Laika

David Eckstein

So I did not end up demolishing featherd. Apologies. But now I am probably in 19th so proud of my tank

Trade enough nickles for dimes... and you’ve got yourself a dollar!

Danny Jansen & The Captain & Gabby

Why did this thread get moved? It's not off topic because the Blue Jays large adult son pitching prospects are talking about ketchup chips. C'mon, mods.

No. I can’t see how he would.

ALL OF A SUDDEN the pitching outlook is... not so bleak Tony Buckets might be a legit SP3. Don't sleep on actual upside here. His type of stuff plays in the big leagues.

I've got my money on a subconscious agreement

The kid's twitter bio says Dartmouth '23. The Cs in his first stats class are going to be emotional. Bizarre that he's a regular contributor on the main website and not just mucking around in the community posts section.

We record on a conference call. Bell sends us the audio file on a CD every week.

Lol So the really good hitters are below average less often. YOU DONT SAY!?

TIL being rich changes your genes Isn’t Jim a purported PhD?

this post seems racist, Jim!

Praise Gio Urshela

Aaron Sanchez needs to go to Driveline and just f***ing air it out!

Well now you've moved the goal posts. I don't think it's fair to say that his reasonable floor is a high end reliever (your original statement). I do think he could reasonably be a good reliever. But there is a difference there. His floor is definitely not a high end reliever.

A lot of his decline is attributable to velocity loss: https://www.fangraphs.com/graphs.aspx?playerid=11490&position=P&pitchgraphs=true&statArr=&legend=1&split=base&time=daily&start=2014&end=2019&rtype=mult&gt1=15&dStatArray=SI&ymin=&ymax= The once special fastball is now a lot closer to average. He used to be able to just throw a strike anywhere and get decent results because his FB was hard to hit. Not so much the case anymore, so he has to try to stay off the middle of the plate and he doesn't have the command to try to do that. I'm surprised that Houston even wanted him.

Can't wait to nuke featherD this week and send him spiraling out of the playoff picture!

Guillen notices Cabrera's weight June 19, 2007 Miguel Cabrera's recent weight gain hasn't escaped the notice of his countryman and mentor, Ozzie Guillen. The subject came up again during their late dinner Sunday evening after the Marlins flew into town for this three-game interleague series with the White Sox. Guillen was blunt as ever with reporters Monday when asked about their conversation. "I'm a little upset with him," said Guillen, the former Marlins third-base coach now in his fourth season managing the White Sox. "I said, 'You're still young. You're going to keep getting bigger.' He knows he's got a problem. We talked about it." Guillen challenged Cabrera, 24, to get in better shape last winter in Venezuela, and Cabrera reported to spring training looking noticeably slimmer. But the combination of a strained oblique in April and some slippage in his commitment to conditioning has led to a much snugger uniform and some criticism in the media. Even Guillen couldn't resist teasing his friend during a recent phone call, telling Cabrera he looked like he had a "lot of arepas" in his burgeoning belly. "When you're young and you're good, you can get away with a lot of stuff," Guillen said. "When you're getting older and you go down, they say you're fat. Right now it's, 'Oh, he's a little chubby. He likes to eat.' When you're not hitting .340 with 40 home runs, they're going to call you a fat boy from Venezuela. You'd better lose some weight." Part of the problem, Guillen said, is cultural. "When your mom is Venezuelan and your wife is Venezuelan, you're going to get fat because they like to cook," Guillen said. "When you sit there for lunch and you see all the food, you're going to eat it. The good thing is he knows about it." Guillen isn't asking Cabrera to go on any crash diets, just to watch what he eats a little more closely. "Miggy is not going to be a small kid; he never will," Guillen said. "I just told him, 'You have to take care of yourself because you have a chance to be one of the best players ever from our country.' Miggy is going to be a Hall of Famer. There's no doubt." As long as Cabrera gets his weight under control, Guillen sees no reason why he shouldn't be able to remain at third base for years to come. He raved about his natural athleticism and said he is a "way better player" than Andres Galarraga, the only Venezuelan to win a batting title in the majors. If Cabrera doesn't make a change soon, however, "He's going to play in the Mexican League," Guillen joked.

Compare to Miggy, who was a beefcake for most of his career but a very athletic beefcake relatively speaking: Prince -23 WAR from being fat in 6853 career PA Miggy -22 WAR from being fat in 10133 career PA There's no reason Vlad can't at least stem the WAR bleeding by being more fit

Prince Fielder is the obvious bad-case body comparison for Vladdy. -172.2 defensive runs and -56.4 baserunning runs in his career. That's almost 23 WAR down the drain. Cut that in half and his 27.4 WAR career becomes nearly 40, and he joins Votto as a HOF candidate hitter (at the point in his career when it ended). Also, have to assume that Fielder's weight contributed to the career ending injury and it's reasonable to say that it might have been the primary factor. I honestly think Vlad minus thirty pounds might be able to cut it in LF.

That doesn't really fix anything on the DEF (value) and UBR front.

lol Yahoo!

why

A lot of people throw out Kevin Pillar as a comparison for light-hitting CF prospects who have good defensive scouting reports. What few people recognize and acknowledge about Pillar is that, despite the atrocious approach at the plate and terrible eye, he has a legitimate 50 hit tool and average game power (or at the very least, fringe-average game power) thanks to a quick bat and some real athleticism. Most of the light-hitting, good defensive CF prospects that people hope can become Pillar just don't have his bat speed or his pop, which is the main reason they won't be big leaguers.