly piss off.
Wait a minute, didn’t he pitch 8 innings the other day, only giving up 3 earned runs?
Yeah, but he’s 0-5 with an ERA of 7.16. Last year, he lost 16, most in MLB. (Not that the rest of the team was much better.)
WOW. With a 4-2 lead in the bottom of the 7th, one man on, and the hitter now representing the tying run, Kyle Finnegan struck out Mike Trout, Shohei Ohtani, and Anthony Rendon consecutively.
Well, FUCK. Nats blew it in the bottom of the 9th. Ohtani nearly walked us off but did tie it, and then Tony walked us off.
Toronto’s offense remains moribund. Somehow they’re 17-13.
Bradley Zimmer is quite literally the worst hitter I have ever seen who was not a pitcher. Statistically he’s appalling; he is 3 for 40, and he’s hitting in GOOD luck. His three hits include two bunt singles that weren’t well played defensively and a fly ball home run that landed in the short porch in Houston that would not have been a home run in any other ballpark. If he has hit a line drive this year I do not recall it.
Zimmer’s career average coming into this year was .220 and I have no idea now. His swing has a loop in it like he’s throwing a lasso and he regularly misses the ball by a foot or more, which isn’t a thing that should happen. He has struck out 19 times in 42 plate appearances; many of these appearances were over in 60-70 seconds. The announcers hardly even talk about his at bats; they delve into other topics while Zimmer flails. Zimmer LOOKS defeated, like he’s trying to get it over with. He’s just astonishingly bad; that he is a major league position player amazes me.
More London games. I’m in the U.K. now and I can tell you there is zero interest in baseball. Baseball caps are worn only as a fashion statement, and most of that is from music videos.
There’s zero interest on the part of Brits, but there are expats who would almost certainly be interested, if only for the novelty. It’s worked for the NFL for the last several years.
Though hopefully, this does not lead anybody in the Commissioner’s office to make the same assumption the NFL does that expats going to a single novelty game/series each year is equivalent to sufficient interest to establish an expansion team or a re-location of an existing franchise or some kind of European minor leagues. It seems like they all think Europe is a ripe market for the plucking while the reality is that outside of those expats, there’s just no real interest.
And I think it’s worse for baseball because of the sheer number of games and almost all of them played at night. There’s a 5 hour time difference from the East Coast of the USA to the U.K. Almost every game starts after midnight.
And trying to play fantasy here sucks because of that.
But, that said, the NFL has worked for decades to build a fanbase in England. They started playing preseason games in London back in the late '80s, had an NFL Europe team in London through the '90s, and, as I understand it, some NFL games have been carried on English TV, over various stations, for years.
Sure, but the main fanbase is still largely American. There are local gridiron football fans, to be sure, but not a lot of them. I hear it’s more popular in Germany, which was basically NFL Europe’s last bastion.
I’m not sure how much weight I’d put on local TV coverage. I took a trip to Japan several years ago and caught part of an NFL game broadcast there. Apparently there’s a small but dedicated fanbase. That doesn’t mean there’s much hope of establishing any real presence in Japan.
More frequent MLB baseball in Japan, on the other hand, would be incredibly popular.
That said, the Yankees/Red Sox series in 2019 apparently drew just shy of 60000 ticketed fans for each game. That’s not bad at all, but the delusions about Europe as a “key growth market” for the league induces Magnitude 11 eye rolling.