Hairyducked Idiot

As an idiot who just got nailed with the MLB TV auto-renewal yet again, mineaswell watch some

Now that I’ve seen the receipts, I have to side with diceman. By Message Board Law, IMB has to be his butler for a week. With a butler outfit and everything.

Thanks! I don't get to follow the team as closely as I used to. I still am around a decent amount, but don't feel like my opinions are informed enough at this point to be of any value. That's the hard thing about baseball, it's hard to have a middle ground between casual fan overreacting to the last thing they saw and super informed fan who can critique each decision because they know all the variables that go behind it. that stops, like, literally no one who posts here. I could probably name like 15 current cubs at most and that’s aided by the fact that Theo took the year off and ran it back.

That’s why I think the blackjack analogy is apt. “If he is a superstar for three years and opts out, great!” Is like saying “I bet $10 on a 50/50 bet, and got back $15, great!” Opt-outs chop a chunk off the high end of expected value for the team, which drives down the average expected value. And yes, that can be worth it if you get concessions elsewhere in the contract, but just because you and I get that doesn’t mean everyone does.

opt outs have monetary value and if the value in dollars given up in exchange for them outweighs the risked value involved with the opt out, then it is good for the team i tend to think of it this way - every future season carries some volatility for any player in terms of performance, no matter who it is. The older a player gets the more volatility there is. Take Harper for example, has a 9-WAR season and an MVP and hits FA at 26, seems like as good a bet as any to live up to whatever deal he gets. But even he has had multiple injuries and up and down seasons. Still, because of his age and track record, he can command a very lengthy deal - it's literally the price of admission to even begin the discussion of signing him. Ideally maybe you would sign him for say 6 years so you're not locked into his decline phase. He may still be very good from 32-36 and could very likely be worth the money through that phase, but there's a much higher chance you're getting your money's worth (or surplus value) out of those first handful of years. Regardless, he's getting 10+ years. So say Harper had demanded an opt out after 4 years so he could hit FA again at 30. The scenarios are this: * He gives the team surplus value for those four years and leaves - Not ideal but hey, you got surplus value so it's still a win. * He is merely worth the contract and leaves - again, not super ideal but at least you got your money's worth. * He is injured and declines or plays poorly and chooses not to opt out - 10+ years was the price of admission so even with no opt outs you were going to be stuck with this anyway. In the first two scenarios, at minimum the signing still worked for you. Not to mention that you may be in a different window where you're not interested in 6+ additional years of a past-prime outfielder anyway. in the third scenario, opt-out or no opt-out, you were going to have him for the length of the contract he could command regardless. There’s a fourth option: he continues to provide good value for the team in the later years. By completely removing that option, you meaningfully change the expected value of the the deal for the team. It’s like sitting at a blackjack table that only pays 70% when you win. You can say “well, if we win we are still ahead, and if we lose we would have lost anyway, so what’s the problem?” But that 30% chop to the payoff meaningfully changes the average value of the bet.

Next year we will have the early stages of the rebuild to excite us again.

Nah, I get that part. That’s still not how most people describe them. They don’t say “it sucks to give an opt-out but it saves us $60m in guaranteed money.” They say “this is actually good for us because we don’t want his decline years and he is definitely going to opt out.” no one describes them either of those two ways Look, most of my thoughts on how human interactions work are gonna be hypothetical

Nah, I get that part. That’s still not how most people describe them. They don’t say “it sucks to give an opt-out but it saves us $60m in guaranteed money.” They say “this is actually good for us because we don’t want his decline years and he is definitely going to opt out.”

Enjoy Kris Bryant's last three, gimpy-shouldered years with the Cubs.

I think it’s okay to let occam’s razor guide us to “they made a dumb move” and not come up with a complicated timeline that somehow absolves them.

Cubs fans won’t have the balls to boo him. Most of them probably think he was right

I hate that some small part of me still buys in

The main thing I don’t miss about chess tournaments is getting paired against kids. It’s 50/50 that you’re going to destroy them and feel bad or they’re going to destroy you and you just got walked by a 9 year old. P sure a 13 year old was getting help from his dad’s laptop on his “bathroom break” one time so horsefeathers that kid

So either my doom boner is justified or I personally saved the cubs. Win-mostly win.

I will never abandon a doom boner because of anything that happens in a meaningless practice game: A ST home run is like Mark Prior getting good snap on his towel

You guys don't have to choose. You can like both of us. He's the Beatles to my Stones.

not to say anything of harper, but pretty much nothing is going to be potentially crippling to the cubs financially anywhere in the near or long term. best post on page 1 He was right because they were already crippled so nothing could do it to them.

The only thing worse than paying $3.5m for a kicker is having $3.5m in dead money from a kicker.

I was two years old in 1984. I'm still pretty mad about 2003, but I don't hate anyone on the Marlins for it, just Dusty.

that dong thread euphoria didn't last long eh This page was practically daring someone to say it.

I would rather see the Padres win the WS this year than the Cubs. These turds don't deserve to win.

Also not technically a Cubs home run, but he put us into the 1998 Wild Card game when he walked off the Rockies against the Giants.

Well, this thread has me hyped. horsefeathers PECOTA

This is the only major one I saw in person: