Around Baseball 2021

[P2F]

 

The playoffs will, in fact, be easy to make.

[z3r0s]

 

The playoffs will, in fact, be easy to make.

 

What are the Brave's doing to get a higher W% than us and the Stros? lol

[Orgfiller]

What are the Brave's doing to get a higher W% than us and the Stros? lol

 

Generally speaking, not being in the AL East.

[Laika]

What are the Brave's doing to get a higher W% than us and the Stros? lol

 

NL East is mediocre? Man, they're pretty good though.

 

CF Acuna - superstar

1B Freeman - big star

2B Albies - big star

LF Ozuna - star?

C d'Arnaud - solid

SS Swanson - solid

3B Riley - contributor

RF - Pache/Water - star upside

 

Soroka

Anderson

Fried

Morton

Smyly

Wright/Wilson/Davidson

 

Rotation blows Toronto's out of the water UNLESS Pearson has a huge leap this year and someone like Fried regresses big time. Everyone in their top 5 was legit 4 WAR upside.

[Terminator]

He's talking about that chart having us projected to have the same exact record but their win percentage is higher. I appreciate the breakdown of the Braves though. Saves me a trip to Roster Resource.

[Laika]

He's talking about that chart having us projected to have the same exact record but their win percentage is higher. I appreciate the breakdown of the Braves though. Saves me a trip to Roster Resource.

 

Oh I get it. That's an easy answer though - expected win % based on runs (pythagorean win-loss) is more granular than rounded win totals.

[P2F]

He's talking about that chart having us projected to have the same exact record but their win percentage is higher. I appreciate the breakdown of the Braves though. Saves me a trip to Roster Resource.

 

Ah, it's because the win-loss records are merely fitted as closely as possible after the calculations are done on the projected win percentage.

[z3r0s]

Oh I get it. That's an easy answer though - expected win % based on runs (pythagorean win-loss) is more granular than rounded win totals.

 

duh, its just funny bro

[The Iceman]

Wilner is BACK

 

Writing for the Toronto Star

[Spanky__99]

 

Darn.

 

Of course we were, that'd have been nice.

[jerb]

 

Ken Rosenthal

@Ken_Rosenthal

 

Source confirms: Free-agent reliever Ken Giles in agreement with Mariners on two-year deal. Coming off Tommy John surgery, will be ready for 2022. First: @shannondrayer.

[jerb]

 

Jon Morosi

@jonmorosi

 

#Phillies and Brad Miller are discussing a contract, source says. @MLBNetwork @MLB

[Jays24]

 

Ken Rosenthal

@Ken_Rosenthal

 

Source confirms: Free-agent reliever Ken Giles in agreement with Mariners on two-year deal. Coming off Tommy John surgery, will be ready for 2022. First: @shannondrayer.

 

Very curious about the contract details here. Sucks that Giles got hurt because he was a beast for us.

[max silver]

Very curious about the contract details here. Sucks that Giles got hurt because he was a beast for us.

 

I was sort of hoping the Jays would be the team that signed him to a two year deal while he rehabbed. Latest I heard about Giles before this signing is that he was going to wait until he was healthy before signing a deal. I guess the Mariners must have made a nice offer that changed his mind.

[Laika]

I was sort of hoping the Jays would be the team that signed him to a two year deal while he rehabbed. Latest I heard about Giles before this signing is that he was going to wait until he was healthy before signing a deal. I guess the Mariners must have made a nice offer that changed his mind.

 

Most of these kinds of signings are about opportunity and not money. The M's will not be pumping money into their pen or competing, likely, in 2022. The Jays could be. So Giles sees a clearer path to closing again in Seattle.

 

Same deal with Marwin Gonzalez and Boston... pure bench player here but in Boston he could start, Dalbec and Cordero are both flimsy options.

[Brownie19]

 

Darn.

 

To be honest, we have so much beautiful flexibility that Marwin didn't interest me. If we want another bench infielder, give me a lefty masher like Jedd Gyorko or someone like Brad Miller - give me an impact bat that can play 3rd/1st, maybe some 2nd and DH if needed. What's Jed Lowrie up to these days? He was a beast in 2017 and 2018.

[Laika]

To be honest, we have so much beautiful flexibility that Marwin didn't interest me. If we want another bench infielder, give me a lefty masher like Jedd Gyorko or someone like Brad Miller - give me an impact bat that can play 3rd/1st, maybe some 2nd and DH if needed. What's Jed Lowrie up to these days? He was a beast in 2017 and 2018.

 

Lowrie signed a minor league deal with Oakland this week

[bronson44]

Miller would have been a good fit here

 

[Brownie19]

Jedd Gyorko it is!

[TwistedLogic]

[BTS]

Melancon to the Padres

[TwistedLogic]

[King]

Anyone read the Molly Knight piece on Bauer today?

 

[BTS]

Anyone read the Molly Knight piece on Bauer today?

 

 

Trash article:

 

It wasn’t as big of a debacle as, say, Justin Turner returning to the field to celebrate a world championship with his teammates while infected with the coronavirus last October. But it wasn’t as mellow as a typical sunny February afternoon at Chavez Ravine, either.

 

If Trevor Bauer thought that, in signing with the Dodgers over the Mets, he could escape New York’s famously tough media for a benign and breezy pack of beat writers not frothing at the mouth with tabloid teeth, he certainly received a rude awakening at his introductory press conference on Thursday. About two-thirds of the 45-minute media session at Dodger Stadium was devoted to questions about Bauer having harassed women on social media.

 

 

The timing for Bauer’s record-setting $102 million contract could not have been worse for the Dodgers. Three weeks ago, Mets general manager Jared Porter was fired for having harassed a female reporter. Last week, the Angels suspended pitching coach Mickey Callaway while the club investigates a report that five women in the industry accused him of lewd behavior.

 

Bauer — who has cultivated an online presence totaling nearly 900,000 followers on Twitter, Instagram and YouTube — has been involved in two highly publicized incidents in which young women came forward to say they were harassed by him and his followers. One of those women, who is Jewish, said she received Holocaust jokes in her Twitter mentions for months.

 

When asked about these incidents on Thursday, Bauer said he had learned from his past mistakes. He was pressed by multiple reporters on what he had learned. He declined to answer. He said it was “not the right forum” to discuss what happened, what he learned and how he is going to do better moving forward.

 

But whether saying that was his idea or some kind of crisis management PR person’s brainchild, the strategy was misguided.

 

Thursday marked Bauer’s introduction to Los Angeles. He signed a free-agent deal in a post-Jared Porter and Mickey Callaway world. People in baseball harassing women is one of the biggest topics in the sport right now. The Dodgers are paying Bauer $40 million to pitch for them this season. That’s more than Mookie Betts and Clayton Kershaw — two future Hall of Famers whose characters are above reproach. Of course, Bauer was going to be asked about his past behavior.

 

Here is what he could have said:

 

Hi, everyone. It’s so great to be signing with my hometown team today and realize a dream come true. I used to sit in those bleachers out there and listen to Vin Scully call the games. To have a world championship team like this want me to join them is the honor of my career. I’m so excited to be here, and I can’t wait to meet all my teammates soon and interact with all of you fans when it’s safe. I’ve got so many ideas for working within the community to help grow the game. Giving back is important to me. I grew up here and went to college here, and it’s so great to be back.

 

But before we begin, I want to address some things that I think are important. There have been some incidents lately of men in this sport treating women badly, and I just want to say that, if the stuff that I’ve read is true, then I’m disgusted by it. Some people might know that I’ve gotten into a couple of online incidents in the past with two women, and I just want to explain a little bit about what happened and how I’ve grown from it.

 

I’ve always felt like a bit of an outsider, or an underdog maybe. It’s tough to remember that I’m a Major League Baseball pitcher with a ton of social media followers. Some of these strangers I don’t even know will just go after someone I might be sparring with online and say the most horrible, shocking, hurtful and vile things I would never say myself, nor would I condone. But even though I myself didn’t say some of these things, I do have to own my part in retweeting some of these women and encouraging my fans to engage with them. I realize now that I wasn’t just defending the underdog I’ve always felt like I am. Instead, I was punching down. That’s not cool. I respect women. I’m sorry for what’s happened in the past, and I’ve privately made amends.

 

Becoming famous is weird. Going from having 20 Twitter followers to over 400,000 can be disorienting. I’m human, and I made mistakes. I’m really sorry, and I want to do better. I’m not going to encourage my followers to go after those who don’t have the same kind of status as I do anymore. I’m no longer an underdog. I’m a Cy Young Award winner, and I’m going to be the highest-paid player in baseball this year. I’m going to represent the Dodgers well in everything I do. I take that seriously. I’ve made mistakes, and I’m committed to listening to how I may have hurt others in the past and growing up so it doesn’t happen again.

 

I just want to help the team win. I don’t want to be a distraction. I want to be a good teammate, give back to the community and bring another championship back to L.A. as soon as possible.

 

It’s possible for people to grow and to change. Maybe Bauer really has learned from his mistakes and he will do better. But the problem is, he doesn’t have any motivation to change a single thing about his behavior, not after the Dodgers found nothing wrong with it and gave him $40 million to pitch for them in 2021 and $45 million to pitch for them next year.

 

Some Dodgers fans do not care about Bauer’s online behavior, and they think all this handwringing is a waste of time. But a great many fans feel alienated by the signing and are stung that the organization they love signed this guy.

 

Young people make dumb mistakes, especially online. But the first step to forgiveness is accountability. Unfortunately for Bauer and the Dodgers, there was none of that Thursday.

 

 

Why the f*** should he be apologizing for people in the game who sexually harassed women? Why is he responsible for anti-Semitic comments that "his followers" allegedly directed at someone (a woman!) on Twitter? Why was this article even published?

[G-Snarls]

So many DFA's, waiver claims and minor signings today its insane...

[jerb]

 

Jon Heyman

@JonHeyman

 

Breaking: Jake Arrieta and the Cubs are getting close to a reunion

[L54]

Trash article:

 

 

 

 

Why the f*** should he be apologizing for people in the game who sexually harassed women? Why is he responsible for anti-Semitic comments that "his followers" allegedly directed at someone (a woman!) on Twitter? Why was this article even published?

 

Molly White Knight can't pass up the chance to show how woke she is

[philly30]

Miller would have been a good fit here

 

 

Dombrowski has been making some good moves for the Phillies but it will still takes years to clean up the mess

[connorp]

Molly White Knight can't pass up the chance to show how woke she is

 

I saw an article right before the SB talking about Tom Brady and his support for Trump and his obvious white privilege (their exact words). Wish these people would just go find a rock to crawl under

[L54]

I saw an article right before the SB talking about Tom Brady and his support for Trump and his obvious white privilege (their exact words). Wish these people would just go find a rock to crawl under

 

I’d prefer a bridge to jump off of but yes I agree

 

Tom Brady drives them absolutely insane and I love it.