masn-baseballs-orioles.jpgEduardo Rodriguez tossed a scoreless inning and was credited with a hold last night in the Arizona Fall League’s Fall Stars Game.

Rodriguez walked one batter in the fourth in the West team’s 9-2 victory over the East. And I honestly don’t know why that qualifies as a hold, but it says so in the box score.

Might have something to do with the West breaking a scoreless tie with two runs in the bottom of the third. I’m not really in tune with the hold rule, and by admitting it, I feel as…Eduardo Rodriguez tossed a scoreless inning and was credited with a hold last night in the Arizona Fall League’s Fall Stars Game.

Rodriguez walked one batter in the fourth in the West team’s 9-2 victory over the East. And I honestly don’t know why that qualifies as a hold, but it says so in the box score.

Might have something to do with the West breaking a scoreless tie with two runs in the bottom of the third. I’m not really in tune with the hold rule, and by admitting it, I feel as though I need to be held right now.

I could have sworn that baseball got rid of the hold stat a few years ago. Must have come back. Or I’m getting it confused with Pete Rose.

I’m not an avid reader of the Bill James Handbook, but the 2014 edition states that the Orioles ranked 25th in manufacturing runs this season.

There are 30 teams. That’s not good. #analysis

“One of the stats developed for the handbook is called Manufactured Runs,” said Ben Jedlovec, a vice-president of Baseball Info Solutions, which produces the stats for the Handbook. “Many managers, coaches and broadcasters will tell you that teams need to be able to move the runners over and manufacture runs to be successful. Get ’em on, get ’em over, get ’em in. You can’t always wait for the longball to score runs, so they say.”

The Orioles led the majors with 212. The longball wasn’t an issue.

According to the handbook, the Orioles manufactured 128 runs, ranking ahead of the Oakland Athletics (124) and right behind the Atlanta Braves (131). The A’s and Braves made the playoffs. What do we make of it?

The Rangers have led the league in manufactured runs in three of the past four years, and they’ve gone to the World Series twice in that span. The Angels have led the league five times since 2002 and have finished out of the top four only once in that span. We haven’t seen them in the Fall Classic since 2002.

What do we make of it?

Left fielder Nate McLouth (27) and third baseman Manny Machado (22) were the only Orioles among the top 50 individual players in the majors, credited with contributing to 49 manufactured runs between them.

The Orioles scored 745 runs to rank fifth in the majors. So, they could score ’em, but they weren’t real good at manufacturing ’em. #moreanalysis