2025 MLB Thread

[Tiger337]

11 minutes ago, romad1 said:

If Lou Whitaker had been "nicer" to the journalists he'd be in.  Something weird was up with his relationship with the press.  

Jim Rice was not nice to the press.  He once ripped the skin off of a Red Sox media person because he parked in Rice's spot.  

[romad1]

5 minutes ago, Tiger337 said:

Jim Rice was not nice to the press.  He once ripped the skin off of a Red Sox media person because he parked in Rice's spot.  

At some point someone like Lynn Henning will spill the tea about Whitaker killing Al Ackerman's or Don Shane's dog or impregnating his daughter or some such. 

[oblong]

1 hour ago, chasfh said:

I grew up in Warren, we got Comcast cable in 1981, and we got jobbed because they gave us WOR from New York and not WGN from Chicago.

and I was mad because my cable system didn't have WOR and WOR would show pro wrestling

[chasfh]

33 minutes ago, oblong said:

and I was mad because my cable system didn't have WOR and WOR would show pro wrestling

Wanna go back in a Time Machine and trade?

[CMU97]

1 hour ago, romad1 said:

If Lou Whitaker had been "nicer" to the journalists he'd be in.  Something weird was up with his relationship with the press.  

I've posted a lot about Whitaker over the years, he is my favorite all time player. I've shared this story on the old board, but I will here again.

When Lou was a rookie, hitting coach Gates Brown was giving him some "advice" in the batting cage. Whitaker said something to the effect, "I know how to hit." I don't know if Joe Falls was standing right there, or if he heard the story second hand, but he printed it, and in a such a way it made Lou look cocky and uncoachable. In reality, he was just being his very confident self, and was not showing up Brown. But after that, he was quiet to the media. I've never seen a time when he went after the media, he would just not say more than he wanted to, which wasn't very much. He just let his play to the talking for him. Which, as we've discussed many times, is HOF worthy. 

He may get the **** Allen treatment and be elected after he dies, and then labeled "misunderstood." But, in my opinion, he never tried to be more than he was to please anyone. He was just a quiet, deeply religious person who was a great baseball player.

[romad1]

5 minutes ago, CMU97 said:

I've posted a lot about Whitaker over the years, he is my favorite all time player. I've shared this story on the old board, but I will here again.

When Lou was a rookie, hitting coach Gates Brown was giving him some "advice" in the batting cage. Whitaker said something to the effect, "I know how to hit." I don't know if Joe Falls was standing right there, or if he heard the story second hand, but he printed it, and in a such a way it made Lou look cocky and uncoachable. In reality, he was just being his very confident self, and was not showing up Brown. But after that, he was quiet to the media. I've never seen a time when he went after the media, he would just not say more than he wanted to, which wasn't very much. He just let his play to the talking for him. Which, as we've discussed many times, is HOF worthy. 

He may get the **** Allen treatment and be elected after he dies, and then labeled "misunderstood." But, in my opinion, he never tried to be more than he was to please anyone. He was just a quiet, deeply religious person who was a great baseball player.

The disparity between his records and performance and his treatment by the baseball establishment seems worthy of a decent sports non-fiction book.  

[Tiger337]

5 minutes ago, CMU97 said:

I've posted a lot about Whitaker over the years, he is my favorite all time player. I've shared this story on the old board, but I will here again.

When Lou was a rookie, hitting coach Gates Brown was giving him some "advice" in the batting cage. Whitaker said something to the effect, "I know how to hit." I don't know if Joe Falls was standing right there, or if he heard the story second hand, but he printed it, and in a such a way it made Lou look cocky and uncoachable. In reality, he was just being his very confident self, and was not showing up Brown. But after that, he was quiet to the media. I've never seen a time when he went after the media, he would just not say more than he wanted to, which wasn't very much. He just let his play to the talking for him. Which, as we've discussed many times, is HOF worthy. 

He may get the **** Allen treatment and be elected after he dies, and then labeled "misunderstood." But, in my opinion, he never tried to be more than he was to please anyone. He was just a quiet, deeply religious person who was a great baseball player.

That was always my impression.  He never came across as a **** Allen type personality.  

[oblong]

During the strike in '94 and '95 he got a lot of national heat for showing up to the meetings in a limo.  But that was his only car.  He and his wife owned a recording studio and they used that for clients.  That was literally their car.

[IdahoBert]

“Sportswriters are a kind of rude and brainless subculture of fascist drunks whose only real function is to publicize and sell whatever the sports editor sends them out to cover.”
— Hunter S. Thompson

[sagnam]

6 hours ago, chasfh said:

My guess is that they audited his communications and found some smoking gun already.

I also find it interesting that Baseball has gotten so far out so far in front of this story, over a month before its reolution. Seems to me that were Clase a relatively isolated incident, they would go through the investigation of him on background and out of public view. Instead, the situation is not even resolved and already we know. That probably means either the Clase situation is already very well known and liable to come out through some other source, or that the gambling rot among players is so deep that Baseball is trying to get control of the situation before it completely blows up in their faces and jeopardizes their billions in gambling partnership money.

My biggest concern is that it appears that this is the sports books doing the outing as a “watchdog” based off of losing bets. They don’t care about the sport at all, just the money they win through this stuff. That’s the real danger. Selective enforcement.

[IdahoBert]

6 minutes ago, sagnam said:

My biggest concern is that it appears that this is the sports books doing the outing as a “watchdog” based off of losing bets. They don’t care about the sport at all, just the money they win through this stuff. That’s the real danger. Selective enforcement.

I think you’re right. They noticed an enormous number of payouts for something obscure that a player has direct control over. 

[CMU97]

51 minutes ago, IdahoBert said:

I think you’re right. They noticed an enormous number of payouts for something obscure that a player has direct control over. 

If this is true, and there is no more evidence that something is amiss, it is a rabbit hole I don't want to go down. If you can take out a team's closer for a sinificant amount of time just by betting, and get a group of people to bet the same thing, because the pitcger has a patteren you figured out, that could be catastophic. 

 

Say our best hitter takes the first pitch 65% of the time. As a gambler, and a fan of the opposing team, you can have your whole fan base make that bet. Then the gaming industry says whoa, we just lost a bunch of money  we nedd to i vestigate. 

Baseball says something looks fishy. You have to swing at the first pitch more. You might laugh, but that very well could happen.

[oblong]

It’s possible that the agreements allow MLB to access all the betting data and they discovered it themselves. 

[papalawrence]

Change of scenery definitely helping Andrew Vaughn so far. In 15 games with the Brewers he is hitting .375 with 5 HR and 21 RBI. Shelton-esque, or possibly legit? I remember AA was interested in him. Iirc he was drafted earlier than Riley Greene. 

[Tiger337]

18 hours ago, chasfh said:

Wanna go back in a Time Machine and trade?

If we can go back in time, I'll give you any stations you want!

[Sports_Freak]

19 hours ago, romad1 said:

If Lou Whitaker had been "nicer" to the journalists he'd be in.  Something weird was up with his relationship with the press.  

Jack Morris was absolutely horrible to the press

 At least, from what I hear. Very arrogant. 

[romad1]

7 minutes ago, Sports_Freak said:

Jack Morris was absolutely horrible to the press

 At least, from what I hear. Very arrogant. 

the 1984 heroes were not very chivalrous to waitresses too.  What are ya gonna do?

[oblong]

I'm not sure Lou's stance with reporters mattered much with regard to the HOF.  It was as Lee pointed out, he never had the BIG year.  He was just good to very good for a long time. He was a leadoff hitter then later had some power. He was an easy player to take for granted.

He won the silver slugger and gold glove in 83-85 which in theory means he was the best 2B in the AL on both sides of the field.

 

[Klondike]

The thing with Whitaker that pisses me off a bit was he could of been the HoF performer that surely gets in, attitude or not. He would state more than once that he COULD of hit 30 homers a year but chose to not and go more for singles and doubles most the time. Lou could also work the count as well as any player but only crankel up hisi HR swing on rare occasions.

[tiger2022]

1 hour ago, Sports_Freak said:

Jack Morris was absolutely horrible to the press

 At least, from what I hear. Very arrogant. 

He was also put in by his buddies on the veterans committee.  

Probably the worst pitcher in modern times to get in there.  

[tiger2022]

6 minutes ago, Klondike said:

The thing with Whitaker that pisses me off a bit was he could of been the HoF performer that surely gets in, attitude or not. He would state more than once that he COULD of hit 30 homers a year but chose to not and go more for singles and doubles most the time. Lou could also work the count as well as any player but only crankel up hisi HR swing on rare occasions.

A bunch of people could claim they COULD of done all sorts of things.  That's a terrible reason to put him in the HOF.

Well, so and so could have hit 600 hrs, let's just say he did it.

[Tiger337]

One of my favorite Lou Whitaker stats:

Middle infielders with most seasons with OPS+ of 100 or higher (at least 100 PA):

Eddie Collins 20

Joe Morgan 19

Lou Whitaker 17

Derek Jeter 16

Nap Lajoie 16

https://stathead.com/baseball/player-batting-season-finder.cgi?request=1&match=player_season_count&positions[]=4&positions[]=6&games_prop=50&ccomp[1]=gt&cval[1]=100&cstat[1]=b_onbase_plus_slugging_plus&ccomp[2]=gt&cval[2]=100&cstat[2]=b_pa

 

 

[chasfh]

20 hours ago, Tiger337 said:

That was always my impression.  [Lou Whitaker] never came across as a **** Allen type personality.  

This is a little like saying Steven Wright never came off as a Gallagher personality. 😉

[chasfh]

19 hours ago, sagnam said:

My biggest concern is that it appears that this is the sports books doing the outing as a “watchdog” based off of losing bets. They don’t care about the sport at all, just the money they win through this stuff. That’s the real danger. Selective enforcement.

Wow. Good one.

[TigerNation]

19 hours ago, CMU97 said:

If this is true, and there is no more evidence that something is amiss, it is a rabbit hole I don't want to go down. If you can take out a team's closer for a sinificant amount of time just by betting, and get a group of people to bet the same thing, because the pitcger has a patteren you figured out, that could be catastophic. 

 

Say our best hitter takes the first pitch 65% of the time. As a gambler, and a fan of the opposing team, you can have your whole fan base make that bet. Then the gaming industry says whoa, we just lost a bunch of money  we nedd to i vestigate. 

Baseball says something looks fishy. You have to swing at the first pitch more. You might laugh, but that very well could happen.

Fundamental misunderstanding of how odds work.