Dylan Moore is 26 years old. The Mariners are his fourth organization. The M’s signed him as a minor league free agent to make him their jack-of-all-trades utility player, since he can player all four infield positions plus the outfield. He is the new Willie Bloomquist/Taylor Motter/A. Romine. He made his MLB debut in Japan on the 20th of March. He walked in his first two plate appearances and stole a base.
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Saturday evening he got the start at 3B against the Red Sox. He went 0 for 4 with three strikeouts and a GIDP. He was not having a good day.
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Still, the Mariners led 6 – 2 with two out in the top of the ninth. The Red Sox had runners on first and second when Mookie Betts grounded to third. Moore bobbled the ball, then threw over the Ryon Healy’s head. (Dan Vogelbach would have caught it.) A run scored.
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Rafael Devers grounded to third, but Moore let the ball get behind him for another error. A run scored. (It probably should have been scored a base hit. Devers’ ball was too hot to handle.)
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JD Martinez grounded to third. Moore bobbled the ball, then bounced the throw to first. Healy couldn’t handle it (but Vogey would have). Moore’s third error on consecutive plays, a third unearned run scored, the M’s lead cut to 6 – 5. Men on first and third.
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Xander Bogaerts was up next. I wondered if Servais should take Dylan out. Bogaerts was the subject of spirited bidding in our draft. So we know he’s good, right? If Bogaerts hits the ball to third, there could be four consecutive errors…
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So: let’s do a poll – a first for an EFL daily update: When would you take Moore out of the game?
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Servais left him in. Bogaerts looked at strike three. The M’s won.
But now there are a bunch more questions:
- What do you do with Dylan Moore if you manage the M’s? Do you send him to the minors? Keep in Seattle but riding the bench for a while? Send him right back into the fray the next day?
- Can Moore recover from this nightmare?
- Has anyone made three consecutive errors to allow three consecutive unearned runs to almost throw away a game — and still gone on to have a successful career?
- Has anyone ever made four consecutive errors in a game? Five?
- How many errors in a row would you have to make before you took yourself out of the game? (In my case, 0. I think I’d stand there at third base, visualizing how I might not even be able to dodge a ball hit at me, and start backing up. Onto the grass. And keep right on backing up until I can find an open seat along the rail way down the left field line.) (Or the bullpen would be ok, too.)
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| EFL | ||||||
| TEAM | WINS | LOSSES | PCT. | GB | RS | RA |
| Canberra Kangaroos | 2 | 0 | .799 | — | 15.3 | 7.7 |
| Old Detroit Wolverines | 2 | 1 | .711 | — | 19.6 | 12.5 |
| Cottage Cheese | 1 | 0 | .728 | 0.4 | 6.2 | 3.8 |
| Pittsburgh Alleghenys | 1 | 1 | .545 | 0.5 | 14.0 | 12.8 |
| Portland Rosebuds | 1 | 2 | .394 | 0.9 | 13.2 | 16.4 |
| Peshastin Pears | 1 | 2 | .385 | 0.9 | 18.2 | 23.0 |
| Brookland Outs | 0 | 1 | .054 | 1 | 1.5 | 6.4 |
| Bellingham Cascades | 0 | 2 | .250 | 1.1 | 7.4 | 12.9 |
| Flint Hill Tornadoes | 1 | 2 | .309 | 1.2 | 11.3 | 16.9 |
| D.C. Balk | 0 | 2 | .145 | 1.3 | 5.7 | 13.9 |
| Kaline Drive | 1 | 4 | .242 | 1.9 | 17.2 | 30.4 |
| Haviland Dragons | 0 | 5 | .083 | 2.7 | 10.6 | 35.3 |
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Old Detroit: W 1, L 1; 14 – 10. (34 PA, .412, .474, .518; 5 ip, 2 er, 3.69 ERA). Wolverine hitters have a case of Marineritis again… but this time it’s a good thing! Kyle Schwarber hit the only homer, but there were 4 doubles and 4 walks. And Dan Vogelbach is still riding the pines. Even Lewis Brinson went 2 for 4 with a double. If only it could last.
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Cottage: W 1, L (-1); 2 – 3. (44 PA, .341, .383, .591; 2 ip, 0 er, 0.00 ERA). Somewhere along the way the Cheese pilfered Yoan Moncada from the impatient Tornados. Who ever heard of a patient Tornado? They got tired of waiting for Moncada to turn into a superstar. But the Cheese can wait forever. Which approach is better? Well… Moncada went 3 for 5 with a homer Saturday, to lift his OPS for the season to 1.435. And the Cheese moved into third place without adding to their total of games played. (And Tyler Skaggs hasn’t made an appearance yet.) How did the Tornados do?
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Pittsburgh: W, 8 – 6. (41 PA, .317, .383, .537; 6.7 ip, 4 er, 5.40 ERA). Although Stephen Strasburg struggled somewhat (6 ip, 4 er), Allegheny hitters covered for him. Especially Maikel Franco, going 2 for 3 with a homer and a walk to bring his season line to .500, .625, 1.500. No one else on the A’s is close to that 2.125 OPS, but Jose Altuve, Tyler Flowers, Dominic Smith and Dansby Swanson are all over 1.000 OPS.
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Portland: L, 1 – 4. (39 PA, .205, .262, .308; 7.7 ip, 4 er, 4.70 ERA). Brett Anderson hurled 6 shutout innings, and JT Realmuto blasted his first homer of the season, but it wasn’t enough. Two relievers combined for 1.7 ip and 4 earned runs. And other than Anthony Rendon’s 2 for 4 with a double and a walk, the rest of the team batted 4 for 31 with 1 walk (.129, .159, .129). Of special delight… er, I mean, anguish: MVP Mookie Betts went 0 for 5, and Ex-Wolverine Infielder Extraordinaire (EWIE) Jeimer Candelario went 0 for 4.
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Peshastin: W, 9 – 6. (46 PA, .304, .347, .522; 5 ip, 2 er, 3.60 ERA). How is the Pears’ all National outfield doing? Well, on Saturday Eaton, Soto and Robles all started in the outfield and went a combined 5 for 13 with a double, a homer, and a HBP. Plus Soto stole a base (although Robles got picked off). On the season they are OPSing .476, .944, and 1.429, respectively. The Nationals are going to figure this out pretty soon, and try to get all of their players to sign with the Pears.
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Brookland: DNP, 0 -2. (30 PA, .333, .333, .667; 7.7 ip, 7 er) Zack Godley suffered through 5.1 innings, allowing 7 er – including a homer run by his own teammate, Cody Bellinger, who went on to go 4 for 6 with TWO home runs. Bellinger is now batting .467, .500, 1.067 on the season. But Outs management will no doubt encourage him to be a bit more discriminant in choosing his victims.
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Bellingham: L, 6 – 8. (23 PA, .304, .407, .696; 6 ip, 6 er, 9.00 ERA). Bryce Harper clouted his first home run of the year. Harper is batting a lowly .167 on the season but sports a 1.042 OPS thanks to the homer and some walks. Justin Turner went 3 for 5 with a walk. But Dakota Hudson got lit up for 3 earned runs in 4.3 innings pitched, including 3 homers.
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Flint Hill: W 1, L 1; 5 – 10. (43 PA, .186, .280, .326; 7,7 ip, 2 er, 2.35 ERA). I accused the Tornados of impatience for giving up on Yoan Moncada too soon. But maybe I should cut them some slack. They haven’t given up yet on Adalberto Mondesi. Adalberto only managed a single in four plate appearances Saturday, but he’s batting .375 and OPSing 1.375 so far this season, so maybe things aren’t so impatient as I thought in the Tornado house.
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DC: L, 3 – 6; (30 PA, .200, .273, .200; 1.7 ip, 0 er). Balk fans worldwide celebrated the first appearance of any Balk pitchers this season. Seranthony Dominguez with a scoreless inning, followed by Tim Mayza who amazed ya with another 2/3 of a scoreless inning. They took awhile to find the park, but those Balk pitchers sure honed their craft along the way.
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Kaline: W, 9 – 7. (31 PA, .258, .410, .323; no pitching Saturday). Steve Duggar led the quietly surprising Drive offense with a 2 for 4 day. Fellow Giant OF Gerardo Parra chipped in a 1 for 2 day with a walk. That’s 2/3 of the Giant outfield, almost a match for the Pears’ Nationals outfield… sort of. If the Drive can snag debutant Michael Reed in the next draft, they can have a complete MLB outfield just like the Pears! (Reed is 0 for 7 so far this year…)
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Haviland: L, 3 – 5. (34 PA, .206, .289, .265; 18.3 ip, 12 er, 5.89 ERA). EWIE Kolten Wong continued to lead the Dragon offense going 3 for 3 yesterday to lift his season batting line to .600, .636, 1.300, for an OPS of 1.936. Even better than Jorge Soler! But for some reason the Cardinals pinch hit for Wong with two out in the ninth inning, down two runs, sending the mighty Yairo Munoz to the plate instead. And the rest of the lineup only managed to go 4 for 31.
That managerial misfire wasn’t the worst thing of the day, though, for Dragon fans. Yu Drvish got through 2.2 innings while surrendering 7 walks and 3 earned runs. Bryse Wilson came in, surviving 3.3 innings while issuing 4 free passes and 4 earned runs. Pablo Lopez did a little better: 3 earned runs in 5 innings. But it was Tyler Glasnow playing the Kolten Wong role for the pitchers: 5 ip, 1 er.
And guess what? I have a transaction just in from Haviland, wanting me to activate Tyler Glasnow to the max (which would be a record 93% increase, except he’s already active 50%). So the Dragons are wasting no time, using on of their 3 mid-month roster moves before things get any worse.
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| AL East | ||||
| TEAM | WINS | LOSSES | PCT. | GB |
| Old Detroit Wolverines | 2 | 1 | .711 | — |
| Toronto Blue Jays | 2 | 1 | .667 | 0.1 |
| Tampa Bay Rays | 2 | 1 | .667 | 0.1 |
| Baltimore Orioles | 1 | 1 | .500 | 0.6 |
| New York Yankees | 1 | 1 | .500 | 0.6 |
| Boston Red Sox | 1 | 2 | .333 | 1.1 |
| Flint Hill Tornadoes | 1 | 2 | .309 | 1.2 |
| NL East | ||||
| TEAM | WINS | LOSSES | PCT. | GB |
| Philadelphia Phillies | 2 | 0 | .000 | — |
| New York Mets | 2 | 0 | .000 | — |
| Canberra Kangaroos | 2 | 0 | .799 | 0.4 |
| Miami Marlins | 1 | 2 | .333 | 1.5 |
| D.C. Balk | 0 | 2 | .145 | 1.7 |
| Washington Nationals | 0 | 2 | .000 | 2 |
| Atlanta Braves | 0 | 2 | .000 | 2 |
| AL Central | ||||
| TEAM | WINS | LOSSES | PCT. | GB |
| Kansas City Royals | 2 | 0 | .000 | — |
| Pittsburgh Alleghenys | 1 | 1 | .545 | 0.9 |
| Cleveland Indians | 1 | 1 | .500 | 1 |
| Minnesota Twins | 1 | 1 | .500 | 1 |
| Detroit Tigers | 1 | 2 | .333 | 1.5 |
| Bellingham Cascades | 0 | 2 | .250 | 1.5 |
| Chicago White Sox | 0 | 2 | .000 | 2 |
| NL Central | ||||
| TEAM | WINS | LOSSES | PCT. | GB |
| Cincinnati Reds | 1 | 0 | .000 | — |
| Milwaukee Brewers | 2 | 1 | .667 | — |
| Cottage Cheese | 1 | 0 | .728 | 0.3 |
| Chicago Cubs | 1 | 1 | .500 | 0.5 |
| Brookland Outs | 0 | 1 | .054 | 0.9 |
| St. Louis Cardinals | 1 | 2 | .333 | 1 |
| Pittsburgh Pirates | 0 | 1 | .000 | 1 |
| AL West | ||||
| TEAM | WINS | LOSSES | PCT. | GB |
| Seattle Mariners | 4 | 1 | .800 | — |
| Texas Rangers | 1 | 1 | .500 | 1.5 |
| Oakland A’s | 2 | 3 | .400 | 2 |
| Houston Astros | 1 | 2 | .333 | 2 |
| Los Angeles Angels | 1 | 2 | .333 | 2 |
| Kaline Drive | 1 | 4 | .242 | 2.8 |
| Haviland Dragons | 0 | 5 | .083 | 3.6 |
| NL West | ||||
| TEAM | WINS | LOSSES | PCT. | GB |
| Los Angeles Dodgers | 2 | 1 | .667 | — |
| San Diego Padres | 2 | 1 | .667 | — |
| Colorado Rockies | 2 | 1 | .667 | — |
| Portland Rosebuds | 1 | 2 | .394 | 0.8 |
| Peshastin Pears | 1 | 2 | .385 | 0.8 |
| San Francisco Giants | 1 | 2 | .333 | 1 |
| Arizona Diamondbacks | 1 | 2 | .333 | 1 |
Your story about Dylan Moore reminds me of another Moore who had a bad day: Donnie. Donnie Moore was an established major-league player for the Angels back in the 1980’s, I think. He was one of their best relief pitchers until one day in the playoffs he gave up a game-losing home run. He never recovered.
I hope that Dylan avoids Donnie’s fate.
Three plays, none of them good but only one egregiously bad, don’t mean much. The FO thinks he’s a capable defender and so you run him back out there as a defensive replacement late in games where Healy starts at third and Bruce or E5 start at first.