At the very beginning he was an amazing GM, gaming the compensation system, unloading Wells, stupidly trading Napoli for Francisco, drafting well, making good trades for Escobar and Rasmus. Then he went all in on a bad team.
I view the Tulo deal like realizing credit card debt is bad (Reyes being the credit card debt) and that Castro and Hoffman were the interest payments to get back to ground zero (Escobar being ground zero).
I get depressed thinking that next year our starting rotation could have been Stroman, Syndergaard, Hutchison, Norris and DeScalafani/Nicolino/Sanchez/Osuna/Hoffman
The reason Travis took so long to recover is that he had four cysts in his chest which were causing the pain. Once they were drained and removed he started feeling really good again from what I've read/heard. There's no reason to think there's a lingering issue. They couldn't have found the cysts without doing the exploratory surgery.
Deep down inside I'm hoping Syndergaard hits Ventura in the ribs with a 99mph fastball, or in the hands. Just enough to make him miss the rest of the playoffs.
Not sure if it was mentioned but Daniel Norris was diagnosed with Thyroid cancer earlier this year, before the trade deadline and based on his Instagram post it might have been as early as the start of the season.
http://www.freep.com/story/sports/mlb/tigers/2015/10/19/detroit-tigers-daniel-norris/74236764/
I thought I saw Travis there last night. I don't think Travis needs to do too much rehab from the surgery but he might also be doing stuff down in Florida while the team travels. I think all that was found in the surgery was cysts.
What I find frustrating about yesterday was the call at second base. The definitive view angle was never added to the definitive review angle videos on MLB.com. I don't think there are too many missing and none should be missing from playoff games.
It's times like this I'm glad I set my own schedule but since I'm taking tomorrow off for surgery it's going to be a mess trying to make up enough time on Wednesday and Thursday to cut my Friday down to a 10:30 am finish.
According to a Sportsnet article, by Shi Davidi, Price wants Thole to catch him.
http://www.sportsnet.ca/baseball/mlb/blue-jays-price-not-worried-about-lengthy-layoff/
Two seasons in Korea and his numbers are hilarious. 71 doubles, 11 triples, 83 homers, 50 stolen bases to 10 caught stealing, 160 walks to 186 strikeouts and a .362/.462/.740 triple slash.