Author: Dave Long

Ready or not baseball kicks off Thursday, July 23, in what will likely be the strangest baseball season ever. No one knows what to expect beyond the fact that with only 60 games each one will have a far greater impact than it would in a marathon-like 162-game season. That urgency is the most interesting thing about the season ahead.

So here’s a preview of the biggest stories and changes the 2020 MLB season may lead to.

No Crowds at Games:I don’t get the hubbub by some over piping background noise into telecasts. As long as they don’t overdo it, why not if it makes it sound less hollow?

Astros Cheating Scandal: If ever a team could benefit from no fans in the stands and a schedule not as closely watched as past years, it’s the Houston Astros. Before the pandemic hit, the retribution parade for their cheating scandal was likely going to be the year’s biggest story. Now it’s an afterthought.

Dark Horse Candidates: As usual the Yankees are getting a lot of ink, especially after signing Gerrit Cole, but I see more money going down on Tampa Bay to win. That is based on a strong 2019 when they finished 12 games ahead of Boston while spending $140 million less and a belief strong bullpens matter most in a 60-game season. I’d argue the opposite, as starters won’t have to pace themselves like over a six-month season. Tell me a 12-start season wouldn’t have been perfect for Chris Sale, which would’ve eliminated his annual post-All-Star game fizzles from overwork.

Non-Dark Horse Candidate: With Masahiro Tanaka already getting nailed in the head by a vicious Giancarlo Stanton line drive the annual injury parade has started for the Yankees. Given their history, I expect more to follow. In the NL I guess it’s L.A., though only because I’ll be watching how Mookie does.

The Stats: Jack Chesbro’s (41) and Hack Wilson’s(190) records for wins and RBI are safe. But what if someone hits .400? If so, there goes Ted Williams being the last to hit .400 in a season. So the question is, should it count? Well, when Roger Maris hit 61 homers in 1961 to break Babe Ruth’s single-season record, Commissioner Ford Frick tied an asterisk to it because it happened during the new 162-game schedule, while Babe’s came in 154. Frick, it should be noted, was a Babe binky and was protecting the big fella. With no one watching out for Ted, who knows. But if ever an asterisk should be attached, it’s to hitting .400 in 60 games! While I know the Commish has a lot going on, he should state what’s what before the season begins.

Can Someone Hit .400? It still may be a long shot, though, since according to a story I found in a FanSided column by someone named Bill Felber the last to be over .400 after 60 games was Andres Galarraga in 1993, which came in Denver’s thin air. That makes Nomar Garciaparra’s .389 in his first 68 of 2000 closer to today’s reality. So, if anyone does it, it happens at Fenway, making the most likely culprit Rafael Devers.

Alumni News: The rising star who got away to shine will be Yoan Moncada in Chicago. While it took him a while to roll, he hit .315 with 25 homers in 2019 and all signs point higher. A huge year will be extra painful because in addition to costing John Henry $50 million to sign him, with Sale out for the year the guy Moncada was traded for faces an uncertain future that comes on the heels of 2019’s dismal 6-11/4.40 campaign and an injury-shortened 12-4 season in 2018. That surprisingly points the needle for winner of that deal a little more toward the White Sox.

Never-ending A-Fraud Saga: It remains beyond belief that two-time PED cheat Alex Rodriguez is allowed to be the face of baseball on ESPN and beyond-er (if that’s a word) belief that MLB is actually considering letting this serial liar into the bidding to buy the Mets less than six months after the Astros cheating scandal exploded. But he’s got a new problem, after blatantly pandering to MLB owners last week by saying that after earning $448 million in baseball’s free market, players should accept a salary cap. Player outrage was best expressed by ex-Yankee Brandon McCarthy, who said players should boycott “self-serving liar” Rodriguez during his ESPN gig. Agreed, because If there’s ever been a bigger me-first fraud, I’ve yet to see him or her.

Radical Realignment Ahead: Playing games within a 10-team region to cut down on travel may be the forerunner to radical realignment that could erase the lines between AL and NL. For the Sox it’ll be facing the Mets, Yanks, Phillies, Blue Jays, Orioles, Nationals, Braves, Marlins and D-Rays. The history lover in me won’t love that, but I will say that after the NFL-AFL merger I hated seeing the Colts, Steelers and Browns leave the NFL to be part of the new AFC and I got over that pretty quick.

New Extra-Innings Rules: Thanks to dugout micro-managers making nine-inning games endless I’m for starting extra innings with a runner on second base. Anything to eliminate ending games at 3 a.m. with seven people in the stands.

Universal DH: The DH will be used in both leagues. Will it lead to it universally going forward? Probably, but who cares.

The Pandemic: As much as we’d like to, we can’t ignore the world’s biggest story with the biggest question being, with 10 teams playing in the nation’s four biggest hot spot stats of Texas, Florida, Arizona and California, will baseball be able to miss all the land mines to finish the season at all?

Cross your fingers, because I think making it through the year is a, ah, long shot.

The abbreviated version of the 2020 baseball season kicks off next week when the Sox and Orioles go at it at Fenway. It’s safe to say we go into this season with the lowest expectations in a long time, for various reasons, which include a lackluster 2019, stat geek Chaim Bloom being hired as GM after a career bargain-hunting with Tampa Bay, Alex Cora’sfiring, the ceaseless cost-cutting chatter leading to the trade of Mookie Betts and David Price,and Chris Sale’s season-ending surgery, all of which were blocked out by the sun of the worldwide pandemic.

As a result, the Sox have many question marks and a few real strengths that are being overlooked by the Nation. He’s a summary.

Injury Update: Camp got off to a rousing start with four guys testing for the virus. If you missed it they were minor-league power hitter Bobby Dalbec, expected bullpen key Darwinzon Hernandez, fringe reliever Josh Taylor and projected opening day starter Eduardo Rodriguez. That leaves a giant void right off the bat, as E-Rod missing just two weeks in the short season is like missing the first 40 of a 162-game season.

Biggest Question Mark – The Rotation: As Butch said to Sundance when they couldn’t shake the posse after them in Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, “Who are those guys?” That’s how I feel about a rotation, ah, headlined to start by Nathan Eovaldi, Martin Perez, and others I’ve never heard of. So my answer to Butch would be “beats me.” Second: At any time in his Red Sox tenure, even right after his marathon relief stint in Game 4 of the 2018 series, did anyone ever see Eovaldi as the ace of the staff? Well, he will be if E-Rod can’t get it back in gear very quickly. We know the potential, but given his injury history that’s not a comforting thought.

Next Question – What’s the Story at Second Base:With the Dustin Pedroia retirement party on the horizon here’s where Chaim’s bargain-hunting comes in. So I’ve got no clue what they have here, especially with Michael Chavis likely earmarked for a 1B, DH, IF utility role.

Biggest Strength – The Hitting: Talk all you want about the loss of Betts, he was only their fourth best hitter a year ago. Xander Bogaerts (.309-33-117), Rafael Devers (.312-32-115) and JD Martinez (.304-36-105) all out-hit Mookie (.295-29-80) in average, homers and RBI, and with 54 and 52 respectively, the first two had had more doubles than Mookie’s 40 too. Andrew Benintendi can take up some of the slack from the loss of Betts if he can re-find his consistency. Bottom line: Even if the 26-double, 23-homer 2019 stat line was the career year for Christian Vazquez they’ll have more than enough hitting to win.

Who’s Hot: It’s hard to tell with anyone, but Eovaldi throwing four scoreless innings in his first outing while allowing just one hit and a walk and striking out four was encouraging. Especially since 34 of his 58 pitches were strikes, the command was good. The 58 pitches indicates he’ll be at 75 on opening day if he makes it that far.

Most Anxious to See – Alex Verdugo: He’s the most ready for prime time prospect they got for Betts. In his first full season he hit .294 with 22 doubles, 12 homers and 44 RBI in 104 games. Projected over a 162-game season that’s 33 doubles, 18 homers and 67 RBI which is comparable to what Betts did — 42 doubles, 18 homers, 77 RBI and .291 — in his first season in Boston. Not saying he’ll be Mookie, but I’m interested to see if the trend goes up. And the pandemic shutdown helped by giving the stress fracture in his back extra time to heal.

What to Make of the 60-Game Schedule: For a team that can’t win it in a 162-game season because the pitching won’t hold up, it’s a good thing. And who knows, if the hot streak everyone eventually gets comes in the first month they’ll stay in it most of the way. It had better too, because if a team starts really hot, you won’t have time to catch up like you can over the marathon of a 162-game season.

Perfect for Chaim Bloom: Given the tradition-laden-ness and IQ of the fan base, the guess is some of the GM’s New Age, Ivy League ideas would get pushback over 162. But in a low-expectation 60-game season he’ll get room to experiment. Like using openers for both the fifth and fourth spots in the rotation where the more programmed strategy lets you set up match-ups more easily to keep their weaknesses at a minimum. And if it works it’ll show what I’ve been saying for a while now, that the cost per out/inning goes way down with this approach over paying big money to mediocre fourth and fifth starters. That lets a team concentrate big money in starters 1 through 3, and with injury questions surrounding Sale and Evoladi after heavy investments in them that’s important with E-Rod in his walk year.

The Ron Roenicke Question:I don’t know much about Roenicke beyond that he got to learn from Earl Weaver playing for him in Baltimore and had a stint of four years and change as manager of the Brewers between 2011 and 2015. That started by winning 96 games in Year 1 and went downhill after that leading to his being fired with a pedestrian 342-331 career record. He fits comfortably into the “baseball lifer” category. Which means a guy who gets a shot or two to manage but ultimately winds up a bench coach and the one who takes over when a manager gets fired. That suggests he’s keeping the seat warm for Cora, which is OK with me after Cora pays the penalty for the transgressions in Houston.

Finally, there is real on-field news to talk about. The Red Sox opened summer camp last week, the Celtics opened theirs earlier this week and, praise the lord, the Tom Brady saga is not the only thing people are talking about when it comes to football.

Well, that’s sorta the case today regarding the latter. But after having a week to think about it I’m back to talk about who’ll be playing QB for the Patriots in 2020, not who’s not. Thus, we’ll leave the Sox, Celtics and Bruins for next time, to fill in some of the blanks on last week’s Cam Newton signing.

The Snap Judgment: I’m always a skeptic and rarely let my imagination run away on big stories of this type. If you do, the first thing that comes to the mind is the MVP season of 2015 and he hasn’t been that guy since, um, 2015. So the first reaction was they’ve improved the backup QB spot and added a big name to challenge Jarrett Stidham for what comes next at quarterback. However, as I’ve thought about it, I’m warming to his potential upside. The caveat being he’s over his recent shoulder and foot woes.

Primarily because a high-level Cam means we’ll be seeing a different type of QB play than we’ve had for over 30 years (with Drew Bledsoe figured in). As great as Brady was, there have been times I’ve thought how nice it would be to have a QB who could get yards on his own with a run/pass option near the goal line and on third and short, or be able to turn a sure sack into chicken salad with his legs.

As the mind wanders, here are some observations on Newton.

Things to Know about Cam Newton: While Brady routinely has thrown for 4,000-plus yards, 11 times overall and only missed doing it in the Deflategate-shortened 12-game 2016 season during the last nine seasons, Newton has only done it once, as a rookie in 2011.

On the flip side, while I’m surprised Brady has run for as much as 100 (barely) three times, in the last eight seasons his combined rushing total is just 321. Newton has topped every season of his career except last year when he played just two games.

Having said that, the flip side of the flip side is that most running QB’s get beat up or worse as a season goes along. But in missing only five games in eight years before last year, Newton’s durability is better than I thought. But that doesn’t mean he hasn’t been the dreaded “game time decision” quite a few times. I don’t recall Brady ever being one of those and that adds uncertainty in a way Brady never did.

Then there’s the accuracy thing. Newton has completed just 59.6 percent of his career passes and been over 60 percent just three times, though the best, 67.5 percent, was in 2018. In 19 seasons Brady has never not been over 60 percent, though he barely did that (60.8 percent) in 2019.

The accuracy difference also shows itself in interceptions, where Brady has thrown for double digits just three times (11 twice and 12) since Newton entered the league in 2011. Cam has never had a non-double-digit pick season with a high of 17 in 2011 and low of 10 when he was MVP in 2015 when he also had his only 30-plus-TD-pass (35) season. Brady has seven 30-plus seasons.

Looking Ahead to 2020: When I hear “mercurial personality” I think Kyrie Irving or Jose Canseco and that’s not good. But my measuring stick actually is a guy I didn’t like, Deion Sanders, because I really hate “hey, look at me, me, me” types. But the rule of thumb is what do you hear about a player coming out of the locker room or after they leave town. In Deion’s case you never heard detractors, so I figured he must have been a good guy. That appears to be the case with Newton as well.

I’ve been harshly critical of Odell Beckham’s commitment to winning over the years, so persistent rumors of Cam’s workout buddy coming to New England got my attention. I wasn’t for Antonio Brown because he’s nuts. For OBJ it seems more maturity issues similar to pre-Foxboro Randy Moss, who worked out great here. At least for a while. So, in a rare about-face, I’m interested, as he’ll certainly help the weapons deficiency. That leaves three questions. Would Cleveland let him go? What would they want back? What would you give up to get him? Oh, plus he’s pricey and they’re up against the cap, so who are you willing to let go?

Passing yards and picks can be a reflection of throwing down field more than the Pats do, as well as not having the great slot guys and third down backs Brady always had. It’ll be interesting to see if the system, play calling and superior coaching can negate Newton’s negatives.

Bottom Line: What the “should have kept Brady” crowd needs to understand is that while TB-12 is the GOAT, he wasn’t that guy last year. He was middle of the pack, with just two vintage Brady games, Pittsburgh in the opener and the second Buffalo game. History tells us he likely won’t be as good at 43 as at 42. Not a Willie Mays on the warning track 43, but not an improvement over 2018. The stats may go up because of his new weapons, but that’s irrelevant to what would have happened here with Patriots personnel. Thus with the team likely transitioning to a more conservative, run-dominated, defense-oriented game to accommodate its talent, Newton’s game may be a better fit than the 2020 version of Brady. So I’d say the likelihood is better than 50-50 that with a healthy Newton the play at QB improves over 2019.

Though that could just be my imagination running away with me.