To the people who follow me know how my life revolves around the sport of baseball. With the lack of opening day, I’ve been trying to get my fix in various ways. Granted, I am fortunate enough to see the last Red Sox home game down in Fort Myers right before the outbreak started in the United States. While I was down there, I met an employee of the Red Sox on the beach and we were talking about the Red Sox. She was an English teacher / translator for the spanish speaking players and told me all about the players in the minor league organization. The news broke that the remainder of spring training would be cancelled mid conversation with her and she texted Darwinzon Hernandez to try to confirm, but at the time he had no idea what was going on either. So, I flew home after the outbreak became a ‘real’ thing.
Anyway, how I’ve been getting my fix for my MLB / MiLB addiction is through various things.
Watching old random games either on the MLB app, through YouTube (you can search full random games), and on MLB Network or NESN if you live in New England. I had to reminisce about how good / bad the knuckleball was so I’ve spent a lot of time watching Tim Wakefield, but when you do that, you will stumble across the Aaron Boone homer in 2003 by accident.
Playing A LOT of MLB The Show 20 on my PS4. YouTube and Twitch were streaming random players representing their teams on The Show and they were playing against each other with MLB Network journalist Robert Flores commenting. While I was streaming that on my laptop, I was playing The Show at the same time and it felt like I was part of the conversation. Kind of like that ‘podcast feel’ where it feels like you’re part of the conversation but can’t talk or anything. Watching Texas Rangers Joey Gallo absolutely destroy everyone including professional streamers who are athletes in the MLB, was insane. Gallo kept saying, “Oh I barely play this,” and had this laid back attitude about it that had the other players in shock and disbelief.
Finally, just thinking of various topics and doing my research on random facts within baseball and its statistics to keep entertained. For instance, Adam Dunn’s career. SB Nation has this infographics video on YouTube about his career. It explains how Adam Dunn went more than half of his career (51%) without running to first base. In the video they describe him as the “four true outcome king.” The four true outcomes in baseball are, a walk, strikeout, hit, and hit-by-pitch. The video breaks down how you didn’t need fielders for 55 games worth of his at bats. It also explains how in 2011, Dunn had 94 at-bats against lefties and in those at-bats he only had 7 hits. That is a batting average of .074. He had the most success as a leftie against Clayton Kershaw though, who is the best pitcher against left handed batters. Left-handed hitters against Kershaw have less than a .200 batting average, but Dunn had a 1.692 slugging percentage against him. Baseball makes no sense.
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