Centerfield

Ceetar is like the Rich Coutinho of this forum.

Edgy MD wrote: Yadi is the only catcher I know who wears that Nike baskeball logo on his chest protector. It's so wrong. I find it fitting that he wears the silhouette of another athlete who drove a dagger straight through my heart. Is it the Jordan logo? Really? On catcher's gear?

Nimmo shut down. Same bulging disc in his neck. Will see a specialist. I would have thought he'd have already seen a specialist. Ugh.

Or don't. If it's 2019. I was thinking that a lot of the guys who are stumbling for us are the same ones who took a step forward when they learned the "Warthen Slider". deGrom, Noah, Jeurys Familia. The fact that all three are struggling leads me to believe that you can't throw the Warthen Slider with this new slick baseball. Edwin Diaz obviously didn't learn his slider from Warthen, but that's his only other pitch, and the reports are that it's been kinda crappy this year. So maybe it's just sliders in general. Meanwhile, curveball guys seem to be ok. Matz, Lugo. Both haven't been affected as much. Vargas has been pretty good and it's been attributed to the slow knuckle curve he's been throwing. I wonder if this is a trend around baseball, or if it's just a perceived trend I'm seeing on this team. Anyway, I don't know what, if anything, can be done about it. Maybe we just hope that the old ball comes back sometime during this season. I remember in 2015 the ball was dead, then suddenly juiced. Maybe the opposite can happen this year.

Is this the first two-day IGT in CPF history?

Also, speaking of Wilson Ramos, he's quietly turned things around pretty nicely. After a terrible April, he's OPS'ed .843 in May, and 1.012 in June so far. Overall .762, a touch over his career norms.

I love that Fleer Darryl Strawberry.

https://i.ytimg.com/vi/ow13ntxzBF8/hqdefault.jpg> Tatanka? http://bluecerealeducation.com/sites/default/files/BoomerSoonerTatanka.jpg> Buffalo! Yes, Tatanka!

I mean, that being said, Yeli Ramos is super pretty. Definitely worth putting up with a little bit of weird.

So it is supposed to be a cute little story about Wilson Ramos' wife telling him that she is pregnant during the game. But check this out. https://img.mlbstatic.com/mlb-images/image/private/mlb/ocs5lf0kl7073g1yq7vh> First, what a strange way to tell your husband that you are pregnant. He's in the middle of a game, about to take an AB. He's, you know, busy? Secondly, does Wilson Ramos not know how many children he has? Thirdly, "We're Pregnant". Really?

Maybe, at some point, we can nominate our five or so favorite Mets cards, create brackets and have a new competition so Maja has some additional artwork for the lobby! Terrific idea! Is it too early to nominate? One of my favorite cards of all time. https://i.ebayimg.com/images/i/153433546747-0-1/s-l1000.jpg>

That's really cool. It really spells out the years I was interested in baseball cards. I think I got a few packs in 83, a few packs in '91. But 84-90, I was really into it. 1984 Topps is what baseball cards look like when I think of them.

I went with emotion on this one. The Swoboda cover is about as perfect as you can get. Those old-time SI covers are real art. But that Darling cover from my childhood, in the middle of the stretch drive in '86. When I was all "OMG WE'RE GONNA BE CHAMPS". You just never forget that.

I would guess that the number of guys who have a career .305 avg in the minors who turn it into .333 in the bigs is pretty low. What I love about McNeil is that it doesn't matter who's on the mound. He can hit against even the tough pitchers. I feel like we haven't had that guy since Murphy and Wright.

=41Forever post_id=12710 time=1560287941 user_id=69] Maybe the MYFs are exhausted from running the bases so much.

It's official. Zack Wheeler sucks again.

I know for a bunch of you guys, the 70's were that special time for baseball cards and magazine covers. For me, it was the 80's. And 1985 was just amazing. Love those 80's SI covers.

I love Jeff McNeil.

And by the way, sure, put the Latino guy as the maid. RACIST.

Edgy MD wrote: That's some sweet inside info. NICE. Meanwhile, let's reveal that lineup the way God and Sherwood Shwartz meant for it to be revealed. https://images.fantasypros.com/images/mlb/players/250x250/8027.jpg> https://images.fantasypros.com/images/mlb/players/250x250/6960.jpg> https://images.fantasypros.com/images/mlb/players/250x250/5812.jpg> https://images.fantasypros.com/images/mlb/players/250x250/4946.jpg> https://images.fantasypros.com/images/mlb/players/250x250/4013.jpg> https://images.fantasypros.com/images/mlb/players/250x250/3957.jpg> https://images.fantasypros.com/images/mlb/players/250x250/5994.jpg> https://images.fantasypros.com/images/mlb/players/250x250/4263.jpg> https://images.fantasypros.com/images/mlb/players/250x250/4850.jpg> Applause! If only you could have gotten them looking back and forth at each other.

On second thought, I think my logic behind the "bad contract" swap is incorrect. I think it's actually worse than I originally thought. It's not right to compare where the clubs ended up without taking into account where they started. Effectively, the Mariners started out with $120 million of bad money, and ended up eating $38 million (because the contracts they took back from the Mets were, as we said at the time, moveable). That's a net benefit to them of $82 million. At the time, MLB TradeRumors estimated the value of Edwin Diaz (elite closer, cost-controlled) at about $60-80 million. So if you take the high-end, Cano, Diaz and $20 million to the Mets for Swarzak and Bruce, is a pretty even trade. If you take the low-end, it's still a win for the Mariners, before you ever throw in Kelenic, Dunn or Batista. Adding those prospects take it into WTF territory, which is why so many of us are still upset months afterwards. Now, the obvious flaw here in my logic is that I assigned value to the Swarzak and Bruce contracts without assigning any value to Cano. Swarzak and Bruce have since been moved, so whether or not we think DiPoto got max value, we have a figure to work with. So now we are left with Cano. What value can you assign to him? It's hard to say. On the one hand, we could speculate that if DiPoto ate enough money, he could have moved Cano on his own. For instance, if the Mariners ate $100 million of that deal, someone would have taken Robinson Cano for 5 years, $20 million. The problem is that Cano had, and retains, a full no-trade clause. He was known to prefer NY, but not linked anywhere else. In other words, we might have been his only possible landing spot, putting his value at a flat zero. We know we can't move him now. Even if we found anyone crazy enough to take him on, he still has that NTC, and can nix any deal. So I think a case can be made that Robinson Cano was sunk cost. $120 million of sunk cost, and the Mets just provided $82 million in relief. Just insane.

Johnny Lunchbucket wrote: Frazier belongs in the "Made It Look Ugly" thread along with Kevin Appier's delivery Yup. Along with every swing Ike Davis ever took.

60 game Check In: JT Realmuto has a .767 OPS, the lowest of the big name catchers. Ramos comes in next, at .783. Grandal is the best overall, .907 OPS with very good defense. But he cost $18 million for one year, plus a draft pick that the Dodgers turned into Jimmy Lewis, a righthander from Austin Texas, who will undoubtedly turn into RH Clayton Kershaw in the near future. I remain completely ok with going the Ramos route here.

I still hold out hope that Rosario can turn into a very good player, even if the likelihood of him being a star is a little more remote than maybe it was in the past. He has great natural power. And maybe someday he can put it all together. He's still only 23. Younger than Alonso, McNeil and Smith. As of right now, comparisons to Lindor may be a but unfair. Lindor, when I watch him play, is a tremendous athlete gifted with tremendous body control. I'm not sure I see the same thing with Rosario. If I had to make a comparison, I'd maybe go with Jason Heyward. Also a physical freak, but maybe just a little lacking in coordination over his long limbs. I don't know. I still like Amed a lot. And I still wouldn't trade him for JT Realmuto.

Benjamin Grimm wrote: Are you saying that a cuddlesome chick is your bag? I don't know what you mean. Can you provide helpful explanations in parentheses?