RandyMarsh

I love the post that one of the commentators of the article put, to paraphrase "The first question the NBA should use in their concussion protocol is 'Do you want to play for the Kings'"

Okudah is a major question mark not only because of his first year but because of the achilles injury. While I think we have made advances in it to the point that isn't isn't a death knell to somebody's career it's still an injury that is more devastating than say an ACL tear. The fact that somebody like Ojabo could be drafted in the 2nd round despite just tearing his makes me think that NFL teams don't fear it as much as they used to. If it was viewed as a potential career killer like it used to be no way would a team use that early of pick on a guy that just ruptured his.

The ironic thing is that the fact that our guys are having such horrible years may be the best thing for Avila. For arguments sake lets pretend that Chris actually gives a shit about the team and is indeed thinking of firing Al. He may be able to convince Chris that these guys are off to such flukishly bad starts that nobody could have foreseen coming which is why the team is losing and once those stats correct themselves the team will turn it around. On the other hand if the guys were performing at or near their personal expectations AND the team was still losing Al would have no excuse, it would show that he constructed a team that wasn't capable of winning even when the players are performing to expectations.

yep, I say this unironically but I legit have the most faith when Harold and now Victor Reyes are at the plate. Like when they show the order for the next inning and I see one of them is coming up I have atleast some faith that something positive might happen. The fact that this is the case shows just how horrible this lineup has been.

Candy 2-4 with a double in his first rehab start in Toledo. I guess we can hope that maybe he was feeling banged up to start the year and didn't say anything so now after this time off he comeback and start to hit.

On top of this in the 3 biggest trades they've made in the past decade in terms of getting back potentially a top 50 prospect that could be an impact bat they instead chose or atleast settled on a pitcher the centerpiece instead. I'm talking about Norris in the Price trade, Fulmer in the Cespedes trade and Franklin Perez in the JV trade.

Yeah I was thinking something along those lines as well. Ultimately since the buck stops at Al he of course needs to shoulder the blame but to me they need to clean house top to bottom with the exception of Hinch, Fetter and Garko who I will give a pass since he hasn't been here that long. If they just fire Al and keep on all the same scouts, minor league instructors, and whomever else has any role in player development or player scouting then the team won't get any better. Those guys are the root of the problems, I doubt Al just looks at a board and without any input randomly decides on who to draft or go after, they are the ones telling him who to chase, acquire and draft and so far they have been wrong.

Assuming no Jabari drop right now I'm at 1A Murray and 1B Mathurin. Daniels, Sharpe and Ivey are all pretty much even in my eyes in terms of my want for them. I won't be disappointed if they draft any of them but they would all be my 3rd choice. To me it's fun to dream about upside and ceiling but you have to factor in the likelihood that a player will hit that ceiling. I think the likelihood Daniels, Sharpe and Ivey hit it is too low for me to take over guys like Murray or Mathurin. I think Murray and Mathurin can come in and contribute from day 1 and while they may not offer superstar upside(not saying it's impossible for either to get there though) I think they offer very real All Star upside so I don't think we're talking about just a run of mill guys you can easily get in FA. Really though barring Weaver doing something crazy I don't think I will walk away from this draft disappointed like say the Stanley Johnson draft. Even the 3 players I mentioned that I don't necessarily prefer I still see the potential value in their upside and wouldn't be kicking and screaming if they do end up with them.

Perhaps Hinch is going all April/May 2006 JIm Leyland on the team and tearing everybody a new one?

In our latest run of pathetic play we are in the midst of getting outscored 69-22 in our last 12 games. So even though the offense continues to to hit at a sub 2 runs per game pace the pitching staff is starting to show some chinks in their armor as well giving up roughly 6 runs a game. Can't fault them though, it's gotta be maddening to know that one mistake likely means you aren't going to win the game. Talk about pitching on egg shells every time you go out. I could maybe MAYBE be ok with this pathetic play if we had a bunch of promising players down the on the farm tearing it up but that isn't the case either. When you factor in the organization from top to bottom there very well may be none that are in worse shape than ours going forward at this point. It's a shame that after all these years of rebuilding this may be the low point for me in terms of my faith of getting back to relevance.

These guys had 78 HRs this time last year, this year they are at 21. Granted the season started a few weeks late but even factoring that in you're talking about a huge drop. If they were even close to last year's power numbers we'd probably be right in the thick of the division or WC chase.

On a similar note I just came across this tidbit.

They have to either fire Coolbaugh or at the very least move him to a bench coach or something and bring in somebody else to take over the hitting duties. Do I believe that will make them do a 180 and become a competent hitting team? No very likely not but you can't just continue to stay the course when your team is quite literally putting up numbers that haven't been seen in like 100 years. Yeah it's not like he has a ton of great hitters on this team to work with but virtually every non Castro is performing way under their career norms, particularly the power department. If one or two guys were performing bad then you could understand but when 10+ are performing 20% or more under their career numbers than something is wrong. At first I may chalk it up to offense being down and the new ball but in the past month or so offense is starting to tick up and HR numbers are going up meanwhile we are getting worse. Again I realize that ultimately it comes down to the players but it's also these coaches jobs to identify the problems the players are having and trying to correct them, whether that is mechanically or in their approach and it seems like they aren't doing that. G2 has been beating it to death all year the horrible approach these guys have and how they take way too many hittable pitches, that is something the coaching staff and scouting department should pick up on. Other teams pick up on patterns of pitchers yet we seemingly don't. That's a problem that needs to be corrected.

Can't wait for it, probably will be my go to guide when it gets published.

Yeah IIRC he was pretty highly touted coming into that COVID shortened draft but dropped to us do to signability concerns. So even though he wasn't technically a 1st or even 2nd round pick he very well may have had the talent to be one which is another reason that makes me more of a believer in him.

Yeah we don't need a scout to tell us whether Kerry Carpenter is actually somebody to get legit excited about, the fact that he hasn't got injured yet is all the confirmation I need to realize that he probably is destined to just be an organizational guy, if he was destined for more he'd already be hurt by now.

Keith is one of few bats that actually showed any promise in the entire system this season so naturally he gets hurt.

A little off topic but it has to do with an athlete changing sports in his 30s, anyway I maintain that Michael Jordan picking up a bat in his 30s for the first time in 15 years and going straight to double A and hitting .202/.290/.266 is one of the more underappreciated sports accomplishments ever. If Golden Tate can match those numbers in single A I will be impressed.

Not sure if it's been mentioned or not but Heyman reported that Rodriguez is on the restricted list due to marital issues. The wife is probably pissed at him that due to his suckiness to start the year they may be stuck in this organization for the whole contract. On a serious note I hope he gets everything worked out and I suppose from our standpoint this is probably better than if it was a substance abuse issue like some people thought it could have been.

Weatherman straight up murders the Cowboys!

Steph doesn't make a 3 the entire game and the Warriors still win. Now 1 game away from another championship.

The fact that we finally hit a HR and scored 5 runs almost feels like a win even if it wasn't one in the standings.

Trevor Thompson said during the game that he will indeed still be getting paid while on the list FWIW.

WHERE"S MY 2 RUNS!?!?!

Even if we don't get Stroud or Young there are a few other QBs in this draft that I'm really high on at this point namely Will Levis from Kentucky. He has all the traits to be a star in the NFL, prototypical size, good mobility and a howitzer for an arm. Also playing in the SEC you don't have to question the competition he faces. The lazy comp is Josh Allen but really he has the tools to be like him. Tyler Van Dyke from Miami and Tanner Mckee from Stanford are two more names to keep an eye on and guys I could see on the Lions radar if they indeed pick around 10, both of whom I feel are better than any QB prospect that was in this draft and would be worthy of being a first round pick assuming they progress at their current trajectory this year and don't pull a Sam Howell or Spencer Rattler.