rjortiz

Love that the Yankees won. BTW, this is Crespo. YOTN, sorry for what I did. I was a 20 year old dumb f*** at the time.

This isn't football. You don't draft for need.

Didn't you just do that?

Lackey and his agent should understand it too. They took a risk when they put that clause in the contract. It didn't work out. You still have to honor that contract. Felix Hernandez has it in his contract if he gets hurt, but there are already thousands of cases of MLB players playing on one year options at the minimum. How about Mike Trout? Mike Trout posted two consecutive 10 WAR seasons for $1 million. The Angels decided to be nice to him and gave a full $1 million for his likely 10 WAR 2014. Should he have "retired" and not have played for the $2 million he got for three years of Hall of Fame level production? He would have had a better case than Lackey. Koji Uehera would have had a case by this logic as well. The amount of the contract doesn't mean it stops being a binding document. Why didn't he, and why won't John Lackey retire? Their teams still own the rights to that contract. Lackey could retire until 2020 if he wanted to. He still will have to pitch for the Red Sox for $500,000. He couldn't even pitch for the Yomiuri Giants.

How many teams are in your league?

I love day baseball when you are too sick to leave the house.

What about Hernandez? Would you be able to guess that he would murder three people?

This guy is a monster.

Lackey could retire, but the Red Sox would still have his rights. He has no leverage.

Red Sox paid him $30.50 million when his elbow was causing him problems in 2011 and 2012. Pitching for the minimum in 2015 would still be a good deal for Lackey.

The two problems with OPS are that all events are not created equal, (OBP component) and OBP is much more valuable than SLG%. Despite that, it is better than every traditional statistic.

I agree with you. I just saw the post about a single scoring two runs, and the question about the difference in value of singles and walks. Batting average is a very bad statistic, and it only lives because "Old Baseball Men" are terrified of high school mathematics. I remember the outrage when ESPN started showing OBP with the other traditional statistics. I can't imagine what is going through Harold Reynolds head when he sees wOBA. wOBA is just a linear equation. It's not calculus. You don't even need to do the math if you know how to use Excel. I can't think of any other reason why baseball analysts, or personnel would be against how the statistic is calculated. No one would disagree that certain events in baseball will lead to more runs on average. Why not use the statistic that considers that?

They are making some attempts to engage fans through social media, and have produced some shows that have "hip" celebrities (does Fat Joe count?) saying YOLO and swag which somehow relates to baseball. The WBC, Japan, and Australia trips are clearly a secondary priority. FIFA shuts down domestic leagues to stage friendlies, qualifiers, and tournaments. MLB puts pitch limits on pitchers, and the best don't even play during the WBC. The Japan and Australia trips is just one series a year. MLB's biggest problem with young people is that most of them are priced out of stadium, and now they are starting to get priced out of watching on TV. MLB has to know this, and almost certainly could care less.

Not much of a predictive measure, and is subject to wild fluctuations due to sample size. Also, it is dependent on other batters getting to scoring position.

http://www.fangraphs.com/library/principles/linear-weights/ The scenario you presented happens enough to make a single more valuable than a walk on average.

Wizards need Hibbert to forget how to play basketball two more times.

Why not? It is better for both parties that he is being honest about his preferred destination. It's also his only form of leverage as a draftee.

That was the scouting report on Brady even out of Michigan. Not so much on Garoppolo.

Bradley is getting a long leash, because there are no other options. All of the internal options would be atrocious in CF, except for Victorino. However, RF in Fenway Park might as well be CF given how huge it is. Gomes, Nava, Carp, and Sizemore would still be awful, and still don't hit enough to justify terrible defense of that extent. Bradley isn't even the worst outfielder on the team. He isn't even the second, third, or fourth worst if you count Carp. The options mentioned in this thread are not CF's. Ethier has barely played CF in his career, and he was awful when he did. Ethier is also potentially due 4/68, so you can cross him off. Denorfia is a cheap rental. He rates very poorly in CF, but he would be a nice upgrade in LF. Of course, we could always trade for Denorfia and Stanton, and go with a Stanton-Victorino-Denorfia outfield. Bradley could be the 4th OF for the rest of the year.

Garoppolo runs a 4.94 in the 40. He isn't slow like Brady and Bledsoe, but he's not exactly a scrambling QB.

I wonder if some of those pitchers in the 1960's would be able to get away with pacing themselves in today's environment. Pitching from Mount Sinai, and the lower quality of hitters probably helped them get away with that. It is almost a certainty that they were less effective the longer they were in the game. Maybe not as pronounced, but I still can't imagine any conditioning program that would alleviate arm fatigue after making a throwing motion hundreds of times in a few hours. I think we are on the same page when you put it this way. I was referring to longevity, but your idea of squeezing six productive seasons and moving on is something I would agree with

I would have to think on it more, but I think I like this approach. Even if you save a pitcher from arm damage at 25, humans still age and decline in overall ability as they age. We could employ what NFL teams do with RB's with starting pitchers. Use them up while they are under team control for the first six years, and then let them walk after they are finished. I doubt this would actually happen, but you would extract the most value out of your starters while they are under your control. One problem would be replacing 280 innings if a starter goes down. I'm also convinced that throwing 160 pitches in a game is risky, because pitching with an exhausted arm is more dangerous than pitching with a fresh one. I don't think any kind of conditioning program would mitigate that risk. Maybe anatomical freaks could do it, but not your typical pitcher. It is also pretty clear that pitchers are generally less effective the longer they are in the game. Relievers are better than starters, so it is a better strategy to use a fresh reliever over a tired starter. I still wouldn't push starters beyond 110-120 pitches, but maybe a four man rotation would be feasible at regular pitch counts. It would eliminate the need for a fifth starter, who usually are below average anyway. Again, I doubt this is realistic, but just a thought.

The typical Pats QB in your lifetime is a first ballot Hall of Famer, so if you meant Jimmy Garoppolo will not be as good as Tom Brady you are probably correct. He is not like Drew Bledsoe or Scott Zolak either, but I am pretty sure you were not referring to them.

How would we measure that, and wouldn't that suggest the opposite of what you say? They may have been pitching eight seasons worth of today's pitcher innings in only four, but most of them were ineffective after taking that much abuse. There are always going to be outliers, such as Tom Seaver, or Nolan Ryan, but I wouldn't base a strategy for the average pitcher on Hall of Famers. I really don't think there is a panacea. Pitching is just inherently risky. The best conditioning program isn't going to change human anatomy.

Here's a little bit of information on the Yankees stadium debt: https://www.moodys.com/research/Moodys-changes-Yankee-Stadium-LLC-outlook-to-stable-from-positive--PR_287411 I'm guessing the Yankees were swapping floating rates with a fixed one. Making matters worse, the Yankees suck, so the risk of them playing in front of 20,000 fans in September is a real possibility. That could trigger collateral calls, which is going to force the Yankees to cut payroll, or sell off more equity in the YES Network.