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PROSPECT INSIDER

Has a sweet new look.  Not only is it clean, but it's patriotic and sports the all-important "carousel" feature.  No word on whether Jason is going to attempt a wacky avatar.  Probably best not to dig base camps at mountains that promise only tragedy and despair.

Jason's right-hand man Luke Arkins does a little season-2016 flyover in this piece.  I hadn't been aware that Ketel Marte's mono cost him 22 pounds during the season, had you?  It's one thing if Dae-Ho Lee or Dr. D loses 16 lbs.  It's another thing if Jon Heder loses two stone.  Well, okay.  That would explain the safety of the Hit It Here Cafe glass during Marte's AB's.  And would forecast, most probably, 2017 attention to Yahtzee slots other than "SS."

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SHANNON DRAYER

Has a typical list of eeyore-type character assassinations on the titles list.  :- )  Scan down the titles; they will exalt you.

A bit more seriously, the piece on Felix resonated in a way I wasn't quite expecting.  It reminded me of the Mariners' shedding Randy Johnson and the Unit saying, "You want to bet against me, you go ahead and make that bet."  Johnson was always a motivated man, and so is Felix.

Bill Krueger and Mike Blowers insist that Felix is a guy who (1) launches baseballs with the muscles in his back, and (2) has the ability to break pitches at all angles of creation.  Dr. Detecto happens to agree with this muchly.  He can sympathize with the denizens who think that 88 MPH is a death knell for Felix, but ... this raises the question, Jered Weaver Hisashi Iwakuma Jamie Moyer Greg Maddux.  Those guys were done at 82 MPH, not at 87 MPH.

What Felix needs is not his 93 MPH back, but a good determined effort to figure out how he can star with a cruddy radar gun reading.  It can be done, and it says here he will do it.

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KENNETH ARTHUR at FIELD GULLS

Demonstrates that Russell Wilson's "launch time" has evolved from 3.4 seconds as a rookie, to 3.2 seconds in 2013-14, to 3.0 seconds last year, to now --- > wait for it --- > 2.5 seconds!

Dr. D has always thought this to be the evolutionary imperative of football, as the field shrinks around the bigger and faster players.  Don Coryell was the "first canary," the prototype of the modern quick-hit passing game.  If the field were Aussie Rules Football, you'd have a different conversation, but that's not what you have; what you have is Bronko Nagurski's field being played by Bobby Wagner and Kam Chancellor.

What makes Wilson's 2.5 second launch time even more interesting, is the whipsaw against his schoolyard scrambles.  You get defenders under more and more pressure to jump routes, and then ... all of a sudden they've got to cover three breaks in one play.

As one NinersNation.com poster asked another one after the Seahawks game, "What do you think a Hall of Fame quarterback LOOKS like in his fifth year?"

BABVA,

Jeff