Happy Factoid Wednesday
VARIOUS FACTOIDS HAVE ENTERED OUR SOLAR SYSTEM
On Sunday, 11th round St Lucie hitter Kuhio Kamakanawehiwamaikalewa Aloy smacked two HRs in his 10th pro game.
- You will have to ask Mack how he pronounces that middle name.
- It’s above my pay grade.
- Mack is a noted linguist, while I stick to linguine.
- I wil simply stick with Aloy. Thank you. May he be the next Alou.
First rounder Aiden Robbins was nicknamed “Baseball Jesus” in college because of his long hair.
- I hope he loses that moniker. It can irk some folks.
But Robbins is indeed humble, at least in part, as he said this, pre-draft:
"I’m still an unfinished product. Especially getting into the pros, there’s a lot of things I can change and make better. I’m able to do everything -- I can hit for power, I can get hits, it’s all just an approach and a mindset thing."
- Well, he is already better than Ryan Clifford and Colin Houck, IMO. Why do I say that? Because everyone is better than those two…unless that duo successfully transitions their games to something much more functional. After all, they’ve fanned 305 times in 191 games this year. In those 305 at bats, statisticians inform me that they are batting .000.
Robbins is .325/.413/.425 in his first 11 St Lucie games.
Robbins Royally Rocks.
WE CRINGED, GOT UNHINGED…THEN HE BENGED
After starting the season and his MLB career a stressful 9 for 66, Benge hit .297 over his next 381 at bats through Saturday, and provides Gold Glove defense.
I will shout it out when I see it: GREAT draft pick.
Best Mets pick since…Pete Crow Strong Arm. Traded by Dumb Ass.
WALKS WALKS WALKS WALKS WALKS WALKS WALKS WALKS WALKS
I saw this:
Most walks issued in a 9 inning game in last 60 years:
A’s had 16 vs Mets, and Cardinals had 16 vs Rockies
The Mets DSL team scoffed at that…they walked 20 times on Friday in the first 9 innings, and one more time in the 10th, for 21.
Also, in the majors, just 4 players, including Jimmie Foxx, have walked 6 times in a game. At least a couple of those were extra inning affairs.
On Friday, 17 year old DSL Met Oscar Pena went 0 for 1, drew 6 walks, in that DSL Mets Blue game. They presumably weren’t pitching around him - he was hitting just .162. Through Saturday, Oscar had 27 Ks - and 27 walks - in 29 games.
In the final games of the DSL season on Tuesday, the two Mets teams lost by a combined 15-3 score.
Lots of walks in one game, 6 wild pitches in the other, 4 of those in one inning by a young unnamed guy who finished the season with a 16.46 ERA, and who, in 13.2 IP, walked 23, hit 5, and tossed 11 wild pitches. I’m sure he never heard of control specialist Bret Saberhagen. I doubt he gets an invite back.
Combined, the two teams went 49-63.
Lastly, in 56 games, if you guessed the Mets Blue pitchers led the league with 104 hit batsmen, you’d be correct. They also led the 51 team league with 185 wild pitches in those 56 games.
TONG (MOSTLY) TERRIFIC
Yes, Mack, Jonah Tong’s 3rd to last start sure was ugly - 5 solo HRs in a 5 hit, 5 innings outing. On a scale of 1 to 10, that start was below a 5.
But in his last 6 starts, that was the only bad one.
In the other 5 of those 6 starts, he tossed 23 innings, allowing just 5 runs, 18 hits, and adding 30 Ks.
On September 1, I expect the Mets to call him up.
‘Cause 5 out of 6 ain’t bad.
YOUR DIVISION MATTERS
The White Sox in the AL Central are 65-58, 5.5 games in front, after Sunday’s action.
Which means the 2nd place AL Central team is 4 games below .500.
The Whiteys are just 18-27 again teams .500 or better, and 47-31 against sub .500 teams. Which means they play a really easy schedule, when 65% of your games are gains below .500 teams.
They lost 121 games just two seasons ago. Only in the AL Central could you do that.
I want the Mets switched to the AL Central. I do not care about geography.
WAR CROW WOES, AND WHERE OUR FAMILY DOC FIT IN
I looked up Mets’ all time WAR hitting leaders in a season.
1) David Wright: 8.3
2) Carlos Beltran 8.2
3) Bernard Gilkey 8.1
4) John Olerud 7.6
Through Monday, ex-Met Pete Crow Armstrong sat at 7.7 WAR.
With 36 games to go.
Extrapolate his 7.7 over a full season and you get 9.2 WAR.
The Mets? They traded him for a late season rental. SMH.
WTE - Worst Trade Ever.
BTW, the all time top 3 MLB ranking in hitter WAR in a single season?
Babe Ruth (14.1), Babe Ruth (12.8), Babe Ruth (12.5).
Fourth, remarkably, was the LI potato farm boy, Carl Yastrzemski, at 12.4.
Pitchers are a different story.
Doc Gooden 1985 - 12.2 WAR. What a season.
Seaver 2nd and 3rd at 10.6 and 10.2 WAR. deGrom 9.2 WAR.
And the surprise #5 WAR Mets pitcher? Jon Matlack 9.1 WAR.
Because Matlack pitched for a Mets team with an utterly inert offense, he was just 13-15 that season. Had he pitched for the Big Red Machine instead, he probably goes 25-3.
The all time pitcher WAR season record was Pud Galvin (20.4 in 1884).
He was 46-22 that year. He was 46-29 the year before.
In those 2 seasons, he threw 143 complete games. He was a complete guy.
But, for pitchers after the 1913 season? When real baseball existed?
Dwight Gooden’s 12.2 WAR was the highest EVER. WOW.
Pud Galvin got to hit a lot, too. So did Cy Young.
Cy Young got up 3,107 times, and hit .210/.234/.282. He only fanned 381 times, a K rate far less than half of Ryan Clifford’s 2026 K rate. So, we can’t even say “Clifford hits like a pitcher, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah.”
I LOVE A PARADA
The often struggling Kevin Parada is crushing it, .387/.444/.774 in August.
Love it.
Nice to be surrounded by many much better hitters than he was in months prior. Hitting begets hitting.
MARCO MAKING HIS MARK
Marco Vargas dealt with multiple injuries this year. He had been quite unimpressive this year, up to just before the trade deadline.
The trades for infield prospects was about to make it tougher going for Marco, what with much more competition.
So how did he respond?
When the going gets tough, the tough GET GOING.
Marco is 19 for his last 51, mostly in AA, with 13 RBIs, over the past three weeks.
Sweet.
13 comments:
Was it something I said about Marco Vargas? 😃
Karma kameleon
Instead of flavors I think Robbins has 39 different ways of getting on base
No one is calling Tong up, Tom
The changes the nerds made him do have cost him his consistency
He needs to be traded to save his career
That’s pretty close.
He will be Baskin in fan attention in Queens by 2028.
Parada can't field. No future behind the plate
Parada has lost his power. No future as DH
Vargas had his chance
Freddy P got adjusted by his new team, and has thrown back-to-back solid starts.
If Tong gets dealt to a smart team, he will be 2027 ROY.
His freeway got a lot more crowded two weeks ago. He is now a trade chip.
If he gets traded to Toronto this off season, he will become a Buffalo Chip in AAA in 2027.
Parada has dug himself a deep, deep hole. He would help himself immensely if he can also hit .387 with a .774 slug % the rest of the season, and not just for the first 10 games of August. He actually has hit .252 since April 30. Maybe he is finally figuring some things out.
Right now, he is still a better catcher defensively than error-prone Suero.
You and I need to take our sick minds on the road
No doubt.
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