Frayed Knot

My abbreviation is going to be SAC for Sacramento Athletic Club (see, it works twice) until such time as they alight in Sin City at which point I switch to LVA

I completely missed the Gold Glove announcements from last week. Lots of first timers! NL: C - Patrick Bailey - SFG (1st) 1B - Christian Walker - ARZ (3rd) 2B - Brice Turang - MIL (1st) 3B - Matt Chapman - SFG (5th) SS - Ezequiel Tovar - COL (1st) LF - Ian Happ - CHC (3rd) CF - Brenton Doyle - COL (2nd) RF - Sal Frelick - MIL (1st) P - Chris Sale - ATL (1st) Util - Jared Triolo - PIT (1st) AL: C - Cal Raleigh - SEA (1st) 1B - Carlos Santana - MIN (1st) 2B - Andres Gimenez - CLE (3rd) 3B - Alex Bregman - HOU (1st) SS - Bobby Witt - KCR (1st) LF - Steven Kwan - CLE (3rd) CF - Daulton Varsho - TOR (1st) RF - Wilyer Abreu - BOS (1st) P - Seth Lugo - KCR (1st) Util - Dylan Moore - SEA (1st)

Ohtani wound up needing surgery for a torn labrum on his left shoulder as a result of his stolen base attempt. That the Yanx were barely able to avoid a sweep despite holding Shohei to 2-for-19 (1 1B, 1 2B), some of that almost certainly attributable to the shoulder, probably doesn't make the loss go down any better.

Yeah, it's early, but it's never too early to think about such stuff. - Neither Ronald Acuna nor Spencer Strider https://www.mlb.com/news/ronald-acuna-jr-spencer-strider-expected-to-miss-start-of-2025-seasonare likely to be ready for the beginning of the 2025 season. - And if that weren't enough, set-up man Joe Jiminez is expected to miss all or most of the season following October 29th knee surgery.

https://www.mlb.com/news/mlb-executives-on-where-juan-soto-will-land-in-free-agency"Wide-ranging belief within the industry" believes that the Soto signing will come down to the Mets and the Yanx ... for whatever that's worth. No word on how or if the vote count from some county in Michigan will play into all of this.

He'll still just turn 31 by opening day and has proven to be healthy for the first time in years (first full season since '19) so I suspect someone is willing to give him two or three years (maybe more?) and, of course, it doesn't mean that the Mets can't be one of them. OTOH, taking the money now and getting a second full year under his belt might make him a more attractive FA at the end of '25 (even though a year older) thereby setting himself up for a nice final contract of his career kind of situation. It's riskier, but possible.

Edgy MD wrote: Please remember to rank these characters only as starting pitchers. Their work as infielders, MMA fighters, app designers, hair stylists, and volunteer teacher's assistants — while noble — should be considered somewhere else, but not here. Y'know I won't always be here to correct your posts all the time.

This year it's $21.05 mil Those who DID receive a QO Willy Adames - SS Pete Alonso Alex Bregman - 3B Corbin Burnes - SP Max Fried - SP Teoscar Hernandez - OF Sean Manaea Nick Martinez - SP/RP Nick Pivetta - SP Anthony Santander - OF Luis Severino Juan Soto - OF Christian Walker - 1B Notable players eligible but NOT receiving a QO: Paul Goldschmidt - 1B Walker Buehler - SP Shane Bieber - SP Jurickson Profar - OF Ha-Seong Kim - Util Tyler O'Neill - OF Gleyber Torres - 2B A bunch more were ineligible for a QO because they had already received one earlier in their career (Scherer, Ozuna, Snell), or are ineligible for not being on their team's roster for all of 2024, such as Jesse Winker. Either I never knew that 'one time only' thing was a thing, or maybe I knew once but forgot. And then there are a shit-ton of rules for who gets or loses what kind of draft pick for signing/losing a QO pick, most of which make my eyebrows hurt just trying to read them. But they're all here if you want to peruse: https://www.mlb.com/news/2024-25-qualifying-offer-candidates-and-decisionshttps://www.mlb.com/news/2024-25-qualifying-offer-candidates-and-decisions

Right. It wounds like the team said that they wouldn't negate his opt-out by giving him that 10th year [5 already played, 4 + 1 to go] but were open to discussion about an differently structured extension (more years but lower AAV?) and he took the TBD route rather than risk losing the 4x$36 already in the bag.

The good news about that for Gleyber is that he's now a FA without compensation attached. The bad is that the QO might be more than he'll make on the free market (the Yanx seem to think so) although he's still young enough to get a couple of years out of his next contract even if it's at a lesser rate.

In the tradition of MLB's MVP Award, the guy you put at the top of of your ballot gets 15 points, the second guy gets eight points, seven for the third, etc. Isn't it 14, then 9,8,7, etc The 14 sounds correct to me plus, without the 9 point score, your method runs out of points with the 9th guy. 2nd = 8; 3rd = 7 ... 9th = 1; 10th = Bupkis

My instinct is that the time to pickup Td'A has passed. And in the one outcome I didn't expect, Gerrit Cole is apparently going to stay with the Yanx but without the added season. iow, he opted back in to the deal he just opted out of a few days ago. This isn't official but the deadline for such stuff is 5:00 today ... and it happens to be 5:00 today as I type.

That $36mil salary is what they've been paying him all along so that doesn't change. Given the choice of locking themselves into 5 x $36 vs no Cole at all I think the Yanx keep him. He turned 34 two months ago so he'll turn 39 at the tail end of that added season.

I have no doubt that this will turn into a NYM off-season moves thread before Page 1 is over, but I'm gonna try anyway. - Gerritt Cole invokes his opt-out although the Yanx can void that opt-out by agreeing to a one-year $36 million contract for 2025 (NYY need to decide by Sunday night) - Speaking of the Yanx, they decline their option on 1B Anthony Rizzo ... does that mean they go after Pete??? - SDP SS Ha Seong Kim opts out of his part of the mutual agreement he had with the Padres

Bob Alpacadaca wrote: What was expected is nonetheless eye-opening: Gerrit Cole has opted out of his contract and placed the ball in the Yankees' court. Cole made the decision Saturday, The Post's Jon Heyman confirmed, to pull out of a deal that had four years and $144 million remaining. The Yankees can prevent their ace from hitting the open market by attaching a fifth year, worth $36 million, to the existing deal that would keep Cole in The Bronx through the 2029 season. If this somehow doesn't work out and Cole walks, that gives the Yankees more money to throw at Soto. Except that if you're using the 'fixed payroll' kind of argument and assign Cole's contract towards Soto then there's less to throw towards the #1 starter they're going to need. Also, I guess that whole 'YANKEE FAN NOW, TOMORROW, FOREVER' that Cole espouses has its limits. Not that I expect it not to.

There must be some kind of announcer disease because, as a backup for Ron Darling's comments, comes the following from Suzyn Waldman: During a Friday appearance on “Maggie and Perloff,” Waldman posited that Hal Steinbrenner, Brian Cashman and Co. may be better off spreading the wealth this offseason rather than putting all their eggs in the Soto basket. “[Juan Soto] is really something,” Waldman said. “What he is not, is a right fielder … Are you really going to break the bank for Juan Soto and still have to put Aaron Judge in center field? … Everyone is so focused on Juan Soto. There are eight other positions on the field that you can't fill right now … If you don't fill those positions correctly you're gonna replay this year.”[/i] Coupla things: - "If you don't fill those positions correctly you're gonna replay this year.” You mean suffer through a season with 94 wins and a World Series appearance? - I was VERY surprised to see Soto get a Gold Glove nomination [does playing in the smallest RF in MLB skew the defensive metrics enough to balance out the eye test? ... I have no idea] but he's not a bad RF as Georgie Girl seems to think. He sometimes takes some funky routes to balls but he's got a legit RF arm and, at worst, I'd rate him average at his position. And while I realize that she sees a lot more MFY games than I do, I've been watching Soto since he came up and he was a division opponent for us for half his career so I'm not just basing this on a misplayed ball or two during the recent playoffs. - Suzyn tends to get very protective of home town players and the longer you're with the pinstripes the more attached. So this sounds like she's more interested in 'protecting' Judge by getting him back to RF with less room for his large self to navigate as he ages and she sees Soto standing in the way of that plan. Will having both as OFs in 2032 present a defensive problem? Yeah, maybe. But, shyeeeet, if I'm the Yanx I'll deal with that when I get there. - I think media types love getting behind what they consider a bunch of scrappy underdogs so the idea of buying the top talent available tends to rain on that parade. An example: Buster Olney, who covered the Yanx in the '90s, wrote a book about the 2001. And it was fine book IMO except that his closing thesis was that that WS loss was a turning point moment that changed the MFY/George philosophy away from home grown talent plus under-the-radar trades and more towards open market buying of players developed elsewhere: Giambi, David Wells II, Matsui, ARod, Sheffield, Kevin Brown, Javier Vazquez, Randy Johnson, Johnny Damon (among others) all were brought on board just in the next five seasons and those seasons weren't nearly as successful (or as popular) as the previous era so it must be cause-and-effect, right? But of course it wasn't a case of shifting to a path of choosing FAs over development it's just that when Jeter, Bernie, Pettitte, Mariano, and Posada all come up within a very small window and all quickly rise to at or near the best at their positions it means your SS, CF, LHP, Closer, and C slots are ones you don't have to fill with expensive FAs because you already had those spots covered with guys making at or near the minimum wage. One thing Yanqui fans like to point out is that the 90's payrolls were less above the norm than were the early 21st century year so that made the first way better in their minds which in turn helped them think of the dynasty teams as scrappy underdogs, once again missing and mixing up the whole cause-and-effect thing. Anyway, both Ronnie and Susie are announcers and not GMs so I'm not going to spend any time worrying about what think on the subject.

Edgy MD wrote: A well-traveled hired gun ... So he's like a rolling stone?

=metirish post_id=177988 time=1730413804 user_id=72]... because he obviously knows pitching

Don't forget about the first time Soler was with the Braves (2021) where his ATL OPS in 242 PA was 224 points above his 360 PAs of KCR OPS (882 to 658) after acquiring him in a trade deadline deal. But at least the Braves had to give up the immortal Kasey Kalich* in order to get him. Oh yeah, and he was their World Series MVP that year [6/20 including 3 HRs and a 2B] * Spoiler Alert: he never reached the majors

Benjamin Grimm wrote: I don't understand why those two clowns would be lauded as heroes. Unless I'm missing something (I haven't been watching, and only saw the clip that batmagadanleadoff posted in this thread) they didn't affect the outcome of the game at all. Betts caught the ball in his glove and the batter was ruled out on a fan interference call. All they really accomplished was that they outed themselves as a couple of louts. I agree. Those two jackasses should be treated no differently than if they ran onto the field and punched a player in the face. YS security has long permitted a degree of lawlessness among the largely young/loud male crowd in the RF stands. Harassment, intimidation, beer showers and the like were often ignored by security even if the aggrieved party wasn't an out of town fan. So the idea that these two felt perfectly entitled to do what they did isn't the least bit surprising. Reportedly frequent complaints have been lodged by those sitting behind these two louts that they stand up for much of the game and block everyone's view.

=MFS62 post_id=177943 time=1730377076 user_id=60] Hey, American League fans. Before the DH, players had to lean how to hit AND field. Remember?

Benjamin Grimm wrote: I don't understand why those two clowns would be lauded as heroes ... they didn't affect the outcome of the game at all. They acted like derelicts and tried to affect the outcome of the game which is very appealing to other derelicts. Betts caught the ball in his glove and the batter was ruled out on a fan interference call. Actually the batter was out via a clean catch. The interference was after the fact and simply meant it was a dead ball so no runners could advance, which didn't matter as there were no runners. The ball grabbing schtick was really just thuggery, plain and simple.

Stroman never pitched an inning of post-season for the Yanx this year, even in those series when he was on the active roster.

=Fman99 post_id=177924 time=1730368478 user_id=86] Didn't that also mean the MFYs would be showing on two giant fucking TV's and that the place would erupt each time they scored? Which they did repeatedly while we were there? Ugh.

I can think of only one other playoff run that was sustained by just three starting pitchers, and that was when the playoffs was intentionally stuffed with extra off days so the teams weren't required to go with 'bullpen days' in order to keep things going. Ladies and Gentlemen, your 2009 New York Yanquis: Round one (starters): Sabathia, AJ Burnett, < day off> Pettitte < four days off> Round two: Sabathia, Burnett, , Pettitte, Sabathia, AJ Burnett, Pettitte World Series: Sabathia, Burnett, Pettitte, Sabathia, Burnett, , Pettitte There was, of course, no way of knowing in advance who that system might benefit but it wound up playing perfectly into the Yanquis hands who were woefully thin on starting pitching that year but hit upon a playoff structure where that wasn't a detriment.