caulfield12

And it's going to get even worse in those areas of the country where they are forcing kids (especially middle and high school) back into school en masse. Between that and the October/November flu season combined with Covid-19, there's just no way they're going to be able to make it. Enjoy it while it lasts, I guess.

Not sure the Cardinals even made it there (to Miller Park)...as Thursday was an off-day.

Under Armour Man is a great nickname. He's closer to 210-215 from everything you read, 100% fast twitch muscles, lol. I keep reading comps to Eric Davis, Mike Cameron and Devon White, but he's somewhere between Davis and Bo Jackson in terms of body type. I wouldn't want to even attempt to tackle him on a football field if he was coming with a head of full steam.

"Should of picked 2 states in the middle of nowhere like Montana and Idaho and just played there. No sense in playing in over crowded downtown areas with no fans. Gee I wonder why he Cardinals tested positive? Could have to do with selfish individuals protesting and rioting in Minneapolis the past month? Oh no they are hero’s according to the MSM." From the St. Louis Post-Dispatch article comments section. Not going to bother addressing the second part, but I love how fans think that there are stadiums/facilities in Montana and Idaho capable of coming close to meeting major league lighting, fencing/safety, field condition and clubhouse requirements to pull that off. In retrospect, they could have moved everyone to the Northeast and played the games in Boston, two NYC stadiums and Philly, maybe Washington, D.C. Of course, then you'd have the issue with the players and families being thousands of miles away from the majority of team sites. But the NBA and NHL have managed to pull off the feat, granted, with roughly half or 75% of the roster numbers that those two leagues feature.

Cardinals instructed to self-isolate in (MILWAUKEE) hotel after possible positive tests The Cardinals arrived in Milwaukee on Wednesday evening and had an off day Thursday before planning to play the Brewers in their home opener on Friday. Jon Heyman of MLB Network reported Friday morning that the Cardinals game would be postponed due to multiple positive tests for COVID-19. The Post-Dispatch has only been able to confirm that the team's sudden lock down Friday morning is the result of at least one positive test. The Cardinals' situation is an alarm for Major League Baseball, which was already dealing with an outbreak on the Miami Marlins and the postponements that caused for the Phillies, Yankees, and Orioles. The Cardinals are in the process of doing contact tracing in order to determine who else should be concerned. The Cardinals last played at Target Field on Wednesday night with the Twins. Since then, however, Cleveland has come to Target Field and presumably used the same visitors' clubhouse. https://www.stltoday.com/sports/baseball/professional/birdland/cardinals-instructed-to-self-isolate-in-hotel-after-possible-positive-tests-postpone-friday-game/article_20cc4c13-7035-50d3-bb05-c53027475c4e.html

Remember the Alamo!!!

https://www.espn.com/mlb/story/_/id/29549772/chicago-white-sox-rookie-outfielder-luis-robert-mlb-next-superstar This definitely deserves its own thread. And, for all the KW haters, they're probably not going to enjoy having to admit how integral he was to the entire process. Maybe some of the FutureSox writers can put together a collection of those homer video highlights that were referenced in the article? It's actually the first time I saw the one where he was falling down as he hit it off Rodon in the intra-squad scrimmage. Crazy. He's already been timed down to 1B at 3.4 at least once this season, fwiw. I mean, say what you want about Williams and Paddy, but they have always had the best eyes for talent in the entire organization. Sale, Alexei Ramirez, Abreu, Eaton, Quintana, Moncada/Kopech (over Benintendi and/or Devers), Jimenez/Cease, Lucas Giolito, Luis Robert, Marcus Semien, Frankie Montas, Eduardo Escobar....the FA decisions have been consistently terrible, but they've almost made up for it in other areas.

Hmm....guess it's not related to Moustakas, Nick Senzel or Matt Davidson. Now the Cardinals just played the Twins for two games...this is like contact tracing by going backwards into each team's schedule the previous 7-10 days. Of course, beyond baseball, the Midwest and Missouri/Ohio are two of the many areas that are currently experiencing outbreaks as the pandemic shifts gears again in the heat/humidity of the summer months. They're going to have to play so many doubleheaders or go through without any off days at this rate. It's going to lead to even more pitching injuries, because you just can't suddenly ramp up to game conditions at 95-100 MPH with just 2-3 weeks of summer camp behind you.

Because his father paid $2.5 million (used to be called a "donation") to gain a favorable admission status for Harvard, and he's been in that elite, rarefied air ever since, which basically causes him to feel entitled to everything that happens in his life. This "deal with the devil" was finalized when he married Ivanka and became a yuppified polo-playing Stepford Husband. Middle East Peace brokering? Moving Embassy to Tel Aviv? Saudi Arabia? Re-inventing government? PPE procurement? Vaccine development? Running a presidential campaign? Sure, why not? Run a newspaper into the ground? Try to push residents out of low-income housing in order to gentrify neighborhoods? Promise resident visas to Chinese who invest in his NYC/NJ properties? SuRE!!!! The problem is there's nothing he can do exceptionally well. It's just that he hasn't faced a reckoning, and won't until the morning of November 4th, 2020.

CUE BALTA in 3, 2, 1....I think he's probably quite sick of arguing the counterpoints here.

Marcus Semien and Tatis, Jr., surely...

Which is highly ironic now, because 85% of the problems are in the "red" states, and most of them will now struggle mightily to reopen schools and allow parents to go back to work. Basically, about 25% of the US economy is never coming back, and that's fine for the stock market (tech companies and pharmaceuticals), but it's the death of the American consumer as driver of the world consumption trends.

Dallas Keuchel vs. Kris Bubic (LHP) The 22-year-old left-hander has never pitched above Class A. “We’ll let him have an opportunity,” manager Mike Matheny said. “I’m excited to watch him. He’s shown us he’s ready. He was phenomenal last year. Everything we saw has shown us he’s ready.” Gio Gonzalez (first career White Sox start) vs. TBD Dylan Cease vs. TBD

https://sports.yahoo.com/report-mlb-considering-making-doubleheaders-7-innings-long-225554194.html Looks like that 7 inning DH rule is now official...became even more of an issue with the early cancellations for Marlins/Phillies/Orioles/Yankees.

What the 15 biggest US school districts are planning for reopening https://www.cnn.com/2020/07/30/us/schools-reopening-district-plans/index.html Hillsborough County, Florida, the eighth-biggest district in the country, will announce its decision August 3. Its school board previously rejected a plan for virtual learning for the first nine weeks of school.

He's got to beat out Bradley, Trout, Kiermaier and Mercado.

One thing that's clear right now...Bieber >>> Berrios for best starting pitcher in the AL Central, and the Indians have that dude under team control through 2024, Carrasco through 2023, Clevinger through 2022, Casey Mize on the doorstep with the Tigers, but they're unlikely to push him up early this year, at least not until they do the whole service time thing.

Moncada/Madrigal, completely similar players, constantly confused for each other, lol... Wouldn't feel confident unless they add one more quality veteran FA pitcher this off-season, especially if Lopez has a season-ending injury, which would mean you couldn't count on him in any way, shape or form except out of the bullpen the last 2-3 months of 2021. 2022 would likely be at least 1 to 1 1/2 seasons early for Kelly (especially without two full months of minor league ball to get his feet under him), unless he just explodes on the scene. The last time we took a highly touted high school pitching prospect in the top 2-3 rounds, he turned out to be a complete bust, so they're always going to be the ones with the highest variability in terms of outcomes. Stiever, Thompson and Dalquist could all figure into the equation down the line (of course, along with Dane Dunning...and we'll just have to wait and see about Lambert for now.)

White Sox projected at #6, fwiw. Was doing some research on the Berrios and Buxton contracts (both free agents after 2022) and came across this article from late in the 2019 season. https://bleacherreport.com/articles/2849545-future-power-rankings-where-every-mlb-team-will-stand-3-years-from-now Thought it would be interesting as a general debate/discussion topic, particularly in light of some of the personnel changes since this article was written. The quite obvious one that jumps out to me is the increasing uncertainty about the Braves in their starting rotation, hard to see how they're going to maintain that top spot but they've always been blessed with one of the best minor league pipelines in baseball, despite going through a GM scandal. If Soroka, Wright and Fried all make it, they could still be fine. Having the Astros at #13 is a bit of a hot take, but they also have a ton of pitching question marks in the near and short term. Also, the Rays being able to sustain a position in the Top 3 of MLB seems a bit dubious, no matter how much every scout raves about Wander Franco. They've also experienced some major injuries in their prospect core over the last 18 months. Of course, for White Sox fans, a bit laughable that any projection of Jake Burger being an important depth piece at this point in his career means someone isn't paying attention all that carefully to the state of the organization.

From Greenberg: “According to preliminary overnight ratings, from a source, the Cubs did a 6.0 household rating (equivalent to 195,000 homes) between 6 p.m. and 9:30 p.m. Friday night, peaking with a 7 (225,000) around 8:30 p.m. That was the No. 1 viewed broadcast in that time slot in Chicago. (The White Sox game, according to a source, did a 3.1 [100,000 homes] on NBC Sports Chicago.)” For context, the Cubs’ local average annual ratings in Chicago have ranged from 3.32 to 4.48 over the past five years – when the games were shared among NBC Sports Chicago and over-the-air options WGN and ABC. The last three years were right around 4.15. Moreover, the Cubs saw a pretty decent sized drop in their ratings from 2018 to 2019. So, yes, a 6.0 rating on Marquee – a cable-only channel – is enormous, even for an opener. I’d think the lack of sports content gave that even more of a boost. https://www.bleachernation.com/cubs/2020/07/27/cubs-ratings-for-the-opener-on-marquee-were-expectedly-huge/

In contrast, the Harvard group says that “at the red level, jurisdictions have reached a tipping point for uncontrolled spread and will require the use of stay-at-home orders and/or advisories to mitigate the disease.” Right now, that would mean 13 of the Trump task force’s 21 red-zone states returning to lockdown: Florida (with a staggering 48.1 new daily cases per 100,000 people), Louisiana (46.2), Mississippi (43.5), Alabama (39.1), Arizona (36.6), Tennessee (34.1), Georgia (33.8), Nevada (33.0), South Carolina (30.1), Texas (27.9), Idaho (27.5), Arkansas (26.4) and Oklahoma (25.6). The other eight task force red-zone states — California (23.5), Missouri (22.0), North Dakota (18.2), North Carolina (18.1), Utah (17.9), Iowa (16.3), Wisconsin (15.7) and Kansas (14.2) — would fall into Harvard’s orange zone. So do an additional 14 states, including several — such as New Mexico (15.6), Nebraska (15.1) and Maryland (14.6) — that seem to be getting worse fast. In the orange zone, Harvard says, “community spread has accelerated” to “dangerous levels” and “stay-at-home orders are advised” (unless “viral testing and contact tracing capacity” are sufficiently robust). If implemented, the Harvard framework wouldn’t necessarily force entire states to stay at home. In fact, the group has produced a county-by-county COVID-19 risk map and argues that “policy decisions about which strategies of disease response are best for a jurisdiction should be made by looking at both the local level and the state picture and considering the dynamic relationship between them.” In Ohio, for instance, that might mean issuing a stay-at-home order in Mercer County (33.7 new daily cases per 100,000), but not across the state as a whole (11.0). In on-the-cusp California (23.5), it might mean holding off statewide but requiring residents of orange-zone Los Angeles County (24.2) to stay at home because they are surrounded by four red-zone counties: Kern (91.6), Riverside (30.1), San Bernardino (33.0) and Ventura (27.7). Nationwide, however, it would mean putting targeted lockdowns back on the table, followed by dramatically expanded testing and tracing. https://www.yahoo.com/news/these-are-the-13-states-that-need-to-lock-down-now-according-to-harvard-coronavirus-experts-162201179.html

Mama Boucher : You gonna lose all your fancy "fools' balls" games! And your gonna fail your big exam! Because school is... Bobby Boucher : The devil? [Mama gasps] Bobby Boucher : Everything is the devil to you, Mama! Well, I like school, and I like football! And I'm gonna keep doin' them both because they make me feel good! Bobby Boucher : [Bobby runs out, slamming the door, then comes back in] And by the way, Mama. "Alligators" are ornery 'cause of their "Medula Oblongata"! Bobby Boucher : [Bobby runs back out, then back in again] And I like Vicki, and she like me back! And she showed me her boobies and I like them too! [slams door on Mama]

The culture on both sides which distracts from addressing, let alone fixing, what is actually wrong with the country is what's really ruining it...that abundant hyper-partisanship on progressive and conservative extremes of the spectrum.

The only thing he lacks is an elite arm. He has a very strong one, especially for CF, but that's a minor quibble to say he's not elite in one of the five tool areas. The player he reminds me of in terms of the way he glides after balls in CF is either Devon White or Eric Davis....but he's much stronger physically than both of those guys. He's also getting into some bad habits about how he catches the ball and eventually that will come back to bite him and one will drop embarrassingly and that will be that, but that swagger's always going to be part of his game, and that's a strength, too. He's not quite showboating out there, but eventually he's going to learn how to give way to the corners and infielders and not try to take every single ball hit in his direction. Fwiw, can't even imagine what it would have been like to have a team with Robert, Moncada and Tatis, Jr., (Jimenez is capable of being a great hitter, but lacks the overall athleticism/coordination/agility those guys possess) all on the field simultaneously. But who knows, maybe Elijah will hit a growth spurt just like his older brother did and fill out and develop enough strength to hit 15-20 homers from the middle infield, becoming our own version of CJ Abrams.

Q2 GDP annualized, quarter over quarter: -34.5% expected vs. -5.0% in Q1 Q2 Personal consumption: -34.5% expected vs. -6.8% in Q1 Core Personal consumption expenditures, quarter over quarter: -0.9% expected vs. 1.7% in Q1 If GDP comes in at a 34.5% annualized contraction as expected, it would mark by far the worst plunge ever recorded, based on Bureau of Economic Analysis data spanning back to 1947. Before the pandemic, the worst GDP print on record was in the first quarter of 1958, when GDP fell 10.0% on an annualized basis. US economic activity contracted by 5.0% in the first quarter of 2020, which captured only the start of the coronavirus pandemic and business shutdowns in March. Estimates for the margin of decline in second-quarter GDP spanned a relatively wide range. On the low end, several economists expected GDP sank as much as 40%. On the high end, Mizuho Securities economists estimated GDP declined by 25% in the second quarter. The Atlanta Federal Reserve’s closely watched GDPNow tool forecast a 32.1% decline in second-quarter GDP, as of Wednesday’s estimate.