NERD Game Scores: Astros Improbable Season Viewing Opp

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.

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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.

Other Brief Note
Today’s Free Game
Today’s free game features the same Houston and Cleveland clubs cited above, and can be accessed by means of this hyperlinked text.

Complete Schedule
Here’s the complete and very sortable table for all of today’s games. Pitching probables and game times aggregated from MLB.com and also the rest of the internet. Note that the calculations both for team and game NERD scores have changed recently to better integrate playoff odds into same. Read more about those changes here, if you’re the sort of person accustomed to making poor life decisions.

NERD Image 4

Away   SP Tm. Gm. Tm. SP   Home Time
Ant’ny DeSclafani CIN 4 4 4 4 3 WAS Doug Fister 19:05
James Shields SD 7 4 6 8 6 PIT A.J. Burnett 19:05
Dallas Keuchel HOU 8 10 9 7 10 CLE Carlos Carrasco 19:10
John Lackey STL 4 5 6 7 6 CHN Jon Lester 20:05
Matt Wisler ATL 3 2 3 3 4 MIL Kyle Lohse 20:10
Wei-Yin Chen BAL 5 6 5 3 4 MIN Phil Hughes 20:10
Alex Colome TB 3 4 5 7 4 KC Edinson Volquez 20:10
Mark Buehrle TOR 5 9 6 1 10 CHA Chris Sale 20:10
Alfredo Simon DET 3 5 4 4 5 SEA Hisashi Iwakuma 22:10
Sean O’Sullivan PHI 0 2 3 5 6 LAN Undecided 22:10
Jon Niese NYN 4 4 5 5 6 SF Chris Heston 22:15

* = Fewer than 10 IP, NERD at discretion of very handsome author.





Carson Cistulli has published a book of aphorisms called Spirited Ejaculations of a New Enthusiast.

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noahjb
8 years ago

Where are the stats of “Undecided” to back up that 6 rating?

tz
8 years ago
Reply to  noahjb

Don’t know how it’s that high. His “Pace” score has to be terrible.