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STARTING PITCHER RANKINGS

I love the BJOL rankings, not in the sense that I enjoy them, but in the sense that I believe in the information.  Who would you rather face - Dallas Keuchel in a slump, or Ian Kennedy on a roll?  Tennis-style "rankings" give you a blend here.  You can tell who is good, like an All-Star, and who is throwing great over the last few months.

Who's the toughest draw tonight?  I can just check the BJOL rankings.  We're sure Jhoulys Chacin can pitch, but he's #165 in the majors, theoretically not able to break a 30x5 starter pool.  The game is not won, but the M's couldn't request a more do-able evening.  Dem's da Big Leagues.

One thing the BJOL rankings don't do, is put a thumb on the scale for newbies who are rising fast.  Chess ELO ratings do this.  If you outperform your expectation by a long ways, you'll get "bonus points" added to your rating -- so you don't "victimize" your opponents.  A 13-year-old junior might have a rating of 1500 but in fact have a playing strength of 1900.  When SABRMatt sits down and punches the clock against Junior, his own ratings change should reflect the 1900, not the 1500.  Chess ratings account for this.

So that's the asterisk, that Nate Karns presently has a 1600 rating but is pitching at 1900 strength.  USCF would have had him on a "provisional" rating and his jumps would have been twice or three times as fast.

At any rate, the M's rotation among 205 ranked starters, with the Opening Day rankings in parentheses:

• #13 (12) Felix
• #39 (35) WBC-san
• #46 (46) Wade Miley
• #75 (95) Taijuan
• #95 (118) Nate Karns

To quicken a game of Monopoly, you can shuffle the title deeds and deal out three of them to each player to start the game.  If you did that with current MLB starters to 30 roto owners, the M's rotation would represent:

• A mid-range #1 starter
• A top #2 starter
• A mid-range #2 starter
• A mid-range #3 starter
• A lower-range #3 starter ... well, he will be after two more starts :- )

It's interesting that the system sees Wade Miley as a top-50 starter, and thinks he has done nothing in 2016 to preach otherwise.  Well, he does have 7.0 strikeouts a game and a 1+ walk rate.  A few homers have cost him in the ERA department.

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There's no doubt that Felix is drawing fewer swings and misses, and striking out fewer batters.  For seven starts this year, he's morphed into a type of Super Jered, the tricksy one who drove you batty with location and change speed.  It will be interesting to watch and see whether Felix throws some 10K games up there and bounces back, or whether this version of Felix is the one we've now got.

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HOTTEST HITTERS

Kyle Seager is the 18th-hottest hitter in baseball, at 89 degrees ambient temperature.  Really he was just hitting the ball at fielders earlier, and now the toe-tap has him at the very pinnacle of his game.  Did you know he was already back to .496 SLG?  And his OPS+ is 125, equal to the highest he's been in his career, at 126.  This could be the year when he breaks out, hits 30 or more homers if he's going to do it.

The last two weeks, 13 games since April 30, he is .385/.411/.750, with 8 doubletriples and 3 homers.  As we go into tonight's ballgame he steps up there as a temporary Stan Musial.

Also Chris Iannetta is 84 degrees ... if that's the temperature in your house right now, you live in another country.  His slash line is rather like his career line:

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Since he's playing in Safeco, the OPS+ comes out to 113, as opposed to his lifelong 102.  Walks play fine in the Safeco updraft.  He gets a night off on Saturday; he's on pace for 134 game played, his previous high being 115.  Put another way, he's always had at least 40 games' rest, at least two a week; so far this year he's only had 6 games' rest.  

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TIREDEST CLOSERS

Cody Allen is the tiredest, with Steve Cishek number two.  Maybe that had something to do with the maddening loss on Friday.  In any case, Dr. D wishes to avoid seeing him pitch on Saturday.  DiPoto just sold Edwin Diaz as "a high-impact major league reliever" so what's the holdup?  Start the clock ticking on his MLB orientation.

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UND TAKE ZIS MIT YOU

The News Tribune has the M's #4 in their power rankings, probably higher than where you'd sea the Hawks right now.  No cheering in the press box, babe.

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See you at the ballpark,

Dr D

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artwork:  James Bennett