AZMike

I think having the salary that would have gone to the player go into an MLB-managed fund, similar to what happens with the luxury tax revenues. As it stands now it's ridiculous a team has to pay the salary of a player who is not playing but merely injured, but they don't hvae to pay salary if a player is out due to being caught cheating.

I don't mind the division format and an unbalanced schedule but it shouldn't be this unbalanced. 19 games against teams within the divsion and only ~ 7 with teams in the same league not in the division? That's over the top. Should be more like 14-5 within the division, 9-10 outside. Also, considering the schedule is unbalanced, having two wild cards is a fine idea but it should be a three game set, not one game.

The angels will continue to lose in ridiculous fashion only sweep their last two series against the As thereby pushing the Rangers into the playoffs and increasing their rank in the standings to the 11th overall pick. Moreno will sign Cano to an outrageous contract then trade Kendrick for an innings eater

Josh Hamilton -- improving the OBP of the batter immediately preceding him since late 2012

IIRC Cowart's been in a pretty bad slump of late, batting well south of the Mathis line in the minors. I think Lindsey was a 2nd round pick.

This is why, IMO, I'm in the "sacrifie 2014" camp. Trade movable pieces on moderate contracts (Kendrick, Aybar, etc) for pitching prospects with some risk who might be able to contribute by 2015 or 2016. Then continue with random waiver wire players (like what we're doing with Shuck, Hawpe etc) at positions.

The ten worst teams in the standings get protected picks which are not given up even if the owner and GM make another bad decision in the free agent market this offseason. We would give up the 1st pick in the second round instead.

Zero solid MLB players in the pipeline following five 1st round draft picks is not very good.

Kaleb Cowart, Cam Bedrosian and Chevy Clarke were all picked in the first round of 2010. CJ Cron was picked in the 1st round of 2011.

Reagins and Dipoto seem to be very similar. Both were good guys at scouting and running the farm system but not good at being GM, which requires things like negotiating fair value in trades and free agent deals, and occasionally talking your boss out of making bad decisions.

We still have 6 more games against the Houston Astros...

This. Dipoto's best transaction of his career -- which got him hired as Angels GM -- was trading a rapidly declining Dan Haren for Joe Saunders, Patrick Corbin and Tyler Skaggs. It is now apparent that move was more a product of Reagins' incompetence than Dipoto's brilliance.

He's struck me as a bit of a d*ck after his post game comments after blowing Greinke should-be no hitter back in KC last fall

Before the season began I predicted that Oakland would win, and 2-5 would be Rangers / Angels / MAriners/ Astros in that order. That appears to be the likely outcome. My prediction that both AL wildcards would go to the west due to a stacked division getting the chance to "beat up on the Astros" appears to be completely wrong.

Dusty Baker helped lead the Giants win 3 straight away games to clinch the 2012 NLDS after falling behind 0-2 in the series

The cluthcness stat is based on leverage -- meaning how well a player does in situatios which have a significant effect on the outcome of the game. Trout has lots of RBI's in blowout games. For example he hit for the cycle in a game which the Angels won 12-0. He's also struck out with bases loaded, two outs, Angels down by one in the 9th IIRC more than once. This latter situation is high leverage.

wRC+ (basically a comprehensive offensive stat considering park factor, 100 is an average MLB player) Trout: Low Leverage: 196 Med. Leverage: 161 High Leverage: 67 Hamilton: Low: 105 Med: 67 High: 100 Hamilton is near or average in all situations. Trout is out of this world good in low and medium leverage, and terrible when the pressure is on. The clutch stat simply means a player does comparatively worse in high pressure spots compared to how that same player performs normally.

It turns out neither Bourjos nor Trout are capable of leaping 15 over the outfield walls to retrieve Blanton's pitches

find a stranger in the Alps

Bees are the visiting team. I live in Tucson (home of AAA Padres)

you would be correct, and it's not close. There is actaully a stat which measures clutchness: Individual list, Team list This thursday I'll be watching the Bees (including, unfortunately, Kole Calhoun) from a $4 general admission seat while enjoying $1 beers

what would you suggest? We have two of the five worst contracts in baseball. Hamilton and Pujols are utterly untradeable and responsible for about of a third of this team's payroll obligations for YEARS. We have no farm to speak of and few tradeable major league players.

He got cut from the Astros while still only costing league minimum, picked up on waivers for free. The bigger indictment is the fact that half of this team is composed of random dudes picked up off waivers despite costing a fortune in payroll.

unfortunately one of those players converted his contract to equity therefore he technically owns the team

Back in spring training everyone was saying "don't worry about having the worst record in spring training, players like Field, Shuck, Enright, Buckner etc. won't actually be used in real games."