Sale with a great start so far- 3 shut out innings with 6 k's. He's got to continue pitching well tonight to IMO get back into the lead.

Giancarlo Stanton with #51 tonight vs the Nats. with that he moves into a 6 way tie for 33rd all time single season. Think about it- only 32 seasons in MLB history did a guy hit more homers than Stanton has this year. The only 2 active guys who have done so- Jose Bautista and Chris Davis. With his next homer- he would join 6 guys who hit 52 homers.

With the homer he hit tonight- he just joins guys named Cecil Fielder, Andruw Jones, Ralph Kiner, Willie Mays, and Johnny Mize. Pretty decent company I'd say.

Overall- if there are 21 homers hit tonight, we will be up to 5000 for the season. Only the 12th season ever with that many homers. Looks like 4 hit so far tonight. So only 17 to go for 5k. Should be a lock you would think.....

So Sale goes 7 shutout innings. Can't wait for all the advanced metrics blowhards tomorrow proclaim the AL Cy Young race over, when clearly it's not.

just saw Fangraphs Dave Cameron still claim Sale should be AL MVP.... What a joke. He's no lock for Cy Young, but you're going to say he should win MVP? GTFO.

HR update- we're up to 5061 homers now. Wtih 4 more today, will move into 8th place all time with a month to go. On pace for 6183 homers- or a cool 490 more than the current MLB record.

So Detroit beats Colorado again yesterday to take 2 of 3 from Colorado....

Colorado now 25-35 in their last 60 games. What is really bad about that stretch is that of those 60 games- only 13 were vs playoff teams currently- and only 9 were teams vs .500 or better. So only 22 games vs .500 or better teams in the stretch.

Colorado just is lucky that Arizona has had by comparison a brutal stretch. In their last 62 games- same dates- they've had 29 games vs playoff teams- and then another 7 vs .500 St Louis- so 36/62 games vs teams .500 or better. Yet they are 5 games over Colorado at 31-31.

Milwaukee has had a pretty tough schedule as well. In their last 60 games- same dates- they've had 20 games vs playoff teams. And then 11 vs winning teams right now. So 31/60 games vs teams .500 or better. They are 6 games over Colorado at 31-29.

looking down the stretch- all 3 teams have 29 games left.....
Colorado had 14 left vs playoff teams and 17 vs winning teams
Arizona and Milwaukee have 11 left vs playoff teams and 14 vs winning teams

So you get the feeling like Colorado has really lost an oppurtunity here with Arizona. And that's been this year- vs losing teams-
Arizona 44-22
Colorado 42-30
Huge difference there. You have to take advantage of your weak opponents. Arizona has. Colorado hasn't.

1 thing kind of interesting is the Nats have kind of all of a sudden gotten back to only 10.5 games behind the Dodgers for top record. I think there's only a 2% chance right now that the Nats could push the Dodgers- but looking at the Nats schedule rest of the way- after the next week(4 @ Mil, 3 @ Mia)- only games vs winning team are 3 with the Dodgers.

Nats have a 2 game lead on the Astros for 2nd best record in MLB- and they have tie breaker vs them for WS home field.

Arizona can kind of lock up the #1 WC this weekend I think... If they can get 2/3 they're pretty much set I think...

going into the series- if Arizona plays .500 ball rest of the way- 14-14, they would finish at 90-72. For Colorado to beat that- they would have to go 91-71. To go 91-71, they would need to finish 19-10. Considering Colorado is 25-35 last 60 games, I think that's pretty much out of the question. And if Arizona goes 2-1 this weekend as part of the 14-14, Colorado would need to finish at 18-8. Don't think there's a snowballs chance in hell of that happening.

Right now- Colorado is closer to Milwaukee than they are Arizona.

ESPN columnist saying as of today- Kluber is the favorite for the AL Cy Young...
http://www.espn.com/blog/sweetspot/post/...for-nl-mvp

really can't argue with any of their selections-
NL MVP-Stanton
AL MVP-Altuve
NL Cy Young- Scherzer(great point on Kershaw- he's back, but will the Dodgers really allow him to go deep in games to get to be more of a factor in the Cy Young Race- probably not)
AL Cy Young- Kluber

(09-01-2017 01:42 PM)stever20 Wrote:  ESPN columnist saying as of today- Kluber is the favorite for the AL Cy Young...
http://www.espn.com/blog/sweetspot/post/...for-nl-mvp

really can't argue with any of their selections-
NL MVP-Stanton
AL MVP-Altuve
NL Cy Young- Scherzer(great point on Kershaw- he's back, but will the Dodgers really allow him to go deep in games to get to be more of a factor in the Cy Young Race- probably not)
AL Cy Young- Kluber

Goldy should be MVP, hands down

Goldy's problem is he's got a lot more pieces playing with him than Stanton does. If Stanton gets up to 60+ homers, it's going to be really tough for Goldy to win.....

The NL Cy Young race got a whole lot more interesting last night with Kershaw pitching great.

Kluber definitely is keeping the pressure on Sale. 8 innings tonight vs the Tigers with 1 run given up with 0 bb and 7 k's. And gets the win so in the tracker it's another 4.7 point start. You add that in the tracker and he's got 72.5 points. Sale has 77.1 points. So 4.6 point difference right now. His 7th straight start by the way where he's gotten at least 2.6 points in a start- and his 3rd start in those 7 with at least 4.7 points. With only 1 start even under 3 points.

by raw-
Kluber 14-4 2.56
Sale 15-6 2.77

Sale with a HUGE start tomorrow IMO.

And Sale struggles tonight vs Yanks- with 3 runs(all solo homers) in 3.1 innings...

his FIP now is up from 2.00 for the season going into tonight to 2.20. His FG WAR, which was 7.9 going into tonight is down to 7.4.

What I will say tonight- even if Sale gets lit up worse tonight. The race isn't over. Kluber as we all know has gotten lit up before. He's in the lead I feel, but it's not over. Not with each guy having 4-5 starts left.

And Sale is out after 4.1 innings. on the hook for the loss right now.

raw numbers-
Kluber 14-4 2.56
Sale 15-6 2.85

the innings lead which was supposed to be so prohibitive is only 21 innings now.

So much for the historically great season Sale was having.

Nats lost a great chance this weekend to make the Dodgers sweat a bit. lost 3 of 4 to the Brewers(who are now only .5 games back of the Rockies for Wild Card spot). Still 10 games behind the Dodgers. Could have gotten back to 7-8 games back.

ok, maybe the dumbest thing I've heard of all year long...

http://nypost.com/2017/09/04/mets-bizarr...the-mound/

that's right- Matt Harvey who got lit up by Houston in 1st start back after DL- is going to start on short rest on Wednesday. the column had it right- it's just bizarre.

Dbacks won 11th straight. 13-0 over LA. JD Martinez with 4 HR's

the 4 HR performance overshadowing Robbie Ray's 14 k performance.

Arizona now with a 8 game lead on Brewers for the Wild Card spot and a 6.5 game lead on the Rockies for home field. With only 24 to go. The home field is huge given that the only team with more home wins than Arizona is the Dodgers. Pretty much Arizona is locked in now. And it's big in that they will very possibly have their position set really early so can really set their pitching exactly as they want it. Meanwhile, the Rockies will likely have to scratch and claw up until the very end.

i know 1 thing for sure. Dodgers do not want to see Arizona in a LDS..... Arizona is the only team besides the Nats(with only 3 games) with a winning record vs LA for the season.

Robbie Ray- 5 starts vs LA. 3-1 with a 2.27 ERA. Ray with a 53/12 k/bb ratio. Ray in last 15 starts overall has a 1.94 ERA. and a 125/36 k/bb ratio. Oh and Ray is 1st pitcher in history to have 4 10 k games vs LA in a season.

And man, with the pitching, Arizona is just so dangerous. They're maybe one of the few teams that are in the WC mix that could be in the Wild Card game that if they win that are fine for the LDS. I mean- Greinke goes in the WC game and then Ray goes in Game 1 vs Dodgers. That seems pretty decent.

i think this weekend is just a huge series with Colorado @ Los Angeles...

For Colorado- these next 8 days are gigantic. 4 in LA followed by 4 with Arizona. With St Louis now only 2 back, it's really now or never for Colorado.
For Los Angeles- these 4 are bigger than you think. All of a sudden the Nats are only 7 games back(with 3 games left head to head). Houston is only 6 back for best record. And LA would not have the tiebreaker for either of these ties. So they have to get out of this funk now or else they could be looking at a fun scenario where they see the Cubs in the 1st round.

It'll be interesting if the LA/Washington series next Fri-Sun starts with the Nats only 3-4 games back. IF LA did blow this, it wouldn't go down as such- but it would be a huge collapse. back on August 27, the Dodgers were 14.5 games up on the Nats. Since then, LA is 1-11, and has lost 7.5 games of that lead. Worst record in MLB. Amazing to think where we would be right now had Washington not struggled with Milwaukee last weekend- losing 3/4.

Oh and the funniest stat.
August 27- LA's magic number vs Arizona was 14
today- LA's magic number vs Arizona is 13
That's what happens when Arizona goes 11-0 and LA goes 1-11.