Yesterday, the Commissioner of Major League Baseball was asked about moving the 2021 All-Star Game from Atlanta, Georgia, to Denver, Colorado.
Rob Manfred replied:
I think the decision was probably the hardest thing I've been asked to do so far.
July 14, 2021
Rob Manfred's Idea Of A Tough Call
July 13, 2021
Dumb-Ass Manfred Says His Dumb-Ass Rules Could Be Gone In 2022 (But The Dumb-Ass Still Manages To Botch That Announcement, Because . . . Well, He's A Dumb-Ass)
MLB Commissioner Rob Manfred indicated on Tuesday that two of the most bone-headed decisions of his tenure – beginning each extra half-inning with a runner on second base and having doubleheader games last only seven innings (both rules were introduced in 2020 and continued in 2021) – will likely be trashed, possibly as early as next season.
The Washington Post described Manfred as "uncommonly candid" when he asked if those rules would be incorporated into the next collective bargaining agreement, which will be hashed out this winter.
I see the extra-inning rule and the seven-inning doubleheader as rules that were adopted based on medical advice to deal with COVID. I think they are much less likely to become part of our permanent landscape than some of the other rules that we've talked about over time that relate to how the game is being played.
That is excellent news, but Manfred said he remains serious about fucking the game up by other means, such as banning shifts:
Let's just say you've regulated the shift by requiring two infielders each side and second base. What does that do? It makes the game look like what it looked like when I was 12 years old. It's not change; it's kind of restoration, right?
I think front offices in general believe it would have a positive effect on the play of the game. I'm hopeful, without going into the specifics of rule by rule, that we will have productive conversations with the MLBPA about, let me use my words, non-radical changes to the game that will restore it to being played in a way that is closer to what many of us enjoyed historically.
How in the hell can requiring that two infielders remain on each side of second base be a restoration when that set-up has never been a rule, ever, in the entire history of the game?
And played in a way that we enjoyed historically? If I recall, there has never been a rule stipulating where a fielder can or cannot stand in fair territory. If Alex Cora feels like having all four infielders and three outfielders bunched together in a group-hug in the right field corner, then that should be his goddamn prerogative. It's horrible strategy, certainly, but it should be allowed.
Mostly, Manfred's comments simply shine a spotlight on how mind-bogglingly stupid those ideas were in the first place.
Could having teams (who are playing a three- or four-game series already) play four fewer innings in a doubleheader really make that much of a difference as far as possible coronavirus infections? On those days, players are still in close proximity for at least 14 innings. Why not 18?
And when Manfred introduced the asinine idea of having a runner on second base to begin all extra innings, he said absolutely nothing about it being tied to the pandemic. He told us quite clearly the rule's only purpose was to get the boring-ass games over with as soon as fucking possible. (That is a direct quote, though I can't find the link right now.)
Yet, oddly (and by that, I mean not oddly), in October 2020, Manfred sang a different tune, predicting "the extra inning rule probably has the best chance of surviving" because it adds "a layer of strategy and sort of a focus at the end of the game that could be helpful". (Wrong and wrong. Helpful focus. Good lord . . .)
At the same time, Manfred said he believed the players like the rule. "I think it's really good from a safety and health perspective that keeps us from putting players in situations where they're out there too long or in positions they're not used to playing." (It's like I've been saying for years, MLB's top priority is health and safety.)
Manfred said that nothing has changed his mind about forcing pitchers to face a minimum of three batters or to finish a half-inning. "I think that's here to stay." (Fuck you, Manfred.)
Linescores!
The Red Sox had a couple of funky linescores last weekend.
PHI - 120 000 200 - 5 9 0BOS - 234 011 00x - 11 14 2PHI - 120 000 080 - 11 13 1BOS - 011 000 000 - 2 4 0
The Phillies had three innings in which the number of the inning matched the number of runs scored. Having any three innings is fairly common, but four such innings is much rarer.
BAL - 000 000 400 - 4 7 0TOR - 004 044 00x - 12 15 0
This is the first game in major league history with four four-run innings and nothing else.
The Dodgers beat the Diamondbacks 22-1 last Saturday, scoring their 22 runs in only four innings.
ARZ - 000 000 010 - 1 4 1LAD - 540 000 76x - 22 21 0
Mookie Betts hit one of the Dodgers' eight home runs. In addition to going 2-for-3, with 3 walks, 4 runs scored, and 4 RBI, Betts also moved from right field to second base for the last three innings of the game. His only two appearances at second base since his rookie season in 2014 were: September 10, 2020 (full game) with Los Angeles and August 3, 2018 (2nd-7th innings, with time in RF before and after) with the Red Sox.
Betts also became the first Dodgers leadoff batter with 3 walks and 4 runs scored in a game since Jim Gilliam (April 19, 1953). This was the first game the Dodgers have hit multiple grand slams at Dodger Stadium (since 1958) (Betts & Justin Turner).
A.J. Pollock is the second Dodgers batter in the modern era (since 1901) to have 4 hits, 2 homers, and 2 walks in the same game (Yasmani Grandal, May 7, 2015).
Albert Pujols is the first Dodgers batter to hit a home run with his team already up by 19 runs since Joe Kelley on September 23, 1901. (Cozy Dolan did not drive in a run - the only "0" in the box score!)
The Dodgers are the first team to have eight different players with at least 1 hit, at least 1 run scored, and at least 2 RBI, since Texas did it on August 22, 2007 (the 30-3 game). It's also the second game in LAD history (since 1958) in which 11 different players had at least 1 hit and at least 1 run scored (September 2, 2002, also against Arizona).
The 22-1 score was the second-largest margin of victory in Dodgers history. Way back on June 24, 1886, the Brooklyn Grays (with Adonis Terry* on the hill) walloped the Orioles 25-1:
The Red Sox signed closer Matt Barnes to a two-year contract extension yesterday. Barnes's salary in 2021 is $4.5 million. This deal will reportedly pay him $7.25 million in 2022 and $7.5 million in 2023. There is a club option for 2024 ($8 million). Let's hope he keeps on being Good Barnes for a while.
*: Terry later worked as an umpire. On August 2, 1900, he was involved in a dispute that ended with New York Giants manager George Davis leading the crowd in assaulting him. #GoodOldDays
Ohtani Has Me Interested In The ASG For The First Time In Many Years; Huge Cache Of Weapons Discovered In Hotel Near Coors Field
From the time I was a kid and up until some point in the 1990s, I enjoyed the All-Star Game for how its double switches made keeping an accurate scorecard a constant challenge. But I cannot remember the last ASG I watched and scored.
My interest in this mid-season exhibition game has been non-existent for a while, as interleague play destroyed the concept of two separate leagues competing against each other. But when Shohei Ohtani was announced as both the American League starting pitcher and leadoff batter for the 2021 ASG, I was intrigued.
Ohtani leads MLB in home runs (33), slugging percentage (.698), extra bases hits (56), and bunt singles (4), and he's second in OPS (1.062). He's also tied for the AL lead in triples (4).
Ohtani was voted by fans as the starting DH and was selected as a pitcher by the players. AL manager Kevin Cash (of the Rays) explained why Ohtani is starting tonight's exhibition game with the most logical reason possible:
This is what the fans want to see. It's personally what I want to see.
Cash says he "begged" MLB to alter the usual DH rule so that when Ohtani is taken out of the game as a pitcher (assuming he won't throw a complete game!), he will simply become the DH. Other AL pitchers will not bat, but other players can be inserted into the DH spot. The only way the AL would lose the DH is if Ohtani (or a successor DH) were to play a position in the field other than pitcher.
Xander Bogaerts and Rafael Devers will bat #3 and #5, respectively, for the American League.
Four people (three men and one woman) were arrested in Denver last Friday night after a cache of weapons was discovered in a hotel room a few blocks from Coors Field. Sixteen guns, more than a thousand rounds of ammunition, and body armor were confiscated.
Denver's KMGH-TV reported that one of the suspects "had posted a message on Facebook referencing a recent divorce and saying he was going to 'go out in a big way' according to the multiple law enforcement sources." The Denver Post reported three of the four suspects "have lengthy criminal histories in Colorado".
The large number of weapons and the location of the room's balcony led police to initially suspect that a "Las Vegas-style" mass shooting had been planned, which might have been connected to the All-Star Game (originally scheduled to be played in Atlanta but moved after Georgia passed a law designed to suppress voting rights). The FBI later downplayed that theory, stating on Sunday that it had "no reason to believe this incident was connected to terrorism or a threat directed at the All-Star Game".
Craig Calcaterra (Cup of Coffee) wonders why, if these people were planning a big drug/weapons transaction, would they decide to do it in a city and at the same time as a huge public event, which would bring with it a larger-than-normal police presence?
July 12, 2021
Schadenfreude 307 (A Continuing Series)
Dan Martin, Post:
Jose Altuve got the Yankees again.The Yankees finished off the first half of the season with a disastrous 8-7 loss at Minute Maid Park, as Domingo German and Chad Green blew a five-run lead in the ninth, with Altuve finishing it with a game-winning three-run homer.German allowed the first two batters of the ninth to reach and Green gave up a two-run double to Chas McCormick to make it 7-4.Abraham Toro followed with a shot to right that Aaron Judge couldn't chase down for an RBI double to cut the Yankees' lead to two runs.After a visit from pitching coach Matt Blake, pinch-hitter Jason Castro singled to center, moving Toro to third.Green got Martin Maldonado on a soft liner to short for the first out.Altuve . . . then slammed a homer and his teammates ripped off his jersey after he crossed the plate. . . .
We heard it was cold, so we turned it up a notch.#ForTheH pic.twitter.com/tcC5xcRcRc
— Houston Astros (@astros) July 11, 2021
Ballgame. pic.twitter.com/FKT4NLqCY9
— MLB (@MLB) July 11, 2021
Kristie Ackert, Daily News:
Aaron Judge and the Yankees trolled Jose Altuve Saturday night, but the Astros and their second baseman had the last laugh Sunday. In an all-too familiar scene for Yankee fans, Altuve hit a game-winning walkoff home run, off Chad Green this time, capping the Astros' six-run ninth inning and delivering a 8-7 gut-punch to the Bombers . . .The weekend played out like the Yankees' first half of the season: inconsistent.On the heels of perhaps their biggest win of the year — beating the Astros behind a resurgent Gerrit Cole’s complete game shutout — the Yankees suffered a brutal loss. In the first 89 games of the season, the only thing consistent about the Bombers has been their erratic play.With confidence in closer Aroldis Chapman low, they went with Domingo German to start the ninth. He put two on and Green let them score on Chas McCormick's double. He gave up another on Abraham Toro’s double and then three more on Altuve's homer. . . .And Sunday, they not only had to suffer the deflating loss, but then had to see the Astros troll them back on the way out.Sunday, Altuve let his teammates rip off his jersey as they celebrated the win, a clear response to the Yankees having mocked him all weekend. . . .[T]he Yankees (46-43) ended their first half with . . . an inconsistent offense and a struggling closer, [the same things] that [have] dogged them for the last month. Those issues are still hanging over their heads as they go into the three-day break.They don't have much time to figure it out.After this deflating loss, [the Yankees are] still eight games behind the American League East-leading Red Sox, who they will face eight times in their first 10 games out of the hiatus. Then they face the Rays, who are battling Boston for the division lead.[Jameson Taillon:] "[C]oming out of the break . . . if we don't come out and play well, it's not gonna be good for us."
Kristie Ackert, Daily News (early edition):
Jose Altuve got the last laugh as the Yankees collapsed in the ninth inning. The Astros second baseman hit a game-winning walkoff three-run homer off Chad Green in the bottom of the ninth as Houston rallied to beat the Yankees 8-7 Sunday.Then the All-Star let his teammates rip off his jersey, trolling the Yankees, who had been mocking him all weekend. . . .The Yankees (46-43) . . . return from the break Thursday with eight of their first 10 games against the Red Sox [who they have not been able to beat this year (0-6)] . . .Domingo German was charged with two runs and could not get out of the ninth. Aaron Boone skipped over closer Aroldis Chapman and went to Green, who had thrown 26 pitches on Friday, to close. . . .Taillon got his ERA under 5.00 in his first 17 starts back with his outing Sunday. . . .
Mike Vaccaro, Post:
[I]t sure seems the Yankees are officially committed to a policy of one-step-up, two-steps-back — and that isn't the best way to negotiate a pennant race, especially one in which you are playing from behind.But, man, baseball could sure use some more Yankees-Astros. . . .[T]hat will only be possible if the Yankees can drag themselves out of the quicksand and make a legit second-half run . . .Yankees fans probably don't want to hear about that right now, because right now Yankees fans want everyone fired, want everyone traded, want to burn the franchise blueprints and start all over following a nasty and nauseating gag job in Houston, a 7-2 laugher heading into the ninth that wound up an 8-7 bone-crusher exiting it with Jose Altuve — of course — serving once more as the Astros' MC from hell.The Yankees lost, somehow, after being issued 14 walks. The Yankees failed to sweep, again, somehow, despite holding the Astros to all of two runs across the first 20 innings of this series. . . . The Yankees were three outs away from inching closer to the top of the division with three days to savor.They only got one of those outs. . . .It was Altuve who won what many Yankees fans believe was Aaron Judge's MVP trophy in '17. It was Altuve who walked off Aroldis Chapman two years later . . .This weekend, the Yankees took great delight in tweaking Altuve. Aaron Judge clearly mimicked him when he hit the home run that won the Yankees a 1-0 game Saturday. Gary Sanchez did the same thing Sunday. . . .And then Altuve. It was a slider this time, out of the zone. Altuve took his best 2-iron hack at it, and it was a goner the moment it left the bat. He rounded the bases slowly. Minute Maid Park nearly fell off its moorings. Dazed Yankees stumbled off the field. . . ."Another gut-punch," Aaron Boone called it. . . .[T]he Yankees are still officially in critical condition. . . .
Dan Martin and Greg Joyce, Post:
Aroldis Chapman will have to wait a while longer to straighten himself out.The Yankees' struggling closer spent yet another game stuck in the bullpen Sunday, watching instead as Domingo German and Chad Green blew a five-run lead in the ninth inning of a brutal 8-7 loss to the Astros . . .Before Sunday's loss, Aaron Boone and pitching coach Matt Blake said they were waiting for the right spot to use Chapman. That did not come in the ninth inning Sunday, which the Yankees started with a 7-2 lead . . .Prior to his last outing, Chapman had blown leads in three straight appearances. His struggles date back even further, giving up 14 earned runs in 5²/₃ innings before the low-leverage inning against the Mariners.
Greg Joyce, Post:
The Astros didn't let Aaron Judge's troll of Jose Altuve go without a response— getting the last laugh in emphatic fashion.After hitting a walk-off home run to beat the Yankees 8-7 on Sunday at Minute Maid Park, Altuve was the last one standing — with his shirt off, a scene he didn't allow to happen when he hit another walk-off homer to sink the Yankees in the 2019 ALCS . . .Aaron Judge had mocked Altuve on Saturday night after hitting a homer, tugging at his jersey like Altuve had in 2019 . . .But the Astros had an answer early and late Sunday, with catcher Martin Maldonado pulling down his collar to expose his buzzer-less chest after hitting a solo homer in the third inning before Altuve socked the game-winner. . . .After Judge had chalked his celebration up to reminding his teammates to "button up" inside the "chilly" dome, Maldonado played along when asked about his response."It's a little hot," Maldonado said. "I was trying to get some air into my shirt. That was it." . . .Astros manager Dusty Baker said before the game that he thought Judge's celebration was "wrong," but was glad to see Altuve — who hit a go-ahead homer off Chad Green at Yankee Stadium in May — deliver against Green again Sunday.
Steve Serby, Post:
The patient still has a fever, and hasn't left the infirmary.Aaron Boone's Yankees have a long recovery to a clean bill of health ahead of them.They made the bed.If they are who they still believe they are, if they are who they told us they were in the spring, they will get out of bed, and with a vengeance. . . .Except these Yankees . . . are not in a place where you can expect them to sustain success, however fleeting it might be.You hit them early, and they stay hit. Or they don't hit. . . .[T]hey don't know how to be Comeback Kids.They know how to make their fan base weep . . .If the meek shall inherit the Earth, the Yankees' hitters stated their case to inherit the Earth against the fireballing [6-foot-6 rookie right-hander Logan ] Gilbert [on Thursday].They were one-hit wonders. . . .Steinbrenner's Underachievers remain easy to identify:Gleyber Torres: . . . [M]ore often than not he has looked lost at the plate. Remember his 38 home runs in 2019? He has hit six HRs in his last 464 at-bats. There were always going to be questions about his defense . . .Gary Sanchez: Streaky as hell (.218), but 0-for-11 versus the Mariners. . . .Clint Frazier: He's on the injured list (vertigo), the latest tale of woe in a lost season for him. . . . Frazier lost [the left-field job] to the defensively challenged Miguel Andujar. His slash line is .186/.317/.633. Down goes Frazier! . . .Aroldis Chapman: For now, Chad Green is the closer. . . . After surrendering leads in three consecutive high-leverage appearances, who can [trust him]? The guy is a basket case right now. . . .At least there are a couple of promising signs. Aaron Judge . . . is feeling quite dangerous . . . Torres is getting the ball out of the infield. Jameson Taillon has . . . lowered his ERA from 5.43 to 5.05. . . .It ain't over 'til it's over, right? Or something like that.
Shohei Ohtani Is The Greatest Two-Way Player Anyone Has Ever Seen (Sorry, Babe)
Update: Shohei Ohtani will be the American League's starting pitcher and leadoff batter in tomorrow's All-Star Game. The rules for the ASG will permit Ohtani to stay in the lineup as DH after he is no longer pitching.
Ohtani has hit 16 home runs in his last 21 games, the most home runs in a 21-game span by any player in American League history. His 33 home runs are the most homers in a player's first 82 games of the season since Albert Pujols in 2006. Ohtani is also the only player in major league history to have at least 33 homers and 12 stolen bases before the All-Star break. (The All-Star Game began in 1933.)
* * *
No one in the major leagues hits the baseball harder than Shohei Ohtani. (It's quite possible, in fact, that no left-handed hitter in baseball history has hit the ball harder (that includes George Herman You-Know-Who)).
No one in the major leagues hits the ball farther, on a regular basis, than Ohtani.
Ohtani's fastball had been clocked at 101 mph and he throws one of the game's best splitters. He is striking out every third batter he faces on the mound – while also being on pace to hit 60 home runs.
Ohtani is one of the fastest baserunners in the game, as fast or faster than 92% of all players. No one in the major leagues has bunted for more hits this year (four) than Ohtani.
Babe Ruth is the first name that gets brought up when discussing great hitters who were also great pitchers, but the time frame in which Ruth pulled double-duty is quite narrow (only parts of 1918 and 1919). Is it too early to say Shohei Ohtani is without question the greatest two-way player in baseball history? It might be. By this time next season, it won't be.
In my periods of Babe Ruth research, I found that sportswriters inserted the phrase "the longest hit ever seen" at X ballpark into every game report as if it were a requirement. Likewise, it seems we cannot go more than a few days without learning that Ohtani is "the first player to do X since" and the year given is often before automobiles existed.
Ohtani is the first player to be selected/voted to the All-Star Game as both a pitcher and a hitter. Tonight, he will compete in the Home Run Derby, as the major league leader in home runs (33).
Ohtani recently became only the 14th player to hit as many as 32 home runs before the All-Star Break – and the first to do so while pitching regularly. He's one of only two players in the past 20 seasons to hit 32+ homers in his team's first 86 games (Chris Davis, 2013).
16 of his 33 home runs have had an exit velocity of 110+ mph, most in MLB. His hardest-hit home run came off the bat at 117.2 mph, on June 28 against the Yankees.
17 of his 33 home runs have been measured at 420+ feet, most in MLB. His longest home run this year was a 470-footer on June 8, against the Royals. Only three home runs have been hit farther this year.
Ohtani has hit five of the Angels' seven hardest homers of the Statcast era (7 years, since 2015) this year alone, including the top two.
He has the second-highest highest exit velocity of any ball hit this season (119 mph) and he leads all MLB hitters in highest EV on fly balls and line drives (101 mph). His average EV is 5th in MLB (93.7 mph).
He has extraordinary power to all fields. His 17 non-pulled home runs this year are second only to Vladimir Guerrero Jr. Over Ohtani's career, nearly half of his home runs have gone to the middle third of the field (the MLB average is about 25%).
In 2017, before Ohtani had signed with the Angels, an international scouting director said: "I've been doing this 26 years, seen as many players as anybody, but I've never seen a skill set like this. There should be giddiness. No one has ever seen it."
Ohtani arrived with an entire mountain range of hype - and now – remarkably – he is not only living up to it, he's surpassing it.
Mike Petriello (mlb.com) and Tom Verducci (Sports Illustrated) have both written amazing articles overflowing with evidence that Ohtani is doing things we all assumed were impossible. (Stats may have changed slightly since the articles were published last week.)
Petriello, "Ohtani Might Just Be A Real-Life Superhero":
The Ohtani story is one that by its very nature transcends mere numbers, because while his ability to throw hard and hit hard and run fast and do it all at the same time is unprecedented . . . that doesn't fully tell the story about what this all means. . . .
Ohtani has a 176 OPS+ while hitting. It's the third-best in baseball, behind only Fernando Tatis Jr. and Vladimir Guerrero Jr., two elite young sons of Major League stars. He has a 32.3% strikeout rate while pitching. It's the 12th-best in baseball, better than Yu Darvish or Clayton Kershaw or most anyone else. Setting aside any worries about whether the two-way role would limit his availability, the Angels have played 85 games, and Ohtani has appeared in 80 of them.
Imagine, if you will, a batter more successful than Aaron Judge, a pitcher allowing fewer hits per plate appearance than Max Scherzer or Carlos Rodón, and a runner faster than Trevor Story, and then remember you need not imagine, because that's Ohtani. He is here. He is doing it now. Nightly.
Growing up, Ohtani reportedly read comic books about Goro Shigeno, a fictional Japanese youth who hit and pitched and grew up to play for the pro team in Anaheim. As an adult, that's exactly who Ohtani has become – a larger than life character. . . .
It is impossible to look at any of the things that Ohtani is doing on either side of the ball without pointing out that he is doing them all, together, simultaneously. The most obvious comparison is to Babe Ruth, history's most legendary two-way player and probably just the most famous player ever in general.
So let's go ahead and compare him to Ruth . . . except, Ruth didn't do this, not really, at least for long.
In his first four years with the Red Sox (1914-17), the Babe was exclusively a pitcher or pinch-hitter. In the final 16 years of his career (1920-35), spanning the entirety of his time with the Yankees and the oft-forgotten final year as a Brave, he appeared on the mound only four times. It was only in 1918 (71 games in the field and 20 on the mound) and '19 (112 games in the field and 17 on the mound), his last two years with Boston, where he really did both.
But while Ohtani is pitching regularly, once every five or six days, and hitting in between, Ruth rarely did that. In 1918, he was again exclusively a pitcher or pinch-hitter for the first month of the season; once he got into the starting lineup as a hitter for the first time in early May, he'd often go weeks at a time without pitching. ("Babe, enjoying the notoriety his hitting was generating, often feigned exhaustion or a sore arm to avoid the mound," reports his SABR bio, though he did keep a more Ohtani-like schedule in August.)
Horn Toot: I wrote Ruth's SABR bio.
In 1919, Ruth's mound appearances were mostly devoid of consistency; in the final 55 games he played, he pitched only four times. Sent to the Yankees after the season, his pitching career was mostly finished before he turned 25.
Still, because of the Great Bambino's fame, you can start with this: Before Ohtani came along, only one AL or NL player had ever had a season with at least 15 homers hit and 10 games started as a pitcher. That was Ruth in 1919. Ohtani did it in 2018. Now he's done it again in 2021. When he reached 30 homers earlier this month, he was the first hitter to get there in 2021, and the first player ever, Ruth included, to do it in a year where he started at least 15 games as a pitcher.
In the century-plus since Ruth's 1919, only four players have started a dozen games both on the mound and elsewhere in the lineup, as Ohtani has this year, and two of them did it the same year as Ruth first did, 1918. . . .
The most recent, two-time All-Star Wes Ferrell, was an excellent hitter for a moundsman; he actually still holds the all-time record for most home runs hit as a pitcher, with 38. (Ohtani has just one so far, coming on April 4 of this year.) Ferrell, however, started only 13 career games away from the mound, all coming in the final weeks of 1933 while a sore shoulder prevented him from pitching.
It hardly feels the same. Meanwhile, the "first since" facts keep piling up.
On April 4, on national TV for ESPN's "Sunday Night Baseball," Ohtani hit second in the lineup while starting on the mound, the first in the AL or NL to do that since Jack Dunleavy of the 1903 Cardinals. That game also marked the first time since 1976 that an American League team intentionally chose to bypass the designated hitter. (Tampa Bay, by mistake, had done so in 2009.) On June 30 in New York, he hit leadoff while pitching, the first to do so in over half a century – and the last time it had been done, back in 1968, it was part of a "playing all nine positions in one game" stunt.
On April 27, Ohtani became the first AL or NL player since Ruth in 1921 to start a game on the mound while also leading the AL or NL in home runs as a hitter, a feat he's repeated several times since, including his last several starts. (Ruth finished that game in center field, and would not appear on the mound again for more than nine years, as a stunt in 1930's final game.)
On May 12, Maddon penciled in Ohtani to lead off against Houston the day after he'd been the starting pitcher, a sequence that hadn't been seen since 1916.
When he stole his 10th base on June 16, it marked only the eighth time in AL or NL history that a player swiped 10 bags in the same season they pitched at least 10 times, but two of those are Ohtani himself (he'd done it in 2018 as well) and five of the other times, aside from George Sisler in 1915, came in the first three years of the 1900s. By reaching 30 homers and 10 steals through the halfway point of the season, he became the first to do it in American League history, and just the third overall.
Four days later, his home run off Casey Mize, the 70th of his career, made him just the fourth player in AL or NL history to have that many homers in a career that also included 100 pitching strikeouts, along with Ruth, Rick Ankiel, and Johnny Lindell. Ankiel and Lindell were not "two-way players" like Ohtani; Ankiel famously converted from the mound to the outfield, and Lindell was a pitcher at the start and end of his career, sandwiched around a decade as an outfielder.
On June 23, Ohtani pitched against the Giants at home in Anaheim, taking his usual second spot in the order as the team bypassed the designated hitter. But since San Francisco did take the rare opportunity to use the DH in an AL park, it made it the first time in Major League history that we saw a National League team deploy the DH in a game against an American League team that did not, which is quite the concept to wrap your head around.
And, since he leads the Angels in home runs (31) and, with 87 pitching strikeouts, is only two behind Andrew Heaney's team lead of 89, there's this: If he finishes the season topping the club in both areas, it will be the first time a player has done that since Walter Johnson in 1918 – and the first time anyone's done it hitting more than a mere three homers. . . .
On and on and on it goes like this. . . .
The Bat
We promised, above, that the Ohtani story transcends mere numbers. It does. It must. But the numbers tell the story too, the ones that express the pure raw skills. They can be as simple as this:
No left-handed batter has ever hit a ball as hard as Ohtani has, as far as we know.
Sit with that one for a moment. Let it stay with you. When Ohtani laced a double in Kansas City on April 12 at 119 mph, it was the hardest-hit ball ever tracked by a left-handed hitter. Now, there's an obvious caveat there, which is that "ever," in this case, only goes back to 2015, when Statcast tracking first came online. We really don't know how hard Barry Bonds hit it, or Ted Williams, or Jim Thome, or Ken Griffey Jr., or Ruth himself. We never will.
But what we do know is that there are limits to how hard a human being can hit a ball in a game setting, because Giancarlo Stanton keeps showing us.
Stanton, despite his myriad injuries over the last few seasons, owns the hardest hit ball of every single season, including this one, and his maximum has consistently been around 121 mph. So, is it possible Ruth or Williams or some other lefty legend hit a ball harder than Ohtani? Sure. But based on everything we know about the increasing strength, size and power of players over the years, even if they did, it wouldn't be by much. There's only so much ceiling above 119. There's at least a chance Ohtani stands alone in history here. . . .
He is, at the moment, tied for the best hard-hit rate in baseball (57%), which is another way of saying "no one hits it harder more often." If he keeps it up, it'd be the fourth-best seasonal mark on record. If you're down with barrels – the Statcast metric that quantifies the perfect combinations of exit velocity and launch angle, i.e., "the only thing better than hitting the ball hard is hitting it hard in the air," then no one, not Judge or Stanton or Ronald Acuña Jr. or Vladimir Guerrero Jr. or anyone, has their plate appearances end in a barrel more often.
When he puts the ball in the air, absolutely no one hits it harder, averaging over 101 mph. . . .
Only four hitters have hit at least seven balls at 115 mph or more this year, with Ohtani being joined by Stanton, Judge and Guerrero. That 119 mph double made Ohtani one of only five players since 2015 to hit even a single ball that hard, and none of them were pitchers. He set the Angels record for hardest-hit home run on May 25, and then topped himself on June 28.
It's because of that that it's not nearly enough to point out that Ohtani is one of only five starting pitchers to touch 100 mph at least nine times this year (he is) or that Jacob deGrom and Gerrit Cole are the only starters to throw a pitch harder than the 101.1 mph he touched on April 4 (they are). It's more necessary to look at the players who have done both of these things at the same time, because there aren't many.
For example, the complete list of players since 2015 to throw a ball 100 mph+ and hit a ball 110 mph+ in the same game is a brief one: Ohtani stands alone.
Mr. Do-It-All
Now, it's one thing to merely appear as a pitcher and a hitter, and another thing to display some truly impressive skills while doing it. It's another thing, entirely, to excel at them.
Ohtani, the hitter, leads the Majors in extra base hits with 53. He's got that 176 OPS+, which is to say that he's been 76% better than the league-average hitter, with some big time names in his rearview mirror, like Acuña, Judge, and Xander Bogaerts. If he keeps that up, it'll be the best hitting season by anyone not named Mike Trout in Angels history, and Trout is probably going to end up as the best player who ever lived.
When he reached 23 homers, it was faster than any Angel had ever reached that point, and it's not like between Trout, Vladimir Guerrero Sr., Troy Glaus, and Tim Salmon that the team has lacked for sluggers over the years. In June, Ohtani's 1.312 OPS was the second-best hitting month by an Angel (minimum 20 games) in club history, behind a Trout month from 2015 – and he did it while allowing six earned runs in his first four starts, before a poor outing in the Bronx on the final day of the month ruined his numbers.
At times, it seems like there's not a place you can put the ball that he can't do something with it.
When he took Cleveland lefty Sam Hentges deep on May 17, it was off a pitch well above the strike zone; it was, at 4.2 feet above the ground, the second-highest pitch anyone has taken deep this year. Five days later, he doubled off Oakland's Chris Bassitt on a pitch that looked like it might well hit him; only once in baseball this year had anyone else had an extra base hit on a pitch further into the left-handed batter's box. He's doubled off a pitch in the right-handed batter's box, too. . . .
Meanwhile, Ohtani, the pitcher, has that Top 10 strikeout rate, ahead of Joe Musgrove, Robbie Ray, and Brandon Woodruff, men who are paid well to pitch full-time. If you get to two strikes, well, don't – only deGrom, having possibly the most dominant season of all time, along with Kevin Gausman, Glasnow, and Freddy Peralta, provides worse outcomes for batters.
But more impressively, perhaps, is that there are signs he's still getting better. If there was a concern about the early part of his 2021, it was that he wasn't terribly effective at throwing strikes. Ohtani walked five in his first start, then, after a brief absence from the mound while dealing with a blister, returned to walk six Rangers on April 20. Two starts later, he walked six more. He had, through May 10, the absolute highest walk rate in the game (22.6%) of anyone who had thrown as many innings as he had. It was a problem.
And then: It wasn't. Ohtani walked only one Astro on May 11, and just two against Cleveland after that. There have been blips – that June 30 debacle in New York, certainly – but he turned that 22.6% walk rate through May 10 into a mere 9.2% walk rate ever since.
Put another way, he walked 19 in his first four starts ... and just 16 over his next nine, including the fact that his July 6 start against the Red Sox featured the highest percentage of pitches in the strike zone of any game in his career. "Walking too many batters" was his one weakness, on either side of the ball. It's not that way anymore.
That's not just a big deal in terms of "avoiding walks," though it's of course about that too. When Ohtani gets a swing on a ball in the strike zone, only six pitchers get more swings-and-misses than he does, and two of them are on their way to the Hall of Fame in Max Scherzer and deGrom.
The Unhittable Hurler
It's not, however, just about the fastball. Ohtani throws five pitches, leading with that four-seamer (53%), often deploying a splitter (19%) and slider (14%), and occasionally showing a cutter (10%) or curveball (4%).
Because of the eye-popping velocity he often shows with the heater, it's easy to overlook his other pitches. But the four-seamer isn't his most dominating pitch. It's the splitter. . . .
The numbers back it up. In 2018, Ohtani threw the splitter 191 times, allowing a mere two hits. It was, that year, the most dominant pitch in the game, just ahead of sliders from Dellin Betances, Trevor Bauer, Will Smith, Tyler Glasnow, and Blake Snell. In 2021, it's been more of the same. He's offered it 196 times, collecting 49 strikeouts and surrendering just six hits, only two for extra bases. He has not yet, in his entire career, allowed a home run on it.
Only four pitches in the sport, among those that have ended 75 plate appearances, have a higher swing-and-miss rate than the 55% mark his splitter posts, and one of those is deGrom's slider. When a plate appearance ends with a splitter, it's a strikeout 61% of the time, third-best in baseball to Glasnow's curve.
Put it this way: Since pitch tracking began in 2008, there have been nearly 4,500 combinations of pitcher+pitch type where a hurler has thrown the pitch at least 400 times. The outcomes on Ohtani's splitter – the Weighted On-Base Average, if you really want to know – are the third-best of any pitcher's pitch type.
Most dominating pitches since 2008
.103 – Felipe Vázquez, slider
.105 – Jonny Venters, slider
.106 – Ohtani, splitter
.116 – Billy Wagner, slider
.123 – Zack Britton, sliderEach of those pitchers, it should be noted, threw lefty. Limiting it just to righties, Ohtani's splitter is the most dominant right-handed pitch we have on record. He's allowed nine hits on it in his career. One of them looked like this.
But: Why? It's not that it's got elite velocity, because while averaging nearly 88 mph on a splitter is nothing to sneeze at, it's also not something no one else has. It gets a little more drop than average, but not in a way that stands out. It is, instead, because it looks like the four-seamer right up until the exact second it does not – at which point it drops an additional 19 inches more than the heater does. . . .
If that's all he had – the blazing four-seamer and then the diving splitter – he'd be plenty successful. It's not. Let's talk about the slider, the one that has the most horizontal break compared to average of any starting pitcher in baseball this side of Sonny Gray. Put another way, the average slider around his 80.7 mph velocity band breaks around 8 inches. Ohtani's breaks 17.5 inches.
If not quite as overwhelming as his two big pitches, the slider has made for an effective third weapon; to this point in his career, it's allowed a mere .163 average.
The Speedster
But you knew about all of that, right? Two-way player. Hits hard. Throws fast. Big homers. Lots of strikeouts. As expected.
Did you realize, truly realize, how fast Ohtani is?
Did you realize he's getting faster?
Ohtani, this year, is the third-fastest Angels runner, with his 28.8 ft/sec sprint speed trailing only Trout's 29.3 and Phil Gosselin's 29.0. Overall, he's in the 92nd percentile, meaning he's as fast or faster than 92% of all other runners in the game. You wouldn't think of him this way, but he's as fast as Fernando Tatis Jr. He's faster than Whit Merrifield, or Cedric Mullins, or Ozzie Albies. He's fast, and that 92nd percentile is up from his 82nd percentile as a rookie.
You can see what it does to fielders. On May 19, Ohtani dropped down a bunt single against Cleveland, one of four he has this year; no one has more, making for yet another leaderboard with Ohtani's name at the top. . . .
On this particular play, Ohtani's home-to-first time was one of the 10 fastest in baseball so far this year, though the broadcast camera, following the ball, doesn't really get that point across. Instead, using FieldVision, look at how much faster Ohtani (29.9 ft/sec on the play) was compared to a similar bunt attempt from another lefty – but one with only league-average speed – in Jackie Bradley, Jr., who posted a 27.7 ft/sec mark on this April attempt.
That combination of speed and power is, really, somewhat rare. He's currently one of just four players to have 20 or more homers and 10 or more steals, though that's underselling him a bit since he's the only one with 30 or more homers. He's one of just five players to post 90th percentile or better skills in both hard-hit rate and running speed, and the names here are spectacular. (Trout, if you're wondering, would qualify as well, if he hadn't missed so much time to injury.) . . .
The Game Changer
All of this, for a fourth-place Angels team stuck at .500, hovering on the fringes of the race with 18.6% playoff odds at the time of writing, according to FanGraphs.
It's the same problem Trout has faced for years: How valuable can you be, how much hype can you deserve, when your team never wins? . . .
The answer, as always, is "it's a team game" . . . One man, no matter how great, cannot turn a baseball team into a winner.
And yet: All of the numbers we've brought up – the various velocities, the foot speed, the advance, the home runs, all of it – are context-free, which is to say they look at the thing the player did without worrying about the game situation it came in. You might not be surprised to find out that when we factor that in, it's yet another thing Ohtani excels at.
For example, he's got a .275 average in "low leverage" situations and a middling .194 in "medium leverage" spots; turn the dial up to "high leverage," and you've got a .487/.553/1.000 line. It is the absolute best performance by anyone in baseball in those very important plate appearances. It would be the second-best in the entire Wild Card era behind only Bonds' monstrous 2004 season.
Or consider the idea of "two outs and runners in scoring position," a situation baseball lifers love to point to as the idea of being clutch. As a hitter, Ohtani has a 1.268 OPS with two outs and runners in scoring position; it is the eighth-best among hitters with 30 chances. As a pitcher, in those same spots, he is also ... eighth-best.
Since there are stats for everything, there's a stat for this too. Win Probability Added exists specifically to apply game context to moments, to give more credit for a tiebreaking double in the ninth inning than a solo homer that turns a 10-0 fifth-inning blowout into a mildly larger 11-0 blowout. As a hitter, Ohtani leads the entire sport in context-dependent value, topping Guerrero and Tatis by a decent margin on the WPA leaderboards.
Of course, Ohtani is a lot more than just "a hitter," obviously, and he has added quite a bit of positive high leverage value on the mound, as well; combine the two, and he's lapping the field.
Highest Combined Win Probability Added, 2021
4.54 – Ohtani, LAA
3.94 – Josh Hader, MIL
3.36 – Guerrero Jr., TOR
3.29 – Brandon Woodruff, MIL
3.12 – Tatis Jr., SD
3.02 – Zack Wheeler, PHI. . .
The Front of the Pack
So: Where does this all lead? Where are we, historically, if this isn't just "a great half-season," and it turns out this is just the first half of what might be an all-time great year?
The immediate question is "will he win the Most Valuable Player Award" if he keeps this up, and the answer right now seems to be that he's going to have an incredibly strong case. No, he isn't hitting quite as well as Guerrero Jr., having a fantastic season in his own right, but also, Guerrero's admittedly-improved defense at first base isn't the same thing as what Ohtani's doing on the mound. (Some voters may dislike awarding the MVP to a player on a losing team; we strongly disagree, and it's not like Toronto is a first-place club anyway.)
While MVP voting is rightfully not a simple "compare the WAR" exercise, you can still see how much of a gap Ohtani is going to have here.
2021 AL WAR Leaders (Combined Pitching+Hitting)
5.6 – Ohtani, LAA
4.4 – Guerrero Jr., TOR
4.4 – Marcus Semien, TOR
4.1 – Kyle Gibson, TEX
4.0 – Carlos Correa, HOUBut maybe we're not thinking big enough here. What if he keeps this up? What if what we've seen to date is something he can make last all season long? . . . Posting a five-WAR season, as he's done, is a great year for 99% of baseball. (In WAR terms, 2 WAR is an average season, and 4 is roughly an All-Star campaign.) Ohtani, however, has done it before the All-Star Game.
To answer that question, we looked back through history. We looked for every AL or NL player since 1901 to have a season with at least 100 plate appearances as a hitter or five games pitched on the mound. This left us with nearly 75,000 player seasons. We took the WAR value for both sides of the ball, combined then, and ranked them.
If Ohtani kept up his current pace, he'd wind up with approximately an 10.6 WAR season. That would be in the top one-half percent of all of these seasons all-time. It would be better than 99% of seasons in the history of Major League Baseball. Of the ones that were better, most of those seasons came in pre-integration era baseball, played against athletes fractionally as talented as today's, almost entirely during the day, rarely if ever requiring the aid of airplanes to travel.
None of those players, not recently, not historically, was a true two-way player. Not even Ruth, who had his best years solely as a hitter. . . .
For all the comparisons to being "the next Babe Ruth," that's not quite right. Ruth slugged for far longer, in the context of a very different sport, and he single-handedly changed the way the game was played. But he didn't do this, either, not really. He didn't come to a new country; he didn't face integrated rosters or cross-country flights or endless relievers or the massively more talented opponents that Ohtani sees. Ohtani isn't the next Ruth. He's not the next anything.
He's the first Shohei Ohtani. That's more than enough. It's more than anyone has ever been.
Verducci, "Shohei Ohtani Isn't Babe Ruth – He's Better":
Shohei Ohtani . . . is a once-in-a-century player in a year when we need to be awed, inspired and distracted. He is a ballplayer in the most fundamental sense of the word. Shunning specialization in a society that craves and rewards it, Ohtani pitches, hits and runs, and does all of it with the irrepressible joy and purpose of a Little Leaguer.
A coronation is scheduled for next week. The most amazing baseball player of our lifetime will be crowned as such. Ohtani will take part in the All-Star Home Run Derby next Monday and – if baseball has any sense of justice and theatre – he will pitch and hit in the All-Star Game the following day. He is the first player ever to be selected as an All-Star hitter and pitcher. He will be the star of stars. This is his time.
What Ohtani is doing deserves such a showcase because his baseball genius for the Los Angeles Angels has otherwise been underappreciated. Babe Ruth, his closest comp, was a true two-way player only for a 218-game window in 1918 and 1919 – and not even the Babe slugged or ran like Ohtani while doing so. This is not like what Samuel Johnson once said about a dog walking on its hind legs: "It is not done well, but you are surprised that it is done at all." No, this two-way show is more like a dog dancing the role of Princess Odette in Swan Lake.
Ruth quit the two-way business after just those 218 games, telling reporters while golfing in Los Angeles after the 1919 season, "The outfield is where I belong. It is too hard on the arm to play every day and then take your turn in the box. I found that I was never effective that way."
Those who suggest Ohtani is compromising his greatness by not specializing – "He can be another deGrom!" "He can be another Yelich" – are missing the point of why he came to the major leagues and what is in his heart.
"I sat in the room with him," says Angels manager Joe Maddon, then with the Cubs when Ohtani was a restricted international free agent after the 2017 season. "He made it clear he was coming here because he wants to pitch and hit. This is what he loves. He loves baseball and he loves the challenge. I will submit to you that by doing both you are seeing the best version of Shohei Ohtani, not by limiting him."
For 500 years people have gazed at the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel in absolute wonder. A bevy of scientists also looked at it with image analysis software and saw embedded in Michelangelo's brushstrokes a spatial relationship known as the golden ratio. Likewise, the aesthetics of Ohtani are best appreciated in person – especially in Denver next week – and without too much thinking, let alone math. But because this is baseball, a community in which numbers are its lingua franca, Ohtani also deserves a statistical appreciation of his uniqueness:
• If you had to distill the amazement of Ohtani to one sentence, it would be this: he hits the ball harder than Juan Soto (92.5-92.3 mph exit velocity), throws harder than Yu Darvish (95.4-94.8 mph), and runs faster than Randy Arozarena (28.9-28.7 sprint speed).
• He leads the major leagues in home runs and bunt hits. (He is 4-for-4 when bunting for a hit, an unmatched success rate.)
• Until this year, no player (and we're looking at you, Babe) ever hit 30 homers and made 10 starts on the mound in the same year. Ohtani did it in just 81 games.
• He is the first AL player ever with 31 homers and 12 stolen bases by the All-Star break.
• Roll this around your head: the major league home run leader also throws the toughest pitch to hit in baseball. Batters are hitting .083 against his splitter, which ties Tyler Glasnow's curveball for the lowest batting average on any pitch that ended at least 70 at bats. Ohtani has thrown 389 splitters in his career and allowed only nine hits and an .069 batting average on the pitch. No batter has ever hit a home run off the Ohtani splitter.
• After 347 career games of hitting and pitching, Ohtani has a higher slugging percentage than Ruth did at the same point (.552-.541).
• Ohtani is slugging .674 against lefties. Only three left-handed hitters ever slugged that high against lefties in a full season: Stan Musial (twice), Ruth and Lou Gehrig (min. 200 PA).• Ohtani has thrown almost as many fastballs (515) as he has seen as a hitter (548). He has hit five times as many extra-base hits off fastballs as he has allowed, 25-5.
• Ohtani is hitting like Willie Mays and pitching like Roger Clemens at the same point in their careers:First 332 Games Hitting
HR RBI SLG
Willie Mays 72 218 .565
Shohei Ohtani 77 213 .552First 24 Games Pitching
W-L ERA SO
Roger Clemens 10-6 4.23 143
Shohei Ohtani 7-4 3.97 149
There are issues with comparing statistics from players more than 100 years apart – the American League slugged .322 and .359 in 1918 and 1919 and is (as of Friday morning) slugging .410 in 2021 – and today's pitchers are striking out far more batters than they were nearly 40 years ago, when Clemens broke in – but it would be disingenuous to use that as an excuse to summarily discount or diminish what Ohtani is doing.
Quite simply, we are seeing something that, in its totality, has never happened in the history of baseball – out of more than 22,450 players, he is the only one. Who knows when (or if) another player even remotely similar to Ohtani will come along?
July 11, 2021
Hey, What's New With NESN?
I wonder if anything is new over at NESN this year.
April 2
Another year of the Nesn cameraman zooming above the monster on a fly ball to the warning track...
— Brendan Guinnane (@breakingbender) April 2, 2021
April 3NESN has some of the fucking worst cameramen in baseball. holy shit
— 55-34 (@nysoxfan79) April 2, 2021
The NESN camera work is outrageously poor. Two days in a row an easy fly ball to left looks like a ball destined for a windshield on the mass pike
— Matt Sowden (@mattsowden_15) April 3, 2021
April 5The cameraman for @NESN is trash
— Kyle Martin (@Kmartin1128) April 3, 2021
April 6nesn cameraman need to be fired
— GGZSK🐒🇦🇼 🎞 (@GGZSK_) April 6, 2021
April 8I will say this every day until it happens, the NESN cameraman has GOT to go
— Ethan R. Godfrey (@ethangodfrey95) April 6, 2021
April 10Nesn cameraman needs to be drug tested
— Brett (@BrettIsNotATree) April 8, 2021
Cause NESN was showing a replay and missed the contact with the ball only cut back to see it land
— Jimmy Foley (@FOLEY_IS_GOOD) April 11, 2021
April 13some high quality camera work tonight from NESN
— Mikewichter (@mikewichter) April 11, 2021
April 15NESN showing a replay from 3 years ago of the Mookie GS off Happ is why they are the worst in the business. Could not have less awareness
— AAA Franchy (@dinnie_voyle) April 13, 2021
April 21Who on earth is actually doing this nesn predict the game shit???
— Mike Neff (@mneff2) April 16, 2021
April 22The NESN Cameraman has got to be trolling at this point
— Ian (@IanMCusick) April 22, 2021
It looked like Kiké sent that ball 569 feet
April 23Find this NESN cameraman and punish them.
— Sturg48 - BLM (@jcsturgeon) April 23, 2021
April 24@RedSox @NESN @LouMerloni @ZapphireMusic Dave O’Brien is the worst sports commentator in TV. I could sit behind a microphone and read shit all night long and make it sound as interesting as he does. He has to go. You fucked up letting Don Orsillo go. He is the best
— Jeff S (@JBS1955) April 23, 2021
May 4Holy shit figure it out @NESN
— AAA Franchy (@dinnie_voyle) April 24, 2021
@ #nesn needs a whole lot of technical work. Score bug down again. Glitches everywhere, a mess when getting ready for TC’s game breaks. Not a great look.
— Neal Waldman (@nealwald) May 4, 2021
May 5Nobody:
— Michael (@ChaimBIoom) May 5, 2021
NESN cameraman on an infield popout: pic.twitter.com/cpm1nildNZ
@NESN what if you showed a replay before going to break so quickly?
— Nate Lawrence (@nateclawrence) May 6, 2021
May 6I want Dave O’Brien and the NESN cameraman fired by the end of the broadcast
— 🌋 (@mjySox) May 6, 2021
May 8Get your shit together @NESN
— Scott Kaplan (@WxManScott) May 6, 2021
May 11Holy shit the NESN product is so bad
— Pat Heffernan (@pheff12) May 8, 2021
May 16@nesn what’s up with the 3rd base camera tonight? Eovaldi looks green. It’s not my TV and it’s not happening on other angles.
— Tony Rees (@Anthony_W_Rees) May 12, 2021
May 19This is good news for @NESN Dave Obrien since he makes a living saying the words home run as many times as possible during a broadcast. That and stating the obvious. "One and one count, one ball two strikes" really? What else does 1 and 1 stand for?
— Jeff S (@JBS1955) May 16, 2021
@NESN don’t take the score bug off the screen. EVER. commercial, replay, no matter what. Fucking idiots
— Jeff Hill (@JHill_21) May 20, 2021
Hey NESN fix your shit cameras....stop start motion is making me ill.
— Dave (@PokahDave) May 20, 2021
May 20Hey @NESN, please save alternative angles for replays only. Nobody needs the view from behind the net when the game is going on.
— Dan Kelley (@DanKelley66) May 20, 2021
May 21No shit!! @NESN is the absolute worst lol
— Jim Daddona (@JDaddona) May 20, 2021
May 22i honestly might never watch @NESN again. Dave OBrien is so hard to listen too. I think I would rather listen on mute. Dude is not even excited when the @RedSox light it up. A 5 year old T-Ball player who can barely speak sentences would do a better job.
— BringBackDonOrsillo (@BringBackDonnyO) May 22, 2021
May 23I literally can’t even read that because NESN has such a shitty website that only 3 sentences at the very bottom of the article can be read at a time. Ridiculously garbage site.
— Kevin Stadnik (@KevinStadnik) May 23, 2021
May 26@NESN Waited until it could be sponsored to show the replay. Gross.
— Carl Lavin (@cplavin) May 23, 2021
May 29NESN needs a new cameraman
— Red Sox Flash (@SoxFlash) May 27, 2021
May 31WTF IS WRONG WITH YOU NESN CAMERAMAN
— Michael (@ChaimBIoom) May 29, 2021
Cool of NESN to fuck up the camera angle and then not show a replay
— 100 win pace #RedSoxAreGood (@YouDownWithOBP1) May 31, 2021
June 2Is all @MLB camera work horrible this year or just @redsox @NESN games?
— Mike (@Mike01588) May 31, 2021
June 5@NESN fire ur cameraman
— Red Sox enthusiast (@MattyBackPacks) June 3, 2021
June 7I feel your pain! I absolutely hate it NESN is the absolute worst
— Ray Duryea (@RayDuryea) June 5, 2021
June 8I thought Big Throb sent that to Jupiter. The NESN cameraman strikes again.
— BoSox Injection (@BoSoxInjection) June 7, 2021
And great camera work by @NESN ….. one blurry angle…
— Brian C (@Redsoxocd) June 8, 2021
June 9Not one good replay by @NESN
— Donald F. (@_D_Flo) June 8, 2021
June 10These NESN camera angles torture me.
— BeanTown_TitleTown (@BeanTown_Title) June 10, 2021
June 14That crazy play:
— JPS (@rsfpt) June 11, 2021
How does NESN miss three separate pitches trying to show replays of it?
Does Remy not know the safe sign means the ball didn't hit the batter in fair territory?
Was Gurriel just pretending he fouled the ball off his foot?
June 15FUCK YOUR STUPID CAMERA ANGLES @NESN
— MattyBackpacksSZN (@alexboswell576) June 15, 2021
June 16@NESN seriously, the music you play over video cuts is too loud. Viewers literally can’t hear what TC and the others are saying.
— Aaron Katz (@AaronJKatz) June 15, 2021
NESN cameraman dude please
— nïçk (@verdugoredsox) June 17, 2021
Can NESN like show a replay to try to see what the fuck happened maybe?
— HVT (@redsoxandstuff) June 17, 2021
June 22Imagine if @NESN had the technology to like show a replay or something
— HVT (@redsoxandstuff) June 17, 2021
Dear @NESN,
— Mike (@Mike01588) June 23, 2021
Why do you hate baseball? #redsox
June 23The Dining Playbook people have a dossier on somebody high up an NESN. Years and years of this shit.
— Lark (@plarkin88) June 23, 2021
June 24NESN cameraman is an asshole. Looked like Vazquez hit a 500 foot bomb
— Dan Lazinsk (@Dlazi) June 23, 2021
June 25@NESN Stop with the stupid music while TC and Jim Ed are recapping the game. Jim Ed can't be heard over that stupid music!!! There is no need of that.
— Andrea Abern (@AndreaAbern) June 25, 2021
June 28Miggy did not go around there but okay NESN let’s not show a replay
— Dylan (@DPac208) June 26, 2021
June 29@NESN stop making your cameraman make me think everything is a HR
— owen (@34PAULPlERCE) June 28, 2021
June 30nesn cameraman making me think these are 400+ foot HRs
— owen (@34PAULPlERCE) June 29, 2021
Fire the NESN cameraman dawg
— Vanté 8-24 Forever 🐍 (@carterunique95) July 1, 2021
It's cool, @NESN. No need to see a replay of that catch. Rush to commercial and then make sure we see all sorts of nonsense time wasting when we rejoin.
— Jon Boswell (@theboz423) July 1, 2021
Too bad we had to wait 7 mins until NESN cued it up within a sponsored spot to see the replay 🤬
— h2o (@dog_bg) July 1, 2021
July 1 (?)
July 2Was anyone listening when O’Brien said that KC’s Ervin Santana changed his name from Johan? Two completely different pitchers!!!
— Ken Robinson (@kenrobinsonSnS) July 9, 2021
July 3TC says the extra-inning rule is great because it creates excitement.
— JPS (@rsfpt) July 3, 2021
Why not do it every inning?
How about bases loaded on every play?
How about a tiger loose in the outfield?
All of these things would create excitement.
July 5No damage in the standings today.
— JPS (@rsfpt) July 4, 2021
Unrelated: The Red Sox' radio announcer said the Sox had the second-longest winning streak, behind the Dodgers. Terrible job forgetting the Brewers' streak--the actual best one in the baseball.
OBrien is a RADIO ANNOUNCER. He talks too much. TV tells the story. He has diarrhea of the mouth.
— bill plante (@billplante) July 5, 2021
July 6Sucks? Who wants to listen to Dave O'Brien??? The guy never shuts up, he worships the players like an 8 year old and still hasn't figured out a home run call after all these years. Mike Monaco will be replacing him before you know it.
— TheRealWillisAndGadge (@RealGadge) July 6, 2021
July 8@Jared_Carrabis This NESN crew is kinda terrible. It’s like a throwback to Joe Morgan/Tim McCarver on the color with a touch of Tommy Smokes doing play by play. I feel like I’m watching a low budget Pawsox game from 1997.
— Jeff Bezanson (@jefbiz) July 7, 2021
July 9I hate @NESN so much
— Dom (@BoSox29) July 9, 2021
lmfao Nesn cameraman what the actual fuck?
— HVT (@redsoxandstuff) July 9, 2021
so foul
Remy says Jeter’s shoes were nearly impossible to fill. Then he says his successor made him realize how shitty Jeter’s range was. (Shouldn’t this have been the point where you take back the “impossible” part?)
— JPS (@rsfpt) July 10, 2021
NESN shows Ted Williams hitting two HR in the 1946 All-Star Game… except the second one was the walk-off HR from the 1941 All-Star Game.
— JPS (@rsfpt) July 10, 2021
July 10All right, it bugs me how Dave O'Brien calls the Home Run Derby "Home Run Derby." Like, he would say, "Juan Soto is participating in Home Run Derby this year."
— Brendan Campbell (@brendan_camp) July 10, 2021
What’s with the @NESN cameraman? That Kiké fly out looked like it was going 10 rows into the seats
— Adam Ginsberg (@adam_ginsberg11) July 10, 2021
Did the NESN camera guy just film the wrong outfielder
— 🇺🇸 (@lolceltics) July 10, 2021
The nesn camera man needs to be fired immediately
— In Stevens We Trust (@LookatTatumman) July 10, 2021
Watch Harper make this catch. Actually you can’t because NESN doesn’t know how to, you know, broadcast a baseball game. pic.twitter.com/PMUfDtLDwl
— JPS (@rsfpt) July 10, 2021
I love hearing Dave O'Brien say bounding ball 700 times a day. It's awesome. Exciting.
— #saveorsillo (@L_etsg_oo) July 10, 2021
July 11It would be really nice if Jerry Remy knew the rules of … checks notes … baseball. #RedSox @NESN
— Carmacarmeleon (@carmacarmeleon) July 10, 2021
Nope. . . . Same old, same old.Our screen shouldn’t look like this at any point on a ground ball to shortstop. #NESups #RedSox #Phillies pic.twitter.com/PKL6w4c3Up
— JPS (@rsfpt) July 11, 2021
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