jerichoholicninja

Have you ever watched Weeks field 1st on a bunt? He's a disaster. If the Ramirez injury forced a move for Weeks it should be to 3rd.

The only time Braun's value has been lower was last off season. His numbers are good but he is constantly having nagging injuries and his thumb is probably going to affect him for the rest of his career. I can't see any team giving up a haul worth trading him for unless that team was really desperate.

I would think so too but when your team already has one (or two) of those, why bring in another?

Axford has been removed as Cleveland's closer. That 8.3 BB/9 isn't going to cut it no matter how many batters you strike out. The guy's toast and Doug was wise to jump off that train when he did. Sooner would have been better but at least he got someone who might be a major leaguer out of it.

There really isn't a solution. The problem is scouts love the radar gun and that's what young pitchers work toward. Not being a smart pitcher, or developing secondary pitches, but getting velocity on their fastball. And obviously the stats show that hard throwing pitchers are more successful. Teams, but really more so fans, need to decide if they want to invest (financially for clubs and emotionally for fans) in a high-90's guy who's going to give you a few (potentially good to great) years before the inevitable TJ or a guy like Marco Estrada who's going to give you high-80's/low-90's with a boring changeup but have a healthy shoulder and elbow. Or to put it simply, do you want good and oft injured or average and healthy? That same question comes up every off season here with free agent pitchers. A lot of people were against the Garza signing because of injury issues. I don't think there were many that thought he was not a good pitcher, they just were worried about DL time on a long-term contract. I think what is really going to make this whole discussion moot, though, is how these guys come back. If they are able to return to the success they had before the injury, who cares? Yes, you're going to lose about a calendar year of the player but if you're getting the same pitcher back is it really that big of an issue?

Estrada gets no respect here for some reason. He's a very solid and cheap pitcher but two freak hamstring injuries have convinced everyone he's an injury prone fluke.

Anyone feel like trying a 6-man rotation for a while? Atlanta will be doing that for a few weeks because they have 6 starters who have been pitching well. I think it would be worth a shot in late July or August to give the starters an extra day and save some innings.

Basically word for word what I came here to post.

Great, the SI jinx.

Not gonna happen. A 28 year old pitcher with little MLB success doesn't bring anything of value back.

Injuries have only gone up since the last time they lowered the mound. I don't see that making much of a difference.

It's amazing how bad he's been but it's more amazing how blah his minor league numbers were for a guy who was a top prospect.

First of all, congratulations. May the two of you be as happy as my wife and I have been and for the rest of your lives. Now I'd like to throw some old fart wisdom (or insane ramblings) your way. I'd be willing to bet that your betrothed doesn't really care if you buy her some big, fancy, color-this and clarity-that ring. It's the REST of the women that care; and believe me, they care. The size of the stone(s) and the perceived cost of the ring will be dissected and discussed at length. It's what they do (ladies, please don't kill me... you know this is how it works). I am extremely fortunate that my wife and I both understand that there are very fundamental differences in men and women. Women over analyze everything; every word, every tone, every gesture and every facial expression. Men are idiots. We stumble along blindly, usually thinking about nothing deeper than a nap and a sandwich. Here's how this all ties into your current situation. We bought our rings at Walmart of all places (and it was even her idea!). Mine is as plain and simple as can be, while hers looks like it was quite expensive but it wasn't. I think it was just under $400. It has one medium sized diamond, surrounded by a bunch of smaller diamonds, laid out brilliantly. It looks as good, or better than, most of her friends' and coworkers' much more expensive rings. Of course, the jewelry stores will tell you that you need such-and-such color as well as such-and such-clarity, but do you really? I don't believe there's a human being on the planet that can tell the difference with the naked eye. So in our case, everybody won. We didn't spend a ton of money needlessly and she didn't end up feeling guilty about it. She knows that I love her dearly and we are every bit as married as anyone else is. And, "the rest of the women" were satisfied with the level of financial misery that I seemingly endured in order to "prove how much I love her." If your future bride is as pragmatic as my wife is, maybe this could work for you too. Although how you would broach the subject, I have no clue. It could definitely be a slippery slope. Like I said, my wife is the one that suggested we buy inexpensive rings (thank Jeebus). Maybe some of the ladies here will chime in. Me? I'm going to have a sandwich. Thankfully my fiance did not want to pay that much so we went to another store and she found a ring that was $500 cheaper. It's still more than I wanted to pay for a ring but at least that's over and done with.

I would think Herrera is the most likely option with Bianchi playing 3rd. Green would be second most likely with Gorzelanny heading to the 60 day. It won't be Morris. That would give them two left handed hitters who can only play first.

Community has been cancelled. What the hell!?

Went wedding ring shopping with my fiance on Tuesday. The one she liked was over $1400 - after the sale price. (note: I'm "thrifty" and hate spending money on almost anything.) My jaw hit the floor when I heard the price but I wasn't going to say anything since she makes a lot more than I do and I felt I would be a little out of line to say anything. When the sales person asked me what kind of ring I was interesting in I said "something cheap." The salesperson gave me a smirk and showed me some rings. Mine will cost $72. When we got in the car, thankfully, my fiance was also floored by the price. Gosh, that's a lock of money for some tiny rocks and little metal.

Juan put up a pretty hot couple weeks last season that had everyone in a tizzy but then bottomed out to end the year. He's had a pretty good few weeks with Toronto and will probably end the year with the same .700-ish OPS he's had every year. Even when not considering his defense (or lack of), I'm not too worried that he was dumped.

Yes, the Brewers gave up on him and because he was so good he was quickly picked up by...a Japanese team. Apparently the whole league agreed with the Brewers assessment.

Ron and most managers love to bunt because it's gritty and veterany and shows how much their players love to battle and grind.

That would be a pretty bad trade for the Jays. Even only half a season of Rasmus is worth more than Weeks.

Pennington isn't much of an upgrade over what the Brewers already have on the bench. I will pass on Pennington. Pennington Career OPS+ 83 Bianchi Career OPS+ 50 Jeff is a terrible hitter. Pennington isn't a good hitter either, but he's an upgrade over Bianchi.

Let's say we swap Wang with Jimmy Nelson in our current situation. And Nelson was being used as infrequently and putting up shut out innings surrounded by innings where he was getting rocked. Would the same people who have a problem with Wang still have a problem?

When I saw the thread title I assumed it would be about Nick Shaw. I'm not sure how much of a major leaguer he projects as but I'd like to see what he can do in the bigs someday.

The ump at third base put his hands up and tried to get in front of Gomez as soon as he left the base. The player with the ball at the time was Josh Harrison and he tried to hold Cole back. So there was really no way for Gomez to be tagged out. People might not like it but it is totally relevant to the situation. Players from Latin America come from a game with a completely different culture where playing with flair and passion is the norm and the opposition doesn't get offended by it.