The joy of baseball lies in its unpredictability. The g**damn frustrating joy of baseball lies in its predictability. In 2015, when opposing batters swung at the first pitch off Masahiro Tanaka, they slugged .508 with four home runs. In September/October, the Yankees offense ranked last or second-to-last in the AL in batting average, on-base percentage, and OPS. […]
Author: Andrew Felper
Seven Weeks in 1998: Comparing Shane Spencer to 2015’s Rookie Sluggers
And these children that you spit on As they try to change their worlds Are immune to your consultations They’re quite aware of what they’re going through 44 years after David Bowie sang about the resistance faced by youth, and 30 years after John Hughes co-opted the lyrics to represent upper middle-class teenage angst in […]
No Longer Boom or Bust: Brian McCann’s Yankee Stadium Production
In the winter of 2013, Baseball Prospectus ranked Brian McCann as the off-season’s fourth best free agent. At the time, he was a 29-year-old, prime-of-his career catcher and a career .277/.350/.473 hitter. McCann had six seasons of at least 20 home runs and a career 10 percent walk rate. When he signed with the Yankees […]
One Very Good Year: Randy Johnson’s Yankees Career
Randy Johnson’s impending enshrinement in Cooperstown has caused baseballs fans to look back in sheer awe at his remarkable run in pinstripes. The purple and teal (or aqua?) pinstripes of the Arizona Diamondbacks, that is. The left-hander with an incredible resume—five Cy Youngs Awards, 10 All-Star Games, 303 wins, 4,875 strikeouts (second all-time)—will wear a […]
Four-Seam Domination: The Resurgence of Mark Teixeira
You can call it a comeback. You can call it a return to form. You can even call it a third cliched expression not thought of by uninventive baseball writer, but that would be kind of mean. No matter what you call the first half of Mark Teixeira’s 2015, though, one thing is undeniably true: […]