Brownie19

I'm not so sure that's true. It's one thing to bring that cocky, larger than life attitude into the clubhouse when you're an MVP candidate. Tough to bring that in when you hit .160 now and miss half the games. If he still has that attitude, he'll look like a douchebag loser. Best you could hope for is he turns into David Justine after Billy Beane sets him straight. Who knows if JD can be that guy. I have to think there are 10+ options I'd consider before JD. I don't think there's a high probability he has a dead cat bounce left in him.

I think Colorado is a horrible landing spot for any player in baseball.

I do think there's also the counter effect for pitchers in warm weather states who play baseball year round - the overuse of arms, especially at younger ages causing issues. It's a bit ironic that in Ontario, we have pitch count rules, designed, through the use of studies, to prevent injury and promote growth and development - yet when we go down and compete in US tournaments, there is almost no rules (if there are, they are miles away from our rules) to protect arms. Most Ontario teams that have success at US tournaments run out of pitching on Sunday (where in some tournaments, may require you to play 3-4 games on the Sunday to win the tournament). I'm not sure if the "cold weather" states use different pitch count restrictions simply because we don't throw/pitch/compete year round or not.

Pretty crazy we were just 2 Blake Snell votes away from having unanimous winners for the MVP, Cy Young and ROY in both leagues (has that ever happened before?). I'm pretty shocked the voting was so unanimous for the NL Cy Young award. I guess ERA still holds a ton of weight with voters.

I think it really depends on the cost. He's a guy with a good pedigree, is entering his physical prime and is statcats numbers were a lot better last year (similar to 2021) and they were in 2022 (despite there not being a lot of change in the results). Obviously no guarantee you'll get much more than he provided last year, but I do still think there's some upside there and we do need another infielder. At the right price, I'd bring him on - my hesitation is that he can't play 3rd and Babe Schneider (or Biggio) probably can't either...

If the A's drop the green - that will be super depressing. The Oakland green is some of the best threads in all of baseball.

Almost every team goes through cycles man. Freeman and Kershaw will be old as f*** in 2026 and by that time, there's a much higher chance that Betts is declining and those guys are weighing down the organization a bit. Young position players on the Dodgers would seem to include Smith, Outman and Lux - which isn't this eye popping group. Cartaya, Vargas and Pages are their top prospects, we'll see what they turn out to be. Bobby Miller looks great, but Urias keeps beating people, so he's f***ed, Buehler and May are always hurt and while there are some more interesting arms there, the Dodgers are not nearly as strong as they once were IMO. Again, picking teams with buckets of cash and a good FO obviously increases the likelihood that the team will be competitive - but only teams with buckets of cash are even going to consider Ohtani anyway.

That it is. I wonder how many teams have handed out $300M+ deals. Also hard to imagine teams who've already handed out $300M+ deals added Ohtani for $600M.

To be fair, a $600M contract is going to be 2-4 times more than most teams have ever invested in 1 player...

Betts and Freeman found the fountain of youth? The reality is it's difficult to look at a team in the 2023 offseason and project where they will be in 2026. You can mitigate the risk by choosing a team that historically has a high payroll, but even those teams can't run beyond the luxury tax forever without it having an impact - and the reality is that Ohtani himself is going to eat up a f***ton of payroll for any team. If Ohtani was looking at the Braves during the 2022 offseason, he may have thought Acuna and Albies are broken and Swanson and Jansen are leaving. s*** changes quickly.

I mean - Bo is a 4.5-5 WAR player right now...

I think I missed this one - I think this is spot on John.

He's certainly making the Panthers look like idiots right now (the Bears also).

I don't get the snarkiness. Are you the only person who didn't enjoy the improved pace of game and reduced length? I understand the thought "what difference can 2 seconds make?", but obviously MLB believes it will be an improvement. MLB has been pretty f***ing spot on with rule changes over the past 5 years have they not? It seems that even those who were dead set against the pitch clock at the start of the season seem to have come around to support it. Maybe you just hate change?

Sounds about right. We definitely saw pitchers manipulating the clock more and more as the season went on. Easy to say "2 seconds, why bother"?, but you can also say "2 seconds, why not"?

Why not? I'm not sure we should be questioning MLB's competition committee at this point. All recent changes have been spot on and great for baseball.

Did SD (Preller) create a team that was built to win in the playoffs, but unfortunately for them, not built to win enough in the regular season to get into the playoffs? FWIW, I do agree with the premise that SD invested in the organization and is reaping the rewards of that. I do hope it's sustainable and they find the right owner to take over and continue to grow the franchise.

That's interesting. IMO, Vlad does have a more traditional "get on top of the ball and backspin it" swing, which should do better v. pitches up the in the zone. This is why in the '90's and early '00's, everyone and their brother was working the bottom of the zone. Sinkers were common and pitchers were taught to pound the knees and "don't miss up". Remember when the "tell" that a pitcher was tiring was that he was leaving pitches "up in the zone"? Batters adjusted to this approach and added the little uppercut to their swings. Suddenly, they were crushing everything low in the zone. That's when we saw the reincarnation of the high fastball (8-10 years ago). Pitchers focusing on high spin rates and VAA and it's of course been super effective. I'm curious to see if hitters adjust back to the "hit down on the ball and backspin it" approach again soon. Certainly some are making changes to their swing paths (Biggio has). It is a fascinating cat and mouse game. I do wonder if Vlad lost his ability to pound the high pitch because he is focused on increasing his launch angle? Who knows. He might be one of those hitters where less is more. Stop trying to get him to change things and just let him go hit with a clear, empty mind.

Holy s*** - that's insane news.

Big time comeback for the Raps tonight. I unfortunately missed the game!

Interesting - thanks for sharing. Football was that way for us also - nobody played until Grade 9 and it worked out pretty good. I guess that's a good example of how the "new system" could still work just fine.

I mean - the other reason to move Manoah is that he's a f***ing loser and you can't let the lazy fat ass run the asylum. I do think there's a possibility they simply take what they can get for him this offseason because the relationship is broken (and/or because they think his value will only continue to plummet).

I agree. The issue is we don't really have any other assets to trade unless it's our top prospects...

How old are you? I'm in my early 40's. And if you're from SSM, that may explain a lot also. Anyway - seems most/all schools in our area are now consistent with what you remember. Seems odd to start playing your first real games of Volleyball and Basketball in Grade 9.

I'm talking public school sports. You didn't have basketball and volleyball teams from Grade 4 through 8? My kids aren't quite yet in high school, but I do understand they are still competitive.