OT: Raise the Jolly Roger: Congrats to the Houston Cheaters on their win

[ImporterExporter]

FRESH mock out on PL:

2022 MLB Draft - Mock Draft 3.0 — Prospects Live

Mock Draft 2.0 is here. Who will your team select? Where wiill Termarr Johnson, Elijah Green, Druw Jones and Dylan Lesko end up? What about college stars like Brooks Lee, Kevin Parada and Jace Jung? MLB scouting personnel helped develop v 2.0. Enjoy.

www.prospectslive.com

Another mock w/Lee to us. We nab Connor Prielipp in the comp round (36) and that could end up being a huge steal as he was a top draft prospect heading into last year, before going down w/TJ surgery. He just threw for teams recently and is nearing full health so there is a chance he sneaks into the back end of round 1. But the kid is talented. Lefty as well.

Rocker goes 22 to St Louis, but talk is he will go higher if he repeats the showing from this past weekend. Velocity back to peak levels. Still has the 70-80 grade slider.

 

[DJ Spinoza]

I'm not sure I like all the consensus around Lee, but I still haven't really seen any tape/games of his, and in any case it basically just seems to be a default guess based on Cherington/Sanders going consistently college early on.

I think it's a good year to swing big with a prep player and am currently pulling for Green, Johnson, and Collier, probably in that order, but with an extreme grain of salt given how little armchair scouting I've done. It actually does seem like it would work well to take the prep pick in the 1st and have an array of college pitchers or hitters to choose from in the 2nd, even if it's also true that the underslot + overslot approach would work well enough this year, too.

One thing that might be interesting this year would be to see if you can flex the move on two players rather than four, i.e., push somebody you want to pick #36. If you have a deal to get someone for 5.5 or 6 with the top pick, then you might have the muscle to push close to 4M for #36, which could be enough to push past most or all of the back half of the 1st round teams. Especially if the top goes pretty straightforwardly with Jones to Baltimore and Holliday or Green to Arizona, or something, then it wouldn't be too much of a stretch to think we'll have the most financial muscle in the draft.

Those two and the Mets are the only two with more, but the Mets picking spots don't exactly lend themselves to trying the same type of strategy. If I had to guess, given how little leaks out of Cherington's office, we're not going to have much of a clue what we plan on doing until the draft has already started.

 

[Gallatin]

I disagree. Performance matters. Keller sucks. The pitching is better than we thought but not nearly good enough.

We will have a gazillion dollars to throw in free agency next winter. Why so intent on protecting Bob's wallet?

Yeah bro - not where I was going. I won't follow a team in frustration, I just won't. Honestly - don't know how you guys do that even? Year after year?

In fact - Keller did great performance-wise in the minors for much of his career. And he never developed a couple key tools. Never really broke out. So that's actually the opposite of my position. Good job Doc.

And you're absolutely right on the $$ part. I have zero expectations for the Nutting's spending money. And what else is a Bucs fan to do if one doesn't want to give up on MLB? Again? So I ask myself, what would Spock do? The logical choices are - adjust expectations, or quit.

So it's "adjust expectations time" if I don't want to take another 8yr break from Baseball. Because I only follow sports for entertainment, and I'm not entertained if I'm angry.

For me it's the Pirates - or absolutely nothing at all. I actually despise MLB Ownership, almost to a man. They're the worst in American sports.

I basically gave up on the Pens 2 years ago when it became clear they weren't going to change their Coach, in spite of all the evidence that was a bad move that would stifle any possibility of 100% team buy-in.

I didn't consciously decide, I just lost interest. I'm simply that kind of guy, you got to be building towards something, or doing something. Did Something a few years back - well that really doesn't do it for me as a fan. Not when you're screwing up this year yet again.

So I gave my Penguins time to the Pirates. It just happened, because I believe the management is building towards something. I believe there's a possibility of something good happening. I don't believe that about the Penguins these days.

And yes, my expectations for the Pens are way way higher. But that's just reality. Nothing I can do about it. They created that with all their success, and when they do things that prevent future success, well...

But the moment they start growing again, start moving forward, I'll be on board I'm sure.

 

[Gallatin]

I'm not sure I like all the consensus around Lee, but I still haven't really seen any tape/games of his, and in any case it basically just seems to be a default guess based on Cherington/Sanders going consistently college early on.

I think it's a good year to swing big with a prep player and am currently pulling for Green, Johnson, and Collier, probably in that order, but with an extreme grain of salt given how little armchair scouting I've done. It actually does seem like it would work well to take the prep pick in the 1st and have an array of college pitchers or hitters to choose from in the 2nd, even if it's also true that the underslot + overslot approach would work well enough this year, too.

One thing that might be interesting this year would be to see if you can flex the move on two players rather than four, i.e., push somebody you want to pick #36. If you have a deal to get someone for 5.5 or 6 with the top pick, then you might have the muscle to push close to 4M for #36, which could be enough to push past most or all of the back half of the 1st round teams. Especially if the top goes pretty straightforwardly with Jones to Baltimore and Holliday or Green to Arizona, or something, then it wouldn't be too much of a stretch to think we'll have the most financial muscle in the draft.

Those two and the Mets are the only two with more, but the Mets picking spots don't exactly lend themselves to trying the same type of strategy. If I had to guess, given how little leaks out of Cherington's office, we're not going to have much of a clue what we plan on doing until the draft has already started.

I'm all in on those 3 prep bats. We are mos def thinking similar.

I don't believe the Lee rumors. Lazy reporting on teams that rarely leak is a standard basic thing in the industry. Nobody has a clue other than past performance.

And they're ignoring the main focus of last year's past performance, which wasn't really college players, but maximizing dollar value in the draft. That's too complicated a subject to write a quick blurb on though...

 

[Gallatin]

FRESH mock out on PL:

2022 MLB Draft - Mock Draft 3.0 — Prospects Live

Mock Draft 2.0 is here. Who will your team select? Where wiill Termarr Johnson, Elijah Green, Druw Jones and Dylan Lesko end up? What about college stars like Brooks Lee, Kevin Parada and Jace Jung? MLB scouting personnel helped develop v 2.0. Enjoy.

www.prospectslive.com

Another mock w/Lee to us. We nab Connor Prielipp in the comp round (36) and that could end up being a huge steal as he was a top draft prospect heading into last year, before going down w/TJ surgery. He just threw for teams recently and is nearing full health so there is a chance he sneaks into the back end of round 1. But the kid is talented. Lefty as well.

Rocker goes 22 to St Louis, but talk is he will go higher if he repeats the showing from this past weekend. Velocity back to peak levels. Still has the 70-80 grade slider.

I don't have a feel for this Draft like I did last year's, haven't put the time in. I do love the possibilities at 36 and 44 however, with a bunch of high upside Pitchers coming off Tommy John.

I especially like the Lefties. Prielipp's one of the guys I'm hoping for with those picks. Staying off the Rocker Train for now, don't trust the health or the FB. And he was packing extra weight last year, that bothered me.

I don't know a ton about Tyler Samaniego, don't yet understand him as a prospect as I've focused on the starters in Bradenton. And I wasn't impressed last year, he snuck up on me. I just started noticing him a couple weeks before your post.

So this guy's not allowed a hit since April 15th....

16.1 innings, no hits. And I don't really even know what his toolkit contains? So that's kinda exciting in my little world. Some small little thing to focus and focus and focus on until I understand it.


Nick Gonzales - when he get's back, the dude MUST quit hunting fastballs for power, as the biggest issue from my view is he's not adjusting to the breaking ball. He's swinging through those all the time. Missing far far to many Curves right down the middle.

When he first got hot this year, he was handling the breaking balls much better, then fell off again. He fixes that one issue, and it's off to the races IMO.

It's a hitting philosophy kind of thing, he's got to change his philosophy. He's never seen breaking balls like they got in AA, and the book's out on him now. Time to change.

But he's stubborn - everyone's always told him he couldn't - and Nick uses that to drive his high end work ethic. He's an Animal in the training and development world, a self-driven warrior.

Psychologically speaking, that will be a hard transition for him to make. Let's all hope he made it whilst out injured this week.


O'Neill Cruz is another guy that needs changes to his mental game, his approach to Baseball, and Life IMO. He has gaping holes yet to be filled.

I've never in my life been so critical of such a high level talent. He could not make these adjustments, and still be a good player, that's the crazy part. But he'll never become a great player until he gets over himself. He's his own man though, so he's never actually done that. The ego is just too big.

It seems I lower my expectations for this guy on a weekly basis, if he had a mental game similar to Henry Davis, I've no doubt Cruz would be a Superstar.

I'm not saying he's not going to work out for the Pirates, I am saying he's never going to reach that ridiculous ceiling without big changes on the inside.

Edit: I wrote the Cruz stuff before I read Tim Williams' article on him today. Tim's now advocating that Pittsburgh trade O'Neil Cruz.

Williams: The Youth Movement Arrives, But One Prospect’s Future With the Pirates is Unclear | Pirates Prospects

piratesprospects.com

 

[ChaosAgent]

Yeah bro - not where I was going. I won't follow a team in frustration, I just won't. Honestly - don't know how you guys do that even? Year after year?

In fact - Keller did great performance-wise in the minors for much of his career. And he never developed a couple key tools. Never really broke out. So that's actually the opposite of my position. Good job Doc.

And you're absolutely right on the $$ part. I have zero expectations for the Nutting's spending money. And what else is a Bucs fan to do if one doesn't want to give up on MLB? Again? So I ask myself, what would Spock do? The logical choices are - adjust expectations, or quit.

So it's "adjust expectations time" if I don't want to take another 8yr break from Baseball. Because I only follow sports for entertainment, and I'm not entertained if I'm angry.

For me it's the Pirates - or absolutely nothing at all. I actually despise MLB Ownership, almost to a man. They're the worst in American sports.

I basically gave up on the Pens 2 years ago when it became clear they weren't going to change their Coach, in spite of all the evidence that was a bad move that would stifle any possibility of 100% team buy-in.

I didn't consciously decide, I just lost interest. I'm simply that kind of guy, you got to be building towards something, or doing something. Did Something a few years back - well that really doesn't do it for me as a fan. Not when you're screwing up this year yet again.

So I gave my Penguins time to the Pirates. It just happened, because I believe the management is building towards something. I believe there's a possibility of something good happening. I don't believe that about the Penguins these days.

And yes, my expectations for the Pens are way way higher. But that's just reality. Nothing I can do about it. They created that with all their success, and when they do things that prevent future success, well...

But the moment they start growing again, start moving forward, I'll be on board I'm sure.

The Pirates can and will get external pitching. Nutting has in the past run payrolls of $100M+ when we win and fan interest is there.

The roster is dirt-cheap for another couple of years, and we have locked in our best position player already.

Though maybe to your latter post, the Pirates move Cruz for pitching. I would be interested for sure.

 

[Gallatin]

The Pirates can and will get external pitching. Nutting has in the past run payrolls of $100M+ when we win and fan interest is there.

The roster is dirt-cheap for another couple of years, and we have locked in our best position player already.

Though maybe to your latter post, the Pirates move Cruz for pitching. I would be interested for sure.

Now, I do have to admit, I might have lied a little bit.

The Nuttings gave Williams and BC their word to spend the money when they got good. To bank some profits from these lean years to spend more when that 2015 moment comes around again.

So that will really piss me off if they don't do that.

 

[Gallatin]

Interesting idea someone floated.

 

[DJ Spinoza]

The Williams thing is truly bizarre -- I do not understand this infatuation people have with Peguero being the staple future shortstop of the MLB team while dismissing Cruz as a bad defender. Peguero has also made a lot of errors, as many minor league players do. Peguero has an abysmal walk rate in AA this year despite otherwise putting up good offensive numbers.

I'm getting tired of seeing so much armchair commentary when simply watching Cruz is enough to ensure you that he can and will make the difficult plays at the position. He's been ready for MLB since the Pirates promoted him last year and now they set themselves up a kind of hamster wheel situation by manipulating his service time. It is what it is, but there's so much bloated discourse around Cruz that it's enough to make you nauseous. He's going to get an opportunity for a promotion in the next few weeks and then we'll see how he fares.

Will he struggle so much defensively that a new plan needs to emerge? Yes, it's within the realm of possibility if he has regular trouble with his throws. But I think a lot of this chatter comes from people who simply do not watch him play. He has quick feet and instincts. There's no reason why he can't be given run at the position for a while, see how he does, and then Peguero pushes him off of it by late next season if Peguero is really that good.

Even setting aside assessment of the specific player, Williams' proposal seems fantastical. Top prospects aren't really deadline trade chips unless the team trading them is looking to acquire one of the best veterans on the market, and even then, it's a pretty rare situation. When top prospects start getting shuffled around, it's usually a sign that the industry has started to really have differing views on the player (such as Trammell a few years ago).

It's all noise, IMO, and I think it's a symptom of wishing away the appearance of a situation with a bit of tension. I've never made a secret of my view that I think Cruz is rightly a bit miffed to be given a promotion and then have the opportunity to earn a spot on the team seemingly yanked away from him. It's hard to even fault him that much for a couple of comments about an OF experiment that is clearly pretty half-assed. If he has to shift to OF to play in MLB, then he really should be spending more time there, and not much time DHing.

The best case scenario at this point is that we ride on the coattails of his better month at the plate and he gets into the mix to start taking his lumps at the MLB level, and this early season stuff is put behind us. What matters is quite simply not what a bunch of us armchair speculators think could happen, but what actually does happen over the course of some games. It looks like Williams and some others are already discussing this on twitter and I think Rosati is spot on here:



Cruz just needs to come up and get into the lineup and face MLB pitching. At the end of the day, the Pirates are already signaling that the future direction of the team will involve quite a bit of mix and match with the lineup and defensive positions, so it's pretty pointless to try and project the perfect, completely fixed lineup.

 

[ChaosAgent]

Interesting idea someone floated.

View attachment 556844

Obviously, I'm all over this because I'm low on Cruz.

Giving up Cruz and Gonzales would really sting though. Basically means we are fully hitching our wagon to our versatility team of Bae, Marcano, Castillo and Castro. I like those guys. A lot! But do they have the upside?

I think if Oakland made this trade they'd want a pitcher in addition to Cruz, though. Anyone outside of Roansy and Bednar, minors or majors - take your pick? Would be curious if they'd go Burrows, Priester or someone else.

 

[ChaosAgent]

The issue with Cruz isn't even the defense really.

It's that despite the exit velos, does he really project to be any more than a generic, flawed lefty slugger? Does having a peak exit velo of 118 versus 115 make him a better hitter than Rowdy Tellez or Pedro Alvarez?

I see much generic 30-homer, 200-strikeout, .750 OPS, can't hit a lefty to save his life in Cruz.

 

[Coastal Kev]

Interesting idea someone floated.

View attachment 556844

Reminds me of the Archer trade.

 

[ImporterExporter]

Cruz and Gonzales aren't getting dealt. It's absurd to suggest that, Tim Williams of all people, should know better.

I've said my piece on Cruz's defense. I saw him in person last year w/my son in Altoona and he made a few nice plays, but also booted a fairly routine ground ball. Ive seen plenty of him on the TV the last 2 years and while DJ is right in saying he looks the part, can make fantastic plays that few others can, because of his length and athleticism, he still makes too many routine mistakes. That's a concentration/focus issue. I don't think the people who completely gloss over defense, understand just how important consistency is at SS, at the MLB level. I don't care if you make 3 web gems in a game. If you also are booting/throwing away a ball every single series, which Cruz is, you will not stick at short, at the MLB level. The new people in power place a great deal of emphasis on D. There is a reason why Cruz is being shifted to the OF off and on.

He will be up in short order though. I think his bat is the calling card, especially the power aspect, largely because we haven't had someone with elite power, in the lineup, since Alvarez, and Cruz has a much higher ceiling if everything clicks.

 

[Gallatin]

The Williams thing is truly bizarre -- I do not understand this infatuation people have with Peguero being the staple future shortstop of the MLB team while dismissing Cruz as a bad defender. Peguero has also made a lot of errors, as many minor league players do. Peguero has an abysmal walk rate in AA this year despite otherwise putting up good offensive numbers.

I'm getting tired of seeing so much armchair commentary when simply watching Cruz is enough to ensure you that he can and will make the difficult plays at the position. He's been ready for MLB since the Pirates promoted him last year and now they set themselves up a kind of hamster wheel situation by manipulating his service time. It is what it is, but there's so much bloated discourse around Cruz that it's enough to make you nauseous. He's going to get an opportunity for a promotion in the next few weeks and then we'll see how he fares.

Will he struggle so much defensively that a new plan needs to emerge? Yes, it's within the realm of possibility if he has regular trouble with his throws. But I think a lot of this chatter comes from people who simply do not watch him play. He has quick feet and instincts. There's no reason why he can't be given run at the position for a while, see how he does, and then Peguero pushes him off of it by late next season if Peguero is really that good.

Even setting aside assessment of the specific player, Williams' proposal seems fantastical. Top prospects aren't really deadline trade chips unless the team trading them is looking to acquire one of the best veterans on the market, and even then, it's a pretty rare situation. When top prospects start getting shuffled around, it's usually a sign that the industry has started to really have differing views on the player (such as Trammell a few years ago).

It's all noise, IMO, and I think it's a symptom of wishing away the appearance of a situation with a bit of tension. I've never made a secret of my view that I think Cruz is rightly a bit miffed to be given a promotion and then have the opportunity to earn a spot on the team seemingly yanked away from him. It's hard to even fault him that much for a couple of comments about an OF experiment that is clearly pretty half-assed. If he has to shift to OF to play in MLB, then he really should be spending more time there, and not much time DHing.

The best case scenario at this point is that we ride on the coattails of his better month at the plate and he gets into the mix to start taking his lumps at the MLB level, and this early season stuff is put behind us. What matters is quite simply not what a bunch of us armchair speculators think could happen, but what actually does happen over the course of some games. It looks like Williams and some others are already discussing this on twitter and I think Rosati is spot on here:



Cruz just needs to come up and get into the lineup and face MLB pitching. At the end of the day, the Pirates are already signaling that the future direction of the team will involve quite a bit of mix and match with the lineup and defensive positions, so it's pretty pointless to try and project the perfect, completely fixed lineup.

I've been watching this kid play for 3yrs, during which I thought he had the highest ceiling in the system since Bonds.

I don't come by a conclusion like this easily. I've just seen too much bad attitude over the years. Too little focus, and too much resistance to change.

 

[Gallatin]

The issue with Cruz isn't even the defense really.

It's that despite the exit velos, does he really project to be any more than a generic, flawed lefty slugger? Does having a peak exit velo of 118 versus 115 make him a better hitter than Rowdy Tellez or Pedro Alvarez?

I see much generic 30-homer, 200-strikeout, .750 OPS, can't hit a lefty to save his life in Cruz.

That's certainly a possible outcome. I've got issues with how he carries himself, and I'm not bought in that it's in his personality to improve the problem's mentioned.

A year ago, I though he would. Would continue to evolve his game that is. Kinda sceptical nowadays....

And it's not the stellar plays he makes DJ, it's the routine ones he can't be bothered with.

 

[ChaosAgent]

That's certainly a possible outcome. I've got issues with how he carries himself, and I'm not bought in that it's in his personality to improve the problem's mentioned.

A year ago, I though he would. Would continue to evolve his game that is. Kinda sceptical nowadays....

And it's not the stellar plays he makes DJ, it's the routine ones he can't be bothered with.

I don't understand the need to have Cruz at short. It's the difference between Diego Castillo hitting and like, Cal Mitchell.

Nowadays virtually all top prospects play the premium positions until they have to be moved off of them. This is of course because of earning potential. Top hitting SS prospects won't be unicorns; they'll be standard fare.

Maybe we won't really know Cruz's offensive potential until he has extended ML time over multiple seasons. Aaron Judge is one example of a big man whose offensive output at the majors blew away his output in the minors. But his limited at-bats against lefties in that Reds series last year looked awfully Pedrory Polvarez to me. Like Cruz was comically overmatched. Exit velo in of itself doesn't wow me. What DOES wow me with Cruz is his ability to mishit homers. Like I see multiple lazy, slice fly balls getting out in the left field corner from him.

 

[Gallatin]

I don't understand the need to have Cruz at short. It's the difference between Diego Castillo hitting and like, Cal Mitchell.

Nowadays virtually all top prospects play the premium positions until they have to be moved off of them. This is of course because of earning potential. Top hitting SS prospects won't be unicorns; they'll be standard fare.

Maybe we won't really know Cruz's offensive potential until he has extended ML time over multiple seasons. Aaron Judge is one example of a big man whose offensive output at the majors blew away his output in the minors. But his limited at-bats against lefties in that Reds series last year looked awfully Pedrory Polvarez to me. Like Cruz was comically overmatched. Exit velo in of itself doesn't wow me. What DOES wow me with Cruz is his ability to mishit homers. Like I see multiple lazy, slice fly balls getting out in the left field corner from him.

O'Neil Cruz openly resists learning new positions. The heart of my criticisms lies with the question - who is he as a person that he's showing his ass like that? And what does it mean for his future in a sport that requires constant change if one is to excell, and continue to do so?

And I will gladly take all the criticism from all of you guys for years and years and years if he proves my concerns false in Pittsburgh.

 

[ChaosAgent]

I do want my credit for being the one to call last October's callup what it was at the time: a marketing tactic to drive interest for 2022.

I guess I do feel bad for Cruz if he got caught in the lurch and didn't recognize it for what it was. But it's a business ya know.

 

[DJ Spinoza]

I don't think anyone who wasn't already paying attention to the Pirates would care that much about a prospect debuting late in the season. His promotion was about rewarding him for having a great season that was cut shorter by an injury. If he drew the wrong conclusion that he then had the opportunity to make the MLB team based on merit, it hardly makes sense to blame him -- it's not like players should willingly default to the cynical, service time manipulating strategies that all teams employ.

If anything, there's fault to be put on the front office for creating the situation, and/or for not communicating with Cruz. I think a lot of it is just a clusterf*** of excessively online fan speculation, though. The simplest and most obvious explanation is their actions have been dictated by the service time clock. In Contreras' case, they were forced to partially ignore it because of injuries and roster concerns.

There's no knowledge outside of wanton and baseless speculation that Cruz refuses to play other positions. The OF experiment is at most a kind of half-assed lark, because if they truly thought he had to move to be promoted, he would have been playing other positions in AA and he would have been playing the OF more often this season. It's one more excuse to foot-drag on keeping him in AAA, a level at which the organization clearly doesn't think is all that important for developmental reasons, as a number of examples make clear.

Because they called him up for that cup of coffee, they need a little bit further of a buffer with Super Two. in the case of Swaggerty, it's likely already passed. Unless he gets hurt, they'll keep him down for another week or week and a half and then he'll be in Pittsburgh, and hopefully most of this noise is behind us.

 

[Gallatin]

I do want my credit for being the one to call last October's callup what it was at the time: a marketing tactic to drive interest for 2022.

I guess I do feel bad for Cruz if he got caught in the lurch and didn't recognize it for what it was. But it's a business ya know.

Please kneel. DocEmrickSkitters - with this I now acknowledge you for being right.

Arise, go forth, and sin no more!

I don't think anyone who wasn't already paying attention to the Pirates would care that much about a prospect debuting late in the season. His promotion was about rewarding him for having a great season that was cut shorter by an injury. If he drew the wrong conclusion that he then had the opportunity to make the MLB team based on merit, it hardly makes sense to blame him -- it's not like players should willingly default to the cynical, service time manipulating strategies that all teams employ.

If anything, there's fault to be put on the front office for creating the situation, and/or for not communicating with Cruz. I think a lot of it is just a clusterf*** of excessively online fan speculation, though. The simplest and most obvious explanation is their actions have been dictated by the service time clock. In Contreras' case, they were forced to partially ignore it because of injuries and roster concerns.

There's no knowledge outside of wanton and baseless speculation that Cruz refuses to play other positions. The OF experiment is at most a kind of half-assed lark, because if they truly thought he had to move to be promoted, he would have been playing other positions in AA and he would have been playing the OF more often this season. It's one more excuse to foot-drag on keeping him in AAA, a level at which the organization clearly doesn't think is all that important for developmental reasons, as a number of examples make clear.

Because they called him up for that cup of coffee, they need a little bit further of a buffer with Super Two. in the case of Swaggerty, it's likely already passed. Unless he gets hurt, they'll keep him down for another week or week and a half and then he'll be in Pittsburgh, and hopefully most of this noise is behind us.

Never change DJ. Us hard bitten Realists need a guy or 3 like you around.

 

[ChaosAgent]

Please kneel. DocEmrickSkitters - with this I now acknowledge you for being right.

Arise, go forth, and sin no more!

Unfortunately I just sinned.

Your mom says hi btw

joking joking joking sorrry sorry

 

[DJ Spinoza]

No surprise that Swaggerty is buried in the lineup, but I guess I actually like this more than hitting him 7th or 8th, because at least here, he will have Hayes batting behind him, which gives him some protection. Maybe you roll with this for a bit to keep the pressure off in the early going, and if he stays hot for the next week, throw him right into the leadoff spot.

 

[ImporterExporter]

No surprise that Swaggerty is buried in the lineup, but I guess I actually like this more than hitting him 7th or 8th, because at least here, he will have Hayes batting behind him, which gives him some protection. Maybe you roll with this for a bit to keep the pressure off in the early going, and if he stays hot for the next week, throw him right into the leadoff spot.

Most of the young guys have come up and been buried with Shelton. I hate it, but it's his MO. I mean even after Suwinski hit the walk off the other day, in the 3 hole, he got pushed to 5 to make room for a still hurt Vogel at 3. That's my biggest gripe with Shelton right now. His lineups are fluid every f***ing game. I have to believe, at least on some small level, that is negatively impacting our hitters.

With that being said, we were off yesterday and yet Marcano is benched for Chang at 2B. Awful.

Either way, we definitely need to split this 2 game set, but obviously the hope is a clean sweep and we go into the road trip only 2 games below .500 w/serious momentum.

 

[DanielPlainview]

Love starting Chang at 2B. 0 hits in 20 PA. Not even a walk. Got smacked on the forearm amongst of sea of hapless ABs. Sure. Leave Marcano and his .915 OPS on the bench.

I don't mind putting as little pressure on recent callups as possible. Putting Swag in the top half isn't needed right now.

 

[Gallatin]

Unfortunately I just sinned.

Your mom says hi btw

joking joking joking sorrry sorry

Hey bro, if you want to make my 80-year-old Mom happy, I'm all for it.

Most of the young guys have come up and been buried with Shelton. I hate it, but it's his MO. I mean even after Suwinski hit the walk off the other day, in the 3 hole, he got pushed to 5 to make room for a still hurt Vogel at 3. That's my biggest gripe with Shelton right now. His lineups are fluid every f***ing game. I have to believe, at least on some small level, that is negatively impacting our hitters.

With that being said, we were off yesterday and yet Marcano is benched for Chang at 2B. Awful.

Either way, we definitely need to split this 2 game set, but obviously the hope is a clean sweep and we go into the road trip only 2 games below .500 w/serious momentum.

Word!

I've noticed Shelton has a tendency to experiment a lot, and then kind of settle in on a process. I think a lot of this is he's been a rookie manager that hasn't had any pressure to win.

I'm hopeful the Lineup stuff begins making more sense soon.