NERD Game Scores for Wednesday, May 27, 2015

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
Seattle at Tampa Bay | 13:10 ET
Hernandez (61.2 IP, 68 xFIP-) vs. Archer (60.0 IP, 69 xFIP-)
It is perhaps not one of the world’s great injustices, but still a small- or medium-sized injustice, that one is compelled to observe half of Seattle right-hander Felix Hernandez’s starts by means of Safeco’s center-field broadcast camera. The angle of that camera, one finds, distorts the magnitude of any horizontal break a pitch might feature moving in towards a right-handed batter or away from a left-handed one. As a result, it’s difficult to distinguish between anything a left-handed pitcher is throwing — or, alternatively, to fully appreciate a great right-handed changeup. Felix Hernandez possesses exactly the latter of those things. Fortunately, the Tampa Bay camera is one of the greats — as is Tampa Bay’s starter tonight, it seems.

Readers’ Preferred Broadcast: Tampa Bay Radio.

A Single, Brief Note
Today’s Free Game
Today’s free game features the same clubs discussed 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.

Away		SP	Tm.	Gm.	Tm.	SP		Home	Time
Colby Lewis	TEX	3	4	6	7	10	CLE	Carlos Carrasco	12:10
Kyle Kendrick	COL	0	3	2	5	3	CIN	Mike Leake	12:35
Brad Hand*	MIA	4	5	7	7	10	PIT	Gerrit Cole	12:35
Jeff Samardzija	CHA	7	0	5	8	5	TOR	Marco Estrada	12:37
Chris Young	KC	2	7	6	7	10	NYA	Michael Pineda	13:05
Rick Porcello	BOS	5	4	4	3	5	MIN	Phil Hughes	13:10
Sean O’Sullivan	PHI	1	0	3	5	7	NYN	No.h Syndergaard	13:10
Felix Hernandez	SEA	8	6	8	5	10	TB	Chris Archer	13:10
Ryan Vogelsong	SF	1	5	4	3	6	MIL	Mike Fiers	13:40
Kyle Ryan*	DET	5	6	5	5	5	OAK	Scott Kazmir	15:35
Collin McHugh	HOU	6	10	7	5	6	BAL	Ubaldo Jimenez	16:35
Max Scherzer	WAS	9	5	7	7	5	CHN	Jon Lester	20:05
Josh Collmenter	AZ	3	6	5	6	6	STL	Lance Lynn	20:15
Andrew Cashner	SD	7	3	5	5	5	LAA	Garrett Richards	22:05
Alex Wood	ATL	4	2	4	7	4	LAN	Zack Greinke	22:10

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