Late Pick - Read Now 6/10

Accounting and analysis a little later, busy morning

FG - Nationals -103 Griffin/Ray

29-42-5, -1,16.52, - ROR -15.5%

6/010/2026

FG – Nationals -103 Griffin/Ray

Like a bunch of pitchers hitting the wall recently, Ray is fading fast, while Griffen has proven himself very good, and very reliable. L/L offense favors the Nats by a large margin. Nats are not to be feared on the road or on get-away-day.

Play At Your Own Risk.

Hey sac, or anyone else that may know, what has become of barneybeans? If he is taking some time off I missed the post. Good 'ol boy, we need him around here.

On it !!!

You guys wanna understand something that is going on? Well, pitchers and pitching coaches have once again embraced stupidity. Let me explain. Back in the late 80's and 90's OBP became all the rage. "take a lot of pitches, grind the starter down, get him out of there." Some of the points were made in "Money Ball". For a while it worked, but there was one guy that never fell for it at all. Cliff Lee, of the Phillies, a great lefty, had the answer immediately, but it takes so long to change the baseball "mindset" that the theory lasted for years. Cliff's answer right from the start was correct all along. Strike one, strike two, now "you wanna keep grinding me down, or get that twig off your shoulder and try to get on base?" So, while some guys were stupid and would stare at strike three (he figured out which ones), most were sane enough to figure out you ain't gonna grind this guy down. Pitch three was close to the zone, but still a little out, but too close to stare at (defend the plate!).

NOW, we find the hitters getting away with a dead strategy again. If they don't swing at strike one, THEY ARE ALMOST ASSURED OF GETTING BALL ONE RIGHT BEHIND IT. Yeah the pitcher wants them to swing at a bad one, but the pitches miss the zone by so far they are almost never fooled. So, with the count 1-1 the pitcher still feels the advantage is his, which it is, so he throws another one outside the zone that misses by a foot, fools no one, and gives up his advantage. With no effort at all the hitter is even in the count and the pitcher can no longer fool around. The strategy has worked! Three or four pitches that accomplished nothing other than "grinding him down" which was the strategy of the OBP tactic all along. Cliff Lee, Nolan Ryan, Roger Clemens, guys like that? Never fooled for a minute, but today's coaches and pitchers are suckers for it. 

There you go; another rant that means little or nothing because we all know "pitching doesn't matter anymore."

BOL with that attitude.

This nats bullpen is absolutely ridiculous!

@chitownjake007

 That has to be the ugliest loss in handicapping history. Now go watch the manager, on the post game show, make excuses for his bullpen, when what they need is the most insulting chewing out imaginable. There are NO excuses. What were they doing out in the pen, smoking a joint, or getting into the beer early? 

That performance was downright unprofessional. Get a haircut and a shave and act like a grown up man!

@KeyElement

 I should be getting email from Reg after that one, he did like your rant a few days ago and agreed. 

Have to say that was pretty incredibl. Sometimes I'll hedge on the runline but didn't see the point today. You mentioned beer and joints- Maybe some coming up !

@Contrarian

 That's one way (or two) to ease the pain

you are absolutely right key. I'm 52 years old and I've never seen an implosion like that before! For the hell of it, I put $10 on the Giants when they were down 9 to 1 after seven innings at +3000 thinking no way that it would happen. You are right, people need to be held accountable for this one.

I had the over 8 in this game. Both pitchers last 5 starts were all overs. But I didn't think I'd see that many runs when the game hit the 5th inning.