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Or maybe Soto and his agent want to give the Nationals the next three years to demonstrate that they are going to put a long-term winning organization together that can rival the Dodgers and the Yankees. That’s a real possibility, too. Soto is already going to make a record first-year arbitration amount whenever baseball gets back on the track. There’s no pressure to take all the money he’s ever going to make right now, or else.

Maybe Soto would rather wait to get 350 million from the Dodgers or the Yankees later than take 350 million from the Nationals now. There’s no reason to believe he won’t get at least that same amount in three years.

Right. As a kid.

What are the chances that Fox is strategically allowing these kinds of commentaries on an occasional basis as a defense in potential future court cases brought against them? You know, so they can claim fair and balance because they air both sides.

Maybe someone should check the IP address of Lyin’ Ted’s tweet.

Seems like their only real goal is to break the spirit of the union. If playing the games were really important to the owners, they would have the season continue while they continue negotiating the new CBA, instead of locking the players out and forcing games to be canceled.

Was it better for her job that she does hate sports, so she couldn't be unduly influenced in some way?

Low bar for what constituted “entertainment” in 1986.

Looks fine to me. I think four-team divisions, instead of eight, is a forgone conclusion for a couple of reasons: (1) Four-team divisions gives more teams more opportunities to be in division races and playoffs, which should be attractive to gamblers. (Oh, and I guess sucker fans, too, whatever.) I don’t think Baseball cares about sub-.500 teams playing in the playoffs, even if they pretend to care in press conferences. More teams in it means more interest. And (2) nobody wants to try to market a team that’s languishing in seventh or eighth place after the All-Star break. I know some people completely reject the entire idea that teams care about that, but they certainly do. Avoiding high-number finishes is one of the reasons they went to divisions back in 1969 in the first place.

I assume Angels will just do what they do in the NL when the hitting pitcher comes out of the game: if the game is within a slam, they’ll double-switch their way out of having the pitcher’s slot come up, and send up a parade of pinch-hitters if/when it does. In late-inning blowouts, they’ll just have relief pitchers stand in the back outside corner of the box and take three pitches down the pipe for the out.

Logan Webb might go down in history as the last pitcher to homer in a big league ballgame.

Object lesson, right under our very noses.

Be sure you get one of the new Divvy bikes to ride when you’re here. Here I am on my own bike, pushing hard to maintain 16 or so MPH, huffing and puffing, sweating my ass off, and I still routinely get passed up by middle-aged ladies out on a Sunday ride on these newer-model Divvys, not even breaking a sweat. Makes me question my very existence when that happens.

Oh yeah, and Putin's got it all.

Got it. Clear as mud. 😉

The sentence that ends the Mediaite story: "What an incredibly embarrassing moment for Fox News." I disagree with this take, because you can't be embarrassed if you have no shame.

There you go, that makes sense.

I meant Trump being quiet while the Democrats agitate loudly to get him to testify, which could successfully portray him as being persecuted by the elites. He probably won't do so, but he could benefit politically with squishy Republican moderates if he did. Those people are eager for him to become "presidential" so they can support him with a clear conscience. But I do think you're on to something regarding being quiet or even meek in court. I remember Trump being interviewed by Colbert before the 2016 election early on in the CBS show's run. Trump was the opposite of bomb-thrower on the show. He was quiet, gentle, measured, borderline meek and "aw shucks", perhaps because he was in the presence of someone who qualifies as being "the elite"? I can't say I know this for certain but that's how it struck me. That comports with my own experience because I've seen plenty of instances of working class red hat-types who rail angrily against "rich assholes" to each other, but then go very quiet and passive when in the presence of someone they perceive to be that, behaving very politely, almost like a supplicant.

Perhaps because Democrats don't feel as threatened by the burning of certain books as Republicans feel by the presence of those books? People egenrally respond to threats accordingly.

Redfin defines investor home buyers as "any institution or business that purchases residential real estate." https://www.redfin.com/news/investor-home-purchases-q4-2021/

As bad as I am at investing, I've been very lucky with my house. I bought it in 2002 in a neighborhood in the early gentrifying stage, and I was never underwater on it even in 2009-10. Close, but never quite. Some people I know, part of that class of people trying to buy, live in and then flip a house in the city for a big profit before fleeing to the 'burbs, came in after me in 2006 or 2007 and took a big loss of as much as several thousand dollars when their escape moment arrived just after the crash.

This can't be a good trend, can it? Data: Redfin; Chart: Jared Whalen/Axios Investors are draining an increasingly large share of American homes from the market, leaving traditional homebuyers with fewer options, at higher prices, Matt writes. Why it matters: Homeownership is the single most important way Americans build wealth. Families are now increasingly facing off with cash-rich institutional investors bidding for houses, as they try to climb onto the property ladder. Driving the news: The share of American homes sold to investors hit a record high of 18.4% in the fourth quarter of 2021, according to a recent report from real estate firm Redfin. These investors bought roughly 80,000 homes worth $50 billion during the last three months of the year. Worth noting: Investors are an especially heavy presence in markets that have seen some of the highest price spikes in the country. In Las Vegas and Phoenix, where prices are were up 28% and 25% last year, investors bought roughly 30% of the houses sold in the fourth quarter, Redfin found. What they're saying: "Ordinary folks are feeling the pinch," says Redfin economist Sheharyar Bokhari, who decided to research the role of investors after hearing anecdotes about individual house hunters increasingly losing out to them. Context: The highly symbolic — politically sensitive — American housing market has transformed in the years since the financial crisis of 2008. Large institutional investors have been pumping cash into a market that used to be highly localized and dominated by owner-occupiers and small-time landlords. At the same time, a decade's dearth of homebuilding in the aftermath of the housing bust has created a structural shortage of houses. State of play: Over the last two years, the pandemic triggered a home-buying boom amid record-low mortgage rates and house-bound families' desires for home offices and more space. Affordability has fallen sharply, as prices have surged. What we're watching: Homebuilding. While the surge of investors into the market is adding to the strains on housing affordability, the fundamental problem is a shortage of supply, especially in the denser markets where the best jobs are. Yes, but: These markets — often in the affluent, liberal-leaning suburbs surrounding big cities — are also the toughest ones in which to build, amid restrictive zoning and endemic NIMBYism.

I was responding to the use of Occupy Wall Street and burning police stations in literally the same sentence, which they did not do. It sure looked like an attempt to implicate them. Not sure what else we were expected to take away from that.

I take it to mean there's no need to regulate.

Devil’s Advocate says that a loud effort to get Trump and his kids to testify will renew his persecuted-by-the-elites bona fides with the red hat faithful and re-energize his political fortunes. If he takes the good advice to stay quiet while all that’s happening—a long shot of course, but if he could—he might recapture a good chunk of the squishy moderates who had taken a chance on him before but who abandoned him recently due to his asshattery.