Brownie19

I hope to god Gold Glove trophies are NEVER mentioned during contract negotiations. Can you imagine contract negotiations with Rafael Palmerio after he won the gold glove in 1999? Agent - "well I think he's worth more - I mean he did just win the gold glove award!" GM - "he won that award while starting 128 games at DH and 28 at first base. Kindly - f*** off" Agent - "that's how good he is defensively at 1st base!"

Nelly Cruz says he's going to return in 2023. It looks like Father Time has caught up to the guy though unfortunately. I'm sure heading into this season, he was eying 500 career HRs, but that looks like he'll come up a bit short after only popping 10 HRs this year.

Ha - that's funny. Oddly enough, I saw a stat this weekend that Gwynn struck out X number of times in the 90's and that Judge has struck out that many times this year and people were all jerking off about how good Gwynn was. I correctly pointed out that Judge is a much better hitter than Gwynn and how slapping the ball around has it's limitations and was piled on by the old school crowd. People will say guys like Gwynn and Ichiro could have hit more HR's if they wanted to. Well that's stupid, because in reality, if they were in fact able to sacrifice some contact for power, it probably would have made them better hitters.

I must be the only person who doesn't like the Padres. Their pitching is really solid. Love watching Darvish, but their offense isn't that interesting to me. Machado (whom I hate), Soto, Jake C and a bunch of duds. What I'd really like to see for SD to stick with Blake Snell deep into an important game (a 3rd time through the lineup) to see what happens. Personally I'd prefer in that situation for him to get lit up. Toronto or Houston in the AL Atlanta, NYM or the Cards in the NL That's who I hope makes the WS.

yes.

I'm stumped. Brett Boone was the closest I could find, but I think we all knew he was on roids late in his career.

I think you spelt 40 wrong.

Huh? Nice of you to take a few weeks off of ripping me, but this one is bizarre. I made a joke about to support the notion that we should be looking at wRC+ instead of slash lines when comparing seasons - because that's obviously a much more appropriate way to do it (something Captain Obvious chose not to do, simply because it suited his narrative better). I don't particularly like Vlad. I hope he figures it out and settles in as a 150-160 wRC+ hitter that he has the ability to be, but he reminds me of Vince Carter to be honest. You're always left shaking your head wondering why he can't get the most out of his talents. So f*** off.

I have no problem rooting for the Cards to make the WS. Pujols, Yadi, Wainwright + 2 of the best in Goldy/Arenado + a bunch of young guys (Nootbaar, Donovan, Carlson, Gorman, O'Neill. I can get behind that. Cleveland - I agree with you.

Their lineup isn't deep (Gimenez, Ramirez, Kwan, Naylor) and maybe Will Brennan takes the world by storm? But - they do almost everything else really well. It may remind us of the 2015 Royals a bit - but I don't think they'll go quietly.

Does anyone know if in the ALDS, would Houston play the lowest remaining seed? If Tampa beats Cleveland - do they play Houston and we (after beating Seattle) play NYY? Or is the ALDS already set that Houston plays the winner of the WC1 v. WC2 round?

Thanks Captain Obvious.

I think we would all respect and applaud this decision by Buck. He's had a good run. Time to focus on his family and his health and let someone take the torch and introduce fans to the way the game is played today.

I'm sorry, but I'm not sure any of that is true. Read this story. https://www.baltimoresun.com/sports/orioles/bal-chris-davis-talks-about-suspension-and-his-add-20150131-story.html He was diagnosed with ADHD in 2008 and began taking Adderall then. For whatever reason, he wasn't granted an exception in 2012 (when he was OK), in 2013 (when he was great) or in 2014 (when he was s***). He was busted for taking Adderall in 2014 and served a 25 game suspension. If you read between the lines, it sounds like he started taking Adderall again in 2014 - while knowing it was banned - as a crutch because he was battling injury and really struggling at the plate (and thus we looking for anything might help him). He was given an exemption again from 2015 through the end of his career (I believe) so theoretically, he was on it throughout his unprecedented decline, which started at age 30 and he was completely useless at age 31. Davis was also a beast and thus very well could have been on HGH - only to go 'off' it as soon as he got the big paycheck. I don't think he's a good example to use. If you google it, almost everything suggests steroids/HGH are significantly more performance enhancing than amphetamines. If amphetamines enhanced performance that much - do you think MLB would grant exemptions and wouldn't like everyone in baseball be applying for them? I think it would be a MASSIVE debate every year if they were better than roids. Dr. Ned would be diagnosis the entire league with ADHD so they could get an exemption.

It's still the AL home run record and the Yankees record. It's still technically a record - but I agree, perhaps not worth cutting away from a live college football game to watch, but still, as a baseball fan, it's worth following. I guess it would be interesting to see if there would be similar fanfare in Canada if someone was approaching the Jays single season HR record. Obviously it wouldn't be anywhere near the same as this Judge thing - but I do think as a Jays fan, it would be must watch TV and local TV and local sports shows would be talking about that historical season a lot. Perhaps here's another way to look at it. If someone was this late in the season, chasing a .400 average - would you consider that to be worth of the same coverage as Judge is getting? It wouldn't be a record, but it would absolutely be must watch TV and I hope they'd cut away from some s***** college football game to show it. And yes I recognize there's been a huge gap in time since the last .400 hitter (where as 60+ HRs was achieved recently - in a relative manner).

Using amphetamines was technically cheating (banned as of 1971) the same as steroids use was also cheating - so, this is correct. However, steroids and HGH are clearly more impactful as performance enhancers than amphetamines are. This is a massive rabbit hole issue.

PED use in football is so common that it's just accepted and nobody gives a f***.

Man - Andres Gimenez finishing the year with a higher WAR than Jose Ramirez is f***ing insane.

You mean NYY? If we have home field v. Seattle, then Tampa plays Cleveland and the winner of that plays NYY. When we beat Seattle - we play Houston (which kind of sucks balls).

My how Leo Jimenez had fallen

Need to flip that s*** to a fan quickly with a quick bro head nod that implies you'll be splitting the money!

I wasn't suggesting "swag". I was thinking $$ + some swag. I'm not suggesting Judge is going to give up $1M to him, but say $100K + swag would be a nice gesture.

It's a good question. Again - I hope Judge takes care of the Jays coach in some appropriate manner.

Didn't the Jays bullpen coach end up with the ball? I'm sure he makes a good salary - but not enough to just give up that ball for nothing. I guess he'd be breaking some unwritten rule/code or some ********. Hopefully Judge takes care of him somehow. Seems like something Judge would do.

I just picked up some for WC Game 2 and ALDS Game 1. Lots of seats left.