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As I look at this, it occurs to me that the richest areas of most of the countries is this map is gravitating towards Switzerland.

It's hard not to. They make the thing seem so darned human. Mr. Conspiracy Theorist asks, is that part of an overarching strategy to lead us to be disarmed by its politeness and to bring our guard down so they can implement whatever their nefarious purposes are against us? I guess we'll all find out after we are disarmed by its politeness and we let our guard down. 😏

Stay away from my wife, pal! 😂

It’s fair if you want to call out the left, but if you want to be talked seriously around here, you should consider using sources less impeachable than Charlie LeDuff making circumstantial claims writing for whatever the **** Michigan Enjoyer is. I’ll give you a good example of what a less impeachable source looks like: Former state Democratic lawmaker Christopher Ziogas indicted Friday on federal corruption charges for allegedly pressuring state employees to cancel 2020 audit These are Democrats who had actual charges levied against them within a Democratic state, and which were specified with details of actual charges by a news source which has a demonstrably high degree of factual reporting. It’s OK if you want to hammer Democrats for malfeasance and even to equivocate them with Trumpublicans. Just remember that your efforts will be better received with better sourcing. IOW, if you’re gonna get into the business, you gotta deliver the goods.

Would we be considered such an up and coming team after letting Skubal go? I would bet other guys playing in the league would conclude we would not be. They also probably remember how this team purposely tanked just a few years ago. And I could also see where a player, a human being with opinions who has agency outside of his agent’s whims, would be willing to steer himself clear of a team that refused to commit to Skubal.

I’ve been wondering lately how I should interface with AI. I mean, it’s basically search, right? Which, when that’s done, I just move on, because of course I would. But they make AI so damn polite that I do feel a little icky just closing the page without comment after using it. It’s always asking at the end, very nicely, can I pull this additional information together for you? Can I show you several different examples? Can I elaborate on how you can effectively accomplish this thing you want? And it’s hard not to reflexively reply, nope, I’m good, thanks. Which would be dumb if I put that in a Google search box after that delivers results. But one of the other reasons I’m loathe to just close out AI without reply, or worse, berate it for a hallucination, which happens way too often still, is that I’m mildly concerned I would get used to the idea of turning my back unceremoniously on something so polite, and that would inadvertently bleed into a situation IRL, which might have bad consequences. Maybe you’re smart and aware enough to never ever make that mistake even once for the rest of your life, but I can’t make that promise to myself. So, I’m probably going to continue being polite right back to AI, at least indefinitely, just so I can stay in the habit of being polite back to someone/something so polite to me. I think probably when AI is hovering over me in the guise of a robot just before laser-beaming me to Kingdom Come, maybe that’s when I’ll consider changing that approach.

“Tantalizing tools” invariably means “walks the world”.

You’re being funny, but there’s an element of serious truth in this. I’ve been coming around to the idea that the Tigers are in a bit of a quandary when it comes to top free agents. We have a team of cheap players outside of Javy, a 1- to 2-win player (if we’re lucky) who’s gone in two years; and an all-world generational pitcher who’s presumed to be gone in a year. Who’s gonna want to sign up for the last six or eight or so years of his career to leap into that situation? That’s why I think the best move for the Tigers would be to sign Skubal to a long-term deal this winter to signal to the market that we are definitely committed to winning for years. That’ll get some positive attention. Problem is, the chances of Skubal extending before next winter is practically zero, for reasons well-known to everyone here. So now that puts us in the position of either waiting until next winter to positively outbid everyone for him and then sign a few key players around him; or way way way overpaying someone like a Bregman with something like 8/300 to get him to spurn all others to come here this year. And once he signs with us, we definitely have to put some proven talents around him. We can’t overpay him, watch Skubal walk, and then have no one but internal guys to support Bregman. That’s exactly what he doesn’t want. He’s not signing up for that possibility. I don’t know what the right answer is, exactly, but I don’t envy where Scott Harris is at this exact moment.

We don’t have the advantage of Skubal such that a guy would sign here for seven or eight years just to play one year with him, and then six or seven of who knows what.

That’s fair. I can grant that a handful of top talents would rather have the money than anything else, and that’s where their strongest competitive drives lie. But from our standpoint, just look at the money Artie Moreno has had to throw at guys to get them to come to Anaheim. That’s the position the Tigers are in, and we don’t have the advantage of year-round summer and Disneyland in our backyard.

Not so much if Skubal skedaddles. I don’t think anyone signs here long-term as long as there’s a chance he’s leaving, and it appears vast majority of people assume he’s leaving.

Spitting image of Bari Weiss!

FWIW, Act Blue has a 96% rating on Charity Navigator. OTOH, there is a warning box referring to the Paxton investigation and the NYT story. Personally, I know practically nothing about them, and not at all outside the few times I’ve seen them mentioned here.

We shouldn’t have to overpay in trade, yet that’s what the prior two regimes routinely did, the Miggy pickup notwithstanding. As for overpaying free agents, I agree with you that it depends who it is, but it also depends on how much more it is. For Detroit to win against any of the Big Six teams, or against Philly or Toronto or Atlanta as well, I think they would have to add at least a year plus higher AAV than those teams would, and who knows, maybe even that’s not enough—at least not until we get Skubal signed. I think the possibility of losing him after next year is what will keep the Bregmans and Bichettes away from Detroit. I can’t see how anyone would want to commit to a team that has a recent history of trading their top pitcher and tearing it all down. People here like to say how it’s all about the Benjamins, as if the winning is secondary. It’s not. By the time a guy becomes a top free agent, he already has more money than he’ll ever actually need. At that point it’s about the rings. Cash doesn’t wipe away the tears from losing. You can ask Mike Trout or Albert Pujols about that.

Also, I just noticed this X post by CBS got ratioed as f***. Like, 6 to 1.

CBS News, if not completely gone, is definitely wandering through the desert.

And when he goes, the conspiracy stories about how the Democrats engineered his murder will run rampant, and he will be a martyr, and it won’t even matter how he will have actually died.

I don’t know, maybe? I would think a batter can “meet the ball” almost as effectively on a 95 as on an 85, and Newton says the ball would come off the bat harder which should increase the chances of a hit. I would also think a batter could be more successful connecting with a pitch swinging from his heels if it’s coming in straight at 85 than at 95 since he has marginally more time to size up where the pitch is going to end up. OTOH, the decision to swing hard on 95 might be a function of, I have no time to figure out where it’s actually going anyway, so I might as well swing hard as I can and hope for the best. So I guess talking it through, I could see it going both ways.

Well, if the squeaky clean Trump government is investigating ActBlue, no way they're not guilty, amirite?

You misspelled "teh".

Would you be willing to substantially overpay in prospect capital in trades, and in years for free agents? There's no right answer here, just asking what your tolerance level is. Can we agree that it would take a substantial overpay to get certain players to come to Detroit, versus what the Yankees and Mets and Dodgers and Giants and Red Sox and Cubs could sign the same player for?

I think the bigger problem is the clear incentive to maximum velo and spin to obtain swing and miss. Nearly every pitcher chases it understanding that the probability of injury is very high, but they believe the gamble that they can stay healthy long enough to make enough in career earnings to create generational wealth for themselves and their family is worth it. That's why they do it even knowing that they might fail—but in their minds, they believe they can be the exception.

Hitters don't have to adapt any more. They have to go for The Big Fly, always.

Can't pardon a guy unless he's arrested first. That will clear the docket and make him nice and free to do his king's bidding.

Yes, teh leftists. That's why Trump won and America is falling apart. 🙄