On Friday night, we witnessed a matchup of starting pitchers in the Dodgers vs. Mets series that only comes along a few times every generation. Clayton Kershaw — in the middle of a career that is already alongside some of the great starting pitchers in history — went head to head versus Jacob deGrom, a leading National League Cy Young Award candidate and ace of the Mets staff.

Perhaps we shouldn’t have been surprised about the combined numbers the two starters produced: 13.2 IP, 9 H, 5 BB, 3 ER (two of which scored after Kershaw was replaced), and a staggering 24 strikeouts. The tally of strikeouts, for those who weren’t watching, was historic: Friday night marked the first game in postseason history that two starters each had at least 11 strikeouts. And, while Kershaw was very good, deGrom was better, going a full seven innings while allowing only six base runners, no runs, and 13 Ks. “Better” is in fact a serious understatement, as deGrom scythed through one of the best offenses in baseball in what was one of the most dominant postseason debuts in recent history.

Earlier this season, when Pedro Martinez was about to be inducted into the Hall of Fame, I wondered: what current starting pitcher possesses the same arsenal of pitches (by velocity) as vintage Pedro? While many commenters simply wrote “no one” in response to the article (an understandable response, given Martinez’ dominance), the answer was actually deGrom: possessing a fastball, changeup, and curveball that clocked in at almost identical speeds to 1999 Martinez.

We don’t have any data on how Martinez’ pitches moved, so comparing the all-important “nastiness” factor between Pedro and deGrom is impossible. However, the conclusion is there: deGrom has the stuff to compare to Martinez, and that simple fact is remarkable. This section toward the end of that piece comparing the two pitchers sums up both the limitations and excitement of the exercise:

“There is more to pitching than velocity, and Martinez’ acumen in terms of pitch sequencing and knowledge of hitters was one of the biggest reasons why he was so incredibly successful. deGrom might not have the other intangible skills (yet) that the newest Hall of Fame member possessed at his peak, but we can all agree: 1999 Pedro velocity is a pretty great starting point.”

Jacob deGrom isn’t Pedro Martinez. Basically no one can make that claim, and deGrom has a long, long way to go before their careers can be compared. However, for a few brief hours on Friday night, deGrom was almost as dominant as peak Martinez, and he was dominant in very similar ways. The similarities between the two were already there, and in many ways, they were cemented in the first game of the NLDS. Let’s dive into deGrom’s start to explain further.

First, there was the electric fastball, which compares very well to Pedro’s. Sitting at an average of 97 mph, he quickly established the pitch on Friday, throwing 85% fastballs in the first inning alone. From then on, he relied on the fastball in all situations and counts as his main pitch, only deviating from that plan to mix in first-pitch sliders to 44% of the right-handed hitters he faced. In fact, most of the “trouble” he got into on Friday night was against righties, so he pitched backwards to those hitters later in the game, relying on offspeed pitches early in counts to keep them off-balance.

In the first few innings, he relentlessly went after righties early in the count with fastballs before getting weak contact or whiffs with sliders, as he did to A.J. Ellis in the second inning:

Read the rest on Just a Bit Outside.

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As most baseball fans are by now aware, Chase Utley was suspended for two games on Sunday evening by Major League Baseball. The suspension relates to Utley’s controversial takeout slide of Mets shortstop Ruben Tejada in Game 2 of the National League Division Series on Saturday night.

Utley’s agent, Joel Wolfe, quickly announced that Utley would be appealing the suspension, as is his right under MLB’s collective bargaining agreement:

“A two-game suspension for a legal baseball play is outrageous and completely unacceptable. Chase did what all players are taught to do in this situation – break up the double play. We routinely see plays at second base similar to this one that have not resulted in suspensions.

Chase feels terrible about Ruben Tejada’s injury and everyone who knows him knows that he would never intentionally hurt anybody. We will be appealing this suspension immediately.”

By appealing the suspension, Utley has temporarily delayed the imposition of his punishment, meaning that he remains eligible to play for the Dodgers until MLB holds a hearing on the matter and issues a final decision. However, with Utley conveniently already in New York City (the designated site of most appeals of this nature), MLB is reportedly planning hear Utley’s appeal today so that the matter can be resolved ahead of tonight’s Game 3 at Citi Field. Whether the appeal will actually go forward today or not, however, remains uncertain, as the Major League Baseball Players Association is reportedly pressing for more time to prepare Utley’s defense.

Given the unprecedented nature of Utley’s suspension, a number of commentators have already predicted that the punishment will either be reduced or entirely overturned. And while such an outcome is certainly possible, and perhaps even likely, it is not entirely inconceivable that the league will uphold Utley’s suspension.

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Unless you’re Cardinals fan, or you happened to watch a lot of Cardinals games this year, you’ve probably given very little thought to Tommy Pham. It’s very possible that you’d never even heard of him before this year’s playoffs. Heck, it’s even possible you’re still not even sure who he is or where he came from. But the 27-year-old rookie played a big role in Friday night’s game, when he blasted a pinch-hit homer off of Jon Lester in the 8th inning. His homer added an important insurance run for the Cards, extending their lead from one run to two. Check it out.

Hitting a homer isn’t a particularly rare occurrence for Pham, at least not lately. He hit five of them in his 173 big league trips to the plate this year, which helped propel him to a .268/.347/.477 batting line. His home-run total placed him third among Cardinals rookies, trailing only Randal Grichuk and Stephen Piscotty. But unlike his rookie teammates, Pham missed the cut for just about every organizational prospect list — both this season and in every prior season.

His absence from these lists had almost everything to do with his age. Pham turned 27 back in March, making him significantly older than your average rookie. But while 27-year-old impact rookies are few and far between, Pham’s success hasn’t exactly come out of the woodwork. He hit .320/.391/.487 in 603 Triple-A plate appearances between this year and last, which was good for a 132 wRC+. To put that in context, Pham was essentially the Lucas Duda of Triple-A before the Cardinals gave him a call.

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That’s it. That’s the whole thing. There are contact sports out there. A whole lot of contact sports. Baseball is not and never has been among them.

Sometimes, players do come into contact with one another. Sometimes, they do so violently, and sometimes, when they do so violently, they’re even on opposing teams. It’s not that the players are forbidden to touch, and it’s not like there’s anything you can do to totally eliminate all collisions. But baseball, at its core, isn’t a contact sport. It’s a bat-and-ball sport, part catch and part golf. Baseball should be played in the spirit in which it was intended.

You ever wonder why players don’t wear pads? I mean, catchers wear pads, almost from head to toe, but that’s because they’re getting shot at by a cannon 130 times a game. Batters wear helmets because sometimes the cannon has a calibration error or an attitude. Defenders wear gloves because sometimes the cannonballs come in hot. Defenders wear cups for basically the same reason. But there isn’t anything else. No other helmets, no other chest protectors, no other shin guards. It’s not because ballplayers are tough guys, impervious to pain. It’s because ballplayers aren’t supposed to run into one another, and when they do, it’s either a freak accident, or something that hasn’t yet been sufficiently codified.

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The Cubs are a confident team. They should be. Despite a lack of experience at several key positions, Joe Maddon’s squad finished with the third-best record in baseball. Last night, they evened up the NLDS at one game apiece by besting the Cardinals.

When did the youthful squad realize they weren’t simply talented, but also capable of seriously contending for a post-season berth, and perhaps even a World Series title? It depends on who you ask.

Maddon suggests it was in early August, when his team won a key series at home against the Giants. The handful of players I queried on Tuesday offered somewhat different answers.

“It kind of kicked in early in the season,” said Chris Denorfia. “I think after we got that first month under our belt, we just started coming to the ballpark expecting to win. We never really had a long losing streak.” Read the rest of this entry »

When Bartolo Colon jogged in from the bullpen to replace Noah Syndergaard, we thought we were going to be talking about the wisdom of using a pitch-to-contact starter in relief when a strikeout was the preferred outcome. But then Howie Kendrick hit a line drive up the middle, which Daniel Murphy fielded and flipped to shortstop Ruben Tejada in an effort to turn an inning-ending double play. And then this happened.

There’s no real way to describe this play in any other way than this: Chase Utley, realizing his role shifted from baserunner to defender, barreled into Ruben Tejada with the intention of preventing him from throwing the ball to first base. To do this, Utley waited until the last possible moment to slide, not even attempting to touch the base as his body upended Tejada, whose legs were taken out from under him and then landed violently on the ground. The impact forced Tejada to be removed from the game.

Read the rest on Just a Bit Outside.

Each week, we publish north of 100 posts on our various blogs. With this post, we hope to highlight 10 to 15 of them. You can read more on it here. The links below are color coded — green for FanGraphs, brown for RotoGraphs, dark red for The Hardball Times, orange for TechGraphs and blue for Community Research.
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