Dinelson Lamet vs. Phoebe Bridgers
Welcome to Football Friday, a baseball column. It’s Friday and the Rockies were extremely annoying this past week, blowing an extremely good Kyle Freeland start (in which he threw even more sinkers by the way) and watching their only other good pitcher go on the IL with forearm stress which is always a good injury for pitchers to have.
Since we last spoke, the Rockies went 2-4. They split with the pathetic Washington Nationals, trading 7-6 results the last two games before dropping two of three to the St. Louis Cardinals. A fun fact, they led both games against the Cardinals, including a 6-2 lead that unraveled after a Ryan McMahon error led to Dinelson Lamet walking in a run and giving up a laser 106.7 mph double to Nolan Arenado that turned that lead into a 6-6 tie.
Lamet was a late season waiver claim in 2022 and for a significant amount of time he was the prime “Rockies give him a 3-year-contract only for him to blow up into 1,000 pieces” type of reliever. Lamet was pretty successful at the end of last season with the Rockies, posting a 3.46 FIP and only giving up two homers in 20 innings of work. He fit the mold perfectly of a guy the Rockies think fits into a multi-year plan only for him to just have had these results by way of relief pitching being a high variance weirdo machine.
This isn’t to say Lamet couldn’t be a successful reliever long term for the Rockies, it’s just to say that the Rockies tend to do things like lock themselves up into a relief pitcher that has 100 good sequences rather than understanding these types of guys aren’t the types of guys you sign to multiple year contracts.
Enough about Dinelson Lamet though, it’s a boring subject and his problems in 2023 may have pushed the Rockies away from this line of thinking. But, if they do sign him, don’t say I didn’t put that bug in your ear.
Let’s talk about something even more exciting ~*Ryan McMahon Exit Velocities*~.
Eno Sarris called out in his preseason predictions that McMahon had a renewed focus on being aggressive at the plate, which is usually a good type of addition to a Coors Field hitter. This also led to McMahon having a 117 mph exit velo in spring (second highest in any statcast park). Then you look at this from his first two weeks and you think, “It’s Ryan McMahon Szn baby.”
And for some of it, it has been. McMahon has an .800 OPS early in the season and has knocked in three dingers. But in another way, it has not been Ryan McMahon szn. Because Ryan McMahon is hitting the ball a lot harder right into the fucking ground.
His launch angle, normally about 10 degrees or what the experts call “eh” is now 5.6 degrees or what experts call “in the earth’s crust”. McMahon has been creating large divots all over the infield by whacking the shit out of the ball but aiming it into the dirt. It’s like Ian Desmond and Giancarlo Stanton became a singular baseball player.
Part of this could be sample size, McMahon may just be still working out the kinks of his new approach and eventually the process will overcome the weird launch angle results and give us a 30-35 home run hitter.
But it’s also very Rockies that McMahon, a career league average hitter, could have added a skill that makes him above average (hitting the ball harder) and it unintentionally forced him into a skill that would bring him back to league average (unmercifully destroying the ground).
A wait and see game as the sample size grows and Ryan makes adjustments on his approach.
This week in Rockies
The Rockies open up a series with Seattle tonight in what could be our first glimpse at the new and improved Jarred Kelenic. Then back home to face the Pirates who are kind of fun so far and the Phillies who have not had good vibes (they only have good or terrible vibes to be fair).
Probably a pretty good chance the Rockies have a really bad losing week and by next Friday my post is titled “this is bullshit”. But hey we all gotta live.
Has everyone listened to the boygenius record?
It’s much better than Dinelson Lamet’s performance this past week, just a thought.
Sad girl indie rock, the new revolution?
See you next week.