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Debbie Downer says: When the Republicans do systematically steal an actual election, it will be impossible to overturn because of this bill, since it will still come down to partisan votes in the chambers. That's right. "When".

This may or may not be funny to you. I rather liked it.

Like I say, Aaron Judge seems like a fine fella and it's nothing personal. I'm just not looking forward to the garbage moral takes about "clean".

lol line forms way in the back of the room

I have nothing against Aaron Judge personally—he seems like an OK-enough guy—but I am actively rooting against his making 62 or even 61 home runs. Part of it is Yankee hate, sure, since the national media will crow that it always was a record that rightfully belongs to the Yankees, because barf. But the bigger reason is that I am not looking forward to the unseemly moralizing about Judge getting the "real record", i.e., one that people haven't discounted because of the so-called steroid era. The media will wax idiotic about how Judge is "clean", the way Pujols is "clean", and the way any other home run hitter writers personally like are declared to be "clean". And, by definition, anyone who exceeded 61 home runs since Maris is "dirty". We will be hearing about that incessantly for the rest of our natural lives. I realize I'm hoping against hope that he will fall short, because he almost surely will not fall short, but speaking only for myself, I'm not looking forward to the moralizing that will attend to it. This is only my opinion and you may not share it, and that's OK.

You're right, and I also believe that it wouldn't matter so much if Trump was saying all the same knuckle-headed MAGA garbage in the exact same words—if his voice sounded like Bill Buckley's while he was doing so, he would not be nearly as popular. We may find out with DeSantis whether this hypothesis holds water, although it's also possible that his tone and voice will be adjusted to connect with the red hats more viscerally.

In their last 30 games, the Dodgers have gone 20-10. That stretch reduced their season winning percentage from .699 to .693.

I don’t think this gets acknowledged much, but I do believe a big part of Trump’s appeal is that he talks like a Queens stevedore, something he leveraged on his TV show to spike his popularity among the people who like that type of show. It sounds like tough talk, which is basically the only thing red hats respect. If Trump sounded like Bill Buckley—or, in this case, Ron DeSantis—I don’t think he’d be nearly as popular.

I’m sure there’s some perfectly valid, law-abiding, law-enforcing reason Paxton is fleeing the law. Too bad Bunker isn’t here to tell us about Paxton’s socialist, baby-eating, Manchurian candidate election opponent.

That’s because they figure girls don’t need STEM to raise kids, bake cookies, and clean house.

You’re right, I missed one. D’Oh. Pujols started in 2001 when Harold Baines was in the game Baines started in 1980 when Willie McCovey was still in the game. And so on …

And a clear bonus is that if you have to recite your number to a worker, there’s no way they recognize the number unless they are white people between age 50 and 64.

I would bet Schoop comes back. He just had a season of elite D, plus a super low BABIP that might be driven by a receded EV and barrel rate that’s more a symptom of poor swing mechanics and timing than eroding raw power—i.e., he might be fixable. He’s probably not done done, and we’re not going to DFA him or anything like that. I also don’t see Scott Harris “alaviling” Schoop away in trade, although if Harris can swing a trade with actual decent return, given the potential for Schoop’s bat to be fixed, that’s within the range of outcomes, too.

There sure is a lot of wishcasting about A.J. getting axed among Tiger fans in multiple forums.

We can do a whole six degrees with this: Pujols started in 2001 when Willie McCovey was in the game McCovey started in 1959 when Enos Slaughter was still in the game. Slaughter started in 1938 when Waite Hoyt was still in the Game. Hoyt started in 1918 when Bobby Wallace was still in the game. Wallace started in 1894 John Montgomery Ward was still in the game. Ward started in 1878 when Al Spaulding was still in the game. Spaulding started out in the 1871 National Association. There’s our six degrees.

Tallest m*****s in the circus.

His voice is the least of my critiques of Monroe, behind his general lack of insights, his clubhouse-y rah-rah demeanor, and his inability to build on anything Dan says.

I know this is probably weird, but one of the things I am excited to see is whom Scott Harris will shitcan this winter. Almost as much as whom we will pick up to replace them. I think I might be disappointed if more than half the guys I named were on the 40-man next April.

QAnon.

Based on my understanding of the public information we all have, I agree with a few things in your post. For one, I agree that Baby Doc is a more hands-off owner than Pap Doc was, so he’s unlikely to force something silly like another 8/300 extension for Miggy. I also agree that obtaining impact free agents, as opposed to stopgap free agents, is something we can benefit from right away even if we believe this is not the year to contend. And I agree that even if they don’t make a move this winter, they can cobble together 70-75 wins assuming all the luck levels out on bouncing balls, injuries, and the like. I don’t agree that Miggy’s contract will be bought out and that he’ll be given the gate. Not only will a significant portion of revenue-producing fans object to that, I think a lot of the players, the Latin players in particular, may take a bad message from him being basically banished from the clubhouse. They may not play him, but I do think they’ll find either roster spot or an IL spot for him which will keep him in the dugout during games. So I think we can plan on zero wins from him, as opposed to -1 or -2, in 2023. As for who’s going to stay and who’s going to go … I need to think on that some. I think Brieske, Hill, Cisneros, Hutchinson, and Alexander might all be gone. Norris too, of course. On the bat side I see both Castros, Reyes, and of course, Tucker being shown the door. Maybe there will be more, I don’t know. But my impression of Scott Harris is that he will not be sparing when it comes to making decisions on who to cut and replace.

Most people are in bubbles, so your theory checks out.

Its hard for me to see how candidates can believe the majority of voters are so cruel that they’ll be motivated to go to the polls on statements like this.

We already have a bunch of guys who hit like Miguel Andujar. He’s been WAR-negative since he’s turned 24. Pass. Maybe he can land on the Rockies next year with Tucker Barnhart where they can both revive their chances for a career.

Well, there's no having to explain Barnhart since most of us knew he was terrible coming in. He had had exactly one season of better than 0.9 bWAR out of his eight total seasons coming into the year. Nobody who was paying attention before the season began who reasonably have expected him to contribute any wins to this team. So we can throw him out. As for the other three, the one that hurt us most was Candelario. He was a 3.8-win player last year and face-planted his way to 0.2 this year, so that's 3.6 wins he's lost us all on his own. Schoop lost a couple wins (2.0 last year, 0.0 so far this) and Baez's value was basically cut in half from 4.6 last year to 2.3 this year. Add them all up, and instead of 57-92, we get to 65-84. So even if they matched their performances of last season, or even elevated their performance by, say, two wins each—if Candy and Baez were six- or seven-win players, and Schoop earned us four wins—we'd still be solidly under .500. And the reason we'd be under .500 under any circumstance is that this roster is littered with the rookies and AAAA players that Al Avila acquired for us. There's that word again: "littered". How dare I use that word to describe our roster? Here's how I dare: The Tigers have had a total of 51 different players put on the uniform at game time during this season. Of those 51, sixteen have been rookies: Alex Faedo; Ángel De Jesus; Beau Brieske; Drew Carlton; Elvin Rodríguez; Garrett Hill; Jason Foley; Joey Wentz; Kody Clemens; Luis Castillo; Josh Lester; Kerry Carpenter; Kody Clemens; Riley Greene; Ryan Kreidler; and Spencer Torkelson. Of the remaining 35 players, there are 11 I would consider AAAA players, guys who have either bounced up and down between the majors and the minors throughout their careers, or guys at or near sub-replacement career WARs who would be bouncing up and down had they not spent their big-league careers exclusively with the Tigers. Those 11 are: Bryan Garcia; Daz Cameron; Derek Hill; Drew Hutchison; Dustin Garneau; Harold Castro; Jacob Barnes; Rony García; Víctor Reyes; Willi Castro; and Zack Short. That's 27 out of 51 Tiger players this year who were either rookies or AAAA players. More than half. And it's not as though these were emergency replacements who were coming in for someone who had to go on the IL and then turning right back down I-75 15 days later. These are guys who got oodles of playing time with this team. Of the 5,379 plate appearances the Tigers made going into tonight's game, these rookies and AAAA players had 42% of them. And of the 1,303 innings pitched by the team, 39% were by rookies and AAAA pitchers. I suppose one could debate whether someone like Victor Reyes (0.6 career WAR in five years) or Harold Castro (-1.2 WAR in five years) should be considered AAAA, given that they've basically maintained their spots on the big club for a few years each. I would counter that neither Reyes not Hackin' Harold would have an ongoing spot on any other roster, outside of Pittsburgh, Baltimore, Kansas City, or Miami, for the last five years running. The point is this: we can place blame on A.J. and the coaches for whatever their part is in the collapse of three of the four guys you named, if it makes us feel better. But I don't think there is any way we can blame them for not leading this same group of guys, handed to them by Al Avila and crew, and getting this same amount of playing time, to the winning record most of us imagined was gonna happen. As the guy here who arguably hates A.J. the most has said, anyone else would have ended up with basically the same result.

Vince Gilligan makes it clear within the article that Rhea Seehorn will be playing a hero, not an anti-hero.