Frayed Knot

Vic Sage: Exposed as closet racist - film at eleven!! My problem with a "tiered" HoF system is the fear that it will inevitably lead to the lowest tier being populated by players not really deserving based on the attitude that it's OK to put them in because by doing so you're not staining the "real" hall.

Benjamin Grimm wrote: A better possibility would be for some competing organization to create a Baseball Hall of Exclusivity. Or maybe a Hall of Merit Projects like this go on all the time - but, like you said, they're not going to out-prestige the one in Cooperstown anytime in the near (or distant) future. This particular one was done just recently via the 'Baseball Think Factory' website which generally has some intelligent conversations about baseball issues. They took it era by era and essentially discussed and then re-voted on each (via a process not unlke our Rankings Project) with a goal of actually not reducing the overall number inducted but rather to get the "right" players in and the "wrong" players out while maintaining the same amount as the real HoF. And y'know what ... there are still going to be disagreements. I'm not real big on rehashing each past vote for the purpose of culling old members. On this issue I'm pretty much in the same place as I'm am with steroids: the past is the past and, whatever mistakes were made back then, it's more important that we get it right from this point forward.

At least part of MacNamee's education was at St. Johns. Eddie Coleman had a lenghty (maybe 30 min?) radio interview with CJ-Nit on Saturday. Living in the Atlanta area and getting ready to pitch his 2nd consectutive season for Sudahara Oh in Japan, CJ comes off much better than the standard jock interview where real questions and interesting answers both run out within 10 minutes. In it he gave similar answers - if longer and more detailed - to what the above article says, both about himself and about the type of advice MacNamee gave him.

Gwreck wrote: - Where is the money going from the increased ticket prices? - What improvements have they made to the game experience at Shea? - What improvements have they made to the product on the field? - What reasonable justification do they have for so arbitrarily raising the prices? Are there businesses you deal with that DO give you itemized reasons for an increase as well as an updated accouting their spending when they raise their prices? No one's saying you have to like the increases. But sports fans are too often under the impression that the laws of supply and demand should get suspended when it comes to ticket prices, or that there has to be some sort of direct correlation to ML payroll size (what direction are the cost of tickets to college football/hoops trending?). The Mets are coming off a year with (a big) increased demand and they're banking on next year being another one. If they're right they stand to add a good chunk of revenue towards their bottom line. And if they're wrong they'll take a hit on this both in bad pr and in empty seats which will make them think twice about doing it again.

Essentially they're taking advantage of the fact that they expect a buying bump from the great Shea farewell tour. IOW, it's basic supply and demand even though I'm sure many will jump on the increase as unwarranted due to last season's late-season collapse and the mistaken assumption that record and seat price should somehow directly correspond.

" ... this would have been a tough price to match simply because Carlos Gonzalez is more highly regarded than Fernando Martinez is" Tough to tell. Both were rated as #1 prospect in their system by BA but that doesn't tell you much about the comparison between the two since a prospect can be only semi-good and still rank as the best in the system via the 'tallest midget in the circus' theory. Gonzalez is certainly closer to ML ready than Martinez although some may prefer our guy in the long run. Either way, with so many minor leaguers going for just one player (two actually since Oakland sent along someone w/Haren) it's hard for us amateurs to put together a similar package and know whether Beane would have preferred it or not.

Pettitte fesses up to HGH use. Now the fun part will be to see if Rajah continues to try to make the case that the trainer McNamee was lying about his 'roid use (as his lawyer claimed immediately) even while the very same source was apparently telling the truth about AP.

Kevin Kernan in the NYPost gets himself a bit over-heated "the game has never been sicker. This is worse than the Black Sox scandal. This is worse than the Pete Rose betting scandal." No it isn't Kevin.

I think the Dublin-living Irishman is missing the NY-living Irishman's sarcastic mocking of Omar's spin of the Schneider + Church acquisitions as worthwhile due to the upgrade in defense alone. Meanwhile, Jim Edmonds (and cash) is sent by the Cards to Sandy Eggo in exchange for a minor leaguer (3B David Freese) Edmonds obviously replaces Mike Cameron as Padre CFer, but he also turns 38 in June and is so often injured that he's not likely to be an upgrade either with the bat or in that big outfield.

Among the prospects headed to Oakland in this deal were those rated by BA as Arizona's #1 (Gonzalez), #3 (Anderson), #7 (Cunningham), & #8 (Carter) in their system OFer Gonzalez looks like he could start for the the A's next year - although on the surface he seems to be a "toolsy" anti-Beane kind of guy. He split last year between AA & AAA and with the emergence of Justin Upton last season there probably wasn't a lot of room for him in Arizona anyway. Carter is an A-ball 1Bman that Az just snagged from the ChiSox in a deal a month or so ago. On the Houston side-deal I know that Burke had pretty much fallen out of favor there and will probably be, at best, a utility player with the Snakes. The 'Stros are doing a lot of dealing this winter but they just may be spinning their wheels (or worse) in the long run.

Lovell wound up making a cameo in 'Apollo 13' so he couldn't have been too mad. He plays one of the military men Hanks/Lovell shakes hands with after being fished out of the Pacific. "Tom Hanks plays who Tom Hanks wants to play." Which is, of course, the larger point. Or, as Hanks himself said in an interview, 'when the movie is called 'Charlie Wilson's War' what part do YOU want to play?' And while it's certainly not crucial that Hanks look like the actual Wilson, casting him as a large and larger-than-life Texan who few people know by sight probably matters a bit more than playing an average sized/looking astronaut than few people know by sight.

No I haven't seen it yet (mainly because I don't even think it's out yet) but I did finally get around to reading the book recently and my first reaction upon seeing the ads for the flick is ... Tom Hanks?!? Charlie Wilson - the socially liberal, hard-drinking party boy of a congressman who doubles as a fervently anti-communist & pro-Israel Democrat from a heavily Baptist district in East Texas's bible belt (try finding that combination in the Capitol today!) - is described as being a 6' 4" cowboy boot wearing guy with the sort of rugged good looks around which western-themed cigarette ads are based. And even though I realize that not many actually know what the real Wilson looked like, that description is not exactly one which screams out 'Tom Hanks' in your mind. And Wilson's CIA agent/partner-in-crime in the funding of the Afghan rebels was a street tough 1st generation Greek-American from steel country in western PA. So naturally that role is played by ... Phillip Seymour Hoffman? Just my opinion, but nobody who's as fair-skinned and blond as, oh I dunno, ME! should be playing a Greek. But I guess that's the Hollywood game. I'm sure a lot of dough was shelled out for the rights to the best-seller from a few years back and lining up multiple Oscar winners (Julia Roberts too) is the way to recoup the investment.

IF he filed a suit it would be in the U.S. since he's going to be suing MLB for spreading false info about him. That part of the story originated in Canada would have nothing to do with it. Besides, the trainer followed him to NYC (he was put on the NYY staff via Rajah's request) and continued working with both him and Andy P there.

Irony is so ironic Andy Pettitte: Living a Pure Life

Via a lawyer: Roger Clemens vehemently denies allegations in the Mitchell Report that he used performance-enhancing steroids, and is outraged that his name is included in the report based on the uncorroborated allegations of a troubled man threatened with federal criminal prosecution," Hardin said in a release sent to reporters late Thursday afternoon. "Roger has been repeatedly tested for these substances and he has never tested positive," Hardin continued. "There has never been one shred of tangible evidence that he ever used these substances, and yet he is being slandered today." Be interesting to see how far he wants to take this. There was no specific paper trail linking Roger to roids, just the words of the trainer (MacNamee) who followed him from Toronto to New York and, while he never admits to selling him the dope, claims to have both given RC advice to as to which to use and also to administering the stuff; ie, shootin him up. MLB, meanwhile, claims they are prepared to back anything in the Mitchell report and supposedly Mitchell only took this if there were assurances that HE could not personally be held liable. My reaction: OH MY GOODNESS GRACIOUS, ROGER CLEMENS IN ON GEORGE MITCHELL'S STEROID LIST!!! OF ALL THE MIRACULOUS THINGS I'VE EVER SEEN ... Also: I guess taking 'Winstrol' and those other equine injectables meant that Roger took the phrase 'being the workhorse of the pitching staff' a bit too literally. David Justice is apparently also ready to publicly deny ever using.

Selig's conf: - Mitchell Report made 20 seperate recommendations. One has already been implemented (elimination of the 24 hour warning of test) MLB [u:e53799026e]WILL[/u:e53799026e] implement those where it can do so independently of the Player's Assoc Will recommend and discuss those others that require PA approval with the PA - Will review each player listed on a case-by-case basis to determine if punishment is warranted - Are funding (with NFL) attempts to create a test for HGH detection

Valadius wrote: It's no surprise that Donnelly and Logan were cut loose now that this has come out. I suspect you're reading too much into the cause-and-effect here. Dozens of players were cut loose in the last few days because last night was a deadline for doing so. And even if it were known that those names were on the list, others also on it (Pettitte, LoDuca, Tejeda) were signed, re-signed, and/or traded for in the same time span. With testing in place now and the unliklihood of suspensions resulting from this report I don't think we're going to see teams running away from players solely because they were named.

Mitchell summing up: 'Follow my recommendations Bitches!!!'

Mitchell: - Only the comiish office can choose to discipline, but I urge him to forego discipline for those on this list unless he feels that a specific case was so severe as to affect the integrity of the game ... most of the offenses were several years ago (2 - 9) and almost half of those named are no longer active. - Going forward the testing program needs to be run by an outside agency, needs to include more year-round testing, needs to be more "transparent" to the public (data released, specifics included, etc)

List coming out: Divided, apparently, into "groups" based on how they were discovered. Below is a [u:ca79dde3d7]partial list[/u:ca79dde3d7] of 'The Radomski Group', ie, those who names were obtained via the ex-NYM clubhouse boy. I didn't get them all as they were being read off: Lenny Dykstra Jack Cust Josias Mazanilla Todd Hundley Mark Carreon Matt Franco Rondell White Grudzelanek Andy Pettitte Clemens Knoblauch Jason Grimsley Gregg Zahn David Justice FP Santangelo GlenAllen Hill Mo Vaughn Denny Neagle Ron Villone Chris Donnels Todd Pratt Kent Merker Miguel Tejada Jerry Hairston Jr

This is also NOT about thinking we can go back in time and alter past results in some sort of attempt to put them as we think they might have been had steroids never existed. And unless they've discovered evidence of [u:c85cb4161c]recent[/u:c85cb4161c] use for some of these names there's probably not going to be any suspensions resulting from this.

John Cougar Lunchbucket wrote: Also, it's a report coming out today, not a list. Egg-Xactly!! This thing is a (hopefully) comprehensive 300+ page document, not just a roster. As I said in another thread (and, from the leaked synopsis so far, it seems to be the case) the purpose of this thing should be to figure out what mis-steps and ignored signs over the last decade-plus got the sport into this mess in the first place and to lay out suggestions for avoiding similar problems in the future. NOT being on the list is not the same as exoneration and being on it just means that you were unlucky that your particular method of obtaining the drugs was one of the few they could trace. Having said all that I don't particularly care that naming names in conjunction with the report is going to embarrass some people and possibly even screw up a few HoF chances. But the names on this thing should really be treated as the appetizer rather than the main course - even though most of the media (at least initially) is likely do things the other way around.

I think the idea is slide Shane 'The Flyin Hawaiin' Victorino over to CF as Jayson Werth takes over full-time in RF. Michael Bourne was the identity (see what I did there?) of the other CF candidate but he was the guy who went in the Lidge deal.

McPherson was a major prospect in the LAA system for a while but never lived up to the promise. He also didn't play at all in 2007 (majors or minors) so I don't know what's up. He's also not ideal as a Delgado backup cuz he also swings lefty. * And now you can call me Al!

DocTee wrote: Here in SF, these names have been leaked: Armando Rios, Bobby Estallella, Benito Santiago, the Giambi Brothers, and Gary Sheffield. Well it doesn't take much of a leak to find those names since they were also already named in the original BALCO investigations. In all, between BALCO, the positive tests via MLB's new policy, plus the Albany-area on-line pharmacy list and a few other extraneous sources, there have already been 50+ players "named" to date. At this point it's not clear whether the Mitchell list will be 60-80 "new" names or just the existing 50 plus only a dozen or two via whatever dirt this Radomski character gave him. Seeing as how players wouldn't talk to him and the names from the initial "dry run" no-penalty test were reportedly off limits it's not like there were a lot of new sources here except for the ex-clubhouse boy.