sneakypower

http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/41YiJKJxaHL.jpg i played this for the first time in my life either last week or the week before, and holy [expletive] is it ever impossible to hit the ball if the other player has half a clue what he/she is doing

y u no throw strikes

Y U NO BATFLIP

Chris Nelson's a pretty stupid baserunner, it seems

Adam Dunn also puts up crazy isoD rates in part due to his Mario Mendoza low averages basically- assuming a constant BB%, with every hit you get, your isoD goes down and isoD also includes HBP; BB rate gives a better picture of plate discipline / patient hitting approach than does isoD, imo

these guys are all going to get promoted in September and we're going to slip so far on the offseason farm system rankings http://cdn.memegenerator.net/images/300x/4238916.jpg

wow, i'm surprised sully hasn't told us the story behind the picture yet

time to give Manny a lifetime contract as hitting coach for every organizational level

don't pay attention to the filters, but the splits the tabbed filters at the top show seasonal totals from everybody with time at those positions, but the splits only show stats accrued at that position (remember the dialogue where Junior Lake was sort of awesome at LF and a complete barf-bag everywhere else?) -Lahair had respectable WAR at 1B and completely disastrous OF WAR in limited duty -i closed the window but i think it was that Mather was replacement level in the IF and like -1.3 or something similarly abominable like that in the OF edit: this probably explains it more succinctly http://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/leaderboard-feature-positional-splits/

what you call pretty damn respectable i call bottom-3 in fWAR What you call bottom-3 in fWAR, fangraphs doesn't. believe me, they do

Brett's got a .909 OPS in July, amazingly

what you call pretty damn respectable i call bottom-3 in fWAR but we're sitting in a position currently where our offense is primed to very soon be a force to be reckoned with for a pretty long time, with or without Cespedes; if you want to cry over league-average spilt milk, that's your right

Didn't have to be a building block to justify signing him; given the Cubs' needs and the money not spent a solid OF worth his contract would have been a nice pick up. It just seems a bit much to dismiss him as "meh" when the Cubs could have and should have walked away with both him and Soler, especially since such moves would have been more in line with the rhetoric they were spouting at the time. sure, he was really cool in 2012 but who knows, he could very well have meant the difference between having Kris Bryant and Colin Moran right now i'm over Cespedes

He probably already knows but is saving it. He promised something before Thursday and he better be clicking "send" unto Bleacher Nation as I type. kyle already pried it out of him but was sworn to secrecy

http://i.imgur.com/rqkLnxQ.jpg wow Bellhorn was the man, that one year

I've been to a few Iowa Cubs games and have never seen Javy even entertain the idea of signing an autograph. "oh good, so then it's not just me"

runs fastest around the bases during HR trots

well, that is positively delightful

Alamo Stealth receives Cucamonga Cracker Killers' MLB 5th rounder in Mauer deal

the title of this topic alone basically refutes your insane assumption

Friday was 14 hours ago?

all the Baez mentions: Adam (Columbus, OH) Keith, First, thank you for the Top 50 update. Your work is one of the major reasons I pay for Insider access. In you evaluation of Baez you mentioned makeup concerns with lapses in concentration and effort. Any chance that this is similar to the concerns that were expressed with Hanley Ramirez in the minors and he just bored with the minors? Klaw I've heard about coaches having trouble with Baez, and I've had scouts/execs from other teams saying he's got some questionable off-field relationships. But I'm much more concerned about a guy who has shown a habit of taking plays and at bats off from the moment he got into the minors, and even in a nationally televised game on Sunday still couldn't bother to make a routine throw properly. ------ Jeff R [via mobile] Re Baez routine throw. So is the expectation that prospects in the futures game and any other exhibition, expect for the MLB all star game, game go 100%? Klaw No. The expectation is that they won't go 20%. ------ Drew (Tokyo) I don't understand your position on Baez. You say mostly negative things about him but rank him extremely high. Why would you have him your 8th best prospect if you think he has so many question marks? Klaw Praising his bat speed as the best in the minors is negative? Did you fail integer math? ------ Andy (Chicago) Your whole stance on Baez feels paper thin. And your opinion of that throw feels like confirmation bias. I've seen him play countless times since he got to AA and I've never once questioned his hustle. Klaw Oh, a Cub fan sees what he wants to see. Film at 11. ------ Klaw I've seen Baez every year since his senior year of high school - when he was always last out on the field to start each inning, and wore a different cap to stand out from his teammates - and there's always been something. An at bat mailed in. A play not made, or not made correctly. A groundball not run out. Baseball's a hard game for most players. Even Manny Ramirez was a ridiculous worker when it came to hitting. (Fielding, not so much.) You don't see or hear the same concerns on Bryant or Soler or Almora. ------ BassmanUW (Chicago) While I'm not big on makeup, barring someone being a Milton Bradley type of distraction (which maybe you have concerns Baez could become), I find it comical that my fellow Cubs fans seem upset by your views on a player you said is the 8th best prospect in baseball despite being terrible for the first month and a half of the season. Klaw WHY DO I HATE wait a minute that's your line

other people experienced the same problem with him [attachment=0]Capture.jpg[/attachment] check his player page for yourself if you want: http://roadkill123.baseball.cbssports.com/players/playerpage/2036154

the cbs software showed no start for him (raisin had the same problem arise with duffy) and there's no real way to ward against this because the software settings make your lineup invalid with a stacked bench if you dump all your non-starting SPs there

yeah, i didn't bother reading that reply and i'm not going to entertain more of this nonsense until somebody with commissioner authority sees it fit to actually dignify your fantasies with a response