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NEWS TICKER - Fangraphs reports ;- ) that the Rockies signed Wade Davis. The amount? 3 years, $52M, which by the old math used to be $17M per year or something. This sets a record for RP salary, and --- > should cause us all to take up a moment of silence for Edwin Diaz.
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Taro says,
Doc, I'm suprised how open minded you are to spiritual leaders from other paths. Its seems unusual for someone from a western Christian background.
Do you practice meditation regularly now?
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Will take that as a high compliment my friend. Yes, I meditate, though with an asterisk.
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To me the question as to Christians 'being open to spiritual leaders from other paths' is quite reasonable. Even if you were to disregard Christianity as you see it on TV (which IMHO is usually a grotesque perversion of the religion), it is still the case that many humble Christians are taught to regard *anything said by non-Christian teachers* as suspect. Many 'rank-and-file' Christians look at you quizzically if you quote the Dalai Lama. Even in my own congregation I usually need to explain myself before going much into his teachings.
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Kate Preusser has a very clever article up defending Jerry Dipoto's offseason. The analogy is this: lots of fans hated, hated, hated the current Star Wars movie ... BECAUSE ... it did not match up with any kind of crowd-pleasing plotline they'd spent two years guessing about. The analogy continues: you CANNOT write great movies based on what fans would like to see; you've got to do better than that.
Those are Premises 1 and 2; the Conclusion is, Jerry Dipoto must be doing the right thing, ignoring the fans.
Is the logic valid? The LL comments to Kate's article say, Nay Verily. There are about 60 sharp, telling refutations of the concept here. (None of them include Dr. D's own reaction: you sure as shootin' CAN make a great movie based on what fans want and expect. Michael Bay, Peter Jackson and James Cameron are crowd-pleasing directors. I do think one of the LL commenters did include Dr. D's reaction that we are running on 15 years absent the playoffs here.)
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Marc W has a tight argument right here, in which he posits that the M's see a hyper-Vincent in Shawn Armstrong. The (compelling) argument is:
See his site for the details and strike zone maps.
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After this post, a bit of Mariner shtick. During it, a Warriors Cavs game on TV. Alongside of it, our warmest hopes for your blessed 2018. In the quasi-philsophical, semi-preachy, relentlessly forwardgoing spirit of the Mainframe, Here are 250 humorous (and otherwise) holidays wishes from wishespoems.com.
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One cubicle to the right, we talk about "iguana" ballplayers. That was partly to set up this piece, claiming that Gordon is one of them. Prior to 2017, Gordon signed a 5/$50M contract, which is what you would expect to pay for what. 1.5 WAR per year?
Gordon has been healthy three of the last four years: 2014, 2015, and 2017, last year. Fangraphs sets his bases gained and bases lost as worth --- > $25.1M, and then $38.7M, and then $26.6M. Counting his injury year in 2016 (79 games played), he's been worth $98.3M in four years. And they gave him ten million a year for that.
Iguana.
Marc W asked (reasonably) at USSM, If Dipoto isn't going to buy stars in FA, where's he going to get them? You and i might spend a few minutes asking whether Dipoto just looked across the country and spotted one that other people don't recognize.
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James started his "Hey, Bill" series ten years ago, in August 2017. The very first question he ever answered, I think, was along the lines of "Sabermetrics does not evaluate players. Sabermetrics seeks to understand the game of baseball."
Relatedly, among the first 10 questions he ever answered was this one:
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Could I add something to that?
OK, a short and sweet thread for Christmas eve eve.
I have been doing some stat surfing for Andrew Moore. As you know, I really like the kid and his upside. Oh, he will never K a bunch of guys, but he will get a bunch of guys out.
So here's what I found:
1. Andrew Moore has a heck of a heater. In fact in '17, Moore's fastball was as good as James Paxton's. Not in terms of velocity, of course, but in terms of run suppression.
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DEE GORDON
They say you will always see something new at a baseball game, usually saying this right after the two occasions per year in which that actually occurs. :- ) As it applies to the SSI blog it occurs more frequently than that. This morning, Dr. D woke up to see something he never thought he would ...
... wait for it ...
