It’s really astonishing how much I loved baseball as a kid (especially just reading box scores in the morning) and how much I STILL enjoy reading about it (primarily Posnanski stuff), but have virtually zero desire to actually watch games now.
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You don’t like watching a pitcher yanked after 3 innings, lost of strikeouts and walks, and the few times a ball is put in play - it’s a routine ground out to a guy playing shallow right field?
I’m sure the new 4-team draft lottery will fix baseball. God forbid any national baseball writer ever utter the words “salary floor” and try to at least put the idea on the table. Nope, that is forbidden speak.
The NHL blowing up a whole season has to be the best thing for owners in other leagues. The idea a league could just shut down was so far out there, and then it happened.
The 2003 Test False Positive news came out before Ortiz had even retired. So it certainly wasn’t part of Manfred begging HOF voters to put Ortiz in.
And tons of notable guys failed during the 13ish years Ortiz was testing clean - Manny, AROD, Tejada, Nelson Cruz, Ryan Braun, we could fill up the thread with the names.
The first I saw of the positive false positive narrative was Manfred in 2016 - right when Ortiz was retiring and it was in connection with comments about HOF voting (also, as I pointed out Manfred’s wasn’t just concerned with Ortiz getting in, but all the other steroid adjacent guys, so was using Ortiz to make his point on where he thought the HOF should draw the line). Even if we accept that there could have been false positives, that still means there is what a 90% or so chance Ortiz tested positive.
Ortiz’s first explanation was that he didn’t take steroids, but that he had been “careless” with his supplements and that was the likely cause of the positive test, so it’s not like at first he was even disputing that he tested positive - just that it wasn’t from steroids.
You’re right there are a few more big names that tested positive - but there are also tons of guys we know took steroids that never tested positive.
Your timing on Manfred is dead wrong - the MLB released a statement in 2009 saying that the leaked list of 2003 players included false positives. It had nothing to do with Ortiz’ retirement or his 2021 Hall of Fame candidacy.
Yeah and this exactly lines up with what MLB said - that the 2003 tests didn’t differentiate well between between actual banned supplements and legal supplements.
I get it - you want Ortiz to be guilty. But all you have is 1 admittedly flawed test, with incomplete info (we don’t even know what Ortiz allegedly took, and neither does Ortiz! That info was never released to the players to my knowledge), and 13 years of clean tests.
https://twitter.com/JeffPassan/status/1502016493105692673
https://twitter.com/jesserogersespn/status/1502017545414479872
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“The final vote by the MLBPA’s eight members of the executive subcommittee and 30 player reps was 26-12 in favor of the agreement, sources told ESPN.”
Really interested to hear what the 12 thought.
“ban on shifts” Curious how this will be implemented/enforced. Pretty good way to drive BA up, which is probably going to lead to a much lower instances of the HR or K at bat being the majority of what we are seeing now.
I’m assuming they will have rules on players on each side of the bases. So you can have the second baseman close to the bag, but not to the left of it. Otherwise seems impossible to enforce.
Not sure how they will deal with 4 OFs. Harder to make a firm rule unless you say that you can only have 3 players in the OF, but lots of times even without a shift a 2B or SS will play on the grass.
Yeah I can see both of these coming about.
Also, 3 division winners and 3 WC spots?
Gonna make the regular season a ton less exciting.
https://twitter.com/SMPLonnie/status/1502024227695726608
8 of the twelve were the full executive subcommittee, five of which are Boras clients. Looks like the rank-and-file outvoted the megastars. The player reps elected by each team voted 26-4 in favor.
While I’m generally against ridiculous expanded playoffs, the Royals were realistically shooting for .500 this year. So maybe with a little luck they make the postseason.
A couple of pieces about how far the national baseball writers are up Scott Boras’s ass.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/sports/2022/03/08/baseball-lockout-media-coverage/
Yahoo’s Keyser was part of the bargaining committee of her union in a previous job. “One thing I learned, and the way I think about this, is the fact that ownership can change your job unilaterally,” she said. “But workers can only change it by leaving or by collective action.”
“I think the players’ cause is righteous,” she said. “The economic structure of the sport should change.”
https://twitter.com/Dejan_Kovacevic/status/1501234224799571968
Dude, give me a break. Just because Scott Boras is glad the media isn’t kowtowing to the asshole owners who caused this fucking lockout, it doesn’t mean reporters are not correct in the way they’ve assigned blame.
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Boy does this stuff really attract the BIG BRAINS like flies to honey. Or are these the bots? Great thing is you can’t tell.
https://twitter.com/josephb2112/status/1502041657344155650
https://twitter.com/EEstaris/status/1502040206676873220
https://twitter.com/RisaJoySlave/status/1502045126444691458
https://twitter.com/baseballfan30/status/1502043910620823564
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LOL, imagine walking around in 2022 and being mad at baseball players.
