Managing in the playoffs is all about balancing immediate payoffs and long-term sustainability. Not ultra long-term, mind you, but managing a bullpen for a seven-game series is trickier than simply pressing the same buttons every day until you win or lose. ALCS Game 4 featured three momentous bullpen decisions. The managers chose differently; they both paid the price. In the end, the Yankees got the better of the Guardians in a 14-pitcher, three-and-a-half-hour, 14-run shootout. But a few early decisions absolutely shaped the way the game went, and so they take center stage here tonight.

No Rest for Cade Smith

Cade Smith was one of the best relievers in baseball this year. If he didn’t play on the same team as Emmanuel Clase, we’d call him a lockdown closer. Instead, he’s a dominant fireman, capable of coming in whenever Stephen Vogt needs him to ice the opposition. And Vogt has needed him a lot. He pitched in all five games of the ALDS. He got the first game of this series off, but then he faced the meat of the Yankees lineup in Game 2 and Game 3.

He’s been pitching nearly every day, which hurts. He’s facing the same batters over and over, which hurts. But what are you going to do, not use your best option against a team that has two MVP-level bats stacked together in an otherwise navigable lineup? Juan Soto had already homered and the Yankees were up 3-2 when the top of the order came up in the sixth inning. On came Smith, for the third time in four days. Read the rest of this entry »

NEW YORK — Though he wasn’t the offensive star of Game 3 of the National League Championship Series — he didn’t hit a moonshot into the second deck like Shohei Ohtani or Max Muncy — Will Smith did collect two hits in the Dodgers’ 8-0 victory over the Mets. They weren’t exactly scorchers, but one was of critical importance, as it drove in the game’s first run. Remarkably, Smith’s performance was just the second time this postseason that a catcher has collected multiple hits in a game, and for as much as Smith has struggled, his numbers still stand out relative to the competition. It’s been an exceptionally difficult October for the men wearing the tools of ignorance.

These days, those tools actually suggest anything but ignorance. Armed with more data than ever, and playing in a pressure-cooker atmosphere where a single pitch can turn a series, Smith and those of his peers who are still standing (or squatting) in October — namely the Yankees’ Austin Wells, the Mets’ Francisco Alvarez, and the Guardians’ tandem of Bo Naylor and Austin Hedges — might be required to navigate a short-working starter and half a dozen relievers through opposing lineups, controlling the tempo of the game when things threaten to spiral out of control, and shaking off untold aches and pains. Hitting? That’s part of the job, but this fall, these catchers’ offensive contributions have felt particularly secondary, not unlike those of pitchers swinging the bat in the days before the universal designated hitter.

The numbers certainly look like those bygone pitchers hacking away. Thus far, the catchers for the 12 postseason teams have collectively hit .169/.236/.255 (40 wRC+) with five homers and a 28.3% strikeout rate through 254 plate appearances. In other words, they’ve been outhit by Madison Bumgarner (.172/.232/.292, 44 wRC+ career). Read the rest of this entry »

Read the rest of this entry »

The St. Louis Cardinals got more than just the 2023 Texas League MVP when they acquired Thomas Saggese from the Rangers as part of the five-player Jordan Montgomery deal at last year’s trade deadline. They also got a young hitter who is attuned to the mechanics of his craft. For Saggese — Texas’ fifth round pick in the 2020 draft out of Carlsbad High School in California — getting on plane with a pitch and driving it is the goal. The manner in which he positions his body in space is what allows him to do that.

A middle infielder listed at 5-foot-11 and 185 pounds, Saggese doesn’t look the part of a player who went deep 26 times in 2023 and another 21 times this past season. But regardless of his appearance, the pop is there, as is what our lead prospect analyst Eric Longenhagen has described as a “feel to hit [that] has been the lynchpin of his prospectdom since high school.” Moreover, Saggese has youth on his side. While his slash line with Triple-A Memphis was a humble .253/.313/.438, those numbers came at age 22 (he won’t turn 23 until April). The Cardinals clearly recognize his upside. Saggese got a big league call-up in September and logged 10 hits, including his first big league home run, in 52 trips to the plate.

Saggese — currently suiting up with the Glendale Desert Dogs — talked hitting following an Arizona Fall League game earlier this week.

———

David Laurila: How do you feel that you profile as a hitter? Looking at your numbers, I see more home runs than I might have expected.

Thomas Saggese: “I think my best swings just happen to be balls in the air. I feel like I get the ball in the air pretty well and can hit some homers. I don’t think it’s going to be anything crazy, but I would like to hit 20 a year — .300 with 20 homers every year. That’s kind of my goal.” Read the rest of this entry »

Ben Lindbergh and Meg Rowley banter about a report that Jerry Reinsdorf might be willing to sell the White Sox, then (13:22) discuss the tactics and storylines of ALCS and NLCS Game 2, including controversial Vogt decisions, how Yankees fans would perceive a pennant or championship, the importance of Max Muncy, visualizing success, Shohei Ohtani’s small-sample splits and playoff history, and more. After that (1:08:02), they answer listener emails about people who don’t know Ohtani can pitch, why some plays aren’t reviewable via replay, expanding the three-batter-minimum rule, and pedantry concerning squaring up foul balls, “taking a souvenir away” when robbing a homer, flying out sharply, and Canadian baseball-executive titles, plus a postscript featuring Ben’s daughter’s Effectively Wild debut (1:39:06).

Audio intro: Liz Panella, “Effectively Wild Theme”
Audio outro: Jonathan Crymes 2, “Effectively Wild Theme”

Link to Reinsdorf report
Link to MLBTR on Reinsdorf
Link to Clemens on Vogt
Link to recent franchise sales
Link to more on recent sales
Link to playoff batting leaders
Link to Baumann on Ohtani splits
Link to Ohtani on the postseason story
Link to Ohtani on the postseason video
Link to Ohtani NPB postseason stats
Link to Ohtani New Balance ad 1
Link to Ohtani New Balance ad 2
Link to xkcd comic
Link to Buehler game story
Link to neighborhood play explainer
Link to replay review explainer
Link to McTaggart tweet
Link to squared-up-barrels rate
Link to squared-up-rate explainer
Link to Greene robbery video
Link to listener emails database

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Cleveland’s baseball club was known as the Blues when the American League was formed in 1901, but that’s far from what Guardians fans were singing following Thursday’s ALCS Game 3. Two days before A Tribe Called Quest and other musical luminaries are to be inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, Progressive Field erupted in rapture as David Fry circled the bases in the bottom of the 10th inning to cap a stunning comeback and give the Guardians a 7-5 win.

More on that in a moment.

The first inning featured missed opportunities — both teams stranded a pair of runners — as well as a pitch clock violation on a chagrinned Juan Soto and a sliding catch by Guardians center fielder Lane Thomas. That those happenings barely qualify as footnotes says a lot about what would eventually transpire. Ditto a second inning that saw Alex Verdugo chop a ball over first baseman Josh Naylor’s head and leg out a sliding double on a play where second base umpire Jansen Visconti ruled that Brayan Rocchio had a foot blocking the bag (that was debatable). Anthony Volpe advanced to third on the hit, then scored on a Jose Trevino groundball single that made it 1-0 Yankees. Guardians starter Matthew Boyd proceeded to pick off Trevino, which helped to limit the damage. Read the rest of this entry »

In baseball history, there have been 15 players signed to contracts worth a total of $300 million or more. The Dodgers started three of those 15 players on Thursday night — Shohei Ohtani, Mookie Betts, and Yoshinobu Yamamoto. That’s a ridiculous amount of money, especially for such a trivial enterprise as baseball. When a team — even a team as well-resourced as the Dodgers — spends that much money on a trio of players, it means they really want to win.

Well, the syndicate of investors at Guggenheim Baseball Management got their money’s worth on Thursday. Ohtani homered to lead off the game and added three walks, scoring four runs in total. Betts went 4-for-6 with three runs and a homer of his own, which took the Dodgers’ lead from tenuous to comfortable in the sixth. And Yamamoto struck out eight batters in 4 1/3 innings as the Dodgers won 10-2. The World Series is now just one win away. Read the rest of this entry »

Shohei Ohtani doesn’t have a hit with the bases empty. I kept hearing that throughout FS1’s broadcast of Game 3 of the NLCS. My first thought was, “Wow, I’m old enough to remember when they dogged star players for not hitting well enough with runners on base! I guess some people will find any reason to complain!”

My second thought was, “Huh, I thought Ohtani was having a decent postseason.” It could be better, of course. Ohtani is hitting .226/.351/.419, which I suppose is disappointing from a player with a legitimate case for being the greatest of all time. But if you told most managers that their leadoff hitter would post a .351 OBP through the first eight games of the playoffs, most of them would take it. Out of 58 players with 20 or more plate appearances this postseason, Ohtani is 18th in wRC+ and 11th in WPA. By any objective standard, Ohtani’s been perfectly adequate at the plate overall. Read the rest of this entry »

Once considered the natural successor to Clayton Kershaw as The Man in the Dodgers’ rotation, Walker Buehler’s career hit a rocky stretch in 2022. Coming off arguably his best season in the majors, Buehler was pulled from a June start with elbow pain, starting a journey that ended with a Tommy John surgery, the second of his career, two months later. After some unrelated injury setbacks this spring, Buehler returned to the Dodgers, but as a shadow of his former self. He finished 2024 with a 5.38 ERA and a 5.54 FIP, and might not have even made the postseason roster if not for the fact that most of the organization’s other plausible starters don’t currently have working throwing arms. His no-strikeout, six-run outing against the Padres in Game 3 of the NLDS wasn’t an inspiring sign that he’d turn things around in the playoffs.

And yet, in Game 3 of the NLCS against the Mets at Citi Field, Buehler had opposing batters flailing at his shockingly nasty repertoire in a short but effective four-inning start. He left with a two-run lead, but after the Los Angeles offense kept tacking on and the bullpen threw five scoreless innings, the Dodgers left the ballpark Wednesday night with an 8-0 win and a 2-1 advantage in the best-of-seven series.

One of the problems with Buehler in his return this year was that he was just so darn hittable at times. Before 2022, his four-seamer was the foundation that his out-pitches were built around, but even before his elbow surgery, the effectiveness of the pitch had practically disappeared. From 2021 to 2022, he bled about 200 rpm off his fastball’s average spin rate. Batters apparently took notice, suddenly slugging .618 as his heater lost some of its rise. Buehler returned from surgery, but the four-seamer’s effectiveness did not, and the pitch became a smaller part of his toolset. Read the rest of this entry »

At my old job, my boss occasionally held idea sessions. He wanted everyone to participate, and the point wasn’t to come up with something actionable, just to brainstorm. No suggestion was too ridiculous – sure, it might get picked apart in discussion, but the whole point was to suggest weird stuff and see what came out of it. Still, I can safely say that none of those judgment-free-zone ideas sounded quite as zany to me as “let’s intentionally walk the guy in front of Aaron Judge.”

That didn’t stop Stephen Vogt on Tuesday night. With runners on second and third base and one out in the bottom of the second inning, Vogt didn’t let Juan Soto hit. He put up four fingers to send Soto to first. His reward? A bases-loaded encounter with Judge, the best hitter in baseball. Obviously Vogt had a reason for his decision. I ran the math to see how well that reason agrees with theory.

In a vacuum, it’s pretty clear why this intentional walk was bad: It loaded the bases with only one out, increasing the chance of a big inning, and it did so with the presumptive American League MVP at the plate. But there were two reasons to do it. First, it took the bat out of Soto’s hands, and Soto is himself a phenomenal hitter, particularly against righties. Second, it created the chance for an inning-ending double play, which would have been a huge boon to the Guardians’ chances (they already trailed by two). If you squint, you can kind of see it; maybe these two choices are equal. It didn’t matter in Game 2, because the Yankees won going away, but if the Guardians come back to win the series, they’ll be facing New York’s best hitters in important spots again, so what Vogt chose to do Tuesday night might help us guess what he’ll do in the future. Read the rest of this entry »