Daily Notes: Presenting “Max Scherzer Schunday”

Table of Contents
Here’s the table of contents for today’s edition of Daily Notes.

1. Featured Game: Los Angeles AL at Detroit, 13:05 ET
2. Today’s MLB.TV Free Game
3. Today’s Complete Schedule

Featured Game: Los Angeles AL at Detroit, 13:05 ET
Regarding What’s Possible
It’s entirely possible that a reader — a brazen sort of reader, that is — it’s possible that such a reader might confront the author regarding his choice of featured game today.

On What Grounds a Reader Might Do That
In the event that a reader were to confront the author on his selection of today’s Featured Game, it’s possible he would do so on the grounds that the NERD score — i.e. the infallible watchability metric created by the author himself — that the NERD score for the Angels-Tigers contest is decidedly not the highest among today’s games.

Other Games with a Higher NERD Score Than Angels-Tigers, A Brief List
Here’s a brief list of games with a higher NERD score than today’s Angels-Tigers game:

• The Cardinals-Reds game
• The Brewers-Pirates game

Regarding the Angels-Tigers Game, Its Distinguishing Characteristic
What sets today’s Angels-Tigers game apart from others is how very mercurial and occasionally transcendent right-hander Max Scherzer (147.2 IP, 79 xFIP-, 2.9 WAR) is starting it for Detroit.

Regarding the Angels-Tigers Game, Another Distinguishing Characteristic
Another distinguishing characteristic of the Angels-Tigers game is how it allows the author to designate today as “Max Scherzer Schunday” — a quality, in itself, that is worthy of further consideration apropos NERD and the calculation of same.

Readers’ Preferred Broadcast
Per the results of our offseason crowdsourcing project, FanGraphs readers prefer Detroit Radio (link).

Today’s MLB.TV Free Game
Milwaukee at Pittsburgh | 13:35 ET
Rookie right-hander Mark Rogers (28.2 IP, 85 xFIP-, 0.4 WAR) starts in front of the excellent Pittsburgh camera. Here’s Rogers’ average fastball velocity through five starts: 94.0 mph. And here’s where that aforementioned and average fastball velocity would rank among the league’s 99 qualified starts: seventh!

Readers’ Preferred Broadcast: Milwaukee 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 4.1.

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
Ervin Santana	LAA	3	8	6	4	10	DET	Max Scherzer	13:05
Freddy Garcia	NYA	5	7	2	2	1	CLE	Ubaldo Jimenez	13:05
Lucas Harrell	HOU	5	4	2	2	5	NYN	Jeremy Hefner	13:10
Adam Wainwright	STL	9	10	7	4	6	CIN	Homer Bailey	13:10
Will Smith	KC	4	8	4	6	7	BOS	Felix Doubront	13:35
Mark Rogers	MIL	10	7	7	4	5	PIT	Erik Bedard	13:35
Hend. Alvarez	TOR	4	6	4	1	6	BAL	Chris Tillman	13:35
Jo. Zimmermann	WAS	8	6	6	5	10	PHI	Cliff Lee	13:35
Kevin Millwood	SEA	3	4	2	5	3	CHA	Gavin Floyd	14:10
Jhoulys Chacin	COL	2	8	2	2	5	CHN	Chris Volstad	14:20
Cole DeVries	MIN	2	4	2	8	4	TEX	Scott Feldman	15:05
Mark Buehrle	MIA	4	4	2	1	1	LAN	Aaron Harang	16:10
Edinson Volquez	SD	5	6	3	6	3	AZ	Joe Saunders	16:10
Tim Hudson	ATL	4	7	5	3	7	SF	Tim Lincecum	20:00

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.