I thought I was over my baseball funk, but I'm not. Truth is, I'm having a hard time getting interested in the post season hot stove news. Over pay for Papelbon? Resign an utterly useless Schneider? Yeah, sure why not. I've even found myself contemplating on more than one occasion how hard it would be to turn my Phillies man room into a Flyers room. But perhaps this being the eve of my yearly end of season fantasy baseball party, some stimulating baseball talk this weekend will get me back into baseball shape. In the mean time, chew on some links...
Clayton Kershaw won the NL Cy Young yesterday becoming the youngest pitcher since Doc Gooden to do so. You may recall my late August rant in which I said it was all but locked up for him, but FanGraphs doesn't seem to agree. Until there's a massive changing of the guard in the BBWAA, don't expect to see xFIP or SIERA lines accounted for in award season voting. Hell, voters are just now starting to contemplate the concept of WAR. Roy Halladay can win the advanced metrics battle for the next decade, but if someone else comes out on top with the pitching triple crown, he's going home with the hardware in November. I'll be more than happy to settle having 3 pitchers finish in the top 5 every year. And speaking of voting, who are the two jokers who tossed Madison Bumgarner and Ryan Vogelsong 5th place votes? On no planet are those two pitchers even top ten material.
Phuture Phillies is a great site for tracking the up and coming prospects within the organization, but if you're looking for an outsider's perspective on some of the same guys, I suggest Seedlings to Stars. A lot of the more recent guys they've been looking at are your potential bullpen arms for next year in Joe Savery, Justin DeFratus, and Michael Schwimmer.
If you haven't had a chance yet, you might want to check out the Yoenis Cespedes highlight reel. He's looking for a monster contract, but the Phillies have apparently kicked the tires on him. Potential left fielder? Doubtful, with all the interest the Phillies have shown in Grady Sizemore and Michael Cuddyer. But he's worth keeping an eye on because a few other teams in the division are looking at him as well...
Big news out of Major League Baseball yesterday with the sale of the Astros leading to a move to the AL. For those not familiar, this creates two 15 team leagues with 3 divisions of 5, something baseball have been pining for for years. But it also creates the opportunity for MLB to add a 2nd Wild Card position into the mix and this is where the debate begins. On one hand, a second Wild Card position would take away the entire storyline of a September collapse and wrap it into one game around October 1st. The Braves and the Red Sox could have had their collapse and still had a last ditch effort against the Cardinals and the Rays to get into the playoffs. In that respect, the whole month can come down to a one game push and the build up to September 28th that we had this year may never have happened. On the other hand, this change truly puts a premium on winning your division. The Yankees-Rays-Red Sox no longer have the luxury of coming in first or second and still finding themselves automatically in the October mix. If you want to live to fight for more than one more day, win the division. Regardless of which side you take, between this and the collective bargaining agreement talks, the next few seasons are bound to shake out differently than what we're used to. Jayson Stark breaks it all down on ESPN in regards to scheduling.
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