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biggentleben

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Everything posted by biggentleben

  1. biggentleben
    I sure wish the park could be visited without dropping $20 apiece. I wanted to take my kiddos to see the stadium as the only night we'd have free (tomorrow night) was sold out, but my seats for Memorial Day in Target Field six rows from the field cost $5 less than a tour of the Saints stadium. That's rather odd to me.
  2. biggentleben
    You've not noticed the black hole that is the Braves bench, have you? Julio Teheran pinch hit and pinch ran in back to back games between starts.
  3. biggentleben
    Yes, though in fairness, the post 10th round stuff could be interesting when we get in June and official papers hit the league office on which high school players opt out of the draft. Hard to convince that long shot HS guy to leave his commitment with a $700K bonus in the 12th round if he's not allowed to be picked at all. That could determine better where the money is spent and allow for more of an intentional plan on the first few rounds, whereas the Braves even admitted that they didn't expect as many of their 11th-40th round guys to come to the table willing to deal as did, and it left them scrambling. Having better ideas there will help budgeting for a team looking to manipulate - or at least it should, in theory.
  4. biggentleben
    On the first, it's a tough question to answer. It depends on the year. College talent in a draft can be low due to a number of the best high schoolers signing in a few drafts in a row or it can be very high due to the opposite reason. There are always some guys who develop in college, but there is also value in getting a guy out of high school and not having a college mess up his arm or swing as colleges are there to win while the minors don't really care if they lose a game 20-0 if there's something positive developmentally that can come out of it for the players involved. On your second question, that's huge. Especially with the flattening of the draft pools, the Twins have about as much ability to manipulate their draft as anyone could this season. The Braves used 3/40/44 last year to really use their large bonus pool to their advantage. Three top 50 picks is a huge advantage for sure.
  5. biggentleben
    He's bold as heck on Carlson, and I love it. I'm a big fan, but I was surprised on that.
  6. biggentleben
    But the industry had also zeroed in on Anthony Molina in last season's draft class early and Riley Pint and Jason Groome as freshmen/sophomores and those guys didn't go 1-1. In fact, I have a Braves Twitter follower who is a big draftnik, and he tracks the different mock drafts each major place puts out. The one out at each major place on the 25th of April had either Jason Groome or Kyle Lewis as 1-1 last year. Neither went top 10.
  7. biggentleben
    Not Jeremy, but did have a chat with a couple scouts with NL teams this last week (not the Braves ones on this topic, interestingly), and they all pretty much assume he'll be a back-end first round guy. Pretty much late-teens on through CBA picks is expected range. Coming into the year, he was a guy most saw as a 3rd-5th round type of hitter.
  8. biggentleben
    This requires more than a "like".
  9. biggentleben
    In all seriousness, is this any different than a guy like Christian McCaffrey (sp?) not doing any individual workouts for NFL teams leading up to the draft or skipping his bowl game?
  10. biggentleben
    The draft flattened out a ton in the middle of the first round as well, with nowhere near the drop after the first 10 picks that there used to be either. There are likely to be less deals. Another thing to consider is that a player can completely opt-out of the draft process now - meaning no team is allowed to select him. That was a little one-line thing in the new CBA and likely won't affect a first round pick, but it could make a difference in saving money for 11th round and beyond. As I'm digging deeper into draft stuff for both sites, I'm finding a lot of interesting scouting differences on players. One guy I'm hearing a ton of helium in talking to guys in the game versus BA/Scout/MLB Pipeline/etc is outfielder Heliot Ramos. I've talked with two scouts in the top 5 that say he's in serious consideration for their team.
  11. biggentleben
    As a guy who has been the resident (by location) Braves fan on first the ESPN boards, then BYTO, and now TD, congrats on 5 years! Even though I don't wade into the Twins area all that frequently, I do enjoy multiple areas of the site and definitely enjoy the community created here!
  12. biggentleben
    I will say that I did enjoy hearing the USD thing, though they screwed up and called them SDSU on radio, I guess.
  13. biggentleben
    I think their line was absolutely gassed - both sides of the ball. When they did try to run, they just couldn't get any push. I think what happened is that the Falcons guys who hadn't been there before got into the bright lights of the situation and went "balls out" right away, dominating the line on both sides initially, but they wore down about mid-3rd quarter. Meanwhile, the Pats' lines were just paced well throughout the game and looked mauling at the end due to their relative "freshness" in comparison to the guys across the ball.
  14. biggentleben
    If you happened to be a Braves writer or fan, you'd be as anti-Falcons as I have been lately due to their fanbase. Absolutely insufferable lately...
  15. biggentleben
    In all seriousness, Gaga actually did put on a very solid halftime show. She didn't do anything over the top really, and her musicianship was on display, which is one of the things that many don't realize (or respect) about her... I was pleased with the opening singing. Both America the Beautiful and the anthem were well done. Along those lines, my favorite commercial was the Coca-Cola commercial that was the first "official" game commercial, singing America the Beautiful in its entirety in dozens of languages, showing a ton of different persons singing in different languages, and notably, many of the countries that are on the travel ban.
  16. biggentleben
    The largest lead by the Falcons was 28-3. That totals 31 points. The Warriors were up 3-1. The Indians were up 3-1. Crazy year for exciting finishes in sports!
  17. biggentleben
    Thanks for this, Seth!
  18. biggentleben
    Eddie Mathews has said that if he were building a "greatest Braves" list, he'd make Chipper the 3B every single day and not think twice, stating that Chipper was the much better player. I think that does say a lot (and is rare that you have two elite all-time guys at a position that rare in Cooperstown both in franchise history).
  19. biggentleben
    And that could be part of the issue. I think Beltre is a no-crap, no-doubt HOFer right now, let alone with 2-3 more years added on.
  20. biggentleben
    Part of the WAR argument there is also that he gets very little credit via metrics for what he did defensively. The "chopper to Chipper" was a call that was made incredibly often in Atlanta, and his ability to scoop barehanded coming in on a ball and throw with accuracy is something that big league third basemen now talk about emulating from him. However, he played behind guys like Glavine and Maddux, which meant that most of the work was done up the middle for infielders, and he really didn't get a ton of work to display his defensive ability.
  21. biggentleben
    Um. How do you figure never having an amazing year? In '99, he hit .319/.441/.633 with 41 doubles, 45 home runs, and 25 stolen bases (versus just 3 caught stealing), along with posting a 126/94 BB/K rate. He won the MVP in a near-runaway. He hit at least 20 home runs for 14 straight seasons, and in that run, he also walked more than he struck out and posted a .310/.407/.548 line. That's a crazy long peak before injuries really took their toll. To finish that run, at 36, he fought through two trips to the DL to post a .364/.470/.574 season, win the batting title and have a 90/61 BB/K ratio at 36 years old.
  22. biggentleben
    Wow. I can't support that take whatsoever. Third baseman (and would have been a hell of a shortstop had he not had a Kubel-esque injury before hitting the majors) that basically sits only behind Mantle in most switch-hitting all-time lists (outside of compiling ones that Murray beats him in), .300/.400/.500 guy over his career while playing primarily in the dirt, except for when he volunteered to move to the outfield so the team could bring in the most impact overall player available that particular offseason to assist in the team's pursuit of a second championship in his career. Crazy part is that I had a conversation with a scout who has been at it a while and told me that before the knee injury, he wrote up a report on Chipper that labeled him as "Eric Davis/Barry Bonds power/speed combination, but with more patience". Crazy to consider that he actually lost that much athleticism and was still a sure-fire first-ballot HOF guy.
  23. biggentleben
    Chipper's going to get dinged for his off-field life by a few writers, and that's whatever, but I'd not put him in Griffey's class whatsoever. If you want to go on "the greatest #1 pick where who would go #1 was actually a question", then sure...because when guys like Griffey, Harper, etc. were on the board, there was no doubt. Chipper was a Mauer-esque pick for the Braves, eschewing the top-rated guy that season to draft him.
  24. biggentleben
    It wasn't just his cannon arm either. He had incredible range early, the type of athleticism that allowed him to be a consistent 40/40 threat.
  25. biggentleben
    Incredibly hypocritical to me. I voted for Manny because I vote for a guy's performance on the field, however, anyone who voted Manny but not Palmeiro, McGwire, Sosa, etc. screams hypocritical to me.
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