Fear The Chorizo

Frankly, this is the Turang many projected after his junior year in high school when he was widely talked about being the 1st overall draft pick the following summer. The combo of great defense, solid hitting with a little pop, and game-changing speed on the bases is an incredibly valuable middle infielder.

He is noticeably bigger than he was last season - that is a huge reason why I think decent offensive output from him is sustainable ( which makes him a 4-5 WAR middle infielder with his defense.)

I think in general there is this prevailing sentiment by posters here that the Brewers can't develop hitting....and prior to that the sentiment was that the Brewers can't develop pitching, which has proven to be false. I think the organization currently has a mix of young mlb players and prospects in the low minors to address the offensive deficiency argument over the next few seasons. Overall, I don't think the Brewers have ever been in a better spot in terms of producing a steady stream of homegrown talent.

Understood - when it comes to the level of income in Ohtani's stratosphere where expenditures are typically combed over to identify deductions/writeoffs, and the level of complexity having to file state returns in any state he played in each year that would be tied to this account, you'd think more than Ohtani and Mizuhara would have access to it for tax purposes. Willful ignorance could obviously be at play by others involved in Ohtani's circle...but frankly that seems to be way too common surrounding this century's version of Babe Ruth to be 100% truth. And if this story currently out there is truly all there is to it, why would Mizuhara have any incentive to not bet on anything baseball-related? tens of thousands of wagers on seemingly everything but baseball (MLB, international, anywhere). Very interesting how quickly that was common knowledge, that he didn't place any bets on baseball. If he was that much of a degenerate where he was robbing his best friend and primary translating client blind to pay off his own exploding gambling debt while making endless sports bets, I don't see him as the type of character to then avoid placing any bets on baseball based on the ethics of breaking the cardinal rule for MLB players because he was secretly stealing the funds from Ohtani's account. I'll add to this general discussion that I actually don't care much at all about Mizuhara/Ohtani making non-baseball sports bets, even while living in a state where that is still currently illegal - it's the way this cover-up attempt has unfolded that instantly went from Ohtani trying to help his friend out with a series of wire transfers to pay off gambling debt during the same time the fed investigation into this bookie implicated Ohtani's account, to "he was robbed" right after Mizuhara's ESPN interview and after attorneys got a more complete look at the financial paper trail that sticks in my craw. I know others disagree and that's fine.

As a CPA, wouldn't it seem odd come tax time every year that Ohtani's bank account that would have been receiving mlb salary paychecks wasn't accessible to his financial people that had ready access to his other accounts, but his interpreter could? No concerns about potential audit risk or financial security down the road for a global celebrity with international endorsement deals earning a mlb paycheck in a high tax blue state who was set to become a billionaire several times over? Then again, the way this story is being told I'm sure it will come out that Ohtani entrusted Mizuhara with doing his taxes. After all, he was already keeping his books.

If you think I was referring to ohtanis baseball salary when I referred to $$$$$$ above, I don't know what else to say. How much taxable revenue/commerce do you think having Ohtani in MLB brings stateside from international sources in Asia? Ohtani is beyond a star overseas in other baseball-loving countries across the pacific ocean. Bookies, even shady illegal ones, aren't dumb - they know where the funds are coming from with clients who they allow to rack up sizeable debts. A mlb interpreter's annual salary is far from sufficient collateral for a bookie to give someone an unlimited line of credit to keep making bets.

When you look at the number of picks the Packers have in the top 100 of this draft, it's exciting knowing that the youngest NFL team is going to add a significant amount more of young talent no matter what positions they pick. The other thing that hasn't been talked about much, but I think could easily happen, is the Packers swinging multiple trades during the draft to either move up or flat out add more picks to their dance card using some of their young players at positions where they have a ton of depth already in the building that is going to struggle to see the field but showed enough promise where the Packers might be thinking of selling high to a team in need of young talent that is pick-limited this year. Thinking WR specifically.

It's par for the course - key player gets injured, Brewers wait 4 extra games to IL him while playing shorthanded during that stretch that starts a bit of a skid, replace key offensive bat on the roster with a guy who happens to have a bunch of gloves in his bag but can't hit (Miller) and then insert a poor hitting 1B (Bauers) to the 3 spot in the lineup. Sigh.... Specific to this article, they won't be able to fill the offensive void and I hope Yelich gets back in the lineup soon. In my mind, the best thing to do would be to call up Black and insert him at 1B, keep Hoskins at DH (or play matchups with those two), and then lean on Chourio/Frelick/Perkins as on OF lineup. Wiemer should be back down at AAA playing everyday.

It's a million or so people in the metro area, and Omaha proper is actually pretty darn diverse - plus its ties to Nebraska-Lincoln and Creighton have established some really good youth leagues/development programs for the major college sports (football, basketball, baseball). Good spot to find polished/developed talent that can play at the D1 level....not necessarily an NBA or NFL hotbed, but a great part of the country to find college roster glue-guys.

At this point there's probably a few journalism undergrads who have NIL deals and market these template posts to tranfer portal athletes on taskrabbit and Craigslist. It's insane.

Nats have to be hoping he stays healthy and productive for another couple months before flipping him at the trade deadline. Good for him if he's fully recovered, although his type of chronic injury could just as easily flare up again once the season starts grinding and turn him right back into the 0.600 OPS hitter with no athleticism he was last year.

2021 Rodgers trade hindsight isn't that cut and dry though....trading Rodgers before the 2022 season started likely forces Love in at starter too soon and potentially warps his progression to the point the Packers may be looking for an alternative franchise qb in this draft instead of feeling like they're set there for the next 7-8 seasons. When you have the reigning league MVP on your roster, you should have the luxury of sticking with him 1 year too long - especially if that timing also makes sense in your heir-apparent's development timeline. I've got zero problems with waiting until last offseason to trade Rodgers with how things have turned out. Taking a different approach and expecting a better outcome at present than the one the Packers have is truly asking for too much.

Can't believe the Orioles gave up 6 years of Ortiz plus a lotto ticket lefty arm and a comp pick for 1 year of this bum!

Overreact much? Permanently?? Quero is 21 and Wilken's injury may not even keep him out the full season

So they can then get TJ in two months like everyone else ?

just tell me what I wrote above that's wrong in your opinion - we're obviously not going to agree on this and that's fine.

yeah...most of it is a string of texts between the bookie and Mizuhara related to fronting money/delayed repayments/and once it was within the timeline of the fed investigation into the bookie it was the rush to get wires processed from Ohtani's account. The last text exchange listed in the complaint reads a ton like a haphazard effort by the bookie to get Mizuhara to confirm this is a 'cover job'....the "technically I did steal from him. it's all over for me" response from Mizuhara is a nothingburger. also, real shocker that Mizuhara refused to allow the finance managers and Ohtani's agent access to the account being used to pull funds for sports betting on illegal sites from, and Ohtani is claiming to be unaware of that fact. The fact Ohtani had other accounts being managed by those groups and not the one he was being paid his MLB salaries into, and somehow Ohtani wasn't aware of that fact makes zero sense. Google translate has been around quite awhile, it's not like his agent can't at any point ask Ohtani in some form why he won't let them have access to that bank account at any point over the 6-7 MLB seasons he had it without having to run it through Mizuhara.

Saw that Montgomery fired Boras after his last free agent saga that led to basically a 1 year contract. Particularly for pitchers, Boras' tactics have burned enough mlb teams where I'd think rally hard about going with him as your representative. Hoping Montgomery stays healthy this year.

Ohtani has been playing stateside for SEVEN years now - it's not like he's still kicking off the jet lag and waiting for the rest of his things to arrive in the mail to unpack like it's spring 2018 and doesn't know anyone else. I can see needing some assistance initially getting settled in the US from a trusted friend and assistant you've known 5-6 years prior to that point, but eventually when you realize the dollars flying in the door probably exceed the financial expertise of your interpreter you'd think it might be a good idea to set things up a bit more ironclad than what is being made out to have been the case. That is, unless the story isn't being completely truthful. To me, it's still alot more believable that Mizuhara was Ohatani's middle man when it came to making bets on the scope and scale that appeared to have occurred, and they were smart enough to not text each other about it largely because they're practically inseparable and could just as easily talk about making bets, money transfers, etc. using the account Mizuhara had ready access to. Once they realized the entity/bookie they were using was under investigation by the Feds, suddenly it was time to craft this story. Ohtani simply doesn't come off to me as a doe-eyed, gullible, victim who's clueless to what's going on around him financially.

For starters, $$$$$$$$, much of it funneled in some way/shape or form through the most populous and tax-heavy state in the country. Ohtani is essentially a larger-than-life, too big to fail entity in terms of celebrity status that also transcends international borders. You really think the govmint would be just fine with the blowback they'd receive by coercing a smoking gun amount of proof out of someone tied to this mess that would effectively send Ohtani back to Japan? Based on how the Feds typically operate during these investigations, I'm certain you can't be that naive.

Navarro?

Yep....exactly. If people want to believe Ohtani had nothing to do with this, there's enough cover in the results of this investigation for them to cling to. Then the best case scenario is Ohtani is a complete buffoon when it comes to taking care of his personal finances. Reality is this newish information really means zilch in terms clearing ohtani, and as long as his buddy keeps his mouth shut it won't matter

Shocked that any gambling winnings were never directly transferred back to ohtani...and that all transfers from ohtanis account weren't made directly by him. Just so totally surprised by that... And no direct texts about gambling were ever exchanged. Ironclad proof that ohtani isn't at all implicated since they never were around each other directly. Oh wait...

It doesn't have much room to go further up after those happenings, obviously, but the cupboard isn't exactly bare, either. Already rumblings about Yophery and last years draft class is already all over various minor league levels. Could care less about a snapshot farm system ranking compared to hoping Quero just loses 1 year with this injury. He's still just 21 and the silver lining is that the Brewers aren't exactly bard up for catcher at the MLB level for a few more seasons.

is it just me or do the Brewers have at least one critical player/prospect tear a shoulder apart sliding into a base every year? Dammit this sucks - that being said, he's still a young buck and hopefully the surgery/recovery gets him back fully healthy headed into next season. Missing this year of high minor league seasoning is still brutal, though.