The latest from the Senior Circuit…
- It’s a big year for Cubs righty Yu Darvish, as The Athletic’s Patrick Mooney explores in an in-depth look at the Japanese star. Darvish “didn’t feel any power in [his] body” last season, easily the nadir in the righty’s decorated seven-year MLB career thus far. The righty’s season-long search for the root of his struggles came to a head in August, when he was ultimately diagnosed with a stress reaction in his right elbow. Limited to just 8 starts last season, Darvish claims to be flinging the “best stuff of his life” in early Cactus League-play, and his coterie of Cub teammates and coaches agree: “He’s been almost a different person this year,” manager Joe Maddon said. “We all know him. He knows us better. Definitely the self-confidence level seems to be soaring a bit right now. I just think the familiarity with the whole group matters to him, plus he’s healthy. All those factors are pointing the needle in the right direction right now.” Peak performances refrains are all too familiar in Spring Training, but a forthright Darvish may just be the weight that tips the scales in favor of Chicago in this season’s brutal NL Central.
- Giants righty Tyler Beede, who’s had difficulty harnessing a high-octane arsenal since spurning a huge Toronto offer as a first-round selection in the 2012 draft, may finally be turning the corner, writes Grant Brisbee of The Athletic. The Vanderbilt product, who overhauled his scintillating repertoire at the behest of the old Giants regime, turning himself into a sinker/command guy who sought soft contact, has gone back to his roots: a hard four-seam/overhand curve mix that’s baffled Cactus League hitters thus far. Technology implemented by the new, data-conscious staff under GM Farhan Zaidi (who singled out the righty in an early-spring media chat) appears to have been the catalyst, and the 25-year-old Beede is all ears. Beede’s eventual role remains unclear – there’s talk of him breaking camp with the club as a reliever – but he’s again a name to watch by the bay.
- Mets IF/OF Jeff McNeil will split time between third base and left field for the remainder of spring, per manager Mickey Callaway (via the NY Daily News’ Deesha Thosar). McNeil, 27 next month, was a virtual non-prospect before mashing his way to the big leagues in 2018: once there, he impressed further, slashing .329/.381/.471 over 248 late-season plate appearances. Much of McNeil’s big-league time came at second base last season, but the lefty has seen time at seven different positions over a six-year minor league career. Veterans Jed Lowrie and Todd Frazier are still shelf-ridden, with no concrete timetable for a return, so an opening-day spot at the hot corner appears increasingly likely for the feel-good story of last season.
I’m happy Beede is getting things in the right direction, I like him.
It shows to be patient with dudes in their mid 20’s that have mid 90’s stuff
Sometimes all it takes is a fresh set of eyes and ideas to get a pitcher back on track. What killed me with the previous regime was basically taking what got Beede to a high level prospect, and trying to turn him into a completely opposite type of pitcher. There aren’t very many IF ANY pitchers that could completely change their identity like that and find success. We are not going to slightly alter your arm angle, we are not going to try and incorporate your hips more, we are not going to try and just have you ditch pitching from the wind-up, we aren’t going to adjust your pitch selection..Oh heck, we will just change everything, and let’s see how that works out for you Beede!?!..lol
In my opinion, it was just flat out ignorant and stupid, and for a casual fan to see that, and know it was an ignorant thing to do speaks volumes of how poorly the Giants previous regime mismanaged Beede..
Anyways, it goes back to what I originally stated, sometimes the best thing for a pitcher is simply just working with someone new..I certainly wish Beede the best, and hope he’s able to break camp. The Giants franchise at least owes him that, for how they’ve absolutely ruined this young man thus far!!
To many words for what other Teams go through also,anybody can miss on one guy,please do your research
Darvish has a whopping 57 career wins. All on good teams.
If you are still using wins as a statistic for judging pitchers you should go back to the 80s and 90s
with your logic, I’m guessing Anthony Young was a great pitcher and Tom Glavin wasn’t?
Seriously? Wins? What a joke it’s a completely useless stat to valuing a pitcher. Look at degrom. CY with barely a 10 wins. Wins don’t make a pitcher, Wins means the team scored more run than you gave up, period.
I mean, how did you think you get ‘wins’? Or why it’s a worthless metric?
Let’s count how many of his starts the team won or lost, but not counting the ones the bullpen blew
You could pitch to a 1.00 era and still not have any wins if your team doesn’t score. Conversely you could pitch to a 5.00 era and if your team scores 6 runs a game you’d have a bunch of wins. I think it’s a worthless stat. ERA and WHIP I think are better measures of a pitcher.
Exactly. Although not a completely worthless stat, when 300 wins will still guarantee you a spot in the Hall, you can see how it should not be used to determine a pitchers value simply by looking at DeGrom last year. He won the Cy Young with a 10-9 record and was considered the best starter in all of baseball.
He’s been plagued with injuries and Texas is a good team?
Darvish is great when healthy.
They were a good club when they had him except for 2014 and 2017*, as they went 67-95 and 78-84, respectively.
*had him 1st half of the season
That deGrom guy was like a .500 pitcher last year. He must have been horrible.
Wait… The Rangers were good? I, sir, do not believe you watch baseball.
“…. but a forthright Darvish may just be the weight that tips the scales in favor of Chicago in this season’s brutal NL Central.”
Cardinals have the best starting pitching depth in MLB.
4 of their starters not making the rotation would be top 3 starters for half the teams. A few will be in the bullpen.
Mikolas and Flaherty can battle Darvish.
Unless all their untested 1st and second year players don’t live up to the hype, then the Cardinals are in trouble…
All starters, for that matter all players, can not live up to hype and/or prior successes. Even veterans.
I think most of us would have more faith in the veterans, though, all things being equal.
Miles Mikolas
Carlos Martinez
Jack Flaherty
Michael Wacha
Adam Wainwright
John Gant
Dakota Hudson
Austin Gomber
Daniel Ponce de Leon
Mike Mayers
Not all have to have Cy Young seasons.
Adam Wainwright lol
He’s healthy again in ST.
Of course, never in his career did he pitch as good as you.
Healthy? He turns 38 this season and he throws 82 mph
The cardinals have depth but it’s all back end depth. Waino, Hudson, Gomber, Gant and Ponce de Leon are all #4 or 5 starters. The cardinals could certainly stand to gain a front of the rotation arm. especially with Martinez expected to be in the pen. Your front 3 is Mikolas, Flaherty, Wacha. That’s not exactly intimidating. The ceilings of guys like Lester, Q, Hendricks, Hamels, and Darvish is higher. They’re thin beyond the group (Monty not withstanding) but if they see a bounce back from the core of their rotation it could certainly be better than what STL throws out there. Or they could certainly have had their best days behind them and be worse but it’s a fair statement by the author.
For 2020 and beyond the cardinals rotation looks much better with the continued development of those guys as well as potentially having Martinez and Reyes back in there. But for this year, I could see it going either way.
Agree with you 100% jbig——well written. Kind of odd how a positive post on Darvish gets turned into a look at the Cardinals pitching (cough, cough) depth. I do believe in Mikolas despite the small sample size of success, but after that the brakes are hit very hard. Flaherty has potential but falls closer to that 3-4-5 that you speak of right now….I think the one thing teams probably don’t fear right now about the Cardinals is their starting rotation. With Bader all year, Goldschmidt, Martinez, DeJong, an always reliable Molina, bounce back from Fowler that lineup can be potent.
Ceilings wise the Cubs #5 (Quintana) would have to slot in at #3 if he were a Cardinal. (Of course not everyone hits the ceilings and some surprise)
I have to hand it to Mr. Spensor on a new, inventive way to troll.
I’m fairly high on Flaherty. I believe he’s capable of being a two. I don’t see a 4 or 5 there but that doesn’t change anything. I like both Mikolas and Flaherty to be honest with you but after that no one excites me. I could certainly see very middling production out of Wacha and the rest of the them. If you told me Alex Reyes and Carlos Martinez could go out there and be SP for a full season this year I’d be all in on their rotation but that’s not the case. As it stands it has just as many question marks as the cubs with less upside at this point IMO. (W/o Reyes or Martinez) Just trying to give an objective view. I have no vested interest either way.
I agree 100%.
I’m hoping we’re in contention come the trade deadline and go for all in for an ace- deGrom is my top choice. As a result, I’ll be rooting against the Mets until the deadline.
John Gant, Austin Gomber, Mike Mayers, Daniel Poncedeleon…..just guys or worse
“Kind of odd how a positive post on Darvish gets turned into a look at the Cardinals pitching (cough, cough) depth.”
@ mike127,
Apparently you didn’t read the quote I took from from the article:
“…. but a forthright Darvish may just be the weight that tips the scales in favor of Chicago in this season’s brutal NL Central.”
Except for Wainwright, all the Cardinals potential starters are young and getting better. Cannot say that for the Cubs. Add that the Cardinals defense surrounding the pitchers is better, and the Cards have the depth to survive the inevitable injuries, while the Cubs have little in reserve.
Anyway, the NLC will be extremely competitive in 2019, and the games played on the field will be fun to watch.
The Cub’s defense is light years ahead of the Cardinal’s.
The Cardinals finished dead last in defense last year.
espn.com/mlb/stats/team/_/stat/fielding
Yeah, the Cub’s 3 (Hendricks) would be the Cardinals opening day starter… And likely so would Quintana or a healthy Darvish…
Mikolas was the best pitcher in either rotation last year and that’s nothing but a fact. The thing of it is that the cubs have 5 guys with much higher ceilings than the 5 in STL right now. But that doesn’t mean that Chicago will realize that. Lester and Hamels have a lot of miles on their arm and Q was not very good last year. Darvish is coming back from TJ and wasn’t very good himself leading up to the surgery. They have plenty of question marks but they have the potential to be a much better 5 if it comes together.
The Mets are looking to contend this year. Why would they trade their best pitcher?
@ Carrington
Agree with most of your points, but saying the Cardinals have depth to survive inevitable injuries is like a Cub fan saying “Chatwood had the second best road ERA in baseball in 2017.” Chatwood’s age and potential, taken that way is good as anyone on your list from at least Gant down. If you have injuries and are digging to numbers 7-8-9 you are in trouble no matter how much depth you have.
Depth is a great, great thing to have——how do you think the Cubs have been one of the better teams in baseball over the past five years?? Depth—just about everywhere.
Again, I agree with your assessment…but the Cubs #4 (Hendricks) is no worse (nor better) than the Cardinals #1 (Mikolas).
Also, with Bader in the lineup everyday and Goldschmidt—the pitching staff may not have to be as good as you think it is to win the division.
Thats a heck of a claim, i would argue they sit behind half the rotations in the NL east alone, and that does not even take into account the AL, where you have some of the best starting rotations in the game
I agree with you that teams like the Mets and Nationals have terrific top 3 pitchers.
But Wainwright and Gant are pitching 5 and 6, and Hudson and Gomber would easily be 4/5 starters for most teams – including the Mets and Nationals.
Gomber has pitched 75 big league innings. It was a solid but unspectacular 75. And Dakota Hudson has 20 innings out of the bullpen where he basically walked as many people as he struck out. Let’s not get carried away here. The depth is good but it’s largely untested and aside from Hudson none of those guys (Gant, Gomber, Ponce) were thought to be much. Doesn’t mean they didn’t slip through the cracks but I don’t think anyone of them has enough major league success to say that yet.
Lol, “Best SP depth in the MLB”
The Cubs arguably have 5 starters that would challenge to be the Cardinal’s opening day starter…
And their 6 and 7 would likely make the Card’s starting 5…
Lester, Hamels, Hendricks, Quintana, Darvish.
Beede seems like the next Archie Bradley. He’s been disgusting so far in Spring training. Watched the A’s/Giants game on MLBN a couple nights ago and he dominated the A’s in 3 innings.
In Bradley’s case, disgusting takes on a literal meaning.
I once ran a marathon with a torn meniscus. It took me 5 and a half hours and I had run 20 marathons under 4 hours. It’s amazing how much an injury takes out of your performance. I also pitched two years with a broken bone in my wrist. That relegated me to nothing but fastballs. Which for me weren’t terribly fast to begin with. Absolutely ruined my bowling too. Now I have to trim my finger nails or I’ll make too many typos. These injuries just make it harder to lean back in my recliner and post nonsense on this site.
Kudos for typing hurt!
You don’t see Kyle Seager typing with an injured wrist.
You’re a gamer, bro.
Ok, who else had to look up “coterie” and “nadir”?
I definitely did. Don’t feel bad about it either. Not exactly 2 words you’d ever come across in the 21st century. Don’t think I’ll be adding them to my vocabulary.
I wasn’t going to admit it
I let nadir slide, because I assumed it was a typo. Once I read ‘coterie’, I knew this article wasnt meant for me.
Don’t go out without you hat and coterie.
An actual lol here.
Farhan, already paying dividends. . . These things take time. Way more than one fast offseason. . . I think the only way IS to build up. . . Like they did with bonds at the end. . . I think they know it too… Those four years they lost. They got Timmy, Buster, Madbum. . . Supplemented with savy vets… They’ll be good again. . . These other teams that are good now will fall back. And the Giants will rise up. . . Ebb n Flow. . . The Giants are committed to winning. . . For now that’s a good base to start with. . . Hopefully they can rock the boat some with Bochy calling it a career. . . I Sure Hope So.!!!
Man, you love the ellipses.
This is a baseball rumor site…might want to ease up on the thesaurus.
You’ll thank the man when you become a god at scrabble