TheLeviathan

Absolutely. Defillipo was a Sparano and Spielman favorite and they hired him to help the Viking offense better fit their personnel: Diggs, Thielen, Cousins, Cook, etc. In other words, a team that throws more. Zimmer, being Zimmer, is outraged the team is actually throwing on first down and throwing to set up the run and gets more and more irritated. Of course, what he ignores is that the team's offense had the following yardage totals: 343, 480, 292, 446, 375, 411, 316 and was averaging about 26 points per game. (Including that horrific 16.5 point favorite whooping at home we took from Buffalo where everything was broken, we were closer to 30+ other than that disaster) So despite the offense bad-assing it's way to a 4-2-1 record while his defense stunk, he starts publicly and privately grousing about not running the ball enough. Slowly undermining the new coordinator until, you guessed it!, the offense went pumpkin out of the bye week and we go from 5-3-1 to 6-6-1. The guy literally took a good offense out back and shot it because he wasn't flexible enough to roll with the success and find a way for his defense to pick up the slack.

The paragraph on DeFillipo makes me wish we would've fired him 3 years ago.

Not shocked. In fact, profited off expecting exactly this. Mac Jones is not special and this Pats team had a breezy schedule. Total paper tigers.

I like the Dejong idea. Mostly because he passes my "better than some old guy who can't hit" test.

Well, I'm on the record saying I'd have shelled out for a SS in this market. There was a bevy of options and the Twins have plenty of money to sign one. So, Trevor Story. Or ask about Kiner-Falefa on Texas if you want a cheaper option. At least that's a guy with some upside and not on the down-slide.

Let's aim for major-league level competence as both a fielder and a hitter. We just had an atrocity of a season offensively from a guy and we've seen what defensive atrociousness can do to a team....let's do better than anyone named in this thread.

Yup. That's a garbage starting point. Baseball should be thinking radically and all we get is this. Plus....14 teams in the playoffs? Ugh.

*Said all future Gopher fans 11 months later the last two years (Hope it happens though!)

One trend is clear as another pile of names emerge.....the Vikings are looking at young candidates.

His skillset is so unique. I hope the Twins find a way to keep him in the lineup somehow. I don't have any bright ideas on that front, but I like what he does for the top of our lineup. Especially in this era of baseball.

Fun fact: Arraez "horrible" production against lefties for his career is still .100 points higher than 2020 Simmons against humans of any handedness!

Correct. A payroll linked salary floor is a red carpet to tank. It does nothing to end false ownership narratives that horde money.

I cannot find this article. Link please? Zimmer saying that reinforces the cancerous culture info coming out.

The only failure here was your unwillingness to remember the topic at hand and avoid your sermon for the eleventy billionth time. The topic is what's good for the game. Read: Not what the Yankees will find swell. Every argument you lay out ignores the context of the other ideas and relies on completely irrelevant arguments. 1) Misses the point. The purpose of the floor is to ensure shared revenues are not pocketed and to help get the players on board for more money being spent instead of horded. Not a relevant criticism. 2) Then overpay. Why should I care? They still get to elect how they spend their money and on whom. Other leagues have salary floors, I assure you dogs and cats are not mating at their arenas and no one is spontaneously combusting. Let 'em overpay. Better than hording. Hording hurts fans. Overpaying does not. 3) So we find a way for small markets to acquire assets and it's a bad thing? Interesting. Also, embedded in all three of these flawed arguments is that you completely ignored that revenues are being shared. The largest factor in current disparities has already been neutered. You removed the context to make an irrelevant argument. 4) I don't recall writing that teams with salary floors had to give out 10 year contracts. Can you cite where I said that please? Or, you know, acknowledge I didn't and your Chicken Little argument is a fallacious attack? Lastly, I don't give a bleep what's fair. This is about what's good for the game. The Yankees or Dodgers having a half billion dollar edge in TV contracts is what's not fair and killing the game. Let them eat cake. They need to share and the teams they share with need to be spending that money on their baseball product. No cap (players happy), a floor (players happy and big teams happy), no luxury tax (big teams happy), and completely shared revenues (little times just wet themselves they're so happy). Wins for all. Most of all....a win for the future of baseball. The point of this thread by way of the title. Not what you want to make it out to be so we can hear you twist the argument back to your talking points. And, before you make the argument, I have no delusions that this would actually pass. Baseball's mutually assured destruction via Holy Self Interest is an unbreakable battle line. They are killing the game and these ideas won't be accepted until it's too late, if even then. This was a hypothetical thought experiment and treated as such.

Every time this sort of thing happens you can point to specific things that justify it. Nevertheless...the pattern persists.

Rhett Ellison is who you are talking about.

Hard not to read a culture problem into what Brian O'neil and Eric Kendricks said today. The stuff about helping young players feel part of the team is a damning indictment. Makes sense why the Wilfs emphasized communication.

Agreed. He turned Barr, a 6'5 250 pound gazelle into a lunchpail dude with no splash plays. Every CB played 15 yards off and was, at best, ok. He never made all those investments pay off into something ferocious.

i think you look at organizations that have achieved what you're trying to achieve period they state they want year in and year out success so you start at the franchises that have been able to achieve that. I guess to me those teams would include the Steelers, the Patriots, the Chiefs, the Packers, 49ers, etc

IMO there was no discord between Zimmer and Spielman. Those two big DTs? That was Spielman delivering Zimmer's request. (Zimmer's coaching them still lead to a terrible run D ) All the DB picks? Spielman catering to Zimmer. Barr over Aaron Donald? Zimmer's guy. If anything....Spielman was too much in service of his coach. His coach just didn't deliver when he was given everything he wanted. GMs and coaches have to be working together. But sometimes a productive working relationship is being able to tell someone they have it wrong and give some pushback.

That is one of the key guys I thought of that lead me down that path.

I was thinking....there are two players that really crystalize my belief that firing Zimmer was the right move. (But being wary of declaring the Spielman firing the right move) 1. Stefon Diggs - Spielman took this dude with a 5th round pick. That's a career maker as a GM. How did that divorce happen? Zimmer, so damn committed to running, was purposely downplaying the usage of his best weapons to fit his mantra. Not change his mantra to match his players. He drove a possible future HOF receiver out of town on stubbornness. 2. Justin Jefferson. We started 2020 1-5 in no small part because we adamantly refused to play Jefferson from Day 1. Once again, Zimmer refused to talk about young player readiness or why he wasn't on the field. He just sat him. When he finally hit the field....the team started turning it around. He is so unwilling to trust young players that a rookie of the year who broke passing records couldn't even see the field. Zimmer in a nutshell. I like the guy, wish him the best, but those two situations highlight why I'm happy today.

I feel like the discussion has become tangential to the topic at times. What would make it better for fans and the health of the game, that's where I'm focused: 1. Salary floor - this is the only thing that limits tanking. (It can't be eliminated) It will drive up wages and force ownerships that have been acting nefariously to at least be semi-competent and respectful to their fan bases. 2. End regional TV deals permanently. All broadcasts need to be run by MLB with revenues completely shared by all the organizations. The only local money kept is in their stadiums, jersey sales, etc. 3. With 1 and 2 implemented....luxury taxes can go away. Teams have a more even footing, let them see how that works out for awhile. If disparities re-emerge....revisit. 4. Universal DH. Watching pitchers hit is the sports equivalent of a Ric Flair eye gouge through a TV. 5. Pay minor leaguers a livable wage and force ownerships to treat those players as investments. More than likely, it'll improve the overall product over time. Afterall....you f#$%$#% invested in them rather than having them play daily on kraft cheese slices and uncooked ramen. 6. No more monkeying with playoffs or divisions. Let some rivalries and traditions grow for awhile. 7. Enforce game timing rules already on the books. Agree, together as owners and players, to be open to ways to grow the game. Kids do not care about baseball. Like, at all. Put egos and profits aside from time to time to sacrifice for the game. You can't write that into a contract beyond good will to try.

Also, the NFL was born out of a desire to end regionalism and become national. Whereas baseball has religiously encouraged regionalism.

Kepler isn't a good CFer. That shouldn't be plan A if Buxton is hurt. Mixed and matched for some games? Sure. Every day? No.