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I had long thought North Carolina could not support a team because the population is so scattered and it would be more difficult to fill 40,000 seats every night, but as times goes by, I think that’s less important than it was maybe even ten years ago. Nowadays they don’t depend so much on high game day attendance to ensure fiancical success, so they could build a stadium in the low 30s, even high 20s, that could look fuller for the optics. But a new franchise would probably be a financial boon for everyone involved almost regardless of where they put it or how many show up for games.

I think D is right overall, regardless of the megamillions ticket, not just because of the reliever trades he made, but because of the reliever trades he didn't make.

He's not wrong.

I don't consider how much Dickerson talks as being a negative. I like hearing the insights he provides, and I like the volume he provides. He digs deep beneath the surface and I appreciate that. I also like when he goes into discussions about the intricacies of baseball, whatever the actual topic may be, with whomever his partner might be at the moment.

I don’t think hitters en masse could change their approach to hitting in a single year, basically because it probably takes at least that long to recognize the change as being persistent and not transitory. I would think that it would take two, three, maybe more years for such a change to be completed on a league-wide basis. And even then, not all players who today rely on launch angle at the cost of high strikeouts in the service of chasing home runs would be able to hack it in that new game. Because of that, I believe a deadened ball with the shift still in place, one that eventually would create a sea change in hitting to spraying more line drives around, might result in a different composition of players playing in the majors in the first place. Some current players wouldn’t be able to hack the change and crap out quicker; others who might not make the majors today because they can’t jack bombs but are decent at spraying line drives around would have a better chance. I think just that change in player composition due to the reprioritizing of skill sets would make it a very different game—and one I think I would enjoy more.

While Henning acknowledges that Ilitch will probably have to fire Avila, basically only because the fans are screaming for it, his article reads more to me like he is exasperated by people criticizing Avila, to the point of saying in as many words that it is reckless of fans to criticize the 2017 return on Verlander and J.D. through 2022 eyes, and that it’s practically not Avila’s fault that he walked into a seven-year-long ambush following the firing of Dave Dombrowski. Henning could not even bring himself to flat out say that the rebuild didn’t have to be this bad for this long. He had to qualify it by saying that “some will say”, “maybe correctly”, that it didn’t have to be so bad, and qualified it again by saying “they might be right”. He simply can’t bring himself to putting that opinion on the record, who knows why—perhaps out of respect for all the dinners, drinks, and off-the-record conversations he probably had with Avila over the decades. Henning is an executive’s beat columnist. He’s not going to drive the bus over Al as long as Al is still here.

If they put it up to a vote in all 50 states, the pro-choice position would win 50 out of 50 times and abortion would be safe, effective, and legal everywhere. So the only real strategy Republicans have is to remove voters from the equation entirely, because otherwise the people would just get what they want.

They'll probably get slightly more balls in play, but not because players would be changing their approach and trying to spray line drives all around the field looking for base hits, which might have happened over the course of a few seasons if the shift were to continue apace and the ball were to continue in its current slightly-deadened state. A sea change in general batter approach was never going to occur within a single season. But what the continuing shift plus deadened ball might have accomplished is hitters finally waking up to the idea that not only is the ball not going to fly out of the park like before, but that failure to hit as many homers would result in even more outs because the rate of homers hit over the shift would fall below the ROI breakeven point due to making outs by hitting into the shift, which might have led hitters to find other ways to get hits, i.e., change their approach to hit around shifts. Now with the removal of the shift starting next year, players can continue to try pulling homers out of the park, and when they fail to barrel the ball sufficiently to do so, they can be rewarded with the consolation prize of more base hits into right field, and they can then just try to pull it out of the park again next time up at the plate. Their behavior won't change, but the results will be marginally better enough for them to keep trying. That strikes me as a recipe for continuing elevated rates for home run and strikeouts, two outcomes Baseball loves because highlights (and, presumably, prop-bet gambling). What I will be interested in seeing next year is whether the ball is livened up again and homer rates go back up. Based on whatever my understanding might be of what makes Baseball as a business tick, that's at least a 50-50 proposition.

I would actually be surprised if there were much Venn intersection between the two at all.

And heeeere co-o-ome the pretzels ...

The Avila regime has been taking a lot of heat lately for the failure of their past drafts and development efforts, so I can see them front-burnering promotions of multiple Pipeline-ranked prospects desperately seeking some win, any win on that front. In that same vein, I also would not be surprised to see Sawyer Gipson-Long appear on the mound for the big club sometime before the end of the year.

"You must tell the truth while you testify. This is not your show." BAM!

Would they?

We've been noting here for years how top-heavy it was.

There can never be another Vin Scully.

From almost five years ago:

I think this means Baseball is doubling down on the home run: by mandating removal of the extra fielder from the pull side, more batters will be encouraged to try to pull and lift the ball out of the park because if they miss and hit liners or grounders, it’s more likely they’ll get base hits instead of grounding out 9-3. The wild card will be whether they keep the ball deadened or, preferably, deaden it even more to reduce homers back down to under 1.00 per team game. I don’t think they would do so if the home run is the most popular prop bet event, which I would not doubt that it is.

This is one reason they need to deaden the ball for good, and even more than it is now. If pitchers know the ball will stay in the park for most hitters, they won’t have to put 110% on every single pitch; the can pitch more to contact with versions of fastballs instead of breaking balls; less need for high spin, less pressure on UCLs, fewer injuries on the whole. Counterpoint: Baseball likes having to cycle through innumerable league-minimum options.

Perhaps because Avila had gotten the memo that this was the hot new offensive strategy a few years too late.

My fear is that we evolve into something like the Pirates going forward: luck into the occasional impact player from drafting, signings or trades; surround him with AAAA and underachieving-veteran teammates; play ~70-win ball year after year while the impact player matures; trade impact player at the deadline before they can make too-high salaries and receive underwhelming prospects in returns; rinse and repeat ad infinitum. Can you see something like that happening with Riley or TORK!? As long as this regime is in control, I can.

I was just thinking before coming into this thread about whether we would hear that Avila couldn’t move Soto, Chafin, or Jimenez because he was asking for the moon and the stars for some or all of them.

There were some other bad returns on trades besides just ours. The Cubs got a bag of balls for Dave Robertson, and they didn’t move Contreras or Happ at all.

How much you wanna bet Fulmer pitches an immaculate inning against us tonight?

RHP Sawyer Gipson-Long