gehringer_2

the whole discussion around SF has, of course dodged the probably the hottest civic issue in SF, which is the homeless population. They are quite likely both the a lot of victims and no doubt some of perps of that one stat I noted, which is so elevated in SF - robbery. I know people around the country like to claim, superciliously, that "CA has a homeless problem" but the reality is that America has a homeless problem and conveniently for the rest of the country, cold (or hot) weather or cruelty drives most of their problem to the west coast for them and CA ends up the safety valve for all.

this may or may not all be true, but you have to love it...

correct. It's always been the back leg he has to drive from. For the last couple of years, you can watch him hit and when the right knee doesn't hurt he can stride and when he can stride he can drive the ball. When the knee is barking, he can't put enough weight on the right knee to pickup his left leg to step and drive, so he hits flatfoot - all arms and no power. He's strong enough he can drive the ball through the IF without his legs. but that's it.

SF, maybe DT Chicago reach densities like NYC. I have a striking memory of going to lunch one day in DT SF. I was working with guys from Bechtel, whose offices were on Beale St. So we go down to the street and walk over a couple of blocks to this deli - no kidding it's the size of a bowling alley with people 10 deep at a counter the length of a football bench, and total chaos - but they are probably moving a hundred people a minute in and out. So yeah - I wouldn't be surprised if that one deli served more customers in a day than all the delis in the City of Detroit combined.

the one that stands out in that listing for SF is robbery. That is more than a property crime - robbery is the forcible taking of property from a person *in person* and 2.85 is too high a rate to sugarcoat. That is something like 40% higher than Tulsa's so not much comfort for Fransciscan's there.

He didn't mention 'Doctors'. Unless there is something they can do for him in the off-season, coming back again would certainly be futile.

fair enough that it is a good sign, it's just not something I'd be that excited about as it is a pretty soft indicator IMO and it wasn't big differential in absolute terms. Sure you get motivation points for being near 50/50 turn out if it's normally a heavy GOP district, but while getting to 50/50 may be a strong indicator all is not well on the R side, it's still isn't a strong predictor of a win.

Certainly it must be true that the slider is the easier breaking pitch to learn to throw and control, because we constantly see guys struggle with the curve and change and settle back to the slider. But you wonder if there is a vicious feed back loop. Pitchers are throwing fewer innings to try to protect their arms, but maybe that means they don't throw enough innings to perfect the more difficult pitches that might protect their arms? I'm not putting that out there as any kind of fact, just as speculation about the kind of bad feedback loop that must be operating somewhere to have gotten the situation with pitching injuries to where it is.

It goes to the idea that you are wasting your time working on moving non-all-star guys without at least a year of control left if you want to get something useful back. Teams wont give you anything valuable for a rental who doesn't project to generate some measurable WAR over the remaining 2 months/playoffs. Fulmer is not in that category. With a Fulmer, either move him last year, sign him yourself, or you'll pretty much end up letting him go for nothing. It's just bad roster management to take a guy like Fulmer to the deadline in his FA year if you aren't going to sign him yourself. Our front office talks a lot about long term sustainability, but that takes strategic planning and the kind of discipline teams like Milwaukee and St. Louis are more known for that says you have to be willing to plow some resources under to keep seeding the field. You have to understand that you can't always put the 'best' team on the field that you could have in a given year if you want to reach a the state where you are team that rebuilds in place. You can't hold a Fulmer on the chance you might be good this year and want him and still get value out of him. That's how you drain your roster value.

and it's not only that sentiment - it's also, "Don't let this place that 'belongs to us' change into someplace where people that will make us uncomfortable will come to"

There is always that.

LOL - just when you start feeling bad for a Repub.... I can understand if he's pissed at the Dems because they 'helped' his opponent, but just in the end another example of a guy whose concern for himself trumps that for his country.

Maybe. I'm actually not at all persuaded that Gipson will net out to be worth any more to the Tigers than the innings Fulmer would have giving them for the next two months. That is unless the Tigers have decided to tank the rest of way.

A couple of trends along this line I think. First is that my impression is that % of hard (non-curve) breaking balls thrown just keeps increasing - we seem to have a team philosophy on the Tigers for instance that says throw 50% non fastballs and most guys don't have much in the way of curves or changes so that mean sliders or maybe splits. The other is that few guys work up and down the velo ladder when they do throw their fastball. That can be almost as effective as throwing more breaking balls but reason would say is lower strain. For example, the young Verlander would work his fast ball anywhere from 91-99. He still had batters worried about 99 on every pitch. He's an extreme example, but you shouldn't have to throw every pitch at max effort to get the effect of hitters being worrying about being late. Hard hit foul balls are just strikes. And to your thesis, this is done to get more Ks in response to the rabbit ball. Until something persuades me otherwise those are my best guesses. The one other factor is how much leeway the league allows on the outside part of the K zone. If you consistently give pitchers the outside black, you are also making sliders relatively more valuable.

OTOH - we as fans jumping to conclusions has no effect on whether the Tigers become a good baseball team, the Tiger org's inability to take obvious actions in a timely manner does.

But again, they should have made the move weeks ago. It negates part of the value of every decision that is correct when it takes so long to finally get to it.

is he trying to say GOP turnout should be larger than Dem turnout because Whitmer is un-opposed? I suppose as a general proposition -- OK, but this was a singularly uninspiring gov race on the GOP side. Still no proof in that that regular GOP voters wont sill line up behind and turn out for the GOP candidate in Nov.

they brought Short up for one day, didn't play him and sent him back. Goofballs.

Bingo. It took a generation to build this set of MLB hitters. If they want to change it, it will take just as long to reverse it.

Aye! There's the rub. What happens when (assuming they were to) they finally find out unequivocally and undeniably, that throwing sliders and/or relievers pitching back to back both damage arms? How can they step back from things so ingrained into the game, and in the former case, traditionally impossibly to enforce even if they had wanted to? That is the interesting thing too, today you could outlaw a pitch like the slider and you could know in real time whether the pitcher tried to throw one and rule it balk. That was never a possibility until very recently but it does open up a whole set of possibilities that may never have previously been considered.

Indeed, "people are saying...."

So we give away Fulmer for nothing so we can have D. Law help cement two losses in two appearances? Was there some kind of point to that? Just making a move to make a move? If you are going to take a nothing return for Fulmer, why bother at all? At least he might help you win a game or two more for your fans the rest of the way before he goes FA. Your high pick is pretty much already assured, turning the rest of season into a tank-a-thon is just adding insult to injury.

only about half the states have voter initiative processes, though in others the state legislature can put something on the ballot. Of course it's the legislatures who are out of sync on the issue so we're not likely to see that happen.

just throw him a party, write him his check and release him. Nothing worse than when great players feel like they have to drag things out or their teams force them to.

he started out with double digit walks early but had dropped off to more like 6% more recently (12 in his last 187 PA). Not terrible, would just like to see more at A ball in a promising bat since it may/probably will fall at each succeeding level.