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Series Preview: Seattle Mariners @ Kansas City Royals

Seattle: 9-10
Kansas City: 7-11

MARINERS Δ Ms ROYALS EDGE
HITTING (wOBA)
-13.4 (26th) -7.4 15.6 (4th) Kansas City
FIELDING (?) 14.9 (1st) 1.0 -3.4 (22nd) Seattle
ROTATION (tRA)
-8.2 (25th) -4.2 -0.5 (17th) Kansas City
BULLPEN (tRA)
-7.6 (28th) -4.9 -15.0 (30th) Seattle
OVERALL(RAA)
-14.3 -15.5 -3.3 KANSAS CITY






 

Ouch. Ow ow ow. That series hurt. It's over with though and the good news is that we get to face the Royals, we get a turn from Felix and after this comes the return of Cliff Lee in an important series against division foe Texas. For now, the team needs to get back to its winning ways in Kansas City which is doable, but there are challenges to be faced as well. 

 

Mon Apr 26, 17:10: Felix Hernandez vs. Kyle Davies

Tue Apr 27, 17:10: Ian Snell vs. Zack Greinke

Wed Apr 28, 11:10: Ryan Rowland-Smith* vs. Gil Meche

At least Felix takes the bump today. A typical showing from him would go a long way to easing our memories of this past series. Kyle Davies should provide an opportunity for the Mariners to put their walking shoes back on. This lineup is never going to be a potent one, but it can fool people into believing that when it works the count and draws walks, especially at the top.

Right after we're (hopefully) done soothing our injured egos with a thrashing of Davies, we get Ian Snell against Zack Greinke which is just haha funny. Originally, Zack Greinke graded out at 55-55-40 on the overall rankings in the below tables, which made me re-evaluate my cutoffs so some of those overall numbers are going to look quite different now than they were before. I think I had left relief pitchers in on the original sample from which I drew my percentile cutoffs.

Felix is good.

I would prefer that the Mariners face former-Mariner Gil Meche like they faced former-Mariner J.J. Putz and not like they faced former-Mariner Matt Thornton.

Wait, we're going up against a Kyle, Zack and Gil this series? Are we playing baseball in Kansas City or bocce ball at the yacht club?

Felix Hernandez Ian Snell Ryan Rowland-Smith
Pitch%SpKBBGB
Fastball 68% 94 75 60 80
Slider 13% 88 75 65 75
Curve 11% 83 60 45 65
Change 8% 87 70 70 80
Overall -- -- 75 65 80
Pitch%SpKBBGB
Fastball 58% 92 55 35 35
Slider 27% 84 70 55 40
Change 13% 84 40 25 55
Overall -- -- 70 45 40

Pitch%SpKBBGB
Fastball 52% 88 45 65 35
Curve 19% 72 35 75 70
Change 18% 80 50 50 40
Sinker 7% 88 20 50 20
Overall -- -- 35 60 40


Kyle Davies Zack Greinke Gil Meche
Pitch%SpKBBGB
Fastball 57% 92 50 25 40
Change 17% 82 70 60 30
Slider 13% 86 50 30 70
Curve 12% 77 50 35 45
Overall -- -- 55 25 40
Pitch%SpKBBGB
Fastball 60% 94 65 55 40
Slider 18% 86 75 60 70
Curve 14% 75 55 65 45
Change 7% 83 50 40 50
Overall -- -- 65 55 40

Pitch%SpKBBGB
Fastball 54% 92 70 50 35
Curve 19% 78 45 45 75
Change 12% 83 75 70 55
Slider 11% 87 25 40 65
Sinker 5% 89 55 40 30
Overall -- -- 60 45 55

0 recs  |  116 comments

Comments

Is Gil a preppy name?
Sounds like a rich old man's name.

But Zack is definitely a preppy name.

Maybe it's a sailor name?
Gil seems to me to be a guy who isn't too bright and drinks a lot of bud light
It seems like Ian is a preppier name than Gil
I disagree
What, it just means Gil is dumber
I want this to be a Gil Meche throwing delays joke
I wore that shirt yesterday!
I'm sorry

I was too comfortable in my Vineyard Vines varsity sweater to understand you correctly. Carry on

the only Gil I know

is a rather wealthy man, living in a very poor town in which he owns the most prospering business chain.

It's a very white name and all white people are preppy
Truer words have never been spoken

This is correct.
And Kyle? Come on!
This is what the internet tells me:
The boy’s name Gil \gil\ is a variant of Gilbert (Old French), Giles (Greek) and Gilon (Hebrew), and the meaning of Gil is “bright promise; small goat; joy”.

Apparently it was in the top 1000 baby names between 1940 and 1970 and has fallen on hard times recently. That means if you meet a Gil it is likely that he is between 40 and 70 yrs old. Prime rich old guy years.

Likely between 40 and 70 years?

Makes for a fucking old goat.

Fucking old "small" goat apparently.
Meche is from LA

I think it’s more common there

I thought you meant Los Angeles for a second and got really confused

Also, I always thought his first name was actually Gil but apparently its Gilbert which is way more common and boring.

Gilliam?
the bottom line is

we can all assume they love hunting

FELIX DAY YEAH.

I purchased my first legitimate M’s jersey today, number 34 of course, thus contributing +1 to Felix’s overall power…..or something nerdy like that.

Also, I’m just going to pretend this last weekend of sports didn’t happen. Today is a new god damn day!

Seahawks?....
I'm not a Seahawks fan, but props to them for drafting well.
Mike Sweeney makes Jose Lopez look disciplined at the plate
Mike Sweeney has swung at 60% of the pitches he's seen this year?
Something around there, he was at 57% before yesterday when he swung at nearly every pitch he saw (and failed to hit the ball hard at all)
He proved himself in spring training, he's obviously just in a slump.
GOTTA SWING YOUR WAY OUT OF IT
IF YOU AINT HACKIN, YOU AINT HITTIN.
HACK THE PLANET
This is our world now. The world of the electron and the switch; the beauty of the baud.
Mike Sweeney's going to kick his former team's ass
Thus justifying his spot on the team for the next month at least.
In other words Sweeney actually producing would be the worst possible thing here.
False hope is a horrible thing.
It is a bitch.

I think that's just idiocy actually.
He always seemed to start the season with a couple good starts, then the bottom falls out.
Fingers crossed.
You forgot the key issue in this matchup

The Battle for Grass Creek continues!

It's sad how the Royals have been hitting the shit out of the ball

And they’re 7-11.

I had no idea they were hitting the shit out of the ball.

Surprised the hell out of me when I looked up the stats.

Ian Snell vs Zach Greinke

Some heckler out there is drooling at the prospect of these fragile egos

Where's Khalil Greene?
Malfunctioning.

Social anxiety disorder. He signed with the Rangers, but didn’t report to spring training due to those issues, so they voided his contract.

That would be pretty depressing
Yes...very depressing...

It's a bad position to be in.

Terrible fear of being ostracized or otherwise singled out, while trying to win a job, with a team in a league you’ve never played in.

Wow

You’ve really gotta feel for the guy.

Not on one of these two teams?
In the shop for repairs to his positronic net
Yippee

More JR at DH.

Sure would be nice to run Bradley out at DH and Langerhans at LF…

And Hannahan at SS or 3B
Any word on Wilson?

Obviously Hannahan would be the better option over Tui.

Still day to day, I believe

as is MB

MB is in the lineup today.
Hannahan has yet to play short in Tacoma

(sadface)

You can't get Josh Wilson out of the line-up!

.360 wOBA + pretty nice defense.

Have him play second?

Or third?

But....Chris Woodward!

And they just got Ramon Vazquez back, which means we have a ‘hey remember the good times we had a decade ago’ guy on both the Rainiers and the Mariners.

Right, Vazquez makes it trickier.

Woodward I don’t know what to do with because he went from us, to the Red Sox, and back again, which just seems… wrong…

Yes

but how is is hugging?

Playing lots of 3B right?

I think that’s the position he was playing yesterday but not 100% positive.

Yes, but has he played at C?
Just third and DH
I was having a good day.

Then I started grading philosophy papers. My good day turned into a day. Then I decided to look at some team stats for the year. Mariners’ DH production (from Fangraphs):

OPS: .432 (last in MLB by a lot)
wOBA: .209 (last in MLB by a lot)

Now I’m not sure what type of day I’m having. I feel slightly depressed, but also rather amused.

And perhaps even more amusing:

SLG: .186 (last in MLB; second worst (Red Sox) is .324).

That seriously sucks for your philosophy students.

Angry grading is never good.

Find a couple comments you don't care for and flag them, always a morale booster.
Happy to see another prof here

I’m also in the midst of grading papers—never a mood booster, that’s for sure. Still trying to put this week-end’s losses behind me and remain hopeful about the series with KC. Somehow it’s a subdued Felix Day.

Subdued Felix Day....

This is an abomination.

Felix day!

Today is a good day after all. I shall make my students write thank you notes to King Felix.

(Leanna: I’m still a grad student, but I’m nearing the end.)

OK, mustering my excitement and appropriate reverence for El Rey.

Keep up the hard work! Recently finished myself. God, how I miss Seattle, the M’s and the Safe. Need to start planning a summer trip up North as it will soon be a thousand degrees in AZ.

Awww at first I thought the top number was going to be DH wOBA and I was excited
Unfortunately for my students, it would appear that Sweeney will not be DFA'd before the semester comes to an end (first week of May).
Reply fail.
I'm hoping for a season ending injury.

I like him, he seems like a nice guy, hopefully all his hacking will throw out his back.

I'm hoping for a series of consecutive DL stints.
I can't help but notice that except for fielding we have been quite putrid thus far
We are 9-10 with brighter skies ahead. I think we'll be fine.
I understand that, and I know we've underperformed to expectations

I think that we are fortunate to be 9-10, looking at our 26th overall wOBA, 25th overall rotation tRA, and 28th overall bullpen tRA. It’s clearly been a rough start.

I'm suprised our rotation did so poorly that series

Was it all RR-S?

I thought our rotation was excellent except for RRS.

It may have been the homeruns that hurt us.

Snell, too, with his close-together face.

I kinda want to see Snell in the pen when Lee gets back. How would his raw stuff play in the pen? Maybe he can crank it up a notch and dominate. He’s been meh as a starter at best and Snell Day usually sucks. Best of all, dominant bullpen Snell adds to tantalizing yet troubled starter Snell’s trade value. Maybe a relief hungry contender (St Louis) will trade for bullpen Snell this year with an eye toward starting him next year. Maybe they’ll give us a ML-ready OF bat that has nowhere to play (Allen Craig). Upgrades for everyone!

Oh come on Ian didn't even play
Oh crap

Didn’t fully read that post I replied to. I stand by my stance on Snell, but you are right. Hyphen hasn’t impressed anyone in any start this year. His last start is mostly to blame fir the sudden drop in our starters’ tRA.

Speaking of Cliff Lee

Steve Kelley (of all people) has a plain old news story covering Lee’s outing in Tacoma.

“Wow,” Arizona Diamondbacks scout Jeff Cirillo said after watching Cliff Lee throw six stainless innings in Sunday afternoon’s rehabilitation assignment with the Class AAA Rainiers."

He also said this

I've never heckled a scout before.
Bradley and Wilson are back in the lineup tonight!

Bradley is playing the outfield D:

Reminds me of Good Idea/Bad Idea from Animaniacs
If this ends with a comically sized anvil crushing Mike Sweeney's legs I'm all for this.
~

Hmm. I am bad at this.

Well this is just the worst .gif ever, isn't it?
Don't get your hopes up, Sweeney's legs would just be flat for a second and then a second later he would reinflate them.
This made me think of Sweeney as the villain from "Who Framed Roger Rabbit?"
Because what better way to ease a guy with a bad leg back into the lineup?
Re: Snell

via Baker

Snell also told me he’s been battling an inner ear issue ever since he fell ill in the days leading up to his most recent start eight days ago. He’s been taking Sudafed for it the past week, as per the team medical staff’s advice, but his ear remains blocked. Hopping on planes hasn’t helped him any. He told me he can barely hear out of the one ear and that it sometimes gets rather painful. I asked him whether this could impact his pitching at all, given the balance issues associated with inner ear problems, and he simply shrugged as if to say he had no idea.

I probably should have used quotation marks.

It looks as though I’d been having a little chat with Ian myself.

That Ian Snell, always making excuses.
This reminds me of Willie Bloomquist's vertigo.
Wow.

He needs to hit the DL instead of trying to gut through it. We need the roster spot and he’s not doing anybody any favors by putting himself through this. Any chronic pain WILL affect performance and who knows how much that is affecting his sense of balance, focus, direction, etc. DL him and backdate it to his last start. And if he still smells when he returns, send him to the pen.

Jesus, what the fuck is wrong with Snell's immune system?

Get that man some god damn vitamins.

I'll be more than happy to smack him upside the head.
15 day DL would be nice
Just a note on mobiLLe formatting.

The pitch grading stats at the end of these series previews always screws with LL mobile formatting. It seems that a single carriage return after the stats might solve the issue.

Again, not that big of a deal, but if it has a simple fix, it’d be nice going forward for those of us who use mobiLLe frequently.

There is a carriage return between them.

I’m sympathetic to the plight, but without being able to easily test possible solutions, it’s not something that’s going to fly up to to do list.

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