What A (Half-) Season It's Been

Hard to believe we're nearly 81 games into the 2017 MLB season. Wasn't Opening Day just last week?

It's been an amazing season. Truly. Little acorn teams have sprung up into mighty oaks. A couple of the mighty have shriveled and gone to seed. A gaggle of mediocre veterans have become Albert Pujols, who himself has become holes of poo.

Most importantly, the game's tectonic plates have shifted. Swing up; hit 'em out.

Let's take stock of the biggest stories of this season so far:

1.  The Launch Angle Revolution -- Hitters have decided that a level swing gets them hard-hit singles. Better to swing up and trade a few more fly outs for a gaggle more home runs, particularly when infields are shifting against your strength.

It's working for White Sox outfielder Avisail Garcia, whose OPS is 150 points higher than ever before.

It's working for A's first baseman Yonder Alonso, whose home run total in half of 2017 is greater than in any two of his previous seven campaigns.

It's working for J.D. Martinez, whose .658 slugging is 100 points higher than at his peak.

And for the Nationals' Ryan Zimmerman and Tampa Bay's Corey Dickerson and Toronto's Justin Smoak, who previous to 2017 placed on the Career Bust leaderboard. His two-and-a-half wins of value is double any previous full season.

All these guys are coming out of the woodwork and tearing the cover off the ball like never before. But wasn't it Babe Ruth who discovered that swinging hard and angling up offered the best results?

2. Aaron Judge -- And Cody Bellinger too. Out of nowhere, a couple of rookies are vying for their league's respective MVP. Between them, they have slugged 50 homers and earned 7.3 wins against replacement.

And Bellinger didn't start the season with the big club.

And Judge batted .179 in 95 plate appearances last fall.

And he's the second coming of Derek Jeter in comportment, except he's, like, 100 pounds heavier.

3. The Return of Bryce Harper -- Whew! Following a disheartening 2016 in which many observers thought the boy phenom was hurt, he's bounced back to an All-Star first half of 2017, posting an OPS over 1000 and hitting walk-off home runs.

4. The Ascendance of the Yankees, Diamondbacks and Rockies -- At press time* all of these teams have been passed by superior rivals. But they all seem poised to make a post-season run, something not generally in the Tarot cards at the commencement of festivities. They're back to bombing in the Bronx, Colorado has finally solved the home/away puzzle and Phoenix is where the scrubs are supporting the stars.

*There is no press. I write without deadlines. This statement is meaningless.

It will be fascinating to see how long they can keep it up. The Yankees' rotation is suspect, the Rockies' bullpen has regressed and the Dbacks are living off contributions from the likes of Robbie Ray, Taijuan Walker and Zach Godley.

5. The demise of the Giants, Mets and AL West. You hear that sound? That was the sound of the Houston Astros clinching the AL West. Premature? Then it must have been the sound of the Giants hitting the Earth. The bigger they are, the harder they fall. We knew the Mets would only be as good as their pitchers' health, but did anyone see this coming in San Francisco? How does a rotation of Johnny Cueto; Jeff, uh, The Shark; and Madison Bumgarner lose more games than all but one team? 'Tis a puzzlement.

6.The accidental? juicing of the ball -- A report by The Ringer found that the baseballs used in MLB games are ever so slightly springier and their stitches are ever so slightly smaller. That means they don't move around as much when pitchers hurl them and they bounce farther off bats. That leads to more home runs, which, coupled with item #1 above, leads to even more home runs, more per batted ball than ever before by a significant margin, as you can see below.

 

7. The head-scratching Cubs -- As recently as 10 weeks ago, the Cubs were the Golden State Warriors of baseball, a juggernaut that would crank out victories until the end of time. Then their pitching staff cratered, their defense became suddenly offensive and Kyle Schwarber found himself in Iowa. We keep saying Chicago will be fine...and they keep losing every other game. Could this be the beginning of the next 108 years?

8. The Brewers' slow burn -- By building their team backwards; i.e., by signing bench parts, utility fielders, middle relievers and fourth starters who have an edge on their league-wide counterparts, the Brewers have embarked on a teardown without the teardown. There aren't any stars on the team, particularly with Ryan Braun on the DL, but their bench is as good as anyone's, and that's kept them over .500 all first half. (The one glaring Achilles heal on the Giants this year is the opposite; their non-starters have been gruesome.) When their farm finally bears fruit they could be a contender without ever having hit rock bottom.

9. The rise of Statcast and the official end of the debate over analytics -- With MLB adopting advanced metrics, and even developing its own, the Luddites have been completely drowned out. Exit velocity, launch angle and other MLB inventions have muted the frustration over useful measurements like TAv, WAR and FIP. Plus Luddite-in-Chief Hawk Harrelson is retiring. The King is dead. Long live the King.

...and we're only halfway through the season.