Author Topic: Today's Game 2018  (Read 68244 times)

CUBluejays

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Re: Today's Game 2018
« Reply #330 on: March 29, 2018, 08:36:15 pm »
ADP Boy

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 WAY TOO EARLY ANALYSIS: Jon Lester averaged 90.2 mph with his fastball. Was at 91.7 last year, and that was down from the previous year.
Danny Parkins

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 With the help of @shane_riordan it looks like Jon Lester topped out at 91.6 MPH today. That's suboptimal.

DelMarFan

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Re: Today's Game 2018
« Reply #331 on: March 29, 2018, 08:39:49 pm »
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I hope Montgomery pitching the 9th with a four run lead is the start of a trend of not treating such games like a key postseason game.

Agree.  I was pretty surprised.  Like P2, I was expecting Edwards.

brjones

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Re: Today's Game 2018
« Reply #332 on: March 29, 2018, 11:02:02 pm »
WAY TOO EARLY ANALYSIS: Jon Lester averaged 90.2 mph with his fastball. Was at 91.7 last year, and that was down from the previous year.

For the first start of the year, that's probably not that bad. Pitchers are usually down a little in the first month of the season...if he's down 1.5 mph now, that probably improves to a non-alarming drop later in a bigger sample.

Chris27

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Re: Today's Game 2018
« Reply #333 on: March 29, 2018, 11:11:40 pm »
Are we sure pitchers' velocity is down the first month of the season as a general rule?

brjones

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Re: Today's Game 2018
« Reply #334 on: March 29, 2018, 11:19:21 pm »
This may be dated, but it's a graph from a BP article from 2011 (based on the 2008-10 seasons).



Fastball speed for an average major-league pitcher starts at its lowest point in early April, rises by about 1.0-1.5 mph to a peak in the month of July, and declines gradually thereafter. These trends apply similarly to starting pitchers and relief pitchers. However, the fastball speed curve looks suspiciously like a graph of temperature.

https://www.baseballprospectus.com/news/article/13380/spinning-yarn-do-spring-speeds-matter/

CUBluejays

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Re: Today's Game 2018
« Reply #335 on: March 29, 2018, 11:31:35 pm »
In 2017 Lester started at 90.08 and ended in playoffs at 92.6. That doesn’t guarantee his velocity will rebound this year though.  You’d like to see him at 91 something by April.  He’s likely going to lose some velocity this year and he needs to adjust to pitching at lower velocities. It might take him a bit, but he’s got the secondaries and usually good enough command to make it work.


guest61

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Re: Today's Game 2018
« Reply #336 on: March 30, 2018, 02:52:26 am »
You all hate on Lester too much.

Ill take him over Hendricks any day of the week.
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DelMarFan

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Re: Today's Game 2018
« Reply #337 on: March 30, 2018, 03:08:29 am »
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Ill take him over Hendricks any day of the week.

Nope.
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craig

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Re: Today's Game 2018
« Reply #338 on: March 30, 2018, 08:32:15 am »
Thanks, br, that graph was quite interesting.  Hadn't realized the low-April was such a thing.  That September is down is not surprising, given a lot of guys are tired and pitching on fumes then.

Not sure Lester getting it up to 92 in playoffs is that meaningful?  Very small sample, plus pitching on adrenalin,  plus he'd been kinda given a month of rest, then another lengthy rest prior to is Washington start, right?  Not like he was sustaining 92 mph over a month of 5-day-rotation starts or anything...

But, hopefully he'll pick it up some and give a lot of good starts over the season.  And hopefully Chatwood and the other four will pitch really well, so that Lester can pitch well but still be viewed as the #5 starter.   


brjones

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Re: Today's Game 2018
« Reply #339 on: March 30, 2018, 09:15:00 am »
One key point with that graph—the correlation with temperature looks almost exactly the same—velocity rises as temperature increases.  So it’s not 100% clear what the main contributing factor is between temperature and working more (or if it’s some combination of both). If it’s really mainly a factor of temperature, the velocity yesterday is less encouraging since it was a nice day in Miami.

craig

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Re: Today's Game 2018
« Reply #340 on: March 30, 2018, 10:55:44 am »
I know nothing, but my guess is the temp correlation is correlation, but not with a cause-effect relationship.  May be wrong; certainly it would seem easier to get really loose when it's warm, and perhaps there is some finesse in the velocity-measuring technology that is impacted by temperature?  Beats me. 

But I'd kinda guess in early spring guys are kinda building themselves up; and that by late season everybody is dinged and tired and sore, and some having less adrenalin and urgency to go all-out if their team is kinda grinding out the season?

Beats me.  The good news, I guess, is that Lester was faster yesterday than he'd been in any of his outings in Mesa.

craig

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Re: Today's Game 2018
« Reply #341 on: March 30, 2018, 11:19:28 am »
Q on Schwarber's defense:  he misjudged and overran the single, running past it so that it could go for a triple or whatever. 

But on the other triple, where he klutzed into the wall: would a decent left fielder or a guy positioned correctly have had a chance to catch it?  Or did his clumsiness on that one really make no difference? Or at most only klutzed a double into a triple, rather than actually costing an out? 

CurtOne

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Re: Today's Game 2018
« Reply #342 on: March 30, 2018, 11:25:53 am »
I know nothing, but my guess is the temp correlation is correlation, but not with a cause-effect relationship.  May be wrong; certainly it would seem easier to get really loose when it's warm, and perhaps there is some finesse in the velocity-measuring technology that is impacted by temperature?  Beats me. 

But I'd kinda guess in early spring guys are kinda building themselves up; and that by late season everybody is dinged and tired and sore, and some having less adrenalin and urgency to go all-out if their team is kinda grinding out the season?

Beats me.  The good news, I guess, is that Lester was faster yesterday than he'd been in any of his outings in Mesa.
In the WS, pitchers were complaining the ball were slippery.  During the season, wouldn't slipperiness, height of seams, humidifered balls, rain wet balls, etc. all effect velocity during the year?

brs2

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Re: Today's Game 2018
« Reply #343 on: March 30, 2018, 11:38:27 am »
Q on Schwarber's defense:  he misjudged and overran the single, running past it so that it could go for a triple or whatever. 

But on the other triple, where he klutzed into the wall: would a decent left fielder or a guy positioned correctly have had a chance to catch it?  Or did his clumsiness on that one really make no difference? Or at most only klutzed a double into a triple, rather than actually costing an out? 

I think it was catchable with a better route.

craig

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Re: Today's Game 2018
« Reply #344 on: March 30, 2018, 11:54:33 am »
Thanks, brs2.

By the way, welcome to the board.  I look forward to more posts. :)