Pitching Grips

The World Series — our annual signifier of another season smoked to its filter — is always a culmination of the sport’s beauty. Teams get rewarded for playing a winning brand of baseball all throughout October, managers are vindicated in all of the micro-decisions that got them there, and front offices can comfortably rest their heads at night knowing their systems and philosophies weren’t… Source * This article was originally published here

Runs are hard to come by during the postseason, in part because of the outsized impact of cooler weather and overpowering relief pitching. So far this fall, no pitcher has done a better job of keeping runs off the board than Aaron Ashby. Working in a multi-inning role that recalls a bygone era of bullpen firemen, the 28-year-old lefty has delivered 12 1/3 scoreless innings for the Brewers thus… Source * This article was originally published here

If you’ve been following the postseason closely, you probably know why every Guardians player celebrates a single by turning to their dugout and flashing their teammates a thumbs down. “When a Guardians hitter notches a single, he stands on first base, peers toward the dugout and flashes either two thumbs up or two thumbs down, depending on how hard he struck the ball.” That’s how The Athletic’s… Source * This article was originally published here

Welcome to our Open Game Thread for the ALCS game today. Only Members can participate, and unlike our usual staff Q&A chats, your messages will be posted immediately. Our Member community is made up of thousands of incredibly knowledgable baseball fans, and we think this is a great way to follow a game with like-minded baseball enthusiasts. We might even have some FanGraphs Staff drop in and join the fun. Please be courteous to your fellow Members, or you may find your chat privileges revoked. Source * This article was originally published here

One of the great underrated joys of baseball is a competitive best-of-seven series that ends in five games. Think the 2024 World Series, when the only game the Dodgers lost was also the only game that was decided by more than three runs. The series scoreboard suggests that it was lopsided, but the individual games were absolutely riveting. Even more overlooked is the enthralling four-game sweep… Source * This article was originally published here

Whether or not you tuned in for Game 3 of the NLCS between the Brewers and the Dodgers, you surely know by now that the highlight of the game belonged to Jake Bauers. After working a back-breaking 12-pitch walk that hastened Yoshinobu Yamamoto’s early departure from Game 2, Bauers put the Brewers ahead with a homer in the seventh inning on the 11th pitch he saw from Blake Snell. Ben Clemens… Source * This article was originally published here

Every October, FanGraphs grades each playoff manager. We focus on their in-game decisions, because a lot of the most important parts of the job – things like keeping players ready to go and making sure relievers understand their role so they know when they might be deployed – aren’t always visible to us from the outside looking in. A lot of what managers do never reaches the public eye, so these… Source * This article was originally published here