Transmogrified Tiger

He's what they were hoping for him at the start of the season, a guy who is going to get LH hitters out. His ability to get out RH in between will vary significantly week to week, but that's not why he was signed, nor the role he will play in important innings.

hand-wringing Hendricks' velocity in his first start back from a finger injury is the most inexplicable doom-mongering to me

that 2008 video should be titled 'Strangers I Filmed on Clark Street'

LIKE A DUNGEON DRAGON. Carl prefers dinosaurs of the Cretaceous period.

5 runs on 7 baserunners, lol

I'm almost certain it's blacked out on MLB TV but you may be able to watch it on espn's streaming service with your cable provider login info Correct, no MLB.tv, but if you have WatchESPN access that will work.

Lake Shore Drive

oh the team that's given 40% their starts to Davies, Guerra, and Peralta is having trouble preventing runs, how about that

I almost had Tseng in my top 5, FWIW. In fact he was there but then I realized I had forgotten Alzolay and he was bumped off. Guys who can limit hits, homers, and walks like he can will be able to get away with a bit less swing and miss, especially since no one is going to count on him spearheading an MLB rotation.

I have nothing else to do so let's spell it out. AAA Tseng - solid results at AA, good command with decent stuff, at AAA at 22 and off to a similar start Williams - promising as next-gen Hendricks before his injury last year, now is mostly dead Mills - partially dead Butler/Brooks/Kelly - not enough missed bats or barrels AA Clifton - very strong start but fading hard, still at AA at 22 though and has the stuff/body to be a SP Alzolay - solid results at A+ with increasingly strong stuff at 22 Hedges - his AAA experience illustrates he found his level at AA Underwood - not even once Morrison - speaking of finding his level A+ Hatch - really hitting his stride after a slow start, good stuff, about to turn 23 Steele - decent results, just turned 22, needs to miss more bats or barrels(both would be great) Rucker - great results, good stuff even after rotation conversion, 23 years old De la Cruz - decent results, great stuff, injuries, 22 Kellogg - speaking of finding his level Robinson - excellent control, 23, probably more Morrison/Bloomquist than Rucker A- Rondon - mediocre results, at 22 stuff isn't enough to look past it Hudson - mediocre results, only 20 but stuff hasn't been good enough to be optimistic Paulino - good stuff, mediocre results at 22, probably on a bullpen trajectory by AA Miller - mediocre results, at 21 stuff isn't enough to look past it Moreno - middling results, only 20 but injuries too Sands - [ducks out of the way of flying baseball] Short Season Assad - only 19 but outright bad results Camargo - 21 and FB/CH profile is probably a big cause, but great results Clark - 22 and bad results, cannon fodder Swarmer - good results but 23, was a reliever in South Bend prior De Los rios - velocity, but 22 and only decent results Garcia - 19 and decent results in early action Albertos - great stuff and 18, but little to go on and injuries Draftees Little - good/very good stuff, lower level competition Lange - good stuff, high level competition, some miles on the arm Abbott - decent stuff, great results against low level competition Thompson - TJS, good results against high level competition, good stuff still coming back Uelmen - solid stuff against decent competition Estrada - HS with stuff Let's strip out the guys who shouldn't have much shot at a Top 10 SP list, we're left with: AAA: Tseng AA: Clifton, Alzolay A+: Rucker, Hatch, De La Cruz, Steele A-: yikes Short Season: Albertos, Camargo Draftees: Lange, Little, Abbott, Thompson, Estrada From there it's easier to get a Top 5, in no particular order: Rucker, Hatch, Alzolay, Lange, Little I give the guys playing a bump for actually showing stuff in pro ball, and I don't see a compelling reason to put Hatch in front of the other two. So yeah, Alzolay and Rucker are the top 2 for me.

Contreras is probably the one player on the roster where there'd be the biggest drop off if he were to be hurt, so Lucroy/Avila would be less about upgrades and more about risk aversion.

Rucker at Myrtle Beach once they started stretching him out: 56.1 IP, 1.74 ERA, 39 H, 60/11 K/BB, 3 HR

Any runs they score are 100% coming from a basket home run with like a 30 mph exit velocity.

Whoever they pick, Hendricks is going to knock them off the roster in 48 hours or so. Given that Grimm threw 43 pitches yesterday and Edwards/Strop/Rondon all threw 15+, it's probably a better bet that Pena can be helpful(even only as insurance) than La Stella's pinch at bat would be.

Our 4th and 5th best relievers are going to pitch a lot of high leverage 7th and 8th innings, especially since they don't have too many off days and because they aren't going to ride Koji or Carl hard. It's not some gaping hole to be filled, but there's always going to be ROI on making a bullpen better if you reasonably can.

Rondon dies for half seasons at a time and Koji is 75 years old and has a 4.70 ERA the last month More importantly though, CJ and Strop are the only ones sure to be around next year, so it's an opportunity to make the pen even more immune to injury/performance and make the offseason easier if you get someone with 2018+ control.

They have one and he's the next Sale, or worst case scenario Andrew Miller.... Now I get it, Hader will follow Miller's career path and take 5 years to be worth anything, that's why they're targeting 2022.

They don't have two different prospects named Hader, right? Because I keep seeing them being so thankful they aren't trading Brinson and Hader for a Quintana/Gray/etc, but when I search for Hader all I see is some guy getting repeatedly torched in AAA.

¯\_(ツ)_/¯ [tweet] [/tweet]

Wittenmyer casually mentioned the Cubs 'kicking the tires' on Samardzija, which is the first time I'd seen his name with the Cubs in a while. I continue to think it's a longshot he's traded at all, but he's another in a list of guys who I like a lot more as targets with Quintana in the fold.

"img" instead of "gif" When I did that it was a box with an x tho It's got to be the URL of the image itself. https://goo.gl/images/4A9vNw gets you an X, https://media.giphy.com/media/i8ZAg4vOFy8AE/giphy.gif gets you the gif.

The picture they use when talking about Pence is such a perfect encapsulation of him that it should be the only picture of him used ever.

That is correct: http://www.bleachernation.com/2017/07/19/cubs-shuffle-rotation-to-maximize-jose-quintana-deployment/ Brett theorizes it's because that change ensures Quintana faces both the divisional opponents in his next 2 starts.

http://www.reactiongifs.com/r/2013/12/grinch1.gif

braves win the trade