2011 MLB Thread

[Scratch]

Why would we want to do that? Baseball doesn't belong in Canada.

Jackie Robinson's minor league team before joining the Brooklyn Dodgers was the Montreal Royals.

 

[Strider]

@Strider
have you ever heard the term "those in glass houses shall not throw rocks"? i ask b/c the cardinals offense is not lighting the world on fire right now. say what you will about the phila offense. i say talk to me at the end of the year and san fran has to deal with colorado. i love reading your lovely predictions you're quite the sage, old boy!

Since you forgot. I never predicted my Cardinals would win the NL central. Also they've score 88 runs in 16 games compared to 83 runs in 18 games for the phillies. The problem isn't so much the 4.88 runs per game; which should be plenty to win games with that pitching staff. The problem is the inconsistency that I mentioned before. Look at your schedule and you see a lot of wins 11-2, 9-3, etc., but a lot of losses right next to those that are 1-3, 1-2, etc.

 

[El Justo]

i never forget a thing, bro ever. don't forget that glass houses, dude. worry about the woes at the back of your BP, albert's last year in st louis, and probably larussa's last year, too. you make all these bold predictions as if you're this type of sooth-sayer. let it unfold some, will ya?

 

[sophie]

Why would we want to do that? Baseball doesn't belong in Canada.

Actually baseball is pretty popular in Canada. Had it not been for the strike, Montreal probably would have become a baseball town.

Not to mention that the MLB season is very conducive to the NHL season

 

[El Justo]

he's being facetious, you big dummy

 

[Lambert Simnel]

i never forget a thing, bro ever. don't forget that glass houses, dude. worry about the woes at the back of your BP, albert's last year in st louis, and probably larussa's last year, too. you make all these bold predictions as if you're this type of sooth-sayer. let it unfold some, will ya?

Lord, man, you're almost making me want the Phils to lose ten in a row to stop the relentless trash talking. Look, we know you have a hell of a pitching staff, and you should have a decent enough offense. We got it. Honestly. If we could persuade the rest of the league to give up and go home, we would, though I realise that you'd miss out on your 150-12 season then.

Or are you just trying to make up for years of hurt of the Phils being a waste of space ? That I can kinda relate to; if Scotland ever again had a decent national football team, I'd crow about it long and hard too.

 

[El Justo]

whatever, Lambert. just calling a spade a spade. take it as trash talk if you wish. i normally don't go tit for tat with folks but if you're talkin' nonsense, i will not sit idly by. years of frustration? perhaps. probably more of years of frustration of reading crappy posts by fan boys.

 

[dgfred]

Utley and Brown in the lineup should help some .

 

[Lambert Simnel]

whatever, Lambert. just calling a spade a spade. take it as trash talk if you wish. i normally don't go tit for tat with folks but if you're talkin' nonsense, i will not sit idly by. years of frustration? perhaps. probably more of years of frustration of reading crappy posts by fan boys.

"Crappy posts by fan boys" is a bit of a harsh description of the post by Strider you were jumping over, I reckon. At the time of posting, the Phils are 14th for team OPS. Doesn't sound unreasonable to question the team's offensive power given that stat. Somewhat surprisingly, the Phils are just 11th in team ERA - I would have guessed in the top half dozen.

(Out of interest, St Louis are 2nd in team OPS (best in the NL), and 10th in team ERA, which just proves how well you need to perform just to counteract 4 blown saves )

Early days, yet, my friend. Just don't get too antsy if we don't all share quite the same level of admiration for your Phillies

 

[naterator]

My thoughts exactly! Didn't he offer more money too?

Not sure, but he bought the dodgers on pretty much 100% borrowed money, so i'd be surprised if that was the case.
A few minutes of googling later...
Ya, it appears that he was outbid by Henry & friends. Who knows, if he had come up with another partner or 2, we could be staring down year 93 and no light at the end of the tunnel. *shiver*
Came across this link about the Red Sox bid, i can't vouch for it's accuracy (edit- sabr.org though, so i guess it's probably good), but i cite it for the reason that it was written from a sox fans point of view in may 2004, opening with the line "Whenever you're frustrated about the 2004 Sox, remember that things could be a lot worse. Frank McCourt could have bought the team." If only he could see 5 months into the future...

Wilson looks even filthier than he did last year. Have you seen that two seamer he's picked up?

The 2-seam, 4-seam, cutter combo is my favorite for a reliever. Basically, your fastball can go any direction but up, it's almost unfair.

 

[Strider]

I think someone just can't be honest . Yeah, the right side of the bullpen is a problem for the cardinals. It also looks like Westbrook and Carpenter will be a bit shaky. If you want to talk about my Cardinals then I'll be happy to discuss their flaws with you. I made a comment about the phillies unrelated to any comment around just as an observation (in the same post I made observations on the Mets and Red Sox). Interestingly enough when I went digging for some stats I found the following article which says the exact same thing I mentioned.

Now the stats I went looking for just to poke a thorn into your side. Comparing the phillies strongest merit to my cardinals:

McClellan(1.89), Lohse (2.82 before today's shutout (edit: with the shutout today Lohse's era is 2.01), and Garcia (1.44) all have better ERA's than the best ERA for the phillies among SPs. (which is Halladay's 2.83). Collectively have more wins than the phillies top three (oswalt, halladay, and lee). Finally they pretty much match each other dead on in WHIP (Cards have a .01 advantage).

 

[El Justo]

thanks for the stats. carpenter has indeed be shaky. lohse pitched well today. so that bodes well for the cards staff imo. keep in mind that the stats you're giving me are april stats. such a small sample and so early. so i take them all with a grain of salt atm. may, june and into july is when stats have some substance, unless you are playing in fantasy baseball leagues. but for comparison's sake, i don't put a lot of stock into april-only stats.

has there been any talk of pujols extensions or is it a complete negotiating blackout as promised?

@Lambert
a typical "crappy fan boy post" contains a lot of language like my pitcher no1 is awesome, no2 pitched ok last time but he's almost as awesome, our 1B is a stud who is underrated etc etc in seasons past i simply didn't comment on this stuff. but no more. sorry. add a little more substance and less fan boy material. if this is what you call Strider's posts, then sorry to Strider no harm meant.

it's not admiration i want for the team i like nor is it a matter of trying to convince. as said before, calling a spade a spade without being overboard obnoxious

 

[Lambert Simnel]

@Lambert
a typical "crappy fan boy post" contains a lot of language like my pitcher no1 is awesome, no2 pitched ok last time but he's almost as awesome ... if this is what you call Strider's posts, then sorry to Strider no harm meant.

It's not what I call Strider's posts. It's what you said as justification when I challenged you for being over the top on one of Strider's posts.

No matter. Storm in the proverbial teacup.

I agree the stats are early days yet, and I wouldn't expect the Cards' ERA to rival that of the Phils come September. On the other hand, if having the best OPS in the NL means that "the cardinals offense is not lighting the world on fire right now", then you're a hard man to please

 

[Scratch]

Thanks to the volatile nature of early season projections based upon limited sample sizes, Ben Francisco homered last night and is back on pace to make Downtown eat a shoe.

 

[El Justo]

not really a hard man to please. it's not a chest-pounding session of my team is better than yours, you know. if you want me to address the diminished phila offense, then yes, it's not as prodigious as years past. utley out of the 3 hole has been hurting the team in terms of rbi chances. rollins has only 1 rbi all year, and he's been in the 3 hole all year. there's been a dearth of extra base hits overall by the lineup. they're scoring runs though. maybe not at the same clip in years past but they're scoring enough to win games which at this time of the year, is almost a better gauge than analyzing half of april's stats. wait until the weather changes over in the Delaware Valley. the ball flies all over the yard come summer time. this applies for just about all mlb teams though (the ones in cooler spring climates).

one comment i took exception to by Strider was the phils record in one run games. zero statistical evidence to suggest this. just a bold prediction with not much to support it. 2010 record: 29-17 and 4-1 in '11 (small sample).

i will eat a shoe if you can safely prove that there are not fan boy posts made in this thread and in the ones from years past. is it a crime? of course not. most of the posts are thoughtful and accurate to a certain degree. but a lot of times it oozes fan boy which is easy to spot no malice. just calling the kettle black.

 

[sophie]

i will eat a shoe if you can safely prove that there are not fan boy posts made in this thread and in the ones from years past. is it a crime? of course not. most of the posts are thoughtful and accurate to a certain degree. but a lot of times it oozes fan boy which is easy to spot no malice. just calling the kettle black.

Thas baseball yo.

Also Giants is the best time of all time, OF ALL TIME!

 

[El Justo]

attaboy!

 

[illram]

No one said the shoe had to be made of anything inedible. I would bake a cake formed as a shoe. Pics or it did not happen!

Also, imagine if we had an Expos/Blue Jays world series way back when? *shudders* America would die a little bit inside that day. Similar to how Canada is having a National Crisis due to there being more Californian teams than Canadian ones in the NHL Playoffs.

 

[Scratch]

I feel like America dies a bit anytime there's a Yankees-Mets World Series.

 

[illram]

Everyone loses when there is a Yankees v. Mets world series. I would rather watch paint dry.