Hello!
Did you notice anything yesterday? For the first time all Spring, there was no official Padre game. I ran some errands, got a haircut and was actually fairly productive, but also…bored.
The team is scheduled to be back in action tonight against the Guardians (6:40pm on 97.3 The Fan!) however…the forecast is not good. In fact, it is quite bad. Like, it’s raining now and supposed to continue all night. Even some thunderstorms this evening. Soooo…stay tuned. Things can change, of course, but just FYI.
The good news is that tomorrow looks very nice and the temps are gonna drop down a bit, too. Seems like every year there’s one rainout in Spring Training and today could be that day.
Joe’s Toe
The story of Joe Musgrove’s ultra-fast return from his broken left big toe is pretty well told by now. He threw a couple of bullpen sessions earlier this week and even went so far as to throw out April 6th in Atlanta as a day he was eyeing in terms of a potential return. That would be the first road game of the season for the Padres. The last time Joe threw the first road game of the season for the Padres? Hint: it was a very memorable night in Arlington, Texas.
Happy Media Guide Day!
While the team had that first (and long overdue) off day of the Spring yesterday, the Padres’ PR staff officially released the 2023 media guide. While this is something far more exciting/important to me than it is to you, I did want to take a moment to write about it.
First of all, very pretty:
Great job as always by the in-house design team, which is literally overflowing with talent. Clean, fresh, exciting…perfectly matches the current state of the club.
The guts of the book, though, are obviously critical to us broadcaster types. And I get to see first hand how hard the PR staff works on this thing every. single. year. It’s a project that basically begins the day the season ends and continues all throughout the winter.
So many of the little stats, nuggets and tidbits that you hear on the broadcasts are courtesy of this book and the hard-working people behind it. So thank you to Craig, Darren, Danny, Jefferson, Vanessa, Tiffany and Lou S. for making it happen.
Dept. of New Terminology
Speaking of broadcasting foolishness, some great announcer chatter this Spring regarding what to call an automatic third strike—and how to score it.
Thanks to the indispensable Jayson Stark of The Athletic, I think we have our answers. When a guy is called out on an automatic third strike, we can’t say he struck out swinging…we can’t say he struck out looking…but what we can say is that he struck out NOT looking. Love it.
As for the scorebook itself? Well a forwards “K” is for swinging, a backwards “K” is for looking, so how about an upside-down “K?” Works for me! Here’s what it looked like the first time I used it on Sunday:
Tony immediately pointed out that it looks like a little picnic table, which is perfect: the batter wasn’t ready in time so you could say…he was out to lunch1.
.300
It’s a fairly magical number in baseball, right? .300 means something. If you look up and see a guy is hitting three-something, you know he’s having a really good year at the plate2.
Somewhere along the line, though, we began to take it for granted and the .300 hitter has not so slowly started to disappear.
If you had to guess, how many hitters in the National League do you think hit .300 in the 2022 season? The answer is…three (McNeil, Freeman, Goldschmidt). Manny hit .298 and was tied for 4th in the league. That gives you a pretty good sense of how hard it is to hit .300 these days.
You don’t have to go too far back to spot the difference, by the way:
In 2015, 11 NL hitters hit .300 or better
In 2010, 11 NL hitters hit .300 or better
In 2005, 15 NL hitters hit .300 or better
In 2000, 27 NL hitters hit .300 or better (!)
Not exactly ancient history. The reasons for this are fairly well understood, I’m sure. Teams value batting average less than they once did, pitchers are throwing harder than ever, shifts changed things, etc.
Will the new rules help lead to more hits and higher averages this season? I tend to think so, and it’ll be fun to check on that throughout the year, which I’m sure we will.
Welcome Back!
While I’m sure they would have preferred to stay away longer, both Xander Bogaerts and Ha-Seong Kim are back in Peoria this week after their teams were unable to advance in the WBC.
They both did damage, though. Kim hit three home runs in pool play, including a grand slam in Korea’s 22-2 win over China. Bogaerts was 4-15 with a homer and a double for the Netherlands.
And while there’s been much talk about the 10 Padres in big league camp who are on WBC rosters (in addition to Bogaerts and Kim: Machado, Soto, Cruz, Garcia, Darvish, Martinez, Crismatt, and Sullivan), there are other members of the organization participating as well, which is pretty neat.
Assistant athletic trainer Ben Fraser is with the DR in Miami; Shingo Horie is doing PR for Team Japan; on the player development side, JoJo Tarantino is across the Pacific with the Italian team; and from the communications staff, Danny Sanchez is working with Team Mexico here in Phoenix, as is athletic trainer Maritza Castro. Really cool and congrats to that group for getting the chance to show their skills on the global stage.
Question!
Good questions continue to pour in, so thank you all for sending them. This one comes from D.J.:
Q: With so many roster spots filled, is there a different feel to camp for the minor league guys? I would imagine seeing all of these long term contracts has to have some sort of impact on how they perceive making the squad.
A: There’s no doubt that there’s a different feel this year. So often, we go into Spring Training talking about spots up for grabs, whether it’s in the rotation, the bullpen, the starting lineup, or the bench.
This year, there’s very little of that. As D.J. said, most everything is pretty well locked up and there’s no question that changes the complexion of camp.
However!
One of the most cliché but still intensely true things you hear from managers this time of year is that it’s going to take more than 26 guys. Even the best teams have injuries and surprises, so there’s no doubt that some of the players who may not be top of your mind right now will end up playing significant roles for the Padres this season.
Thinking back to last Spring, for instance, Jose Azocar was a nice story and a guy having a good camp, but no fan’s idea of a key piece. By the time all was said and done, though, he played a critical role for the team, particularly in September.
There’s also the fact that the Spring presents an opportunity for some of these guys to showcase themselves for other organizations who may have more available playing time.
So my very long-winded point is this: just because there aren’t an obvious abundance of jobs available on this roster, this is still a critical time for these players.
Thanks as always for reading and remember to tell your friends, etc. And, oh btw…15 days ‘til Opening Day.
Tony should be very concerned that his sense of humor is slowly becoming more like mine. Dangers of sitting next to someone for hours a day most of the year, I suppose.
Also, LOL that Tony Gwynn hit at least .300 every year of his entire career after his call-up season in 1982 (and he hit .289 in 54 games that year).