Category Archives: Randomness

ALDS Game 5 Drinking Game

by jakemintz

DISCLAIMER (mostly for our mothers): As many of you know, we are only 18 years old. So while everyone else can play this game with alcohol, we will OBVIOUSLY not be doing so. We’ll be enjoying our juice boxes. Thank you and drink responsibly. 

Tonight, the Oakland Athletics will be playing the Detroit Tigers in a game of baseball. The loser will be rewarded with a vacation while the winner will be punished and forced to fly to Boston. Here is your guide to making this game five one you’ll definitely forget:

You Drink When…

It goes without saying that you drink every time a #MUP is lit, but here are some other guidelines:

PREGAME SHOW

Drink any time…

  • Pedro Martinez makes you smile
  • Adam Jones winks
  • TBS screws up a graphic
  • There’s a replay of Josh Reddick vs. Fan

IN GAME

Drink when…

  • Justin Verlander goes behind 3-0
  • TOOTBLAN
  • Yoenis Cespedes walks
  • There’s an instance of BABIP Magic
  • Alex Avila looks bored
  • Jim Leyland has his hands in his pants
  • Jim Leyland smokes a cig
  • Miguel Cabrera looks like he’s in a lot of pain as he runs
  • Miggy smiles at the pitcher
  • The camera zooms in on Sonny Gray’s mustache
  • You complain about how terrible the TBS broadcast is

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Our Fall TBS Show Ideas

by jakemintz

The LDS on TBS have been somewhat of a disaster. The only thing worse than the production of the games are the shows advertised in between innings. We decided to put our money where our mouths are (which is gross if you think about it) and came up with our own baseball themed TBS show ideas. 

Cuban Mistletoe Crisis

Premise: Oh no! It’s almost Christmas, but Yoenis Cespedes and his countrymen Yasiel Puig, Jose Fernandez, Jose Dariel Abreu, and Jorge Soler don’t have any mistletoe to hang up at their Christmas dinner. 

Pitch: The rise of Cuban players has been one of the biggest stories in baseball this year. And everyone loves Christmas!

Mike Trout Highlights

Premise: Baseball Jesus just does things while we watch.

Pitch: Would instantly be the best show on television.

Spelling Xander Bogaerts

Screen Shot 2013-10-05 at 11.28.54 PM

Premise: The top 10 finishers in last year’s National Spelling Bee have to spell baseball’s unspellable names.

“Can you use that in a sentence?” 

“Sure. I went to the grocery store and was promptly robbed by a cross-faded Jarrod Saltalamacchia”

Pitch: Who doesn’t want to watch 10 Indian kids disappoint their parents while Adeiny Hechavarria and Matt Tuiasosopo laugh at them? 

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2013 Regular Season Review: THE FUN STUFF (The Hitters)

by Jordan Shusterman

On Monday, the Tampa Bay Rays defeated the Texas Wranglers last night for the exciting opportunity to go to Cleveland, Ohio for a night of competitive baseball. What a treat. Last night, the Pittsburgh Pirates WON A PLAYOFF GAME against the Cincinnati Reds in the NL Wild Card game and will move on to face the St. Louis Best Organization In Baseball. Honestly, I’m still mourning the death of the ridiculous 2013 regular season and I probably will be for a while. In an effort to remember the year that was and because I spend so much time on FanGraphs anyway, I’m gonna just gonna go through a multitude of interesting statistical finishes throughout baseball and maybe possibly probably not say a few things about them. We will probably do some sort of CFB Awards post after or later in the postseason, but this is what I’ve got for now. And again, thank you based FanGraphs for being too good to be true.

Important:

  • Qualified hitters = minimum 500 PA’s
  • Qualified starters = minimum 162 innings pitched
  • Qualified relievers = minimum 49 innings pitched
  • Qualified defenders = minimum 900 innings at a position

I’m gonna do this in four parts: hitters, starting pitchers, relievers and crazy stupid defensive numbers.

We start with the guys that hit the balls with the bats.

HITTERS:

Let’s Talk About WAR:

  • Mike Trout completed his second consecutive 10 win season, finishing with 10.4 WAR. A healthy lead over second place Andrew McCutchen who finished at 8.2 WAR. A brief list of guys who Mike Trout has already surpassed in CAREER WAR: Matt Kemp, Andre Ethier, Nick Markakis, Justin Upton, Buster Posey, Ryan Howard (lolololololol), Marco Scutaro, Josh Willingham and Justin Morneau. Put it this way: there are only 55 players that have produced more WAR since beginning of the 2006 season than Mike Trout has since he came up. Mike Trout the best.

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Minnesota Twins Opening Day 2014 Starting Lineup

by jakemintz

Sure, the Twins’ 2013 season just ended. But we’ve already received an exclusive look at their starting lineup for next season’s Opening Day match-up in Chicago against the White Sox.

YOUR 2014 Minnesota Twins:

2B Chance Moore

SS Juan Laricio

DH Melt Marlo

1B Chub Smith

LF Carlos Duran-Duran

3B Larry Coriander

RF Tanke Jones

CF Lazlo Holloway

C Max Rosario

STARTING PITCHER: Caleb Thielbar

Manager: Ralph Snow

Advanced Pitching Metrics: John McDonald For Cy Young

by jakemintz

I don’t have a vote for the Cy Young award, but if I did I would vote for one of these three pitchers.

David Carpenter: 

John McDonald:

Ryan Raburn:

In today’s baseball world, strikeouts are key. They are the lifeblood to any good pitcher. 

Ground balls are awesome too by the way.

Also important in today’s modern baseball world are rate stats. Counting stats are frowned upon by many, especially those who cannot count.

Therefore the only way to get good stats are to combine these concepts. When we mix rate stats and strikeouts, we get a fantastic stat called K/9. K/9 measures how many strikeouts a pitcher averages every nine innings. Combining ground balls and rate stats creates GB%. These advanced metrics are the basis for my plea to the Cy Young voters: Vote McDonald, vote Raburn, and vote Carpenter. Scratch those names and I’ll scratch you. Nope, that was a bad sentence. Let’s just get on with it.

Angels RHP David Carpenter: 

  • Carpenter might have a particularly high ERA for a Cy Young candidate as his ERA currently sits at 108.00. At first glance that appears a bit too high to be considered the best pitcher in the league but hold your horses bucko. We all know that ERA is a flawed stat so this number cannot be trusted. His xFIP is almost A HUNDRED points lower. That’s nuts. He just got unlucky this year.
  • Carpenter has also been extremely unlucky this year as evidenced by his insane 100% HR/FB rate.

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Over-analyzing Gerald Laird’s Chest

by jakemintz

Yesterday Braves person Elliot Johnson tweeted a picture of two sets of abdominals. He asked Twitter to determine which midsection stood above the other. One set was impressively ripped and chiseled even though it belonged to the seemingly pudgy Dan Uggla. The other set was Gerald Laird. Laird is the backup catcher for the #BARVES and his midsection looks exactly like you think it would.

Screen Shot 2013-09-09 at 4.59.11 PM

This is a stereotypical back up catcher body. You have a protective layer of pudge surrounding everything to protect the innards from harm and baseballs. But beneath the pudge layer and before the innards layer, you find a layer of muscle. If you look closely you can see the lines of his six pac struggling to break free of the pudge layer, but sadly it never will. Gerald Laird has a fantastically strong core, but you’ll never be able to see that because the muscle is forever trapped beneath the layer of pudge.

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Ryan Braun To Sit Out Entire Jewish Holiday Season

by jakemintz

Sandy Koufax and Hank Greenberg are famous for sitting out on Yom Kippur, the holiest day of the Jewish year. Brewers outfielder Ryan Braun is taking it one step further. Not only will Braun sit out on Yom Kippur, he will sit out both days of Rosh Hashanah, the first two days of Sukkot, Simchat Torah, and every single Shabbat until the season ends.

“I’ve had a hard year,” says Braun, who was wrapped up in Major League Baseball’s Biogenesis controversy. “I think that sitting out for the Jewish Holidays this year is the right thing to do.”

5773 has been a real tough year for Braun. He has lost the trust of his fans, his teammates, and most importantly, the Jewish community. He believes that by observing the Jewish holiday season he will be able to reconnect with his people.

“I haven’t been acting like myself this year. I’ve been nothing more than a schmuck; a real embarrassment to my fans, the Jewish people, and especially my Bubbie. I want to reconnect with my Jewish roots.”

Last year the Brewers were in the thick of the wild card race and Braun made the decision to play on Yom Kippur. A decision he says he regrets.

“PED’s weren’t the only mistake I made last year. Playing on Yom Kippur really got the year started off in a bad way. I hope to have a fresh start this fall.”

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