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A few notes: Skubal as a 5+ service time service player is not unique. Nearly every player to reach their final year of arbitration is a 5+ service time player. This is not some secret provision that makes him special. Why is it a story? Because Boras told his media cronies and they ate it up. The reason it’s rarely cited is that it has minimal persuasive value. Slubal is in his third year of arbitration. Not his fourth. That David price contract was a fourth year arbitration award. In Price’s third year he made 14. He went 4-10-14-19.7 over his four arb years. Juan soto’s record of 31 was also a fourth year arbitration contract. Soto went 8-17-23-31. Corbin Burnes was a three year arb guy. Had won a Cy young. Was coming off multiple star appearances. Received cy young votes multiple years in a row. His three arb salaries were 6-10-15. Now he’s getting 31 from free agency. The suggestion from Skubal/boras is that his arbitration salaries should be 4-10-32. A 22 million dollar raise. A 200+% raise. Skubal is a fantastic pitcher Second best in baseball at the moment. But he’s not a unicorn. He’s not the first tier 1 SP or ace or whatever label you want to use. He’s not the first player coming off a cy young. There was one just last year named Tarik Skubal that got over a 100% raise from his prior 4 million dollar salary. For Skubal and Boras to prevail, they would need to convince an objective and trained neutral arbitration panel that Skubal is so unique that his fair series of arbitration salaries would be at least 4-10-26. Is there a chance? The panel is human so anything is possible. But they are also huge nerds and they are going to love Scotty Harris.

legend.

SA were a bunch of repressed losers that the Nazis needed initially to sow the chaos they needed to take power. The SS were the diligent career men who knew this Nazi thing was a good career path. Once the regime made it cool to take the priests and other complaining members of their own community away, it became the right gig for the guy who had the right connections.

They are going to lose the Skubal pr battle no matter what happens. If they have a good 2026 season and they part ways on good terms, it will be fine. The middle path where the team is bad and he gets traded is what will suck.

How is Boras going to convince Harris and Hinch that Skubal is not allowed to pitch more than five innings? If Skubal never pitches more than five innings, who’s going to pay him what he wants? What team would give $50 million a year to a guy who willing to go into Operation Shutdown at the behest of his agent?

QFT

Ok I'll bite. My guess is your thinking trade Skubal to the Mets and we get Tong and another player goes to the Brewers who send us Peralta and we then sign Suarez ??

Here it is. Hull is a pretty funny dude.

The Packers get their hearts broken and the Aaron Rodgers gets destroyed in the same weekend? I'll take it !

Ghost didn't get the call because he dove as soon as he felt Cat's stick - you can see the way his weight was distributed he was helping push himself forward to go down.

Cry, Canes, cry.

Right there with you.

I listened to a Brett Hull podcast/interview recently where he claimed that Sergei was put on defense as a punishment because Bowman didn't believe he was consistently giving 100% but then was even more pissed off after because he realized he had a norris trophy level player in him if he kept him on D and wasn't sure if he actually had learned his lesson or not.

I think we have seen both the pinnacle and the death valley of Hinch's managing. The way he managed the pitching in the '24 run was unprecedented creativity, nobody's come close other than maybe Maddon. OTOH, he clearly had to be tearing his hair out not being able to find ways to pick-up a team in such a collective slump and pressing as at the end of '25. You can't blame him for them slumping the way you have to credit his pitching management, but OTOH, if there is anyone who can do something for a clubhouse vibe gone bad, you hope it's the manager. A+ tactician, maybe B- inspirational clubhouse guy.

So a pol ****ed people? No, tell me it ain't so!

Mike McDaniel is the exception to the norm. Not going to base the quality of the rule because one biracial guy who looks white is considered black. Someone like Tee Martin probably doesn’t get an interview. While it’s unlikely he gets hired, if he impressed word gets around. The Rooney rule gave him that opportunity.

Relative to the current 12-team system that includes conference championship games, a 24-team system without auto bids or conference championship games feels like an improvement. I would assume 8 byes and 16 teams playing in the first round at campus sites during the first week of December in place of conference championship games. A 9-24 matchup is likely to be more interesting than the current 5-12 (who is a true 20ish ranked team). A second set of campus site games in the round of 16, giving the top 8 seeds all a home game and a true 1-16 matchup feels ok. The toothpaste is out of the tube with the current system. Eliminating auto bids (which won’t eliminate the good group of five teams), and replacing meaningless conference championship games in the first week of December doesn’t seem so bad.

its a good thing the celtics never did an illegal screen.

Here's one published at the time that I remember.

pettiti really has it in for michigan...

The 19M to 32M difference is small change relative to the long term contract Skubal will eventually sign. The Tiger can say they will only negotiate contract extensions during the arbitration period and make Skubal/Boras decline a 200M + extension offer knowing Skubal is one injury away from missing out on a big pay day. BTW, agreeing to abide by an arbitration decision and pay a player between 19M and 32M, does not make the Tigers a trash organization. Under paying employees in the ticket offices, concessions. ushers, and minor leaguers struggling to make ends meet would make the Tigers a trash organization.

Didn't Trollaholic recently post something about Libs suppressing free speech????

if you were to try the most Machiavellian take on this, it would be that Boras would just as soon lose in arbitration if that loss strengthens Skubal's resolve to refuse any offer from the Tigers and go to FA as an aggrieved party because that's where the payoff is for Boras. To me, Skubal gives the impression of young man unlikely to manipulated even by his own agent, but I can't deny that's in Boras' interest to have a deep understanding of what makes his star clients tick and Boras is pretty good at looking after his interests. 🤔

My belief is that Skubal and boras are operating outside of any reasonable bounds here, and they are doing it precisely to push their narrative and make it into a story. I think it’s a calculated risk that they believe will pay off down the line. We all know boras is very skilled at this type of thing. But I don’t think it’s necessarily going to work before a three person panel of arbitrators from the AAA (American Arbitration Association).

Big win for Google. Apple really is going out of their way not to dump billions into developing their own AI. They seem content to just sit back and wait until someone actually starts to make money on it, then probably buy it. Probably cheaper in the long run. Not burning billions per year on something that isn't giving an ROI anytime soon is better for shareholders, too.

And it looks like Rodgers last pass was run back 50+ yards for a pick 6. Rodgers made a lame attempt to tackle, the interceptor laughed that off and headed to the endzone. Yeah, I can be petty.

not sure why the Texans signed Danielle Hunter when they already had Will Anderson; why would any team want more than 1 guy who can get to the QB?

Its more to see Aaron Rodgers fail. Just retire already...and that Houston defense is legit.

This is glorious. And to The Requiem by Mozart is a delight.

He’s still a fascist though. I mean… if cheering on those guys is your thing. Cool. We know where you would stand in 1930s Germany. it makes easier to sort out the good guys, especially when you blatantly tell us. It gets easier every day.

That would go poorly, but it would be fun to watch. Please, proceed.

3-0 with 2nd period goals by DeBrincat and Johansson (!). Back to back measuring stick games and so far the Wings are measuring up well.

He ran away from them

They’re scumbags.

Rumor on X is that the Browns are working on a deal with Ryan Day

As if shooting her in the face wasn’t enough. Dark times indeed…

Look whose back tonight doing the Anthem . . .

I doubt it. I think it came down to Chris I and Yzerman and Sergei were all youngish together in those years and Chris knew all those guys in a different way than his father did and so didn't have those hang-ups. It was inevitable but it had to work its way through.

I can change my mind, but the evidence needs to be convincing. People told me that AJ Hinch was was the best manager ever. I told them that managers don't matter. Now, I agree that Hinch is a great manager, the best I've followed closely. Then when I give him credit for the Tigers winning, people get MAD. Some people can just never be happy. 😐

I'm sure every red blooded, 16 year old sports fan was thinking of Anna lol.

Hunter was pardoned to protect him from fascists.

Might want to work on that part a little 😜

Hey pal, this is the “complaints department.” We only handle complaints here… 😉

About how I feel about the situation.

Raiders do have the #1 pick and can get a QB. The Browns head coach still has to deal with Watson and the circus that is Sanders.

as someone who manages a lot of people, if i went into an open process like arbitration and said all sorts of things about how they didnt deserve the same salary as x, y, or z, there would be hurt feelings. no matter how much money they made. i know "its a business", but its still hard to hear that your employer doesnt think youre worth what you think youre worth. baseball players arent robots.