2018 MLB Spring Training Running Thread

Sounds good to me:

 

That increase for breaks from 2:05 to 2:55 for playoff games is a killer. It's why postseason baseball games seem to drag on infinitely.

 

Full release:

MLB announces pace of play initiatives

 

Six mound visits PLUS pitching changes?

Are they trying to speed the game up or slow it down?

 

Because God forbid they do something radical like cut down commercials between innings.

 

They need to bring relievers in from the bullpen in novelty golf carts again. And make the pitching coaches and managers go out to the mound on souped-up Rascal scooters with a minimum speed limit. It would solve all of our problems.

 

They dealt away a 27-year-old Opening Day starter for a guy with a 95+ ERA at the time of the trade. Arrieta got 63 starts with the Orioles, fewer than such Buck-era luminaries as Brian Matusz (68), Jeremy Guthrie (153) and Ubaldo Jimenez (104). Kevin Gausman, whose progress has been halting at best, has received 106 starts.

Nobody knows how patient the Orioles have to be to avoid riding with sunk free agent costs more than, well, the Orioles. Yet they dumped Arrieta for a replacement-level pitcher during a longish-shot run at a playoff berth (were 3 1/2 behind the Red Sox and occupying the second WC at the time the trade was made). They did it b/c Arrieta's a complete, uncoachable moron. The Cubs let him run wild with his mechanics and it worked out well and they'd still rather invest long-term in a Tommy John patient who hacked it up twice in huge spots last year.

 

Hey, if your logic tells you the Orioles were the smart ones in the Arrieta-Feldman deal, I can’t argue with that!

 

I never said they were smart. I said if they were dumping Arrieta for a league-average guy, it has to tell you how sick they were of his shit.

 

Appears to be some movement on the JD Martinez front:

 

Hmmm I wonder where Jon got that info from.

 

I think this is just semantics over what BYH meant by "flaming asshole." I'm not sure anyone would say that Arrieta isn't a guy you'd want to have a beer with, though he can be a little intense. (Not that he would break training.) But he's a pain in the ass who thinks he invented conditioning and whose mechanics are constantly in danger of falling apart.