New Sheriff in Town  

Baseball’s owners met, and despite some bluster against Rob Manfred, he was ultimately elected the next commissioner of baseball by a unanimous vote. It’s no upset that he was elected, but the interesting thing is that he was unanimously elected despite known opposition by as many as six owners. The significance of a unified front means that when labor negotiations begin in the next year (the current deal expires in 2016) the owners aren’t giving the players any leverage for dissent. In the end the all mighty dollar won out as owners realized that Manfred will continue to stalk steroid users and other cheaters to help get them out of the game and thus not have to pay for stats that won’t continue. I’m guessing that’s why the other 24 owners convinced the dissenters to rethink their positions; the thought of going back to building your franchise from the ground up rather than pay free agents double their actual value was far more appealing.  

Stat Trending 

The sport is moving backward in that 30 home runs will be like hitting 50 maybe as soon as next year. This year the first half of the season saw Nelson Cruz, Jose Abreu and Giancarlo Stanton be the first to 30 homers, however since they reached that number Cruz and Abreu have drastically tailed off their production. Abreu has recently admitted that the Major League season is much more of a grind than he was used to playing; a full season in Cuba of fewer than 100 games. Cruz has historically not been able to stay healthy a full season and indeed spent time on the DL this year for a hand/wrist injury that sapped his power ever since. Stanton has taken a more methodical approach to his total, and despite his own rich injury history has managed to stay healthy this year and hit the majority of his home runs in a home ballpark that isn’t a power hitter's dream.   

Conversely, Jose Altuve, all 5 feet 6 inches of him, leads the majors in hits, average and the American League in stolen bases for the Astros who are 19 games under .500.   

Stat Shifting 

The use of defensive shifts, mostly versus left handed hitters has kept averages in the middling .260 range and has no doubt been frustrating to hitters. Managers are forcing hitters to use the whole field, which in their mind means a lesser hit ball the other way rather than a line drive in the power gap, and in turn the defensive team incurs less base runners thus keeping the starting pitcher in game longer. With the divide between managers who use analytics and shift, and those “old school” skippers who play the game as written in the rule book being very rigid, hitters no doubt will favor an old school manager as line drives into the short outfield will once again be hits and not outs. That’s not to say players don’t like playing for managers who shift, Joe Maddon is one of the most intelligent and respected managers in the game, and he employs the shift more than any other manager. This is no doubt a byproduct of being in a small market where he needs to maximize his player’s ability in order to contend each year.   

September Call Ups 

Fantasy baseball people are excited to see which teams bring up prospects after September 1st when rosters expand and the minor league season is done. This is dangerous for a couple reasons; one is if a highly touted player such as Jorge Soler comes up and dominates for the Cubs fans will ask why he wasn’t up earlier to buoy a playoff run. This can make fans contentious with GM’s and ownership which is never good, especially for a team asking fans to accept a rebuild. The second reason is the exact opposite, the kid comes up and is overmatched by a Major League fastball or a pitcher doesn’t have a secondary pitch and is exposed. This can stunt growth but should make the player focus on what they need to work on in the off season; it’s whether or not the player is able to forsake his ego and work to get better. Prime example of this is Mike Trout, he came up at the end of 2011 with the Angels out of contention and struggled- .220 average 30 K’s in 123 at bats. Of course he has worked to become a perennial MVP candidate in the next three seasons, this one included.