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Sousy

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Everything posted by Sousy

  1. Agreed on the Simmons debacle. I would be in agreement with the FO, though, should they go out and find another SS in free agency for all of the conventional wisdom reasons (Polanco & the ankles are happy and productive at 2nd, Arraez’ knees aren’t great to have at SS, Gordon just doesn’t seem to have the natural arm strength to be a dependable player there.) I also don’t think the team should press too hard / give up too much to bring Cruz back. There’s a glut of corner / DH kind of guys now and a lack of center depth and pitching; I’d rather the team spend effort and resources on the latter. However, I’m totally on board with offering him whatever coaching job he wants when the time comes if that’s what he wants to do.
  2. Yup, yup, yup. This likely won't be the best team BIlly G puts on the ice - things are on an upswing. A young and (after this preseason) surprisingly deep team might make some noise this year in the playoffs; will only get better as Spurgeon, Dumba, Foligno grow into leadership roles, Ek and Kaprisov solidify their game and young guys (Boldy, Rossi, Beckman) learn theirs. If you haven't been in on this - now's a good time. Plus, that Winter Classic in Target Field is a pretty good tie between franchises on other sides of the river. BONUS: baseball and hockey seasons dovetail almost perfectly.
  3. On the Kirilloff front: have we heard anything about how recovery from wrist surgery is going, or Larnach's issue that put him on the IL at the end of season? More than anything recovery from injury is going to tell the tale next year. We're not even sure if Larnach's injury impacted his hitting in the last half of the season: they just shut him down in the last month or so.
  4. This is a great thread bump. I introduced my youngest to Strat O Matic this year and we've had a great time with the "2020" set (not "2020 re-imagined"). Anyone have fun customizations (cigar box stadiums, etc.)?
  5. I had a bunch of authentication issues with a Firestick - couldn't log in for some reason and didn't dig much harder; nice to know that it's workable. There was a St. Paul at Omaha game where Ian Hamilton was pitching. For whatever reason the camera angle was such where you couldn't really see half the plate due to the angle: just Hamilton's back. It was great fun to scroll through the Class A video feeds - so many ballparks in the early part of the season that looked like they mounted a webcam in a (mostly) empty stadium.
  6. The same is true for all professional sports leagues - this generation of players is the kind that isn't motivated by the "old school ass chewing" manager. When there are cases where the ass chewing is deserved, it's not coming from the managers but rather the veteran players. That case of Machado ripping into Tatis Jr. a few weeks ago is a perfect example: 15 - 20 - 30 years ago it would have been the role of the manager to keep an iron fist on their players; today most teams lean on veteran players to be the clubhouse / bench leaders.
  7. There's a bit of a reputation with Tony L, but this year (his 77th!) was certainly not the fire and brimstone type of manager of old. I don't think he looked to be the emotional center of this year's White Sox team.
  8. I don't know about that - the days of players needing an Earl Weaver to raise hell seems to be in the past. There aren't many fire-and-brimstone kind of managers out there because it doesn't seem to be terribly effective. Even seeing Tony LaRussa getting tossed from games this year was a like a sad reflection of what his management style used to be. One thing not mentioned here was how well Rocco handled an obviously frustrated Byron Buxton this year. At the time of coming back from the hip injury there was a flutter of media activity about how unhappy Buxton was that he wasn't playing though he thought he was 'ready to go'. Rocco said from the get go that unless Buxton was 100%, he wouldn't see the field. Buxton thought he was ready, so Rocco made him prove it. After he couldn't, Buxton went to see a second set of doctors and the media flutter was over.
  9. That was pretty amazing, too. I just wish there was an easier way to do MiLB on a "TV" rather than having to Airplay / Cast the video. It was amusing to see the differences in how the different MiLB teams did the broadcast, which also reflects the amount of financial / community support that exists for the teams. St. Paul / Wichita originate some pretty good broadcasts. Some of the other cities felt more like someone's mom was holding a phone camera while a radio broadcast was playing.
  10. In retrospect, the offseason move that made the biggest difference in how I watch / consume baseball was the new Twins AAA affiliation with the St. Paul Saints. I paid more attention to the AAA / AA levels than I really had in the past, mostly because the various beat writers were able to actually go see the teams - and so could we. Having the AAA players be in the media market is a great thing for being able to connect to and track the progress of these players. A year ago I don't know that I would have really known some of these guys beyond what I could find on the internet, but going to actually see Ryan Jeffers catch Bailey Ober earlier in the year really cemented that mental / emotional connection in a way that reading about the Rochester Red Wings on the internet didn't.
  11. It's hard to classify this one. 2011 and all the injuries seem to be the closest, but this season feels like a mix of bad luck in terms of injuries and bad luck in terms of nearly every free agent signing turning into a bust. There's also a number of younger players coming up in terms of the lineup and pitching that don't make the future seem that dire. 1993 and afterwards was a total different universe of disappointment - from a bad season to labor disputes to what felt like a nail in the coffin in 1995. I suppose the good news of those memories is that no matter what happens from then on out, there's always a reason for optimism.
  12. I watch this market through the eyes of my ten year old that really likes the idea of cards, but there are big parts of the market that exceed a ten year old’s budget. I’m not sure what to think about cards in that context - there is not the ubiquity there once was, and it’s interesting that cards become a digital currency in games like MLB The Show. What is probably my biggest concern is all of this concentration of brands under the umbrella of the Fanatics company. They already seem to control much of the merchandising and all of the online presence of MLB and others; it’s not the best experience for fans and seemingly not for teams. The Twins online store is a Fanatics site that has far fewer products available than you can find in person at Target Field for instance - and that retail arm of the Twins has no online presence. I’m curious what that experience will translate to for card collectors. I’m not confident that a one source for all things baseball will be a good thing.
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