Cy Young winner Chris Sale thread

Smiling Joe Hesketh

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Wasn't the "inverted W" poster child Mark Prior? Not a great case, as it turns out. He was done as a major leaguer before he turned 26. Though he kept trying in the minors through 2013, including a forgettable (as in, I'd completely forgotten it happened) stint with Pawtucket in 2012.
23 walks in 25 IP with Pawtucket. Yikes.

Prior had elbow injuries, but the real career-killer was the shoulder. His rotator cuff and labrum were shredded. That's an injury that's nearly impossible to overcome.

I think the overall lesson to be taken is that pitching is essentially a destructive task, and all pitchers will fall victim to injuries in one way or another. Some like Verlander can put it off for a while.
 

BaseballJones

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23 walks in 25 IP with Pawtucket. Yikes.

Prior had elbow injuries, but the real career-killer was the shoulder. His rotator cuff and labrum were shredded. That's an injury that's nearly impossible to overcome.

I think the overall lesson to be taken is that pitching is essentially a destructive task, and all pitchers will fall victim to injuries in one way or another. Some like Verlander can put it off for a while.
Seems like Maddux and Clemens avoided major injury. Clemens had a torn labrum in 1984 but that's about it.
 

donutogre

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Verlander had a remarkable run but even he broke down eventually (though is probably age as much as anything).
I mean, I think it's definitely as much age as anything. His age 39 and 40 seasons were very, very good. The wheels finally fell off this year at 41, an age that almost no one gets to. I think he only made less than 27 starts 4 times (not counting 2005). That's about as durable as you could possibly expect.
 

Smiling Joe Hesketh

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Seems like Maddux and Clemens avoided major injury. Clemens had a torn labrum in 1984 but that's about it.
I'm sure for Clemens at least the HGH helped.

Some guys are just less injury-prone. All snark aside, Clemens was built like a horse and had good mechanics. Maddux....he's just a freak. You can't emulate him because no one in history could pitch like him.
 

lexrageorge

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Seems like Maddux and Clemens avoided major injury. Clemens had a torn labrum in 1984 but that's about it.
I think there's degrees of severity. Clemens' season in 1984 ended early, but IIRC it was a fairly minor tear as those things go (of course, easy for me to say - it wasn't my shoulder).

I don't believe we are going to find any easy ways to identify pitchers more prone to injury in our lifetime.
 

Sandy Leon Trotsky

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I came across this guy looking into slow motion mechanics. Not sure how fresh or on the ball he is, but he seems to feel that a "flat" arm, as opposed to an "up" arm just before planting the foot, is a technique many modern pitchers are taught as a way to increase velocity, but that also increases the risk of injury.






The Difference
The difference between...

1. Dominant and durable pitchers...

  • Of the past...
    • Nolan Ryan
    • Tom Seaver
    • Mariano Rivera
    • Greg Maddux
  • Of the present...
    • Justin Verlander
    • Aroldis Chapman
Justin Verlander Pitching Mechanics
2. Modern, hard-throwing, but far more injury-prone pitchers like...

  • Matt Harvey
  • Joel Zumaya
  • Mark Prior
...isn't complicated.

Matt Harvey Pitching Mechanics
It can be seen with the naked eye.

In the pictures above, notice how, at Foot Plant, Justin Verlander's pitching arm is UP while Matt Harvey's pitching arm is FLAT.
I will guarantee that if I had an hour or so to go through tons of photos, I'd find lots of oft-injured pitchers with the same technique as Verlander and ones that stayed relatively healthy with the same technique as Prior. This is still all correlation without causation. And basically it's the "Inverted W" which has been proven to not be even close to a conclusive fact
 

Sad Sam Jones

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I'm sure for Clemens at least the HGH helped.

Some guys are just less injury-prone. All snark aside, Clemens was built like a horse and had good mechanics. Maddux....he's just a freak. You can't emulate him because no one in history could pitch like him.
Despite Randy Johnson being the poster boy of "long-limbed", which one wouldn't think is especially conducive to arm health – and as far as body types go, was a bit of an upsized version of Sale – he also managed to average 30 starts and 210 IP from age 25-42.
 

PapnMillsy

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Part of the reason Atlanta didn't get to the division series is that Sale was unavailable due to an injury.

He's simply not a durable player and will never be one that can be relied upon in the postseason.
I mean, Sale would have pitched game two in that Mets series were he healthy so his injury didn’t really sink their playoff chances. Their offense didn’t score a single run in that first game, even if Sale was pitching, he can’t win a 0-0 game.

Sale was a durable player for about 10 years, with multiple 200 inning seasons including leading the league in 2017. He was durable this year. You’ll find far worse track records for pitcher health, including on this very team, but we continue to pretend that Sale is made of glass
 

Sausage in Section 17

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I will guarantee that if I had an hour or so to go through tons of photos, I'd find lots of oft-injured pitchers with the same technique as Verlander and ones that stayed relatively healthy with the same technique as Prior. This is still all correlation without causation. And basically it's the "Inverted W" which has been proven to not be even close to a conclusive fact
That's fine, and I'm not trying to promote this guy as correct.

If you dig a bit further in his articles, he points out that Verlander got injured only AFTER he abandoned his traditional delivery and went to more of a flat arm delivery. He then reverted after getting injured.

I won't make any claims as to what's best, just thought the article(s) were interesting and relevant to the discussion.
 

mauf

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Sale made 29 starts. That's fewer than 3 Sox starters. *That* is an overlooked part of parting with him. No more "ok, not-Sale people, maybe you'll be starting or maybe you wont be....or maybe you'll start a few games and then maybe you wont......depends on Sale....maybe it will be Monday, or maybe Wednesday...." The predictable unpredictability didn't just affect the major league rotation; it affects roster management.
The game is changing. Only 51 pitchers started as many as 30 games this season, compared to 68 in 2014 and 76 in 2004. If 29 starts doesn’t meet your expectations for a starting pitcher, the problem is with your expectations.

The success or failure of this trade hinges on Grissom. If he ends up not being a real major leaguer, it’s a bad trade, because Sale had real value this year. But if Grissom ends up being a solid player, it’s a good trade — it’s unclear that Sale would have pitched as well here as he did in Atlanta; even if he did, that might not have been enough to secure a playoff berth; and with the way we played in August and September, a deep playoff run with Sale not pitching almost certainly wasn’t in the cards.

Grissom had a lost year where he seemed to be dealing with some sort of medical ailment beyond the injuries we knew about, but he seemed physically fine by the end of the season. I’d do the deal again, notwithstanding the poor early returns.
 

loneredseat

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The dodgers only had two pitchers with more than 20 starts, fwiw (stone with 25 and Glasnow with 22). Flaherty had 28 but only 10 with LA, and Paxton had 21 but only 18 with LA. Kinda interesting.
 

Red(s)HawksFan

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I think there's degrees of severity. Clemens' season in 1984 ended early, but IIRC it was a fairly minor tear as those things go (of course, easy for me to say - it wasn't my shoulder).
The shoulder injury/surgery was in 1985, not '84 (it was his forearm in '84, I believe). It was a torn bit of cartilage floating in his shoulder joint and it was corrected arthroscopically. Minor enough that the next season was his CY/MVP/20K game season. In his case, it might have been fortuitous that it happened so early in his career since he kinda became fanatical about keeping up his shoulder strength. Probably helped his longevity. Well, that and steroids/HGH.
 

geoflin

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The dodgers only had two pitchers with more than 20 starts, fwiw (stone with 25 and Glasnow with 22). Flaherty had 28 but only 10 with LA, and Paxton had 21 but only 18 with LA. Kinda interesting.
And Stone is now out for next year.
 

radsoxfan

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Obviously plenty of logic behind the trade at the time it was made, but ouch. The outcome is the outcome. Subsidizing Sale's Cy Young season and Grissom being injured/awful is about as bad as it could have gone.

Overall probably a 1st % outcome for the Red Sox/99th % outcome for the Braves if you combine the expected probabilities of each.
 

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Not to rehash but I said at the time the trade was totally unnecessary. They should have at least waited until the trade deadline to deal him. Really bad decision. And they even paid some of the freight.
 

shaggydog2000

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Not to rehash but I said at the time the trade was totally unnecessary. They should have at least waited until the trade deadline to deal him. Really bad decision. And they even paid some of the freight.
They needed a starting 2B to open the season though, so how would waiting until the deadline help with that?

(Oh, and I forgot about the decent chance he would be injured by the trade deadline)
 

SouthernBoSox

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The fact Sale didn’t have a CY never felt right. Happy for him after what has been an insane few years.

Incredible comeback for a pitcher of his age and workload.
 

chrisfont9

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They needed a starting 2B to open the season though, so how would waiting until the deadline help with that?

(Oh, and I forgot about the decent chance he would be injured by the trade deadline)
This is where I suspect they were much more in asset collection mode -- as opposed to GFIN -- than they admitted. It makes total sense as an asset going into the 2025+ window. They were playing PR games, or maybe trying to keep other teams guessing about their plans.
Happy for Chris, comes pretty close to making him a HoF lock, I would think.
53 career bWAR. 7x top 5 CYA, plus a win. World Series Champ with an iconic final moment. Good resume but not a lock. Recent SP inductees:
Mike Mussina: 82 bWAR
John Smoltz: 69
Doc Halladay: 64
Jack Morris: 47

Not in:
Tim Hudson: 57
Andy Pettite: 60
Schilling: 79
Clemens: 135

I think he needs to keep it up a bit longer and/or take the Braves to a title.
 
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Petagine in a Bottle

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I don’t really disagree but all those guys you list have been retired for a long time, they aren’t Sale’s peers (and Hudson is the only one who isn’t in purely because of on the field performance).

Active pitchers (bWAR / age)

Verlander 80.5 / 41
Kershaw 79.4 / 36
Scherzer 75.4 / 39
Sale 53.3 / 35
DeGrom 45.2 / 36
Cole 43.3 / 33
Cueto 36.2 / 38
Nola 35.3 / 31
Wheeler 35.2 / 34
Darvish 33.0 / 37

I think he’s pretty close to in, unless the HOF just stops voting in pitchers after the Verlander / Kershaw / Scherzer trio retire.
 

Kliq

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I don’t really disagree but all those guys you list have been retired for a long time, they aren’t Sale’s peers (and Hudson is the only one who isn’t in purely because of on the field performance).

Active pitchers (bWAR / age)

Verlander 80.5 / 41
Kershaw 79.4 / 36
Scherzer 75.4 / 39
Sale 53.3 / 35
DeGrom 45.2 / 36
Cole 43.3 / 33
Cueto 36.2 / 38
Nola 35.3 / 31
Wheeler 35.2 / 34
Darvish 33.0 / 37

I think he’s pretty close to in, unless the HOF just stops voting in pitchers after the Verlander / Kershaw / Scherzer trio retire.
Greinke is also part of that group but yeah, it gets thin after that.

Sale was far more dominant than Hudson or Pettitte. I think his rate stats will really help him down the line. He's clearly still got something left in the tank so it will be interesting how much stat padding he can do--he's got a shot at 3,000 Ks.
 

Philip Jeff Frye

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His HOF chances are going to depend almost entirely on whether and how quickly the voters move away from the historical norms for what has gotten starters into Cooperstown.
 

Niastri

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This is where I suspect they were much more in asset collection mode -- as opposed to GFIN -- than they admitted. It makes total sense as an asset going into the 2025+ window. They were playing PR games, or maybe trying to keep other teams guessing about their plans.

53 career bWAR. 7x top 5 CYA, plus a win. World Series Champ with an iconic final moment. Good resume but not a lock. Recent SP inductees:
Mike Mussina: 82 bWAR
John Smoltz: 69
Doc Halladay: 64
Jack Morris: 47

Not in:
Tim Hudson: 57
Andy Pettite: 60
Schilling: 79
Clemens: 135

I think he needs to keep it up a bit longer and/or take the Braves to a title.
Schilling, Pettite and Clemons all have off the field concerns helping to keep them out. Although you could make a really strong case Pettite doesn't deserve it, he got carried by the ten other HoF players during his Yankees tenure. Good pitcher, no way a Hall of Famer.

Also, I literally said "who?" when you mentioned Tim Hudson... Did he ever do anything other than quietly accumulate meaningless WAR? I am not being snarky, I don't know anything about him, which is part of the point of the Hall.

At any rate, Sale still has a few years left to accumulate stats. He might pitch for a few more years at a high rate and make it a slam dunk.
 

chrisfont9

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Also, I literally said "who?" when you mentioned Tim Hudson... Did he ever do anything other than quietly accumulate meaningless WAR? I am not being snarky, I don't know anything about him, which is part of the point of the Hall.
Look up his stats, Hudson had a great career. The rest of your points, I don't know what to tell you. His 6 years in Oakland they won the division 4 times with 3 100-win seasons. He played in the playoffs nine years and won a world series. Whether you happen to know about any of this is absolutely not the point of the Hall.
 

OCST

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I wrote the following a few years ago, but it’s relevant to this discussion.



Sale was fantastic in 2024. It was, arguably, his best season ever because, unlike 2017, he was able to pitch well late into the season. But he still broke down, predictably I’d say considering the above. And I remain surprised teams haven’t given him more forced rest during the regular season.
Figuring out how to do that optimally for a starting pitcher *and the rest of the staff, given the knock-on effects of disrupting the usual rhythm of a rotation- seems like a tough problem.

If management tried what you did with Rask- to look at the schedule and pick spots where you could add rest days for Sale- wouldn’t you have to run the same kind of analysis for the other starters, and you’d need a six man rotation probably- so that’s like a six-variable calculus problem? Then it would inevitably get disrupted by injuries?

Rask sitting is a simpler math problem because you just have to plug in Suboptimal Goalie B as the other variable, right?

im asking as a hypothetical because it’s fascinating but it seems tough, especially given how conservative/superstitious some players and coaches can be about habit and conventional wisdom.
 

OCST

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Schilling, Pettite and Clemons all have off the field concerns helping to keep them out. Although you could make a really strong case Pettite doesn't deserve it, he got carried by the ten other HoF players during his Yankees tenure. Good pitcher, no way a Hall of Famer.

Also, I literally said "who?" when you mentioned Tim Hudson... Did he ever do anything other than quietly accumulate meaningless WAR? I am not being snarky, I don't know anything about him, which is part of the point of the Hall.

At any rate, Sale still has a few years left to accumulate stats. He might pitch for a few more years at a high rate and make it a slam dunk.
Clemons’ most pressing off the field issue is that he’s a dead saxophone player with 0 IP, but yeah.

Have to disagree re Pettite being carried by others. I’m not going to opine one way or the other on his candidacy but if that was a criterion then there would be fewer players, not more, from the all time great teams and that’s the antithesis of what the Hall should be about, as per your Hudson riff.
 

Average Reds

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Loved having Sale on the Sox and I’m very happy for him to have rebounded the way he did. Even happier that his inevitable late season breakdown is no longer our heartache.

Looking forward to seeing what Grissom does in 2025.
 

Smiling Joe Hesketh

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Again, Chris Sale's CY season got the Braves nothing, because once again he predictably broke down and could not pitch in the playoffs. 0-2 in the postseason and there goes the year.

I have never once regretting getting Sale out of Boston. He remains a frustrating player who can never, ever be counted upon.
 

brownsox

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This is where I suspect they were much more in asset collection mode -- as opposed to GFIN -- than they admitted. It makes total sense as an asset going into the 2025+ window. They were playing PR games, or maybe trying to keep other teams guessing about their plans.

53 career bWAR. 7x top 5 CYA, plus a win. World Series Champ with an iconic final moment. Good resume but not a lock. Recent SP inductees:
Mike Mussina: 82 bWAR
John Smoltz: 69
Doc Halladay: 64
Jack Morris: 47

Not in:
Tim Hudson: 57
Andy Pettite: 60
Schilling: 79
Clemens: 135

I think he needs to keep it up a bit longer and/or take the Braves to a title.
Others have noted that aside from Hudson, the other three have had off field issues helping to keep them out (which is true, and obvious in Schilling’s and Clemens’s cases, less clear-cut but likely in Pettitte’s who is borderline anyway). But there are plenty more examples of recent 60~ bWAR pitchers not getting much of a sniff from the voters:

Kevin Brown, 68
David Cone, 62
Mark Buehrle, 60
Bret Saberhagen, 59
Chuck Finley, 58
Dave Stieb, 57
Frank Tanana, 57
Kevin Appier, 55

Of these, Brown had off-field issues (just being a jerk) but I don’t think the others did. Sale probably has better vibes - “dominance” etc - but his resume isn’t a slam dunk.

Johan Santana, by way of comparison, is at 52 WAR.

His HOF chances are going to depend almost entirely on whether and how quickly the voters move away from the historical norms for what has gotten starters into Cooperstown.
Exactly this. Sale’s career record is 135-83. We all know the game has changed, standards for pitcher wins and losses have changed, and that W/L was always a highly imperfect way (at best) to measure pitcher value.

But historically, only seven guys have made the Hall of Fame with fewer than 200 wins (not counting Eckersley who had 197): Jack Chesbro, Ed Walsh, Rube Waddell, Lefty Gomez, Sandy Koufax, Addie Joss, and Dizzy Dean. All of them were Veterans Committee selections (and mostly glaring mistakes) except Koufax and Dean. And they all had better records than Sale - he’d have to go 15-0 to match Dean, for example, or 29-4 to match Koufax.

Sale’s candidacy is going to depend on how quickly voters understand how much the game has changed, and how soon they start applying standards they didn’t apply to Cone, Saberhagen, or Santana.
 

BaseballJones

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Again, Chris Sale's CY season got the Braves nothing, because once again he predictably broke down and could not pitch in the playoffs. 0-2 in the postseason and there goes the year.

I have never once regretting getting Sale out of Boston. He remains a frustrating player who can never, ever be counted upon.
Obviously we all want a lot more out of Grissom, and I'd rather have made the playoffs than not, but in some freakish way, this worked out for Boston. Sale was indeed great for Atlanta, obviously, so that made it look bad for Boston. Yet at the same time, he DID break down right at the very end, and it cost Atlanta dearly. Just as Boston probably expected to happen (they may have expected it sooner, but I'm sure they expected it at some point). It wasn't that the Braves got nothing - they got the best pitcher in the NL for the regular season. That's quite a bit. But they also got the full Chris Sale experience, which cost them a chance at a pennant in the end, validating Boston's fears.
 

astrozombie

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Clemons’ most pressing off the field issue is that he’s a dead saxophone player with 0 IP, but yeah.

Have to disagree re Pettite being carried by others. I’m not going to opine one way or the other on his candidacy but if that was a criterion then there would be fewer players, not more, from the all time great teams and that’s the antithesis of what the Hall should be about, as per your Hudson riff.
I am with you here. I haven't thought about it in awhile, Pettite's HoF denial was due to HGH usage.
 

LogansDad

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Others have noted that aside from Hudson, the other three have had off field issues helping to keep them out (which is true, and obvious in Schilling’s and Clemens’s cases, less clear-cut but likely in Pettitte’s who is borderline anyway). But there are plenty more examples of recent 60~ bWAR pitchers not getting much of a sniff from the voters:

Kevin Brown, 68
David Cone, 62
Mark Buehrle, 60
Bret Saberhagen, 59
Chuck Finley, 58
Dave Stieb, 57
Frank Tanana, 57
Kevin Appier, 55

Of these, Brown had off-field issues (just being a jerk) but I don’t think the others did. Sale probably has better vibes - “dominance” etc - but his resume isn’t a slam dunk.

Johan Santana, by way of comparison, is at 52 WAR.



Exactly this. Sale’s career record is 135-83. We all know the game has changed, standards for pitcher wins and losses have changed, and that W/L was always a highly imperfect way (at best) to measure pitcher value.

But historically, only seven guys have made the Hall of Fame with fewer than 200 wins (not counting Eckersley who had 197): Jack Chesbro, Ed Walsh, Rube Waddell, Lefty Gomez, Sandy Koufax, Addie Joss, and Dizzy Dean. All of them were Veterans Committee selections (and mostly glaring mistakes) except Koufax and Dean. And they all had better records than Sale - he’d have to go 15-0 to match Dean, for example, or 29-4 to match Koufax.

Sale’s candidacy is going to depend on how quickly voters understand how much the game has changed, and how soon they start applying standards they didn’t apply to Cone, Saberhagen, or Santana.
I don't think Sale is a slam dunk, but let me make a case.

In the 15 year span from 1995 until 2010, there were 11 pitchers with 50 or more WAR, and 11 with 175 or more wins. In the same 15 year span from 2010 (Sale's debut) until 2024 (yes I recognize there is a year of overlap, but it's early and I am lazy), there have been 3 pitchers with 50 or more WAR, and four with 175 wins. It is hard to overstate just how much the concept of pitching has changed in such a short period of time.

Among pitchers with 200+ starts since his debut, Sale ranks 3rd in ERA (3.04), 3rd in FIP (2.89), 2nd in K/9 (11.1, only Snell is higher), T9th in BB/9 (2.1), and 2nd in K/BB 5.31, only deGrom is better).

I think the three guys above him in WAR (Scherzer, Kershaw and Verlander) are all absolute, no doubt locks for the Hall of Fame. I also think the guy right behind him (Greinke) likely gets in. Cole will likely surpass Sale at some point in many of these categories (and obviously has more wins, but has also played for, shocker, much more consistently good teams). DeGrom has a chance to pass him in some as well, if the duct tape (and is actually one of the two players leading Sale in FIP).

If you change the criteria to the entire careers of pitchers who debuted between 2005 and 2012, Sale is 5th in WAR, 2nd in ERA, 2nd in FIP, 2nd in WHIP, and far and away first in K:BB (he is at 5.31, 2nd is Kluber at 4.69). I think he is clearly a top 5 pitcher among his "generation", and if you put a gun to my head I would probably place him 4th behind Scherzer, Kershaw and Verlander.

I think if he retired today, he has a pretty good case.

IF (yes, that word is doing a lot work here) he has seasons at about 60% of what he did this year with the Braves in the final two years of his contracts, he is up to ~1750 K's and ~155 wins. If that happens, I think he becomes a shoe in.
 

moondog80

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I get the point about Sale being unavailable, but it's also true that the Braves do not make it into the postseason without him. That's far from "nothing".
 

lexrageorge

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I get the point about Sale being unavailable, but it's also true that the Braves do not make it into the postseason without him. That's far from "nothing".
This. The fact that the Braves lost the two postseason games speaks as much to the team's lack of depth as it does to Sale's missing the opening round. If the only way the Braves can win a playoff game is to have Sale pitch, then they wouldn't get very far regardless of Sale's health.

I certainly feel it was time for Boston to move on from Sale, and his having a Cy Young season was literally a 99th percentile outcome for Atlanta and so not at all easily predicted except in hindsight. But trade will reflect poorly on Breslow if Grissom turns into a bust, which from where we are sitting would not be all that unexpected.
 

Smiling Joe Hesketh

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I get the point about Sale being unavailable, but it's also true that the Braves do not make it into the postseason without him. That's far from "nothing".
It's nothing when you consider they were a 104 win team in 2023 and underperformed in the playoffs that year, and they added Sale, won only 89 games and got bounced 0-2 in the playoffs in large part because Chris Sale was hurt.

They really didn't benefit from him at all, if the bigger picture of postseason success is taken into account. And that is why Chris Sale could win the next 6 Cys in a row and still provide nothing, because the entire point is postseason success and he cannot help a team there.

I have no patience for such a player. He's not missed here for precisely that reason. You cannot count on him.
 

lexrageorge

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It's nothing when you consider they were a 104 win team in 2023 and underperformed in the playoffs that year, and they added Sale, won only 89 games and got bounced 0-2 in the playoffs in large part because Chris Sale was hurt.

They really didn't benefit from him at all, if the bigger picture of postseason success is taken into account. And that is why Chris Sale could win the next 6 Cys in a row and still provide nothing, because the entire point is postseason success and he cannot help a team there.

I have no patience for such a player. He's not missed here for precisely that reason. You cannot count on him.
There are literally zero baseball GM's that consider making the playoffs "nothing".
 

rodderick

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It's nothing when you consider they were a 104 win team in 2023 and underperformed in the playoffs that year, and they added Sale, won only 89 games and got bounced 0-2 in the playoffs in large part because Chris Sale was hurt.

They really didn't benefit from him at all, if the bigger picture of postseason success is taken into account. And that is why Chris Sale could win the next 6 Cys in a row and still provide nothing, because the entire point is postseason success and he cannot help a team there.

I have no patience for such a player. He's not missed here for precisely that reason. You cannot count on him.
They got Chris Sale for Vaughn Grissom, it's not like he was acquired to be 2004 Curt Schilling. He was a reclamation project and won the Cy Young, the Braves never pinned their playoff hopes on Chris Sale.
 

brs3

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I'm happy for Chris Sale, but do not think he bolstered his Hall of Fame chances all that much. I think he'd need minimally several more high caliber seasons to even enter the discussion. He is among the best pitchers of his time, but that doesn't mean he needs to be in the Hall of Fame. Johan Santana and David Price are his career and age comps on b-ref and that sounds about right.

Great player, not a hall of famer.
 

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May 20, 2003
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Deep inside Muppet Labs
There are literally zero baseball GM's that consider making the playoffs "nothing".
The Braves were going to make the playoffs in all likelihood given their 104 win season the year before.

Chris Sale remains one of the most infuriating players to have ever put on the uniform. Even when he's good he still cannot be counted upon. I am positive the Braves are hardly doing cartwheels at the results of their 2024 season.

Again, he's not missed here. Thank God he's gone.
 

simplicio

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SoSH Member
Apr 11, 2012
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It's nothing when you consider they were a 104 win team in 2023 and underperformed in the playoffs that year, and they added Sale, won only 89 games and got bounced 0-2 in the playoffs in large part because Chris Sale was hurt.
Or maybe cause they got about 15 fewer wins out of Acuna and Strider.