Look at Ray Ray Run

The more I think about it, the more shares I'm going to be buying of Alz.

Cease is incredibly exciting because he has all the tools to be absolutely great; he has elite, Cole and Verlander level, spin rates on his fastball but he just doesn't get the right spin right now. I imagine it's easier to teach a slight grip adjustment to maximize the damage of your spin rate, than it is to teach an elite spin rate. Cease's problem now is he gets no lateral movement with his fastball - if he can add a little cut to the already elite horizontal movement he could be flat out filthy. Command and fine tuning his spin are the focal points of his development, but WHEN he unlocks it all look out. My number one concern with Cease isn't his success or ceiling - it's his durability.

I hear you, and I'm not a huge fan of Martinez but I think his elite platoon splits fit the Rays roster well and they probably really like alzaranezo however you spell. I love prospect rankings but need to remind myself occasionally that public rankings are not the same and do not equal private internal rankings. I, for one, am much more interested in him now that he appeared to be a target of the rays. The whole a ball pitcher thing matters too.

Martinez numbers vs lefties in his career are really elite too.

Or they really like Arozarena and are buying all in on his changes last year. Either way it feels really odd. A-ball pitching prospects are the riskiest prospects in the game - in a sense of prospect ranking to success. Even still youd have to think hes worth more than that.

Yeah, crazy pop for sure. Iso, hard hit and HR rates to be envious of. He has holes but his upside is very apparent.

O'Neill is a lot better than you're giving him credit for.

Rays would be swapping Pham and Avi for O'Neil, Renfroe and Martinez while having an even swap between minor league talent.

O'Neil is a high level prospect who is MLB ready. And a position player to boot. This would make sense imo. If the Ray's like Oniel better than Pham, they basically got O'niel, renfrow, maybe Martinez and Edward's for Pham and Libatorie. Would be a big win if the Rays like oniel more than pham going forward.

This was from a fake Jeff Passan account. Jeff didn't take too kindly to this guy imitating him again.

Maybe the Cardinals have a pending deal with Ozuna - that would make some sense for the delay on the big league name.

The Rays finally are pushing the pieces into the middle and trading from their prospect surplus to improve the MLB roster and go for it all. FINALLY!

Ahhh true true. I shouldn't have cited the housing in the same way I cited education. My premise was more so related to the buying power of that dollar; the escalation of home prices has been artificial for about 3 decades now as well, but that's for another discussion. The first thing a modern company cuts is middle and lower class people - they never cut the executive wages when the numbers look bad.

If you have questions Jack, feel free to PM me. When I get time, I will happily respond with my thoughts.

By the way, my apologies for not picking up your sarcasm. I agree with you 100%. We have 40 years of data telling us that this is hurting the middle class and lower class of this country, and yet you have vast amounts of middle and lower class earners agreeing with a system that harms them. It is truly baffling stuff. Every single member in the middle class should be for a substantial increase to the national minimum wage - it is by far the most beneficial thing for their continued growth of wealth. It's even worse when you consider I have less buying power today than I would have had in 1970, despite the fact that technology has made things easier and should have increased wages based on the sole fact that technology increases efficiencies. Good discussion overall; I'll cease here as it's not related to the thread but appreciate the thoughts of others. Everyone thinks they're going to be the next billionaire so they don't understand the fact that billionaires really shouldn't even be a thing. Jeff Bezo's pays his warehouse workers like complete shit - as well as his drivers - while being worth more money than he would ever no what to do with. It's much more beneficial to the economy in general for that money to be in circulation. https://www.epi.org/publication/congress-has-never-let-the-federal-minimum-wage-erode-for-this-long/

$12/hr in 1970, with the average cost of a home and school was a livable wage. You could work a full-time summer job, on minimum wage, in 1970 and pay for a hefty portion of 1 years tuition. Today? If you worked a minimum wage job, for 3 months at 40 hours a week, you would net about $2800 which isn't even 10% of the average tuition for one year.

Based on what? The costs of homes and education has escalated significantly since 1970 - even when factoring in inflation - while the minimum wage has not. In 1968, minumum wage was $1.60; that would be worth $11.55 in 2018. The federal minumum wage in 2018? $7.25. That means, even if home prices and education was the exact same in 1970 (it's not!), you had nearly 150% (this is a middle class figure, the number is closer to 40% for the minimum wage class) more buying power in 1970 than you have today. When you factor in the dramatic escalation of home prices an education, you actually had even more buying power in 1970 than the cited 150%.

Also, population growth is a good thing - not bad - especially when pertaining to manufacturing and services. It's not as if the population has grown exponentially greater than the profitability of a company. In fact, it's had the opposite effect.

None of this matters, the economy has simply shifted from a manufacturing economy to a technological and service economy. The premise and margins in the service world are in line with the margins and premises within the manufacturing world. The only thing that has changed is the government has convinced many that somehow pressing a button at a factory was substantially more difficult than delivering food to a human being or driving them around. If anything, the positive benefits of technology should have streamlined wage escalation even moreso due to the increase and benefit to a companies margins.

Ahh, gotcha. 100% correct - my apologies.

Caufield, I'm going to go ahead and assume (I could be wrong) that I have a much stronger grasp on the economic impact of trickle down economics on wealth distribution than you do here. If you want to have a serious discussion on this, you can PM me as I won't pollute this forum further with this discussion. I have no idea how you can look at stagnated middle class and lower class wages going on 4 DECADES, with a near 1000% increase to the top bracket, and think trickle down economics is beneficial to anyone in a non-executive position. The number one driver of middle class wage escalation is what Caufield? Minimum wage. The war the politicians have created between middle class and poor people have stunted the growth of both entities. As minimum wage escalates (it was once at a level that was equal to a livable wage, CRAZY), so do middle class salaries. Since our federal minimum wage has greatly declined in relation to the cost of living, the middle class has stagnated as well. As states like Washington raise their minimum wage to $15/hr, the middle class has in turn seen a 1 year escalation on average income greater than any state that has not made the same change. While you get angry at someone at McDonalds making $15/hr, you fail to understand the immense benefit that has on the middle class. I wrote a thesis on this exact topic. The falsification and war on the middle class waged by trickle down bullshitters.

What? This is not true or accurate. Do not confuse wealth distribution - which was much better in the 60's and 70's - to safe working conditions. Workers have more rights pertaining to discrimination and others; they work in safer environments, and they have more power to hold their bosses accountable for inappropriate and wrong actions... but the distribution of wealth is significantly worse since the implementation of fake "trickle down economics" in the late 70's early 80's.

First, let me say I agree with your premise. Owners aren't going to stop treating this like a business - in many cases, it's the largest investment they've ever made and asking them to treat it as a non-money making entity goes against everything that got them where they are.... but, I do find it incredibly ironic that while they run the PnL sector like your standard business, they do throw out a lot of other wise business decisions in the name of fan pressures - such as stability. Great companies have great stability at the top level; just because you have the 5th best CEO in the world doesn't mean you should fire him to try and find the 4th best, in fact you should never take that risk. In sports though? You could have a top 10 coach or GM and you fire him in hopes of getting the best. It's an irrational way of doing business, as stability is much more correlated to success than constant and endless turnover is.

Its theo's fault they dont have a farm lol. Its inexcusable for a major market team to rebuild and cry poor twice in 10 years. I have no idea why fans accept this bullshit from filthy rich ownership groups. The cubs have no problem spending millions and millions developing the area around the ballpark. Yet, when it comes to the team they cry poor. Their payroll situation lol? Something else theo created. When the yankees have dead contracts they dont tell the fans they cant try because of them.

You think the Marlins fall was a standard drop off after a WS title? What? They had the worst year in baseball history following a WS. One time (the red sox) he was brought in to "go win a WS." You cant give the guy credit for the Red Sox World Series (as putting them over the edge with someone elses players) and the 2003 Marlins world series. Those things are polar opposites.