About a week ago, Jake Arrieta tried to throw a perfect game against the Cincinnati Reds. I mean, every pitcher is always trying to throw a perfect game, but Arrieta actually made a lot of progress before ultimately falling short. Then, Monday, Arrieta tried to no-hit the Red Sox. A no-hitter is a little less perfect than a perfect game, but Arrieta got deeper before ultimately falling short — again. He departed to a standing ovation in Fenway Park. For Arrieta, in the small picture, it was a pair of frustrating missed shots at history. For Arrieta, in the bigger picture, it was a twin demonstration of the pitcher Arrieta is becoming. You might not realize this, but the Cubs rotation has the highest WAR in the National League, and it’s not all because of the two trade targets.

Once again, in his latest start, Arrieta was masterful. Once again, Arrieta kept hitters off balance by mixing everything and featuring a lot of his new, improved slider. Or maybe it’s a cutter — people haven’t agreed. Arrieta was constantly down and constantly on the edges, and as the Red Sox waited for him to make mistakes, he picked up out after out. Arrieta turned in a start worthy of a tribute, so, as a tribute, I’ve taken care to identify the eight worst pitches Arrieta threw to the Red Sox during his 7.2 innings. It wasn’t an easy project.

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It wouldn’t be wrong to say that Mike Napoli called Masahiro Tanaka an idiot on the baseball field. It would, of course, be misleading — Napoli didn’t say that to Tanaka’s face, and Napoli wasn’t asserting that Tanaka is some kind of moron. Napoli was simply gleeful, returning to the dugout Saturday night after breaking a tie with a ninth-inning dinger. Down two strikes, Napoli was pleased to see Tanaka throw him an elevated fastball, and Napoli knocked it out of the yard to right-center. Though the ESPN Home Run Tracker says the ball would’ve left just one of 30 stadiums under standard conditions, that one, presumably, is New York, and within a few minutes the Yankees lost. Dingers have been Tanaka’s one human side.

If you listen to Napoli, Tanaka was a fool for throwing a fastball. Obviously, according to results-based analysis, Tanaka was a fool for throwing a fastball, since that pitch ultimately was the difference in the game. There’s no question that Tanaka made a mistake in that he missed his spot and left the pitch up. But let’s think a bit about the sequencing. Did Tanaka make a mistake in going with the heat in a 1-and-2 count? Was Tanaka being an idiot, or did he get burned by a fine idea?

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Over the weekend, the Red Sox summoned Mookie Betts from Triple-A; he made his big league debut last night, going 1-3 with a walk. While no single game will ever reveal much about a player’s skillset, the process by which he approached the game seems to fit with his minor league profile:

He didn’t chase pitches; he swung at only two of 11 out-of-zone-pitches.

He makes contact; he put the bat on the ball on all eight in-zone swings.

According to MinorLeagueCentral, Betts only swung at 34% of the pitches he was thrown in Pawtucket, and he made contact on 88% of his swings. Minor league data isn’t as reliable as major league data, but in general, swing and contact rates are pretty easy things to track and should at least be in the ballpark. While Betts will almost certainly see more in-zone pitches and be forced to swing more often in the big leagues, he has shown a pretty disciplined eye at the plate, and we shouldn’t expect him to expand the strike zone even against big league pitching.

And swing/contact rates do tend to carry over from the minors to a decent degree. For instance, if we look at the other prospects of note who have been promoted from the International League this year, we see that their swing and contact rates in the big leagues were in the same general range as their were in Triple-A.

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During a year in which they own the right to call themselves champions until someone dethrones them in October, it’s safe to say things aren’t exactly going the way the Boston Red Sox anticipated. At this point last year, the Red Sox had the best record in the American League at 49-34 and were on their way to winning the eighth World Series title in franchise history. This year, they’re 38-44 and currently own just a 17% chance to make the postseason at all, according to the very smart FanGraphs Playoff Odds.

The starting rotation, outside of Jon Lester and John Lackey, has been a disaster. Shane Victorino has barely played due to back and hamstring injuries. Dustin Pedroia has been reduced to a league average hitter as his complete lack of power starts to look more and more real. The A.J. Pierzynski signing hasn’t worked out like it did for the Rangers last year and Pierzynski’s time in the MLB appears to be coming to a close. It took Daniel Nava a month to go from starting major league outfielder to starting minor league outfielder. Xander Bogaerts hasn’t lit the world on fire like some hoped and Jackie Bradley Jr. has done nothing to prove that he can hit major league pitching, at all. Even David Ortiz, despite his gaudy home run total, hasn’t been totally himself at the plate.

When a season is going like this, one must try to find a bright spot, somewhere, lest one risk being a total pessimistic bummer. Even on the worst of teams, you can usually point to at least one guy that’s been exciting, surprising or shown some promise one way or another.

Enter Brock Holt.
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Among starting pitchers with at least 40 innings, here are the biggest increases and increasers in strikeout rate since 2013, by percentage points:

• Jon Lester, +9.5%
• Zack Greinke, +7.7%
• Jason Hammel, +7.3%
• Brandon McCarthy, +7.3%
• Garrett Richards, +6.9%

The Red Sox are playing well again, which means we get to write positive things about them. Among the most positive things has beenJon Lester, who’s taken a step forward after having taken a step back. Lester, for a couple years, posted ace-like numbers. The following three years he lost a lot of strikeouts, but now he’s back to the old level and then some, carrying what’s otherwise been an inconsistent starting unit. For Lester, it’s a good strategy in what remains a contract year — play better baseball. After all, better baseball means better baseball money.

An increase like Lester’s causes one to dig around for potential explanations. It’s not that he’s really throwing harder. It’s not like he’s dramatically changed his pitch mix. It’s not a matter of getting ahead more. Between 2011 and 2013, 29% of Lester’s pitches thrown were with two strikes. This year, he’s at 30%. But over those three years, under 18% of those two-strike pitches turned into strikeouts. This year, he’s at 24%. That’s a change, and it might lead you somewhere else.

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Each weekday during the minor-league season, FanGraphs is providing a status update on multiple rookie-eligible players. Note that Age denotes the relevant prospect’s baseball age (i.e. as of July 1st of the current year); Top-15, the prospect’s place on Marc Hulet’s preseason organizational list; and Top-100, that same prospect’s rank on Hulet’s overall top-100 list.

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Last off-season, the Red Sox made Stephen Drew a qualifying offer, giving him a chance to return for 2014 with a $14.1 million salary. He turned it down, and sought a multi-year offer in free agency instead. No offers came, and the Red Sox moved on. They brought Xander Bogaerts to camp as their regular shortstop, and gave Will Middlebrooks a chance to reclaim the starting third base job. While Boras made noise about the problems with the qualifying offer system, he continued to suggest that Drew’s market would emerge once the draft occurred and the attached compensation pick went away. The draft will be held in two weeks, and so Drew could have signed with any club as a “true free agent” 16 days from now.

Instead, today, he essentially accepted the qualifying offer from the Red Sox, taking a pro-rated version of the $14 million salary he turned down seven months ago. Once he’s ready to resume facing live pitching, Drew will presumably once again take over as the Red Sox shortstop, with Bogaerts shifting back to third base, and Middlebrooks serving as depth or a trade chip once he returns from the DL.

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Mookie Betts is hitting .400. Mookie Betts has reached base in 70 consecutive games. Mookie Betts walks more often than he strikes out. Mookie Betts doesn’t have a position, but it doesn’t matter. Mookie Betts is coming.

The question is when? Since Ben Cherington took over as the team’s director of player development in 2003, the Sox have promoted 75 position players to the majors. Parsing that list for playing time, duplicates (as in someone got a September call-up but was still rookie eligible the following season) and players who weren’t really Red Sox farmhands, such as Brandon Snyder, leaves us with the following 18-player list:

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Generally, when you think of Jake Peavy, you often think “Cy Young winner.” But that was a long time ago. These days, Peavy lives on the edge between “effective enough” and “not fooling anybody.” He is living there because he has become more cautious about living in the heart of the plate, where he used to. His earned run average paints him as one of the better pitchers in the American League, but if you look beyond that there is definitely cause for concern.

It’s no surprise that a pitcher getting on in years would have diminished velocity, particularly one with Peavy’s injury history. And diminished his velocity is. In his last few starts, he has worked his way back up to an average fastball of 90 mph, but that is a far cry from the 92-93 mph heat he was flashing in 2007-2008. Actually, he has been in the 90 mph range for a number of years. According to our PITCHf/x numbers, his first season with an average four-seam fastball under 91 mph was 2011. As his velocity has dropped, he has worked hard to refine his control in order to stay effective. To wit:
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Monday featured, for the first time in 2014, a full slate of meaningful baseball, albeit with a bit of a lull in the late afternoon as the only live game for a stretch had the Rockies and the Marlins. I met a friend at a neighborhood bar a little after 5, and the bar had the game on all of its screens, and after a little conversation I found I was completely hanging on the action. Come August, I probably won’t be watching the Rockies and the Marlins, but this early in the year, everything’s interesting. And while we always know that anything can happen, there’s no cynicism around opening day. By the middle of the year, anything can happen, but we know what’s probably going to happen. In late March and early April, it’s more fun to imagine that baseball’s a big giant toss-up. That Marcell Ozuna looks good. If he hits, and if the Marlins get their pitching…

I don’t remember what most opening days are like, but this one felt like it had an unusual number of anything-can-happens. That is, events that would take one by complete and utter surprise. What are documented below are, I think, the five most outstanding miracles from a long and rejuvenating Monday. From one perspective, this is evidence that the future is a mystery and all a surprise is is a run of good or bad luck. From another, more bummer of a perspective, this is evidence that opening day doesn’t matter at all in the grand scheme of things and come on why are you already projecting Grady Sizemore to be a five-win center fielder? Why are you already freaking out about the 2014 Blue Jays? Be whatever kind of fan you like. Just remember that baseball is a silly game, and you’ll never outsmart it.

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