It was good watching the Giants beat the A's tonight. Have to be encouraged that they put up 6 runs against Sean Manaea and the A's pitching. Obviously I don't expect the Giants to be world beaters this year but I think they may at least be competitive and thats all you can ask for as a fan.
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3 more days, let’s go!Comment -
The Cardinals have settled upon some pitching roles for the outset of the season, as Derrick Goold of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch was among those to cover on Twitter. Newly inked southpaw Kwang-Hyun Kim is headed to a high-leverage relief role, while right-hander Carlos Martinez will step back into the rotation.
This represented one of those good problems in need of resolution. Lacking any health issues to drive a decision, the Cards had to take their pick between two rather appealing choices to round out the starting staff.
Kim inked a two-year, $8MM deal under which the club also posted a $1.6MM fee to his former KBO outfit. Kim was sharp in Spring Training, throwing eight scoreless frames with 11 strikeouts and just one walk. While he made his mark as a starter in Korea, Kim will have to earn his way back into the rotation in St. Louis. Alternatively, he could etch out a prominent gig at the back of the pen, perhaps as a closer.
There’s a model to follow in Martinez himself, who was a high-quality MLB starter for years before health issues intervened. He ended up being shifted back into the pen, where he rung up saves in half of his 48 appearances in 2019. Now, the talented 28-year-old will get a chance to reestablish himself as a starter. It makes sense that the club elected to give him another crack at the rotation. Beyond his established ceiling in that role, Martinez is owed $11.5MM in 2021 with two high-priced club options to follow.Comment -
San Francisco's Alyssa Nakken on Monday night became the first woman to coach in an on-field capacity during a major league game when she took over as Giants first-base coach.
She replaced Antoan Richardson in the late innings of Monday's exhibition at the Oakland Athletics.
"Congratulations on making history!'' Giants outfielder Hunter Pence posted on Twitter shortly after the final out of San Francisco's 6-2 win.Comment -
Padres got shutout in a 1-0 ballgame.Comment -
2 days til "opening day"...stoked 4 some live sports to watch on the tube!Comment -
Good or bad its going to be a memorable 2020 season.Comment -
Mike Trout's ADP is 7.
Remember just a few years ago he was the overall #1. Period.Comment -
The Dodgers optioned Gavin Lux. He won't make the opening-day roster. Also, they signed left-handed reliever Jake McGee, who was just released by Colorado.Comment -
Jose Altuve exited the game with a leg contusion, according to the Astros. He is day to day.Comment -
So Tommy Milone, 33, will be with his seventh MLB team in his 10th MLB season, making his 175th MLB appearance, 137th start on Fri. He signed a minors deal with Orioles in mid-Feb. Friday, he's the O's 2020 Opening Day starter at Fenway Park. Oh baseball, we missed your nuttinessComment -
will the orioles win 10 gamesComment -
Bet the OVER in Orioles games.Comment -
Good luck everyone. We are all counting on you guys.Comment -
yanks got it easy w marlins oriolesComment -
In a surprising move, the Yankees announced Tuesday that they’ve optioned lefty Jordan Montgomery to the team’s alternate site in Scranton. The Yanks also selected the contracts of non-roster veterans Luis Avilan, Chris Iannetta and David Hale.
New York also announced that non-roster righty Dan Otero has been placed on the restricted list. Meanwhile, each of Matt Duffy, Estevan Florial, Deivi Garcia, Zack Granite, Erik Kratz, Brooks Kriske, Tyler Lyons, Nick Nelson, Clarke Schmidt, Nick Tropeano, Miguel Yajure and Tony Zych has been reassigned to the team’s alternate site.
Montgomery, 27, seemed like a lock for a rotation spot to begin the season. It seems likely that he’ll be called back to the big leagues in short order, but it seems that the Yankees will roll out Gerrit Cole, James Paxton and a either Mike King or a bullpen game in their first three contests. Manager Aaron Boone indicated as much today an added that J.A. Happ is expected to start the fourth game (Twitter link via WFAN’s Sweeny Murti), so Montgomery may not join the club until its second trip through the rotation. An off-day should allow Cole to start the team’s fifth game.
Avilan, 31, has a strong big league track record but stumbled to a 5.06 ERA and 4.96 FIP in 32 frames with the Mets last year. That forced him to settle for a minor league deal over the winter, but Avilan has a career 3.28 ERA and 3.41 FIP with averages of 8.1 strikeouts, 3.5 walks and 0.5 home runs per nine innings pitched. He’s held opposing lefties to a putrid .203/.280/.283 slash since his 2012 MLB debut and has held righties in check reasonably well: .259/.340/.374.
The 37-year-old Iannetta gives the Yankees a third catcher behind Gary Sanchez and Kyle Higashioka early in the season when rosters are expanded to 30 players. The 14-year veteran hasn’t hit particularly well in recent seasons but has a long track record of quality on-base percentages thanks to a gaudy 13.5 percent walk rate in his career. Iannetta posted a .254/.354/.511 slash in 316 plate appearances as recently as 2017, but his two-year reunion with his original club, the Rockies, didn’t go well; in 524 plate appearances over the past two seasons in Colorado, Iannetta hit .223/.335/.395 (85 OPS+, 80 wRC+).
Hale’s boomerang act with the Yankees is well-documented by this point. He’s signed a ridiculous five minor league contracts with the Yankees since Jan. 2018 and, despite being jettisoned from the roster so many times, fared quite well. Hale has racked up 48 1/3 innings across his scattered stints in the Bronx and, amid constant roster uncertainty, pitched to a strong 2.98 ERA with a 29-to-8 K/BB ratio. He’s plenty capable of working in multi-inning stints, which should prove particularly valuable early in the year as the club both manages workloads and apparently tinkers with the occasional opener/bullpen game.Comment -
So Orioles worst in baseball or just best divisional foes?Comment -
As MLB returns, a baseball family devastated by coronavirus feels conflicted
Bill Luderer, a 71-year-old Yankees fan, will be in front of his TV Thursday night to watch his team open a major league season like none before it.
On one hand, Luderer will be overjoyed by the return of baseball at Nationals Park in Washington, D.C., where the Yankees will face the defending champs. He can still hear the thunderous crack of Mickey Mantle's bat from those bygone days he spent inside the grand ol' ballyard in the Bronx.
On the other hand, Luderer says, "I'm conflicted."
At the intersection of the pastime and the pandemic, few baseball fans understand the conflict like the New Jersey father who lost his only child to the coronavirus. Ben Luderer was the starting catcher and a .500 hitter for high school power Don Bosco Prep, which finished the 2008 season with a 33-0 record and the No. 1 ranking in the nation in ESPN's poll. He was a Division I player at Marist, and then the varsity head coach at Cliffside Park (N.J.) High School and an independent instructor who ran a travel team and helped prospects land scholarships to college.
Nearly four months after Ben's death at age 30, as MLB launches what is scheduled to be a 60-game regular season, the virus that has claimed more than 140,000 American lives is still killing people, still spreading like wildfire. Bill Luderer is like many sports fans who wonder whether ballplayers should even be taking the field.
"Obviously I hope everything goes well, but it's hard to believe that there are not going to be problems," he says. "The ultimate problem is that somebody dies. But what if dozens of these athletes come down with it, and who knows in the future what effect this is going to have on people's bodies? ... So I'm really torn about it."
He's torn between love and loss, between sweet memories of the game's father-and-son rituals and the potential life-and-death stakes of playing ball in the age of the coronavirus. Luderer weighs the reward against the risk.
"And nobody," he says, "needs to tell me what that risk means."Comment -
For the first time ever I selected a SP in the first round (4th overall) in my big boy fantasy masters league.
Never have I selected a pitcher so early as it usually goes against my fantasy philosophy.Comment -
Tomorrow night. Go KershawComment -
Blue Jays still homeless, Pittsburgh is out as an option for them.Comment -
Mets sign Brian Dozier.
Mike Fiers ERA goes up 5.52 after getting a loss in a game.Comment -
Looks like all teams will have BLM stenciled on the pitchers mound this weekend.
Let the shitshow begin.
MLB is shooting themselves in the foot being connected to this terrorist organization.Comment -
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Let’s hope the Astros get what’s coming to them this year, cheaters.Comment
