Devised originally in response to a challenge issued by viscount of the internet Rob Neyer, and expanded at the request of nobody, NERD scores represent an attempt to summarize in one number (and on a scale of 0-10) the likely aesthetic appeal or watchability, for the learned fan, of a player or team or game. Read more about the components of and formulae for NERD scores here.

Most Highly Rated Game
Houston at Cleveland | 19:10 ET
Velasquez (25.2 IP, 116 xFIP-) vs. Kluber (118.2 IP, 66 xFIP-)
Talented Cleveland right-hander Corey Kluber faces a group of young men who, after crash-landing on an uninhabited island in the Pacific following a wartime evacuation, instead of descending into murderous anarchy — instead of doing that, proceeded rather to diligently train and practice baseball, eventually forming a club and joining Major League Baseball as the Houston Astros. Today represents an opportunity to experience their inspirational story again, as if for the first time.

Readers’ Preferred Broadcast: Cleveland Radio.

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Devised originally in response to a challenge issued by viscount of the internet Rob Neyer, and expanded at the request of nobody, NERD scores represent an attempt to summarize in one number (and on a scale of 0-10) the likely aesthetic appeal or watchability, for the learned fan, of a player or team or game. Read more about the components of and formulae for NERD scores here.

Most Highly Rated Game
Houston at Cleveland | 18:10 ET
Keuchel (124.1 IP, 71 xFIP-) vs. Carrasco (97.1 IP, 70 xFIP-)
By the haphazardly derived methodology utilized by the author, this Houston-Cleveland encounter is the day’s most appealing by a considerable margin. With the exception of the White Sox game, for example — which features left-hander Chris Sale — it appears to offer all the day’s most noteworthy pitchers. And with the exception of Pittsburgh or Toronto, it offers probably the day’s most noteworthy teams, as well. And really, regardless of all that, it provides yet another opportunity to observe the Houston Astros, itself less a professional baseball club and more a loosely organized group of physically precocious neighbor children who’ve somehow been permitted to compete against actual, financially compensated adults.

Readers’ Preferred Broadcast: Cleveland Radio.

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Devised originally in response to a challenge issued by viscount of the internet Rob Neyer, and expanded at the request of nobody, NERD scores represent an attempt to summarize in one number (and on a scale of 0-10) the likely aesthetic appeal or watchability, for the learned fan, of a player or team or game. Read more about the components of and formulae for NERD scores here.

Most Highly Rated Game
Cleveland at Pittsburgh | 13:35 ET
Salazar (85.1 IP, 78 xFIP-) vs. Cole (102.1 IP, 77 xFIP-)
Were one to insist today on watching an encounter between the two hardest-throwing starting pitchers in all of baseball, that same one would be disappointed by the major-league games scheduled for this afternoon and evening. Were one to lower his expectations even slightly, however, this Cleveland-Pittsburgh contest featuring Danny Salazar and Gerrit Cole — who’ve produced the fifth- and third-highest average fastball velocities, respectively, among qualifiers — would likely represent a source of considerable pleasure. Meanwhile, were one to recalibrate one’s tastes entirely, he could compete with an immortal god for happiness merely by eating a barley cake.

Readers’ Preferred Broadcast: Cleveland Radio.

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Devised originally in response to a challenge issued by viscount of the internet Rob Neyer, and expanded at the request of nobody, NERD scores represent an attempt to summarize in one number (and on a scale of 0-10) the likely aesthetic appeal or watchability, for the learned fan, of a player or team or game. Read more about the components of and formulae for NERD scores here.

Most Highly Rated Game
San Francisco at Washington | 11:05 ET
Bumgarner (108.1 IP, 82 xFIP-) vs. Strasburg (57.1 IP, 90 xFIP-)
Roughly 240 years ago on this date, American colonists declared independence from the tyranny of British rule — an event to which the Washington Nationals pay homage each July 4th (i.e. today) by declaring independence from the tyranny of afternoon and night baseball. Fortunately for all involved, the latter event generates much less in the way of bloodshed and political turmoil. Also fortunate, is this: that this year’s edition of the ante-meridian game features starting pitchers Madison Bumgarner and Stephen Strasburg, each of whom possess objectively compelling traits according both to the methodology laboriously crafted by the author and also just everybody’s normal judgment.

Readers’ Preferred Broadcast: San Francisco Radio or Television.

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Devised originally in response to a challenge issued by viscount of the internet Rob Neyer, and expanded at the request of nobody, NERD scores represent an attempt to summarize in one number (and on a scale of 0-10) the likely aesthetic appeal or watchability, for the learned fan, of a player or team or game. Read more about the components of and formulae for NERD scores here.

Most Highly Rated Game
Tampa Bay at New York AL | 19:05 ET
Archer (109.0 IP, 61 xFIP-) vs. Tanaka (53.1 IP, 79 xFIP-)
To the degree that the reader is a human person, that same reader likely holds the opinion that the process of updating one’s resume is among the most tedious activities one is compelled to endure. Indeed, Greek mythology reveals to us that, when Zeus condemned Sisyphus for the latter’s hubris, he gave Sisyphus the option either of rolling a boulder uphill for all eternity or re-writing his cover letter to better reflect his passion for streamlining workflow. The choice was easy.

The advantage of working primarily as a Major League Baseball Pitcher is that one’s performance, whether positive or negative, is recorded by a number of well-known media outlets. As such, one isn’t compelled to dedicate much time or effort in the resume department. In fact, the present media outlet reveals that Chris Archer is currently among the most likely candidates to be recognized at year’s end as the American’s League’s top pitcher. One finds, for example, that he’s produced the third-best park-adjusted xFIP among all qualifiers, and also the fourth-best pitcher WAR. This game against the division-leading Yankees represents an opportunity to make his case even more strongly.

Readersí Preferred Broadcast: Tampa Bay Radio.

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The Fringe Five is a weekly regular-season exercise, introduced a couple years ago by the present author, wherein that same author utilizes regressed stats, scouting reports, and also his own fallible intuition to identify and/or continue monitoring the most compelling fringe prospects in all of baseball.

Central to the exercise, of course, is a definition of the word fringe, a term which possesses different connotations for different sorts of readers. For the purposes of the column this year, a fringe prospect (and therefore one eligible for inclusion in the Five) is any rookie-eligible player at High-A or above both (a) absent from the most current iteration of Kiley McDaniel’s top-200 prospect list and (b) not currently playing in the majors. Players appearing on any of McDaniel’s updated prospect lists or, otherwise, selected in the first round of the current season’s amateur draft will also be excluded from eligibility.

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Devised originally in response to a challenge issued by viscount of the internet Rob Neyer, and expanded at the request of nobody, NERD scores represent an attempt to summarize in one number (and on a scale of 0-10) the likely aesthetic appeal or watchability, for the learned fan, of a player or team or game. Read more about the components of and formulae for NERD scores here.

Most Highly Rated Game
San Francisco at Miami | 12:10 ET
Cain (Season Debut) vs. Fernandez (Season Debut)
With few exceptions, three conditions must exist for a game — a game of any sort — to hold any sort of appeal for spectators, irrespective of what other variables might be present.

Three conditions, as follow:

1. The players must (mostly) follow the rules; and
2. The players must give the impression that they’re trying to win; and
3. There must exist some consequence to the result, such that victory produces a positive outcome; defeat, an undesirable one.

For today’s Marlins game, like most other Marlins games, no more than one and a half of those criteria are likely to be met — and yet it would be difficult for a reasonable party to argue that this afternoon’s contest possesses anything less than great appeal for spectators. The reason: today represents the return of Miami right-hander Jose Fernandez from the elbow injury that afflicted him last May.

Whatever the severity of that injury, it would appear as though this version of Fernandez bears considerable resemblance to that previous, ecstatic one. He produced strikeout and walk rates of 33.7% and 6.1%, respectively, over five starts and 24.2 innings between High- and Double-A as part of his rehab, sitting at 94-96 mph, it would appear, during the last of those.

Readers’ Preferred Broadcast: San Francisco Radio or Television.

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Devised originally in response to a challenge issued by viscount of the internet Rob Neyer, and expanded at the request of nobody, NERD scores represent an attempt to summarize in one number (and on a scale of 0-10) the likely aesthetic appeal or watchability, for the learned fan, of a player or team or game. Read more about the components of and formulae for NERD scores here.

Most Highly Rated Game
New York AL at Los Angeles AL | 19:05 ET
Eovaldi (82.1 IP, 98 xFIP-) vs. Shoemaker (78.2 IP, 101 xFIP-)
The introduction of the wild-card game to baseball’s postseason format in 2012 has problematized slightly what precisely one means when saying that a club has “reached” or “qualified for” the playoffs. Technically, that wild-card game is denoted as a playoff contest. For the team that loses it, however — and for that team’s supporters — the pleasures typically associated with postseason baseball are incredibly short-lived. For that reason, the component of NERD team scores that accounts for a club’s playoff odds — which component is weighted more heavily in direct proportion to the proximity of those playoffs — is informed not by the relevant club’s overall playoff odds, but rather by the club’s odds of reaching the divisional series. Specifically, the closer to 50% a team’s odds of qualifying for the divisional series, the greater positive influence over that team’s NERD score — the logic being that such a club is playing the highest-leverage games in the league.

One finds, in the Yankees and Angels, two of the three clubs in closest proximity to that 50% mark. Regard, the seven clubs within 20 points or less of same:

New York currently possesses the least certain future with regard to the postseason. Pittsburgh trails them by only a slight amount. And then the Anaheims’ divisional-series odds of 37.8% place them third. While it’s probably fair to say that winning or losing this particular game is not of the greatest urgency to either the Yankees or Angels, it’s also accurate to say that urgency is most present in this encounter of all those present on today’s schedule.

Readers’ Preferred Broadcast: Los Angeles AL Television.

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Episode 577
Kiley McDaniel is both (a) the lead prospect analyst for FanGraphs and also (b) the guest on this particular edition of FanGraphs Audio — during which edition he discusses, among sundry matters, baseball’s looming international-signing period.

Don’t hesitate to direct pod-related correspondence to @cistulli on Twitter.

You can subscribe to the podcast via iTunes or other feeder things.

Audio after the jump. (Approximately 1 hr 19 min play time.)

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Devised originally in response to a challenge issued by viscount of the internet Rob Neyer, and expanded at the request of nobody, NERD scores represent an attempt to summarize in one number (and on a scale of 0-10) the likely aesthetic appeal or watchability, for the learned fan, of a player or team or game. Read more about the components of and formulae for NERD scores here.

Most Highly Rated Game
Kansas City at Houston | 20:10 ET
Duffy (43.0 IP, 117 xFIP-) vs. Keuchel (116.1 IP, 73 xFIP-)
By mere decimal points, this Royals-Astros encounter receives today’s highest game score, rendering it not only (a) the (hypothetically) most watchable contest of the evening according to the inadequate methodology devised by the author, but also (b) the third consecutive day on which the Houstons have been featured within same. With regard to which of the club’s qualities distinguish them most substantially, one finds that they’ve produced a park-adjusted home-run rate nearly 2.5 standard deviations better than the league average while having deployed batters who, overall, are more than 2.5 standard deviations younger than the mean — both league-leading figures, those. Additionally, the Astros bullpen has recorded the lowest park-adjusted xFIP in all the majors; its baserunners, the fifth-most runs by that measure. A collection of promising traits, is what one finds here — just as within a dating profile on which one has lied about his collection of promising traits.

Readers’ Preferred Broadcast: Houston Radio.

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