Frobby

By the way, Means has options, which could be exercised if the IL is unavailable. That would require Means’ consent as a guy with 5 years of service, but he’d be foolish not to give his consent if he’s pitching like this in his next two starts.

Edgar Portes has been piggybacking with Cameron Weston for Aberdeen and doing an excellent job. Today he threw four innings and allowed 1 run on a solo homer, the only hit he allowed, along with 1 walk against 5 strikeouts. On the year, the 21-year old Portes has a 1.64 ERA and 0.91 WHIP in 11 innings.

That’s three very good outings to start the year. Only 1 run allowed in 12 IP.

I’m expecting they’ll be able to make the case.

Until April 30. Only time for two more outings. They have the option of putting him back on the IL, as they did with Tate last year.

No question attendance will be higher. The question is by how much.

Honestly, I could see the decision either way. O’Hearn is a hot hitter historically vulnerable to lefties. Hays historically hits lefties well but has been as cold as you can get. He’s a significant defensive upgrade to O’Hearn for the rest of the game. So what do you do? If my only concern was to maximize the chance to win today’s game, I’d probably stick with O’Hearn, for a reason not mentioned yet. This was the leadoff batter in the 7th inning, and if anyone gets on base the next three innings, that means the batter will get one more AB after the one in the 7th inning, and decent chance that AB will be against a RHP. So, that favors leaving O’Hearn in. At the same time, I don’t believe that maximizing the chance to win this game was the only consideration. Simply put, Hyde wants to keep Hays involved in things, and wants to give him opportunities to break out of his slump. And that’s important for the long term benefit of the team. So, as I see it, it’s a close call, and I wouldn’t criticize Hyde either way. We won the game so I’m certainly not going to obsess about it.

It makes the games go faster, so I like that tradeoff.

I believe he’s referring to platooning.

The truth is, a middle reliever is pretty much what you get in a trade of a 1B/COF/DH who has one year of service time left, unless the guy is a superstar level hitter. I think though that Trae value doesn’t always define a player’s value to the team he’s on. There’s no question that O’Hearn brought more value to this team last year than a middle reliever would, and it looks like he will again. Now, could we get similar production from Kjerstad or Stowers? Maybe, but we’re not going to find out unless someone gets hurt.

I’m not in the mood to tangle with you or do research. I clearly recall though some posters declaring in March and April that we had to take Jones and that failing to do it would be GM malpractice. And I recall saying (1) they don’t make these decisions in March/April, and (2) I don’t care what the pundits think, I care what Elias thinks. Now I just want Holliday to start hitting and prove Elias correct.

Yeah, there have been a few CRAZY team HR totals the last few years. But I’d settle for 270.

So we’re better than the White Sox? Got it! We’re on pace for 270 homers. Is that good?

Mullins’ swing is so beautiful when he’s dialed in. Which he certainly is right now.

Just read the OP.