MLB 2023 Season - The Winter Stove of Warmth

Is baseball the only sport where this can happen? Basically, put a bunch of money into scouting and player development, get 3 years of young players at baseball minimum wage, keep a few around at reasonable prices but trade everyone else as they start to get expensive.

It's basically the same thing Oakland has been doing forever.

(When they played last week, the Rays swept Oakland by a combined score of 33-5, FYI)

Oh, yeah. Oakland is trash. I assume this is them trying to do the Major League thing and play so poorly that they can move the team. But aside from this recent run of putting unwatchable teams on the field, they've had an impressive 2 decades.

It is something the Rays have actually done since the ownership changes quite a bit ago. The only issue with smaller payrolls is depth so many of those years they drop off toward the end of the season due to injury, fatigue, etc.

When you're good, you're good.

...and when you're not?

IMAGE(https://pbs.twimg.com/media/FttoVuxWIAE7oFx?format=jpg&name=medium)

(The shocking part here for me is that he's 33.)

33 is also when Felix Hernandez's career ended. Both came up at 19 and put a lot of mileage on their arms, though Felix was well ahead in that category.

Well sh*t. Rays fall to 13-1.

Fire the manager!

Dang, and I thought the Rays would have been blown out by 20. Should've taken the under.

I’ve really enjoyed all the ‘Rays have only played last place teams’ takes. Like, yeah. It’s the first two weeks of the season and the teams have been swept in a 3 or 4 game series.

Currently, the most fun thing about the A's is their social media team.

Yay Yankees win. That 3rd strike call on Trout was trash.

Prederick wrote:

Currently, the most fun thing about the A's is their social media team.

The last refuge for fans of a sh*tty team.

They're about to become another city's sh*tty team:

Oakland Mayor Sheng Thao said the city is ending negotiations with the Oakland Athletics on building a new waterfront ballpark stadium after the team has entered into a purchasing agreement for a potential stadium site in Las Vegas.

The Nevada Independent reported Wednesday that the A’s will pay for a 35,000-seat stadium on a nearly 100-acre site near Tropicana Boulevard and Interstate 15.

A's president Dave Kaval, when reached by The Chronicle, said, "For a long time we were on parallel paths and right now, at this moment, and with this transaction that we just entered into, we are really focusing our efforts on Las Vegas and on bringing the 20-year saga of the A's stadium venue efforts to kind of a final positive conclusion."

Mayor Thao said in a statement Wednesday night, “I am deeply disappointed that the A’s have chosen not to negotiate with the City of Oakland as a true partner, in a way that respects the long relationship between the fans, the City and the team. The City has gone above and beyond in our attempts to arrive at mutually beneficial terms to keep the A’s in Oakland. In the last three months, we’ve made significant strides to close the deal. Yet, it is clear to me that the A’s have no intention of staying in Oakland and have simply been using this process to try to extract a better deal out of Las Vegas. I am not interested in continuing to play that game - the fans and our residents deserve better.

"I am incredibly proud of what we have accomplished as a City, including securing a fully entitled site and over $375 million in new infrastructure investment that will benefit Oakland and its Port for generations to come. In a time of budget deficits, I refuse to compromise the safety and well-being of our residents. Given these realities, we are ceasing negotiations and moving forward on alternatives for the redevelopment of Howard Terminal.”

The city of Oakland may be the first metropolitan area in the US to go from having three professional sports teams to zero in the span of five years. The city's also the first metropolitan area in the US to say f*ck off to getting fleeced by three professional sports teams.

Good for them. I know it’s too much to hope that every other city will say ‘we’d love to have you but we’re not building you a stadium’, but one can dream I guess.

I usually razz my Mets-fan friend about them being eliminated from playoffs by now, but they are doing surprisingly well. I am pleasantly disappointed.

Rat Boy wrote:

The city of Oakland may be the first metropolitan area in the US to go from having three professional sports teams to zero in the span of five years. The city's also the first metropolitan area in the US to say f*ck off to getting fleeced by three professional sports teams.

It's too bad.. and while I agree cities (or The Town) shouldn't be fleeced I'm not going to call this solely a win for Fiscal Responsible Cities. The A's needed a new facility every since the Raiders moved back and this has been going on for probably 20 years now. Oakland doesn't need to look very far to see the impact the Giants stadium has been to SF (pre-COVID of course). Also true that in todays political environment particularly here in the Bay Area, issues like affordable housing, gentrification and environmental impact in the Bay cause more delays and bureaucracy than most other cities. On top of that the SF Giants have a chokehold on the TV market and could (and did) block the As move to San Jose.

I just learned that the Indoor Football League team co-owned by Marshawn Lynch, who reps the Town harder than anyone moved from Oakland to San Jose... there's a fricken empty arena in Oakland for them and they still found it made sense to move to San Jose.

Ouch

Catcher had money it.

HE'S DOING IT AGAIN

Question: He isn't The Best, but I think it's fair to argue right now that Shohei is the most talented baseball player ever, right?

Like, in any other situation, I'd say "Barry Bonds" but... Barry couldn't pitch.

5 facts about Ohtani's incredible first 5 starts

Just to dive deeper on that batting average, let’s go to the counting stats. He’s allowed just eight hits, out of 105 batters faced. That’s the fewest in a pitcher’s first five starts of a year since at least 1901 (min. 20 innings)
Prederick wrote:

Question: He isn't The Best, but I think it's fair to argue right now that Shohei is the most talented baseball player ever, right?

Like, in any other situation, I'd say "Barry Bonds" but... Barry couldn't pitch.

At least post Babe Ruth.

Ruth is disqualified for playing pre-integration. It’s hard to say though because we don’t know which hitters could have been good pitchers and the other way around because teams were not interested in two-way players. Even with Ohtani, a big reason he chose LAA was that they were willing to let him do both. Best we can probably say is he’s the first player to prove it’s possible to do both and do both well and he’s setting an incredibly high bar for such players.

Like, could Rickey pitch? Could Satchel Paige hit?

In other Let’s Remember Some Guys news, last nights SEA broadcast had a graphic on fastest to 30HR/30SB, and there was a name I’d never seen before: Kal Daniels. Eric Davis was also on the list, and even as a fan of an AL team in the late 80s, I knew who he was. So I was blown away reading about a teammate of his who had an incredible start to a career ruined by repeated knee injuries. What a bummer.

Remember Some Guys is a fantastic game, but it's always best in baseball. If I had the ability, I'd make it so you have to Remember A Guy whenever you post in this thread or it gets deleted.

David Segui.

Tampa is 20-3 and has 6 starting players with a batting avg above .300

I want whatever they are chewing.

I love whenever Americans freak out about a bare-handed catch in baseball because I just know Cricket fans are looking at us like...

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I think he's to genuinely beloved for it to happen, but I'm imagining how ferally insane I would go if I was on the Angels and someone tried to bean Shohei anywhere dangerous.