chasfh

I'm knocked out by the idea that games lasted 2-1/2 to 3 hours back then. Given how quickly hitters put pitchers' pitches into play, that must have entailed a hell of a lot of dawdling.

Well, at least he's consistent.

The Pirates are buying?!

Nesbitt thinks it's a reliever now for a reliever later. Stavenhagen thinks Montalvo is a starter. https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/5669835/2024/07/30/mlb-trade-grades-andrew-chafin-tigers-rangers/ The trade Texas Rangers get: LHP Andrew Chafin Detroit Tigers get: RHP Chase Lee, RHP Joseph Montalvo Stephen J. Nesbitt: The Rangers have had a bottom-10 bullpen by ERA this season, and adding a veteran lefty like Chafin will help bolster that unit. Chafin had a 1.35 ERA through May 7, and over the next month that number swelled to 5.40 because of three particularly bad outings. Since early June, though, Chafin has allowed only one run over 17 innings. He is a known commodity, exactly the type of arm teams target at the trade deadline. Chafin eviscerates lefties, and the AL West has some scary ones. Chafin has held left-handed hitters to a .474 OPS this season, compared to .756 OPS for righties. We’ve seen a few lefty relievers moved already this month — A.J. Puk, Jalen Beeks, Caleb Ferguson — and Chafin might be the most reliable of the bunch. His command is solid. He’s leaning on his slider more than ever this season, leading to a career-best strikeout rate (30.9 percent). The Tigers, who enjoyed their first go-round with Chafin in 2022 so much that they brought him back in 2024, now acquire his expiring contract for a couple minor league arms. Baseball America has Montalvo ranked as the Rangers’ No. 19 prospect. Between Lee and Montalvo, there’s a decent chance the Tigers will one day get a capable reliever out of this deal. Rangers: B Tigers: B Cody Stavenhagen: Chafin has had a nice bounce-back season after a down year in 2023. With a 34.4 percent whiff rate and a slider that is holding opposing hitters to a .132 average, he makes perfect sense for a Rangers bullpen in need of another left-handed weapon. The Rangers have an uphill climb to make the postseason, but Chafin is the type of durable arm who could take down important innings in their quest to get there. He even comes with a $6.5 million team option after the season the Rangers could pick up if all goes well. Detroit gets back a pair of interesting right-handed arms. Lee averages 12.3 strikeouts per nine innings in relief over four years in the minors. Montalvo, currently a starter, has a riding fastball and a swing-and-miss slider that have helped him post a 2.63 ERA and solid strikeout rates in the minors. The Tigers believe in their ability to get the most out of pitchers, so getting two intriguing arms rather than one makes this a solid return. Rangers: B+ Tigers: B

Do you have the fever? Because the only prescription is more cowbell.

You know what they say: you can't have too many left-handed-hitting outfielders.

Fifty-five minutes left. I want my shiny new toys!

Absolutely, and Facebook, Imstagram, YouTube, all of it. It will be especially delicious when it comes to Twitter.

Again, someone should start a random baseball thread for random baseball stuff—anyway, pulling together something for a deck I'm doing and ran across this interesting tidbit from 1901, just as the American league was becoming a major league.

Fire Harris!

Montalvo is the get. #27 Pipeline midseason, #19 Fangraphs as of July 12. FG: 19. Joseph Montalvo, SP Drafted: 20th Round, 2021 from Central Pointe Christian (FL) (TEX) Age 22.2 Height 6′ 2″ Weight 185 Bat / Thr S / R FV 40 Tool Grades (Present/Future) Fastball Slider Changeup Command Sits/Tops 40/50 50/60 40/55 35/60 91-94 / 97 Montalvo has a very athletic drop-and-drive delivery with big hip/shoulder separation that may portend more velocity even though he’s a smaller-framed guy. He’s run a sub-3.00 ERA at every minor league level, including at High-A this year, because Montalvo’s command weaponizes below-average stuff that might keep improving. His fastball already punches above its weight because of its uphill angle, and Montalvo has feel for a long-bending low-80s slider that flashes plus length and will likely play plus at maturity because of his command. He also has a mid-80s changeup that flashes bat-missing tail, but it tends to have early action that puts hitters off the scent, and Montalvo uses it sparingly. Montalvo’s capacity for movement and lower body athleticism is exciting and makes me want to project on his stuff quality into his mid-20s. He’s thrown a ton of strikes in the low minors and stands a good shot to be a no. 4/5 starter down the line. He’s Rule 5 eligible this offseason and might be kept at High-A all year in effort to keep him off the Rule 5 radar. He’s more likely to be rostered after next season and debut in 2026, probably as a spot starter. Seems like a good get for a middle reliever.

But at least Flaherty will not have blocked a trade at the last second! 😁

They allow toilet paper in the visitor's clubhouse? Talk about mollycoddling. Why, back in my day, if an opponent tried to wipe his ass with toilet paper we'd beat him unconscious to a bloody pulp and then let the red ants do the rest. The nerve ...

Ha ha ha, yeah, I'm actually being serious here.

Or ... and hear me out, here ... or he's going to explain why he did not or could not trade Flaherty.

How soon before the RWM start hammering Twitter for its liberal bias for allowing pro-Kamala/anti-Trump tweets on its platform?

Jonathan Swan got it all wrong in his tweet. The correct way to say it is, "Trump doesn't yet have a functioning transition team but will likely never need its resources anyway."

Shhh, don't give the mopes ideas! 😝

Homophobic queer-shaming is a bad look in 2024.

They can call it Project 2025 or the Fascism Program or the Permanent Government Shutdown Proposal or Betty Jane Bluebells if they want. It doesn’t matter what they call it because they’re still going to do it. All of it. Kamala cannot let anyone forget that.

Trump can’t get his arms around a rabbit? What is he in this meme, two-foot-three?

Non-player character? National Physique Committee? Northland Pioneer College? National Panhellenic Conference? National Plasterers Council? National Pharmaceutical Council? Navy Personnel Command? National Park College? Am I getting any closer? https://www.google.com/search?q=NPC&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&client=firefox-b-1-m

Talk about the gift that keeps on giving … One of the things I was really worried about after the debate was that Trump was taking some sort of high road by not piling on Biden and instead letting Biden implode on his own, and that would bring reasonable swing voters and fence-sitters into the fold. But now with Kamala on board, it’s been just a complete 180. Trump is not only back to his unhinged self, but now he’s really going off the deep end, not bothering to keep his anti-anyone-not-WASPy-man-ism in check at all anymore. The worse he thinks it’s going for him, the worse a candidate he gets. If he keeps going on the trajectory he’s now on, not only will he lose his election , but the Democrats will mop the floor with the Republicans in the House, and D might end up keeping the Senate as well despite an historically unfavorable election map. It’s freaking amazing in the best possible way. What I’m tying myself into knots over is trying to figure out just how the Supreme Court is going to step in and hand him the presidency. It might be as simple as they rule on an arcane election fraud issue in his favor—someone here once said the justices care too much about their legacy to do anything so crass, but at least five of them owe their careers to Trump and/or don’t give a shït about what liberals think their legacy should be—or it might be in some way no one can even imagine today. Either way, if we think SCOTUS is just going to sit on their hands and allow democracy to simply happen in this election, then I believe they don’t understand this particular Court.

Not doing the players any favors, either. I’m maybe 80% certain that the Tigers have more home day games than any other team.