Monday Bantering: Jays Stuff, Vlad, Bo, What Ifs, Arbitrary Numbers

We don’t go ‘dark’ over the off-season. There will be looks at the individual players. And comments on whatever news the Jays make.

The season is over, except for a double-header between the Mets and the Braves, which will decide the Wild Card spots in the NL:

• The winner of the first game gets a Wild Card spot.
• If the loser of game one wins game two they both get a Wild Card spot.
• In the same team wins both, they and the Diamondbacks get Wild Card spots. The Padres own one of the Wild Card spots.

Game one of the doubleheader starts at 1:00 Eastern and will be on Sportsnet. If you are watching, use this as a game thread.

I’m guessing the teams will split the games. The winner of game one doesn’t have much incentive to win game two, but you never know. But if you are a gambler, put money down on the loser of game one to win game two.

The Braves starters will be Spencer Schwellenbach (game one) and Chris Sale in game two, if they lose game one.

The Mets starter will be Tylor Megill in game one and Luis Severino if they need to win game two.

And Playoffs start tomorrow:

• 2:30 Eastern: Tigers @ Astros (Go Tigers)
• 4:00 Eastern: Royals @ Orioles
• 5:30 Eastern: TBD (the winner of the first game of today’s double-header) @ Brewers
• 8:30 Eastern: TBD (the winner of the second game, or the Diamondbacks if one team wins both games) @ Padres

We’ll have a GameThread for the games tomorrow.

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In yesterday’s game thread, we discussed the Jays’ 2025 draft pick. If all goes as planned, the Jays would get the fifth pick, but they have a 7.48% chance of getting the number one pick. I’d love to see them move up.

A chart stolen from the Score. The White Sox get the 10th spot because of some rule that non-revenue-sharing teams can’t be in the lottery two years in a row. I

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It wasn’t the season we wanted. I was trying to convince myself that it would have been different if Bo was Bo and not injured most of the time.

June 16th we were 35-36. If Bo had been his usual self, could they have been above .500. Maybe won 3 or 4 more games? Maybe kept around .500 until the trade deadline, and they could have been buyers? Likely not, but it would have been more fun.

Maybe if Bo had been Bo and Jordan Romano. Tim Mayza and Erik Swanson had been the players they were last year, we could have been in the race? With them and Yimi Garcia, Chad Green, the bullpen would have been good.

I guess, as well as those things happening, George Springer would have had to come out of the leadoff spot and we would have needed to send out Davis Schneider.

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Shi Davidi has a long post up about the season and the future. One of the bits that I liked:

Stuck at 199 hits, in what was likely his final trip to the plate this season, Guerrero had good reason to chase the down-and-away, 3-2 fastball Lake Bachar threw him in the eighth inning Sunday. Instead, he watched it all the way into the glove and took his base, was replaced by Nathan Lukes and ran off the field to a loud ovation from the crowd of 31,668 disappointed that he was forced to keep his bat on his shoulder.

Even with the 200-hit milestone on the line, taking the pitch “was easy for me,” said Guerrero, speaking through interpreter Hector Lebron. “I’m not just going to strike out trying to get a hit knowing that I can get a walk. So it was easy for me. Obviously, they didn’t want to pitch to me. That was fine. Go ahead and move forward. I’m OK with that.”

Playing the game right was more important than chasing the number. He’s more mature than I would have been. I’d have chased that pitch to get one more pitch. And, of course, he came out of the game, instead of staying in to hope for another at bat. Would another hit have made it a better season for him? Of course not, unless he could have won the game for us with it and even then.

I often wonder how we fixate on round numbers. Are 200 hits better than 199? Are 100 RBIs better than 99? .300 is better than .299? Buck talked about him getting to 100 runs scored a lot, I can’t remember anyone ever talking about 100 runs scored before. Maybe for a leadoff hitter, but not for a guy batting third.

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I second this:

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Isiah Kiner-Falefa sat out the last game of the second, costing himself $250,000. I wonder if there are three players in the MLB who would have done this:

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Use the thread for a GameThread for today’s Braves/Mets games. They are basically playoff games.