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The Pussy Boss
Nov 2, 2004

Shimrra Jamaane posted:

Literally no one in Boston can figure out what the Red Sox are doing. Is John Henry aiming to sell the team? Do they think that going full moneyball will work in a big market with a once diehard fanbase as long as they win? There are absolutely a ton Red Sox fans who value having big names and personalities that make the team more interesting to follow over a roster of interchangeables that might win more games.

It seems like Boston is gonna try to compete this year, but are leaving the door open to rebuilding. Their payroll will be around $189 million which is like 5th in baseball. They have a lot of big contracts: Sale, JDMart, Xander, heck, Eovaldi is making $17M this year. They kinda have to go for it, and its possible that Sale and E-Rod come back healthy, Martinez, Devers and Chavis bounce back, Verdugo continues to play like an All-Star, Franchy realizes his potential... They made a couple of nice low-key moves signing Kiké Hernandez and trading for Ottavino. It's not crazy to think they make the playoffs if everything breaks right. But if not, they might very well tear it down at the deadline.

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Salvor_Hardin
Sep 13, 2005

I want to go protest.
Nap Ghost
https://twitter.com/tipping_pitches/status/1367533561503506438?s=20

boroda
Jul 26, 2007


нет усов
yess my first thread title ever

rickiep00h
Aug 16, 2010

BATDANCE



I mean, it was closed as a prison in 1963, and for a lot of people, movies about it are the only way of knowing about it. I can understand someone not knowing that it's a real place or that it's still standing.

howe_sam
Mar 7, 2013

Creepy little garbage eaters

The Pussy Boss posted:

It seems like Boston is gonna try to compete this year, but are leaving the door open to rebuilding. Their payroll will be around $189 million which is like 5th in baseball.

If you include the twenty million the Sox are paying Price and Pedroia they have something like the second highest payroll in baseball for tax purposes. For as much as I hate trading Mookie, I've actually liked the moves Bloom has made this year. After the attempt to run it back crashed and burned in 2019 they needed to put some work into the farm system and build up some organizational depth again.

Intruder
Mar 5, 2003

Sydin posted:

Framber Valdez apparently fractured his ring finger on his pitching hand fielding a ball yesterday, uh, somehow? Not really clear from this clip but it must have bounced into his hand hard.

https://twitter.com/adams_at/status/1367177905500004355

Anyway apparently he could end up missing the entire season because of it, the human body is dumb:

https://twitter.com/JonHeyman/status/1367479249905602561

Well uhhhhh gently caress

Pungry
Feb 26, 2011

JUST PICK ONE. ANY ONE.

logger posted:

Perfect opportunity for the Mariners to get in the hunt for the playoffs and ultimately lose out by one game.

We just did that last year!

Shimrra Jamaane
Aug 10, 2007

Obscure to all except those well-versed in Yuuzhan Vong lore.
I watched the 4 hour Jon Bois video on the Marines over the last week and dang.

KICK BAMA KICK
Mar 2, 2009

Max Fried scratched from his first scheduled spring start tomorrow with potential COVID exposure; has not tested positive though. I don't like it!

Its Rinaldo
Aug 13, 2010

CODS BINCH

Shimrra Jamaane posted:

I watched the 4 hour Jon Bois video on the Marines over the last week and dang.

What are your feelings about arson?

Doctor Skeleton
Nov 15, 2003

Shimrra Jamaane posted:

I watched the 4 hour Jon Bois video on the Marines over the last week and dang.

There is no better time than in March to be excited about the Mariners.

IcePhoenix
Sep 18, 2005

Take me to your Shida

https://gfycat.com/pepperyscalyflickertailsquirrel

I hate remembering which sites embed and which don't

Sydin
Oct 29, 2011

Another spring commute
Cubs and Sox set their rivalry aside to collaborate on the most important issue of the day: a pitch to open 'er up :sigh:

https://twitter.com/ESPN1000/status/1367595426120048644

IcePhoenix posted:

https://gfycat.com/pepperyscalyflickertailsquirrel

I hate remembering which sites embed and which don't

lmao

Dinosaurs!
May 22, 2003

Johnny Bravo posted:

Baseball players in general just don't seem that popular outside of the sport. In the past 30 years, the list of mainstream dudes seems very small to me with Griffey, McGwire, Jeter and A-Rod. I could probably make an argument to include Sosa, Bonds, Clemens and Schilling in that list but 2 of those are almost certainly due to huge cheating scandals accompanying their generational talent and one for being a loud racist in a time when loud racists get noticed

e: I'd probably throw Ichiro on there too because he was basically awesome as gently caress from his first day in MLB coming over from Japan and having a cool name

It can’t help that MLB players get such little screen time compared to their NFL and NBA peers. Up to bat once every ~40 mins and the handful of fielding plays they end up with are more likely to be routine than a highlight someone will remember. And if the game keeps leaning towards TTO there will be even fewer plays. Starting pitchers have it a little better, but are hamstring by their off days.

I’m not sure how much MLB can do to compete with the NFL and MLB in creating household names without drastically altering the game. Someone in the last thread threw out an extra innings rule where anyone can go up to bat after the 11th as long as they’re still an eligible player. I kind of love it, but that’s a pretty big change. And it’s a tired conversation, but outside the rules the sport should stop discouraging players from expressing their personalities. I know baseball writers deservedly get a lot of flack for that one, but it’s an institutional issue that MLB tacitly approves and players prop up via many of the ~*Unwritten Rules*~ - leading to big dorks like Hosmer scolding Tatis.

Mr. Fix It
Oct 26, 2000

💀ayyy💀


Sweatpants Baby posted:

There is no better time than in March to be excited about the Mariners.

counterpoint: roughly the first half of April 2019

Craptacular!
Jul 9, 2001

Fuck the DH
Boston still has a roster that many other cities fans would be thrilled to have. It just looks bad because of big market expectations.

Whereas I think the Cubs are just getting ready to implode everything, and the only sad thing is I think they’re doing it because they’re cheap and not to prevent themselves from driving into the same ditch the Giants did last decade.

Shimrra Jamaane posted:

I watched the 4 hour Jon Bois video on the Marines over the last week and dang.

The interesting thing about that video to me is how he footnotes Nintendo owning that team. And it’s weird because the very next thing that happens is shaking down the taxpayer for Safeco Field under threats to leave for Florida or something. I don’t know how it was covered at the time, but Nintendo was a Seattle-based branch of a Japanese company that had no real organization outside of the northwest. I always got the sense they bought the team so the Japanese executives could continue to watch MLB on business trips.

I always wondered if it may also have played a role in landing Ichiro and creating interest in the team abroad. If nothing else, it certainly didn’t hurt.


EDIT: Glad that the NL DH is gone again so I can finally get an avatar change soon.

Craptacular! fucked around with this message at 03:11 on Mar 5, 2021

Shrecknet
Jan 2, 2005


Dinosaurs! posted:

outside the rules the sport should stop discouraging players from expressing their personalities.
For real. I remember when Oscar Tavares died, one of his teammates wrote "OT RIP" or something on his hat and the league fined him for it.

Intruder
Mar 5, 2003

Should have written MLG RIP

Timby
Dec 23, 2006

Your mother!

Craptacular! posted:

I always got the sense they bought the team so the Japanese executives could continue to watch MLB on business trips.

Nintendo bought the Mariners because the ownership had been threatening to move the team for years (this was one of the original plays for Tampa Bay, before they moved onto the White Sox and eventually got an expansion team) and Howard Lincoln, Nintendo of America's COO, convinced Nintendo of Japan's president, Hiroshi Yamauchi, that it would be good corporate citizenship and a good PR move for Nintendo to step in, buy the Mariners and promise to keep them in Seattle. Yamauchi had absolutely zero interest in baseball and after watching a game found it boring as poo poo, but NoA was making money hand over fist--so he wanted to keep its footprint in Seattle--and he thought the team would be a decent investment, so he agreed.

Unfortunately, this coincided with pretty much the peak of conservative Japan-bashing and xenophobia, with people convinced that Nintendo and other video games were just a Japanese plot to brainwash our children, and that was reflected in a lot of the literature and movies of the time (notably, Michael Crichton and Tom Clancy bought into this bullshit, hard). Both Fay Vincent and Bud Selig, as well as a lot of the power brokers in MLB ownership such as the Wilpons, Reinsdorf, the O'Malleys and Steinbrenner, vehemently opposed the Nintendo play, and Yamauchi threatened to back out of it multiple times. Eventually a deal was brokered that Nintendo would be allowed to buy the team, but actual control of the team had to remain in Seattle while Yamauchi served as an owner in absentia, which is how Lincoln wound up pulling double duty as the chairman of both Nintendo of America and the Mariners.

elentar
Aug 26, 2002

Every single year the Ivy League takes a break from fucking up the world through its various alumni to fuck up everyone's bracket instead.
Michael Crichton was a piece of poo poo in so many ways.

Shimrra Jamaane
Aug 10, 2007

Obscure to all except those well-versed in Yuuzhan Vong lore.

Its Rinaldo posted:

What are your feelings about arson?

I mean would any Washington Stats jury convict someone for trying to burn down Safeco?

Kevlar v2.0
Dec 25, 2003

=^•⩊•^=
White Sox Fans Drink the Most of Any MLB Fan Base, Study Shows

TLR is gonna fit right in

bawfuls
Oct 28, 2009

According to the study, White Sox fans drink an average of 4.2 drinks per game and spend about $46, placing them in the No. 1 spot of the "Booziest Baseball Fans" list.

So people are paying on average $10.95 a drink, sounds cheap for a modern sporting event.

Der Meister
May 12, 2001

How the gently caress did I not know about trout’s warzone stream

Thom P. Tiers
May 29, 2008

Red Birds
Red Ass
Red Text

They must not be counting the parking lot at Brewers games.

Intruder
Mar 5, 2003

bawfuls posted:

According to the study, White Sox fans drink an average of 4.2 drinks per game and spend about $46, placing them in the No. 1 spot of the "Booziest Baseball Fans" list.

So people are paying on average $10.95 a drink, sounds cheap for a modern sporting event.

That number doesn't seem so bad if you round it in with nickel beer night!

R.D. Mangles
Jan 10, 2004


Once again white sox fans are disrespected by the national media forgetting about them and assuming cubs fans are baseball's drunkest dipshits.

Poque
Sep 11, 2003

=^-^=
The drunkest I've ever been at a baseball game was 100% at Comiskey so anecdotally it tracks

bawfuls
Oct 28, 2009

The drunkest I’ve been at a ballgame was probably either Wrigley or Toronto, also both high on the list. Haven’t been to Comiskey yet.

Intruder
Mar 5, 2003

I've never purchased enough overpriced stadium beer to get shitfaced but I've absolutely arrived at the game already there

Poque
Sep 11, 2003

=^-^=

Intruder posted:

I've never purchased enough overpriced stadium beer to get shitfaced but I've absolutely arrived at the game already there

We do a double header at Wrigley and Comiskey every year and that year we had some kind of all-you-can-drink package for 90 mins before the second game at Comiskey. I couldn't go to the early game that year so I felt like I had to catch up...mistake

Darude - Adam Sandstorm
Aug 16, 2012

Last time the Jays were playing they had 5dollar beers, and boy did I get loaded watching a terrible team.

Kevlar v2.0
Dec 25, 2003

=^•⩊•^=
Boozy grapes are the key to getting poo poo-faced at the ballpark without spending a ton on beer. Just soak a bag of grapes overnight in the liquor of your choice (rum works very well) and they'll let you bring them into the ball park because they just look like normal grapes.

Darude - Adam Sandstorm
Aug 16, 2012

Also works with watermelon!

Sydin
Oct 29, 2011

Another spring commute
I've not gotten drunk exclusively off ballpark beer but I have taken the train up to SF, stopped by a couple breweries pre-game, had a couple more at the game, and then gone back out into the city for a few more after the game, and then missed the last CalTrain of the night because I was too drunk to remember the schedule and had to pay a shitload to take an Uber all the way back to San Jose. :downs:

Thom P. Tiers
May 29, 2008

Red Birds
Red Ass
Red Text

Kevlar v2.0 posted:

Boozy grapes are the key to getting poo poo-faced at the ballpark without spending a ton on beer. Just soak a bag of grapes overnight in the liquor of your choice (rum works very well) and they'll let you bring them into the ball park because they just look like normal grapes.


Darude - Adam Sandstorm posted:

Also works with watermelon!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XkuwffDFWQA

Shimrra Jamaane
Aug 10, 2007

Obscure to all except those well-versed in Yuuzhan Vong lore.

R.D. Mangles posted:

Once again white sox fans are disrespected by the national media forgetting about them and assuming cubs fans are baseball's drunkest dipshits.

I’ve always found it strange that the White Sox had a longer World Series victory drought and far less overall success than the Red Sox did but when they finally won in 2005 no one really cared.

R.D. Mangles
Jan 10, 2004


Shimrra Jamaane posted:

I’ve always found it strange that the White Sox had a longer World Series victory drought and far less overall success than the Red Sox did but when they finally won in 2005 no one really cared.

It is because red sox fans spent the entirety of the 1990s whining to ken burns from book-lined studies.

The White Sox didn't even get mentioned in the 10th inning!!!!!!

Gerblederp
Dec 4, 2009

Darude - Adam Sandstorm posted:

Last time the Jays were playing they had 5dollar beers, and boy did I get loaded watching a terrible team.

gently caress I drove 22 hours to watch a couple games and they were $16.

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Darude - Adam Sandstorm
Aug 16, 2012

Gerblederp posted:

gently caress I drove 22 hours to watch a couple games and they were $16.

They had a single place out near the left field pole on the concourse that was selling 5 dollar 12oz beers/hotdogs/ice cream. You just have to stock up when you're there if you're not sitting nearby.

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