There was a time when there was no such thing as bullpens and closers. In fact saves! weren’t even an official statistic until 1969. Starting pitchers were expected to pitch the whole game, and relief pitchers were used for spot starts and multi-inning relief appearances when a starter would struggle or get injured. Things changed however… starters went from pitching
Read moreBoston acquired rotation help. Without knowing more, this is a great move for both teams. Boston get a solid starter and Baltimore cut costs in a rebuilding season. Advertisements
Read moreA lot has been said about how teams were unusually quiet in the pursuit of Bryce Harper and Manny Machado. I wasn’t too surprised however, Harper had been maddeningly inconsistent throughout his career and Machado was a very good but not great player, that was expecting to be paid as if he was the former. We’re now at the All-Star
Read moreIt‘s a messy situation. The Tampa Bay Rays wanted a new stadium in downtown Tampa, but wanted the city to pay for it, an idea that the city was naturally not particularly fond of. At first it looked like it might actually come to fruition, but now it’s dead. They’re now forced to keep playing in one of the worst
Read moreSeattle trades Edwin Encarnacion to the New York Yankees yesterday. This is a great salary dump trade, that is an odd one for New York. The Bronx Bombers already have Luke Voit at first base and Giancarlo Stanton at DH. They could of course move Stanton to LF, which seems to be their intention, but that means benching Brett Gardner
Read moreEntering the season, the expectations were that the Cleveland Indians would rather easily win the division for the fourth straight year. The Kansas City Royals, the Chicago White Sox, and the Detroit Tigers were rebuilding teams not expected to be competitive, and the Minnesota Twins were expected to at best be Wild Card contenders and at worst a .500 team.
Read moreAtlanta signed Dallas Keuchel to a most likely one year deal. This is a great signing for a team that needs a stable top of the rotation starter. Keuchel may not be an ace, but he’s capable of being one and did win a Cy Young award only a few years ago. Atlanta now has an edge in the NL
Read moreThe Chicago Cubs signed Craig Kimbrel. This is a good deal for a Chicago team that badly needed a closer. The deal is fair and barring a surprising decline, this should give them a major competitive advantage against St. Louis and Pittsburgh. I don’t think that Atlanta made a mistake not signing him due to the amount of good young
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