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ARIEL MIRANDA
In the 27th start of his career, opted for "Ah, who cares" mode. Many times you saw him stepping back into his rock, practically at the same time as Zunino put the sign down. His body language, his first-pitch strikes, and his 2-hit shutout all spoke for his extreme ATTACK mode.
Now, if you're going to encourage your talented rookie to just grab the ball and huck it -- and the M's should do this with Miranda -- then you're going to have to console him when he gives up two-three homers now and again. Drew Smyly his ownself gave up 5 or more runs how many times last season? Ten times. Any non-superstar pitcher is going to take his lumps. But Miranda will give you scads of 10-0 wins if you let him go at people like that.
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Miranda is tough regardless. He's 7-4, 3.82 with a toolbox Sam Gaviglio only dreams he could have. But he is truly special when he (1) gets the bats started, gets them cheating, with a 93 MPH full court press and then comes back with (2) offspeed stuff that drops below the knees. They fish time and time and time again. As his change/splitter develop more, he's looking at a role as a reliable staff ace.
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MAX POVSE
In Spring Training, used a 92 MPH fastball and a long, long string of Ultra King Felix (TM) pitch sequences. Reg'lar King Felix (TM) sequences avoid the sweet spot of the plate; Ultra (TM) sequences nick the corners and/or break outside the zone. Both stay ahead of the hitter. (Felix himself had a healthy portion of Felix sequences last time out, particularly with dry spitters dropping out of the zone.)
But Povse's first couple games up, he has resorted to a Kato/Pink Panther mode of diving for the middle-middle throat of the zone with 95 MPH fastballs. His body language is high and bunched in his shoulders. It's pretty understandable that he'd be nervous, we suppose ...
Povse needs to settle in before we can get a good look at him. But his power curve/change is even better than advertised and this is a very nice pull at the deck for a 13-game winner.
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LONG LINEUP
The M's have 5 starters whose offense is 125+ or better, and 8 who are 103 or better. The 9th player is the Dyson/Heredia platoon.
Story up on M's.com about Nelson Cruz going homerless the last month. A couple of degrees of launch angle, here and there, is just luck of course. Kind of funny still. Every Mariner including Ruiz has homered in the meantime -- HEH! -- but without homers, Cruz is still slugging .500 with 59 RBI in half a season.
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Gamel and Zunino of course will fall back to earth, but "earth" doesn't necessarily mean Tacoma. Gamel hitting .348 for a half a season is about as likely as Seth Smith hitting .348 for half a year, but Seth Smith isn't exactly gum on your shoe. The M's team OPS+ is 105 and heading way north from there.
The M's put up a graphic on the TV last night, showing that Mike Zunino was #2 all time for catcher RBI in the month of June. Point A, that's a junk stat. But now move on to point B. Supposing I told you Jeremy Gwinn would some day set an American League record for "Reliever Strikeouts In the Month of August"?
Here is Zuumball's 1-arm 400+ foot shot. He stayed back on an offspeed, took a little fungo swing, and ... Harmon Killebrew would have come to tears on it. https://www.mlb.com/gameday/mariners-vs-angels/2017/06/30/491304?#game_s...
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The M's offense is probably deeeeeper even than the 116-win M's, not to say better. But Kyle Seager is running #7 in the Seattle OPS+ 500 and that's about where he fits right now, career 120ish OPS notwithstanding.
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Enjoy,
Dr D
