caulfield12

Gray is one of the fastest moving prospects in baseball recently…tons of hype. And Ruiz highly touted but catching is a superfluous position for the Dodgers. Cease/Burger doesn’t come close.

What’s crazy is the Nationals just gave an NL rival a Willie Wonka ticket to the WS after winning it all two seasons ago and trying to compete recently without the same ability the Dodgers have to keep both a Rendon and a Strasburg. Who knows, maybe the Dodgers now turn around and trade Seager, lol. Or simply play one of those guys at second.

I’m sure the fans in about 15-18 baseball markets who are paying attention actually care. Especially Arizona and Colorado. There’s no point for those teams to exist, although Colorado has one of the most consistently supportive fanbases in the sport…at least they will until the next five year rebuild.

Which will only help the Twins’ rebuild… Probably add Buxton, too.

Not if Rodon, Keuchel and Cease keep pitching like this, and Kopech remains in the pen.

Sure, but does anyone care? Did they sell a single season ticket off that? At any rate, I’m sure Dodgers vs. NL field or entire field for WS will be the fascinating bets for Vegas to price out…

Betts, Taylor, Muncy, Turner, Turner, Seager, Bellinger, Pujols (crazy numbers against LHP), Will Smith How do you stop that lineup?

The Warriors won 3 of 4. The Dodgers had one stolen. Would you STILL be convinced there are no Super Teams if they win it again this year?

Except they need to trade Hader before he breaks down from overuse or gets too expensive. Always about timing with that team…unfortunately, Yelich losing his MVP form makes it a steep hill to climb offensively.

See how many times the A’s and Twins win in the post season. The Indians in 2016 and Rays, Brewers…they’re pretty much the only exceptions to the rule over a decade of playoff baseball. I guess you can include the Royals. Not something you COUNT on. Remember, the 2005 White Sox ran out just a $65 million tram after getting rid of Ordonez, Lee and Valentin. But that was WELL before the Dodgers started spending $250+ million per season. And they had another World Series taken away by massive cheating by the Astros. The worst part is they’re raking in broadcast dollars while excluding a huge part of that market from even watching them. Eventually, that will kill the sport unless they rebalance things yet again.

You’re really going to root for the Dodgers? LOL. It’s like cheering for the Yankees. They’re the real Evil Empire of baseball. Pretty soon, there will only be 6-8 teams capable of competing every season. If I am a fan in Colorado, Arizona or basically any small or mid tier market, there’s not a prayer from Day 1 of Spring Training.

Well, depending on how Bauer is adjudicated, they will be freeing up payroll…they already added Duffy and Scherzer, to go along with Kershaw, Buehler, Urias, Gonsolin, May (back next year), etc. NBA Superteam Stuff. Only weakness now is Jansen at the backend. Probably add Kimbrel or Iglesias as insurance. Then add Verlander as well in the offseason. The entire AL can’t compete with the NL West at the moment. Not unless Sale comes back at 100%.

Pitching in those conditions wasn’t ideal, yet it didn’t seem to bother Hernandez, who came into the game with a 6+ ERA. Of course, no Anderson, Abreu and Jimenez to deal with, either.

Then two Turners playing side by side, until Seager returns. Well, they’ve only got about five or six MVP candidates on that team. And still in second place. Writing would be on the wall with Corey out the door as a FA. Dodgers would be closing on $270-275 million payroll, more or less…depending on how Bauer is being calculated.

OMG. Stop the presses! Hosmer is in the line-up against LHP Kyle Freeland, who he is 3 for 16 against in his career. Looks like he is magically now 3/3 in games played. Despite the dreaded fWAR argument that could be just as much about Grandal or Moncada as properly valuing 1B positionally. Going by past numbers and splits, they/Tingler should have sat Profar, Hosmer and Cronenworth. This is one of those subtle nuances cases where knowing your players is more important than looking at fWAR as the be all, end all in putting together a team or even a starting lineup.

Because Rodon used to be feared on lefties?

They might end up getting too cute one of these years. Already traded Rich Hill/Dick Mountain. Fortunately, at least until now, they’ve owned the Yankees. If Franco can hit and Cruz stay healthy, they still have a good shot to hold them off or at least get the other WC.

Don’t forget a Lynn flare being most of the offense on Sunday…

What players are going to the Cubs? Voit and Andujar?

We already lost our Covid thread due to politics…in the middle of an interminable worldwide pandemic, lol. Why not every other game thread? I see a warning “sticky” coming from mods. TLR debates have spilled over into 75% of game threads as it is.

Not to mention asking him to change leagues and learn a new position on the fly…and actually hit away from Coors and beat his splits.

If the cost is only Paddack, they would rather deal him than Weathers or Gore (or the rest of their Top 5). Yes, he was right up there with Pete Alonso for ROY in 2019, but frustrating/enigmatic/Cease-like the other two years. It would like the Sox trading him or Kopech, but he just diesn’t have the explosive stuff he had before, 94-96 is pretty pedestrian right now and not not even close to Top 3-5% for a starter like a decade ago. They also get Morejon and Clevinger back next season, Clevinger for the full year. Lamet who knows. You could put together a team with all their trades, but most have disappointed. Patino, Quantrill and Paddack the three best arms. Luis Urias (much better off with Grisham), Franmil Reyes (one dimensional), Francisco Mejia, Ty France (see Reyes), Naylor (pre-injury, not quite enough pop), Hunter Renfroe, Margot, arguably the best on the position side. Owen Miller could be Madrigal-ish. Hedges can’t hit his way out of a paper bag. Of course, they also stole Cronenworth from the Rays and Nola (from SEA) is finally healthy and was a huge offensive contributor down the stretch last year.

See 2011/13-19.

Robert, Engel…hopefully Rodon hasn’t hit a wall now.

The Porter and Callaway cases more recently have been huge.