Pitching Grips

RVR Photos-Imagn Images The first thing to know about the firing of Carlos Mendoza is that nobody in the Mets’ clubhouse believes their poor performance is the former manager’s fault. Not David Stearns, the president of baseball operations. Not Francisco Lindor , the franchise shortstop. Not Bo Bichette , the big offseason acquisition. Not Andy Green , the farm director-turned-interim manager. Mendoza did not lose the clubhouse, Stearns said at a press conference Friday afternoon, less than six hours after the team announced the dismissal, while Lindor said he and the players failed Mendoza. It would be easy to point to the embarrassing series the Mets just played against the Cubs at Citi Field, the low point coming in the second game of Wednesday’s doubleheader. Each of the four infielders made at least one error; that hadn’t happened since Sept. 8, 1962. New York recorded six defensive miscues in total. But the truth is, neither one game nor one series did Mendoza in. T...

12:16 Eric A Longenhagen : Hey, chatters. We’ll get underway in 10 minutes, or so. Get your questions in. 12:27 Eric A Longenhagen : Okay, good morning everyone. Thanks for your patience. Quicker chat today due to a vet visit. 12:27 liljebbie10 : Do you think Seth Hernandez makes it to AA by the end of the year? Do you think he could debut by the end of next year? Is his upside Bubba Chandler but throws strikes more consistently? 12:29 Eric A Longenhagen : I think they’ll make him sustain success with Greensboro before promoting him, but I do think the end of next year (late enough for him to retain rookie eligibility in 2028) is possible. Don’t give up on Bubba throwing strikes yet, he’s too young to be this impatient and conclude he won’t. 12:29 dansanchez86 : Joseph Dzierwa real? 12:30 Eric A Longenhagen : To an extent. I think his ceiling is limited by his breaking ball quality. I don’t thi...

2:02 Jason Martinez : Welcome to the RosterResource chat! Last chat of June and then I’m sure we’ll all be heavily focused on trades for the next several weeks. As of now, 4 AL teams look like sellers (DET, KCR, LAA, BOS all 12+ games under .500) but still too early since they’re all within 5-6 games of a playoff spot. 3 NL teams (NYM, SFG, COL) are far enough out where they’re getting ready to sell. Should be a fun July. Here we go … 2:03 Phil : What’s your best guess as to the total number of Red Sox traded? Is it going to be a Bloomian tweak or a Cheringtonian purge? I’m kind of assuming Gray and Chapman are inevitable. 2:05 Jon Becker : I think closer to a tweak than a purge. I’m not even sure Aroldis gets traded because he has a vesting option for next year that’s all but certain to vest (he just needs 40 IP + a passed physical), and they’ll have to kick in some money to move Gray but he...

Pablo Robles-Imagn Images I ended up here by accident. I was writing about Steven Kwan yesterday, and I found myself on a leaderboard that contained all 3,658 qualified seasons for batters since 2002. That’s the first year Sports Info Solutions started tracking its reams and reams of granular data, so I spend a lot of time with the leaderboards set to that particular date range. If somebody is at the top or bottom of a column on that leaderboard, then they have earned a superlative. For example, in 2003, SIS credited Tony Batista with a 63.4% pull rate — the highest pull rate ever recorded! I have to believe it’s the highest of all time, too. How is it even possible to pull the ball 63% of the time? It certainly sounds impossible, but I believe the number to be true both because the second and eighth spots also belong to Batista, and because, well, do you remember Tony Batista’s batting stance? Yeah, that’s what you’d expect a guy with a 63% pull rate to look like. Batista’s offen...