Kolek planning to go pro
1) Arrieta 2) Murphy 3) TurnerTop 3 most obvious PED users in the MLB.
This is well said about Maddon. He brings a good mindset/attitude to the clubhouse, but in pressure situations, he's at best mediocre in his decision making. He'll always have a WS title to his name, but overrated for sure.
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Don't forget you also said strongly implied the entire Cubs starting rotation.
In other news. The League of legends championship beat out the world series in ratings in 2015
Aren't you retired? I would think one of the biggest benefits of retirement was not running short on sleep.
Definitely a bit mad scientist, a guy who is incredibly entertaining, and for the foreseeable future untouchable because he was in charge when the Cubs finally won one, but as far as game time decisions, agreed completely. Not as bad with pitchers as Dusty was, but if it's anything more than getting 8 innings from a starter and 1 from a closer, you kind of know there'll be second guessing going on.
+1 on the general Maddon consensus in this thread. Kind of wonder if he'll outgrow his utility to that team somewhere around 2019. Bryant and Contreras will be 27, Rizzo will be 30, Russell and Baez will still be young at 25 & 26 but will have more service time, and they'll probably add some more veterans to plug holes over the years a la Zobrist, Heyward. I feel like Maddon's personality is more important to a young club over 162 games to help them grow into the game, than it is for a batch of vets used to winning. At that point, you might just want a guy that relies on analytics and makes the statistically correct decisions.
As already stated, the decision to bring in Lackey was inexplicable. I'd rather go down with Duensing or even Rondon at that point. There's no excuse for it. I like Maddon but what is so frustrating is his unwillingness to take accountability for poor decisions, specifically games 6 and 7 last year. Rich Hill left a ton of hittable fastballs right over the plate last night and the Cubs either took them or swung right through them. I've never seen Bryant look this bad - it's bizarre.
As a Brewer fan, I don't have much experience with playoff baseball. Is the using the starters in relief a new thing? I understand wanting your best arms in the game, but at some point, you have to do what got you there. Relief is so different than starting. I can see as a long reliever to eat innings, but not 1 or 2 inning stints.
By the way, Contreras is super annoying as a catcher. He make more mound visits than Joe Mauer did. How many trips did he make yesterday? 50?
Mark Buehrle closed a game (albiet extra innings) in the 2005 World Series.
Cy Young pitched in relief in the 1903 World Series. It's been going on forever. In the old days you had 4 man rotations and the 4th starter wasn't needed in the World Series with the travel days and was moved to the bullpen. Now there are 5 starters and the fifth starter (or sometimes someone better than the fifth starter if they have relief experience) moves to the pen, like Lackey. What's changed is rather than using that fifth starter to eat up innings with an early starter departure, they're starting to use them like regular relievers and hoping for the best.
Yes, 50.
after Puig got on second there were a LOT of mound visits and steps off the mound. 50? no, but there were way too many. You can fault your manager for having Lackey in but he was never allowed to get into any kind of rhythm. Ya gotta admit it was unusual at a minimum.
Not really. You are comparing concurrent streaming to TV ratings, that's flawed from the start. You're also comparing global access to US only access.