The Tyler Skaggs news just broke. I’m sick to my stomach and need a hug. All the love, energy, thoughts vibes and whatever I can muster to his family and friends. 

Good morning afternoon sports fans and welcome back for another edition of MLB Weekend Round Up.  Please know up front that I’m going to miss some shit because there’s 45 games to comb through. FWIW I’m trying my best and according to Captain America that’s pretty much all any of us can do.

Personally I think Trying Your Best is a pretty cupcake platform when you can disable a fighter jet from the future with your barehands but I digress. This is a baseball blog and you bet your ass I’m keeping it this way so let’s start there:

MLB went to London this weekend to showcase the Yankees and Red Sox on an international stage. From all accounts it was a resounding success for everyone but the two pitching staffs. The only valid complaint over the course of the weekend is that it was a little too hot.

For that, I blame these industrial flamethrowers.

Need. More. Fire.

Hardo.

Pretty symbolic of the 2-game series in London that featured FIFTY combined runs on 65 hits and 10 dingers. That’s absurd.

For context, you should give up about 1H per 1IP and hold a WHIP around 1.2. In this case it was closer to 2.3 so you tell me: maybe the ball just travels exceptionally well in London’s thicc, humid sea-level atmosphere.

Or maybe the All Star Game is around the corner and Major League Baseball is DESPERATE for international expansion into high revenue markets like the NBA and NFL. And maybe with that desperation came the realization that people want to watch fireworks at the ballpark – not clean infield play and clutch 2 out hitting. And maybe just maybe the desperation + realization = motivation to juice balls and possibly even players.

Maybe.

Personally, I love the action. You should know that by now. As a purist I could probably do without but I stopped being a true baseball purist the second I accepted a full time contract with Barstool Sports. Now it’s about being an internet baseball guy and that means SEX

WEEKEND DING DOGS

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The longball movement isn’t slowing down because it can’t slow down. Classic matchup of unstoppable force vs. immovable object and my brain says it’s not stopping ever again. The old days are officially dead and gone.

Top Plays

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Cup Check Standings Check

American League

American League Observations: 

– Seriously. Cancel the Blue Jays and the Orioles.
– The Rangers got it to 4.5 last week now back to 6.5 and that’s with Lance Lynn and Mike Minor pitching their balls off
– Tigers last 10 = 1-9 = LOL
– Imagine having Mike Trout and Shohei Ohtani and having ZERO shot at your division

National League Observations:

– The NL Central is the only notably attractive division for baseball fans
– Everyone is 4-6, 5-5 or 6-4 over their last 10 save for the Mets and Pirates. It’s not the Dog Days of Summer yet, but that’s basically what it looks like. Bunch of teams going .500 like waves hitting the beach
– The Dodgers. MY GOD.
– I think the Mets win 1-4 more games the rest of the year and even that sounds remarkably generous.

On to the highlights starting with your weekly reminder that Whit Merrifield can absolutely fuckin BALL OUT.

He’s turned himself into a bonafide .300 big league hitter which is just about every hitter’s goal whether they want to admit it or not. I interviewed Whit last summer on Red Line and can confidently preach that he’s just a Good Old Boy from South Carolina that wants to hit line drives. There’s no slow motion video analysis of him in a black leotard studying swing resistance coefficient factors or whatever the fucking kids are doing these days. He’s literally just looking for a pitch over the plate that he can hit hard. It’s that simple to him which makes it that much more amazing to me. So kudos to Whit Merrifield for being a true and noble Baseball Guy.

Then on the other side of the Baseball Guy equation are a couple other types of players. You got Dogs, Dudes, Pussies, Vets, and on it goes. A good comparison of how it plays out would be Chapman and Machado.

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Machado is what I call SWEET. Everything looks smooth. He’s obviously cooler than you or me. He’s never struggled athletically for a day in his life and he never will. Sometimes he looks like a Dog but when you’re as SWEET as Machado, your Dog gene gets recessive and goes away until you stop being SWEET.

Comparatively, Chapman is a straight up Dude. He eats baseballs for breakfast. Loves taking BP. Loves infield drills and leading other people. He’s a jaw dropping type player amongst scouts and that’s saying a lot because scouts hate everyone and everything.

That’s part of being a scout – you’re an asshole baseball guy that think everyone sucks. And honestly you would be too if your job consisted of driving tens of thousands of miles each year to watch shitty 17 year old assholes play baseball.

Now imagine you show up to the field and 17 year-old Joey Gallo is taking BP. Good chance your boner rips through your mesh shorts.

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Keeping on the underage track, Juan Soto might be a butcher in leftfield but at 20 years old and with a career .928 OPS, you gotta imagine the youngster ends up in Cooperstown. I hate putting that on a 20 year old but common sense tells me I’d be stupid to think otherwise.

Granted, the Tigers Suck:

Which is both good and bad news for the White Sox. Good because the Tigers suck and they get to play them all the time. Bad because they’re not in a position to really take a big step:

Rumors are Tim Anderson is out 4-6 weeks but you have to imagine it could be longer based on his position and style of play. He’s an explosive, aggressive shortstop that fits into the next 10 years of CWS baseball. How the Sox treat his rehab though will be telling of how the front office really sees the team. They aint too fuckin bad and last time someone said that the Indians won the Pennant

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To be fair though the White Sox took down the Twins 2-1 over the weekend and are actually one phenomenal pitcher away from having a puncher’s outside shot at the 2nd WC

Oh fuck.

On the north side of Chicago things are getting ugly:

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While I’m crying I’d also like to admit that I’m sooooo salty Pete Alonso isn’t on my team.

Not that I EXPECT him to be on my team. I’m just saying I’d love love LOVE to watch him play in my uniform. That’s it.

All he does is mash baseballs and play an average first base aka Major League Baseball in the 90’s. That’s when baseball was at it’s absolute best because defense was an afterthought. It was arcade style baseball where almost everyone could do this:

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Unfortunately for Eloy though he looks like a newborn baby deer in left field so let’s devote some time to our friends in the field and celebrate the best defensive plays:

*insert luckiest play I’ve ever witnessed on Twitter*

Mercado is spanish for Market, a place where you would buy steroids

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And finally, another Max Muncy submission at 2nd base, two more than I could ever anticipate

Funny how that works – when you mash baseballs you can pretty much play wherever you want.

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From here we might feel redundant. That’s because outside of the London series it really was an overall mild weekend of average Dog Day baseball.

That said, I love a Joe Buck home run call. Always have. Always will.

And not to be too picky but you can’t use this caption on this home run

I much prefer this one

And while we’re here, I’ve always liked Josh Reddick. He got drafted by Theo in 2006 and climbed the prospect rankings til getting sent to Oakland for Andrew Bailey. Notable to me because I argued for Andrew Bailey at the 2012 National Baseball Arbitration Competition for my law school vs. a couple boners from NYU. I lost in that round but the ‘judge” was the Arizona Diamondbacks general counsel. She told me I had a gift for talking about baseball but failed to use any notable charts or graphs to make my argument. The NYU had two binders full of shit. Sometimes I find myself wondering what those guys are up to and if they ended up working in baseball. I sure hope not.

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Back to Reddick.

He’s hitting .301 /.338/.448 but more importantly to me he’s got a big arm and sweet flair.

More important to him, his team is fucking AWESOME

Speaking of awesome, Lance Lynn turned in one of the best games of the season so far.

People forget Lance Lynn is one of the biggest SEC hillbillies in major league baseball. I love those guys.

And while Lynn was amazing in that start, Musial was amazing over his entire career and this should REALLY put some context behind Bellinger’s 2019 season.

They need a special MVP award to be given out every decade and they need it because of Bellinger’s season. He’s so fucking good but in hindsight I can’t imagine 30 years from now it will stand out or whatever. That’s why I need a special designation or award to let everyone know in the future that this really was the best season I’ve witnessed since watching Mike Trout play all those American League games.

But probably most important is how good of a guy Mike Trout is *BARFS*

*STILL BARFING*

Much better. I miss Nomar btw. He was the cooler version of Derek Jeter. Like to me Jeter was on a different planet. Not human. Basically a demi-god walking Earth to win championships and fuck you up. Then Nomar comes along from Georgia Tech and he’s this gritty ugly neighborhood guy that looks like he dropped out of Eddie’s high school St. Pats.

Another neighborhood feel guy is Matt Olson from the A’s. He’s got a .553 slugging which is about 10% better than Fred McGriff in his prime.

Although I’d rather have the Crime Dog if we’re being honest. He was sweet (but not SWEET) and so is this bomb even if I hate the Cardinals

But nothing beats a pitcher home run. Ever.

Although slight exception when it’s an American League pitcher. Those are hands down the best home runs ever. Mark Buehrle hit one in Milwaukee that the folks in St. Charles, Missouri are still talking about:

Now compare that to your 1 Orioles Highlight:

Give me Buehrle 100/100 times even if he can’t make me fall out of my chair like Vlad Junior

Next question – would you rather have Vlad Junior/Cavan Biggio or Vlad Senior and Craig Biggio?

Don’t forget that one group did a lot of steroids unlike Javy Baez

But a lot like Yasiel Puig

Just kidding. He’s always been a crazy motherfucker but funny enough is that afterwards Pedro Strop basically told the media FUCK HIM. He’s not backing down and I bet there will be actual blood spilled this year as a result of actual fighting between these 2 teams. Especially with the Reds telling people they think theyre a playoff team. They can be. But that just tells me they’re all pissed off and that makes sense. Imagine having to be in the Cubs’ shadow all the way out in Cinci. Woof.

That’s about as far as Nelson Cruz put this ball

Next question – more impressive – that home run or Brendan MacKay retiring 16 straight to start his career

I think he’s a 1-way player now officially, right? Has to be. People thought he had Charlie Blackmon’s low-ball swing and well turns out it’s hard to compare anyone to Charlie

Naturally you can find him here:

which compares favorably for the right to the major advantage in the World fucking Series *BARFS AGAIN*

Only 1 Royal on the whole roster and it’s my guy Whit Merrifield. What a perfect dismount for the blog this week because I’m also a big Royal Family guy.

Some would even say HUGE.

It’s because I’m addicted to nice shit and being jealous of people who have more than me and the Royal Family is at the top of the list. I mean if you can get over yourself for a solid 2 seconds you should be able to naturally admire just how much better his life is than yours. All of you. Literally not one person reading this blog as it better than Prince Harry. Not the Pope. Not Derek Jeter. Not your IT software sales buddy who made $107,000 last year after commission that always buys the first round. No one. Prince Harry Fucks.

Pictured: The New York Yankees, the Prince of England and his smokeshow American wife.

Goddamn do I love baseball.