Back in the great years of the 90s when I was playing travel baseball I moved from shortstop to Center Field, I made a diving catch in my first game in the outfield and it was a love affair from then on. My heroes turned into guys like Andruw Jones, Torii Hunter and the guy everyone hated because he was on the Cardinals but I have always liked. That man would be Jim Edmonds who … Continue reading
As the season winds down to an end and the new regime enters their third year with the Cubs they look to continue to build them up to a championship caliber team. Many fans know that next year may not be the year, but this year is extremely important if not the MOST important year for the Cubs moving forward. I say that because in the first two years the front office turned short term … Continue reading
I just had to make a small post about Darvish after what I saw tonight. Sure, he was facing the poor-hitting Astros, but he made a bunch of major-league players look like fools for almost 9 straight innings. Darvish, when he is on, has the best stuff in the majors right now. As Jason Cole tweeted earlier: Scout who saw Darvish tonight: “The most impressive thing was that he had 94-97 whenever he wanted, but … Continue reading
Billy Beane’s Oakland Athletics made a miracle run into the postseason in 2012, and enter 2013 with hopes of competing in an increasingly rough AL West. The underdog A’s seem to be one of the “teams of the internet”, because everywhere I go I see them being touted as legitimate threats to the Angels and Rangers. And I cannot figure out why. The A’s made very few changes to a roster that played out of … Continue reading
After a rough 2012, Royals GM Dayton Moore looked to cut the rebuilding process short by a year or two by trading for James Shields, Ervin Santana, and resigning Jeremy Guthrie. Moore is counting on Shields to be the #1 he was in 2011, lead the Royals into the playoffs, and possibly save his GM job. Moore’s trade for Shields drew rave reviews from national baseball writers, many of whom declared the Royals were now … Continue reading
Drafts are a huge part of rebuilding a club. When a team “goes for it” they also look outside the organization for big time free agents to get the last piece of the puzzle for a championship team. Signing free agents sometimes cost you a draft pick. Tommy examines in an earlier article the Indians offseason and why they should sign Kyle Lohse even if it costs them a draft pick. I decided to take … Continue reading
In the first installment of teams we expect to disappoint in 2013 the first team is the Chicago White Sox. After a poor showing from a 2011 Sox teams that some writers expected to win the World Series the unheralded 2012 White Sox were in the AL central race until the very end. Going into 2013 many people believe this team can repeat its success and compete for a Wild Card spot. Looking back at … Continue reading
Coming into the 2013 season, we thought we’d take a quick look at the best NL Central players at each position as a proxy for the strongest teams in the division. The position players of the NL Central are quite strong, but the pitching leaves a bit to be desired. How do our Cubbies stack up? Well, it looks like it’s going to be a rough year for the Cubs (but you already knew that) … Continue reading
By signing Michael Bourn, the Indians have added a high quality top-of-the-order bat, turned Drew Stubbs and Michael Brantley into a good platoon partnership (or trade bait), and opened up the ability to occasionally play Nick Swisher at 1B and Mark Reynolds where he belongs – DH. The Bourn Signing should also somewhat help their dismal pitching staff if Francona starts an OF of Stubbs-Bourn-Brantley, which could track down pretty much any fly ball. However, … Continue reading
