I think that, behind the smile and jovial personality, Vlad is an extremely serious player. He wants to win so badly - to the point that he often tries to do too much to win. He errs on the side of aggression and it can bite the team but can also be brilliant. If he can stay within himself in the big moments, he’ll be a huge contributor to a playoff run.
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Grabbed a pair of cheap $20 Outfield District tickets tonight with a buddy and we're glad we did! What a fantastic game and ending!
How many Looney Dogs did you eat, and did you just spend the night posting pictures on socials of you eating them...for the first 5 plus innings....that was probably better than the game was.
__________________ "Some guys like old balls"
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Yeah I’ve been hard on Vlad for not taking the game serious enough
Tonight I saw a guy focused and dead serious
Agreed. I was worried being locked in for 14 years at half a billion was going to reduce seriousness in his game even more. If anything this year he has taken the 'to whom much is given, much is expected' mentality and is hyper focused on leading the team and winning.
Maybe we sometimes forget that he's only 26 years old now despite playing for 6 years with the Jays already and what we're seeing is a maturation into a veteran star player and leader whereas other players are only coming onto the scene at age 24 or 25. He's definitely matured into the kind of professional the Jays hoped they had when giving him that deal.
I think that, behind the smile and jovial personality, Vlad is an extremely serious player. He wants to win so badly - to the point that he often tries to do too much to win. He errs on the side of aggression and it can bite the team but can also be brilliant. If he can stay within himself in the big moments, he’ll be a huge contributor to a playoff run.
Yeah. That throw to 3rd for the lead runner was a great play, but quite aggressive. I think few guys try it. The narrative would be different right now if the throw wasn't in time and now you've got runners on the corners with no outs. I don't think "Vlad doesn't want to win" is ever fair criticism.
Watching the replay it's clear they had talked about it before. Barger went straight to 3B after it was hit. Altuve isn't what he was and the Jays took advantage of that.
Watching the replay it's clear they had talked about it before. Barger went straight to 3B after it was hit. Altuve isn't what he was and the Jays took advantage of that.
For sure - not criticizing that play at all, and obviously with hindsight it worked out great.
But Vladdy is definitely an aggressive player, and there would definitely have been a storm of criticism if that choice had cost them the game - which was a possible outcome.
Yeah. That throw to 3rd for the lead runner was a great play, but quite aggressive. I think few guys try it. The narrative would be different right now if the throw wasn't in time and now you've got runners on the corners with no outs. I don't think "Vlad doesn't want to win" is ever fair criticism.
They said on the Fan that no first baseman has attempted that throw in extra innings in the past 2 seasons, until now. Given that your main concern is to stop that placed runner from scoring it would seem an obvious play to make if it was even remotely doable, which apparently it isn’t. Except for Vlad.
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They said on the Fan that no first baseman has attempted that throw in extra innings in the past 2 seasons, until now. Given that your main concern is to stop that placed runner from scoring it would seem an obvious play to make if it was even remotely doable, which apparently it isn’t. Except for Vlad.
Agreed that's probably because Vladdy has a better arm than most 1B. But I think the risk has something to do with it.
With 1 out and Runner on 1st, teams score an average of 0.48 runs
With 1 out and Runner on 3rd, teams score an average of 0.86 runs
With 0 outs and runners on the corners, teams score an average of 1.78 runs
That compares to where you start the next inning (0 outs, runner on 2nd) which has an expected value of 1.12 runs.
So making that throw saves on average 0.38 of a run, or saves a run about 40% of the time. That's huge for extras, and if you put up a zero you're likely to win. But missing it and not getting an out is nearly a whole run worse than taking the easy play at first (1.78 expected runs vs 0.86 expected runs). And giving up 2 means you're very likely to lose.
So the cost of missing the play is greater than the benefit from making it, so you need to be fairly confident you can make the play to attempt it. Obviously that confidence depends on all sorts of things (speed of the runner, how good a break he gets, how hard the ball is hit, how strong the arm is) and only some of those things are known in advance of the play. So on a split-second decision where the risk is greater than the reward I'm not surprised most 1B (who are often not the best defenders) play it safe.
Again, not a criticism of Vlad - that was a great play.
