Hey Billy, Buckner called and wants his eyebrows back. And McCourt, too, and wants his Darth nickname back-and take it off the bat ahora mismo!
I think the dodgers ranking is fair. The roster has some spectacular potential......both ways. It's going to end either really, really good or really, really bad and the early results are bad. 4 games over .500 after the marlins trade, 1 game over after the Red Sox deal. The ball is the players court now to prove espn, Boston and Miami wrong.
totally agree great players don't necessarily equate to great results however regarding the post-trade results i'm willing to give them a little leeway it was immediate cultural shock with a bunch of egos wondering where they all fit in am i the leader, or is it kemp? or kershaw? ethier? hanley? agon?... takes time to get to know each other and mesh one spring together will do a lot to smooth out the wrinkles again, won't necessarily equate to great results but their comfort level should improve dramatically
on a side note even being ranked 8th if this team fails to make the postseason mattingly will be gone
There is something to that Irish, I can't argue heavily against it but I don't put much stock in it either. Baseball relies less on chemistry than any other sport. You don't run plays, you basically do the right thing for your position and hope the other guys do too. No one is in the batters box with you and no one fields your plays. There is something to feeding off each other and motivating each other but weren't all these guys boosted from getting out of bad situations? They should have been motivated by that alone.
This makes me hope you guys blow it, the Yankees too. It's girardis walk year and I would love to see him gone. Speaking to Boston guys, it wasn't franconas fault they failed, it wasn't valentines and it won't be mattingly's either. At some point you have to blame the players. It's baseball, three strikes and you're out.
Im not as upset on the ranking as I'm on the double standards...again, to use Age as an issue on the Dodgers (most of our key players are between 27-31), but ignore it for the Yankees, who rely on Jeter, Tex, A-Rod, Youk and Ichiro??? I know the dodgers arent #1, and they are right in giving Wash the top spot, but the rest is debatable... AND NOW, they have pushed us to 8th after the RA Dickey trade... I would like to go spot by spot Toronto vs Dodgers Starters: CK > Josh Johnson Greinke > Dickey (sure the guy has been good 2 years, but that all, and he's like 51) Bills = Morrow Beckett < Buhrle Ryu = Romero (and this is based on 2011, cuz he was terrible in 2012) That's 2-1-2... Batting order (or what it could look like) Mark Ellis < Jose Reyes Crawford = Melky (we have no idea what's gonna come out of them) Kemp > Bautista Gonzalez > Encarnacion (Encarnacion has more power, but I like Adrian more on the overall performance) Hanley = Lawrie Ethier > Rasmus Cruz < Lind Ellis < Bonifacio Pitcher < Arencibia If you go position by position, they only beat us in RF with Encarnacion and 3B with Lawrie. I call SS a tied because you cant compare Reyes with Hanley and the LF tie... 2B could also be a tie... the BP is not even a challenge... Beli, Jansen, League could be considered a top 3 BP in the league, and Toronto's is a patch work...
The yanks are relying on guys who maybe old but won 95 games last year, the dodgers are relying on the addition of guys who have either failed recently on the big stage or never been on one. In that instance I will take previous success over age. As for comparing the dodgers with the blue jays, I'll give you an edge but Toronto is being seriously over rated, IMO and just getting hype because people are now aware they still exist. I'd rank them third in al east with ny and tb being the teams to beat. Even Baltimore slipped in the rankings but are largely unchanged from last year. I'd consider them tied with the jays.
totally agree again except i selfishly hope both our teams make it to october francona was a scapegoat for sure and valentine is an absolute assclown who alienates players wherever he goes and you're spot on with the chemistry -- it is an oft overlooked tangible factor imo
If you take past success ( and Im not saying you as you, but i the general term), shouldnt Adrian be getting some extra credit, or Hanley, or Kemp who had a monster year in 2011??? Again,its double standard. They make the ranking on names first and then try to justify the reason. I cant wait for Chapman to fail as a starter (the guy cant live on 2 pitches and throw 100 mph for 7 innings) just to see what they will start saying about the Reds great rotation... To me the dodgers are a top 5 team, nothing less than that...
The Yankees won 95 games last year and went to the alcs. Agons numbers have been slipping, he was the leader if a shitty Boston team for two years. Hanley's numbers have been in the toilet a couple years now. Kemp hasn't done it two years in a row. None of them have ever won shit. I'm not really sure what to give them credit for other playing well enough to get paid and not live up to the payday. The bottom line is all players are paid to win. With the LA team it remains to be seen if they can do it
Ps to that last post. Kemp shouldn't be in the "never won shit" list. While I don't like the length of any deal over 4 or 5 year, he's by far the least likely to disappoint on the dodgers roster.
I had the Yankees 1st in the East until Dickey, now I like Toronto. As for comparing a team by comparing one player against another, it's ridiculous, as it doesn't address how much better one player is than the other. One matchup might have a guy be 0.5 wins better than another, while another matchup could be 5+ wins. For example, if you say "Reyes > Hanley, Ellis > Arencibia". Reyes is probably a little better than Hanley at this point, I'd give him a win advantage, while Ellis has 2-3 wins on terrible Arencibia. The Blue Jays have a better lineup than us, and if their pitching stays healthy they're all around better, but that's a significant if. Simple as that.
How? Dickey, Josh Johnson, Morrow, Buehrle and Romero, with Joey Bats, Jose Reyes, E5, Lawrie and Melky. That's an amazing core.
