Trout hurt again, naturally

[G1911]

They are bigger, faster, stronger, better physical specimens. And yet their playing time is poor. Pitchers especially, who are now babied extensively with pitch counts and very low inning totals, are still mostly unable to piece together full careers anymore. The current approach does not seem to work in the long run, but it does work for the short term analytics that everyone is using, playing too, and getting paid on.

A player is incentivized to perform extremely well early on, at the absolute best all-out they can, until their initial contract is up and they get the lifetime mega contract and then it doesn't matter what they do. Teams are revolving around the analytics that are based on current short samples, how much WAR are they producing right now? This year? Last year? They are, for the most part, not looking at the future, even as they hand out hundreds of millions for the extended contracts, they are paying for past performance for young guys and paying them for that until they are old.

In the past, players on single-year-at-a-time contracts and a reserve clause maximized income by playing well for a long time. A team generally paid for the next season, based on past performance but a year at a time. To get that contract again, a player still needed to perform that next year. There is no reason not to go all out everything while young and endure the injuries and problems that the current approach of 100% all out every single pitch and play seems to be creating.

[jingram058]

Originally Posted by G1911

They are bigger, faster, stronger, better physical specimens. And yet their playing time is poor. Pitchers especially, who are now babied extensively with pitch counts and very low inning totals, are still mostly unable to piece together full careers anymore. The current approach does not seem to work in the long run, but it does work for the short term analytics that everyone is using, playing too, and getting paid on.

A player is incentivized to perform extremely well early on, at the absolute best all-out they can, until their initial contract is up and they get the lifetime mega contract and then it doesn't matter what they do. Teams are revolving around the analytics that are based on current short samples, how much WAR are they producing right now? This year? Last year? They are, for the most part, not looking at the future, even as they hand out hundreds of millions for the extended contracts, they are paying for past performance for young guys and paying them for that until they are old.

In the past, players on single-year-at-a-time contracts and a reserve clause maximized income by playing well for a long time. A team generally paid for the next season, based on past performance but a year at a time. To get that contract again, a player still needed to perform that next year. There is no reason not to go all out everything while young and endure the injuries and problems that the current approach of 100% all out every single pitch and play seems to be creating.

This is 100% correct, every word.

[packs]

Such a bummer. Batting average aside he was off to a great start. I do agree that DH must be in his future now. He's only appeared as a DH in 81 career games up until now.

[Peter_Spaeth]

Originally Posted by packs

Such a bummer. Batting average aside he was off to a great start. I do agree that DH must be in his future now. He's only appeared as a DH in 81 career games up until now.

10 HR and only 14 RBI. That could be a record low for 10 HR.

[jayshum]

Originally Posted by Peter_Spaeth

10 HR and only 14 RBI. That could be a record low for 10 HR.

Angels aren't very good and Trout has been leading off lately so probably not a lot of RBI opportunities.

[Peter_Spaeth]

Originally Posted by jayshum

Angels aren't very good and Trout has been leading off lately so probably not a lot of RBI opportunities.

Hitting .200 doesn't help either. When did he last play a full season?

[packs]

Those 10 home runs were leading all of baseball. His OPS+ was 141. Mortal for Trout, maybe. But not a good start?

[Deertick]

Originally Posted by G1911

... the injuries and problems that the current approach of 100% all out every single pitch and play seems to be creating.

I lay a lot of the blame at the feet of the 'Travel Ball / Development $yndicate'. Young kids are training and playing all year long. They are being trained in "explosiveness". It's no wonder why things explode. Redlining any engine will cause it to breakdown sooner than later. I'd wager that most of the pitchers drafted have thrown more innings than a 5 yr minor leaguer who made a MLB roster in the 80's. And many have had a Tommy John or two.

No 12 yr old should be doing medicine ball twist throws in November. Or preparing for a New Year's tournament in FL.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5825337/

[packs]

I really don't think this is a common issue amongst players who don't pitch. Aside from specific people (like Trout, Anthony Rendon, Stanton, even Judge) there isn't the same injury bug as there is for the pitching side.

I do agree that pitching has been reduced from an art form to trying to throw a ball through a brick wall. It's pretty obvious to this casual observer that if you want to pitch for a long time, you'll need to learn how to actually pitch. And it's no mystery why somebody like Noah Syndergaard gets hurt every year.

[Eric72]

Originally Posted by packs

...pitching has been reduced from an art form to trying to throw a ball through a brick wall...

Very sad and very true.

[Gorditadogg]

Originally Posted by packs

I really don't think this is a common issue amongst players who don't pitch. Aside from specific people (like Trout, Anthony Rendon, Stanton, even Judge) there isn't the same injury bug as there is for the pitching side.



I do agree that pitching has been reduced from an art form to trying to throw a ball through a brick wall. It's pretty obvious to this casual observer that if you want to pitch for a long time, you'll need to learn how to actually pitch. And it's no mystery why somebody like Noah Syndergaard gets hurt every year.

As a Chicago fan, I can add Roberts, Jimenez, Moncada, Bryant, Baez, Contreras and Bellinger to that list.

Sent from my SM-S906U using Tapatalk

[D. Bergin]

Recency bias's do exist...both for the good, and the bad.

The more I pore over old-timers statistics, the more I scratch my head whenever, seemingly mobs of posters, start opining about the injury proneness of today's players and how players were made of something different, something more Iron Man-ish, in the good old days (whenever those were).

Nolan Ryan is not the norm
Hank Aaron is not the norm
Willie Mays is not the norm
Warren Spahn is not the norm
Ty Cobb is not the norm
even Derek Jeter...is not the norm

Their longevity is part of their greatness, but they are the exception, the outlier, not the norm.

History is littered with players who were briefly "Great", but succumbed to one injury, malady, ailment or another, to either diminish their career, or end it...sooner then hoped.

There's been lots of "All-Stars" throughout baseball history. Been a lot less HOF'ers and All-Time Greats...for good reason.

Sure, pitchers expend more energy then they used to from pitch to pitch to pitch...and they also benefit from modern medical technology, to make a comeback, much more likely then used to be possible when the inevitable injury does occur.

[G1911]

Originally Posted by D. Bergin

Recency bias's do exist...both for the good, and the bad.

The more I pore over old-timers statistics, the more I scratch my head whenever, seemingly mobs of posters, start opining about the injury proneness of today's players and how players were made of something different, something more Iron Man-ish, in the good old days (whenever those were).

Nolan Ryan is not the norm
Hank Aaron is not the norm
Willie Mays is not the norm
Warren Spahn is not the norm
Ty Cobb is not the norm
even Derek Jeter...is not the norm

Their longevity is part of their greatness, but they are the exception, the outlier, not the norm.

History is littered with players who were briefly "Great", but succumbed to one injury, malady, ailment or another, to either diminish their career, or end it...sooner then hoped.

There's been lots of "All-Stars" throughout baseball history. Been a lot less HOF'ers and All-Time Greats...for good reason.

Sure, pitchers expend more energy then they used to from pitch to pitch to pitch...and they also benefit from modern medical technology, to make a comeback, much more likely then used to be possible when the inevitable injury does occur.

I don't think anyone is expecting Nolan Ryan or Warren Spahn when we talk about pitcher fragility. The problem is we have tons of guys who are clearly talented enough and destroy their arms very very quickly. This has always happened, there has always been a Herb Score, but it seems to increase even as the complete game has died out. There seems to be a clear decrease in Lou Burdette and Livan Hernandez type pitchers that can hurl consistently over the years. Conserving pitch counts and innings limits, having pitchers throw significantly less every year has not extended careers and in fact seems to have correlated to a shortening of them. We still have the freaks of nature one offs like Verlander that just keeps going, but the problem is the not the .1%.

[Seven]

Originally Posted by G1911

I don't think anyone is expecting Nolan Ryan or Warren Spahn when we talk about pitcher fragility. The problem is we have tons of guys who are clearly talented enough and destroy their arms very very quickly. This has always happened, there has always been a Herb Score, but it seems to increase even as the complete game has died out. There seems to be a clear decrease in Lou Burdette and Livan Hernandez type pitchers that can hurl consistently over the years. Conserving pitch counts and innings limits, having pitchers throw significantly less every year has not extended careers and in fact seems to have correlated to a shortening of them. We still have the freaks of nature one offs like Verlander that just keeps going, but the problem is the not the .1%.

Pitching has become an all or nothing endeavor and is no longer the art form it once was. This is not an "Old man yells at cloud" sort of rant, the reason why arm injuries are more prevalent than ever is due to the over specialization of youth sports, and the fact that every pitcher is maxing out at extremely high speeds on the gun. Throwing is not a natural motion as it is, the amount of stress that is being put on elbow ligaments and shoulders is too great for the body to handle. Combined with the fact that these kids have been throwing hard and often for a long time by the time they hit the Bigs, it's an epedmic of sorts.

You have facilities like drive line emphasizing velocity and spin rate for 12 year olds, it's no wonder that by the time they're 25 their elbows are shot and they'll need either their 2nd or sometimes 3rd Tommy John Surgey.

The position players, probably experience something similar with Baseball being a year round sport now, but the stress is more prevalent IMO in pitchers. We also have the situation now where players are truly investments. Baseball is a Billion Dollar Business. Players are not going to play through minor injuries anymore because the organizations do not want to lose how ever many millions are invested into their young players. It's an unfortunate reality.