Frayed Knot

Phillies also want in on the action ... and why not?

Ichiro, and I'm going to ponder over King Felix and C.C. His acceptance speech will be the first time most of the baseball world will ever hear Suzuki. Reportedly his English was always better than he let on but only in close quarters. He remained a cypher to the public for his entire career.

It's a source. If the source wanted to go record then Klapisch would have told us who it was. But he/she obviously doesn't and so it's just a kernel of information that's out there, along with other nuggets and speculations, and we can think of it however we choose. I understand why we'd want more info but things don't always work that way and so I'm not quite sure why this has folks all upset.

Klapisch specifically says there IS a source to the "all in" mindset. How you want to consider that source is up to you, but that's not the same as saying there isn't one.

cal sharpie wrote: When I was there about 22 or so years ago it was called Minute Maid but the seats had an Enron E on the side of them. Yes, you may recall that that was a VERY quick change of naming rights so they probably hadn't gotten the chance to start ripping the E's off yet. And I'm going to guess that this new place is pronounced DIE-kin

So no more 'pumpkins (as Keith always called them) on the train behind the LF wall.

Charlotte? Nashville? It would be a shame if they wound up leaving the Tampa/St P area especially given as how it's been such a hotbed of talent over the years. But MLB moved there in the first place seemingly for the sole reason that they pre-built a (bad) stadium designed to lure in some outside team even though that strategy wound up failing on several occasions (Giants, White Sox).

Instead of having the exact same picture (as competing papers often have) the three Alvarez covers appear to be all the same angle but just fractions of a second apart. I went with GREEN LIGHT as the best of the three I like the way they worked the text and sub-heading around the action in SNAKE CHARMERS And, of course, HAIR FORCE ONE

=metirish post_id=179150 time=1731689990 user_id=72] Sims is 71 , not that it means much

=MFS62 post_id=179134 time=1731683401 user_id=60] We heard later that Duquette thought he was getting Carlos Zambrano in the Kazmir deal. That is unforgivable for a GM.

Sims is a good p-b-p guy. He's been out in Seattle for years doing M's games but I don't think he ever permanently relocated so not surprising that he leapt at the chance to get back east.

=Centerfield post_id=179042 time=1731603270 user_id=65] I'll be honest. Spelling wise. FK has had better threads.

I wondered aloud in one of these threads about whether the small RF in YSIII skews Soto's defensive range numbers to the positive. aka: tough for stuff to fall in for a hit when the fielder only has to cover 7-1/2 ft in any direction. (OK so I'm exaggerating slightly) But, yeah, he occasionally takes some odd routes to balls but he's at least a decent fielder and throws well. Starling on top of his form was better but not anymore.

MLB's Jonathan Nayo gives his scouting report ... and he's purdy dern impressed. https://www.mlb.com/news/roki-sasaki-scouting-report?t=mlb-pipeline-coveragehttps://www.mlb.com/news/roki-sasaki-scouting-report?t=mlb-pipeline-coverage

Johnny Lunchbucket wrote: Just throwing this put there. Soto isn't a great fielder or baserunner today ... Bu ... but, he was a Gold Glove Finalist!

He really hasn't been a full time starter since 2020. Partly that was due to his injuries but he came into both the '23 & '24 seasons with the backup label in Atlanta. He wound up with substantial playing time this past year due to Sean Murphy injuries and, even as the titular backup, he was getting around 1/3 or so of the starts rather than the 1-in-5 that typically goes to the caddy of the duo. So more like option 1B than a strict 2 Kind of surprised he got two years but it's not a crazy deal for a 37 y/o and the man from Lakewood, CA gets to likely finish his career 17 miles down the road (so about 90 minutes with traffic)

=Centerfield post_id=178858 time=1731431593 user_id=65] Do we read anything into the order of meetings?

Totally burst onto the radar this year, his first as a starter. L/L (not that the second L matters anymore) 6' 6"/ 245 Former #11 overall draft pick out of U of Tennessee in the abbreviated (five rounds) 2020 draft Went directly to the majors and made his first appearance in Sept of '20 Only made 12 minor league appearances and not until 2023 Will turn 26 in mid-season '25 / three years of club control, thru '27 Missed all of '22 with some kind of injury Made a full season's worth of starts (32) in '24 although only 146 innings so just 4.5 IP/start (which is probably smart given the missed time) 3.58 ERA; 1.07 WHIP; 12.9 K/9 vs 2.0 BB/9 (yes, that's 2 BB/per 9, not per inning like we're used to) And I think I heard him say that he's going to play for free for whichever team gets him off the White Sox But, yeah, you're gonna have to give up to get. Place your pun about knitting together a deal here:

A bit of a scouting report from former CY winner Dallas Keuchel who spent the final two months of the 2024 season with Chiba Lotte and Sasaki “The overview is incredible. There is nothing he can't do.” –70 for pitchability. “I saw multiple times where his fastball wasn't there early and he could land his slider and even his split for strikes.” –No less than a 70 for a fastball. “He can pitch at 93-94 (mph) and be successful.” Keuchel noted that he often averaged more than that trying to “impress” all the MLB officials who were there to see him. Sasaki has often topped out at more than 100 mph. –65-70 for his splitter, which Keuchel viewed as his best off-speed pitch and often unhittable. –70 for a slider and as he learns to vary speeds, “A chance to get to 80, that's how good it can be. He can be like Dylan Cease and throw the pitch 60 percent of the time.” And then on a more personal side: “He's a curious young man, who is very quiet, even for his own Japanese culture,” Keuchel said. “But I think he loves winning and I think he loves baseball, so you can't really discount that. I think he literally wants to be the best version of himself he can be. And I really believe he thinks he can be one of the best pitchers of all-time.”

It's Roki. Either my spell check 'corrected' it, or my brain automatically went to Rori after another one of my many Gilmore Girls marathons. Wait! Did I just type that out loud?

Japanese pitcher Tori Sasaki WILL be posted by his NPL club making him not only eligible for MLB but at a rate the doesn't qualify for MLB's salary cap. In four years in Japan the 23 y/o's record, with five NPL seasons under his belt, is 30-15 with a 2.02 ERA and a 1.204 WHIP Because of his lack of age and experience under NPL rules, Sasaki will be treated as a international FA rather than a MLB FA a las Yamamoto last year.

A-a-ron Boone will manage the Yanx in 2025 ... at least to start the season. After that it's all up for grabs.

We couldn't just leave this thread incomplete forever [media=youtube]8bjzuSO27fA[/media]

That's absurdly and, I suspect, unnecessarily, long IMO. I also hope it's not Steve going over his POBO's head trying to make a splash a la Carlos Correa. It would also pretty much say bye bye to Pete before this whole thing really gets started, wouldn't it.

If you're going to talk about 3B FAs then you should toss Alex Bregman on the fire too, although his OBP took a nose dive this past season as well: ~.370 for 2017 - 23; .315 in '24 which is odd because the rest of his numbers were pretty consistent. But the walk rate went from 94 pts for his career to 55 this season. 65 to 70 is about average so that's a big (and puzzling) drop from well above avg to somewhat below all of a sudden.