caulfield12

That’s not quite what happened. Ventura died in a car crash. Moustakas missed a full season due to injury. Alex Gordon completely fell apart, Cain and Perez were injured, too. But they had a similar core for 2016 and most of 2017. A lot of it was bad luck, similar to the 2006 White Sox, although that team had a better record than KC by far. The biggest point was losing rentals like Zobrist and Cueto to FA...along with the position player injuries, and loss of bullpen depth due attrition and just getting too expensive (Davis and Holland over two consecutive years...but also Madson and Blanton.) This offseason, when they Hosmer and Cain, they were already dead men walking.

Madrigal is the perfect #2 hitter. He can leadoff, as well, but his best profile is second (due to always making contact and situational hitting skills we’re typically lacking)...behind a prolific base stealer like Pods, first half 2005 version.

Can we ask the Dash to put that lineup card up for online auction?

Yep, forgot about that one...was listening on the At-Bat app, so it didn’t make the same impression as watching because half the time DJ and Farmer are talking nonsense.

If we went just by physical tools, Borchard, Anderson, Jared Mitchell and Hawkins would be in the HoF...well, at least three of those guys.

The players who hit that profile (not pure power guys who will get AT LEAST 25-35+ homers) that are OPSing above 840 are: Yelich, Benintendi, Markakis, Eduardo Escobar, Bogaerts, Zobrist, Dickerson (he's more of a doubles hitter this year) and Altuve. He definitely needs more doubles/triples and walks, those two elements of his game.

Are they more upset about Sano or Buxton? What do they do next...rebuild AGAIN? They're in a terrible position right now. Not worse than the Royals and Tigers, maybe, but not much better off. Rosario's had a really strong (break-through) year, but can he repeat it? Berrios has been pretty good, but NOT an ace, either.

And yet if you started out with this "spin" the day of the Sale trade...that he would be fighting just to be average, well...that wouldn't have been considered a win. But at least we have Kopech and Basabe, right? Or we can go with Javier Baez's 4.9 cumulative fWAR from 2014-2017, yes? That's even worse than Moncada (pace-wise) today...Baez debuted at 22, right around the same time as Moncada. Of course, there's no comparison in terms of the core of Cubs' players around Baez. Rizzo, Bryant, Contreras and the rest of their young position players picked up the slack and allowed Baez "not to have to be THE man" until he finally broke through this season. Right now, Moncada only has Jimenez to pick up the slack and take off the yoke of expectations and most of the spotlight away from him. And maybe Abreu/Avi, but who is writing their name/s in pen onto the 2020 roster? Now I'm a bit concerned Hahn will pull the trigger on moving up Jimenez and Kopech...to have the season with Moncada tailspinning below a .200 batting average over these last two months would be a PR disaster for the White Sox to deal with all offseason. Hahn will spend most of it defending himself and the rebuild, and promoting those two and Cease whenever he could go on the attack. At this point, it's highly unlikely he would choose to send Moncada down, for the same reason that Giolito has been up all season long.

The comeback is why do the happiest countries in the world (Iceland, Norway, Sweden, Finland, Denmark, Canada, Australia and NZ) have these EXACT same socialist tendencies in terms of education, health care, environmental protection/green jobs and taxation rates/income inequality? The answer will invariably be...well, we simply can't do that in America...it's too big, it's too diverse, etc. That's fine, if we continue on in this current path, lots of Millenials are simply going to give up...keep piling up debt on their credit cards for travelling and "unique" Instagramable experiences...quitting jobs they don't enjoy at least 80% of what they do, etc. If I was 20-25 again, looking at the $21 trillion Federal debt, the increasing costs of higher education and rate of student loan defaults and the fact that Social Security and Medicare would be cut (thanks Rubio, for suggesting we "borrow" from SS for Family/Medical Leave, brilliant!) dramatically or non-existent by the time I retired, I might be tempted to say "screw it!" too. Before we say that Venezuela, Bolivia, USSR or China failed....it was the leadership in those countries, not the system, per se. Unless we're willing to call what China has done the last 30+ years as a socialist/Communist country a failure? In the end, no country is pure 100% free market (Hong Kong and Singapore are usually mentioned) because the government still has tight controls on many aspects of their economies. Same thing is true in Vietnam today. These countries are mostly hybrids, with both tendencies. In some ways, China is just as much a capitalistic as it in a "socialist" country. The key point is balancing the two sides. In America, we've gone way too far to the right the last 40 years (Clinton and Obama were inarguably centrists) and the pendulum is naturally swinging back in the other direction, just as it did in the US after Democrats for 28 years out of 36 (FDR, Truman, Ike, JFK, LBJ) or 32 out of 40 if you add on Jimmy Carter.

I will give him a +1 for the (possible) Lamar Johnson reference, just because it caused me to recall those crazy collared jerseys.

What about his right her?

How many strikeouts would he have to accumulate to qualify as overmatched? Yeah, I know part of it's umpires, called 3rd strikes (even letting the umpire get in that position to make a decision, as Madrigal points out in his interviews)...not being aggressive early, guessing wrong on pitches, being in-between, etc. It feels like he has gotten behind in the count almost every at-bat since the beginning of May (coming off DL), with a few rather memorable exceptions where he's done damage early in the count. But when is the last time he absolutely clobbered an upper 90's fastball? Giles last year? It seems like most of his homers have come again fastballs in the 91-93 mph range. Others who follow gamethreads would probably have the answer.

Byron Buxton, 1046 career at-bats, 4.6 fWAR Yoan Moncada, 712 career at-bats, 2.2 fWAR

Part of it is the whole generational wealth issue...we’ve seen it with Trump, Gates, etc. If his parents weren’t around to invest $200-300,000 into Amazon in the mid 90’s (Now worth $30 billion today), he wouldn’t have ever gotten it off the ground. If you look at most of these guys like Kalanick (Uber), Zuckerberg, Musk...their empathy gene seems to be missing. Most importantly, there’s no reason you should pay workers below market rates when you’re the richest person in the world. If you want to read about the opposite kind of story, read In-N-Out Burger by Stacy Perman, ethical companies that treat employees well but still are immensely profitable do exist in America today.

Jeff Bezos’s $150 Billion Fortune Is a Policy Failure Growing inequality in the United States shows that the game is rigged https://medium.com/the-atlantic/jeff-bezoss-150-billion-fortune-is-a-policy-failure-f569af2f77dc The result of these decades of trends and policy choices is that Jeff Bezos has accumulated a $150 billion fortune while the average American family is poorer than it was when the Great Recession hit. Concerns about such astonishing levels of inequality are not just about fairness, nor are they just sour-grapesing about runaway success. The point is not that Jeff Bezos himself has done wrong by accumulating such wealth, or creating such profitable and world-changing businesses. But wealth concentration is bad for the economy and the country itself, and the government has failed to counter it. Rising inequality fuels political polarization and partisan gridlock. It slows economic growth, and implies a lack of competition that fuels economic sclerosis. It makes the government less responsive to the demands of normal people, potentially putting our very democracy at risk. Bezos’s extraordinary fortune shows that the game is rigged. He just happened to play it better than anyone else.

Depressing...

Someone is going to say Yolmer, Davidson, Moncada, Anderson and Engel...

But guys like Syndegaard and Kopech are supposed to be dating Victoria’s Secret Angels...(until 2-3 years later when they can’t stand the sight of them, see Naomi Campbell.) She’s 26, that might create a little bit of pressure on the marriage side, which almost no guy is ready for at that age...and she’ll definitely have to leave Charlotte for Chitown to make it work. (TMZ Analysis...also avoid all the Kardashians, except Kourtney.)

SURPRISE, Ariz. -- If not for Yoan Moncada's father, the White Sox switch-hitting second baseman of the future and No. 2 prospect according to MLBPipeline.com solely would be hitting from his natural right side. "He was the one who insisted I needed to prove I could hit with both hands," said Moncada through interpreter Billy Russo, adding that he started to switch-hit at 10 years of age. "And I did it." When Moncada hits from the right side, he said that swing is more technical. His left-handed swing is more natural and loose. His splits in 2016 show a .167 hitter from the right side with two homers at Double-A Portland in the Red Sox system and a .305 hitter with nine homers from the left side. But in 2015, Moncada hit .310 with six homers from the right side and .262 with two homers from the left. "As a switch-hitter, you are never going to feel comfortable at the same moment hitting lefty or righty," Moncada said. "Some time you feel better as a left-hander or sometimes you feel better as a righty. "It depends on the moment. It's very difficult to find a specific moment where you can feel good in both hands."

One thing I don’t quite get is why we can’t afford to piss off prospects but the Cubs have no problem doing so...and it’s pretty difficult to imagine a scenario where Bryant doesn’t stay for the next 5-7 years. Just feels a bit insecure, lacking in confidence that the Sox organization doesn’t have as much to offer, perhaps?

Who did we really lose to injury that was going to be counted on being ready for 2019? Arguably, Dunning and Hansen...certainly not Burger and Robert. Burdi, I guess.

Maybe to blow up my points total...I can just start typing “too long/didn’t read” to every Balta post these days if that’s the feedback received from taking an hour or so to try to actually write something thoughtful.? One thing that’s kind of illogical is that just being snarky gets more instantaneous feedback than attempting to have a legitimate discussion about something. That’s all well and good, I guess...and I could care less about likes and dislikes in the Filibuster, where have spent proportionately more time since 2016) but I’m not sure what it’s actually adding (other than being slightly better than downvoting others intentionally when we had a 1-5 “community scale.”)

I think Davidson also has to be considered, but get the logic of choosing between the two lefties with similar skill sets/deficiencies. With Palka so hot again at the moment, he will win. But there are arguments for both players. All or nothing, exit velocity and terrible RF vs. a more consistent stroke, lots of doubles and a more competent fielder. 3 platoon guys who we can’t combine into just one, unfortunately.

The way things are currently going in baseball, there are going to be more and more players rotating all around the diamond...like Baez, Zobrist, Happ, Bryant, etc. Russell can play 2b, too, although he doesn’t move anymore.

Yeah, forgot the Phillies kind of gave up on him after an injury-plagued year. Im also pretty sure Pirates’ fans would love to have Cole and Morton back...then they could actually be contending for the playoffs.