MLB Bullets and the bonfire of the vanities

Let’s see how many things you can name about the Miami Marlins? Derek Jeter got rid of all of them. As Jon Heyman wrote, what Jeter knows about art couldn’t fill a thimble.

• We interrupt the MLB Playoffs to bring you an act of cultural terrorism. Marlins team president Derek Jeter has completed his goal to be the Savonarola of MLB by getting permission to move the Marlins’ Home Run sculpture. They’re moving it outside the stadium, because fans are going to be outside the park waiting for it to go off when the Marlins hit a home run. Here’s the funny part—the ownership group claims that they “love” the statue but that they need to make a standing-room-only beer garden in the outfield to attract a “millennial audience.” Oh, that makes perfect sense. The only reason millennials aren’t going to Marlins Park is because there isn’t a beer garden 420 feet from home plate.
• Really, the title of this piece by Claire McNear tells you all you need to know: “The Assassination of Joy, Weirdness, and Marlins Victories by the Coward Derek Jeter.”
• Whitney McIntosh is also outraged and says that Jeter hates fun. Which he totally does. Jeter is the enemy of fun. We know he never watches baseball, for example, unless he’s being paid to do so.
• Charlotte Wilder is also “livid” and that the statue represented what made Miami fun. Why even go to Marlins games now, she asks? (From the attendance figures, everyone seems to agree with her.)
• Grant Brisbee has written about the Home Run sculpture before and he admits he loved that sculpture. He argues that Jeter’s plan for the Marlins seems to be to remove any possible reason why someone might like the Marlins. I really do hope someone doesn’t vote for him on the first ballot for Cooperstown and says this is the reason.
• OK, on to the games. Game 4 of the National League Championship Series is still going on (and on and on) as I write this, but Dodgers infielder Manny Machado is getting some flack for not running out a grounder in game 2. Machado said he had no excuse for not running but that “I’m not the type of player who is going to be ‘Johnny Hustle.’”
• Dodgers manager Dave Roberts will not discipline Machado for failing to run out the grounder.
• Then there is Dodgers catcher Yasmani Grandal, who is having a personal NLCS from hell. He had another terrible game in game 3 of the NLCS and even Mary Hart was booing him.
• Grandal defended himself by saying “I value my opinion way over everybody else.” Also, teammate Kiké Hernandez defended Grandal and said it it “sucked” that the fans were booing him.
• That’s not all Hernandez said. He criticized the fans at Dodger Stadium for their lack of “energy.” Hernandez later apologized for his comments and relied on the tried-and-true trick of someone with his foot in his mouth by saying his comments were “taken out of context.”
• Jay Jaffe thinks the critical mistake by the Dodgers in game 3 was letting starter Walker Buehler hit for himself in the bottom of the fifth inning.
• Marc Normandin argues that we shouldn’t be surprised that Brewers starter Jhoulys Chacin has been so good. He was always supposed to be good. He just took a little longer to reach his potential.
• Some problems for the Brewers as game 4 starter Gio Gonzalez exited in the second inning with an apparent ankle injury.
• The good news for the Brewers is that their strength has always been their bullpen. Tom Verducci has an inside look at how Craig Counsell manages all those arms.
• On the NLCS, Michael Baumann notes that neither of the game plans by the Dodgers or the Brewers is actually working.
• Some intrigue over in the American League Championship Series as an Astros employee was removed from the photographer’s pit at Fenway Park in game 1. The employee was taking video of something in the Red Sox dugout.
• The Red Sox won game 3 of the ALCS in part due to a grand slam by Jackie Bradley Jr. David Ortiz had a big reaction to the homer.
• After losing game 3, Astros starter Dallas Keuchel called the series “a coin flip from here on out.” That’s not what going down two-games-to-one means, Dallas.
• Red Sox ace Chris Sale was released from the hospital after suffering from a stomach illness. His availability in game 5 is still unclear although Sale naturally says he’s pitching.
• Mike Axisa looks at the Red Sox options if Sale can’t go.
• Astros third baseman Alex Bregman also caused a social media controversy with a video he posted that was taunting Red Sox game 3 starter Nate Eovaldi. The Red Sox responded and a mountain was made out of that molehill.
• Sam Miller notes that Bregman is walking in the playoffs at a “Barry Bonds-level” and it’s not really clear why. Miller does examine some possible reasons.
• Marly Rivera looks at the role players that give the Astros terrific team depth and play a big role in the team’s recent successes.
• One of those “role-players” is Tony Kemp and he made a terrific catch at the wall in game 3.
• Stephanie Apstein speaks with Red Sox infielder Dustin Pedroia, who has been injured almost the entire season, about what it’s like to be sitting out the Red Sox historic run. Pedroia is trying to be a good teammate, but admits it’s hard to not be out there playing.
• Red Sox pitcher David Price took time to groom the mound in the Red Sox bullpen, thus literally becoming a #PitcherWhoRakes.
• The Astros are posting domestic violence hotline fliers around Minute Maid Park and making several donations to local organizations that work with domestic violence victims and work to prevent it. This is in light of their trade for Roberto Osuna, who had been suspended for domestic violence when he was with the Blue Jays.
• Tom Hoffarth writes what many of us have been saying. At a time when MLB wants young people to get interested in baseball, it is unhelpful to have John Smoltz on the national TV broadcast continually talking about how much better the game was in the 1990s. Smolitz even addressed the criticism in game 4 and then proceeded to say how much better the game was in the nineties.
• The Braves gave manager Brian Snitker a two-year contract extension. Not bad for a guy who was basically fired (and also intended to quit) at the end of the 2017 season.
• The Angels have opted out of their lease at Angels Stadium. This is basically a procedural move as not having done this no would lock them into the lease for another ten years. But the Angels want a new stadium and no one in Southern California is going to build them one with taxpayer money. It also makes no financial sense for them to ever leave the second-largest media market in the country, so their options are limited. (h/t Hardball Talk.)
• If the Diamondbacks decide to rebuild, R.J. Anderson looks at the team’s biggest trade chips.
• Back on the Marlins briefly. They traded another pair of minor leaguers to the Astros for more international pool money. They are widely believed to be interested in signing the Mesa brothers from Cuba.
• Stephanie Springer looks at some new advances in drug testing.
• And finally, if you went to bed early and didn’t catch the end of the Dodgers/Brewers game, check out this amazing catch by Dodgers right fielder Cody Bellinger.

And tomorrow will be a better day than today, Buster.