The Buscher

The quality of the games would nosedive though. I suspect most teams will either sacrifice two early season non-divisional games or save their backup games for the very end of the season, which will mean a whole lot of unwatchable football that won't draw the ratings the league would be hoping for. The 18 games schedule/16 games played max idea is so ludicrous that I'm convinced owners deliberately put it out there to try to negotiate down to what they actually wanted.

The 16 game schedule is perfect as is and it's structured in such a way that you know all but two games on your schedule every year. It works. There is no good reason to change it.

Owners have proposed an 18 game schedule but players would only be allowed to play in a maximum of 16 games per year. So presumably, gigantic preseason rosters would just be the norm all year and teams would have to strategically decide when to bench players. Unbelievably bad idea. Can't imagine what a mess that would be. Would be funny though when a Pats/Saints Sunday Night Football game ends up being all backups because Belichick and Payton decided an out of conference game was a good week to give everyone a breather.

Ended up getting this on the cheap. Downloaded the most recent OSFM, spent five minutes converting every closer in the game to a reliever (the CPU has always been wonky with closers, crappy closers continue to stay employed just because there aren't many of them) and launched into a fantasy draft. While I don't want to see it happen, I implemented league-wide DH because I figure if the league ever did something as drastic as a fantasy draft in real life, they'd go all out with changing everything. My closer to reliever conversion though did have unintended consequences, they've never modified draft logic over the years and I forgot that no other team takes a RP until round 9 and then every CPU takes one in a run. Remembering this I ended up spending my 7th and 8th round picks on Jose Alvarado and Josh Hader - obviously there were higher rated relievers but I wanted the best guys I could get that were making league minimum with a lot of team control left. My team ends up being freaking incredible, got Yelich and Story with my top two picks. A lot of really good young talent that can win now, solid pitching, and a handful of older veterans for backup roles. Starting lineup looks something like: 2B - Dee Gordon SS - Trevor Story RF - Christian Yelich LF - Khris Davis DH - Max Muncy CF - George Springer C - Tucker Barnhart 1B - Jesus Aguilar 3B - Asdrubal Cabrera Ridiculous that I got such a good young core, still haven't decided on the lineup order but I always like L/R balance. I'm playing some spring games to decide on the bench but Brian McCann is probably going to be my backup C to give me some thump on Barnhart's off days. David Freese had a HR off a lefty in the first game I played and has killer ratings against them so he might potentially be a 3B starter against lefties. Yandy Diaz can play anywhere but at a B potential he may or may not be better suited playing in Syracuse every day until I get an injury. Speaking of B potential, I got Stephen Piscotty in like the 30th round so he could be an upside guy on my bench or in Syracuse. Rotation will be headed by Miles Mikolas, Mike Clevinger, Jimmy Nelson, and Chris Archer. Gio Gonzalez is going to make the team as he can't be optioned, but he's in a race for the #5 spot with Matthew Boyd, Jerad Eickoff, and another guy whose name escapes me. Bullpen has five locks - Alvarado, Hader, Liam Hendriks, Hector Neris, and Bryan Shaw. Shaw's the only one I'm not happy with, I drafted like 35 rounds and simmed the rest and the game drafted Shaw for me even later than that. I mean ratings wise he's a good fifth reliever, but he makes a ton of money. Gio might be in here, might keep like a 60-something rated player as my #7 guy if I find someone in spring I feel good using. Very Brewer heavy team, actually. Not intentional but it worked out that way. I have none of the Top 50 prospects in baseball so that's a mild concern but with my core players all being young and cost-controlled for a few seasons I think I can manage.

The highlight of the Celebrity Softball Game was The Miz talking mad shit after making Ryan Howard swing and miss twice only for Howard to take him deep on the next pitch.

I'm actually shocked that they didn't try to shoehorn Joe Namath onto that Top 25 list as they normally do with all of their top lists. TD: 173 INT: 220 Completion Percentage: 50.1% His entire legacy is built off of his guarantee to win Super Bowl III, for which he was awarded MVP despite not really doing much. Look at the stats from that game and tell me he deserved it over Matt Snell. Nope. Historians point to that game as a big reason the merger happened, and between that and Joe's larger than life personality, that's the reason he gets endless praise from the league. To his credit, it was a different game back then so the subpar stats aren't anywhere near as backbreaking as they'd be nowadays. But given how stat heavy sports fans are nowadays, it'd be easy to look at his numbers and think he might be the worst player in the Hall of Fame.

This will end up being like 2008. Josh Hamilton didn’t win the Derby that year but he’s what everyone remembers. Will be the same for Vlad Jr.

BIG MEAT PETE!!! There’s my World Series.

Can’t see Vlad losing this with the rhythm he’s been on, and his pitcher’s been laying them in perfectly. This has been a blast.

Alonso’s cousin is the worst batting practice pitcher I’ve ever seen. Dude is throwing sidearm. Holy crap Alonso put his cousin on his back!

I think Acuna’s taking this round unless Alonso’s cousin got his shit together.

Guys are barely swinging and the balls are sailing 450 feet. But the drama is incredible.

And then Joc tied it. The balls are undeniably juiced to hell.

Alonso heel turn on the Cleveland crowd

Whole lot of people on Twitter butthurt that the team allowed the flag to touch the ground during their celebration. Fuck the flag and fuck forced patriotism.

Justin Verlander rules.

Matt Chapman has replaced Christian Yelich in the Home Run Derby as Yelich has a minor back issue. Yelich still intends on playing in the actual game. Lineups: NL 1 - LF Yelich 2 - SS Baez 3 - 1B Freeman 4 - RF Bellinger 5 - 3B Arenado 6 - DH Bell 7 - C Contreras 8 - 2B Marte 9 - CF Acuna P - Ryu AL 1 - RF Springer 2 - 2B LeMahieu 3 - CF Trout 4 - 1B Santana 5 - DH Martinez 6 - 3B Bregman 7 - C Sanchez 8 - LF Brantley 9 - SS Polanco P - Verlander

I’ve seen the Phillies linked for a potential reunion with Giles as well.

It’s not just that the Mets make decisions that simply don’t work out. It’s that the decisions completely blow up in their face. Every time. I’ll be rootin for Alonso, McNeil, and deGrom during the All Star festivities, and I’ll continue to pull for them from afar since they’re seemingly the only three likable players on the team. But much like main roster WWE, I’ve been worn down one time too many. I can’t justify the countless hours I spend supporting this franchise as long as the Wilpons remain in charge. I can’t give up on baseball, but I’ve given up on supporting this team. I’ll have to take the All Star break to mull my options.

Jay Bruce, traded away by the Mets in November, has 4 home runs against the Mets in the last two weeks. He’s doing the exact same thing Daniel Murphy did against them while being a far more productive this season than Cano. I can’t do it anymore. This franchise has reached Browns and Knicks level of embarrassment.

Hell yeah!

Jake Arrieta hit THREE batters last night, one of which was after warnings had already been issued, and the umpire didn't throw him out. The only people ejected were Todd Frazier who wanted to charge the mound after the second hit (which prompted the warning) and Mickey Callaway after arguing Arrieta not getting ejected after the third. On top of all of that, in his post game comments to reporters, Arrieta addressed Frazier by saying "I'll put a dent in his skull". I'm shocked that a Trump supporter is a giant piece of shit.

I mean I could understand if John Means went down and the Orioles didn’t have a rep, as they have no other good pitchers and the only other player who would warrant going (Mancini) would need to replace a position player. But it just seemed like a lay-up for Giles. It was fair to argue against the rule of every team needing a rep when the game was for homefield, but with it now just being for fun I think it’s best to give every fanbase a reason to watch.

MLB basically gives the middle finger to Canada. Marcus Stroman pulls out of the All Star Game and replaces him with Masahiro Tanaka instead of giving the Jays a new rep when they actually had one who was deserving (Ken Giles). Even if they didn’t go with Giles, Tanaka’s numbers don’t scream “All Star” at all. Adam Ottavino would’ve been a much better choice.

Carlos Carrasco has leukemia