Arena The Major League Baseball Thread

At least there are races in the AL. The only drama in the NL is what order the Pirates, Cardinals, and Reds will finish.

Amazing.

 

The A.L. wild card race ought to provide for some fascinating baseball in September, along with Oakland & Texas battling for the West.

 

the league in general might have been more pitching dominated in '68 but there was still no one even close to gibson's level that year. compare that to koufax's year when juan marichal was his equal or better in a bunch of important categories. i definitely like the argument for pedro more than i like the argument for koufax.

 

Yikes... Chad Billingsley had a similar issue last year, and ended up having Tommy John surgery. It's hard not imaging that Harvey will end up on the same road.



So, despite the nice & tidy win on Friday night, the Bums lost the next 2 to Boston, giving them their first series loss since late-midish June. No shame in losing to a really, really good (and well bearded) Red Sox team, and it's better for the Dodgers to have an iffy stretch now (4-4 in their last 8 games) than in a few weeks when the postseason* starts.


http://www.forbes.com/sites/danalexander/2013/08/26/2013-houston-astros-baseballs-worst-team-is-most-profitable-in-history/{/URL}]The[/url] 2013 Houston Astros... the most profitable team ever in MLB history


Who would have guessed that?




*knocks on wood... barring an epic, historical collapse of course. You can never be 100% certain about that sort of thing.

 

I think I must be numb to this nonsense by now, because when I found out at work, I just kind of rolled with it. Harvey shouldn't even bother trying to rehab; have the surgery, come back in 2015 and maybe they'll have some offense by then.

Amazing.

 

I messed up on the link on the Astros story, so here it is:


http://www.forbes.com/sites/danalex...lls-worst-team-is-most-profitable-in-history/ .

 

That Astros thing feels a lot like a non-story to me. Baseball finances are rather complicated with all sorts of manipulations (I've heard that they use accounting measures that let them count payroll twice as expenses), so it would tend to shock me if the Astros' profit is really a record. And I'm sure some people will use this to gin up some outrage, but what are they supposed to do? Give a couple of overrated players $10 million contracts so they can win 65 games instead of 55?

Amazing.

 

Cincy vs. St Louis on the Network, big series for the Central. Exciting 10 days coming up for the division. Things could look a whole lot different soon.

 

With Harvey done for the year, the Mets have placed 5 players on waivers and have three minor leaguers ready to be called up, so it's likely a trade or two is in the works. I like to believe this is just coincidental timing and the Mets didn't actually harbor any serious thoughts of competing for the wild card. But I know too much to fully believe that.

Amazing.

 

we'll give you guys zito if you give us wheeler back

 

And the Mets have traded Marlon Byrd and John Buck to the Pirates for a 19-year old second base prospect and a player to be named later (this time of year that usually means a player from the June draft since they can't be traded until the season is over, but we'll see). All things considered, not a bad haul for the Mets. And while they'll only have him for the last 30 games or so, Byrd represents an upgrade over what the Pirates have been running out in the outfield.

Amazing.

 

Came across this nifty graph on a Dodger blog some minutes ago:


.

 

In typical Mets fashion they can't manage to do the right thing without somehow messing it up. Mets trade Marlon Byrd on Marlon Byrd T-shirt night

 

Maybe I'm just the eternal optimist (or delusional), but I'm still keeping the faith with the Yankees. You have to admit, they've been playing pretty solid lately. It breaks my heart to think that without the injuries, we could've been running away with the division right now.....

 

Hopefully he can come in and not rock the boat. The Pirates black hole in right field shouldn't be hard to fill and I hope Byrd does well. The Mets are going to win the heck out of this trade but at this point the Pirates have to dip into the farm for these types of trades.

 

After winning 2-1 tonight the Braves have won 5 straight and their magic number is down to 15 games.

 

They did it! The Pirates won and can't finish with a losing record. The last time my favorite baseball team had a winning record I was 14 years old, I'm 34 today. I considered myself a pretty die hard baseball fan and man does it feel good to know that the Pirates cannot finish with a losing season this year! Pretty big day for Pirates fans. Loving it!

 

If the Royals and Indians both finish above .500, and it won't be much of a stretch for either, the team with the longest winning season drought... the Mets.

Amazing.

 

Congrats Pirates fans. Very happy for you.

 

Darth McClain, Rox, Quixotic-Sith, big_boss_nass







It's a tremendously great thing not just for baseball, but for Pittsburgh (duh! ) to have the Pirates streak of losing seasons finally come to an end. There should be more made of this nationally, but nonetheless it's something to really enjoy & be happy about.





As for the Bums, despite losing today series finale in Denver* (doubling also for the Bums season finale at Coors Field), they had won their previous 6 games, and look good to clinch the division sometime in the next 2 weeks, and then hopefully are poised for a deep postseason run (*knocks on wood*). Matt Kemp is still rehabbing in Arizona, and though undoubtedly he could prove a lot of help if he comes back, honestly, he's not needed. They've been playing historically great without him, and they can continue to do so.





*today's lineup include the Edinson Volquez (starting pitcher), Michael Young at 1st base, Nicholas "the Little Pony" Punto at 2nd, and an outfield of Schumaker/Van Slyke/Hairston. When up 12+ games in the division with little over 20 games left to go, Mattingly can afford to temp fate in such an odd fashion.

 

Are the Red Sox still scoring runs off the Tigers?

 

Nope, now we're doing it to the Yankees.

 

The streak is over at 20 years!

 

Fun game to watch both Darvish and Cole were dealing. Nice to see the Bucs pick up number 82.