Thor'sLinks: Angels still finding a winning spring

Jose Abreu, testifying in Florida in the Cuban smuggling trial, explained that he chewed up the identification page of a phony passport and washed it down with a Heineken so that he would not be found with false travel docs upon landing in Miami.And that was his ticket to the Chicago White Sox..........

Pretty soon we will get to see Jered Weaver on the mound for the Padres and it will be weird. Weirder still will be if Weaver proves himself right, and his is NOT washed up............

Exactly. When you are closer to the bottom than the top, that is the perfect time to go into the laboratory of baseball and learn a thing or two that might just accelerate the trip back up. And so it is that the Cincinnati Reds are looking to go all Frankenstein with bullpen ideas this year...........

I'm surprised that a contemporary Cuban entry into the WBC doesn't look more formidable than this.............The All-World team, though, outside of the pitching staff all I got is yeesh............

Well, in theory, if every Padre played this season and reached the 90th percentile of their PECOTA projection, they would be the best team in baseball. But read that article carefully. Because it also presumes that Jered Weaver doesn't play for them at all. Thus not dragging them down?............

Headline Of The Day: Tim Tebow's relentless pursuit of failure.............

More ideas about Pace of Play. The crap about Kiss Cams, etc., is stupid. That stuff exists to fill in the dead time. It doesn't create dead time. The idea about the September call-ups, though, is pretty fresh..............

If radio stations stop giving you updates on baseball news and scores, are you even gonna miss it?.............

The Dodgers are looking to make an end around to the broadcast idiocy of their own making. Since they cannot find a buyer for their dumb-assed idea to dog pile fees one to innocent cable subscribers, and they have blocked their own fans from getting to watch an endless stream of Farmer John commercials, they are on the verge of broadcasting 10 games on regular, local television. It will be odd to see them on KTLA, though, after decades of being seen on KTTV..........

More on broadcasts. Matthew Trueblood of Baseball Prospectus spent this winter watching old MLB games on the YouTube channel ClassicMLB11. It's fascinating to see what he noticed about how the game was played, and how players executed their plays, back then versus today. We should make a study project of this next winter. Somebody take a note...........

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The Duffle Bag

Baseball fans need some work in Spring Training, too. Clearly...........Fresno Grizzlies, still kicking the shit out of SoCal MLB promotion ideas...........David Ross for Dancing With The Stars? Is this because Bartolo Colon refuses to retire and make himself available?...........Do you play Fantasy Baseball? That would practically make you a felon as far as the NCAA is concerned............Theo Epstein takes a bat into the cage, and rips it...........You are going to notice this at some point this year. That would be the New Era logo on the outside of ballcaps. Some will like it and some not. UniWatch hates it. That's why they celebrate on renegades such as Jason Giambi (who pulled his off)............

OT: Huntington Beach is going to try and ban plastic straws?? I'm sure that is going to be an item very high on the list of the HB police force. Especially 4th of July...........

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Halo-Oppo-ly

Week 4 of our Chance/Community Chest cards!

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