Newsletter Excerpt, June 20, 2024 -- "Automation, Pt. 2"

This is a preview of the Joe Sheehan Baseball Newsletter, an e-mail newsletter about all things baseball, featuring analysis and opinion about the game on and off the field from the perspective of the informed outsider.

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Unlike some of the other suggestions for balancing the batter/pitcher relationship, such as my crusade to move the mound back, using ABS to change the called strike zone is consistent with baseball history. The powers that be have tweaked the zone repeatedly over the years, most famously in the 1960s, when a vertical expansion in 1963 created a second deadball era that was eventually reversed in 1969. Modifying the strike zone in an effort to change gameplay has a long history, and the difference here is just using technology to do so.

There is no single change MLB can make that will have as many positive effects as moving to full ABS. It won’t just make umpiring better, it will make baseball better.

 

 

 

Newsletter Excerpt, June 18, 2024 -- "Automation, Pt. 1"

 

This is a preview of the Joe Sheehan Baseball Newsletter, an e-mail newsletter about all things baseball, featuring analysis and opinion about the game on and off the field from the perspective of the informed outsider.

You can subscribe to the newsletter for one year for $79.95 using your PayPal account or major credit card.

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 Whatever the outputs, though, ABS is far superior to human umpires in one key way: It calls pitches based on where they cross the plate, where they go past the batter, rather than based on what the catcher does. This alone makes ABS better than what we have now, because ABS calls pitches. In modern baseball, home-plate umpires don’t call pitches, they call catches.

Let’s repeat that.

ABS calls pitches, umpires call catches.

Newsletter Excerpt, June 17, 2024 -- "Mailbag"

 

This is a preview of the Joe Sheehan Baseball Newsletter, an e-mail newsletter about all things baseball, featuring analysis and opinion about the game on and off the field from the perspective of the informed outsider.

You can subscribe to the newsletter for one year for $79.95 using your PayPal account or major credit card.

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Do you think it's really, really good for MLB that they have so many wild cards to keep everyone interested when division leaders have such terrific records/leads so early? Plenty of time for most teams to get hot and get themselves a shot.

--Tom E.

The expanded playoffs are designed to keep mediocre teams in the race and theoretically keep their fans invested longer. I don’t really enjoy watching .480 baseball teams, and I have argued many times that if you just analyze the games played by wild-card contenders in September, they do not seem to move attendance at all. My personal preference would be for a maximally meaningful regular season feeding into a shorter, smaller postseason.

--J.

Newsletter Excerpt, June 14, 2024 -- "The Cubs"

 

This is a preview of the Joe Sheehan Baseball Newsletter, an e-mail newsletter about all things baseball, featuring analysis and opinion about the game on and off the field from the perspective of the informed outsider.

You can subscribe to the newsletter for one year for $79.95 using your PayPal account or major credit card.

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The Cubs have lost six games when leading after six innings, as they did last night. That’s tied for eighth-worst in baseball. Their .793 winning percentage when leading after six is eighth-worst. The Cubs are seventh-worst in runs allowed in the last three innings. Their relievers have the second-most losses in baseball, with 18, and the Cubs’ bullpen is one of four with more losses than saves. 

 

 

Newsletter Excerpt, June 13, 2024 -- "Thinking Inside the Box"

 

This is a preview of the Joe Sheehan Baseball Newsletter, an e-mail newsletter about all things baseball, featuring analysis and opinion about the game on and off the field from the perspective of the informed outsider.

You can subscribe to the newsletter for one year for $79.95 using your PayPal account or major credit card.

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Right now, the Brewers have a top-ten offense and a top-ten bullpen. Their starters...are 25th in FIP, 24th in K-BB%. They just need to not lose games for the team, and so far, they’re doing just that. The Brewers have used 12 starters, tied for most in baseball with the Braves, with Jared Koenig serving as an opener four times. The Brewers are down Wade Miley for the year, as well as DL Hall, Robert Gasser, and Joe Ross for the moment. Every quality start from the likes of Myers is big as they try to steal the NL Central. 

 

 

Newsletter Excerpt, June 12, 2024 -- "Parity"

This is a preview of the Joe Sheehan Baseball Newsletter, an e-mail newsletter about all things baseball, featuring analysis and opinion about the game on and off the field from the perspective of the informed outsider.

You can subscribe to the newsletter for one year for $79.95 using your PayPal account or major credit card.

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Instead of investing our baseball attention in the best teams, the next few months will be spent with this large group of mediocrity, seeing which ones, if any, can rise to an 85-win level. There are any number of reasons to dislike expanded playoffs, but this may be the most frustrating for me, the way it forces us to care more about teams playing .525 ball than ones playing .625 ball.