ashbury

More than just in jeopardy. The deal is off, and Balfour is talking about filing a grievance. Could get uuuuugly.

Moderator's note: the line is purposely ambiguous where the TD Comment Policy on personal attacks comes into play, but this post needs to be the last of its kind.You can discuss Pelfrey versus Baker, but stay *far* away from the line questioning the person.

It's surely accepted that baserunners, especially one on second, will try to read the catcher's sign and give the batter a clue of what's coming. It's why the catcher switches from a simple index finger signal for the fastball when no one's on, to the fancy five-second wiggle waggle.

Between Butera+$$ and Suzuki+Sulbaran, I choose the latter.

2011-13, Fryer's OPS in AAA was approximately the same as Suzuki's in the Show. Just a shorthand number for comparison, but it seems to me the talent difference on offense is marked, and I have no way to say Fryer's defense would be better (enough) to outweigh that.

Fellow SABR member Stew Thornley has long made the case that first-hand accounts from ballplayers still need rigorous fact-checking. They don't mean to mis-remember, but time plays tricks on the synapses. What then becomes tricky is how to deal with discrepancies when you write up the interview in a biography or whatever. In-line corrections, parenthetical corrections that in effect call him out, endless footnotes, do nothing, or what? Interesting to see in this case that you don't have to be an old goat to unintentionally embellish. As you say, it wasn't your point, but an interesting side point anyway.

Turn on your audio, you'll get your answer. Oh, and Brian. I've long contended that the umpires continually squeezed Ankiel. Your video provides the proof I've been looking for. I've got a call in to the umpires office now.

Suzuki's contract is under $3M. If you had a whole team of Suzukis your ML payroll would be less than $75M, not even close to the ML average payroll. And the Twins indeed aren't anywhere close to ML average payroll at the moment. And that contract is for one year. Basically, although most years money is a constraint for the Twins front office, this off-season at this time it is not. Signing Suzuki has no effect on the money the Twins can offer another FA. Fryer.

TD moderators sometimes invest considerable time composing messages to fellow site members. Here are a few collected over time, edited slightly into short essays, on the subject of contributing respectfully. They seemed worth sharing more widely. 1: I wish you could just make your point without characterizing the other poster in the process. 2: 3: Worry about yourself, and less about other posters. 4: 5: If you see yourself in one of these images, maybe just take a break and come back tomorrow. http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/duty_calls.png 6: This site is here to discuss baseball and we wouldn’t be here if there weren’t divergent opinions. Further, articles are written and topics chosen to provoke discussion. The writers know that some will agree, some disagree. Your post wasn’t about the topic but rather to mock other posters. That won’t fly here. Stick to Twitter or the STrib comments section if that’s what you want to do. 7: Maybe you're an Overachiever? Want to go beyond the requirements of TD's Comment Policy, and become an elite rhetorical contributor? Have a look at this: Rapoport’s Rules to Criticize Someone Constructively The page provides this helpful summary: "You should attempt to re-express your target’s position so clearly, vividly, and fairly that your target says, 'Thanks, I wish I’d thought of putting it that way.' You should list any points of agreement (especially if they are not matters of general or widespread agreement). You should mention anything you have learned from your target. Only then are you permitted to say so much as a word of rebuttal or criticism." I wonder how many of us could reach this lofty standard. 8: Here is a restatement by a relationship counselor about one simple rule. "The premise was simple, he said: Nothing you do or say to each other should drop below the level of simple respect. That was it." 9: Q: Why is this site's Policy so long? A: 1) It's not. At heart what we ask is, "post respectfully, and don't troll." 2) Tolstoy said in one of his novels, "happy families are all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way." The parallel to unhappy posting habits is apt, and the variety of examples and re-phrasings of our policy reflects this.

I am pretty sure that saying something without actually saying it still counts as a violation. Please knock it off. Rule of thumb, if you think you're close to the line, you probably are.

Moderator's note: I guess I was too subtle with my earlier post in this thread. Please take discussion of the 2012 draft to a more appropriate thread, unless it involves Rob Antony.

Someone should mail Rob Antony, the topic of this thread, a link to the helpful advice posted here so far. Alternatively, I might re-title this thread "Terry Ryan - your thoughts?"

There's a thread on him in the Adopt-a-Prospect forum section - better if we discuss him there: http://twinsdaily.com/showthread.php/1011-Levi-Michael-Adopt-A-Prospect-Project

Not quite exactly, but good call nonetheless!

Doumit? Great trade! (Who'd we get?)

The item on MLBTR about Santana doesn't discuss contract terms. It worries me if they are thinking about a guaranteed major league contract. A minor league deal, as mentioned here, would of course be fine. And if some other team wants to snatch him away by guaranteeing a contract, well, good for them I guess. Maybe the Astros, who originally signed him, would like to offer him a chance to end his career where he started.

Agreed. Good article, though I had to stop reading at that point because I don't have time t

Very fair point in addition.

MLBTR has an item stating that the Phillies would be willing to trade Jimmy Rollins. In the article, it's stated: "Rollins, 35, struggled at the plate in 2013, batting .252/.318/.348..." Meanwhile our resident starter pleased some fans with his progress, posting .221/.281/.330. I don't particularly advocate trading for Rollins, as I assume the Phils want prospects the Twins won't want to part with and the Twins won't want to invest $11M a year in an aging player. I'm just mindful that one team's "struggled" can be better on offense than another team's "incumbent shortstop".

Toothpickjam, then.

Yes, and for now, they have plenty of 40-man room. Two open slots if I counted correctly.

The MLBTR headline on this scared me, but finding out it's just a minor league contract lowered my blood pressure. It won't be any surprise if we look back in a couple of years and see that Kubel was one of those guys who hit his permanent decline right after age 30. As a low risk move, I can't fault it. But I'm not sure it really helps with the clutter of similar players - even if some of the clutter is traded, when he's added to the 40-man it's more of the same. Hope it works out for all concerned.

Seconded.

I see that until his age-25 season you couldn't really say the same about his 3B fielding percentage.

Thank you for summarizing my opposition to the play.