gehringer_2

If vax rates stay below the herd immunity level (whatever that turns out to be, which is going to be higher than initially understood due to delta) then everyone will be infected in a year or two more. My best estimate is that at least a third of the country has already had it now (we know of ~50 million cases and there has to be at least one case unreported for everyone that is.....) At that point the susceptible non-vaxxed will be dead and thus no longer a pubiic health risk. So it is what it is. Society has actually managed to compensate pretty well really. We are not all at home sitting in the dark and cold - the GDP is doing fine and the labor market is tight. So if we had to yes - we could do this indefinitely. The only thing for certain is that little is certain. For example Paxlovid (Pfizer's new drug) might make a huge difference - or it might not.

While cases at UM seem to be on the way back down from a local peak, cases are still skyrocketing in Washtenaw County. Significance here is the Washtenaw and Oakland have the highest vax rates in SE MI and cases are still climbing in both places. Since we haven't heard much about a variant replacing delta, do have to assume vaccine immunity is wearing off? Vaccinated patients are 50% of hospital admissions in Washtenaw. Or with life going largely back to 'normal' are all these folks the 5-10% left out of luck by a 90-95% effective vaccine and a vaccine too contagious for herd immunity to take effect in the community even at the 70% immunization rates? On the plus side (what there is of it) over 500K shots were delivered last week and ~500K Michigan minors have been vaccinated since the approval.

yup - offer the opt out and front load the contract a bit and pray like crazy that being at the top of his game at 31 or 32 and seeing that new deals at higher AAV are being signed encourages the athlete to opt out. You might lose one or two years of performance but have saved yourself a likely 5yrs of shoveling money into a black hole.

I think the only guy that has paid off on a 10 yr deal was ARod's original deal from Tx. Because they signed him at 24. He produced every year on that contract until he opted out (now with the Yankees) of the last 3 yrs. Yankees then extended him for 10 yr at 31 and got only 5 productive years. If you look at Arod, Pujols and Cabrera - three of the greatest players of their eras - "generational" by any definition, and NONE of them could produce on a long term contract that took them into their later 30s. And Trout probably won't either. Just offer a guy $60M for 5 yrs and be done with it since that's what you are actually going to get!

GOP business deregulation.

Yeah and I think Ross or some such underwrote part of Harbaugh's original deal as well. The argument is "Well it's fine, the money is not coming from the Chemistry/English/Art Dept." But how true is that, really? If you have a big bank roll donor maybe he would have given it to the chemistry dept if that's what you had asked for. Sure there are going to be some guys who have a big sports thing, but I think the idea that somehow these deals are all 'free' money is an overstatement at best. There is some varying level of donor 'opportunity cost' with each one. Maybe less than most in this case but who really knows?

this is a family forum right? Maybe not.

IDK, I think it's not necessarily better when it's 'fluke' injuries accumulating around a player. I guess you have to analyze each one individually but that kind of thing can indicate a certain lack of body consciousness or recklessness as well and that can be just a bad as actually being physically fragile. It's just really hard to know. A guy whose never been hurt can be done tomorrow, but guess if it were my money he's still the guy I'd prefer - if I have a choice.

10yr/$95M reported. Good for him Hope he doesn't end up 9-4.

Along this line, I won't be surprised to see Seager signed 1st.

Maybe then, I'll fade away And not have to face the facts It's not easy facing up When your whole world is black

Fister for Ray was good trade. The impatience with Ray resulted in an overal loss of roster capital.

there was a time losing your committee assignments would have made you dead meat against an opponent from either other party or your own because you wouldn't have any legislative work to show, but in a party where legislating is no longer even remotely the point, you are correct.

Zing!

Right now I guess it's bad enough everywhere, but the core of the early dissatisfaction with the state was that conditions in the counties across the state were wildly different - I guess meaning the county health depts should be taking the lead. Do MI county depts of health have that kind of authority?

I count 7 guys on the 40 today I don't think would be losses so I'd be willing to protect some new guys.

Wentz was lights out when the showed up at Erie in 2019. It was only a handful of games but he dominated so that got people charged up. In his come back from TJ he was putting up good BA against but still hadn't gotten his walk rate back down where it needs to be as the season ended. But command is the usually the last thing that comes back, so we'll see.

so Boyle is ahead of Blough on the depth chart? How do they even tell them apart? They seem to be the same guy.

you'd get a glaring disparity between the international players and the domestic college players. Although OTOH for the same reason it might make a lot of guys more interested in going to the minors at 18 instead of college. Don't really know if that's good or bad but it could be a reversal of the trend.

Kind of funny looking actually. Holds his torso very straight up - but sure, no excess moving parts.

Bertuzzi next in 3..2..

and one that all the baby boomer couch potatoes remember for stealing their quarters at that.....

Epic level of Oblivion

No question - he could come out flat ST and they leave him in Toledo to ripen, but if so it's not going to be based on the way he finished in '21.

Really, how do you figure, the HRs were in 4 different games, a double was in another different game, and they walked him twice the one night he didn't have a hit