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I have seen a number of comments, here and elsewhere, that start out with “I didn’t watch the speech, but…” and then proceed to bring up all sorts of outrage and some dire warnings. Maybe those folks could spend a few minutes to find out what was said before jumping to some pretty radical conclusions. Maybe the outrage is the goal. Maybe the speech never included them in any condemnations.

Hopefully he's thinks it's time to retire!

Come on. To be fair—I do believe your concern about your military friends and how they might as a group react has some basis in legitimacy. A lot of people the past few days have portrayed red hats as being butt-hurt crybabies who will simply retreat and suck their thumbs. But some of the people you refer to have done military stuff overseas before, are willing to do it again here, and are out training for that right now. So while I don’t anticipate them waging anything like years-long quasi-military campaigns against liberal enclaves and slaughtering civilians by the tens of thousands, I can envision them doing guerrilla strikes here and there, perhaps even attempting the assassination of certain government executives. I agree they are a threat that needs to be monitored and dealt with appropriately, and I’m trusting that the federal police are amping up surveillance of them in the wake of this speech, and will continue to do so after future aggravating events.

You show up in November and vote against the ideology? That's largely what I heard in the speech, but someone correct me if they heard otherwise.

First to 7.

Barnhart with a hit to the warning track? Give him credit for a HR already.

that way I look at it is that you never do know where a hitter's ceiling is going to be. He can OPS 1000 at every level up to AAA and still crash and burn in the majors, but one other thing is also true, guys that can't excel where they are are never going to get to the next level let alone the majors, so every time a guy plays well enough to be a candidate to be leveled up, that's a good thing for the org and a positive for a fan. Pitchers are a little easier I think, and maybe that is why a low competence organization has managed to do better with them. You can measure that a guy has a big league fastball when he's at A ball. You may not know if he will develop the command or consistency to be effective in the majors, but the arm and the pitch shape are there to see regardless of the level of hitter he is throwing to. OTOH, it's really hard to evaluate whether even a good MiLB hitter's pitch recognition skill is going to be good enough against MLB pitching until he faces it.

I keep seeing the Twitter bubble referenced—not sure who all this entails, but the ones I’m aware of I view mostly as Tigers fans. Emily seems nice, but it seems like she is typically sharing information that she comes across. I view Dan Hasty as an employee of the Tigers org and he is probably the most sunny and optimistic guy on the platform—he’d find positives in Jeffrey Dahmer if he was a Whitecap. Chris C doesn’t profess to be an analyst—just a very engaging and passionate super fan. Not sure who else is part of the Twitter mafia, but I really doubt that anyone here puts too much stock in any of it. I’ve learned much more from people here, like Gehringer, mutiger, Buddha, etc.. even still, I don’t agree with all of their perspectives. It’s called critical thinking, and we all possess it. To suggest otherwise is both incorrect and douchy.

i texted my ucla fan friend that iowa score and told him "welcome to the big ten." he told me south dakota was actually pretty good. so i see ucla is already fitting right in, making excuses for poor ooc games.

OK, this is total randomness. I never really have a reason to watch a college football game, but my cousin‘s son (does this make him my second cousin, or a cousin once removed? I can never figure that out), is the new defensive coordinator at Rutgers, who is (unbelievably) now a Big 10 team. They beat Boston College today (and I have no idea whether they should have, or they did well to do so), but I thought the defense was 👍👍. I know they’ll have a very hard time with Big 10 teams, but today’s game was totally watchable. 😁

The COVID overlay has also been mentioned. That is enough of a wildcard that it leaves all kinds of room to speculate. Long term diffuse chronic after affects of viral disease in general are probably much more widespread than are generally recognized by the public or the medical profession. If the COVID pandemic triggers more research in that area it will be a good thing. The difference for a professional athlete is that most people can manage to keep their lives together and hold down their employment while being at only 50-80% of their top form for a few months or maybe more while some physical normalcy hopefully returns. An MLB hitter does not have that luxury.

It's a whole song?

I know. I wasn’t criticizing you or suggesting you’re naive. I was building on what you said.

I think some of the MAGAs imagine a world where "one man, one vote" is literally one white man, one vote or one head of household (the white patriarch) one vote. They would welcome a form of democracy where this group dominated all the non-whites and non-males. I think we call that oligarchy. G2 and others took pains to educate me and my own observation has also instructed that we already have oligarchy in many ways because of the outsized influence of money (exacerbated post citizens united) enabling people like John Malone who can take over the editorial direction of CNN and the Murdochs who get to choose who will be the GOP presidential nominee because of Fox's reach.

Not sure you're referring to Madden or Flores or someone else here (since those guys are AA pitchers now), either way, I think it's possible to be interested in the performance of minor league players in the Detroit Tigers system despite the fact that many of them may not make the major leagues. Particularly on a Detroit Tigers message board for fans who follow this team more closely than the GP.

How popular was the deadly public violence against Jews and other marginalized groups in 1930s Europe? How many in the Aryan majority actively cheered it on? How many of the majority contributed to the marginalization of these people by firing them from their jobs, cutting off cordial relations with them, and excluding them from public spaces they managed? And how many of the majority simply kept their heads down, trying to ignore it so they could try to just live their own “normal” lives? I’m not sure we’ll ever know the actual numbers, but I do know this: only a small percentage of people in Germany were actively engaged in the actual violent repression, and the rest of Aryan society succumbed to the pressure to accept it just so they could get along with as little drama in their own lives as possible. That could be instructive for America today. It doesn’t take a majority of people answering a poll to politically approve of a violent anti-democracy to make a violent anti-democracy happen. All that’s really needed is a highly-motivated, well-resourced, establishment-supported minority to put it in motion, coupled with a well-fed, constantly-entertained, moderately affluent majority base that will passively accept what’s happening in the background so they can just live out their lives in comfort. That majority base doesn’t have to be active red hats, participate in pogroms, vote for Trumpy candidates, or anything like that. With their well-bring and livelihoods being a higher priority than any group representing a small fraction of the population, groups who are constantly demonized as “leftists”, “Antifa”, BLM”, “marxists”, “groomers”, or as an otherwise dangerous threat, all the majority will need to do for it all to succeed is to overlook the real threats to the red hat targets and mind their own fucking business.

Personally, I'd stay a bit tempered on both Flores and Madden. There's still a fair number of scouts I've talked to that have reliever projection on Madden, though he's converted a couple guys I know to thinking he can be a #4, and most also only see back-end ability for Flores due to c/c projection and less feel for the CH than you'd like at this stage.

Especially if the coaches are still stuck on the elevator.

You haven't seriously done introspection about the dialogue on the right. People want there to be political moderation. What people really want is for the political playing field to be free of violence. Until the MAGAs give up their calls for civil war and insurrections we won't have that.

I have a family member who survived a serious bout with Covid and know of others...it can really mess with your mental state, even after the physical symptoms have lessened. For people involved in long term medical research, I think Covid is going to be a treasure chest

Speaking of Kreidler and the chemistry lab, Cowan's post reminded me of almost failing physics lab. I had never failed a class in my life and surely did not want to repeat it. The teaching assistant looked like George Brett and I knew I was in trouble when some student told him that and the guy didn't know who George Brett was. Then, every week we'd come to lab and we'd ask the TA what we were supposed to do and he would say "I have no idea". I was not good at any kind of lab, so I watched what other people were doing on the lab and half assed my way through lab reports. I thought for sure I would fail, but I passed. George must have graded the lab reports.

Old Dominion beats VA Tech.

Soto closes it out to keep hope alive for a .500 season!

Tigers win! Breathing down the Royals’ neck for 4th place.

Since he is coming off a broken hand I will give him a pass for wearing the oven mitt on the basepaths which normally takes away from your grit and toughness.

Jim Bowden put out his list of "10 pitchers primed to make his top 50 in 2023" and Flores was one of them. If that comes to fruition and Jobe progresses along with Madden and we could be having ourselves a Big 3 Part Deux.

I really feel bad for Austin Meadows.....he is going through absolute hell.

Nice game by Madden! I keep forgetting to put him in my 2023 Rotation consideration but, really... he needs to be included. Might not make it out of Spring Training (most likely won't) but he still has to be in consideration.

Right... But in 2016 there were a lot of unknowns for the uninitiated on exactly who or what Trump was. And for those who were under financial duress in 2016, whether due to competition for high paying jobs or the evaporation of high paying jobs (manufacturing or other) or the lack of education/ ability to obtain a reasonable job that a family could be raised on... for this group of people I would give the most cause to turn to someone like Trump who, although he's been a con-artist his entire life.. the message of "Trust me, I can fix everything/ I can bring back your manufacturing jobs" well... that sounds pretty good. But it seems you're making a statement that 2022 and beyond are no different whatsoever from 2016... and I don't think that's true. I mean obviously, enough has come to light that a "reasonable" person, even if they re not politically initiated, can still see the shit storm that is surrounding Trump. Unless someone is hiding inside the Fox News cocoon... but I don't think that is reasonable person. Someone looking to be angry, at someone, and willing to be demagogic, or to lash out, is neither uninitiated nor reasonable. The center right, center left, Independents, etc... Will not be demagogic to that degree. So I think the extremism of MAGA SHOULD be called out for the following three reasons: 1) To the uninitiated, as you have pointed out, they are busy with their jobs and family and life, etc... so they are just going to ignore this, right? It's background noise. If Trump holding Top Secret documents illegally, whatever issues are at the southern border, Biden cheering a couple of great plans for the American people on the one hand and being angry at MAGA on the other hand... all falls to the wayside because they have more important things on their mind. This is all immaterial, right? Why would you pick out this one issue and raise it above all others? If they are busy with life, there's only ONE issue that will dominate all others: money. Do they have a job, is the economy strong, is inflation killing them? It's all about the money to support one's family. To me, "MAGA is BAD" is a non-issue with these folks. People vote their pocket book. 2) To the center right and Independents... This is pretty black and white IMO. There's no gray here. MAGA is willing to resort to violence and fascism. If someone uses this as an excuse to run back to Trump, they were never center right or Independent to begin with. There are no excuses any more, Trump and his followers have exposed themselves as who they actually are. I think this EXACT MESSAGE needs to be shouted out loud, by Biden, the FBI, etc., etc., etc. "We see you, we see you for your lies, for your violence, your hatreds and bigotry, and we will respond accordingly". If someone is center right.. you are saying that THIS message (including Angry Biden) will make them run back to Trump? Ummm... I don't think so. 3) That exact message, and not just message but actions; domestic terrorist cells need to be investigated (Proud Boys, 3 Percenters, Oath Keepers, etc.), and charges brought to trial for their actions... and publicly. If they are not publicly called out, and that includes the political movement and the politicians who are supporting this fascism as well as the terrorist militias all across America... then they think that no one is watching them and they can get away with murder or the kidnapping and execution of a Governor (Whitmer) or the overthrow of our Democracy. I believe this MUST be called out, out loud... and maybe the opposite will happen... not center right running back to Trump... but some people who may not be 100% invested in violent fascism, even if they support MAGA, might realize that things have gone too far... But we'll see. We'll see how people react... pretty soon in fact with midterms coming up.

In the way that a surgeon's scalpel is divisive when it removes the cancer from the body. In the way that the Allied armies in World War II were divisive in killing nazi scum.

Still not sold on the name Ryan Kreidler. It sounds like the grad student who graded your Chemistry lab.

For people who love it when someone "tells it like it is" they sure are snowflakes when their fee fees get hurt.

Honestly, why on earth would anything he said get them “riled up”? He spoke to people who would defend the capital police ATTACKERS being called patriots. Are you saying that in your experience THAT is what vets you know are thinking?? I give veterans more credit than that.

There is no uniting with people who are trying to overturn democracy.

Well there it is. Like the speech or else I am a trump lover who wishes he was there on Jan 6th to participate. There cant be any other reason to dislike that speech last night! You guys have become them and don't even know it.

WELL THEY ARE EMPTY SO THAT MEANS NOTHING WAS THERE

That's not Woody Allen. It's Bruce Springsteen

Humans don’t deserve this planet.

Fascinating how uniformed and well built and no powered equipment.