Daily Notes: Mat Latos Is a Talking Point, Bam
Table of Contents
Here’s the table of contents for today’s edition of Daily Notes.
1. Featured Game: St. Louis at Cincinnati, 19:10 ET
2. Other Notable Games (Including MLB.TV Free Game)
3. Today’s Complete Schedule
Featured Game: St. Louis at Cincinnati, 19:10 ET
A Thing That Will Surprise You
A thing that will surprise you, the marvelous reader, is perhaps that tonight’s starter for Cincinnati, Mat Latos, after a generally miserable April and May, currently has a 95 xFIP- (i.e. park- and league-adjusted xFIP, where below 100 is better).
Regarding Mat Latos, His xFIPs by Month
Here are Latos’s xFIPs by month this season, so far (month and innings pitched in parentheses): 4.79 (April, 28.2 IP), 4.00 (May, 30.1), 3.02 (June, 38.2), 2.26 (July, 7.0).
What a Reasonable Person Might Suggest
A person — an entirely reasonable one, in fact — might suggest, after looking at Mat Latos’s month-by-month xFIPs, that some manner of “trend” has revealed itself.
Regarding Latos’s Improvement, If It’s Related to Fastball Velocity
Regard, a fact: it does not necessarily appear as though Latos’s average fastball velocity has changed substantially since the beginning of the season.
Regarding the Word Necessarily in the Above Entry, Why the Author Used It
The author has likely used the word necessarily in the above entry because he’s averse to making strong claims — prefers, instead, to couch such claims among as many qualifiers as is reasonable to use without rendering a sentence entirely meaningless.
Regarding All This Sort of Information, Where One Can Find It
Much of the above information can be found at very important internet website FanGraphs.com (link). Or in the reader’s heart, too. Either/or.
Readers’ Preferred Broadcast
Per the results of our offseason crowdsourcing project, FanGraphs readers prefer St. Louis Radio (link).
Other Notable Games
Detroit at Baltimore | 19:05 ET
Can Jason Hammel continue to Jason Hammel in the Jason Hammel?!? America is wait-ting!!!
Readers’ Preferred Broadcast: Detroit Radio (although, note: the Detroit audio feed might not feature the above-average Baltimore center-field camera angle).
Oakland at Minnesota | 20:10 ET ***MLB.TV Free Game***
Right-hander A.J. Griffin (18.0 IP, 105 xFIP-, 0.2 WAR) and his Curveball of Desire face whatever is the name of the team from Minnesota.
Readers’ Preferred Broadcast: Oakland Radio.
Today’s Complete Schedule
Here’s the complete schedule for all of today’s games, with our very proprietary watchability (NERD) scores for each one. Pitching probables and game times aggregated from MLB.com and RotoWire. The average NERD Game Score for today is 5.3.
Note: the following Game Scores include the poorly conceived playoff-odds adjustment discussed in a recent edition of Daily Notes. Also note: the following table is entirely sortable.
| Away | SP | Tm. | Gm. | Tm. | SP | Home | Time | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Ian Kennedy | AZ | 6 | 6 | 4 | 1 | 3 | CHN | Paul Maholm | 14:20 |
| C.J. Wilson | LAA | 3 | 5 | 4 | 7 | 5 | NYA | Hiroki Kuroda | 19:05 |
| Doug Fister | DET | 7 | 5 | 7 | 1 | 7 | BAL | Jason Hammel | 19:05 |
| Justin Masterson | CLE | 5 | 5 | 5 | 8 | 2 | TOR | Ricky Romero | 19:07 |
| Franklin Morales | BOS | 7 | 5 | 6 | 4 | 2 | TB | Jeremy Hellickson | 19:10 |
| Adam Wainwright | STL | 9 | 9 | 8 | 4 | 8 | CIN | Mat Latos | 19:10 |
| Jordan Zimmermann | WAS | 8 | 6 | 6 | 3 | 7 | MIA | Josh Johnson | 19:10 |
| Chris Young | NYN | 1 | 2 | 5 | 8 | 5 | ATL | Tim Hudson | 19:35 |
| Jose Quintana | CHA | 7 | 5 | 4 | 5 | 4 | KC | Bruce Chen | 20:10 |
| A.J. Griffin* | OAK | 7 | 4 | 5 | 3 | 5 | MIN | Francisco Liriano | 20:10 |
| James McDonald | PIT | 6 | 4 | 6 | 7 | 9 | MIL | Zack Greinke | 20:10 |
| Cliff Lee | PHI | 9 | 5 | 6 | 10 | 7 | COL | Christian Friedrich | 20:40 |
| Clayton Richard | SD | 4 | 5 | 5 | 2 | 9 | LAN | Clayton Kershaw | 22:10 |
| Derek Holland | TEX | 6 | 9 | 3 | 3 | 3 | SEA | Kevin Millwood | 22:10 |
| Jordan Lyles | HOU | 4 | 5 | 5 | 4 | 9 | SF | Madison Bumgarner | 22:15 |
To learn more about Pitcher and Team NERD scores click here.
To learn how Game NERD Scores are calculated, click here.
* = Fewer than 20 IP, NERD at discretion of very handsome author.
Carson Cistulli has published a book of aphorisms called Spirited Ejaculations of a New Enthusiast.
NYN… New York… Nets?
Welcome to old school baseball
New York (National League).
Jim beat me to it.
NY national league
notice the LAN and LAA
Rockies have a teamNERD of 10? Juh?
They’re pretty exciting offensively, at home.
Pitching and road games… Yeah, probable closer to a 1 than a 10…
“The author has likely used the word necessarily in the above entry because he’s averse to making strong claims — prefers, instead, to couch such claims among as many qualifiers as is reasonable to use without rendering a sentence entirely meaningless”
– This statement could probably be prescribed to possibly a fair number of baseball writers, I think.
The Cardinals & Rangers are no longer 10 NERD caliber teams. It’s a sad day for America, folks.
The rate of improvement wasn’t as great but Latos’s xFIP also got lower every month of the season last year. It would appear that the best strategy for the Reds would be to make sure that every calendar that Latos sees makes him think that it is September.
One might surmise that, upon regaining both Matt Kemp and Andre Ethier tonight, the Dodgers can be regarded as >2 NERD. One might even be compelled to raise his internet voice at this perceived injustice.
Please consider how offensive and unsettling the reality of Juan Uribe being on that or any team may be to some. Note that although his body and face are indeed both grotesque, that perhaps the most disturbing thing about him is his baseball playing. Picking a single facet of his game to label “most foul” is a fool’s errand.
I submit that Juan Uribe is Iago’s Balls, and that as such, the Dodgers are being treated generously by the esteemed Mr. Cistulli.
“the Detroit audio feed might not feature the above-average Baltimore center-field camera angle”
Dryly applied, sir.
As an aside, that Left Hand Milk Stout was good. Not the best aftertaste ever, but the initial flavor was quite nice. Was definitely worth trying.
And since you are an Englishman, any chance you’ve tried any of the Samuel Smith’s beers? I was planning on getting a pack of the oatmeal stout soon, but was curious if the other ones were good.
That sums up my feelings about LHMS pretty well.
I have tried Samuel Smith’s! Smith’s is known in London as a fairly lower-middle-market beer, sold exclusively in Smith’s-owned pubs; if you find a Smith’s pub it will serve the full line but nothing from any other brewery. I have had the wheat on draught and it is good but not necessarily distinctive; I’ve had the oatmeal stout here in the USA, bottled, and enjoyed it well. Would happily drink again.
As you can tell by the time stamp, I am doing a poor job of getting knackered this weekend. A friend is, as I write, tweeting from Indiana that he is being served Three Floyds Apocalypse Cow on draught. Crushing envy.
Yeah, I think your buddy definitely got the better experience this weekend. I had a similar experience to yours, as me and a friend each only had 2 beers over the course of the evening so that we would be functional enough today to go ice skating. And then we’ll go to one of the nicer bars in that area, haha. Speaking of ice skating and drinking, I’d like to add that drinking before skating is not the smartest things. Had my first (and probably only) gin martini before going to an outdoor rink in Chicago and it did not go well. Save your drinking until after ice skating!
Thanks for the advice on Samuel Smith’s.I’ve been going through quite a few stouts of late (I prefer a darker flavor mostly because I was brought up drinking coffee and black tea nonstop) and saw the Samuel Smith’s at my local liquor store, so I wanted to give it a try.