caulfield12

If 2020 is not a competitive team for the White Sox, if not a playoff team (the Indians' foundation is already showing cracks)...then the rebuild has already started to go awry.

Well, there's no doubt Amazon and Wal-Mart enjoy unprecedented economies of scale. There's also no doubt they have been the bane of small and medium-sized business across Flyover Territory...wiping out many small towns in the Midwest/Heartland, Southwest, Rust Belt and Deep South/Appalachia. Of course, all of this is wrapped in the issue of tariffs and the unprecedented dumping of lots of cheaper Chinese-manufactured products onto the American market to allow the average consumer to afford (with credit, of course) a comparatively better life than would have been possible with 25-30% higher costs if all those same goods had been US-sourced.

Well, one thing's for sure...tomorrow's start for Giolito is going to be under a magnifying glass for all the armchair psychologists out there in viewing land.

Well, if you consider the fact that dealing Rodon wipes out one of your potential aces under team control through 2021...then the cost is probably going to be higher, simply because that means that Kopech, Lopez, Hansen, Cease and Dunning (and/or Giolito) pretty much all have to make it as effective major league starters AND avoid injury. The odds of that are slim and none, of course. Which means trading minor league outfielders and/or spending top dollars acquiring a FA pitcher on the open market.

Acuna with his first big league hit...Albies with his 7th HR.

There's no way we can sell low on Rodon at this point...even though Happ seems like a decent bet, he's always going to be limited defensively, so he's going to have to hit like Schwarber to have much value. He does (still) have a 741 OPS, but, once again, the defensive limitations bite into the overall value significantly. Certainly, it would be a huge upgrade in CF (in terms of "offensive potential".) The Cubs would counteroffer...take Ben Zobrist and we'll give you X/Y/Z prospects to ditch that contract, lol.

Up to a 595 OPS. The inevitable two homer game... http://www.milb.com/multimedia/vpp.jsp?content_id=1973348483&sid=milb Pretty impressive opposite field power stroke.

http://www.espn.com/mlb/standings/_/group/overall 4 way tie for second pick, one GB of Cincy. 5 games in four days against the Royals hould provide some clarity. Bottom 9 taking teams quickly forming...Giants and Tigers holding on for now, Nationals hugely underachieving in a critical season for that franchise’s direction.

Could we have at least tried Leury and Castillo in that final sequence...? At least Palka had a pretty decent at-bat there, and Engel escaped further traumatization/torture from Diaz. Engel is hitting with all hands, zero leg and hip drive, off balance, completely out of synch, totally lost his spring training approach of attacking the baseball.

Can’t disagree with anything said there. Anyone with an inkling of what kind of contract in terms of years and dollars that Pollock’s looking for? And let’s just hope we can get that catcher or set-up guy internally.

Take the good with the bad...another 3 k game, but still lots of positive vibes with yet another blast.

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/interest-rates-wont-get-much-higher-analysts-say-121515711.html for all those convinced the corporate tax cuts were going to help workers significantly...

It’s an emotional argument that resonates, particularly with the older generation that gave Trump 87,000 votes in 3 particular Rust Belt and Heartland states. The Dems don’t have a great counter that doesn’t involve more government spending (when’s the last totally effective goernment-based jobs/training/retraining program that became legislation since FDR or LBJ?), higher taxes or passing on higher costs to consumers. To just continue advocating higher taxes on the Top 1% to subsidize everyone else doesn’t resonate either, because half of America continues to believe those are the job creators and taxing them more heavily will have detrimental effects on the economy and hiring/wage rises. The Earned Income Credit (Clinton) and doing the same with UBI are always going to be more palatable options to the public than what will be perceived to be a giveaway program to lazy Millennials.

So the subsidy should be financed by corporations that said employ workers, the government and/or higher indirect taxes/VAT, etc., on consumers? Or a combination of all three?

If you owned a company that delivered products more efficiently and more cheaply for the same or better quality...using robotics and automation, would you feel responsible for taking care of your displaced human wokers for the remainder of their lives? Or should consumers pay 25-50% more for goods to subsidize those laborers lacking in education or training to adapt to rapidly-changing work environments? Neither solutions seems particularly fair, does it?