Caption: Elly De La Cruz (L), Jake Fraley (M), and Joey Votto (R) pose in the dugout following a Joey Votto home run
By Ryan Harless
Ryan Harless is a fourth-year undergraduate at BGSU from Hillsboro, Ohio. He is majoring in Sport Management with a Journalism Minor. Baseball and golf at all levels are his primary interests but he is also interested in combat sports, hockey, basketball, and football.
July 22, 2023
Entering the 2023 season of Major League Baseball, many baseball fans didn’t put much thought into standings of the National League Central. The division had been run by the St. Louis Cardinals and Milwaukee Brewers for almost an entire decade and with very little changing on these rosters in the offseason, it didn’t look like much would be changing for another year.
However, heading into the All-Star break, the Brewers were in second place by a full game to the Cincinnati Reds with the Cardinals firmly in last place eight games back from first. You might read this and wonder if the Reds made any big offseason moves that have helped them. And the answer to that is, not really. The biggest offseason acquisition in Cincinnati was outfielder and first-baseman Wil Meyers who was designated for assignment and released before the break.
So now you might be thinking, “Just how bad is this division?” Well… pretty bad, but let’s focus on the good things!
This Reds team has been able to show that they are not only competitors for this year, but plan to cause issues in the National League for many years to come. As of 7/11/2023, FanDuel has three Cincinnati Reds rookies in the top five for favorites to win Rookie of The Year. Those players respectively are Spencer Steer (3B), Matt McLain (SS), and Elly De La Cruz (SS). Each of these young stars has brought his own spark to this team and has helped to make them actually fun to watch for the first time in years.
To see how well these three rookies are performing, here’s a brief breakdown of their stats so far:
Elly De La Cruz – .297/.333/.478 OPS+ 113, 4 HR, 41 Hits, 16 SB (33 Games)
Although De La Cruz and McLain didn’t get to join the team until later in the season, they both have had tremendous impacts on the team. As soon as De La Cruz joined the team, his impact was felt as the team went 13-2 in his first 15 MLB games. During that spell, he led Cincinnati to a 12-game winning streak which is now the longest such streak in franchise history.
De La Cruz capped off that 12-game streak with a cycle in just his 15th game in Cincinnati’s 11-10 win over the Atlanta Braves in one of the most exciting games of the year. Since then, De La Cruz has also set the bar in the MLB with the fastest sprint speed in baseball at 30.8 ft/s and the fastest throw on an infield assist in the Statcast era (since 2015) at 97.9 mph. He has truly been a human highlight reel to this point.
Along with all of those great rookies I have mentioned, the Reds have also gotten plenty of help from other notable rookies Will Benson and Andrew Abbott who have shown incredible spots of greatness to come.
Speaking of pitchers, Cincinnati has had a rough go of it thus far on the pitching front. As of today, arguably their best two pitchers are still on the 60 day injured list, Hunter Greene and Nick Lodolo. The fact that this team has been able to not only compete but command the division for almost a month without their two best starting pitchers shows me that when everyone is healthy, the Reds are going to pose a problem for opposing teams.
As things stand today (7/22/2023) the Reds are in the midst of a series against the Arizona Diamondbacks and are 1.5 games behind the Brewers after going 4-6 in their last ten games. Although Cincinnati had seemingly hit a cold patch with a 6-game slide, they have since bounced back to win 4 straight. I think once they have a fully healthy team, they still have a chance at the division. And while they aren’t in first, I can still take solace in the fact the St. Louis Cardinals are 11 games back and in next to last place.
Ryan Harless is a fourth-year undergraduate at BGSU from Hillsboro, Ohio. He is majoring in Sport Management with a Journalism Minor. Baseball and golf at all levels are his primary interests but he is also interested in combat sports, hockey, basketball, and football.
June 11, 2023
Note: This is a follow-up article to the one on the American League that was posted May 29. Editor’s note: My apologies for not posting this update sooner.
Taking a look at the National League, things have been just as crazy as in the American League.
NL East: Heading into this season we saw the New York Mets spend $500 million in free agency which seemingly made them the clear frontrunners to take the division. However, the 2021 World Series champion Atlanta Braves would like to have some input as they are currently leading the division with their 40-24 record, giving them a 9.5 game lead over the Mets, who currently stand in 4th place. New York has really struggled with injuries this season seeing both Justin Verlander and Max Scherzer debut much later than expected. And even when both were healthy, they have yet to live up to the money they are getting paid. Sitting in 3rd place with a 31-33 record are the Philadelphia Phillies. Despite their current standing, I think that this team could get hot and make a playoff push later in the season. They have all the tools and were a very good team last year, they just need to get everything to fall into place at the right time. In 2nd place with a 36-29 record are the Miami Marlins. They have consistently played competitive baseball and seem to have broken through the .500 barrier for good. Furthermore, they are still holding onto their second wildcard spot. In 5th place, behind the Mets are the Nationals with a 25-38 record. Just a few years after winning the World Series, the Nationals have completely dismantled their team and sit 14.5 games behind first. With a pitching staff still lead by Patrick Corbin who has been one of the worst pitchers in baseball for the last three years and hardly any star power, I don’t see this team crawling out of the basement anytime soon.
NL Central: The National League Central is the closest division in baseball at the moment with only 2 teams above .500. Currently, the Pirates (33-30) and Brewers (34-31) are tied for first place, holding a four game lead over the Cincinnati Reds. The Brewers have stepped into a dominant role in the Central Division over the past few seasons and have really benefitted from the struggles of St. Louis this season. The Pirates have absolutely come out of nowhere this season. No one expected much from this team, and they have led the division for a good chunk of time in the early season and have continued to show that they are here to stay in the central. Sitting in the middle of the pack are my Cincinnati Reds with a 30-35 record, only 4 games back of first. This team has really surprised me, I didn’t expect much at all from them at the beginning of the year. And while they have still made some questionable decisions relating to call-ups (perhaps with the exception of rookie Elly De La Cruz who has demonstrated tremendous power and speed on the base paths in his first week in MLB); I think if they ever start giving their starting pitchers run support, they could be a real threat in the near future. Bringing up the back of the pack, the Chicago Cubs are 5.5 games behind the Pirates and Brewers while the St. Louis Cardinals trail the leaders by 7 games. The Cubs are a really young team with a lot to prove. They have lots of talent on both sides of the ball and especially their starting pitcher Justin Steele who has been lights out for the majority of his starts thus far. The Cardinals have been an anomaly this season. Usually the perennial division winners, they haven’t been able to put any sort of consistency together this season. But if this division remains close, any team can easily get hot and make a push to take it.
NL West: The western division has been perhaps the most shocking for me at this point in the season. We have grown accustomed to seeing the Dodgers run away with the division almost every year for quite a while, but this season things have been shaken up. The Arizona Diamondbacks, with a record of 40-25, are currently 3 games ahead of the L.A. Dodgers. The Diamondbacks have been super impressive this season. Lourdes Gurriel Jr. is batting .301, Corbin Carroll has 18 stolen bases, and starting pitcher Zac Gallen has 8 wins with a 2.72 ERA and 93 strikeouts already. This team is ready to start competing year after year in the West. In 2nd place, the Dodgers are playing as we have come to expect, with a record of 37-28. The Giants (and the rest of the division) are quite a way from being a threat in the division, standing 7.5 games back with their record of 32-32. The highlight of their season to this point has been continued dominance from starting pitcher Logan Webb who has shown no signs of slowing down from last year. One game behind the Giants are the disappointing Padres. I really like the Padres and was hoping that getting Tatis Jr. back would be the key to making them contenders again, but that doesn’t seem to be the case. Although they have a positive run differential, they have struggled to win consistently at home. And bringing up the back of the pack yet again are the Colorado Rockies at 26-40 who have the distinction of having the fourth worst record in baseball. This team showed signs of greatness a few years back but have either traded their stars or held onto them beyond their prime and don’t have what they need to compete. Of course, it is probably always hard to compete as far as pitching when you play half of your games in the most hitter friendly park in the league.
Caption: Shohei Ohtani in the batters’ box for the LA Angels
By Ryan Harless
Ryan Harless is a third-year undergraduate at BGSU from Hillsboro, Ohio. He is majoring in Sport Management with a Journalism Minor. Baseball and golf at all levels are his primary interests but he is also interested in combat sports, hockey, basketball, and football.
May 29, 2023
With most teams being at least 50 games into their season, I felt it would be a good time to see where things are. Here’s my overview of the season as it stands in the American League.
AL East: This division has completely caught me off guard this season. Tampa got off to an insanely hot start and has only now started to cool down, but they still hold a three-game lead over the second-place team… Baltimore. The Orioles are having a great season so far, standing at 33-17 with a four-game advantage over the Yankees. New York has had a very disappointing season (if you’re a Yankees fan) so far. Manager Aaron Boone just got suspended by the MLB due to the number of ejections he has had and after winning his first four starts, Gerrit Cole has only had one decision. Bringing up the rear in the East are the Red Sox and Toronto who are both under .500 and just a half-game apart in the standings. If either of these teams expect to make any sort of postseason push, they need to start making changes right now.
AL Central: The Twins present another surprise in this division as they are holding onto first place, partly due to the season that starting pitcher Sonny Gray is having. He still has the best ERA in MLB at 1.83 leading Tampa’s Shane McClanahan’s 1.97. The Tigers are another surprise in second place, trailing Minnesota by two games. The Tigers have a surprising record due to the fact they have scored the second fewest runs in the MLB this season and already have a -53-run differential. Trailing the Tigers, the Guardians really shocked me; after last season’s impressive run I thought their young team could only improve. But they have struggled this season and not only have been odd to watch on the major league field, but also, why is Bo Naylor still in the minor leagues? Rounding out the bottom of the AL Central are the White Sox and Royals. The White Sox have had a really disappointing season thus far; they have a lot of talent on their team but are only 9-18 when playing away from home. Kansas City is, yet again, painfully bad with a record of 15-36 and is neither winning at home or on the road.
AL West: Another shocking division when looking at expectations. Leading the division are the Rangers with a +112-run differential and a 31-18 record so far. Of course, they have spent a lot of money in the past few years on the trio of Marcus Semien, Corey Seager, and Jacob DeGrom. Although Seager and DeGrom have both had injury issues this season, the team has done a great job of producing without their stars. Standing three games behind them are the Houston Astros who are still the Astros, they’re just always good no matter what, although their +38-run differential is crazy when looking at how well they have played. Sitting in the middle of the pack, only four games back from first place are the Angels. It makes me so sad to think about it, but I think this will be the last season we ever get to see Ohtani and Trout on the same team. Unless this team can do something drastic and make a playoff push (they are only one game back in wildcard standings), I can’t see them keeping both players beyond this year. They are both having phenomenal seasons with Ohtani looking like the obvious MVP that he is, and Trout being himself. But outside of those two, there aren’t a lot of fun things to talk about with this team. In fourth place and still with a winning record, are the Seattle Mariners. Seattle has given up the second fewest runs in all of baseball this year due to their stellar pitching staff led by my 2023 AL Cy Young prediction Luis Castillo who has been nothing but flawless so far this season. Now, let’s get sad as we round off the AL West. The Athletics are bad, like historically bad, and there was never any other way for this season to go. The owners wanted the team to fail so they could move to Las Vegas (which looks like it will be happening in the next couple of years) without much pushback from fans. The fans are not happy about it at all and have staged a “reverse boycott” where they plan to fill the stadium showing that there should be baseball in Oakland. Now to the on-field overview. As of today, the A’s are 10-42 which is the worst start in MLB since 1932 when the Red Sox started 10-40. They have scored 183 runs which is the third lowest in the league; HOWEVER they have given up 367 runs which is over 100 more than every other team in the league outside of Colorado who play in the most hitter friendly park. Their run differential is -184 which is at least 100 worse than anyone else. The team is batting .222 and they have a team ERA of 6.88. It is really sad to watch such a storied franchise crumble like this.
Caption: Shohei Ohtani celebrates striking out Mike Trout and winning the WBC
By Ryan Harless
Ryan Harless is a third-year undergraduate at BGSU from Hillsboro, Ohio. He is majoring in Sport Management with a Journalism Minor. Baseball and golf at all levels are his primary interests but he is also interested in combat sports, hockey, basketball, and football.
March 26, 2023
The World Baseball Classic (WBC) has come to a close with Japan taking the crown after a 3-2 win over Team U.S.A. on March 21. If the final game were to be a movie, people would have a hard time believing it.
With Japan up 3-2 in the top of the ninth inning, Shohei Ohtani emerged from the bullpen to put the final nail in the coffin for Team U.S.A. After getting the first two batters out, his Angels teammate, Mike Trout, stepped to the plate in one of the coolest baseball moments of all time.
Mike Trout, who is considered to be one of the greatest baseball players of all time since his 2011 debut in MLB. Shohei Ohtani, who could arguably become THE best baseball player of all time faced off with the WBC championship on the line. It was the most poetic end to a baseball game (or other athletic competition) I have ever seen.
Ohtani fanned Trout on just four pitches. Now that is impressive enough as is, but when you look into it further, it’s even crazier.
Through Trout’s 6,174 plate appearances, he has only struck out on three swinging strikes 24 times. Yes, I said 24 times.
And if that wasn’t enough for Ohtani, he also recorded the hardest hit ball (118.7 MPH), the farthest hit homer (448 ft.), and threw the hardest pitch in the entire tournament (102 MPH).
We got to see Shohei pumped up, playing his hardest, and at the top of his game in one of the most important games of his career. And it was a thing of beauty.
Pedro Martinez talked to Ohtani and gave him the praise that every baseball fan has thought, saying, “Shohei, I want to say…on behalf of baseball…we want to thank you for the effort, for the discipline, for everything that you have done for baseball and what you represent for baseball. I just want to personally thank him for all you do. All you do. We are really proud and thankful and grateful for what you do. You are a special human being. So we want to thank you and recognize it.”
I am so happy that someone like Martinez was able to thank Ohtani for being as fun to watch as he is. Baseball is truly in a ‘golden age’ with fans getting to see stars like Trout and Aaron Judge, but Ohtani is the face of baseball and I think it will stay that way for a while.
The game is now the most watched WBC game of all time in America with 5.2 million viewers. That was up 69% from the 2017 WBC final which was an all-timer itself.
Ohtani has gained 3 million Instagram followers since the beginning of March, Lars Nootbarr gained almost a million himself after his performance and bromance with Ohtani. These games were huge for the sport of baseball.
Mike Trout has already declared that he will play in the games again when they return in 2026 and I expect many others to follow suit. Ohtani will only be 31 at the time of the next WBC and could be performing even better than he did this year.
I cannot wait until the next WBC as it is consistently the most fun professional baseball tournament in the world. It manages to bring the fun of the Little League World Series to the pros, and we get to see the athletes play the game like kids again.
We will have to see if the popularity of the WBC translates to MLB regular season games as they begin on the 30th. I really am hopeful that MLB will be able to capitalize on some of the excitement and bring some more eyes to the league and start to turn around the game.
Ryan Harless is a third-year undergraduate at BGSU from Hillsboro, Ohio. He is majoring in Sport Management with a Journalism Minor. Baseball and golf at all levels are his primary interests but he is also interested in combat sports, hockey, basketball, and football.
March 14, 2023
Trevor Bauer made his Major League Baseball (MLB) debut in 2012 with the Arizona Diamondbacks before being quietly traded to the Cleveland Guardians (then Indians) in December 2012. He became a full time starter in the big leagues in the 2014 season when he started 26 games.
Bauer worked his way toward his first (and only to date) all-star appearance in 2018 when he went 12-6 with a 2.21 ERA in 175.1 innings. He was also sixth in Cy Young voting and 22nd in AL MVP voting.
At the trade deadline in 2019, Bauer was traded to the Cincinnati Reds, which proved to be a smart trade as he won the Cy Young in the COVID-shortened 2020 season. He started 11 games, going 5-4 with a 1.73 ERA while leading the league in shutouts and complete games with two each.
However, all of that would change on the 29th of June, when sexual assault allegations were brought against Bauer. It was also reported that the accuser had filed for a restraining order against Bauer on the 28th, one day prior.
The story starts around April 18, 2021, when Bauer first had physical contact with the alleged victim. Court documents state that Bauer reached out to the victim over Instagram direct message after she had tagged him in a post about watching his game.
The victim accused Bauer of “assaulting her on two occasions during what began as consensual sex.” Along with her accusations, there are also text messages between the two as well as pictures the accuser took of herself to document the abuse.
Shortly after these accusations were made public, the Dodgers announced that Bauer would be placed on paid administrative leave while the charges were being examined. Then, in April of 2022, MLB announced that they would be suspending Bauer for what was essentially two years.
Bauer would later appeal and have his suspension reduced from two years to one plus what he had already served after it was decided that he would face no criminal charges.
The Dodgers would go on to release Bauer after the opt-out in his contract came up making him available to be signed by any professional team. There were many MLB teams that could have used Bauer’s pitching every fifth day to help them make playoff runs but no team offered a deal.
Most, if not all, MLB front offices declined to even consider signing him due to the PR nightmare that they would have to brave, and rightfully so. Bauer sat idle for a while posting videos to his YouTube channel, sometimes alongside the “King of JUCO” where he would take part in baseball challenges.
Bauer is now eligible to pitch on opening day for the BayStars on March 31.
Bauer isn’t the first disgraced baseball player to find a home in Japan. The most recent example being Addison Russell of Chicago Cubs and Oakland Athletics fame who quietly left MLB after having allegations of domestic assault brought against him. I didn’t anticipate any team picking up Bauer, however, due to the nature of his allegations. Bauer has been out of professional baseball for over a year so we will have to see if he holds up to his former self in Japan or if he even has a place in professional baseball anymore.
Ryan Harless is a third-year undergraduate at BGSU from Hillsboro, Ohio. He is majoring in Sport Management with a Journalism Minor. Baseball and golf at all levels are his primary interests but he is also interested in combat sports, hockey, basketball, and football.
February 26, 2023
We’ve finally made it to the end of the series! Welcome to part six (of six), of my predictions for the breakout star on every Major League Baseball (MLB) team in 2023. We have finally made it all the way to the American League (AL) Western Division.
This division has been dominated recently by the Houston Astros, but last year the Seattle Mariners made a surprising run in the postseason.
Kicking off this list, however, are the Oakland Athletics. The A’s lost 102 games last season and they have nowhere to go but up.
I expect a large part of their rebuilding process is going to be Paul Blackburn. Twenty twenty-two was Blackburn’s first year entirely in the Majors, as he had spent all or parts of the last 10 years on various Minor League teams.
Over his nine seasons in the Minors, Blackburn had a 3.66 ERA in 721 innings. In his experience at the Major League level, he has struggled to keep on pace posting a 5.09 ERA over 249.1 innings.
Last season, Blackburn got his most starts in MLB since 2017 with 21 and he made the most of it, being named to his first All-Star team. He finished the season with a 4.28 ERA alongside his 89 strikeouts over 111.1 innings.
I predict that if Blackburn is able to stay healthy and make 25+ starts, he can go 12-8 with a 3.50 ERA. With Blackburn being a contact pitcher, he does have to rely on his fielders to be there for him when batters make contact so there is always uncertainty.
Finishing eight games ahead of Oakland were the Texas Rangers. This team spent around $350 million in one offseason to bring Corey Seager and Marcus Semien in to be their middle-infielders. They finished with fewer than 70 wins even with those two on the team.
The Rangers are another team looking to turn things around and I think a certain switch-hitting catcher might be a major key to their turnaround.
My choice for the 2023 breakout star of the Texas Rangers is Jonah Heim. Heim is entering his second season as the primary catcher for Texas. He played parts of the 2020 and 2021 seasons and was relatively inconsequential posting a 0 WAR (wins above replacement). But, this last season saw Heim play in 127 games, and post a 2.5 WAR.
Heim, as is the case with most catchers, is most valuable behind the plate and not in the batters box. Heim has posted an above average fielding percentage all of the last three years as well as having eight defensive runs saved above average.
I expect Heim to play in 130 games, have a caught stealing percentage above 30%, and have a 3+ WAR. With these numbers, I could easily see Heim starting behind the dish for the All-Star game this season.
This brings us to one of the oddest teams in all of MLB, the Los Angeles Angels. The Angels have had two of the top five players in all of the league (Shohei Ohtani and Mike Trout) every one of the last five seasons and haven’t been .500 or better in any of them. Nor have they finished above third place in any of those years.
I think that another one of their outfielders could be one of the keys to their success this year. Jo Adell has struggled to get on his feet in his three seasons in the big leagues. But I feel that a lot of times, position players need 2-3 years of struggling in MLB to really catch hold and play to the height of their abilities.
Adell has the tools to be a star both in the field and at the plate, and I think he will do just that in the 2023 season.
I expect Adell to slash .250/.300/.350 with 18 homers and somewhere around 50 RBIs and 20 stolen bases.
Finishing 2nd in the AL West last season were the Seattle Mariners. This is a team that is amped up and ready to make another postseason push and they have the talent to do so.
I think this team will make it to the American League Championship Series (ALCS) and maybe even their first World Series ever.
I think the player that is going to have a true breakout season and propel them there is Luis Castillo.
Castillo has already proved himself as one of the better starting pitchers in all of MLB, but I think that this will be the year that he wins a Cy Young award.
Those Reds teams did little to help Castillo with run support so his win-loss records look a little sketchy. But, finding his home in Seattle, I expect him to put up league-leading numbers, especially if he is able to master his changeup which is already one of the best in all of MLB.
I expect Castillo to go 15-3 with a 2.85 ERA in 180 innings to go alongside 200 strikeouts. As I mentioned above, I also anticipate him winning the AL Cy Young Award.
This brings us to the 2022 World Series champions, the Houston Astros. The Astros won the second most games in MLB last year, trailing only the Dodgers by five wins. I can only imagine that the Houston organization is taking this year as another World Series or bust year.
I think that this year, they are going to have more help from one of their quieter returning players, Chas McCormick.
McCormick has played two seasons for Houston batting around .250, but like I said before, I think a lot of hitters need a few years in the big leagues to get the swing of things. I’m sure he will bounce back just fine.
Ryan Harless is a third-year undergraduate at BGSU from Hillsboro, Ohio. He is majoring in Sport Management with a Journalism Minor. Baseball and golf at all levels are his primary interests but he is also interested in combat sports, hockey, basketball, and football.
February 11, 2023
MLB Breakout Predictions: NL Central
Early spring is one of my favorite times of year because it means I get to look forward to the upcoming Major League Baseball (MLB) season. While most teams and fans have an idea of where their team will end up, there is always a chance that a new star will emerge and stake their claim as a top talent.
In this entry, I plan to discuss who I believe will be the “dark horse” for each team (by division) across MLB in 2023, starting with the one that I have to most experience with. The National League (NL) Central.
Starting with the Pittsburgh Pirates, there are a lot of possibilities as they have plenty of young talent. I look for Andrew McCutchen to have a bounce back year in his return to the Pirates; Ke’Bryan Hayes is also super fun to watch and will be a key member of the team for years to come. However, you simply cannot miss my pick, Oneil Cruz, the 6’7” short stop with all five tools at his disposal.
Given Cruz‘s size, he has been compared to Cal Ripken Jr., even though Cruz has three inches on Ripken when talking about height. In 2022, he did worry fans with his 34.9% strikeout rate and .233 batting average, but I’m going to chalk that up to it being his first Major League experience.
I anticipate that Cruz will hit .275 with 80+ RBI and at least 20 homers.
Next, we can take a look at the Cincinnati Reds. The Reds are a team with loads of young players who could step up and bring the rebuilding process to an end. I would like to say that Alexis Diaz (younger brother of Mets closer Edwin Diaz) will be the breakout star for the Reds this year. But I don’t believe the team will give him enough save opportunities to consider him their star.
I look for another pitcher, Hunter Greene, to be the definitive ace of the staff and star of the team. Greene has shown flashes of greatness in the past with his blazing fastball and frisbee-like slider. He has already set many MLB records for pitch velocity in just his rookie year.
I think Greene will stay healthy this year and throw 175 innings. If he can keep his home runs against down, I think he can keep his ERA under 3.00 on the season.
Finishing ahead of the Reds in 2022, were the Chicago Cubs. The Cubs had a sneaky good offseason this year, picking up former league MVP Cody Bellinger and established star Dansby Swanson. But outside of established stars, I look for second baseman Nick Madrigal to finally hit his stride in the Majors.
Madrigal is yet to play 60 games in one season which I believe has prevented him from setting his feet and catching onto things. But through 552 plate appearances in his career so far, he’s got a .289/.336/.355 slash line. While the .355 slugging is a little lower than you’d like to see, he is a traditional second baseman.
If Madrigal plays the whole season, expect him to put up a .280+ average and at least 150 hits. With Madrigal, you are getting a sure handed second baseman who can bat leadoff and get ‘ducks on the pond’ for the power hitters in the lineup.
Finishing above the Cubs in the Central standings are the Milwaukee Brewers, another team with a lot of star power to show this season. Featuring former MVP Christian Yelich, all-stars Brandon Woodruff, Devin Williams, Corbin Burnes, and Willy Adames, this team can seriously contend for the NL Central crown and even more.
Aside from all of the above is one of my favorite players to watch, first baseman Rowdy Tellez. In a Brewers’ uniform, Tellez gives me flashbacks to another great Brewer first baseman, Prince Fielder; both are big boys who can hit the ball a country mile.
Tellez hit multiple clutch homers for the Brew Crew last postseason and I don’t see him stopping anytime soon. He is a true power hitting first baseman who brings a charge to the team when they’re down. Last year, he smashed 35 homeruns and 89 RBI yet he only managed a .219 average.
I’m expecting Rowdy to have a major breakout year where he hits 40 homers and 100 RBI. To do so, he needs to improve his average to somewhere around .240, but I know he can. Look for the Brewers to find their new franchise first baseman in a ‘Rowdy way’ this season.
Finally, there are the winners of the NL Central in 2022, the St. Louis Cardinals. Much like the Cubs, my choice for their breakout star isn’t someone known for his hitting (although he can still hold his own at the plate). The Cardinals have so much star power on the team that it is difficult to find someone primed for breakout who hasn’t already emerged.
Last year’s NL MVP Paul Goldschmidt, Nolan Arenado, and Willson Contreras to go along with their already strong pitching staff makes for a team primed to repeat as NL Central Champs.
I have chosen outfielder Lars Nootbaar as my breakout star for the Cardinals this season. Lars showed off his defensive prowess last year making many memorable grabs in right field along with some more than competent batting stats to boot. Last year he only batted .228 but he had a .340 on base percentage as well as a .448 slugging percentage. On top of that he already has a career 120 OPS+ meaning that he is 20% better than the average major leaguer today.
I can see Nootbaar batting .260 with 20 homers and 80 RBI this season. I would even venture to say that if he chooses to focus on power in his swing, he could hit 30+ homers at the sake of his average.
Ryan Harless is a third-year undergraduate at BGSU from Hillsboro, Ohio. He is majoring in Sport Management with a Journalism Minor. Baseball and golf at all levels are his primary interests but he is also interested in combat sports, hockey, basketball, and football.
We often categorize teams into two categories: large-market and small-market. It’s a pretty cut and dry concept, teams in New York City, Los Angeles, and Chicago have larger shares of the market and are more likely to spend more money on their teams. Smaller cities like Cincinnati, Denver, and St. Louis will be more likely to have teams that spend less.
In an article written in 2012, teams were relegated to high, middle, and low markets. Teams were put into those categories based on the population of their city, their payroll per year, and their average cost per win. Through these different measurements, they were able to get a good breakdown of just where teams lie. Even just 10 years ago most of the teams are in the same place they were then.
There are some areas where you might think a team would be in a large market, yet they rarely spend money like others do. Examples of this would be the Miami Marlins and the Tampa Bay Rays. They are both based in relatively large markets in Florida, but both teams ranked among the bottom 10 teams in the league for payroll in 2022.
It is staggering to see the variances in payroll across the league, with the New York Mets ranking number one in payroll at $235.6 million for just one year, whereas the Cleveland Guardians who ranked last only paid their players a total of $29.1 million.
Here’s where one of my favorite parts of baseball comes into play, however. Both of these teams made the playoffs. Not only that, but the Guardians survived longer than the Mets who lost to the Padres (2022 payroll of $184.5 million) in the Wild Card round. Cleveland was eliminated in the next round by the Yankees ($249 million payroll) but it just goes to show that spending more money doesn’t always produce a winning team.
Now, while spending money guarantees nothing for your team, spending little to no money does guarantee you something as a team. Concern from your fans.
As I talked about in my previous article, every team in MLB is largely profitable on a year-to-year basis. There is only one current team that Forbes had sitting below $1 billion dollars in value, that being the Miami Marlins which was valued at $990 million.
The fact that so many of these low-ranking teams (based on payroll) could still afford to spend more makes little sense to me. Oftentimes, owners will excuse their spending habits by saying that they are in a small-market and players are going to chase the larger sums of money elsewhere. But if you look at how much the team could be spending on players to improve the team, that statement doesn’t make a lot of sense.
I just cannot see a reason as to why the owner of a team would intentionally not spend money towards improving their team if they are underperforming. Of course, there are situations where it makes sense not to spend money, such as when a team is undergoing a rebuild.
A rebuild is just what it sounds like. More than likely, the team has struggled for a few years and has built up a good farm system of prospects. So, the team will save money for when the prospects make it to the majors and perform well, and then be signed to long term contracts.
But what happens when the team isn’t in a rebuild or has been in a rebuild for years with nothing to show for it? The Oakland Athletics and Cincinnati Reds come to mind when you think of this. Both teams are toward the bottom of the list in team value and yearly payroll and have been stuck there for years.
These teams both have histories of trading away very talented homegrown players for aging veterans. Or they will let players walk in free agency after a year of great numbers because they don’t think they can afford what the player is asking.
The A’s traded away Josh Donaldson just a few seasons before he won the MVP with the Toronto Blue Jays. The A’s more recently traded their talented corner infielders, Matt Olson and Matt Chapman, with little to show in return. The Reds refused to reach out to their star outfielder Nick Castellanos with an offer after he declined his option. They let now infamous Cy Young winner Trevor Bauer go to the Dodgers after winning his award.
The owners of these teams will just continue along the paths that they are currently on unless something is done to prevent it.
This is something very similar to “tanking” in the NFL or the NBA, but with a twist. See, in those leagues, teams will tank to improve their chances of securing better players in the next season’s draft. But with those leagues, the pipeline from the draft to the league is often a lot quicker than in MLB.
Players typically spend 2 or 3 years in the minor leagues working and honing their craft so they can perform at the major league level. There is a lower correlation between a player’s pre-draft numbers and how they actually perform. That is why I see the owners’ action as nothing more than padding their own pockets with the revenue the team brings in.
If they don’t have to spend their money to get large returns on it, and if they have little to no interest in winning, then why wouldn’t they? Until the league is able to force team owners to place a certain portion of their teams’ value and revenue back into it, I’m not sure what is going to change for the teams and fans of the teams who are going through this process.
Ryan Harless is a third-year undergraduate at BGSU from Hillsboro, Ohio. He is majoring in Sport Management with a Journalism Minor. Baseball and golf at all levels are his primary interests but he is also interested in combat sports, hockey, basketball, and football.
October 13, 2022
Since the late 1980s, baseball has evolved from the steroid era to the sabermetric era. During that time, there has been one true star whose career began in 2001; yet he remains relevant today – Albert Pujols. Since batting .204 prior to the All-Star break, he reached a seemingly impossible mark by hitting his 700th career home run. In doing so, he joined Babe Ruth, Hank Aaron, and Barry Bonds as the only members of the 700-home run club.
Entering the 2022 season, it looked like this was going to be the classic farewell tour for Pujols. He was finally back with his long-time teammates Yadier Molina and Adam Wainwright, for the first time in over a decade. After the 2011 season, Pujols was signed by the Los Angeles Angels for 10 years and $240 million. He never truly lived up to his potential in Los Angeles, only being an All-Star once, hitting around .256, and striking out almost twice as much as he walked. It seemed like his return to St. Louis was going to be a merciful end to Pujols’ playing career. But that’s where baseball fans were wrong.
Through the first three months of the season, Pujols batted a measly .181 with 4 homers, leaving him 17 shy of the 700 mark at the All-Star break. With Pujols being the only current player with a reasonable chance of hitting 700 homeruns, fans became hopeful. But after the first half of the season, most wrote him off. Alicia de Artola of Fansided doubted that he would be able to reach 700, questioning just how much he had left in the tank given his age. But “The Machine” was going to go out on his terms, slashing .318/.377/.671 since July 4th. Not only was this enough to make us reminisce about Pujols’ first stint with the Cardinals when he was consistently one of the best hitters in all of baseball. It also made him the BEST hitter in baseball (outside of Aaron Judge who was on another planet) per plate appearance.
Doing this, Pujols also helped the Cardinals clinch the National League Central Championship. Unfortunately, the Cardinals fell in two games to the Philadelphia Phillies in the Wild Card round of the playoffs, cutting Pujols’ chances short of further padding his stats. However, it is just difficult to fathom how the 42-year-old Pujols could play his best baseball of the past decade, as he neared the end of his career. It’s just one of the things that you look at as a baseball fan and think, “how can you not be romantic about baseball?.” A fun stat to put into perspective is how many home runs 700 is, Pujols’ average homerun trot over his career is around 26 seconds per. This means that over the 22 seasons Albert has played in, he has spent a little over 5 hours rounding the bases for his home runs.
Albert Pujols was by far the longest-tenured player in the MLB today debuting one year before pitcher Oliver Perez. He truly was the last of a dying breed and I don’t know that we will ever get to see someone dominate the majors for the first decade of their career. The only star in today’s game with similar dominance is Mike Trout. Who knows, maybe in another decade someone will be writing a similar story about Trout. But right to the very end of his illustrious career, ‘The Machine’ was the story.
Griffin is a third-year undergraduate BGSU student from North Ridgeville, Ohio. He is a Sport Management major and a Journalism minor. His primary sports interests are baseball and football, both collegiate and professional, but he is also interested in basketball, MMA, boxing and hockey.
February 17, 2021
This entry contains material and descriptions of depression and suicide. If you or a loved one are experiencing depression, emotional distress or thoughts of harming your/themselves, you/they are not alone. Help is available. Contact a mental health professional or the National Suicide Prevention Hotline at 1-800-273-TALK (8255) or suicidepreventionlifeline.org to get the help you/they deserve and need.
“I hate myself” (Passan, 2021, para. 94).
These were the words that San Francisco Giants outfielder Drew Robinson spoke to paramedics as they arrived at his house on April 17, 2020. Three simple words. Apparently, they were enough to make sense of everything he had been feeling.
Drew Robinson might not be a name that you know. He’s played 100 career games at the major league level over the past three years, the first two with the Texas Rangers and the third with the St. Louis Cardinals (“Drew Robinson,” 2021b). He was signed by the San Francisco Giants to convert from infield to outfield before the 2020 season, but he never saw the field in the pandemic shortened season – and April 16, 2020 is the main reason for that (Passan, 2021).
Andrelton Simmons, on the other hand, is a name you might know. Simmons, a four-time Gold Glove winner with a Platinum Glove also in his trophy case, has spent nine years in the big leagues with the Atlanta Braves and Los Angeles Angels with great success. He is regarded as one of the best defenders in MLB and has received MVP votes three times in his career (2013, 2017 and 2018), with an eighth place finish as his highest (“Andrelton Simmons,” 2021a).
So, what connects one of the top defenders in the game to a utility player bouncing between the majors and AAA? The answer: depression and thoughts of suicide.
A day before Drew Robinson called the paramedics, he sat at his kitchen table and wrote. To anyone gazing in, this seems like a normal event. Sure, most baseball players don’t write on the side, but it seems like a simple task. Robinson finished whatever it was he was writing and moved throughout the house, cleaning as he went. He set about making the house as clean as possible. Then, he sat on the couch (Passan, 2021).
Andrelton Simmons was reaching the end of his age-30 season in the pandemic-shortened 2020 season. The Angels were on the outside of the playoffs looking in, and with one week left in the season, there was a small chance that they could make the postseason. Simmons was enjoying an offensive resurgence in the 30 games he played – he had a .297 batting average and a .702 OPS that were his highest since finishing 15th in the 2018 MVP voting (“Andrelton Simmons,” 2021a). In September, Simmons shocked the Angels and opted out of that final week. He didn’t speak to the media until January 31 at his introductory press conference after signing a one year, $10.5 million deal to be the shortstop of the Minnesota Twins. He declined to answer any questions about his opt-out (Fletcher, 2021).
As with the writing, everything that Robinson did leading up to sitting on the couch was normal. People write everyday. Cleaning is not something that should raise red flags. Everything on the outside was normal and peaceful. Simmons was playing the sport he loved and playing it well. Everything seemed okay on the outside until his opt-out raised eyebrows across the league. Each one of these players had one of the toughest decisions in human life to make, and they made it.
Simmons’ decision was much less dramatic, but produced more stories at the time. He initially cited “COVID-19 concerns” for his opt-out, which caught manager Joe Maddon off guard (Torres, 2020, para. 1). Simmons then released a statement to the local media thanking the Angels organization for his time in Los Angeles, and then rode off into the sunset, not to be heard from until his Twins press conference (Torres, 2020).
Robinson’s decision, however, was complex and had multiple parts to it. The first was on that couch. Before looking at that, however, we need to look back at what Drew Robinson wrote at his kitchen table. A normally mundane activity like writing took massive meaning here. Robinson wrote a suicide note (Passan, 2021).
Back on the couch, Drew Robinson, at 8 p.m. on April 16, 2020, pressed a handgun to his head and pulled the trigger (Passan, 2021).
A few hours later, Robinson woke up, a hole in his head from the bullet. For the next 20 hours, Robinson sat alone in his house, trying to cope with the idea that he was still alive. Once those 20 hours came to a close, he sat down on his couch, the gun in one hand and a phone dialed to 911 in the other. He had a choice to make: life or death. Drew Robinson chose life (Passan, 2021).
Until recently, depression and mental illness were taboo subjects. Even now, stereotypes and misinformation about mental illness run rampant while facts stay in the dark. There was no reason for any athlete to suffer from mental illness, let alone mention it publicly. Success was supposed to make people happy. Money was supposed to solve problems. So, why would someone that successful and with that much money playing the game they love suffer from mental illness?
The ‘Superman mentality’ of athletes took a sharp change when stars like Jerry West, Brandon Marshall and Michael Phelps went public with their struggles with depression (Gleeson & Brady, 2017). If athletes of their caliber could suffer from the same mental health problems that affect one in five American adults, then how many other athletes are affected (“Mental illness,” 2021)? The only problem here is that retired athletes were the ones coming out. What about those that are playing now?
The next year, in 2018, NBA stars Kevin Love and DeMar DeRozan went public with their mental health struggles: DeRozan with depression and Love with anxiety. Kevin Love even went as far as saying “everyone is going through something we can’t see” when talking about his own struggles with asking for help and his panic attacks (2018, para. 30). More stars followed, including Dak Prescott of the Dallas Cowboys (Epstein, 2020). Finally, mental illness in professional athletes was in the public eye. It was okay to not be okay. Or, so it seemed.
Even though all of those athletes went public with their struggles, nothing changed. They still played at a high level on the field. They still engaged with the media at the same level they did before. Commercials, TV spots and other ads never halted. Even though they bared their minds and their souls, nothing changed. Enter two baseball players of different playing levels: Drew Robinson and Andrelton Simmons.
Simmons opted out of the season because of his depression, as he later told the Southern California News Group through Twitter Direct Messages (Fletcher, 2021). For the first time, depression was visibly impacting an athlete’s performance. Drew Robinson is still struggling with the aftermath of what happened to him in April. He lost his right eye in the attempt. After countless surgeries to repair the eye socket and ensure his brain was fully intact and functioning, Robinson is attempting a comeback to baseball’s highest level. The San Francisco Giants, his employer at the time in April, signed him to a contract extension to give him a full chance at returning to baseball (Passan, 2021). These effects on both players’ careers may be the next turning point.
As for the media, this is an incredibly hard topic to cover. Even writing this entry, I’ve had some difficulties on how to say things and how to represent what happened. But, the media has been doing a great job leading the charge to destroy the stigma of mental health. ESPN ran the Drew Robinson story as their feature in early February. Andrelton Simmons’ story garnered headlines across the nation as he revealed his struggles with mental health last season. This attention, while it may lead to triggers to some viewers, is erasing the stigma of mental illness. It’s okay not to be okay, and these athletes are reinforcing that idea by sharing their own stories for all to hear.
Even more important than that exposure, though, is the content of these articles and stories. None of the articles that I’ve come across in my own time and in the research for this entry have expressed the athlete’s mental health in a negative light. In fact, any negative views disappeared after Dak Prescott revealed his struggles with mental illness, which Skip Bayless called a sign of weakness and said he “ha[d] no sympathy” for Prescott (Gardner, 2020, para. 6). Bayless’s comments were denounced by his employer, Fox Sports, as well as athletes and media members across the nation, and the stigma surrounding mental illness became something the sports world looked to erase (Gardner, 2020). Jeff Passan’s recounting of Drew Robinson’s story, while graphic, is an important step to humanizing the problem. The in-depth look at Robinson’s experience, how it affected his family, and how he felt leading up to April 16 may open the eyes of some viewers. It may even encourage them to seek help. It may help readers pick up on signs that a friend, colleague or family member is also struggling. That is what needs to happen to get everyone the help they need.
Most importantly, though, was how Passan ended his piece; with hope. Hope that Robinson can make his way back to the majors. Hope that the stigma is being erased. Hope that Robinson’s story can affect others positively. Hope that everyone can come together and help each other, so everyone knows that no matter what they’re going through, they’re not alone.
After all, in the words of Drew Robinson, “I’m meant to be alive” (Passan, 2021, para. 114). You are, too!
References
Andrelton Simmons. (2021a). Baseball Reference. https://www.baseball-reference.com/players/s/simmoan01.shtml
Drew Robinson. (2021b). Baseball Reference. https://www.baseball-reference.com/players/r/robindr01.shtml
Maxwell Media Watch 