“I’m not sure when it began—maybe the picture I saw was the very first—but I saw visual evidence of cement being poured in the Chicago Cubs’ off-season bleacher reconstruction project on Monday. After weeks of striking pictures of the stadium’s long-time horizon line being demolished, and a fair few pictures where nothing seemed to be happening, and nothing was left, Monday was the first concrete reminder that there will be bleachers there again, and soon, at least for me.”
The Lefty Strike
There’s never this much buzz around the MLB Winter Meetings. As much as everyone wants it to, because it sure was nice back when half the winter’s player movement packed itself into three or four… Read more »
An introduction.
“Since Major League Baseball began expanding, in 1961, only one player has hit between 10 and 23 home runs in each of his first nine seasons, according to the Baseball-Reference Play Index. That player, Nick Markakis, agreed to a four-year, $44-million deal with the Atlanta Braves Wednesday. “
“I don’t have an overarching deep-dive in me tonight. A bunch of small moves with very low potential impact happened on Tuesday, driven by the deadline at which teams had to decide whether they would tender contracts to their pre-arbitration and arbitration-eligible players or release them into free agency. Nothing big happened. It would be a disservice for me to write two or three thousand words for you about anything that happened. I’ll just run through the three moves that stood out, offering up the analysis I think each move deserves.”
“Monday was an interesting day in Major League Baseball, with a handful of very small moves and one big one that stood apart. Beyond the actual moves, though, there was an unusual abundance of interesting speculation, tidbits and non-transactions. A couple of those stood out to me, as well, so I’ll quickly run through my thoughts on them here.”
“The Toronto Blue Jays acquired Josh Donaldson from the Oakland Athletics for Brett Lawrie, Sean Nolin, Kendall Graveman and Franklin Barreto Friday, leaving the baseball world a bit baffled. The most common thesis I saw from the pundits, as I scrolled through my Twitter feed late that night, was ‘I don’t get it.'”
