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All this says to me is that the Phillies and White Sox are still most likely to get the a Harper or MAchado on the roster. It would just be truly incredible for the Nats to be able to afford HArper, but because of their amenable relationship to Boras are likely to keep up this posture.

The NCAA responded to the huge North Carolina academic scandal by giving Missouri a post-season ban.

I wouldn't read too much into this. While I still think sox are in on harper, he's saying that the sox were known to have met with them. That's not new info.

I love the range of players from Marwin Gonzalez to Bryce Harper.

I always believed that Machado's market was legitimately phills/white sox but with Harper despite silence I always thought more teams in on him. Still wouldn't be surprised if a team like ATL talks with them often. You know, Rockies.

Thought of one, Bulls backcourt is probably better than the Cavs.

Augustin has a higher FG%, shoots 43% from 3pt range, and turns it over half as much as Dunn. Dunn certainly fills defensive stat sheet more but Dunn's 45% 2pt% on 9 attempts per game...he's just such a bad offensive player between his shooting but especially his turnovers that I'm not sure the bulls wouldn't be better with augustin.

Sure but none of those owners were involved in the collusion cases of the 80s as JR was. I mean, one of the main collusion cases was the white sox getting carlton fisk after Reinsdorf told Steinbrenner to back off. Sox getting Machado on collusion on a deal cheaper than expected after the phillies pledged stupid money? I won't blame players for thinking something was up again.

In the 1980s, a fine was forced by owners that was paid out directly to the Players Association. They also allowed the players affected to look for better contracts as free agents while not terminating their current ones. If JR is caught in a collusion case again, I would hope the mlb would force him out but that's hilarious and would never happen.

It's a shame because I was really hoping it was the lowered arm slot that would unlock him: https://blogs.fangraphs.com/lets-watch-lucas-giolito-look-very-good/

Mannn I did not notice that Luzardo was ranked top 15 by pipeline. That rumored 2016-17 offseason trade to the Nats that was nixed by ownership for Drew Waters and Jesus Luzardo is definitely one that got away. I'm also a bit surprised how high pipeline is on carter kieboom. That will always be an easy hypothetical vs. burdi in years to come.

Sorry gotcha. I get caught up in re-enforcing that the best teams in the league have redundancies that they aren't scared of. There is consistent discussion here about trading a guy because someone else is there, when these teams would just keep both. It may not guarantee a World Series as we've seen, but it pushes odds in your favor for competing for division by not seeing big dropoffs from injuries and slumps.

I could see Dodgers winning with a package of Ruiz easily, especially if the "aggressive" reds package is mostly around India.

Honest question: do we think this variance is even conscious? He just seems to have no idea where his body is when he's pitching.

The counterpoint is they've dealt with "overload" like this every year and made it work. What you are pointing out isn't terribly different than last year, and Verdugo having options to go back and forth makes it easier.

Well no, but the padres have shown that they are capable of supplementing their talent through draft and (especially) LatAm whereas the white sox haven't proved that yet so maybe it's worth it to them (especially if they prioritize re-signing).

I think this is absolutely a thing to be honest

Man I guess a lot of baseball people are talking today. Marwyn Fernandez would be perfect fit for SD.

wind chill is dumb anyways.

No, in general PG has been a pretty easy position for teams to fill (bulls were good at this getting decent production for years from players like mike james/dj augustin/nate robinson). But they also aren't trying that hard to fill it now. I thought it would be a good idea to get marcus smart this offseason because it was clear his market was depressed. It would have been bad because we are way worse than I expected, but it would have removed 50% of the stupid decisionmaking from our backcourt, though, Lavine makes enough for a whole team.

I think the league should stop messing around so much with 'gameplay" stuff and figure out ways to make pitchers less effective. Either by speeding up time between pitches, lowering mound, whatever, it would add action (more plays/contact) even if it doesn't cut time. I think we could also see that smooth out the aging curve. My hunch is that eventually the added average velocity hit a level that made veterans that could have at least been league average in years past become unplayable due to lower bat speed. Would this see a return of things like the running game in the 80s? Maybe not, but I think the league is too scared due to the relationship with numbers to "change" the game artificially in the way that other leagues don't care about.

Dang I forgot him on my big board.

...Fukudome is more expensive than jermaine effing Dye? edit: Jermaine Dye had more bWAR in 2006 than Fukudome had in his entire career.

I would imagine this is less sox looking for help and more keeping up with some available guys and that gets forwarded through as "interest" for a guy like heyman.

Kris Dunns Assist to Turnover ratio from last night: 0 : 6