March/April MLB News and Notes

LogansDad

LogansDad

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Figured the actual news was worth breaking out from the game thread.

Justin Steele down at least a month after straining his hamstring fielding a bunt on Opening Day.

As per the other thread:

Royce Lewis down at least a month with a quad strain (here is my shocked face, sadly)

DeSclafani (also the Twins!) done for the year after flexor tendon surgery.
 
Max Power

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The voters of Kansas City told the Royals and Chiefs to go find someone else to pay for new stadia.

Voters reject sales tax for Chiefs, Royals stadium projects, raising questions about future in KC - The Athletic

The best current team in the most profitable league in America shouldn't need a dime from the public to fix up their stadium. The Royals have one of the nicest ballparks in the smallest markets in the game. I get why they'd want to grab some of that sweet "entertainment district" money all the other owners are looking for, but the people of KC shouldn't be paying billions of dollars to make the owners richer.
 
simplicio

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Good for KC. With that vote out of the way, I wonder if KC tries to sell everyone they bought this winter at the deadline.
 
Vandalman

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Interesting stat from Sarah Langs via the Poscast:
Since Bonds retired in 2007, the Giants have started 17 different left fielders on opening day.
 
Sad Sam Jones

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It's crazy that Bieber was pitching with pain in both of his starts. You could have dangled a string over the outside edge of the plate in his last start and he would have hit it every time. I've been far more concerned about Triston McKenzie whose velocity was down and was intermittently losing the plate.

I liked Cleveland's chances this year because if you break things down to offense, rotation and bullpen in the AL Central, their starting five was easily the best aspect of any team in the division... but the depth is gone and they needed at least 130+ starts from them.
 
Scoops Bolling

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Sad Sam Jones said:
It's crazy that Bieber was pitching with pain in both of his starts. You could have dangled a string over the outside edge of the plate in his last start and he would have hit it every time. I've been far more concerned about Triston McKenzie whose velocity was down and was intermittently losing the plate.

I liked Cleveland's chances this year because if you break things down to offense, rotation and bullpen in the AL Central, their starting five was easily the best aspect of any team in the division... but the depth is gone and they needed at least 130+ starts from them.
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That team really needs Gavin Williams to come back and stay healthy now. He could be a make or break talent for them with Bieber out.
 
Sad Sam Jones

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The good news on Gavin Williams is that the elbow tweak was from a very specific action taken during practice and the MRI reportedly showed nothing to be concerned about, so it shouldn't be a case of wear and tear creating a ticking time bomb. It just set him back too far to ramp up for the start of the season. The problem with being a small market team built on developing starting pitching is that it's pretty much guaranteed you'll get less than 5 years out of an arm now before they hit free agency (barring the gamble of contract extensions).
 
Wingack

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Sad Sam Jones said:
It's crazy that Bieber was pitching with pain in both of his starts. You could have dangled a string over the outside edge of the plate in his last start and he would have hit it every time. I've been far more concerned about Triston McKenzie whose velocity was down and was intermittently losing the plate.

I liked Cleveland's chances this year because if you break things down to offense, rotation and bullpen in the AL Central, their starting five was easily the best aspect of any team in the division... but the depth is gone and they needed at least 130+ starts from them.
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Maybe if we see a guy like McKenzie maybe he is actually trying not to air it out so he doesn’t get hurt.
 
jon abbey

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BigSoxFan said:
Interesting. Would have figured that Cleveland would have offered him something last year.
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They generally operate like TB, they trade everyone a year or two before FA (with the exception of Jose Ramirez who took way under market value to stay). They would have probably traded Bieber this winter but he was coming off a mediocre season and I don't think they got great offers.
 
P

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jon abbey said:
It’s going to be hard for any contract to ever touch that in terms of how bad it turned out, 7/245 and he pitched just 31 innings total, a 6.89 ERA.
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Yes, it almost has to be retired as the obvious answer. The crazy thing is that the Nats got crap for choosing Strasburg over the safer position player, Anthony Rendon, to give out a ~250M contract and that one sucks too. These poor owners...
 
sean1562

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Through his first two years, he has had seasons of 5.6 bWAR and 6.0 bWAR. He turns 31 in November. Lindor will be fine.
 
jon abbey

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So last Wednesday (6 days ago), the Mets signed FA Julio Teheran to a 1/$2.5M deal, which will cost them a bit over $5M given their 110 percent tax bracket and that it's not quite a full season.

Yesterday he pitched 2.2 innings against ATL, 2.2 6 4 4 2 3, 68 pitches.

Just now they DFAd him!!!
 
Petagine in a Bottle

Petagine in a Bottle

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Maybe they wanted to see how he’d deal with some disappointment? Absolutely mashed the ball in AAA, wonder if there’s an element of hey, you handled this the right way and we aren’t keeping you down any longer?
 
DeadlySplitter

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jon abbey said:
So last Wednesday (6 days ago), the Mets signed FA Julio Teheran to a 1/$2.5M deal, which will cost them a bit over $5M given their 110 percent tax bracket and that it's not quite a full season.

Yesterday he pitched 2.2 innings against ATL, 2.2 6 4 4 2 3, 68 pitches.

Just now they DFAd him!!!
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It later came out it was a prorated deal, so the Mets only paid like 50k for the one start.

As far as Holiday - my guess is they wanted to see if he looked like he would likely NOT net them a pick via the PPI, if he started slow. If he did start slow, they would have stashed him fully for the year of control, even longer than that to make sure he wouldn't get a full year anyways with top 3 ROY votes.
 
Red(s)HawksFan

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SirPsychoSquints said:
Thank you! I thought it was about opening day.
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The PPI is aimed at disincentivizing teams from keeping rookies down long enough to add a year of control, so it's based on the service time clock. A full service year is 172 days, but there are 186 days per season. So if he's down for 15+ days, it's impossible to accumulate enough days to be credited with a full season (what they want teams to not do). Assuming he isn't sent down again, his clock starting today means he can earn 173 service days this season and thus a full season.

The only explanation I could maybe rationalize for why the O's did what they did is it was a version on the story that was given last year when Sale wasn't the Sox Opening Day starter. Cora said something about taking that pressure off his plate so he could enjoy that day and have a "normal" work day for his first start. Maybe they wanted Holliday's debut to be away from the pomp and pressure of Opening Day (including being a part of the Pirates and Sox home openers).
 
Yelling At Clouds

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Red(s)HawksFan said:
The only explanation I could maybe rationalize for why the O's did what they did is it was a version on the story that was given last year when Sale wasn't the Sox Opening Day starter. Cora said something about taking that pressure off his plate so he could enjoy that day and have a "normal" work day for his first start. Maybe they wanted Holliday's debut to be away from the pomp and pressure of Opening Day (including being a part of the Pirates and Sox home openers).
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So I don’t know if it turned out this way in reality, but I read somewhere (possibly here?) that the O’s were concerned about facing several tough LHPs in the opening weeks (looked it up and, sure enough, six LHPs in the first ten games, though one of them was Marco Gonzales), and they didn’t want to bring him up and then sit him or have him struggle against them and get off to a poor start as a result. Still seems a little weird because I don’t think the intention is to make him a platoon player.
 
JOBU

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Not sure if this is the appropriate place for this as it’s just a rumor… but it’s been making the rounds in my pilot circle.

*Rumor*

On the Rockies recent team charter from Denver to Toronto the United flight crew let the Rockies hitting coach Hensley Meulens go up into the flight deck (while the aircraft was enroute) and be “at the controls” of the aircraft. There’s a IG video out which I believe the captain posted, which is colossally stupid on his part. The autopilot was on so no true harm was done but this is a huge violation of FAA/ Airline safety measure. I don’t expect Muelens to get in any trouble but both pilots are probably in a world of shit. United is trying to squash the news but it wouldn’t surprise me if this gets out especially since it involves the FAA and Transport Canada.


I will cross post this in the ask an airline pilot thread.
 
canderson

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In the “WTF are you thinking“ department …

Colorado‘s opening day starter Kyle Freeland was pinch running in the 9th in a tied game vs the Phillies. He tried to score on a passed ball and got blown up by the catcher at the plate and was called out for the final out of the inning. Freeland now has what seems to be a separated shoulder (on his non-throwing side, but still).

Philly walked off to win in the 10th.

That’s a $64 million managing mistake imo.
 
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Petagine in a Bottle

Petagine in a Bottle

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The real question is how did Kyle Freeland ever land a $64M deal?

They really need to expand the 40-man roster or allow some exemptions for circumstances like this, though. Hell, the Sox are a few injuries away from having nobody left to call up too.
 
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