Baseball Chatter 04/28

Jeremy Hellickson has thrown his changeup at least 35 percent of the time in each of his last three starts. The Phillies have won all five games he has started, despite just 11 strikeouts in 30 innings. His strikeout rate has dipped to 9.5 percent

Brandon Phillips is expected to play today after missing a couple games with a groin strain.

I’m going to wrap it up, I’m going to do something. I’m going to be like Chipotle burrito, I’m wrapping that thing up. I’m not going on the DL, I promise you thatBrandon Phillips on his Groin Strain

R.A. Dickey pitched at City Field for the first time since he was traded in 2012. He left after the fifth with left quad spasms.

Matt Harvey filled in for the ailing Noah Syndegaard last night, with little to no advance notice. His velocity dropped substantially after the first inning and he only induced five swings and misses out of 86 pitches over 4 ⅓ innings.

Things were just pretty tight mechanically. Overall it felt tight on the mound and couldn’t get loose throughout the start. Just kind of a rough day It’s different, something I’m not used to. I needed to do a better job of being ready. I was expecting to pitch [Friday], I had a big workout [Wednesday], so body-wise it just tightened up and I wasn’t physically prepared for starting. Obviously it’s happened before once, and I need to be ready for it to happen again. I got the call and I just needed to be ready.Matt Harvey

Eric Hosmer is hitting .195, and leads the league in hitting into double plays (7)

Francisco Rodriguez has allowed a run in six of his last nine appearances. Last night he earned his second loss to go along with two blown saves so far this season. Tigers need to invest in a bullpen for once. Jeez, what is so hard about getting a decent bullpen? Poor Tigers fans.

Ervin Santana is 4-0 with a .77 ERA after five starts this season. Last night he threw seven innings, allowed four hits and earned one run.

Joey Gallo hit home run number seven last night 462 feet, breaking his longest home run in baseball record from last week. Only Miguel Sano has a higher average exit velocity than Gallo’s 97.2 mph. Some think Gallo will have no job when Beltre returns and I say, poppycock and bulldinky. If you hit, they will find room in the lineup for you.

The Rangers provided zero run support to Andrew Cashner for the third consecutive start.

Roberto Osuna has blown four of his past six save opportunities – including three of his last four. With two outs in the ninth inning last night he allowed the game tying homer. Toronto lost in eleven innings.

Yasmany Tomas is batting .353 (12-for-34) with four home runs and 13 RBI over the last nine games.

Chris Sale is the third pitcher since 1913 to begin his Red Sox career with five straight starts of seven-plus innings and two or fewer earned runs. He struck out seven of the first ten Yankees he faced last night and ten overall. Unfortunately, the Red Sox have scored just four runs for Sale in his 37 ²/₃ innings on the mound.

Dodgers manager Dave Roberts is still hinting around that Rich Hill may not rejoin the rotation upon his return from the disabled list.

I can’t say with 100 percent confidence when Rich will be back as a starter, We’ve talked about him potentially coming back sooner in a role out of the ’pen and he’s open to that. So that would sort of leave an opportunity for Woody to stay in the rotation. I don’t want to get too far ahead of ourselves but I do expect him to make his next start.Kenta’s here for the long haul But I think we always say every start is important – but even for Kenta’s confidence to go out there and spit out a good one. If you look at the whole body of work, there’s been a lot of good pitches but the (slugging percentage), the damage he hasn’t been able to avoid. This is a situation where I think Kenta is really focused and wants to pitch well. We want him to pitch well. And, yeah, after tomorrow I think we will look at things and see what’s best for Kenta, what’s best for all of us.Manager Dave Roberts on Rotation

Could he really consider moving Hill to the pen with Kenta Maeda leading the league with seven home runs allowed in 19 innings?

Injury News

Didi Gregorius is expected to be activated from disabled list today.

Both A.J. Griffin and Sam Dyson are eligible to come off the disabled list today. Dyson only managed to throw nine strikes out of nineteen pitches in a rehab assignment so who know when he will be back, but Griffin should be activated this afternoon.

Yoenis Cespedes left the game with a hamstring injury, and when I say he left the game, i mean he needed the help of a man on each side of him to limp off the field. He is going to miss significant time.

Cespedes missed three games last week because of his hammy. Makes you wonder why he wasn’t already on the disabled list.. Also makes you wonder why Syndergaard isn’t on it when he can’t even lift his arm over his head.

Steven Matz is looking pretty smart now isn’t he? Speaking of Matz, both him and Seth Lugo are going to throw off a mound soon, after both threw from 120 feet without any discomfort.

Lugo has a partial tear in his UCL, but there is no talk about Tommy John surgery???

Shelby Miller, after three opinions, has been diagnosed with a strained flexor tendon and partial tear of UCL in his right elbow. He now gets to decide between Tommy John surgery, Stem Cell Therapy or Platelet Rich Plasma .

Team News

The White Sox turned things around when they got lucky enough to face the Royals. The Sox went 23 innings before scoring a run, now they have 28 runs in three games, along with three straight wins.

Is it time for the Royals to start talking some trades with other clubs? They have scored less runs this season than the Nats and Rockies scored in their three game series. They have lost seven in a row, in last place in the American League Central, are only averaging 2.57 runs per game, and their batting average is the worst in baseball .203, the worst in baseball…

After starting the season 3-9, The Cardinals are back to .500 and have won eight of their last 10

The Phillies have a six game win streak, are two games over .500, and average 4.75 runs per game. The first and second hitters have combined for a .397 on base percentage and 34 runs scored.

The Marlins had to drive to Delaware last night because there were no rooms available in Philly due to the NFL draft, and manager Don Mattingly was annoyed that his team lacked energy after traveling over 7,000 miles on the road trip.

The Mets have lost six of their last ten and ten of their last 11. They have been swept by the Braves three times in the past ten months.

 

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