12/21/24
September 24, 2014
SportsFilter: The Wednesday Huddle:
A place to discuss the sports stories that aren't making news, share links that aren't quite front-page material, and diagram plays on your hand. Remember to count to five Mississippi before commenting in anger.
Stick it to the Angels fans!
posted by tommybiden at 12:27 PM on September 24, 2014
posted by kokaku at 03:47 PM on September 24, 2014
ESPN has suspended The BSG 3 weeks for something about Commandante Goodell.
posted by yerfatma at 07:52 PM on September 24, 2014
Every employee must be accountable to ESPN and those engaged in our editorial operations must also operate within ESPN's journalistic standards.Notice how they carefully use the term "ESPN's journalistic standards" so as not to be accused of holding Simmons to, say, actual journalistic standards.
posted by Etrigan at 08:17 PM on September 24, 2014
A statistical case for keeping Mookie Betts.
Statistics or not, he passes the eyeball test. Looks like he hustles. He has some tools, he's working on his batting approach, and he's got some pop. He could well be a keeper. They'll put him in the outfield (if there's room), but if Pedroia's injuries prove sufficiently debilitating, he's your 2nd baseman.
posted by Howard_T at 11:22 PM on September 24, 2014
A top Fifa official announced today that he does not think that the 2022 World Cup will be held in Qatar because of the scorching temperatures in the Middle East country.
"The FIFA selection committee was unaware that the temperatures could go that high, as their Qatar climate information package was buried under a giant pile of money."
posted by grum@work at 11:57 PM on September 24, 2014
Mark Buerhle finished his 14th consecutive +200IP season, and did so in under two hours. If younger pitchers can learn only one thing from watching him, I hope it's how to pitch as quickly as he does.
posted by grum@work at 12:00 AM on September 25, 2014
The Red Sox would be foolish to trade Betts at this point - he's an undersized, two-position 21 year old whose ML experience hasn't been good enough to nab an elite starter on his own.
Fourth outfielder, spot starter for Pedroia, maybe he even picks up SS or 3B enough to spell there too. A hedge against injury (Victorino in particular) or Castillo not being as ready as everyone thinks he is.
The Sox need pitching, but Betts isn't going to get them far enough down the road to an ace like Hamels to skip another top prospect or two. They can get the rest of the rotation with other prospects and/or FA without having to deal a flexible tookit like he has.
posted by dfleming at 10:55 AM on September 25, 2014
I think I buried the lede a bit with the short link. The article suggests Betts is, right now, a 3.3 WAR player just as a utility guy. That's at age 21 and puts him in the top 60 or so hitters this year with the potential to be a 4+ player if he were at 2B. It's not so much they shouldn't sacrifice him because the return wouldn't be that great, it's more like appreciate what he is instead of wishing for a slugger. He's definitely an interesting case; guys like Victorino, Zobrist and Sam Fuld have made me appreciate the non-star stars in baseball.
posted by yerfatma at 02:56 PM on September 25, 2014
A statistical case for keeping Mookie Betts.