Open Thread: Random stuff
ByThat’s a video of Ichiro pitching in the 1996 All Star Game in Japan, which may be the coolest thing ever. He may just be a glorified singles hitter with the bat, but damn, is he fun to watch.
In other news, Andy in Sunny Daytona took a bunch of pictures from minor league camp the other day, which you can see here. Make sure you click “Show Info” in the top right corner so you know who you’re looking at. Now we have some good shots of Slade Heathcott in a Yankee uni. Neat.
And lastly, a couple of people have emailed in asking about this Jayson Werth report at MLBTR, which of course I wrote. I’m pretty sure at least a few of them realize that. Anyway, it turns out that Reggie Jackson has a longstanding relationship with the Werth family, which could be helpful if the Yanks decide to pursue the outfielder when he becomes a free agent after the season. We’ve talked about the possibility of the Yankees signing Werth before, but what does everyone think about this new development?
Other than that, use this sucker as your open thread. The Rangers, Devils, Isles, and Nets (going for win number ten, w00t!) are all in action, plus you’ve got college hoops. I’m in 85th place out of 149 teams in our Yahoo! pool. Sigh. Enjoy the thread and the night.
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The Tyler Austin Watch
Matsui is there in the beggining as well.
Captain obvious is obviously not a captain
Tomorrow’s Open Thread, with 7 fantasy teams drafting on the same day, is going to be epic.
5. Leagues 6,7 draft on April 2nd.
I’m in league 7 and the draft is tomorrow at 7 p.m.
Oh, must have changed. I guess it’s just us at League 6 (RAB National League) unless that changed, too.
**check reveals April 2nd for #6**
Even so.
Oh yeah, it’ll be the most lively Sunday Night Open thread this place has seen in a while.
Damn, Ichiro threw 90 pretty easily.
Also, Matsui is the same way he is know…except with knees.
Check out the home plate umpire’s strike call. Good stuff.
Everyone always says Ichiro could hit 30 homers if he wanted to. Why the hell doesn’t he do it? He’s supposed to be pretty smart, right? If he’s so smart, wouldn’t he be trying to hit homers since they’re better than singles? Hitting for power could also allow him to walk more and create more trouble on the bases. Plus, his awesome contact skills could keep everyone honest.
I think some people say that because he hit 25, 21, 17, 16 HRs during some seasons in Japan (21 in only 411 ABs too).
Which means shit because Akinori Iwamura hit 44 and 32 HRs there and he cant even hit 10 here.
Matty, you have to watch him take batting practice. He can do anything, anything he wants with a bat in his hands.
He will literally start out by peppering singles to Left, then Center, then Right field. Then he will progress to depositing balls in the Left field stands, Center field bleachers and Right field bleachers. In order, with only a rare miss here and there.
When the Mariners come to town, if you have tix get there early. It’s a treat to watch.
I saw Ichiro play many times when I lived in Seattle. He is the epitome of baseball entertainment. I remember watching him in batting practice and he was hitting bombs. The man can mash. I think he would do well in a HR derby, but his approach at the plate is different during actual games.
He would have to sacrifice a lot of BA to hit those home runs, and as we’ve seen, even people that we consider to be pretty smart have the ability to disregard the stats that say that home runs are more valuable than average.
Jayson Werth has only made 13.3m (6.3m + 7m this upcoming year) in his career and he’s 31; he’s taking the highest offer.
Yup. As he should.
He’s probably a better target for us than Crawford if we’re going to shell out the cash.
Eh, idk. IIRC, he has some knee concerns that will hurt as he ages
Yeah he blew out both knees earlier in his career.
But then again, Crawford has played his entire career in a dome on turf- isnt that suppose to shorten a guy’s career?
His knees are so bad he stole 20 bags each of the past 2 seasons.
Ok, but I think the concern is more long term. Mike usually addresses it weekly during the chats.
Crawford has a career OPS+ of 103 and wOBA of .343. Offensively, these are both just slightly above average. Yeah… he has speed and excellent D, so he is a nice player… but certainly not elite or even excellent.
His career wRC+ is 111. For comparison, Werth has a wOBA/wRC+ of .364 / 123. Our crippled buddy Nick Johnson is at .371 / 130.
Again, it’s a matter of bang for the buck.
So my question to all the Crawford fans is this:
If he has posted the above numbers (.343 / 111) up to age 30, what might you expect over the next 5 years? And based on the current economy, what do you think he’s worth?
I can’t see him being worth more then $10m/yr.
And again, for comparison, for $13m/yr for JD, he had an average wRC+ of 122.5 (over 4 years).
I wasn’t aware that he’d blown out both knees. Kind of changes my opinion a bit.
It shouldn’t. See above.
Better looking, too.
Werth is better looking than Crawford? Honestly, I think he looks like a serial killing drifter that smokes weed on the regular. Maybe that’s just me, though.
Either way, not a great way to evaluate a player.
hah this is a pretty accurate description of Werth. FWIW I don’t think he’s very good-looking. I don’t think of Crawford as very hot either though
But the Yankees shouldn’t choose which FA to sign based on hotness as that is a silly way to evaluate players.
Wow Matsui looks the same.
Ah, Mr. Zero. I’ll remember you fondly for serving up Bubba Crosby’s first Major League home run.
You forgot to mention that the Red Bulls are in action tonight too
Thanks for the pics, Andy.
Now WVU’s gonna start trying all threes and they’re gonna cough up the lead.
Joey Porter is such a douche.
The grass is green.
I’m not big on Werth, the knee thing is likely to get worse as he goes into his mid to late 30′s.
ALL the Japanese announcers in the Ichiro vid are better than Michael Kay.
Can’t we DFA Michael Kay and put Bob Lorenz in his place. It would be better on my ears.
sean black looks really young? anyone know what his story is? You’d have to figure he could add a few ticks to his FB just on account of maturing physically
He’s a college guy. I don’t know how much more velocity he might have. His stock has gone down since he was drafted in HS.
That’s Shingo Takatasu, who closed for the White Sox briefly, pinch-hitting for Matsui against Ichiro.
with kentucky losing, my bracket is officially dead
what is it with calipari-coached teams and free throws?
My bracket died last week when Kansas/’nova went down…but with Kentucky done I don’t have a single team right in my Final Four. Last place here I come!!!
I don’t think Calipari is much for coaching. He lets his star players do whatever they want and his teams always lack fundamentals. He’s one of those “recruiter only” guys.
Damn, Shane Carwin is a beast
Those 7 consecutive uppercuts hurt my feelings. Ha.
My boy GSP is still the best, but Dan Hardy gained a whole lot of respect tonight.
Brutal, just hope he can do that to Lesnar.
Yeah I was just waiting for his elbow/shoulder to pop with the bar and kimora.
Maybe in his next fight he’ll actually throw a punch.
Hmm, I need to get a reliever that will get me some holds for my team. This is a very deep league, and I’ll be dropping John Maine I guess to get one. I was thinking DRob…
If you want holds, pick up a LOOGY
Nice ‘Fifth Element’ reference there, Andy.
Man Ichiro works fast!
“He may just be a glorified singles hitter with the bat, but damn, is he fun to watch.”
Maybe he’s also glorified because he came to the states in the middle of his career,
and now he’s a Hall of Famer?