08.10.24
This was originally posted as a thread on Twitter at x.com/seldomusedres/status/182197018550… but I thought I would post here, too.
My son turned 18 yesterday and I have one baseball game left with him. This is the story of our summer of baseball…and so much more…
1/10 One More Game
My son turned 18 today. We've spent the summer traveling to watch baseball before he starts college in a couple weeks. We've got one more game.
2/10 We've been to San Marcos, San Antonio (2x), Sugar Land, Round Rock (3x), Oakland, San Francisco, San Jose and Houston (2x). We've traveled by car, plane, Lyft and our feet...stayed in hotels, motels, airports and Holiday Inns.
3/10 Sat thru blazing Texas sun, wind, rain, air-conditioned stadiums and 65 degrees in mid-July in CA...had a ton of fun in the first row in Sugar Land, a little shaky in Oakland, traveled on Crowd Strike Outage day (& several days after), drove across the Golden Gate Bridge.
4/10 I've been exhausted, exhilarated, proud, sad, concerned, carefree and almost every other emotion you can imagine.
5/10 At times I've been so excited and happy for him...he's young, headed to college, the whole world in front of him...
6/10 At other times, I'm terrified for him...when I turn on the internet or read the news...conflicted..., but these trips were a highlight of my life...the good, the bad, the ugly..but that's part of being a parent.
7/10 This baseball journey is something I'll never forget. We've grown closer...had conversations we've rarely had at home. Something about baseball brings that out of him. In the car, at the hotel, in the stands. He's shared hopes, dreams, concerns, fears.
8/10 For me what they say has been true...it goes by fast...my advice is don't wish the days away...soak up every moment...good and bad...as the song says, "You're gonna miss this, you're gonna want this back, you're gonna wish these days hadn't gone by so fast, I know I do.
9/10 Maybe baseball isn't your kid's thing...I'd recommend finding whatever is your kid's thing..and sharing it with them if they'll let you in. Mine did and it's been a fantastic ride. Almost magical at times.
10/10 One more game with him. 9 innings..& I'm already dreading the end...but he knows I love him & he appreciates our home & what he has. I know because he told me in the San Jose airport. One more game... Here's to hoping it's the longest game in Minor League history.
07.13.24
Hunter Brown tossed another quality start last night as the Astros beat the Rangers 6-3.
Brown has made a remarkable turnaround this season from a pitcher who was 1-4 with a 7.71 ERA on May 17, to one that is 7-6 with a 4.39 ERA today.
Underlying the progress is a concern on the stress being put on Brown’s arm as indicated by his stress index.
While Brown’s season average is below the team average, that can mainly be attributed to his early departure and blowout scores during the first part of the season.
As Brown has gone deeper into games and he’s accumulated stress levels of over 100 three times since June 19.
This is my first season tracking this data, so the sample is tiny, everyone’s arm is different, so who knows if this means anything.
Brown has thrown 98.1 innings and the Astros will have 66 games left post-All-Star break and Brown is likely to get between 12-13 more starts if he remains healthy and effective.
Last season Brown threw 155.2 innings, the most of his professional career.
He faded down the stretch, earning one win (and four losses) in five September starts (and a relief appearance), giving up 22 earned runs in 22.2 innings.
07.11.24
Watching Kaleb Ort pitch last night I had an idea for a new stat that I don’t think is tracked.
Ort covered two innings, which relievers didn’t do very much of under Dusty Baker and I had grown to assume one inning per reliever, meaning they would typically have used two last night.
Ort covered two innings and as I said to my son, “Ort saved an arm”.
That’s valuable.
The entire point of astrosprojections.com is to look at numbers differently when possible and this (and its reverse, when an inning can’t be completed and another arm is used) will add some additional context around the value (or not) of a reliever.
Sometimes, especially for those who pitch in low-leverage situations, the numbers we all know and love: ERA, ERA+, xERA, WHIP, FIP, xFIP, etc. don’t convey the value a pitcher provides to his team.
“Eating innings” is a thing, especially with an injury-riddled, well-traveled, fringy bullpen staff.
I plan to track this moving forward, though I’m not quite sure what that will look like at this point.
More to come.