What Were the Odds?
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From Hey Bill this week:
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Later in the week a reader chimed in "Kyle Schwarber," which (he says nicely) completely misses the point. Well, which makes a point similar to the questioner's but completely dissimilar to Zunino's situation. Schwarber is a 24-year-old prospect -- that's young to win a starting job in the majors -- and who had 200-odd at bats before 2017, was sent to AAA in late June to make adjustments, and who made them. True enough, Schwarber looked in June like he was fighting an extreme rearguard action in his first* real job ...
... but who did not look like a player who had been totally destroyed 5 different times (2013, 2104, 2015, 2016, 2017) by major league pitchers.
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On the broad sabermetric point: sure. All kinds of kids have been sent back down to the minors, made adjustments, and come back to the majors to star in the second half. How many of those occur per year? 0.5, 1.0, 2.5, you pick ... :- )
On the narrow sabermetric point: how many HR/RBI kids with huge swings do this? Fascinating to reflect that "none" have ever done this and returned fast enough to bang 30 taters.
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On the Mariner point: the Mariners SURE ARE WEIRD. I mean they are WEIRD. The whole organization is just super weird. But then again there's comfort in that; it remindes us that we weren't homers (as such!) to think Justin Smoak could do good. He was on the cover of Baseball Prospectus, y know.
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On the Mike Zunino point: he was a #3 overall. Or whatever it was. Picked 3 by the guy who picked Fielder and Weeks and Braun and stuff. Maybe it's just that all these guys (Zunino, Smoak, Condor, whoever) had to learn how to play without any help from their home org?
Going into the month of June - like, school is out then, or used to be - Zuumball had hit 1 homer. I don't know what his second half PX (Power Index) is going to be next year, 160, 170?, but I bet it's up there with the top 10 guys in the game. PX is going to be Zunino's calling card. He ain't a 6 runs per game guy and don't need to be. Enjoy his PX for what it's worth.
BABVA,
Dr D