2014 MLB Season: How Many Pitchers Will Die For Our Sins?

Yeah, holy crap that scared me for a second. I feel Utley would die a little inside if he went to the Yankees of all places.

 

I bet the Yankees would take his production, given how much they're missing the presence of Messieurs Cano and Rodriguez.

Oh, that's right, they weren't "true Yankees."

 

Utley's season isn't half bad and he made the All Star game, so I have no doubt they'd take his numbers. But the Yankees don't really have much to offer in trade value. If they want Ryan Howard (and his contract) that might be OK, but the Yankees aren't really buyers any more than the Phillies right now.

 

Oh, I agree completely (a page or two back I wrote a few paragraphs about how barren their farm system is).

In other news, yesterday Jon Jay took a 3 - 2 pitch in a two-run game.

It was called a ball.

Nobody noticed it was ball four, and he then fanned on the 4 - 2 pitch.

lol

 

I've said this before, but life as a Cubs fan:

Imagine you're walking down the street on a beautiful summer afternoon. Sun's shining, nice breeze, not a cloud in the sky. Suddenly, on the sidewalk, you notice a $100 bill on the ground.

As you bend over to pick up that $100, some asshole runs up from behind and kicks you in the junk with a steel-toed boot. Hard. Like, after the initial kick he twists his foot around just to make it hurt that much more.

And as you stumble around, half-blind from the pain and desperately trying not to puke all over the sidewalk, that asshole steals the $100 bill.

That's being a Cubs fan. So I have to laugh, otherwise I'd puke all over the sidewalk.

 

Cardinals / The rest of the NL Central.

 

What possible advantage is there to releasing him? I know he takes up a roster spot, but you have to pay the money even if he's cut so he's at least worth it as a backup player. The best option is to agree to continue paying part of his salary and trade him to a team that will at least take some of it (ideally trade him for some kind of player or pick, but that's really secondary).

Shame, before his injury, he was such a great player. And the injury was such a freak occurrence on literally the last play of the season just as it was ending. Since the play was such an obvious ground out to first, I turned off the TV in frustration before the injury occurred and I've never seen it. Really makes me wonder what would have happened to his career had that never happened.

 

The sad / hilarious part is that Rube gave him that monster extension with a full two years before it was necessary (he had already signed a deal to buy out his arb years through 2011).

In other news, in one of the most egregious cases of a solution desperately in need of a problem, the Hall of Fame has announced that player eligibility for the Hall of Fame is being reduced from 15 to 10 years beginning with the next voting cycle (although Mattingly, Smith and Trammell are being grandfathered in).

Ridiculous move, though it's now even more ridiculous that those three got grandfathered in, since they're never going to make it, but they'll stick around getting 50 - 60 percent of the votes on a stacked ballot, which means that Tim Raines has only three years left on that stacked ballot and he's going to get undeservedly crushed. This also has huge ramifications for Mussina.

God, fuck the Hall of Fame / BBWAA.

 

Yeah, it never entirely made sense. Although I do feel bad for athletes who do really well and then get injured before their big payday. It's the nature of the beast and this current situation is proof that the alternative isn't much better, but it's still tough.