Lance Berkman's return to Houston is a popular topic today, with the best takes I've found coming from Bernie Miklasz of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch and Astros senior director of digital media Alyson Footer. On to today's links:
- Bill Plaschke of the L.A. Times explains that new Dodgers trustee Tom Schieffer is "a hands-off-the-roster guy, famous for leaving the Rangers baseball folks alone during his tenure there, one of the main reasons he was chosen for this job." GM Ned Colletti will only have to make a case to Schieffer if he wants to go over budget.
- We have to recalculate our expectations of position players in their late 30s in the post-PED era, writes SI's Tom Verducci.
- WEEI's Alex Speier discusses the timeline of top Red Sox pitching prospect Anthony Ranaudo.
- The cases of Phil Hughes and Philip Humber demonstrate "the fickle nature of pitching," writes Joel Sherman of the New York Post.
- Geoff Baker of the Seattle Times wonders how much time the Mariners will give Jack Cust to start hitting. So far he's at .171/.326/.186 in 86 plate appearances, which means he's outhitting Carlos Pena.
- Player's union head Michael Weiner told ESPN's Jayson Stark the players are open to adding more playoff teams, but no proposals have been made and "it's just too early in the bargaining process to predict or guess where it's going to land." For much more on the topic, check out Stark's Rumblings and Grumblings column.
Interesting, The verducci article also touches on pitch counts and how they’re rising again. Which is a good thing.
More specifically this april there has been as many 125+ pitch pitchers in april than there was in the combined aprils of the last 5 years. Exciting stuff.
That was quite an article. It bugged me that he mixed up Jeff and Jered Weaver though. I don’t get how that still happens.
Seriously. At this point, that would be like confusing Tony and Chris Gwynn.
I know that I should, but I don’t have it in me to drop Carlos Pena on my fantasy baseball team. I have Billy Butler and Victor Martinez who can man first, so Pena can ride the bench for a while, right?
-wtk
No one is going to pick him up!
-Fantasy_Theo
Just do it! You can pick up someone like Brett Wallace who is on fire right now.
Ranaudo makes me feel better about losing Casey Kelly.
Really? Personally, it’s Adrian Gonzalez who makes me feel better about losing Casey Kelly.
Ranaudo is a nice prospect. I’m just hoping his elbow problems last year were sort of a fluky thing, rather than a sign of things to come. There’s a reason he was available in the supplemental round. Healthy, he would have gone in the top 10 for sure.
i believe it was his shoulder, not elbow. That is much much worse
Nah, elbow. http://www.mlbtraderumors.com/2010/05/2010-draft-prospect-anthony-ranaudo.html
don’t believe that anymore, because it was his elbow
Before he started that last year of college a lot of people expected him to go #2 overall. Ranaudo is really really good, probably a lot better than Kelly, he was available when he was because he had been injured, and had a pretty bad year after he came back, but still wanted a large amount of money to sign. He had to pitch in the cape cod league before the Sox would sign him so that they could see if his down year was residual effects from the injury or if there was something else causing him to have problems pitching effectively.
His hot start is impressive and he should rocket through the system like Buccholz did. 2013 is going to be interesting because its the first time a spot in the major league rotation is open and it should be a good competition with lefty’s Britton and Pimentel.
Ranaudo is a solid prospect but its so stupid of Speier to suggest that renaudo could be the best ever sox prospect.
can you quote speier saying or “suggesting” that?
my bad.
Insert “most hyped” in place of “best ever” in previous post
“A case can be made that Anthony Ranaudo was the most-hyped Red Sox draft pick of all time. ”
still stupid regardless
suggesting he’s the best ever would be stupid, agree. why is it stupid to suggest he could be the most-hyped?
As far as hype, anaudo hasn’t come close to a guy like buchholz, or even Kelly.
Ranaudo is projected to become a #2/3 type starter.
Buchholz was expected to become the ace of the staff
well that’s apples to oranges innit? buchholz and kelly were around for years earning their “ace” hype. ranaudo’s been in the system for a month, and after this summer is already being talked about as front-end guy
the proper comparison would look at the hype of the former two one month into their pro starts. which is what speier did
obviously a factor here is that a lot more attention is paid to prospects now than ever before. but…that was part of speier’s point. most-hyped ever, not best ever
still not seeing the stupidity
oops meant to hit reply
agree to disagree i guess. i see Ranaudo as a nearly finished product
High floor type of guy with potential for #2/3 starter
“i see Ranaudo as a nearly finished product” are you a scout? Because I’ve never heard anyone claim that before, so you must know something others don’t. He has pitched all of four times as a pro, he’s not even used to pitching every five days, is just starting to learn a change-up, and they chose to start him in Greenville, but he’s nearly a finished product?
Dear Alex Speier,
Please stop riding the WEEI suck up train. It’s mind-blowingly obvious to the non-casual fans (most of your readers) that it’s insane to call Ranaudo one of the best prospects in Red Sox history.
We wonder why other cities hate our teams…
he. didn’t. do. that.
knowing how to read should be a prerequisite for criticizing writers imo
I should rephrase – to even bring up the notion that a case can be made is absurd
From the first line of the article:
A case can be made that Anthony Ranaudo was the most-hyped Red Sox draft pick of all time.
do you think most-hyped means best?
Most hyped is self implied. If you are most hyped, you are considered a huge prospect.
Does he say “best”? No. But even the phrase “most hyped” is insane.
“Most hyped is self implied.”
what does this even mean? ranaudo is a huge prospect; and most-hyped might imply he’s the best current prospect, but it very obviously doesn’t imply that he’s the best prospect ever
i wouldn’t argue that ranaudo is more hyped than jose iglesias, for example. but speier didn’t say ranaudo is most-hyped, just that a case could be made for that proposition. and it can
you’re overreacting and you can’t even explain why
lmfo. One more time.
Read closer…the context is that Speier says that fans are paying more attention than ever to the lower levels of pro ball. In that sense, more people are paying attention to Ranaudo, and in turn is receiving hyped in all likelihood because he is one of the most promising pitching prospects the Red Sox currently have.