phdave wrote:

Domonic Brown could have been to the Phillies as Andruw Jones was to the late-90s Braves, the second-generation dynastic star who’s brought up as a complementary player and carries the team into the next plane of spiritual existence. But instead he was left to wither on the vine while a parade of older, more expensive, not-particularly-more-productive alternatives paraded by as the Phillies’ clubhouse turned into a Lexus dealership–a room full of old people with delusionally inflated self-importance and commodities that aren’t worth half what they were purchased for.

phdave wrote:

phdave wrote:

Domonic Brown could have been to the Phillies as Andruw Jones was to the late-90s Braves, the second-generation dynastic star who’s brought up as a complementary player and carries the team into the next plane of spiritual existence. But instead he was left to wither on the vine while a parade of older, more expensive, not-particularly-more-productive alternatives paraded by as the Phillies’ clubhouse turned into a Lexus dealership–a room full of old people with delusionally inflated self-importance and commodities that aren’t worth half what they were purchased for.

I just looked something up:

Player A age 19 minor league stats: 4 HRs .778 OPS
Player B age 19 minor league stats: 34 HRs 1.072 OPS

Hint: Player A played in A- and A+ while Player B played in A+, AA, and AAA.

Well, we start with something absolutely beautiful, and we take kind of a slow-motion approach to an almost nihilistic embrace of the futility of human life. Couched in a creative voice capable of staging heartbreaking beauty and juxtaposing it with a curious nostalgia for the customs and practices of generations past.

We fall in love with a character and root for him to succeed, then get clued in halfway through the story that not only do we know better than our hero, we care more. We watch in paralyzed fascination as he throws away his life after being given every advantage. And it all takes place under the auspices of such beautiful prose that you almost don’t care.

That’s right, Ruben Amaro is Frank Bascombe, and the 2013 Phillies are being written by Richard Ford.

With the Phillies’ dynasty fixing to end with an impotent whimpering of clueless old men the like of which we haven’t seen since the fall of the Soviet Union, it’s easy to forget about the little things.

I cannot tell you how many damns I do not give about spring training. I wrote a whole thing about it last year. I don’t care about who’s in what shape, who’s playing well and who’s not and how much all the beat writers are enjoying wearing khaki shorts and Hawaiian shirts while we’re all freezing to death. Do. Not. Care. Spring training performance has only marginally more predictive value in baseball than the lunar phase. So I’ll be watching college baseball, and the NBA, and hockey and soccer, and certainly reading volumes of season preview material, but I don’t expect to learn anything from the games themselves. Blah blah blah platitudes, blah blah best shape of his career, blah blah blah quad-A player raking, blah blah blah blah blah.

when I was a young boy, Star Trek: The Next Generation was an immensely important part of my life.

phdave wrote:

when I was a young boy, Star Trek: The Next Generation was an immensely important part of my life.

Giancarlo Baumann ‏@MJ_Baumann
I hate this trade. 3 years from now Art Charles is going to hit 30 HR in AA and people are going to bug me asking if he's a future all-star.

phdave wrote:

I cannot tell you how many damns I do not give about spring training. I wrote a whole thing about it last year. I don’t care about who’s in what shape, who’s playing well and who’s not and how much all the beat writers are enjoying wearing khaki shorts and Hawaiian shirts while we’re all freezing to death. Do. Not. Care. Spring training performance has only marginally more predictive value in baseball than the lunar phase. So I’ll be watching college baseball, and the NBA, and hockey and soccer, and certainly reading volumes of season preview material, but I don’t expect to learn anything from the games themselves. Blah blah blah platitudes, blah blah best shape of his career, blah blah blah quad-A player raking, blah blah blah blah blah.

phdave wrote:

Giancarlo Baumann ‏@MJ_Baumann
I hate this trade. 3 years from now Art Charles is going to hit 30 HR in AA and people are going to bug me asking if he's a future all-star.

smitty wrote:

phdave wrote:

Giancarlo Baumann ‏@MJ_Baumann
I hate this trade. 3 years from now Art Charles is going to hit 30 HR in AA and people are going to bug me asking if he's a future all-star.

Why would anyone ask this guy a question about baseball? Or anything really other than Star Wars movies?

kruker wrote:It's really amazing how someone can have zero self awareness

...fails to do so with a lack of self-awareness matched only by the douchebag who brings his acoustic guitar to a party, then plays Oasis’s “Wonderwall” until the only people left in the room are waiting for him to stop bogarting the guitar so they can play something not included in the “Teenager’s first open mic night” book of sheet music.