Welcome to a different version of 5 Issues, my weekly column that highlights unusual and sometimes pleasant happenings from the final week of baseball. My very own baseball watching was a bit stilted this week, for the absolute best purpose. I went to 3 Giants video games, an thrilling occasion made doable by low cost ticket offers, a good friend’s birthday, and a few final minute cancellations of non-baseball weekend plans. Two of these video games have been fairly terrible; Blake Snell bought shelled Friday night time, after which Blake Snell’s replacements bought shelled Wednesday afternoon.
The excellent news is, there’s nonetheless *a lot* good baseball happening on a regular basis that I had a lot within the tank to put in writing about. You don’t should look too far to seek out issues to love about baseball lately. We’ve bought new holidays, outdated AL Central rivals, stadium gimmicks, and pure unadulterated velocity. As at all times, this column is impressed by Zach Lowe’s basketball column, Ten Issues (Zach impressed Will Leitch to start out his personal 5 Issues column over at MLB.com, in truth).
1. Jared Jones Day
There’s a brand new vacation making the rounds. It occurs each 5 days or so. Possibly you haven’t heard of it, wherein case I’m more than happy to introduce it to you. It’s referred to as Jared Jones Day, and I hope you’ll begin celebrating with me.
The customs of Jared Jones Day are fairly easy. When Pirates rookie Jared Jones pitches, we activate the opposing group’s broadcast. Then we watch the admiration, disbelief, and normal chaos that ensues as he makes lineups full {of professional} athletes seem like uncoordinated rubes.
This vacation started in earnest for me when the Pirates visited the Mets final week. I turned on the Mets broadcast as a result of it’s one in all my favorites, and all three broadcasters have been gobsmacked by Jones’s arsenal and method. Keith Hernandez was lowered to guffawing at one significantly nasty slider. Jones went 5 one-hit innings, putting out seven, and left destruction in his wake. The Mets seemed each bit as impressed because the broadcasters sounded.
It’s so enjoyable to observe Jones that I can’t blame these guys. His fastball defies gravity. He challenges hitters quite than losing pitches or giving up on at-bats. When he walks somebody, it’s regardless of his greatest efforts, and it means the hitter bought to swing at a center-cut fastball someplace within the equation. His slider, alternatively, is a surgical device, slicing off the corners of the strike zone at 90 miles an hour.
This week’s commentary of JJDay got here on Monday in opposition to the Brewers. Milwaukee’s announcers aren’t as fast to go with opponents because the Mets crew, however even nonetheless, they couldn’t maintain the admiration out of their voice as he blew William Contreras away with a 99-mph fastball situated completely on the higher fringe of the zone. And naturally, there was the piece de resistance, this pitch that Brice Turang won’t ever ever reside down:
Jones wasn’t good by any means in his begin in opposition to the Brewers. He gave up a Rhys Hoskins solo shot – throw 100 up within the zone, and also you’re gonna hand over some bombs – and allowed six complete baserunners. However he went six innings with seven strikeouts and solely that single earned run, and made believers out of one other saying crew. By the third inning, they’d gone from studying his stats dispassionately to inventing a hypothetical advance scouting report: “nastiest pitcher doable proper now.”
Ultimately, all of the groups within the league may have seen this man and it’ll be much less enjoyable. However for now, I’m having a blast seeing a brand new group of educated baseball individuals encounter his incandescent expertise for the primary time and wrestle to seek out phrases to explain the majesty. And yet one more time for the highway:
2. Energy on Energy
Monday afternoon within the Bronx, the A’s clung to a good 2-0 lead. They’d taken that lead solely moments earlier than, within the high of the ninth inning, on a Zack Gelof house run. However the Yankees lineup was ideally positioned to mount a comeback: Anthony Volpe, Juan Soto, and Aaron Decide have been due up. That’s not the hardest lineup you might face on this place – the Dodgers would love a phrase – but it surely must be shut.
Fortunately for Oakland, their greatest participant occurs to be their nearer. Mason Miller is ridiculous. I’m unsure I’m promoting it sufficient by saying that, even. He throws 103 with motion, goes max effort on each pitch, and appears like a soccer participant who took up baseball as a interest. You’ve by no means seen a person so hulking throw so onerous.
Miller shortly distributed with Volpe, tossing just a few sliders that Volpe fouled off earlier than blowing the doorways off with 103 up and away:
Sorry, Anthony, thanks for taking part in. Subsequent time, possibly you’ll have time for a full swing in opposition to that heat-seeking missile.
Soto was subsequent up, and you may’t idiot round with him. He’s not the type of man to fall for the outdated in-zone spin trick. Maybe earlier in his profession, that will have fooled him, however you may’t throw tender in-zone stuff to somebody seeing the ball in addition to Soto is true now. So Miller went after him. First, he missed with one. Then, he got here again within the zone and bought the social gathering began:
1-1? Seems like a fastball depend:
1-2? Seems like a 103-mph fastball depend:
Hey, like I mentioned, there’s actually no fooling Soto proper now. The one possibility is to point out him your greatest and see what he can do about it. The factor is, Miller’s greatest is actually good.
Decide is mired in a stoop proper now, however he’s nonetheless Aaron freaking Decide. Miller was nonetheless all jacked up on fastballs after barreling by means of Soto. He began Decide off with some warmth as nicely:
Man, Decide seemed dangerous on that second one. That’s the ability of 102 with fine condition; it turns hitters into pretzels even after they’re searching for a fastball. Miller in all probability counted on bending Decide inside out with a slider after that in a basic fast-then-slow plan. However Decide isn’t any dummy, and Miller’s sliders couldn’t get the job completed:
That final one may have been an issue if the A’s have been solely up one run. Middle reduce 88-mph pitches are usually not what it is best to throw to the single-season AL house run document holder. However Decide solely fouled it off, and that meant we bought to see what everybody wished. Energy in opposition to power. The very best fastball in baseball in opposition to the pre-eminent energy hitter:
Ah, pleasant. Miller is a blast. I particularly like watching him in opposition to good hitters; nobody desires to see Tucker Barnhart attempt to hit 103, however Soto making an attempt to hit it’s gripping tv. The A’s are higher than anticipated this 12 months, and extra watchable too. Miller is a whole lot of the rationale why.
A fast observe: Miller bought the highest of the Yankee order once more on Thursday night, after the half above was already written. He acquitted himself nicely – 1.1 innings, three strikeouts, one annoyed Soto bat slam – I simply don’t have any video for you.
3. Metropolis By The Bai-Ley
The Giants haven’t had the perfect farm system in baseball in recent times. Current graduates like Luis Matos, Casey Schmitt, Joey Bart, and David Villar have been someplace in between position gamers and journeymen. However it hasn’t been all dangerous. Patrick Bailey, the group’s first draft decide in 2020, appears to be like like the following nice homegrown Big. Final Saturday, I occurred to be on the park for a pleasant afternoon of baseball. The Giants celebrated Bailey with a bobblehead, and he had himself a day worthy of the festivities.
Bailey’s higher identified for his protection than his offense, however Saturday was an exception. Within the first, he dumped a tender liner to heart in opposition to Zac Gallen. Within the third, he prolonged the lead with a bloop double. That’s the type of hitter he was in 2023; good bat management however under common energy meant he was hitting his justifiable share of line drives, however not cashing a lot of them in for homers.
The Diamondbacks tied the sport within the fourth, however Bailey should have heard me, as a result of he provided all the ability you may ask for within the fifth:
Splash hits are a beloved a part of Giants fan tradition. I’ve a Lou Seal splash hit counter bobblehead in my workplace, and the counter really works; the group and its followers make an enormous deal out of them. This one was completely crushed, too; it’s a very good factor he didn’t hit it two toes longer or that kayak might need began taking over water. A splash hit in your bobblehead day? That’s the type of factor that makes you a fan favourite out right here.
Bailey wasn’t completed, although. He cracked a ground-rule double to left his subsequent time up for a real line-to-line energy show and completed the day 4-for-4 with 9 complete bases. All of the whereas, Bailey-centered segments performed on the Jumbotron. There was “Patrick Bailey solutions search engine auto-complete questions,” a staple this 12 months. “Does Patrick Bailey have an outdated truck? In that case does it run good?” in all probability isn’t really an auto-complete phrase, however he gamely answered. If you happen to’re curious, he has a brand new truck, however he did affirm that it runs good.
Suppose that’s slightly bit too self-centered of a phase for the massive tech capital of America? You’d love the following phase: “Patrick Bailey reads AI poetry written about Patrick Bailey.” It was about as tortured as you’d anticipate, with a compelled rhyme scheme and loads of over-the-top descriptions of how Bailey makes the Giants higher. He stored a straight face by means of all of it, although, and drew some laughs from the group consequently. That type of stage presence will repay when he’s inevitably doing advert reads for native companies for the following decade.
He performs the proper place – Buster Posey began a convention of nice catchers and Bailey will get to draft off of his fan favourite standing — and he performs it nicely; his electrical throwing arm is a staple of Giants spotlight packages already. He can hit. He has sufficient comedian timing to thrill, or at the very least amuse, the pleasant crowd regardless of the gimmicky segments. The love affair between SF and Bailey is simply beginning, and if I needed to guess, he’s going to be the following generationally adored Big. “That point he smacked one into the cove on his bobblehead day” is the type of story that individuals inform years after it occurred.
4. Elite Bat Management Used Ridiculously
Francisco Lindor is without doubt one of the greatest gamers of the final decade, and it’s not simply due to his protection. He’s a spectacular shortstop, and he’s additionally 17% higher than league common offensively. That’s not due to his gaudy uncooked energy or his spectacular management of the strike zone. It’s as a result of he has elite bat management. He hardly ever swings and misses, and he appears to get the barrel of the bat to the whole lot even when he’s fooled.
Monday night time, Lindor went above and past “regular” bat management. Need an instance of how Lindor doesn’t have elite strike zone recognition? He swung at this factor:
That yellow line exhibits the trajectory of the pitch that Camilo Doval threw Lindor within the ninth inning on Monday night time. You possibly can see from the faint outlines of different pitches that there was one thing bizarre about this one. It bounced toes, not inches, in entrance of the plate, and it was by no means near being a strike. You shouldn’t swing at pitches like these.
Why, then, is Lindor so good? He nonetheless put that ball in play:
I don’t actually know what to say about that one. That isn’t regular. That pitch bounced, and it wasn’t some large curveball that began at eye top and simply fooled him. It was a sinker, with slight constructive motion relative to spinless flight. Out of Doval’s hand, that ball seemed prefer it was going to hit the plate, and it didn’t even get that far. There weren’t two strikes or something. Lindor simply had one thing in his mind inform him to swing, and he’s so freaking good at making contact that he went full cricket and made it work.
I’m not saying everybody ought to do that. The truth is, in all probability nobody ought to do that. Lindor reached base, however solely as a result of Doval dropped a flip from Wilmer Flores that there was in loads of time. Possibly the Giants have been pushed to distraction by eager about how Lindor may presumably have put that ball into play. I do know I used to be.
5. Salvy Smashes
Salvador Perez is a surprisingly controversial participant. I feel that’s the case as a result of he’s good at one a part of catching protection – controlling the working sport – and poor at framing, which is tougher to see on any given play. We expect he’s been price solely 16.6 WAR in his profession, whereas Baseball Reference’s calculation, which omits framing, has him at 34.3. That makes him a stats-versus-eye-test lightning rod.
That type of sucks, to be sincere, as a result of it takes away from what we must be specializing in: I really like watching him work on the plate. Out Of The Park Baseball options quotes about outdated baseball gamers in its loading display, and one about Vladimir Guerrero at all times caught with me: “From his nostril to his toes, that’s how Vladdy goes.” He had a voracious urge for food for pitches to drive, and Perez is type of the identical. He swings at half the balls he sees and three quarters of the strikes. He doesn’t take pitches. He doesn’t hit grounders. He’s up there making an attempt to place one within the seats, each pitch, each at-bat.
Typically, that results in abysmal slumps. He mainly by no means walks, and if issues aren’t clicking, which means a whole lot of empty journeys to the plate. Final 12 months was the worst season of his profession offensively, and our harsh grading of his baserunning and protection left him under alternative degree. However I by no means bought the sense that he was nearing the tip of the highway, and he’s come roaring again to date in 2024, by no means extra so than within the final week, when he hit .435/.519/.783 for a 264 wRC+.
These are simply numbers. Watching it’s much more enjoyable. You’re not supposed to do that to Corbin Burnes when he dots the nook with a sinker:
You’re not supposed to tug a pitch on the far outer reaches of the plate down the left subject line, in opposition to Kevin Gausman no much less:
And I had to return earlier than this week for this one, however c’mon, that is outrageous:
When the printed reduce to Luis Severino, he seemed bemused. “That one? OK.” That’s the Salvy impact. He’s up there making an attempt to make highlights for us. When he does, it’s tremendously enjoyable to observe. Might he proceed his wild-hacking, homer-hunting methods for years to come back.