Career strikeout milestones tend to arrive quietly for most pitchers, a round number that shows up in a broadcast graphic mid-game without much fanfare beyond the moment itself. For a pitcher of Tarik Skubal’s current standing in the sport, even a routine milestone carries a bit more weight, if only because his…
Franchise home run records tend to belong to sluggers, the players built specifically to hit the ball over the fence as often as possible, often at some real cost to their defensive value or their durability behind the plate. Salvador Perez has spent his career complicating that assumption, catching at an elite…
The All-Star Game occupies a strange place in the baseball calendar. It’s an exhibition in the most literal sense, a game that carries no standings weight and asks its participants to perform for an audience rather than to win at any real cost. That context usually strips some of the analytical value out of what…
