Sports, some (including us) surmise, are an outlet for our war impulse. Humanity has, deep down, a strong tribal inclination, and with that comes an inclination to war with other tribes. We want conflict. We want heartbreak. We want bravery, and courage, and cowardice, and victories against insurmountable odds. We have a craving for glory. Sports give us all those things, and best of all, they do it without costing anyone their life.
In recent years, though, sports have—in America—gotten a little too calculated for our tastes. The NBA has become an exercise in which friends can form the strongest alliance. Baseball is too often played on a spreadsheet. Two months ago, Clayton Kershaw—an all-time great who’s accomplished everything one could want to accomplish in his sport besides maybe throwing a perfect game—let Dave Roberts remove him with a perfect game in his sights.
Last night, Tristan Stivors gave us a taste of glory.
College sports, sneakily, are the last stop for a number of athletes, and in college baseball, where few players get immediate riches from the minor leagues, there is less to lose than we are used to communicating. Normally, with college athletes, we stick to a narrative that players need to protect themselves for the next level. Sit out the bowl game. Buy the insurance policy on your ACL. In baseball, for a few players, yes, there are riches to be had if injury is avoided, but for most? This is the pinnacle. Which I think is why coaches and players so often treat it as such, which in turn makes college baseball among the more rewarding sports to watch.
Tristan Stivors is not a starting pitcher. On the season, the senior was used primarily as a closer, posting—before last night—a 2.33 ERA over 54 innings of work across 31 appearances. He was used to multi-inning outings, and he was used to pressure (he closed out that memorable Horns Down win over Texas in Austin in March, if that rings a bell for anyone), but he was not a starting pitcher.
No matter.
With Texas State playing mighty Stanford in Palo Alto in a winner-take-all Regional Championship, Stivors took the start. And Stivors went seven innings. And Stivors threw one hundred pitches. And Stivors only allowed one run.
It was one of those baseball games where every inning, you checked back to see if the thing was still happening, and every inning, there it was. There he was. Defying the odds. It ended, in the end, in a brutal dose of heartbreak: Stivors exited after seven with the game tied at one, Texas State took a 3-1 lead on a two-out single in the ninth, Stanford—facing an opponent who’d already burned its closer—tied it up on back-to-back home runs before winning four batters later, ending Texas State’s season, and ending, I believe, Tristan Stivors’ college career.
Stivors, to be fair, is an All-American. I don’t know where he’ll be drafted, and I don’t know for sure that he’ll be drafted, but it does seem he has career left ahead of him. Which, honestly, makes it better.
You can never fault someone for preserving their economic value. That’s everyone’s right. But there’s something special about an athlete declining to do that when the chips are down. There’s something special about an athlete deciding that at some point, one moment of competition is more important than better odds of comfort over the rest of a life. It’s not exactly selfless, though it does put high importance on tribal interests. It’s more than that. It’s selfish in a glorious way. It’s selfish in the way of pursuing what’s most important to oneself, and that thing of import turning out to be an honorable thing.
Roy McAvoy would be proud.
What a Hockey Game
What turned out to be the Avalanche/Oilers finale was as perfect a finale to that series as we could request. It was a wildly entertaining game, with continuously-escalating scoring, comebacks and lead changes, sensationally good individual performances, sensationally bad individual performances, and ultimately a quick dispatching by the better team.
I haven’t run Gelo yet today—got called on to help receive a couch, so I’m a little scattered this morning—but it was interesting that our model and the market were so aligned on last night’s individual game. There were factors likely dragging down the Avalanche in the market’s eyes that the model doesn’t know about—injuries to Kuemper and Kadri, weird series forces that make bettors (rightly or wrongly) skeptical of sweeps—but even so, Gelo is catching up on Colorado. Now, with some hedging complete (and successful, we picked up seven or eight units and put ourselves in a good place for Rangers-Avalanche and a fine place for Lightning-Avalanche), I’m curious if we can actually get a little value on the Avs. More to come in a few hours. Then, another potential great one tonight. The Stanley Cup Playoffs are as fun as advertised.
Two Nights in Baltimore
The Cubs are at Camden Yards tonight for the first time since 2017, when a Chicago sweep coming out of the All-Star Break keyed a second half surge which left the Cubs NL Central champions for the second straight year.
It’s a grimmer scene this time around, with the Cubs just trying to win a few games as they approach what’s expected to be another aggressive sell-off, and possibly another quite sad one, with even Ian Happ’s name out there as a potential trade chip.
What does success look like over the series? It’s hard to ask for a two-game sweep, especially from a team nine games under .500 a week into June, but with Keegan Thompson facing Kyle Bradish tonight, the Cubs really should win Game 1, and Marcus Stroman should be expected to give the visitors a fighting chance against Jordan Lyles in the back half of the set tomorrow.
On the roster side, keep an eye out for some big news later today. It’s possible Jonathan Villar’s return will simply result in someone else going on the IL, but it’s also possible we see something more noteworthy. On the quieter end, Clint Frazier, Alfonso Rivas, or someone from the bullpen could be optioned to Iowa. On the louder end, Jason Heyward could be designated for assignment or Nick Madrigal could be sent down to try to get his feet back under him. In between, Andrelton Simmons could get the DFA, though choosing between him and Villar is like choosing between Burger King and Subway. They’re different, but neither is particularly great.
If Frazier or Rivas is sent down, there’ll be grumbles, but it’s worth digging into those a little bit and asking the ‘why.’ The Cubs are not going to make the playoffs this year. I think we all can accept that, at least begrudgingly. Frazier and Rivas could each provide value next year or in a hypothetical future season of contention, but they’re two lottery tickets in a fat stack of assets similar to themselves. Villar serves no purpose but trade bait, and he’s capable of getting hot, just as Andrelton Simmons is capable of being viewed as an essential defensive replacement for a team with a bopper up the middle they prefer to take out of playoff games with a lead in the bottom of the ninth. You might not get someone with as much upside as Frazier or Rivas out of a deal for one of these two, but you also might, and even someone like Anderson Espinoza, whom the Cubs received in return for Jake Marisnick, has value. So, it’s smart to keep playing Villar and Simmons. Even if it costs you a few weeks of development of one of these lottery tickets.
Still Portaling
We got two more EvanMiya five-star transfer commitments yesterday, first with Keion Brooks committing to Washington, then with Isiaih Mosley committing to Missouri.
Brooks, a starter for Kentucky last year, lifts a Washington Huskies program sorely in need of a lift, with a decent final win-loss record last year (17-15) but just one NCAA Tournament appearance and one NIT appearance in Mike Hopkins’s five years at the helm. The fourth transfer acquisition of the offseason, and the third rated at four stars or better, Brooks brings the Huskies up to third place in EvanMiya’s “Overall Transfer Activity” metric. Will it be enough? Probably not to be actively good—T-Rank has the Huskies ranked 80th at the moment—but it should at least get them into the NIT conversation, which is a step forward right now.
The addition of Mosley for Mizzou makes a bigger national difference. Eighth in Overall Transfer Activity, the Tigers have picked up five players rated as four-stars or better, and with Mosley capable of being a go-to guy, this team should be competitive in most of their SEC games. T-Rank has them 46th nationally now, putting them squarely onto the bubble discussion.
***
Viewing schedule, second screen rotation in italics:
- 3:10 PM EDT: Rangers @ Guardians, Gray vs. Quantrill (MLB TV)
- 7:05 PM EDT: Cubs @ Orioles, Thompson vs. Bradish (MLB TV)
- 8:00 PM EDT: Rangers @ Lightning, Game 4 (ESPN)
- 8:10 PM EDT: Mariners @ Astros, Flexen vs. Verlander (MLB TV)
- 9:40 PM EDT: Mets @ Padres, Walker vs. Darvish (MLB TV)
