Around the NHL: 2021

[apuszczalowski]

6 hours ago, Flashsabre said:

You are right but I don’t think it is Charlie. I think it is coming straight from Atkins on how to handle the pitching staff.

Its Charlie too, one of the reasons they went with him was because he fit their mold of what Atkins and the front office want to do.

[Thorny]

8 minutes ago, apuszczalowski said:

Its Charlie too, one of the reasons they went with him was because he fit their mold of what Atkins and the front office want to do.

Montoyo literally gave the last game away with his management of the pitching

[#freejame]

3 minutes ago, Thorny said:

Can you elaborate? 

This is going to be a mess and all over the place, but yes. 
 

Very glossed over TLDR: Manfred wanted more offense by secretly implementing a more lively ball->lively led to increase home runs and strikeouts but fewer balls in play->Manfred wanted more balls in so he secretly implemented a dead baseball with raised seams->home runs decrease, strikeouts increase, BA decreases, balls in play decrease 

Manfred is largely alienating baseball’s lifelong fans is attempts to create a game that he believes will please the masses. Disregarding various time of play rules such as batter limits, extra inning rules, expanded playoffs, new pickoff limitations, etc, he is hellbent on creating a game that he deems is “more exciting.”

Manfred’s first true attempt to make baseball more exciting was to increase runs. The simplest way of doing so was to add something like 1/8” of diameter to the core of the baseball while simultaneously wrapping the ball tighter with its yarn. There has also been evidence that an additional new piece a fabric was also included in this yarn. Lastly, to decrease air friction, the seams of the ball were also significantly decreased. All of this resulted in consecutive records being broken league wide for total home runs hit and a slight increase in scoring, but game time has not decreased.

Pitchers rapidly began to complain, particularly about the seams, and began to change from their typical mix of rosin and sunscreen to a whole bevy of “sticky stuff.”  While “sticky stuff” (and rosin combined with sunscreen) have always been illegal, batters never had any issue with pitchers increasing their grip because in theory it keeps them safe. Even before the advent of the newer gripping products, you would occasional see players ejected for pine tar use, but even then, few players cared and no manager wanted to protest because they knew their pitchers were doing the same. There was also no way to police rosin/sunscreen mixes because both are legal substances (no umpire can eject a player for wearing sunscreen and no umpire can eject a pitcher for using rosin). 

Right during the middle of the home run surge, Trevor Bauer started releasing data on spin rates, both their effects of contact rates, ball-movements, giving “rise” to fastball, etc. He was using a developmental center call driveline sports and basically tweeted out that he can has found that the only way he has been able to increase his spin rate was through artificial means (sticky stuff). He then complied a list of players with jumps in RPM and more or less concluded that these pitchers (all of whom were now having increased success) cheated. To prove this hypothesis, for a single game while on the Indians, Bauer loaded up with a mixture of melted coca-cola, pinetar, and another substance that is escaping me. His performance was one of the best and he was essentially saying to the MLB “DO SOMETHING.” Shortly thereafter, Bauer tweeted something along the lines of “its simple, load up with illegal substances, increase your spin rate, you will be a better pitcher, and you can sign a larger contract.” The very next season, Bauer did exactly that. He threw with the highest level of spin during his career, put up career bests in WHIP, ERA, and strikeouts, won the Cy Young and signed a 3 year, $105m contract. 

The off-season that followed, the MLB once again decided to alter the baseball (once again without proper testing or any sort of public eye). The raised the seams significantly, spun the yarn surrounding the core looser, and created an effect that essentially deadened that ball by approximately 10ft. However, while all of these changes go to benefit the pitcher, they chose not to stop using “sticky” stuff. That’s resulting in movement like never before seen from players who have never been seen throwing it. The idea that the decrease of ten feet would eliminate many of the home runs, resulting in more balls in player and therefore more action.

Instead, what we have seen, is the fewest balls out in play in decades, the lowest league wide batting average in decades, and continuous loss of fan interest. 

Launch angles were briefly discussed up-thread, but I am not so much convinced they are responsible what has become of MLB offense. Yes, three true outcomes are on the rise, and yes, fans would rather see a nice snag down the third baseline for an out than swinging strikes, but an out is an out.

There are many fans (myself included) who are huge fans of small ball. Give me a good station to station inning and some sharp fielding and I’m over the moon. But with the advents of scoring charts, small ball is proving to be significantly less effective over the course of 162 games. It’s seen a lot more in the playoffs, but it’s a different baseball game. 

It’s these same scoring charts that are ruining bunting, hit and runs, and steals. It never made any sense to have a close play at 3rd with three down because it jeopardizes your chances of scoring. Baseball has the math in place for every scenario of base runners and outs, again negatively impacting the things us fans find fun.

As for the shift, I understand the arguments against it but there is a certain “where is the line?” point. If, say, you want the left side of the infield to only stay on the left side of the infield, whatever I get it. That eliminates maybe 25% of the shifts seen. Shifts are a crucial part of infield defense, even if everyone is on “their” side of second base. Where is gets even more difficult is outfield shifts. There are plenty of pros making comments about how being perfectly positioned in the outfield nearly every at-bat takes about the fun of the game. But what should be done? Force all outfields inside 5*5 circles before every AB? 

There are a lot of issues in baseball right now. Fan growth is down because a lack of MLB sponsored youth programs, MLB has the most restrictive blackout policy of any major sport, and baseball finds an incredibly difficult time becoming a national sport rather than a local sport. Manfred is currently driving away the sports lifelong fans, and doing nothing to create new fans. MLB will release commercials and tweets and television segments to players having fun and showing emotion and acting like kids playing a kids game and then the commissions office will suspend them. Oh and after all of the changes to increase game time, nothing has changed except for pissing people off. The average baseball fan is something like 54 years old. They are driving away those people and telling the young people of you want to have fun and have a personality you should play a different sport instead. 

[Thorny]

11 minutes ago, #freejame said:

This is going to be a mess and all over the place, but yes. 
 

Very glossed over TLDR: Manfred wanted more offense by secretly implementing a more lively ball->lively led to increase home runs and strikeouts but fewer balls in play->Manfred wanted more balls in so he secretly implemented a dead baseball with raised seams->home runs decrease, strikeouts increase, BA decreases, balls in play decrease 

Manfred is largely alienating baseball’s lifelong fans is attempts to create a game that he believes will please the masses. Disregarding various time of play rules such as batter limits, extra inning rules, expanded playoffs, new pickoff limitations, etc, he is hellbent on creating a game that he deems is “more exciting.”

Manfred’s first true attempt to make baseball more exciting was to increase runs. The simplest way of doing so was to add something like 1/8” of diameter to the core of the baseball while simultaneously wrapping the ball tighter with its yarn. There has also been evidence that an additional new piece a fabric was also included in this yarn. Lastly, to decrease air friction, the seams of the ball were also significantly decreased. All of this resulted in consecutive records being broken league wide for total home runs hit and a slight increase in scoring, but game time has not decreased.

Pitchers rapidly began to complain, particularly about the seams, and began to change from their typical mix of rosin and sunscreen to a whole bevy of “sticky stuff.”  While “sticky stuff” (and rosin combined with sunscreen) have always been illegal, batters never had any issue with pitchers increasing their grip because in theory it keeps them safe. Even before the advent of the newer gripping products, you would occasional see players ejected for pine tar use, but even then, few players cared and no manager wanted to protest because they knew their pitchers were doing the same. There was also no way to police rosin/sunscreen mixes because both are legal substances (no umpire can eject a player for wearing sunscreen and no umpire can eject a pitcher for using rosin). 

Right during the middle of the home run surge, Trevor Bauer started releasing data on spin rates, both their effects of contact rates, ball-movements, giving “rise” to fastball, etc. He was using a developmental center call driveline sports and basically tweeted out that he can has found that the only way he has been able to increase his spin rate was through artificial means (sticky stuff). He then complied a list of players with jumps in RPM and more or less concluded that these pitchers (all of whom were now having increased success) cheated. To prove this hypothesis, for a single game while on the Indians, Bauer loaded up with a mixture of melted coca-cola, pinetar, and another substance that is escaping me. His performance was one of the best and he was essentially saying to the MLB “DO SOMETHING.” Shortly thereafter, Bauer tweeted something along the lines of “its simple, load up with illegal substances, increase your spin rate, you will be a better pitcher, and you can sign a larger contract.” The very next season, Bauer did exactly that. He threw with the highest level of spin during his career, put up career bests in WHIP, ERA, and strikeouts, won the Cy Young and signed a 3 year, $105m contract. 

The off-season that followed, the MLB once again decided to alter the baseball (once again without proper testing or any sort of public eye). The raised the seams significantly, spun the yarn surrounding the core looser, and created an effect that essentially deadened that ball by approximately 10ft. However, while all of these changes go to benefit the pitcher, they chose not to stop using “sticky” stuff. That’s resulting in movement like never before seen from players who have never been seen throwing it. The idea that the decrease of ten feet would eliminate many of the home runs, resulting in more balls in player and therefore more action.

Instead, what we have seen, is the fewest balls out in play in decades, the lowest league wide batting average in decades, and continuous loss of fan interest. 

Launch angles were briefly discussed up-thread, but I am not so much convinced they are responsible what has become of MLB offense. Yes, three true outcomes are on the rise, and yes, fans would rather see a nice snag down the third baseline for an out than swinging strikes, but an out is an out.

There are many fans (myself included) who are huge fans of small ball. Give me a good station to station inning and some sharp fielding and I’m over the moon. But with the advents of scoring charts, small ball is proving to be significantly less effective over the course of 162 games. It’s seen a lot more in the playoffs, but it’s a different baseball game. 

It’s these same scoring charts that are ruining bunting, hit and runs, and steals. It never made any sense to have a close play at 3rd with three down because it jeopardizes your chances of scoring. Baseball has the math in place for every scenario of base runners and outs, again negatively impacting the things us fans find fun.

As for the shift, I understand the arguments against it but there is a certain “where is the line?” point. If, say, you want the left side of the infield to only stay on the left side of the infield, whatever I get it. That eliminates maybe 25% of the shifts seen. Shifts are a crucial part of infield defense, even if everyone is on “their” side of second base. Where is gets even more difficult is outfield shifts. There are plenty of pros making comments about how being perfectly positioned in the outfield nearly every at-bat takes about the fun of the game. But what should be done? Force all outfields inside 5*5 circles before every AB? 

There are a lot of issues in baseball right now. Fan growth is down because a lack of MLB sponsored youth programs, MLB has the most restrictive blackout policy of any major sport, and baseball finds an incredibly difficult time becoming a national sport rather than a local sport. Manfred is currently driving away the sports lifelong fans, and doing nothing to create new fans. MLB will release commercials and tweets and television segments to players having fun and showing emotion and acting like kids playing a kids game and then the commissions office will suspend them. Oh and after all of the changes to increase game time, nothing has changed except for pissing people off. The average baseball fan is something like 54 years old. They are driving away those people and telling the young people of you want to have fun and have a personality you should play a different sport instead. 

Thanks a ton for taking the time to do this.

It's all very interesting and I've heard some of these things about Manfred, but you've done a great job of laying it all out. He has indeed taken steps to try and speed up the game, no? But the results have been the opposite? I'm one of those people who can deal with the 3 hour game, but it does test my patience a bit when the 3.5-4 hour versions become commonplace.

I guess we can't blame him for the scoring charts, eh?

[#freejame]

2 minutes ago, Thorny said:

Thanks a ton for taking the time to do this.

It's all very interesting and I've heard some of these things about Manfred, but you've done a great job of laying it all out. He has indeed taken steps to try and speed up the game, no? But the results have been the opposite? I'm one of those people who can deal with the 3 hour game, but it does test my patience a bit when the 3.5-4 hour versions become commonplace.

I guess we can't blame him for the scoring charts, eh?

There’s a lot of great articles on the baseball conspiracy that I plan to link once I’m on my computer because that’s really been the biggest change year over year on the quality of the game. Some of the changes (runner starting on second in the 10th, 7 inning double headers) have definitely lowered game times by a very minute amount but at the same time they are alienating actual baseball fans. The minor leagues use a pitch count and the MLB has always had rules in the book related to time between pitches. The only change baseball needs to make is enforce its own rule. Basically every player less than 25 has played under pitch clocks. I have never once noticed it at a minor league game nor saw a ball (or strike) called due to the time. I believe it is 20 seconds between pitches from the time the batter toes the rubber. Between 2007-2017 over 2.3 seconds were added between every pitches. The data I am looking at is from 2018 and has Pedro Baez clocking in at 31.2 seconds between pitches. I can’t find the data right this second but I believe Kennedy Jansen was clocking in close to forty seconds this last season. And quite frankly, what baseball does not want the outside world to know is that broadcast time has increased significantly as ad time increases. There’s twenty-two minutes of ad time during every local game and and 45.5 minutes of ads for nationally televised games. The MLB did recently take steps to shorten the time, but it still makes up a good portion of the broadcast. 

[Thorny]

7 minutes ago, #freejame said:

There’s a lot of great articles on the baseball conspiracy that I plan to link once I’m on my computer because that’s really been the biggest change year over year on the quality of the game. Some of the changes (runner starting on second in the 10th, 7 inning double headers) have definitely lowered game times by a very minute amount but at the same time they are alienating actual baseball fans. The minor leagues use a pitch count and the MLB has always had rules in the book related to time between pitches. The only change baseball needs to make is enforce its own rule. Basically every player less than 25 has played under pitch clocks. I have never once noticed it at a minor league game nor saw a ball (or strike) called due to the time. I believe it is 20 seconds between pitches from the time the batter toes the rubber. Between 2007-2017 over 2.3 seconds were added between every pitches. The data I am looking at is from 2018 and has Pedro Baez clocking in at 31.2 seconds between pitches. I can’t find the data right this second but I believe Kennedy Jansen was clocking in close to forty seconds this last season. And quite frankly, what baseball does not want the outside world to know is that broadcast time has increased significantly as ad time increases. There’s twenty-two minutes of ad time during every local game and and 45.5 minutes of ads for nationally televised games. The MLB did recently take steps to shorten the time, but it still makes up a good portion of the broadcast. 

Just like the NHL, I'd argue, in it's playoffs

[#freejame]

Since this is a hockey board after all, there has been some recent studies/success on the impacts of pitch tunneling. For those that don’t know, pitch tunneling is where, regardless of what pitch or where you are aiming, you are releasing the ball from the same arm slot. The more proficient you are at tunneling, the longer time is takes to differentiate pitchers. Jacob Degrom last night is a great example. 

Alex Wood really started keying on of this a few years back and it really helped him rebound, especially after losing some velocity. My question as it pertains to hockey is, is there really any way to tunnel a shot? Obviously pucks don’t move nearly the way baseball do, but outside of looking off a target, what kind of advancements might be had and perfected in shot deception, if any? 

Regardless, I can’t wait for the new NHL statcast system. It’s been amazing for baseball. I can’t wait to see what it does for hockey. 

[#freejame]

13 hours ago, apuszczalowski said:

That sounds more like just good coaching

When I think analytics, I'm thinking about how guys like Charlie Montoya ruin games by pulling their starter whos been doing great all game just because the other team is starting through their lineup a 3rd time, or having no one in the bullpen warming up until 'your best reliever' just walked the bases loaded in the last inning of a 1 run ball game while your bullpen didn't pitch the day before because of a rainout, you used up 2 relievers in the first half of a double header earlier in the day when the starter could have gone longer, and you have a day off the next day (before playing 2 games before your next day off)

Sorry, didn't really have much to do with analytics or your comment, just wanted to complain about Montoya.......

There’s maybe 25 pitchers tops in the league who have the ability to go through the order 3 times with regularity. Teams want to win. The differences in batting averages between the first trip through the order and the third trip through the order is astounding. wOBA goes up 26 points, k% go down, BABIP and hard hit balls all go up, velocity goes down, swing strike% goes down. Bad managing is bad managing and unless you’re a handful of guys, leaving someone in three times through is bad managing. If you’ve got the bullpen to come in, you do it every time (not counting Blake Snell in the WS, but managerial tactics and analytics play a significantly different role on post-season baseball). 

Montoya was some bad baseball the other day, no doubt about that. But man, how freaking good did Manoah look?!

[bunomatic]

Not much happening in the NHL ? 

[#freejame]

17 minutes ago, bunomatic said:

Not much happening in the NHL ? 

I believe you’re just confused. With the recent rash of no-no’s the league formally known as Major League Baseball is now known as the No Hitter League. It’s a recent change, I understand your confusion. 

[Brawndo]

 

Another great example of Sabres Stellar Drafting 

[Norcal]

17 minutes ago, Brawndo said:

 

Another great example of Sabres Stellar Drafting 

Would rather have Jason Robertson 😒

[Huckleberry]

29 minutes ago, Brawndo said:

 

Another great example of Sabres Stellar Drafting 

I had high hopes for him his first draft year.   That being said the rest of that year is signed by the sabres.

[dudacek]

He looked like a prospect that first year.

I wonder what happened to him?

[thewookie1]

Davidsson, that is a name I haven’t heard in a great many years....

After Year 1 he went Houdini and vanished into thin air. 

[MODO Hockey]

7 hours ago, dudacek said:

He looked like a prospect that first year.

I wonder what happened to him?

His career went down the drain, he is literally trash today. Beeing sent back and forth between bad teams on echl level.

[Thorny]

14 hours ago, dudacek said:

He looked like a prospect that first year.

I wonder what happened to him?

Botterill only drafted players with a development window longer than the tenure of your average GM. FLEXIBILITY!

[LGR4GM]

15 hours ago, dudacek said:

He looked like a prospect that first year.

I wonder what happened to him?

Injuries and lack of development. But hey at least we didn't draft... Jason Roberson out of the OHL. That would have been a bridge too far for the genius of Botterill. 

[Rasmus_]

19 hours ago, Brawndo said:

 

Another great example of Sabres Stellar Drafting 

Barf.  God, this was a SECOND ROUND PICK.  This is why I'm pissed at this time.  Inferior drafting and with the Pegula's in charge, it won't change.  They are imbeciles, who want people who will "listen to them".  Go to counseling Terry. 

[Thorny]

gold!

The Dallas Cowboys of Canada lol

[Thorny]

- - - 

No reason for this it's just worth watching, again, any time you can - what imo might be the best goal in NHL history

 

Edited June 2, 2021 by Thorny

[SwampD]

6 hours ago, Thorny said:

- - - 

No reason for this it's just worth watching, again, any time you can - what imo might be the best goal in NHL history

 

Darren Pang is a great color guy.

[#freejame]

1 hour ago, SwampD said:

Darren Pang is a great color guy.

Now just imagine Gary Thorne on the PBP. I hope TNT or ESPN find a role for him because he's the best announcer in all of sports. 

[Taro T]

15 hours ago, #freejame said:

Now just imagine Gary Thorne on the PBP. I hope TNT or ESPN find a role for him because he's the best announcer in all of sports. 

Is he still solid?  Can't recall hearing him do pbp since ESPN & the NHL parted ways after the lockout.  So have no idea if he's lost the proverbial step or 2.

[#freejame]

2 hours ago, Taro T said:

Is he still solid?  Can't recall hearing him do pbp since ESPN & the NHL parted ways after the lockout.  So have no idea if he's lost the proverbial step or 2.

Before the Orioles let him go he was still top notch. I haven't heard him call hockey in ages so I couldn't say he's still got it there.