If I had to pick three words to describe Goldschmidt they would be these: he is fantastic. He is easily the best first baseman in baseball right now, and on his current pace will finish his career with well over 50 WAR. Not bad for an 8th round pick.
Read more "The Next Paul Goldschmidt"Not one, but two all-stars for the Reds. Whether that or the six Nationals is more surprising is up to you to decide.
Read more "My 2017 National League All-Star Team"No Mike Trout? Well, maybe if he makes it back in time he can play. If he doesn’t, the AL won’t be much worse off with a J.D.-Betts-Judge OF from left to right.
Read more "My 2017 American League All-Star Team"I understand that there are “unwritten rules” about baseball, and that if you go hard into second base, you leave yourself open to getting beaned, but the fact of the matter is that throwing at a guy doesn’t solve the issue. It won’t un-injure the player on your team that got hurt. This isn’t a tit-for-tat deal.
Read more "If It’s Not Written Down, It’s Not a Rule"On April 14th, 2017, the White Sox trotted out a starting OF of Garcia, Garcia, and Garcia. That is not even the craziest thing that has happened in the past 12 months: Bryce Harper reached base seven times in a row without swinging the bat.
Read more "The Three Garcias and other strange-but-true MLB happenings"Charlie Morton, Brandon Finnegan, and Kendall Graveman are all on the verge of a true breakout.
Read more "Three Hot Start Pitchers that’ll Stay Hot"Ramirez, in his third full season in the majors (he got only 14 PA in 2013), triple-slashed a robust .312/.363/.462, while striking out at a mere 10.0% clip (good for fifth-best among qualified hitters). His 2016 was a great season, he even received a few MVP votes, but Ramirez still doesn’t get enough love.
Read more "MLB Players to Watch for in 2017"“I hope kids watching the W.B.C. can watch the way we play the game and appreciate the way we play the game as opposed to the way Puerto Rico plays or the Dominican plays. That’s not taking anything away from them. That just wasn’t the way we were raised. They were raised differently and to show emotion and passion when you play. We do show emotion; we do show passion. But we just do it in a different way.” –Ian Kinsler
Read more "Take It Easy on Ian Kinsler"Shane Battier had the best point of the entire day when he addressed the student-athlete salary issue: “Money wouldn’t be a life changer in college–change lives within college scholarships. If we want to be about education let’s make it about education; offer any student who graduates [and doesn’t forego their college eligibility early to enter any drafts] a full ride to any graduate degree.”
Read more "MIT Sloan Sports Panel Review: Life of the College Student-Athlete"Mark Cuban quote highlights:
Silver: Are you prepared to announce your candidacy for the presidency?
Cuban: I’ll have to get back to you on that.
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Cuban: If I ever did announce a candidacy, it would be on 4/20 at 4:20.
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Cuban: We have the least literate President and Vice President we could possibly find.
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Cuban: [Donald Trump] hasn’t read a book in 30 years…he has no contextual awareness whatsoever.
Read more "Recapping the MIT Sloan Sports Analytics Conference: Day 2"
Musings of a Baseball Addict 