00:01Welcome back to Newswire here on Sports Grid. Also fun to catch up with Peter Apple,
00:05Just Baseball, exclusively here on Sports Grid. Peter getting ready for, of course,
00:09the college regionals and naturally the Major League Baseball summer, which we are headed
00:14toward here, Memorial Day on the back burner. And now it is the remainder of the season. Peter,
00:19thanks for coming on Newswire, as always. Appreciate it. Let's start off with the Cy
00:23Young race in the National League, which is heating up. Velocity, no pun intended,
00:28with Jacob Mizorowski, who is basically throwing his way to 103 miles an hour Cy Young Award win,
00:36potentially here. It's like, that's all I hear about. Like, this is an interesting topic here,
00:41Peter, because basically he throws as hard as any pitcher has ever thrown in the history of Major
00:46League Baseball, but he's also doing it with results. So I would ask you, is it a three-player
00:52race with Sanchez, Mizorowski, and Skeens, who can't pitch during the day for some reason,
00:59but at night is the best pitcher in the history of the league?
01:02I think it's like a six or seven-player race in the National League, and it's one of the more
01:07incredible Cy Young races that we've seen, I think, in a long time, right? We already kind of knew going
01:13into the season. Paul Skeens was going to be the favorite, and Christopher Sanchez, maybe Yoshinobu
01:17Yamamoto was going to be two and three, but with the emergence of Jacob Mizorowski, it's one thing
01:24to throw 103 miles an hour, which is already just absurd, but when we're looking at perceived
01:30velocity, because Jacob Mizorowski extends down the mound over seven feet, so basically, in layman's
01:36terms, he's throwing the ball closer to the batter. Baseball savant gives us that perceived velocity,
01:43106 miles an hour. Even saying that out loud sounds crazy to me, so he absolutely has to be up
01:51there,
01:51but when I'm looking at these odds right now, it's hard for me not to at least take a look
01:57at Zach Wheeler at 25 to 1. I know he started the season late, but it wasn't that late,
02:03and because Wheeler has been so efficient, he's able to kind of log those six, seven-inning starts
02:09when maybe other pitchers might have five to six-inning elite outings, maybe similarly to a
02:14Shohei Otani, so Wheeler is trailing a little bit behind, and his fastball velocity is down,
02:20and yet he's still pitching to a 1-6-7 ERA, and that's why I say it's more of a
02:25six- or seven-man
02:26race, because Chase Burns looks like a young Spencer Strider at his peak. Shohei Otani barely ever
02:32allows runs, and we cannot forget about Chris Sale. I do think right now, prices are accurate,
02:39but if I were to pick a long shot right now, I got my eyes on Wheeler.
02:45Yeah, Wheeler has really come on, and I think to me it's a big surprise with, I mean, you consider
02:50the history of thoracic outlet surgery and the pitchers that have come back from it, he looks
02:54exactly like the guy that he was before, and that's really good for the future for pitchers who go
02:58through that too. All right, now over in the American League, it's certainly a little more
03:03clear, and maybe got even clearer with this injury to Dylan Cease. I don't think it's a serious one,
03:08but again, he's now behind some of the other pitchers as we enter the month of June after
03:13he misses a couple of starts, so Cam Schlittler is the favorite. Look who's right there at the top,
03:17it's Jacob deGrom. If you really believe in Cease, you can get him now back at plus 550, but I
03:23gotta say,
03:23I don't know that I want to go there, and poor Jose Soriano's on the Angels, so nobody gives that
03:27guy
03:27any love. Rasmussen, same thing on Tampa Bay. In fact, he got two Tampa Bay pitchers, McClanahan
03:33and Rasmussen, and there's Gavin Williams at 14-1-2. So do you think that this is clear-cut,
03:38Peter? Because to me, it is surprising, considering Schlittler's never thrown like 150 innings in a
03:44season, that we're just going to hand him the Cy Young here in May.
03:48Yeah, I don't know about handing him the Cy Young, but he absolutely should be the favorite. I mean,
03:53when you look at his three different variations of fastballs, he is punishing hitters inside the
03:58zone, which is a true, you know, skill level of elite upper-end pitchers, because, you know,
04:04some pitchers, they like to nibble around the corners, they like to get you to chase outside
04:07the strike zone. Cam Schlittler, it's simple for him. Here are my three variations of fastballs,
04:13the four-seamer, the cutter, and the sinker. I dare you to hit them. He's locating them inside the
04:18zone at a 70-plus percent clip. It's just elite stuff. His cutter actually reminds me of 2021
04:24Corbin Burns when he won the Cy Young, but Corbin Burns didn't have a 99-mile-an-hour heater and
04:30a
04:30sinker to boot. So he should be the favorite. However, when looking at these odds, it's hard for
04:35me not to be biased, because I do have a ticket on Dylan Cease at 12-1 that I bet
04:41earlier on in the
04:42year. Just a few starts ago, he was close to, like, plus 250. Of course, the hamstring injury puts him
04:47out
04:47for a little bit 15-day IL. Thankfully, it's not an arm thing. What Dylan Cease does have working in
04:53his favor is the amount of strikeouts that he can put up, right? Even if he only misses two starts,
04:58he could still lead all of Major League Baseball in strikeouts. But a plus 550, it's hard for me to
05:04pitch that to anybody listening. And then with Jacob deGrom, he's a very, very good pitcher. But
05:09simply put, he doesn't have the stuff that Cam Schlittler does. And Cam Schlittler, at least last
05:15year, it was about 150 innings between the minor leagues and the Major League. So if he can go up
05:20to 175, there is history in Major League Baseball, American League or National League, of pitchers
05:27winning with an ERA below two and only about 175 innings. And when you, again, look at the rest of
05:34the American League pitchers, Cam Schlittler might not have this 200-inning, you know, 175-type year
05:42that you might see in the National League. But all you got to do is beat the competition.
05:46And right now, he is levels above his competition.
05:49Yeah, no, there's, look, there's no doubt. And you make a really good point if you combine the
05:53minors and majors, but it just, and I'm not trying to jinx anything here, but it feels like the second
05:57we crown somebody any award from a pitching perspective in baseball, all of a sudden, we're
06:02trying to find somebody else the next week because that guy gets hurt. And I'm not hoping for that,
06:06but it just keeps happening over and over again in baseball.
06:09Okay, so the odds for the Chicago Cubs, let's get to them here, have cratered significantly.
06:13They're on a nine-game losing streak, Peter, and their win total has jumped, has gone down
06:19from 92 to 87 over the course of a week, which tells you they're on the fringe of being a
06:25playoff
06:25team. But yet their odds are minus 188 to get there. I know they're super talented. I'm going
06:31to guess that there's some bad luck involved here because they're playing in this division
06:35that everybody basically is playing well and over 500. So is it time to panic a little bit
06:39on the Cubs or do they right this ship quick? It's funny. This is now the third time that I've
06:45been on the show and we've gotten to speak about the Chicago Cubs and it's all been in different
06:49instances. You know, early on before they really started to get hot, it was about the first maybe
06:54two weeks of the season. The Cubs started out pretty poorly and we saw their odds tank and
06:59there was nervousness because the offense wasn't putting it together. The rotation looked a little
07:05mediocre, some would say. And then I came on when they had two separate 10-game win streaks
07:11and their odds catapulted all the way to the top. And now they've lost nine in a row. I'm pretty
07:15sure
07:15they're 2-15 in their last 17 games or something like 2-14. They're playing terrible baseball and I
07:21continue to just say the same thing about the Chicago Cubs. They're one of the toughest teams in
07:25all of baseball to handicap. Why? I think they rely on momentum more than any other team in the game,
07:31right? It's almost like when you see the front guy, the guy at the top of the lineup get a
07:35hit,
07:36that means Nico Horner is then going to get a hit and then the next guy gets a hit. And
07:39they
07:39steamroll teams. However, right now their offense has zero momentum. So you can't point to a specific
07:45guy in the lineup and say you need to step up. They all need to step up. But again, we've
07:50seen when
07:51it's good. We've seen when it's bad. If I'm currently looking at the odds right now,
07:55I think 87 and a half is fair. Right now my win total projections have them finishing at about
08:0088 wins. So if you were to put a gun to my head, it would be a slight lean towards
08:04the over. And I
08:05do still think that they're a playoff team. But right now, it's not a great time to just be
08:11invested in the Cubs. It's a team that I'm just staying away from. I agree. I don't know how you
08:15can. I think you got to wait a little bit longer and maybe, you know, I mean, you were right
08:19about
08:19the Cardinals are definitely better than I thought. Maybe it's them. I still am bullish on Cincinnati.
08:24I think that they got to put the foot on the pedal here at some point. Very unclear in that
08:28division. Milwaukee, the class right now. How about the American League West? I mean,
08:33this is like a division by default here, Peter. I got to tell you, I got no faith in the
08:36Angels
08:37whatsoever. I have almost no faith in Houston. I think they're headed toward a rebuild. I don't
08:41believe in the A's. And I can't believe what's going on with the Rangers. Like, I mean, I'm shocked
08:46here that they're as bad as they are. Like, I thought they'd be much better this season. So I guess
08:51give me Seattle by default. Yeah, I couldn't agree with you more. I actually just gave out
08:56a Texas Ranger to win the American League West about three days ago. And then they got swept
09:01by the Angels and combined no hit by the Astros. I can't believe what I'm watching right now.
09:05But I still believe in the pitching. Corey Seager is hurt. He will return. I'm not saying
09:09the Rangers are good, but I still think they can win the division in a plus 240. I still like
09:13the price. All right. Fair enough, Peter. Thanks again. We'll catch you on Just Baseball.
09:17Thanks again for coming on. Absolutely. Thank you.
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