big news here-

(03-21-2022 02:17 PM)stever20 Wrote:  

(03-21-2022 02:12 PM)Wedge Wrote:  

(03-21-2022 02:06 PM)dbackjon Wrote:  

(03-21-2022 10:49 AM)Brookes Owl Wrote:  Back story on Jansen/Dodgers: LA wanted to sign, and were even willing to give him 2 years (he signed a one year deal with Atlanta) but asked him to wait to see if they could clear salary and avoid the 80% threshold of the CBT of $290MM. They're less than $5MM from it now.

Holy @#$%

BASEBALL NEEDS A SALARY CAP

MLB needs a salary floor far more than it needs a cap.

Right. Saw the Pirates have a team salary of about 22.5 million right now.

26 rookies would get paid 18.2 million.

Far more of a problem with them than I do with teams that actually give a damn.

As someone pointed out on Twitter -- the Pirates have a ballpark that is nice and relatively new, only 21 years old this year, and was 80% paid for by taxpayers. Those taxpayers are getting the shaft.

Gifting a new ballpark to terrible ownership doesn't lead to a competitive payroll, and MLB has failed to require owners to have a competitive payroll.

(03-23-2022 02:54 PM)Wedge Wrote:  

(03-21-2022 02:17 PM)stever20 Wrote:  

(03-21-2022 02:12 PM)Wedge Wrote:  

(03-21-2022 02:06 PM)dbackjon Wrote:  

(03-21-2022 10:49 AM)Brookes Owl Wrote:  Back story on Jansen/Dodgers: LA wanted to sign, and were even willing to give him 2 years (he signed a one year deal with Atlanta) but asked him to wait to see if they could clear salary and avoid the 80% threshold of the CBT of $290MM. They're less than $5MM from it now.

Holy @#$%

BASEBALL NEEDS A SALARY CAP

MLB needs a salary floor far more than it needs a cap.

Right. Saw the Pirates have a team salary of about 22.5 million right now.

26 rookies would get paid 18.2 million.

Far more of a problem with them than I do with teams that actually give a damn.

As someone pointed out on Twitter -- the Pirates have a ballpark that is nice and relatively new, only 21 years old this year, and was 80% paid for by taxpayers. Those taxpayers are getting the shaft.

Gifting a new ballpark to terrible ownership doesn't lead to a competitive payroll, and MLB has failed to require owners to have a competitive payroll.

I think the one hope is that the grievance the players have against 4 teams who didn't spend their revenue sharing money goes the players way. That would make it tougher on those cheap ass teams.

21 yrs ago today-

(03-23-2022 02:54 PM)Wedge Wrote:  As someone pointed out on Twitter -- the Pirates have a ballpark that is nice and relatively new, only 21 years old this year, and was 80% paid for by taxpayers. Those taxpayers are getting the shaft.

This is a separate conversation, but when taxpayers anywhere fund stadia, they are getting the shaft.

man, this hardly seems fair-

So was looking some at the ghost runners and the impact of home field....

from 2005-19(did 05 since that's when the Nats came around!) road teams went 1485-1632 for a .476 winning pct
in 2020-21 road teams have gone 160-149 for a .519 winning pct.

What I thought was really interesting was the 2021 season and this-
AL road teams in extras went 65-50 for a .565 winning pct
NL road teams in extras went 56-60 for a .483 winning pct

AL teams in normal AL baseball went 59-41 for a .590 winning pct
NL teams interleague went 5-12 in AL parks
so road teams in DH games last year went 64-53 for a .547 winning pct in extra innings
road teams in non-DH games last year went 57-57 for a .500 winning pct in extra innings

It kind of makes sense that there would be such a difference between DH/non DH.

from 2005-19-
All DH games 666-755 .469
All P games 819-963 .460

So a difference, but not as big of a difference.

(03-24-2022 11:55 AM)stever20 Wrote:  21 yrs ago today-

They brought that up on local sports radio this morning.

Since it was in Tucson, they had to make the requisite dig on Tucson

so thought this is interesting-
https://blogs.fangraphs.com/a-minor-cba-...-wrinkles/

“However, under the new CBA, a traded contract is recalculated to reflect the remaining actual dollars. That means contracts that are backloaded will be harder to trade (if the acquiring team is concerned about the luxury tax threshold).”

Going to be a pretty big thing on trades. One team will impact the Rays. Lets say they deal Franco after 5 cheap years. Instead of being able to deal someone that's got a 16.5M AAV they'd be dealing someone that's got a 25M AAV.

Owl Brave!

limk: https://twitter.com/BillShanks/status/15...1331855364

Quote:The #Braves have signed 2B Brock Holt and RHP Brad Brach to minor league contracts with an invitation to big league camp. Holt is an experienced super sub with versatility. Brach was with Atlanta in 2018 and did well, but he's struggled since then. More depth pieces.
11:43 AM · Mar 20, 2022

Quote:MrDeezo️@MrDeezo·Mar 20
Replying to: @BillShanks@DaddyDimmuTv
..take care of Holt down there in ATL. He hits dingers, plays every position and some say, he's better than Babe.

Quote:Braves Sign Brock Holt To Minor League Deal
March 20, 2022 at 11:28am CDT

The Braves have signed veteran utility player Brock Holt to a minor league deal, Bill Shanks of SportsRadio WXKO. He’s received an invite to big league camp and will compete for a bench role.

Holt, turning 34 in June, has played in each of the last ten MLB seasons, primarily with the Red Sox, but also spending some time with the Pirates, Brewers, Nationals and Rangers. In 753 games, he’s made 2,661 plate appearances. He’s never been a huge power threat with the bat, only hitting 25 home runs in that time. However, he’s still occasionally been competent at the plate, with a career slash line of .262/.332/.362, wRC+ of 89, 19.1% strikeout rate and 8.8% walk rate. Last year, with the Rangers, he had a bit of a swoon, hitting just .209/.281/.298 for a wRC+ of 62.

Defensively, Holt brings great versatility to the table, having some spent some time at every position except catcher, even logging 2 1/3 innings of mop-up duty on the mound. However, he’s spent most of his career innings at second base, third base and left field.

The Braves already have Orlando Arcia as a bench/utility option on the 40-man roster. They also added Phil Gosselin and Pat Valaika into the mix this week, with Holt likely competing against that bunch for a roster spot and playing time.

It's just a spring game, but Braves starter Ian Anderson got absolutely shelled in 2 innings in today's game with Red Sox:

Pitchers IP H R ER BB K HR ERA
I. Anderson 2.0 7 6 6 3 4 2 10.80

Now 7-1 Red Sox in bot 4th. Wonder what was going on?

Maybe I don't feel so bad now:

Washington Nationals allow 29 runs in exhibition loss as 'things just got a little bit out of hand'

Team R H E
Cardinals (6-4, 3-2 away) 29 26 0
Nationals(1-10, 0-6 home) 8 12 2

Braves ended up coming back a bit but still lost 7-10 to Red Sox after falling behind 2-9 early.