Tracer Bullet

speaking of cheap production from a former Cub OF, I just went to Fangraphs and saw today's article. http://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/index.php/matt-murton-dfa I know there's a split of opinion on the accuracy of defensive metrics, but I was surprised that UZR has him as average defensively, given the general feeling about his defense around these parts. And here we are paying $28m next year for our corner OF spots.

Yes, off the list. They didn't want him anymore.

The offer was never coming. Though I like the way Hampton talks about ND. When I was in college, I narrowed my 2 career choices down to lawyer and President of the United States. After much deliberation, I chose lawyer. I'm sure the USA is disappointed, but this was the best career move for me. As of a couple of weeks ago, Hampton was talked about as likely Notre Dame's third choice, at worst fourth, for two openings at DT. If you assume that Notre Dame is going to land their top two remaining choices, then no, Notre Dame wasn't going to offer Hampton. But that's probably not the safest assumption. Hampton didn't want to wait for those top two choices to decide and see where that left Notre Dame. ND dropped Hampton off the list. He wasn't getting an offer.

The offer was never coming. Though I like the way Hampton talks about ND. When I was in college, I narrowed my 2 career choices down to lawyer and President of the United States. After much deliberation, I chose lawyer. I'm sure the USA is disappointed, but this was the best career move for me.

On the spectrum of possible GMs, Stone and Ned are quite close and every one between them would suck as much as they do. And the rest of that idea (which I assume was from one of the radio guys) is stupid.

I saw that, it was funny and typical of something he would say. If ND did manage to go undefeated I still think a 1 loss, Texas, OU, OSU, Florida, Alabama, LSU, Ohio State, Penn State, or USC would go in ahead of ND. Hell if BYU goes undefeated they will go ahead of ND too. A 1 loss USC team couldn't possibly deserve to go ahead of an undefeated ND team that beat them. Yet I'm not even sure that's the most ridiculous part of that post.

breach of contract? playing pickup softball is breach of contract? I'd like to hear this. It could easily be. These guys have clauses in their contracts that ban them from participating in all sorts of physical activities. Teams don't generally call them out on it, even if the activity leads to an injury, but it's in there. softball? Sure, I've read some things about the various clauses in the standard MLBPA contract, but I've never seen anything that would suggest that pickup softball isn't allowed.

breach of contract? playing pickup softball is breach of contract? I'd like to hear this.

Yeah, we need a fiery guy to replace that old softie Lou Piniella. SORIANO!!! PLAY BETTER OR I'LL ASK YOU TO GIVE UP 100M CAUSE I'M ANGRY Im saying Soriano would be begging to opt out. A lot of people dont quite know the extent of Bobby Vs reputation. no, he wouldn't. Don't underestimate Bobby V. He could scold a starving man out of his sandwich. Getting an old baseball player to walk away from $100m is nothing.

Fallacy and semantics in the same thread. Double-score bonus!

A - No, it's not. It's vague and indirect, but not any more pleasant. B - sure, there could be a good reason to discount April stats. But no one's throwing them out. "Here's his April stats, here's his stats sans April, here's his stats since June 1." BTW - wtf is hand waving? Am I making a fair catch?

No, you're arguing against a point that's never been made. Raw simply presented 3 sets of data: his brutal April, his numbers since May 1, and his numbers since June 1. In each case, he acknowledged a sample size issue. He didn't draw any sweeping conclusions, but merely observed that if he continues hitting where he is, he could end the season with respectable numbers. There is no projection in raw's post. There's barely a hint of how he thinks Pie will end up. It's simply some stats, and observation, and a possible conclusion. There's no reason to fire up the sabermetrics scare alarm. There's no fallacy. There's no logical problems. It's just an observational post. But you made it more than that so you could rail against it, apparently.

First - not necessarily an arbitrary endpoint fallacy (is that even a thing?). I imagine he used the first of May as the starting point as a matter of convenience. I find it hard to believe that raw calculated the exact start date which made Pie's numbers look the best and used that. Second - he's not hiding anything or making broad conclusions. It's an observation that has some merit. But the post clearly indicates that his April sucked. So maybe he got better with regular ABs, made some adjustments, etc. Maybe it's random and he'll suck in September. The info is there for the reader to analyze. Finally - it's not difficult to make an upward trend case b/c he had a bad month in the middle. A trend wouldn't have to mean he literally improves every month. Besides, the months are arbitrary slices of ABs, so maybe sliced in different ways, a more clear upward trend would become clear. Either way, the point seems to be that he could end the year with respectable numbers despite a putrid start. But I think you know all this, so I'm not sure what you're arguing against. Maybe you're just bored.

If you take out his 51 ABs in April where his OPS was .461, Pie has hit .309/.351/.495 for an .846 OPS. Since June 1, granted in only 55 ABs, his OPS is a fantastic .961. If the O's continue to hit him between Roberts and Adam Jones, he could end this season with some respectable numbers. Why would we take out the 51 ABs in April? To make a point?

I never wore a cup in the OF, but to not wear one playing IF in MLB is just stupid.

what does that even mean?

he didn't get a $10M bonus. No let facts get in the way of random venting

Are Iowa and Wisconsin really hated rivals? I don't remember any particular venom for the Badgers in my 20+ years living in Iowa.

Probably has nothing to do with George The Rose and J Happ being southpaws. ok, so why is he being platooned for ANOTHER LEFTY? Using a tough lefty as an opportunity to give Fukudome a rest is probably smart. Sitting him against damn near every lefty drives me crazy (how is he ever going to hit lefties if he never faces them). Doubly so when Reed Johnson is on the DL. Damn Lou is frustrating at times. If he can't hit left-handers in his 30's, he's not likely ever going to hit them. He probably wasn't platooned in Japan so he would have had plenty of chances to see left-handers. This isn't like a prospect coming up. It looks like Fuld and Fukudome are probably about the same player against a left-hander. Both are slap hitters with no power but still walking a lot (while there's a huge difference between them against right-handers thanks to Fukudome's power). I don't think Fuld should be playing against every left-hander, but it just doesn't really matter which one plays. They're so interchangeable offensively that if Lou wants to play Fuld against every left-hander for either his defense or to give Fukudome lots of rest, I don't really think it will hurt the Cubs at all. I don't ever recall seeing his splits from Japan, so maybe he wasn't able to hit them either. And though this isn't a prospect, MLB pitchers are different from Japanese pitchers. There is some adjusting to do. He's not getting the opportunity to adjust. If my choice is Fukudome v Fuld and we're not sure that Fukudome is really bad against LHP, I'd much rather have him get the bulk of the ABs.

It's the same guys standing on the same corners with fists full of tickets for every game every year. I'm sure they're middle men.

Hmm ... I thought Notre Dame sells out every game, so demand greatly exceeds supply. I'm not sure if you're being sarcastic or not, but they sell out almost every single game. Those people standing across the street are selling tickets that have technically been sold by the university already. I should add, you can get the tix at face. If you're not wise, you can also get them for almost 2 times face.

Other than USC (and maybe even then), there's not a single game that won't be selling at or below face across the street from campus the morning of.

Probably has nothing to do with George The Rose and J Happ being southpaws. ok, so why is he being platooned for ANOTHER LEFTY? Using a tough lefty as an opportunity to give Fukudome a rest is probably smart. Sitting him against damn near every lefty drives me crazy (how is he ever going to hit lefties if he never faces them). Doubly so when Reed Johnson is on the DL. Damn Lou is frustrating at times.

:rotfl: I'm sorry, is anything in his statement untrue? You mean other than the last sentence?

Seriously? There's a discussion in a thread clearly identified and in the right forum. What's your problem with that?