Transmogrified Tiger

If you're a T-Mobile user, they're giving users free MLS Season pass like they have done in the past for MLB.tv: https://www.cnet.com/tech/mobile/t-mobile-is-giving-a-free-season-of-apples-mls-season-pass-to-all-its-customers/ Looks like it'll work the same way, on Tuesday you use their giveaway app and they have you tie the logins together.

If Britton is still needing to work out for teams at the start of pitchers and catchers, my guess he's gonna command a pretty light contract. He's thrown less than 50 pro innings since the start of the pandemic, less than 8 last year, and ended the year with shoulder problems. In that light I'm very interested if he can prove himself healthy(he seems like a great combo of upside, likely cost, and fit to cap off the bullpen/roster), but if he requires Fulmer money then I'm fine with passing(and I imagine the FO would too).

The announcement is a little light on specifics, but it looks like MiLB.tv is getting folded into MLB.tv, so if you have MLB.tv you'll be able to watch minor league games through that app/subscription too: https://www.mlb.com/news/mlb-tv-has-new-feature-in-2023

There have definitely been fewer marathon games. LA and the Padres went 16 innings in 2021, but a CBS Sports article about this said that only 7 games have gone past 12 in the 3 seasons with the rule whereas 2019 alone had 37 games go past 12. So the rule's stated purpose is being fulfilled, just at the cost of surpassing the NBA's 'time-warp the basketball to half court because reasons' rule as the dumbest in sports. Love that 1% of games played having a couple extra innings shaved off is considered a success. Solving a problem that doesn't exist and doing it in the worst way.

I think with the big guys there’s just always some sort of contact (whether it’s on the big guy or a guy fouling the big guy), yes a foul is a foul, but if everything is called the game would basically come to a standstill. They can’t call everything, it’s like holding in football, they probably could call it on 80-90% of plays if they really wanted to. Is it right that not every foul is called, no, but get it somewhat. Building on this, I think guys like Edey and Kofi kinda break a ref's normal points of comparison. As you say, basketball has contact all the time, and the difference between good defense and a flagrant shove is often about how severe the contact is. I'm not a ref, but I imagine refs use the physical *reaction* to the contact as a big guide in understanding that severity. With Kofi and Edey, their size means they give out contact with significant reactions more often, and react to contact from others less than a smaller player would, which can create a dynamic where they're whistled more harshly and simultaneously not protected enough by whistles with the ball in their hand. You even saw this at the NBA level with certain freaks of nature, early career LeBron being one that sticks out in my mind.

This is interesting because I've seen discussion that the opposite is true of the SEC, where there's been a few 70 foul games and plenty of whistle-fests in general. Some of this is a stylistic/cultural thing(e.g. the B10 shoots better on the whole so you may have more SEC teams throwing athletes at the lane) but it's hard to tell given how small and varied the tournament sample size is.

Very nice, Fulmer has been very effective since he became a full-time reliever. A little risk that whatever was going on in Comerica last year shielded him a bit, but a very nice addition nonetheless to add to the late inning short relief group.

You absolutely can, I got 22 for the laptop but this season when I've played I've been gravitating back to 21 for the iPad.

This reads more to me like a list of players who can maybe get them some more first round picks to stockpile now that, for example, all the West teams have a new team to try and chase down. Yeah, I'm an NBA idiot but it reads like a list of guys who are 3rd/4th options on a championship caliber team. A fairly deep list of those guys, but still, the types that everyone gets excited about only at the trade deadline because teams are looking to patch a hole rather than build a title contender.

Joe West seems to be enjoying himself in retirement - edits his wikipedia page to remove negative stuff - his changes get reverted - he makes more changes in a similar vein - they get reverted again - he threatens to sue them and gets banned from making wikipedia edits

Different dynamic but I continue to be a little confused by Caissie's helium too. I get the age relative to level comparison, but it seems like no one is really arguing he's an MLB 1B/DH and his bat hasn't looked close to that part yet. Seems like it's way more likely that Davis and/or Canario's injuries didn't actually ruin their careers and they're still strong prospects and should rate higher than the speculative guys like Triantos/Caissie.

Are we? We have all spring training and all season Happ probably isn't signing an extension after opening day. I would probably argue he wasn't signing an extension regardless, but his clock is ticking. Hoerner isn't a FA until after 2025, you have all sorts of time to extend him. I'd guess it becomes much more likely later this summer if they can do it and avoid exceeding the LT, and if not then the offseason when they have a ton of dead money freed up and may be going over the LT anyway.

Similar to Brady, right? His counting stats look so far out of reach for anyone. At 44 years old he threw for 5300 yards and 43 TDs, and went out with a (obligatory reminder the Bears have never had one such season) 4600 yard season and 25 TDs. You literally have to throw for 90K yards and 650 TDs to pass him. But his efficiency stats are also just incredible; a 97 rating with a 3:1 TD:INT. Oh and 7 rings. What LeBron is doing is a mindbender. I have little doubt he could be an MVP top 10 at age 50 if he just kept playing. His physical prowess is unbelievable. Sent from my motorola one 5G UW using Tapatalk The one thing that probably keeps Brady in reach is that passing stats didn't really take off league-wide until midway through his career, he didn't have his 3rd 4000 yard passing season until 32. So someone like Mahomes could average 5k/season til 41 or so and catch him, or some future hotshot could do so until 39-40. Not something I'd bet on, but more likely than anyone coming close to LBJ/Kareem for a really long time.

I think there's a chance this has a pretty big impact but in specific and unpredictable ways. You have hitters who have become accustomed to the longer gap between pitches and the routines and ways of focusing that go with it. Maybe this benefits certain hitters who have better athleticism for repeating swing mechanics vs. guys who have their swings trained in a more robotic/less dynamic way(I'm not communicating this perfectly but hopefully the intent is clear). And on the pitching side, who is going to lose velocity by having to speed up the pace, and how much and how quickly? You could see previously effective pitchers become unplayable without the boost of those extra few seconds of rest every single pitch, but I don't think you can broadly make declarations about who because so much is individually dependent(conditioning, repeatability of mechanics, spin and other repertoire considerations, etc). e.g. Ryan Helsley might be just a guy at 98 v. 101 but Quintana may be pretty much the same at 88 v. 91.

Just now realized that Marsch just got fired in time for the USMNT job to be open, gonna be some fun discourse there

Seems clear that Marsch wasn't going to be taking them to European heights even with more time and investment, but yeah firing him after an unlucky road defeat immediately after the transfer deadline is strange.

I wonder how meaningful it is that Morel is listed as an OF on the cubs.com roster. CF was where he spent the most time in MLB last year, but he came up as an IF and had equal playing time between IF and OF in MLB. I think Deluzio's biggest hurdle would be roster opportunity cost. Someone has to get dropped for the 40 man, and the only position players who fit as candidates to my eyes (McKinstry & Mastrobuoni) have had several opportunities to get DFA'd and it hasn't happened yet. By the time he'd need to be added, a few guys will be on the 60 day DL On the position player side? They're already at 19 position players which is a little heavy for current roster construction. 8 of those (including Morel) are outfielders too. Sure Heuer and maybe Roberts or even Hendricks could be 60 Day'd by April, but I'm not sure that creates opportunity for Deluzio in particular. This is not to say that Deluzio has zero chance of making the roster through some combination of performance or injury, but I think the default assumption is that they're comfortable with the CF depth(Bellinger, Morel, Velazquez, soon Davis) already on the 40 man, even if it's not plus defensively.

I wonder how meaningful it is that Morel is listed as an OF on the cubs.com roster. CF was where he spent the most time in MLB last year, but he came up as an IF and had equal playing time between IF and OF in MLB. I think Deluzio's biggest hurdle would be roster opportunity cost. Someone has to get dropped for the 40 man, and the only position players who fit as candidates to my eyes (McKinstry & Mastrobuoni) have had several opportunities to get DFA'd and it hasn't happened yet.

Thaaaat...does actually strike me as kind of a simple approach, yes. This off of knowing Wesneski exists for what...6 months now? Surely there's much more information available than vacuum sealed AAA and 33 inning MLB lines with no further analysis. Heck just quick glancing, Wesneski wasn't even K'ing more at the level at the TDL end of July and their respective AAA walk rates in 2022 can both be rounded to 8%. I'd also love to hear what wasn't strong about Liberatore's 2019 in A ball at 19. Is it K's? I submit that's boring, which seems obvious given he jumped 2+ levels after the pandemic, playing a level of ball Wesneski wouldn't reach until the age Liberatore will be in 2023, and increased the Ks re: Liberatore's 2019, a Low-A K/9 under 9 with a BB% of nearly 10(combined which make the worst K%-BB% of his career) doesn't strike me as particularly excellent, but it's maybe more telling that the nitpick is about his performance from 4 years ago. Liberatore since the pandemic year does not prevent runs, does not miss bats at a high rate, does not throw enough strikes to have a good walk rate, gives up HR at a problematic clip, and on the whole gives up a high enough BABIP that we can't infer he's much at contact management either. He didn't get better as the year went along or finish strong, didn't have better performance when shoved into relief, and generally does not show any signs that he's on the cusp of being an effective MLB pitcher. Fangraphs described him as a 'pitchability 4th starter prospect' with unremarkable FB qualities *before* he underwhelmed this year with peripherals that scream 'high level hitters rip my fastball', so there's not consensus that he's one tweak from having plus MLB stuff either. Setting the Wesneski comparison aside, he doesn't belong on a Top 100 list. But to continue that comparison, Wesneski actually has succeeded at the job of a pitcher at high levels, showed some reason for belief in his future trajectory with an uptick in a new organization, including pitching excellently at the MLB level in the same sample where Liberatore failed, and doesn't have a meaningful delta in terms of stuff(e.g. we're not talking about some old-for-level 90 mph guy catching 3 weeks of good command). I don't need Wesneski to show up at a particular spot on a prospect list and understand the limitations on his ceiling, but it's more than fair to wonder where the logic is coming from that leaves him off while someone like Liberatore has their name in pen.

Probably a blessing you fell out of Europe, trying to compete on those fronts with that payroll after even a little bit of raiding would've been a recipe for a relegation fight. The bolded always drove me insane, especially if it's a club that's not drowning in debt. You have this because of me, let me keep making the money printer go brrr

I may be a simpleton, but for me the guy who is better at getting Ks, and better at avoiding walks, HRs, hits, and runs while at AAA, and then was excellent in MLB in a short stint instead of horrible, might be a better prospect than the guy whose fastball maybe touches a bit faster and showed up higher in prospect rankings as an upside HS draftee before not having strong MiLB performance in the last 5 years once he left rookie ball.

Doesn't change the odds much, but Bushnell is saying it'll be next year's Nations League(so not the games in the March and June windows this year). If the format for Nations League remains the same, being one of the Top 6 teams is functionally impossible, just don't finish last or among the bottom two 2nd place teams in a 3 person group that this year is El Salvador and Grenada.