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Exactly. The game on the field is merely the conduit for maximizing revenue, and can be radically modified to that end. And if a particular radical modification doesn’t work, they can employ additional radical modifications until they are satisfied they’ve achieved optimal profitability trajectory.

I can see us passing on Bregman this time because we have other holes to fill and/or the front office is calculating that we have enough to cover third base well enough going forward. They may also try to cover it with a trade for Arenado, which is getting a lot more Twitter buzz the past day or so. I’m not sure how I feel about a grizzled veteran parachuting into a group of underpaid kids in the same circumstance who are all getting along—after all, Arenado was getting mouthy in the media about how the kids were overrunning the Cardinals clubhouse—but he is a plus defender with pop in the stick who would put us on the hook for only 3/69, rather than 6+/pushing 200. It might depend as much on how any new player gels within the clubhouse and its culture for the next several seasons, as it does on how much the new guy can help us play into November in 2025 and we’ll figure out what happens after that.

It’s not about the game on the field. It’s about the stars in the promotional spots. That’s how they want to grow the game.

If Harris signs Alex Bregman, I am all in on that. If Harris does not sign Alex Bregman, I’m all in on that, too. That’s because my assumption is that the decision will be based strictly on whether Bregman is the best fit for us both right now and going forward, and that we won’t be signing him because we have to sign whatever big free agent we can so we can signal our arrival, or that we will forego signing him because Bregman’s perfect for us but Baby Doc simply doesn’t want to spend the money.

I remember going to HR early-ish in my career because my boss, who was known to be skating on thin ice in other aspects of her job, was using the force of her authority to employ bullying tactics against me. I had been chafing against it, but it was only getting worse. HR’s suggestion? Just show acceptance of it by “rolling over and showing my belly”—that way I’d be showing my submission in a proper way, she’d be satisfied that I recognize her as the dominant force, and then she would stop bullying me and start treating me with respect. That was the last time I ever went to HR for anything.

Well, that blows that entire position out of the water.

Well, they do oppose Ukraine, so that’s what passes as anti-war cred.

But he can start dropping bombs on Iran. After all, Iraq didn’t have anything to do with 9/11, either.

Did you say you wanted to see Mickey Mantle’s first career at-bat? Well, here you go, then:

Trump dropped bombs on seven countries when he was president the first time around.

Похоже вам ребята пора начинать подтягивать свой русский.

You mean the Republican Senate that's utterly beholden to the leader of their party? That Senate?

I already tried this argument here. No takers.

Hey, the top tier basketball league in the world fields teams in Oklahoma City, Memphis, and New Orleans, and they are all smaller markets than Grand Rapids-Kalamazoo-Battle Creek.

That's a sad field of study to excel in.

Yes, but there's more. It's not just that aging hitters have slower reflexes. It's also that the pitcher class they face as an old hitter is better than they did as a young hitter. Especially nowadays—pitchers are much harder to hit now, if nothing else than due to velocity, than they were fifteen, or ten, or even five years ago. I like to call it the Wooderson Effect: the batter gets older, the pitchers stay the same age.

More evidence supporting the hypothesis that Ricketts is all about going to the bank and not at all about winning an eminently winnable division.

I'd be surprised if those deferred obligations did not factor into the sales price.

Oh, yeah, they got a straight line to the White House on crypto, and they have the criminal history Ttump loves so much in his cohorts, so hells yeah they're coming back.

Yeah, really, who gives a f***? Except sore winners who are too insecure to just let that s*** go already. People who still crave the approval of the elites they claim to hate.

I don't think Ttump's going to allow Hegseth and Patel to go through nominations. They're going to be recess appointments. Granted, he won't do recess appointments for literally everybody. At least I don't think so—he may be beyond giving any s***s about that. But I can see him allowing low-stakes appointments go through the process for appearances' sake, people like Doug Collins for Veterans, Doug Burgum for Interior, even L'il Marco for Secretary of State. But the guys he really wants in there at all costs, the guys he wants to go in and just hollow out and effectively disable core government functions from within? I don't see him allowing them to go through confirmation hearings. Hegseth and Patel are two of those guys. RFK, Tulsi, Linda McMahon, and maybe Brendan Carr are a few others.

The only both sidings is the idea that this rises to the level of Trump inevitably and preemptively pardoning himself and his entire family and criminal inner circle for all crimes past, present, and future. ****, he'd already pardoned his daughter's FIL and just now handed him a plum ambassador role.

Good. Stick it right up Trump’s ass sideways.

Well, they don’t want to go back to all of the early 1950s.

Indeed. Preferably early 1950s.