Tennessee

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Cool Papa sez,

Weird that they would have Paxton in AA (along with Taijuan and Hultzen).

He already pitched there last season. I guess it's a way to keep pressure off the org to have them in the majors the moment there is an opening or someone struggles. It will be the perfect chance to see exactly how Walker compares to the older, college-trained pitchers, which will be fun.

Who was it, Jeff Sullivan who noted that Tennessee is a better climate in April and May?

Along with that, we fancy that Jay-Z forsees a Maddux-Glavine-Smoltz type golf group, one stimulating another to 3-hit shutout into 2-hit shutout into 1-hit shutout... he has to align his rotations from the top to the bottom of the system, and it could be that he didn't have four open slots at the top rung.  Counting Erasmo's slot at Tacoma, if he winds up there.

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:: shrug :: AA or AAA, they are all three of them under-challenged in any case.  A starting high school point guard doesn't get better playing 1-on-4 in the driveway with the neighborhood kids.  He gets better in a camp with Bobby Knight pointing out his weaknesses.  

Playing in the driveway is TERRIBLE for him, and a good way to get hurt, by the way, since he's not focused.  Worst thing in the world for an elite athlete, to let him overmatch players who are far worse than he is.

They want to secure the 7th years, or keep the IP down this year, or let them dink around with their command and control, or whatever, fine, Tennessee is as good a place to stash them as anywhere.  Stash them in Everett if you want.

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=== Holland's Deal ===

By the way, Derek Holland became the latest young gun to give a hometown discount which looks terrible for him on paper, but which looks great for him in real life.

We kibitzed, in this series, the Rays' (tremendous) idea of giving an 8-year deal to a rookie starting pitcher.  Matt Moore could feasibly make $70-80M in his first 8 years, if he turned out to be a great pitcher.  The Rays guaranteed him $15M, with the probability of making $40M if he's any good at all.

=== Prospect Status, March 2010 ===

Groupthink:  In March 2010?  A good solid Grade B or B+ prospect.

In the 1970's, my friends and I spent a lot of happy hours sitting around a table, playing Strat-O-Matic football.  Sometimes only myself and one other player would set up an entire league (with maybe 12 teams) and play through a season.