Albert Pujols's power, Ryan Theriot's lack thereof

So I’m going to cherry pick stats to convince myself he’s back to normal. His walk rate has climbed all the way back to 9.9 for the year, which is tantalizingly close to double digits. He could end up with an end-of-year walk rate that doesn’t look too different from the earlier part of his career, which would be very impressive considering how he started the season. His ISO is currently not too out of line, and certainly not the worst he’s ever put up. His wOBA has climbed all the way up to .390. I used to think him incapable of ending a season with a wOBA under .400 (or whatever stat I used before I knew what wOBA was) and it will be very hard for him to get there, but who knows. His wRC+ is at 150 right now, officially making it only his second-worst if the season ended right now. Lastly, he’s up to 4.8 WAR. An end-of-season total in the mid-5’s seems possible to me.

I think the question is whether this year looks like a typical decline year. If it does, the “slump” is just noise and we should expect this sort of complete-year picture of Albert Pujols. However, maybe the slump did not "need’ to happen and was an aberration. It could truly have been a strange funk where the ability was still there but he wasn’t putting it together for some strange reason. I will optimistically cling to the latter hypothesis for now because this sweep of the Brewers has cheered me up and I don’t wanna lose this nice buzz.

Is that Ryan Theriot’s walk rate has cratered to 5.4%, less than half that of his peak (outlying) 2008 year. He’s taking a few more pitches than he has in years past, but it’s certainly not showing up in his walk rate. So much for the benefits that were supposed to accrue from his oft-discussed “change in approach”…

we better not suck too bad for the remaining 25

He has some serious clout behind himnin the lineup, and with his early season slump, pitchers are actually pitching to him this season.

Jonah Keri is a good, and well-informed writer. linky

For TLR and Mo so we can rub thier noses in it

In 2006, Pujols had an ISO of .340.

If Albert’s 2006 ISO were a batting average, it would have placed second in the NL batting race behind Freddy Sanchez (.344) and just ahead of Miguel Cabrera (.339).

the Brewers makes VivaElBirdos happy and talky.

At least Dal had a good glove. Maybe Westy should pinch hit for Eriot with men on base?

I’m ready for this 3 day weekend.

The Cubs announced Friday that Carlos Zambrano will not return to the team this season but will be paid for the remainder of September when his stint on the disqualified list ends on Sept. 12.

The cardinals are going to crush my soul again.

BBC America is playing a Battlestar Galactica marathon from the beginning this weekend. Watch a few episodes, you will be hooked.

In 1964 the Cards were 8.5 (I think she said 10.5) games out going into the last month of play. They made a come back and went on into the playoffs.

There is still a chance and we have a precedent of doing it.

Thanks for linking to it, guys.

Here is his line: 6 IP, 2 R, 2 ER, 6 H, 3 BB, 3 SO

I’d love to meet some of you…coming in from Bama.

If Houston is going to win any games against Milwaukee, at least their pitching is set up to do so — they’ll have Norris, Wandy, and Henry Sosa (who the Brewers haven’t seen and has thrown well in his last two starts). Whether they’ll score any runs is another matter.

The Cardinals have to contend with the 2nd best pitcher in the NL (Cueto), followed by Bailey and Arroyo, in matchups which should favor us on the pitching side (Jaime and Jackson, respectively).

If we’re making a run at this, we basically need to sweep the Reds and pray that the Astros take 2 of 3, which would get us to within 6.5 games. Then we’d have to sweep the Brewers next week (-3.5), and take 2 of three from the Braves and pray that the Phillies sweep the Brewers in that series (-0.5).

If all that happens, we’re in it. If the Brewers simply go .500 in their next 10 games, we’re fucked.

would give us. BP now has us at a 3.3% chance of making the playoffs, up 1.1% from yesterday. Most of that probability comes from the division but there’s a ~1% chance at the wild card.

Let’s assume that a few days ago, the Brewers were up by 4.5 games on the Cards heading into a “critical” series in Milwaukee. In that universe, the Brewers sweep the Cards to go up 7.5 games. I can only assume that this place, and all of Card fandom, would be apoplectic. I think everyone would say that we are utterly and completely out of the race with no hope.

Of course, it didn’t happen like that…but we are still 7.5 games out. The way you feel about the difference in these scenarios, IMO, is a good proxy for your thoughts about “momentum” – especially that certain type of team momentum that has no real underlying cause (like that brought about by major injuries to star players, for example).

In any event, IMO, the Cards must pick up a game in the next series and must sweep Milwaukee in the series after that to have a real chance.

Muffin Night (FF to 0:15)

milwaukee 74-64
saint louis 73-64, 0.5 GB
cincinnati 72-65, 1.5 GB
pittsburgh 62-75, 11.5 GB
chicago 58-79, 15.5 GB
houston 54-83, 19.5 GB

http://gamedev.rasmuswriedtlarsen.com/

sorry it’s FLASH.

(declines to pimp pastelgames, while at it.)

apparently, Jason Motte’s a badass.

if the cardinals and brewers end up tied, will they have a one-game playoff, or will the team with the better h2h record get the playoff spot?

hopefully i will get to see sunday’s game. i will miss monday’s also!

Simmons himself, with a shockingly reasonable take on advanced metrics and the MVP race. I think he’s really kind of decent writing about baseball, which I didn’t realize until about 3 minutes ago.

the better I like Skip.

Grantland article

Stop doing this