BCB Mailbag 15: Extra innings in the kitchen

Oof, what a long week. I did get to go to Miller Park, though. But thank God it’s Friday. Let’s crack open a Diet Pepsi (classic sweetener blend) and get down to the questions.

GoGregGo asks:

On a scale of "Purchasing a Remetee shirt" to "Putting out a fire by dropping a nuclear warhead on it"

How bad of an idea is the proposal to start extra innings with a man on second base?

Yeah, I really don’t like the idea of having a runner start on second base in a major league setting. Wouldn’t everyone just go for a bunt and a sac fly? Would the run be earned or unearned, since no pitcher put that runner on base? Who will be the runner, the last hitter from the previous inning, or? Only 7.6% of MLB games went to extra innings anyway last season anyway, and more than three-quarters of those games were over after only one or two innings. This really seems like mostly a non-issue to me. I guess it’s fine in rookie ball where there’s no one at the games at nobody there wants to play more than 9 innings, but I hope it never comes to the big leagues.

rouguejim asks:

When

are you planning to announce your #2017BrewersMVP selection?

I don’t know, man, I just don’t feel as strongly about anyone this year as I did about my guy Juni G last year. I’m intrigued by Forrest Snow (another splitter guy) and Paolo Espino (similar profile to Zach Davies), but it’s easy to see guys like that get lost in the shuffle this year with so many more advanced arms poised to get shots at the big league level.

I will say, however, that I firmly believe that the #2016BrewersAce will outperform the projections that are out there for him in 2017. There might be some regression, sure, but I’m betting he still posts at least an ERA somewhere around the mid 3.00’s and pitches 150+ innings.

Yar Nivek asks:

Is the mobile site design by some kind of evil genius?

Because it seems like every day I tap on "load comments" just as new images load, and I wind up clicking on an ad instead.

And that’s exactly what happened to me as I came here to post this question, naturally…

Ugh, man, I know exactly what you’re talking about. That’s happened to me so many times. One thing I have noticed, though: the issue happened almost every time I was loading it on my iPhone’s safari, unless I waited for a long time to let the whole darn page load. That phone has since bitten the dust (red face angry emoji) and I let the guy at the Verizon store talk me into getting a Galaxy S7 instead of a new iPhone. Now, I rarely have a problem with that happening on my Chrome app.

cjsever asks:

Hard and Soft

Who on the 40-man throws the hardest? And who throws the softest?

According to Pitch F/X data at Fangraphs, Damien Magnifico’s average fastball of 96.5 MPH last season makes him the hardest throwing pitcher on the Brewers. Taylor Williams was said to throw pretty hard back before his Tommy John surgery, and according to Baseball America he was clocked at 100 MPH back in 2014 (as was Magnifico, and David Goforth). Now that he’s on the 40 man roster, we should be able to get a better read on if that velocity has fully recovered during spring training action.

The softest-tosser on the roster last year was submariner Ben Rowen (80.1 MPH), but he’s no longer around so that distinction falls to Brent Suter (84.8 MPH). Suter is incredibly fun to watch, in my opinion, and I love the pace he works at and the fact that he threw more sliders (29.4%) than four-seamers (28.0%) during his 21.2 innings last season. I hope he makes the team, though with options remaining the odds might be against him.

Aaron128 asks:

Assuming there won't be any injuries in ST, who will be the Brewers' opening day starter?

There’s only one answer.

drezdn asks:

If you were a guest on Prince Fielder's new cooking show

What would your dish be?

I actually really enjoy being in the kitchen. I do the majority of the cooking in my household. I make a pretty mean barbecue, bacon-wrapped pork chop, my smashed potatoes are to die for, and I think I perfected my creamy chicken and potato soup recipe when I made my last batch. But I would have to say, my from-scratch pizza recipe stands alone.

Thanks for all the great questions this week, everyone! ONLY FOUR DAYS TIL PITCHERS AND CATCHERS REPORT, AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!