harmony

Luxury tax penalties will likely prevent the Red Sox from pursuing Bryce Harper while paying David Price, J.D. Martinez and Dustin Pedrioa, ultimately replacing Chris Sale, Craig Kimbrel, Rick Porcello, Hanley Ramirez, Drew Pomeranz and Joe Kelly, and negotiating extensions for Mookie Betts, Xander Bogaerts and Jackie Bradley, and arbitration salaries for Andrew Benintendi, Rafael Devers and others.

What return could the Red Sox expect in a trade of Blake Swihart to the Marlins?

I suspect the Red Sox lost a potential suitor when the New York Mets traded for Devin Mesoraco.

Depends on the university and program. I am old enough to remember when many top football and basketball programs had incredibly low graduation rates, in part because many athletes rarely went to class. Still those athletes got a taste of higher education that many of their parents did not. In turn, the children of those athletes are more likely to pursue higher education regardless of whether the offspring participate in sports. The benefit may not be immediately apparent but may be passed down to the next generation.

FWIW: Seattle's average annual precipitation (37.49 inches) falls short of Boston's average annual precipitation (43.76 inches). During the baseball season* Boston averages more than twice the precipitation that Seattle receives. * from April through September Boston averages 21.11 inches of precipitation while Seattle averages 9.11 inches of precipitation

The new ballpark in Arlington, Texas, will have a retractable roof: https://sportsday.dallasnews.com/texas-rangers/rangers/2018/01/01/10-things-know-new-rangers-ballpark-including-will-much-will-cost I'm feeling old because I went to old Arlington Stadium in 1986 but have never been to the current ballpark, Globe Life Park. In a similar vein, I went to the Minnesota Twins' first two stadiums but have never been to Target Field.

That's only because of Portland's clouds from November through February. Portland has more hours of sunshine (1,653) than Boston (1,596) during the average baseball season from April through September. Not to mention significantly less precipitation.

Compare the average monthly precipitation (in inches) for Portland and Boston during the baseball season: March: BOS 4.33, PDX 3.66 April: BOS 3.74, PDX 2.72 May: BOS 3.50, PDX 2.48 June: BOS 3.66, PDX 1.69 July: BOS 3.43, PDX 0.67 August: BOS 3.35, PDX 0.67 September: BOS 3.43, PDX 1.46 October: BOS 3.94, PDX 2.99 https://www.usclimatedata.com/climate/boston/massachusetts/united-states/usma0046 https://www.usclimatedata.com/climate/portland/oregon/united-states/usor0275 ... and the average total hours of sunshine: March: BOS 214, PDX 191 April: BOS 227, PDX 221 May: BOS 267, PDX 276 June: BOS 287, PDX 290 July: BOS 301, PDX 332 August: BOS 277, PDX 298 September: BOS 237, PDX 236 October: BOS 206, PDX 152 https://www.currentresults.com/Weather/US/average-annual-sunshine-by-city.php

A Portland group plans to make a bid for an MLB club: https://www.forbes.com/sites/maurybrown/2018/04/18/group-makes-offers-for-property-to-build-mlb-ballpark-in-portland-now-comes-the-tricky-part/#7af729018182 This Portland resident has doubts.

ZiPS. Steamer and FanGraphs Depth Charts project rest-of-season wRC+ of 105, 111 and 108 for Hanley Ramirez and 60, 70 and 65 for Blake Swihart: https://www.fangraphs.com/statss.aspx?playerid=8001&position=SS https://www.fangraphs.com/statss.aspx?playerid=13176&position=C

Next weekend I may go to the NCAA Division I match-up between the No. 2 and No. 3 teams in the country when Oregon State hosts Stanford. I will definitely watch Stanford entertain Washington State the following weekend.

I wanted the Seattle Mariners to pursue Miles Mikolas last offseason but I'm pleased to have the 29-year-old righthander on my fantasy team at the league minimum salary.

Jurickson Profar fouled off three straight ball fours, if the pitch tracker at MLB.com was accurate.\

Seattle icon Felix Hernandez has seen the velocity of his fastball drop significantly since the right-hander signed a seven-year, $175 million extension in February 2013 two months shy of his 27th birthday: https://www.fangraphs.com/statss.aspx?playerid=4772&position=P#pitchtype Hernandez has posted 16.1 fWAR, valued at $122.9 million, on the contract that runs through next season. David Price, who is seven-and-a-half months older than Hernandez, has posted 6.5 fWAR, valued at $51.7 million, so far under his seven-year, $217 million contract that runs through the 2022 season. In the first two seasons of their respective seven-year contracts, Hernandez posted 11.8 fWAR, valued at $88.7 million, while Price posted 5.9 fWAR, valued at $47.5 million. Long-term contract too often end up underwater.

I agree. The Mariners played the Athletics there for two games in 2012. Nonstop flights from Seattle to Tokyo take at least 10 hours and 20 minutes while nonstop flights from Boston to London take at least six hours and 20 minutes.

The Seattle Mariners have announced they will open the 2019 season in Tokyo against the Oakland Athletics. My closest baseball friend immediately said we should go. He's been to all 30 MLB stadiums and recently returned from the two MLB games in Puerto Rico. I doubt that I'll go for many reasons, including that my daughter is likely to have an athletic competition on those dates. I have not been to all MLB stadiums but I have joined my friend for games in Seattle, Los Angeles, Anaheim, San Diego, Phoenix, Denver, Boston, New York (Yankee and Citi Field), Philadelphia, Baltimore, Washington and Toronto.

That was in the original Ball Four, which was given to me by my grandmother, a retired English professor, when I was 14 years old. At the time I was surprised that she would give me a book filled with profanity. Three years later my mother shared with my grandmother my profanity-laced but well-regarded creative writing. Grandma said she liked the writing but that I should not use profanity just for the sake of using profanity. Good advice. I don't think I've use profanity on this forum (and have been roundly criticized for questioning posters who do).

I've read Ball Four three times and got something different out of the book each time. As a young teen when the book came out, I was riveted by the accounts of sex and partying. Around my 40th birthday, I was interested in the book's description of the developing labor issues in baseball. In my mid-50s I could relate to self doubt of the aging Jim Bouton. The 1969 Seattle Pilots held a 40-year public reunion at a Seattle hotel on a Saturday afternoon in 2009. I had long-standing plans to attend the reunion but broke my wrist in a bicycle crash that morning, delaying my departure to Seattle. I made it that evening to the Mariner game where the Pilots were honored.

The lefty starters were once teammates at Vanderbilt: http://www.vucommodores.com/sports/m-basebl/archive/vand-m-basebl-06-07-roster.html

To be fair, at the time of the November 2015 trade the Padres had 23-year-old catcher Austin Hedges, whom Baseball Prospectus and MLB Prospect Watch had ranked No. 23 and No. 51 among prospects entering the 2015 season. Baseball America had ranked Hedges No. 27 the previous year. The 2011 draft saw Hedges taken with the No. 82 pick and Swihart with the No. 26 pick. Hedges, who is four months younger than Swihart, has posted 0.4 bWAR and a negative 0.2 fWAR in 152 games since the Kimbrel trade while Swihart has posted 0.0 bWAR and a negative 0.2 fWAR in 37 games. Hedges entered this season with one year and 166 days of MLB service while Swihart had one year and 164 days of MLB service. Compare their minor league lines: AH 1621 PA, .270/.323/.433/.757 BS 1716 PA, .269/.328/.398/.727 Hedges has struggled with an OPS+ of 58 in 676 plate appearances at the MLB level while Swihart has posted an OPS+ of 86 in 411 plate appearances, including and OPS+ of 73 in 102 plate appearances since the start of the 2016 season. ZiPS, Steamer and FanGraphs Depth Charts project rest-of-season wRC+ of 72, 67 and 70 for Hedges and 60, 69 and 64 for Swihart. Hedges probably has a brighter future than Swihart because of his vastly superior defensive skills: https://www.fanragsports.com/padres/pleskoff-scouting-report-austin-hedges/

This Boston Globe piece from last June describes Rusney Castillo's unenviable situation after revisions to the MLB Collective Bargaining Agreement: https://www.bostonglobe.com/sports/redsox/2017/06/22/rusney-castillo-reborn-but-also-stuck-pawtucket/WXXV4C6o8xF3h4zCC5q6KL/story.html

Hanley Ramirez has posted 0.6 fWAR in his 27 games this year. ZiPS, Steamer and FanGraphs Depth Charts project Ramirez with rest-of-season WAR of 0.9, 0.7 and 0.6 in 105, 73 and 66 games, respectively: https://www.fangraphs.com/statss.aspx?playerid=8001&position=SS

I found the early World Series odds interesting: https://www.fangraphs.com/standings/playoff-odds

True. This is what Kevin Youkilis tweeted last month about the rules change: https://twitter.com/GreekGodOfHops/status/984267816424521728

Nearly three years ago ESPN columnist Tim Kurkjian wrote of "four examples that define a dirty slide": http://www.espn.com/mlb/story/_/id/13134635/what-exactly-dirty-slide The rules -- written and unwritten -- apparently have changed since I last played in the 1960s.