1. Bedard's Change
Quoth Drayer:
As for the stuff, Adam Moore who faced him gave this report.
"He looked really good. There was a lot of life on the fastball, the curveball was good and the changeup had good sink and cut."
The change up is relatively new for Bedard. I spoke with Rob Johnson about this a few weeks ago and he feels it could be a big, and needed pitch for Bedard. The problem in the past he said was that guys just couldn't square up the fastball. This is great until they start fouling off four or five pitches. Bedard has told me in the past that this is a frustration of his, that he wants the guys to put the ball in play but instead they keep fouling if off and up goes the pitch count. The Mariners are looking to give him an extra weapon with a change up that apparently today looked very good. No batters got a hit off him.
Obviously, we all noticed Bedard only going 5.0 IP. Did folks notice lots of foul balls driving up the pitch count? Anyway, it's interesting that they are looking to improve Bedard and not just rehab him.
2. Saunders offense
http://seattle.mariners.mlb.com/video/play.jsp?content_id=7996403&c_id=sea
Everyone points out that Saunders was only hitting .200 at Tacoma. Actually, his April was worse: .129/.191/.129. 8 singles in 62 AB. One extra-inning game yielded an epic 0-fer-7 with 3 K. But he also had a .170 BABIP on a 20.4 LD% so he was not catching any breaks.
Then he was on a 5-game hitting streak, got a fluke call-up due to MB's issues, and suddenly is the only offensive presence in the MLB lineup.
I've always been one to contend that Saunders had a decent chance of "getting it" and that, if he did, he had great athletic ability to which to join up with the baseball skills. It was a matter of figuring out the baseball skills.
I realize he's on a hot streak right now, but how do folks feel about his chances of "getting it." Ignoring the 4 XBH, only 3 K in 18 ABs is a good place to start, considering he fanned 40 times in 122 ABs in his 09 trial (17% vs. 33%).
Especially in June last year, I remember one inning where he retired a team 1-2-3 and needed 31 pitches to do it. Even in his peak season, he had lots of swing-and-misses but he also had lots of fouls. And in 2009, he definitely had almost no swing-and-misses and a whole bunch of foul strikes and strike threes were largely looking at his curve.