Forum Replies Created
-
Posts
-
MLB did that for a couple of years as I recall. Quite a few years back, they scheduled the early season games in warm weather sites, but then went away from it.
It’s rare these days that MLB does anything that makes sense to me. All decisions are based on short-term revenues, with little-to-no value ever given to the big picture, legacy, tradition or fan considerations.
But they are not alone in that way of thinking. It’s pretty much a universal thought across most industries. I think it gets magnified in professional and big-time collegiate athletics because there is so much public interest in sports.
It’s hard to believe the Clark’s have only $25K in assets. They must not own a home, and only have a car or two and some furnishings. $25K is not much.
Medical bills can really be tough though. My son incurred around $15K in medical debts, and struggled to pay them. I tried to work with the credit agency on his behalf and offered a settlement of a $5K lump sum cash payment, but they would not do it. Finally my son got ahold of someone who would negotiate, and signed a contract to pay $300 per month over the course of 3 years, and they would call it good. Basically that paid off the remaining principle, and they waived the interest and penalties.
Anyway, all the best to Jack and Angela. Clark seems like a nice guy (I have met him at collectibles shows). But he has burned some bridges over the years with stuff like the Pujols allegations.
Rolen was my favorite Cardinal for a couple of years there when he was a star. The whole soap opera between him and LaRussa sort of soured me on him a little bit, although neither guy took the high road in that crazy deal.
That’s the cool thing about the Cardinals Hall – fans can vote for some of their favorites.
Way too early to start a baseball season. They are still having snow storms in the northeast.
But this is a sign of the times. Start in March, and end in November. Do all you can to make sure revenues are higher than last year. Cross your fingers that the weather cooperates.
I wonder if the baseball commissioner’s job is one where no one can truly succeed? The job is really not powerful enough to escape the control of the owners, who tend to be a bunch of too-rich executives who made their money elsewhere, and think of a baseball team more as a toy they got for Christmas. Has there ever been a great commissioner? Landis lent a tough hand when baseball really needed it, but was not able to change with the times later in his career.
Since then there have been some real questionable choices, like Ford Frick, William Eckert, Bowie Kuhn…
Bart Giamatti might have been a good one, but ended up being sort of the “William Henry Harrison” of baseball commissioners. That would make Fay Vincent the “John Tyler” of commissioners, sort of a “His Accidency” in ascending to the role. Like Tyler, he was probably better than people thought he would be, but nothing special.
Dodger Stadium staying up in the top five is quite a testimony to the vision of Walter O’Malley. After being denied building a new park by the powers that be in Brooklyn, he foresaw the opportunity to extend big league baseball to the west coast.
And here we are all these years later, and San Francisco’s park is ranked number one, and the Dodgers are #4.
The Cardinals seem to operate under a similar plan as the Dodgers. The difference of course is that the Dodgers have a much more lucrative media market, and ownership seems to be more financially diverse as well.
Plus free agents most likely would choose LA over St. Louis, all other things being comparable.
However, California has lost a lot of it’s luster in recent years. High taxes and the negative consequences of dense populations makes Southern California less attractive than it once was. But then whenever I look at those lists of “best places to live”, neither Southern California nor the St. Louis area rank high. In fact, St. Louis comes in dead last in some of those rankings. Sad to see as I have always loved visiting the area.The odds of Heyward opting out are only slightly better than my odds taking his place in the Cubs starting lineup. ?
He would have to have a career year in one of the option seasons, and even that might not entice him since the Cubs should be a contender for awhile, and the free agent market looks like it might be trending down a bit.
Seems like all but a few organizations, maybe even all but two (LA and Boston), are taking the approach of building from within, and content to put up with several years of poor-to-mediocre teams in exchange for that window of greatness.
SP C. Martinez
SP Wacha
SP Wainwright
SP Weaver
SP MikolasMan, that is a weak rotation. All righties, with Wainwright aging and coming off a season of only 23 starts and 123 innings. Mikolas has not pitched in the majors in what, 3 years or so? Weaver made 10 stars in 2017 and usually looked good, so hopefully he can continue to develop.
Over 300 starting innings are gone with Lynn and Leake out of the picture.
But on the bright side, you like having pitchers with names that start with “W”. 🙂
I totally agree Mike. This signing was more about the future than 2018 although Arrieta does have an opt out after year two of the deal.
Yep, it sounds counter-intuitive but this is one of those signings where bringing on a veteran is geared towards looking a few years down the road. If they can bring in a top name free agent like Machado or Harper for 2019, then go out and have a strong season they are in a win-win with Arrieta. If he is pitching well and stays, they most likely remain competitive. If he leaves, they are off the hook on the contract.
The downside risk is that Arrieta is damaged goods and does not do well. But he’s always been a guy dedicated to conditioning, so I think the Phillies made a good move with this deal.
I wish our club would be a little more aggressive like this now and then. Enough of the Brandon Moss nonsense. Although in fairness, they did make strong offers to jason Heyward and David Price a couple of years ago. And as it has turned out, they were lucky to have been outbid on both guys, at least to date. We’ll see if either guy can get it together and justify their deals.
The Cubs undoubtedly hope Heyward has a good year, and then opts out of his deal (I think he has that option after this year).
Most of our guys are in the second half of the 175, but still good to see.
On a side note, has anyone noticed that the name “Dakota” seems to be quite popular? In 2016 we sold the house that I grew up in, and the buyer’s name was Dakota (won’t mention the last name for privacy, although no one here would know him anyway). And then literally a week later when I was at work, I got a call from a guy with the exact same name, Dakota, and the same last name as the guy I sold the house to. I thought maybe he was calling back to ask something about the house, but wondered how he got my work number. Turns out it was a different Dakota <blank>. This “Dakota” was a salesman.
Joe Kelly would be the closer on at least half of the major league baseball teams. He’s got great stuff and knows how to pitch.
I thought we made a mistake letting both him and then Shelby Miller go, but neither has done a whole lot since the deals. Both have similar issues – location. Both have great arms, and when they can effectively control their pitchers they are great. But Kelly and Miller have struggled keeping the ball over the plate.
The signing of Arrieta was more than just inking a veteran pitcher. The Phillies may have increased their chances at Harper et all by this signing. If Arrieta has a good year, and they play around .500 or better, then that is all the more enticing to a top name free agent.
I am sure they knew there is no way one of the top players in next year’s class will want to sign with a poor club. So they add a couple of guys who can help them be respectable, both on the field and in next off-season’s negotiations. Not too mention some mentors for their talented young guys. It was part of their overall strategy, and might just be an excellent move.
I know, it is Spring training. But at what point does concern set in? Some of those numbers are just putrid.
I never put that much emphasis into Spring Training numbers. Guys usually play parts of games, lots of substitutions and shuffling around, rarely face the same pitcher twice, etc. Just no way to get into a groove.
Still some guys have great Springs, but neither bad nor good Springs are to be taken as a definite predictor of the coming season.
Fastball pitcher in the low 90s, his best days are in the rearview mirror.
Not so sure. Last year he came back about as good as he has ever been. A solid #2 starter, just slightly under Martinez in WAR last year. A work horse, if you can call any starter in this era a “work horse”. But he takes the ball every fifth day and gives you mostly quality starts.
Hopefully someone can step up and be just as good. But I think we will be regretting let him go at pretty much a bargain rate in today’s base ball economy.
1 year deal for Lynn doesn’t sound bad now does it.
Not at all. If I was Cardinal management, I would have kept in contact with Lynn’s agent and would have done this in a heartbeat. I think sometime in mid-season we will see stories about how much he is missed.
Going back to the events, Ken Boyer’s salami in game four of the 1964 World Series is incredibly significant as well, as it turned that Series around. The Cards were on their way to being down 3 games to 1 before that.
Then McCarver’s 10th inning blast in game 5 was another clutch home run. Still cannot argue with the Freese home run though. That one was incredible.
It’s great to be a fan of a franchise where it’s tough to pick the most significant home run in post season history.
Lynn turned down 2 years, $20M from Twins
Hindsight being what it is, he probably wishes he would have taken the one-year $17.5M from the Cardinals, and jump back into the free agent pool waters after this season.
Personally, I would have been okay with that as well. We might need him this year.
Here is an 11th event: The greatest tag out in Cardinal history. Rogers Hornsby tagging out Babe Ruth attempting to steal second, to secure the final out of the Redibrd’s first modern era World Championship in 1926.
Good point on the Twins, CC. The Twins and Indians look to be the best “bang for buck” teams out there, along with Houston of course butt they are in the top 10.
Brian, you mentioned 12 teams make the playoffs, but it is only 10 right? Three division winners and two wild cards per league.
Lynn or Arrieta might be a nice one-year sign for the Cardinals, similar to what we did with Kyle Lohse some 10 years ago.
Yankees down to 7th, with a pretty solid club. Red Sox committing almost half again as much as the Yankees to player personnel, and yet the Yankees might be the better team.
The Giants are rolling the dice that they can get back in contention after a terrible 2017. Dodgers, Cubs and Washington should all be right there in September.
A couple of top 10 teams that look to be over-extended are the ’77 AL expansion twins, Seattle and Toronto. It will be interesting to see if either club can make a playoff push this year.
With the exception of the Indians, the teams from 11 down are probably under 50% to make the 2018 post season. Yeah, I don’t think we are going to get there this year, but as I always say, you never know. Both the ’67 and ’85 teams were not supposed to do all that well, and each won 101 games.
Dichotomy in early #stlcards team stats. Offense good, pitching struggling
I think our pitching will struggle this year. Our offense was really not as bad as it seemed last year. We were sixth in the league in scoring. One thing that magnified our offensive woes to a degree was running into a lot of outs on the bases. If we are better in the fundamentals, that in itself will help a lot.
We could really struggle on the mound though. We are heavily dependent on young guys taking a step forward, which may work out, but may not. Plus our bullpen seems sort of chaotic. I think the loss of Lynn is going to bite us, as when you take that solid innings-eater out of your rotation it effects everyone else on the staff. Maybe we can get him back on a one-year deal, since the market is shying away from risky long-term deals to pitchers who are over 30.