MJLiverock

Not buying that at all. Strasburg throws hard either way. There is no guarantee he doesn't overthrow in a minor league game because he knows the GM is in the crowd, or he wants to impress a hot girl, or he is pissed the guy hit a bomb off him in his last AB. There is also nothing that says it was overthrowing. Injuries happen and given that he wasn't being overworked it was probably just his time, plenty of pitchers go down in minor league starts as well. He wasn't over any career innings amount by a large amount and he had never even topped the magical 100 pitch count.

I'd actually question the authenticity of those items. I am willing to be that 90% of the Coach, Louis Vuitton, Prada, etc. stuff seen in WI is a knockoff. My wife probably has half a dozen knock off purses acquired over the years and I can even spot some of the really bad knockoffs/counterfeit bags a lot of women carry. It is actually a what's bugging me thing. I teased my wife about the fake brand stuff so much that she won't even use the fake bags anymore. To me it makes me think less of the person, i.e. trying to seem rich or trying to seem like they have expensive items but in reality havinig a piece of junk that probably isn't even worth the $30 it cost. The whole image is everything and hide the truth but in reality advertising just how fake the person is. If you get out of a '88 Datsun don't try to fool me that you are carrying a $700 Louis Vitton bag or that $3000 Louis Vitton luggage set is real. Sort of like the guys who "debadge" their cars. The removal of the model number on a BMW or replacing the model number with a more expensive model number. I can look at the car and know it is a 1 or 3 series and not the 5 or M series the badge has on the trunk lid.

Sorry to give the props to the wrong poster. EdgarDiaz thanks for reminding me of Once Upon a Time in the West. I do agree with RobertR, the Lisbeth Sanders character is an interesting lead and definately not a shrinking violet type female lead.

Fiduciary duty violations usually result in civil penalties. I know if I breach my fiduciary duty to my clients or my firm I can expect to be sued. If say I passed along one of my wealthy clients fiancial information or the financials of a private pension plan to the newspaper I wouldn't do jail time but my job, career, and likely bank accounts would take a serious hit.

What difference does it make if pitched 100 innings in AA or MLB? They were going to limit his innings at the MLB level as well. Even the Yankees mentioned limiting Phil Hughes innings this year at the MLB level despite his success. Strasburg's career high for innings was just over a 100 so there was talk of limiting him to 140 to 150 this year whether those came at the MLB or AA or AAA wasn't really going to matter to his elbow.

Let me say it again, why should they be forced to spend it on marginal major league talent that won't make the team any better but will just serve the purpose of wasting the money so as not to show a profit. If the team runs a loss every year there is no reserve or even willingness to add that extra umph for a playoff push or pennant race. A $15MM profit is really not that much in the scale of professional sports. They can probably swing a few million of that one way or the other just on attendance variances and given the high fixed cost nature of running a sports team variance in profits will occur. It isn't like if attendance is running 100,000 ahead of budget they can out and spend that extra $4MM from tickets/parking/concessions/merchandise on building a better player in August to make sure they end up with zero profits. The report also fails to mention the balance sheet numbers of the club which are an important piece of the puzzle. The ownership claims to have not paid out dividends to the owners which would mean the profits were retained by the club which is what a business often does to fund future expenditures. Also income statements, if that is what was leaked, do not account for capital investments such as stadium improvments. It is also interesting that the revenue sharing payments were 2x the reported profits so without the reveneu share agreement they would have been $15MM+ in the hole each year forcing further cutbacks. And as stated they may well have just held the $15MM in profits in the club for a rainy day, for future needs to exceed budgets, to fund capital improvements, or just because they didn't want to waste the money on a mediocre FA signing.

Should the Pirates lose money every year? They spent money on things like scouting ,amatuer drafting, international players, instead of overpaying for MLBers that werent' going to make them any better. Probably a good decision on their part. If the team banks the money for when they actually had something good to spend it on all the better but I'm not going to say they actually went that far or thought ahead but if the ownership is willing to pay more in the future when it will matter while thinking in their head that yeah I made $15MM in 2008 or whenever so I can afford to lose $10 MM this year and get that Free Agent that takes me a chance to get over the top or take on that big contract in a trade at the deadline. Spending that $15MM on signing Randy Wolf and a $5MM 2nd baseman this year wouldn't have made the Pirates any more of a contender or raised their hopes to drive ticket sales. The problem with the Yankees is that the defenders of their largess, which is rightfully earned, complain that the other teams would somehow have that much money if they just spent more. Or that the Yankees just care about winning more and that is why they spend so much. Ignoring their population is 10x most of the competing teams driving their TV revenues much higher and giving them the war chest to spend. Conveniently ignoring that if the Yankees didn't have the Royals, Orioles, Twins, Rays, etc. to play agains there would be a serious decline in interest in watching televised Yankee intrasqaud scrimmages. If the Pirates have $80 Million to spend and spend $60MM on MLB payroll and $20MM on farm systems and scouting that may be a much wiser use of money to help improve the team for furture MLB growth when the team may be better and the attendence/intersest grows leading to more TV and merchandising revs to make the pot grow to $100MM to spend an then their MLB payroll can be $80MM and the lower level stuff still $20MM. Meanwhile the Yankees may have $250MM to spend of which they may have to pay $50MM to the other MLB teams still leaving them $150M for MLB numbers and $30MM for all of the scouting stuff. And taking home a $20MM profit. No one complains that the Yankees may spend more on scouting in Asia or the Dominican and says they should spend more on the MLB team since they made a profit. The Yankees have so much more money to spend and are such an outlier in comparison to the other teams through just pure demographics. The fact that they aren't complete idiots, along with running a good international scouting department, and have a tremendous history drawing in fans from all over allows them to maximize their advantage. But it doesn't mean every team should run thier organzation the same way especially when it comes to budgeting for each year's MLB payroll. If the Pirates were forced to spend all their money or even some high percentage like 80% on the MLB payroll - - how long before they stunk again as their minor leagues suffered from lack of investment and the team was forced to sign aging Free Agents to bad contracts just to spend the money. Teams need to have the ability to spend the money where their management determines the best use may be with the understanding there will always be bad management in baseball so it won't work out for every team. The Pirates have stunk for a long time but maybe with their empahsis over the last few years of improving talent in the lower levels instead of floundering around at the MLB level they may actually improve. The Rays struggled for years before fixing things. The Brewers were horrible before they finally stopped signing the Jeffrey Hammonds of the world and focused on improving from the bottom up. Eventually, the Pirates may get it right and some team like the Rays or Twins will be horrible again and payroll will fall and they will be the new whipping boy of why can't they spend like the Yankees.

RobertR Great reminder about Once Upon a Time in the West. I bought the DVD years ago out of a $5 bin at Best Buy after seeing it once in college and loving it. It is long but the film is a classic that never seems to get a lot of mention. Now I just have to find the time to watch it again. RE: Girl with the Dragon Tatoo - - Did you read the book first? I just finished the book and must admit being slightly disappointed in it. I don't want to say too much for those on here who haven't read or seen it but I found the first half of the book was really slow with way too much mundane facts and detail without moving the story along. The plot was fairly predictable and there is a problem with the way the book is set up giving away a major clue too early on the ending. It wasnt' the worst book I have read but I just didn't feel like I was reading an incredible work of fiction either.

Prince's production is below last year but pretty similar to slightly better than 2008 and really pretty much average for his career. He is fourth in the league for 1B with 400 PA's in wOBA and 3rd in RC. In fact regardless of position he is 3rd in wRC or 7th in wOBA. I wouldn't call that middle of the pack. Braun is having a down year by his standards and is more middle of pack ranking 6/13 in wOBA for left fielders but 3/13 in wRC. Replacing Prince's bat in the lineup with say Gamel is going to result in a drop off there unless one thinks Gamel is going to put up a .400/.500/.900 line as a rookie. There is room for improvement as you mentioned in SS, C, CF numbers. All three guys in Escobar, Gomez, and Lucroy have put up basically the same wOBA and wRC. Ranking them position wise, Lucroy ranks 14/20 for catchers with 190+ PA's in wOBA and 19/20 in wRC. Gomez was 18/19 for CF with 250 PA's in wOBA (interestingly only ahead of Tony Gwynn, Jr.) and 19/19th in wRC (just behind TGJ). Escobar is 17/19 at SS with 250 PA's and 13/19 in wRC. Lucroy actually walks even less than Gomez who figures to be replaced hopefully by Cain to start the season. The Brewers aren't without guys who are performing above expectations to offset Braun's down year and Fielder's average for him year. Hart and Weeks are both playing at levels never seen by either player for a full season. Not to mention McGehee continuing to prove doubters wrong with a respectable ranking of 6th and 4th in wOBA and wRC for 3rd baseman. Weeks and Hart have both been top 3 at their positions this year. Weeks has always been thought to have the talent to do it and remaining healthy is probably key to keeping it up for him. Hart is probably still questionable as to can he keep it up for the rest of this year and all of next. I can easily see why the offense could be thought to take a step back next year without Prince. I don't think they will be the worst offense but they could drop a few notches.

Cubs, Cardinals, Yankees, A's

$15MM on a $200MM is 7.5% per year. Not bad but not some panacea of incredible returns either. I'd still like to see the actual cash return as well since the taxable income is perverted by tax codes. Someone mentioned their payroll was $51MM so even with bumping that payroll up to the mid $60's and eating all profits it still doesn't buy the club a whole lot more cometitiveness. Also further cements by thoughts that the Brewers are pretty much tapped out financially for payroll at around $90MM which will likely go down as the attendence dwindles this year and next.

I agree that Gomez could use some time in AAA. He only has about 650 PAs on the minors. But to rebut some the comments that he can never improve or has no value I ask if the feeling is the same about Lucroy? His offensive stats aren't all that different from Gomez this year , they are only a year apart in age and Lucroy has 2 x the number of minor league PA's. Gomez has the ceiling of an elite defender while Lucroy's upside is probably average defensively.

Hardy's offense has been disappearing and for all the grief about Escobar he has the same Obp as Hardy. Hardy may have already peaked and will be a FA after next season. I'd take Escobar easily over Hardy today.

I couldn't believe how the guys on MLB network were gushing about his bat helping the Cardinal offense and why this shows how smart the Cardinals are and poised to go deep in the playoffs.

The clock sure is ticking and getting down to the wire on this one. Going to be a pretty disapointing draft if they don't get him signed.

Nice location by Parra as well, catcher sets up outside and Parra completely misses to the inside.

I think endaround's point is pretty valid, if UZR explains about 20% of the teams winning percentage that is plausible and passes the smell test. But the idea that equally weighting defense or UZR with offense is again shown to be not the case as defense isn't 50. Even the defensive stat gure Dewan only said UZR is about 60% reliable in explaining defense. It also doesn't let the excuse that the pitching staff is OK but the defense is really the problem fly. The defense isn't helping the staff but the defense isn't why Manny Parra can't throw strikes consistently, grooves fast balls that get rocketed, or Dave Bush gives up 4 bombs in a row. The pitchers either don't have the talent to do well, or can't harness their talent and locate pitches. UZR doesn't even fully explain the defense but putting an infield of all great UZR guys out there still wouldn't make this staff even average.

Attendance is down 9% this year and merchandise sales are also likely down. I don't know that I would count on another million dollar rabbit out of the hat. Attendance next year likely won't be a whole lot better

I figured they saw Hudson hitting 95 with his fastball and assumed they didn't need any more relievers because the couldn't believe a starter threw that hard

Attanasio said in a recent interview that the team will lose money this year. With the team being more than one pitcher away from being a serious contender next year I think it is realistic to expect some payroll contraction next year. I do agree it is foolish to waste $20-$30 million a year on 3 or 4 replacement or just above guys. That is probably my biggest beef with Melvin. Squandering $5 million here and there on multi year deals for middling bullpen guys and back of the rotation guys when similar production was available in house. Then being willing to spend $10+ million on a guy like Wolf but not $15 million to get a guy who is truly above average or good. Or if the FA market isn't good then I would rather they just wait until next year when a better fit or better player is available rather than just spending the money to spend the money. I don't see how they will be a contender next year by adding one player. No pitcher on the cusp of the majors in the system now is going to be more than a back of the rotation guy. A young guy fe a Fielder trade will not immediately be a #2 starter or ready to throw 180+ innings.

And runs allowed will be heavily influenced by the quality, or lack therof in Milwakee's case, of the pitching staff.

Name me some of those, please. WAR may not be perfect, but, by no means is it showing that Seattle, as a team, should be having a good year.The fact is Seattle has Ichiro and... well... Ichiro this season. It makes no sense to equally weight offense and defense since the numer of chances for a player to help/hurt his team offensively is much greater than the number of chances to help hurt his team defensively. For instance, a guy like Andre Ethier, his batting is worth 17.3 and his fielding is worth -16.3 yielding a WAR of basically 1 his so called defensive liablity is nearly cancelling out his offense completely. He has 396 PA this year and a wRC+ of 136, meaning he is 36% better than league average for offense. Even if one assumes the defensive metrics are correct he would have to be 36% worse than average on defense. But he only has 153 put outs, now assuming his defense is terrible and he really should have 239 put outs since he is 36% worse than average at converting plays into outs so his total put outs must be understated by what a elite or in this case average fielder would convert. His defensive impact on a the game is still only about half what his offensive impact on the game is just based on pure number of chances to do something either good or bad. I know that you can't truly calculate defense that way but it just shows how overstated a player's defensive impact on a game is in comparison to his offense, especially if the player is a very good hitter. Let alone some of the pure ridiculous numbers that implied by the defensive metrics for allowing runs to score in comparison to runs created to offset offensive production. Guys would have to be booting balls, not getting to balls that they should in every single game, to allow the number of runs ot offset their offense if they are very good hitters, given the disparity in chances. I'm not saying defense isn't important but to equally weight it with offense is overstating its value in relation to the difference between being average or below at it vs. elite at it and the difference in being average to below average in offense vs. being elite at it. This also doesn't take into account how subjective the defensive ratings are anyway given positioning, speed of balls, spin, pitch thrown, and just guessing on what a guy should get to or not. Not to mention the impact of being a corner outfielder who gets only a few plays a week that truly are up for debate on making or not making the play as a great defender. A guy like Adam Everett in 2006 was a 2.4 WAR player because his defense was 25.2 while his offense was -26.3. His wRC+ was 65 an absolutely atrocious offensive performer well below any kind of average performance. Yet we are to believe his defense was so stellar and above average that he completely offsets that kind of miserable offense?

Illustrating that some of the models that weight defense equally with offense like WAR are really not very realistic. i.e. guys who are studs offensively being reduced to replacment level as if their superb offense is totally offset by bad defense, implying defense so bad that the guy must be giving up a run every third game in order to completely offset their offensive production.

Gross was a very overrated player by many on this board. He is simply just a worse hitting version of Kevin Mench and not much better of a defender. Gross's supposed platoon strength of playing vs. Rhers still only yields a .740 OPS in his career and he was/is flat out awful vs. LH pitching. The guy should always remain just a 4th or 5th outfielder and not part of a planned platoon unless some team really can't find a LHer who can get above a low .700 OPS vs. RHers only.

The Brewers have a bad record in probably the worst division in baseball. This is just not a good team. A few wins vs a horrible Astros team doesn't change it and will likely be offset by some losses to another bad team.