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Matt looks at where the out fielders should be organizationally. A tough task at Toledo where some non-prospects demand playing time (I’m looking at you Timo).
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Why Dont Sports Teams Use Randomization? A Guest Post - Freakonomics - Opinion - New York Times BlogA little geeky - okay a lot geeky - but boiled down in layman’s terms: why don’t sports teams uses randomized trials.
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Excellent (and lengthy) article by Howard Bryant about the Mitchell report process. Bryant is an excellent writer and he wrote Juicing the Game.
{ 27 comments… read them below or add one }
I can’t remember if I said this in the article, but what mitigates the problem with outfielders in Toledo is Parrish has experience with juggling a roster. I was surprised at how many at bats he was able to get everyone when they had what seemed like a couple extra infielders the last couple years.
Tigers just signed Byrdak for 700k+ according to Freep
http://beck.mlblogs.com/beck/2.....tende.html
durbin non-tendered. this surprised me.
Crasnick takes an early look at the best and worst 2008 lineups over at ESPN today. He ranks the new look Tigs, tops.
However, what really stuck with me from his piece is the last place lineup:
30. San Francisco Giants
Current batting order: (1) Dave Roberts, LF; (2) Omar Vizquel, SS; (3) Randy Winn, RF; (4) Ray Durham, 2B; (5) Rich Aurilia or Dan Ortmeier, 1B; (6) Bengie Molina, C; (7) Kevin Frandsen, 3B; (8) Fred Lewis or Rajai Davis, CF.
If the Giants end up running out anything that resembles Crasnick’s projected lineup, it will be one of the most hilariously terrible lineups I’ve ever seen. I mean that is shockingly bad. And old.
How does Brian Sabean still have a job?
They apparently signed Rowand, so that will help a little.
Just think about this for a minute. Dave Roberts is still in baseball. Whoa.
tigers non tendered chad durbin
Countdown to the release of the thoroughly useless Mitchell Report… but oooh! the gossip!
Yea look at where he placed the Royals
I really think that next year they have a good shot at 3rd in our division.
Their new manager (Trey Hillman) along with the young talent progressing could really shock some people.
I agree, David. The Royals are on the rise, the Sox are bad and getting worse and the Twins are in real trouble if Santana is gone.
And Dave is correct about the Mitchell Report. He’s a politician. This thing isn’t going to tell us anything that anyone with some common sense didn’t already know.
It’s interesting how ESPN has hired all these “steroid” guys to write for them now. Along with Bryant, they’ve also brought on T.J. Quinn and Mark Fairanu-Wada. How much do they expect to write about this stuff?
That Giants line-up wouldn’t have been quite so laughable 5 or 6 years ago.Not much power,but at least they were able to get on base and run in their pre-AARP days.
The motives of the report are extremely suspect. Considering that thousands of people have played in MLB since the 1980’s, revealing 60-80 names tells us absolutely nothing about the prevalence of drugs in the sport. It does, however, allow for the destruction of the reputations of individuals that have no real ability to defend themselves.
And we should sign Mark Prior. We don’t really have a spot for him, but man, are his mechanics pretty.
Pettite and Clemens so far. Big surprise. Some people will do anything for fame and fortune. And we as fans keep buying into it. We’re as addicted as they are to the fame and fortune, living vicariously through them.
Unofficial list of all names on the report I received had both Pudge and Sheffield on it.
No surprise really since we all knew Sheff was mentioned in Game of Shadows and Pudge was mentioned in Canseco’s book.
Remains to be seen what, if anything, will come of it.
Hopefully, the future hall of famers on the list are never voted in.
Greg, you may have received what is referred to in this Baseball Prospectus post:
http://www.baseballprospectus......red/?p=700
Looks like the Tigers sorta dodged one, I didn’t see any names in any articles… yet anyway.
Here is a list of those listed in the Mitchell Report.
I just went through the report using the “find” function and the only current Tiger mentioned at all is Sheffield. There is some pretty extensive discussion of Rondell White, however (he also apparently converted Nook Logan to the dark side, thus dispelling any notion that steroids makes one a better hitter). Poor Rondell, his stellar reputation will be ruined!
Dont forget that Fernando Vina is also on this list. Im kinda disappointed I liked the guy and he was a stellar infielder both defensively and offensively, but without the roids one has to wonder if Vina would have been that good……. sad day in baseball overall……so many good names now ruined, White, Vina, Pettitte, Justice, Stanton etc……
Please keep in mind that the “evidence” in this report is almost entirely second or even third hand. I’m not sure any of these accusations could be proven, and it is thus fundamentally unfair to take them as fact. Don’t be so quick to write those guys off, Steve.
Here is a better list, per ESPN.
Honestly, this entire report is a joke save for the Pettitte/Clemens stuff. It’s mostly hearsay and reads like a bunch of gossip. Can’t believe that we’ve anticipated this for a long time and that MLB spent millions to have someone quote Larry Bigbie on a conversation he had 4 years ago about Brian Roberts and have that the be only thing linking Roberts to steroids. Oh wait, he lived in a house with David Segui, what am I thinking!? He must’ve roided!
Garbage.
$40 million spent! How?!?
Dave,
Dont get me wrong I’m not saying that this is 100% proven and correctly written report. I’m just saying that these guys that were respected so much especially as people and their personalities will be ruined or tarnished. I still think this is still to circumstancial(sp?) to be correct with nothing wrong with it. They should have had more distributors ringed up and brought in not to mention former and current trainers that should be at the very least questioned but the MLBPA didn’t want their players to comment and Mitchell was not given the power to subpena which should have been given if we really want to stop these drugs from tarnishing our great past time!
At least none of our guys turned up with a signed check to one of these clinics. They didn’t mention Paul Byrd who purchased over 25,000 worth of the stuff. Oh, that’s right he had prescriptions. Evidently, Pudge and Sheff did not test positive when the drug tests were given. And thank God Miggy and DTrain weren’t mentioned.
Paul Byrd claims to have had a pituitary gland condition, which required the use of HGH. Somehow that explains why he obtained the prescription from his dentist. I don’t know about you, but whenever I have a tumor in my brain I go straight to the dentist.
I guess his prescription coverage doesn’t cover HGH.