squally1313

‘Embattled’ huh

Yea I have a feeling Buffalo and Cincy just have a 16 game schedule. I certainly don't think Buffalo is going to have that be top of mind, and it likely doesn't affect Cincy in the standings anyways. It's honestly hard to imagine what the Buffalo players will have to do to even be ready for week 18. Due to the trauma, anything will probably be a rush job and mentally unhealthy for those players. The interesting thing here is there are Super Bowl implications with this game. I'd estimate about 90% of NFL games don't matter in the grand scheme of who wins a title or not, if the NFL had to cancel 1 every couple years and have an unbalanced situation. But this game was between 2 of the top 3 teams in the AFC....the conference that will be the favorite to win a championship. And this game was going a long way to determining who wins home field advantage. If Buffalo won, HFA was there's. If they lost, goes to KC. If KC loses, potentially to Cincinnati after that. If not played, KC would win HFA based on a 1/2 game difference. HFA can legit be the difference between who makes the Superbowl or not. Obviously, in comparison to a player's life, HFA doesn't matter at all. And I'm sure Buffalo would take going on the road to KC if it meant Hamlin was OK. But there will be a lot for the NFL to discuss. If you're Buffalo, at this point does it even make sense, setting aside all of the actually important stuff, to screw up your schedule for the next few weeks for...a coin flip shot at best? Every one of those players on both teams woke up today significantly more drained than they would after a normal game, going through the whole process of a game again (and two, potentially three short weeks) to potentially avoid playing a first round game just might not seem worth it. And then I would think it would be even less important for Cincinnati, but haven't gamed out of those scenarios. Again, setting aside all of the actually important stuff

Neagle made 58 starts in the two years after signing his Colorado deal (3.8 total fWAR), and then had a variety of things go wrong (including injuries) and only pitched 35 more innings. But that was driven largely by a solicitation arrest that let Colorado get out of the contract. But he also signed that contract going into his age 32 season, and was a pitcher. So, closer, but still no.

What does this mean

Hopefully we can flip him for some lottery pick single A who has an incredible second half and becomes the new Future guy to build around when he's ready in 2026, so let's hold off on signing anyone big until then.

I guess I'm not sure why this would be in question at this point. They're linked both locally and nationally with all of those things, Mooney/Sharma specifically listed the holes they wanted to fill that included all of them, and there's significant noise about them spending more than recent years. Maybe the SS isn't Correa and maybe the SP isn't Senga or the catcher isn't Murphy, but it seems very certain they are going to keep adding at those spots. The main open question is if they can win the race for one of the SS, since that's the one spot where there's not really a plan B, but they're heavily linked to all 3 available which means they aren't putting everything in a single option. Key point here. A ton of teams want these dudes, and rightly so. If we lose out because of the money spent here, we're big picture screwed anyways. But we can also very easily miss out on these dudes for whatever other reason that has nothing to do with these signings, and I can't imagine how this and Taillon hurt anything.

If this was a move big market teams should make then options 2 and 4 wouldn’t be on the table. But they are, because what this team needs to do is acquire a crap ton of production, not a guy with a long history of no production. I....don't think you're actually angry about this particular transaction.

None of us are going to know just how much money is available, and if committing $80m or so to Bellinger and Jameson takes us out of the running for someone like Correa…we probably weren’t seriously involved anyways and there are bigger problems. What these signings could do is signal our desire and potential ability to compete immediately, which at the very least alleviates some concerns if Correa is picking between something like us and Minnesota (who I wouldn’t think would win out otherwise).

Who did you want to play centerfield next year? A good baseball player Well Bellinger last year, at 1.7 fWAR, would have been 18th in baseball in team production for centerfield. Certainly not great, certainly better than the 0.3 we put up as a team. Looking around the rest of the roster, I don't see a lot of better options for 2023. Looking around free agency, unless you wanted Nimmo (and the ramifications of a $100+m deal), don't see much there either. If he sucks, too bad for PTR, and we can still explore all these trades people have tossed around without any concern of long term contract issues. But maybe he's good? Just wrote that last sentence so you can snip the rest out and respond with something like 'but he won't be'.

Who did you want to play centerfield next year?

Kinda shocked at the amount of dislike here. It's a one year deal for a dude who plays a really good defensive centerfield and first base. Am I missing a better center field option that only costs money? I don't think anyone wanted to throw 9 figures at already 30 years old Brandon Nimmo to be our CF for 5 years. If he sucks, which to be clear, him sucking is putting up a 92 wRC against righties, oh well. Can still make all those weird trades Tom's been talking about all offseason.

This is good right? Just don’t get smoked today and hope englands second team is still good enough to grab 3 points against wales and we just need to beat Iran.

Almost seems like they're feeling themselves a little too much. Can't give KDB too many of these counters.

I think I'm more in the middle, where you let the ref come up with an extra time number, and then do more of a hard/'American' clock from there.

So basically don't get blown out by England and then hope to pour it on Iran?

Guys there's a whole thread for fantasy football and also a whole gambling thread.

Good

I wonder if we're looking at a situation where Lavine and DDR don't miss extended time but we only see them on the court together for like...35-40 games.

If you're open to a superior hitter for a shorter, cheaper contract, a worse hitter for longer and more money should have tons of appeal. Am I doing this right? In what reality is a soon to be 36 YO RHH 1B/DH coming off a 15 HR season in nearly 700 PAs a superior option to Conteras? You can’t be serious and/or surely no one call fall for cheap tricks. There’s no meaningful gap btw his .361 wOBA / 137 wRC+ to Contreras’ .357 / 132 given the massive gaps in defensive value, this should be obvious to anyone willing to do more than just recite or seem momentarily clever Ugh. Fine. We started with GB rates, of which Contreras carries a higher one, both in 2022 and his career. We can talk about xSLG, where Contreras is in the 85th percentile and Abreu is in the 92nd. Average exit velocity is 76% to 93%. There's a significant K rate gap, again in Abreu's favor. Abreu's career 133 wRC+ is better than any single season Contreras has. Contreras is, the last time I checked, also a RHH, so not sure why that keeps getting mentioned. Contreras vs Abreu for 2 years? Sure, good debate, probably lean Contreras. Tack on having to pay $60m for the three years after that? Pass.

If you're open to a superior hitter for a shorter, cheaper contract, a worse hitter for longer and more money should have tons of appeal. Am I doing this right?

The four teams playing for the World Series are good, and the 2022 Cubs are not good. Got it.

Yeah, now that I know I'll get to root for either Yu or Schwarber, give me Astros/Yanks and hopefully one loses in excruciating fashion in the ALCS and then the other one does in the WS.

Would agree, but Schwarber not singlehandedly donging the Cards out of the playoffs and Pujols/Molina somehow ending their careers with base hits are too far out of line with my preferred outcomes.

Guys I love baseball

Speaking of Quintana, he's starting game 1 for them today, which WTF? 17th best pitcher in baseball this year per fWAR. Classic Quintana 6-7 record. I guess the thinking is trying to slow down Schwarber and Harper, though from what I can tell the Phillies are actually better against lefties than righties, so who knows.