TuesdoLinks: TroHtani-istic

We are officially full swing into post-season award season. We might not even notice that the GM’s are playing golf down in San Diego. And that’s OK, because GM meets are merely a Table Of Contents to the Winter Meets anyway.

Something I didn’t get too much into yesterday was all the chatter about how the Red Sox were one of the 2 teams to snag 3 Gold Gloves in 2018 (along with the Braves, here and here as examples). The Red Sox got their 3 GG’s due to awards to Mookie Betts, Jackie Bradley, Jr., and...um...Ian Kinsler. Kinsler played only 37 games with the Red Sox. He played 91 under the Halo. If Kinsler is seriously the AL 2B GG winner, then his service time should credit that to LAA, giving the Halos 2 to match the Red Sox’ 2. But at least one of our guys gets it..........

Chug Some Major-Hardware-Sampling-HaloLinks:

I am going to keep this up here until the event, as a reminder. JeffJoiner directs us all to the annual opportunity for we fans to join the Halos in giving back to our community. The Groundskeepers are hosting their 12th Annual Canned Food Drive Friday, November 16th thru Sunday, November 18th at Angel Stadium.

A Little Bit Of Angels News

Ok homies. Here we are, exactly where we expected to be. The major individual achievement awards finalists were announced and we got what we knew we were gonna get all along. For AL MVP it’s Mookie Betts versus Mike Trout. And for AL RoY it’s Miguel Andujar versus Shohei Ohtani. I know where your hearts are. Use your fingers and go track down all the lobbying going on in public. You would be surprised at all the Ohtani love to be found. You should not be surprised at all the Mookie love...........

Sonny Gray was a dumpster fire for the Yankees this season. One of the anchors in the butt of their AL East title hopes. They certainly don’t want a repeat of that, and are looking to foist him off on anybody else willing to be conned into seeing only the world through 2015-colored glasses. Of course, folks appear to believe that Billy Eppler is one of those people.........

The stat contribution into GG selection comes from SABR. Here is the SABR SDI ranking for AL SS. It’s a pretty good page for arguing the large gray area that are defensive metrics..........

Shohei getting his first MLB win earns him a beer shower. It’s a better way to celebrate than drinking all that, I suppose..........

Your 2018 Angels, a pretty cool failure..........

Oh look, a trade-Trout-to-Phillie column. How novel............

Everywhere In Baseball

It’s GM meeting week down in San Diego. Of greatest note is the notion to drastically alter the waiver process. The options being discussed are pushing back the trade deadline to mid-August, and eliminating the trade waiver system completely. Expect the Player’s Union to be so utterly confused by this that they won’t allow it to go forward..........

Manny Machado and Bryce Harper together in Chicago, after all...derp!...but with the White Sox??..........

I am far more unsmart than FanGraphs and FG readership. That explains why their projections for contracts to their Top 50 FA’s seem a tad high to me..........But their FA tracker looks pretty cool..........And watch out, Garrett Richards: “The changing face of pitching could be most evident in the markets of Nathan Eovaldi and Garrett Richards. Both have high-octane stuff, relative youth, Tommy John surgery in the past, and flexibility to fit in relief or starting roles. Both may end up getting more than you’d expect, as over half the league is aggressively looking for this type of pitcher.”..........

Not be to lost in the MLB Free Agent hoopla is Yusei Kikuchi of the Seibu Lions, a kid who gets a lot of comps to Patrick Corbin. Kikuchi was just officially posted. FWIW, he was almost a high school teammate of Shohei Ohtani, having graduated 1 month before Ohtani entered as a freshman..........

Not sure I am following the logic here. Ken Rosenthal is suggesting that because Jed Lowrie’s agent used to be the guy who is now the Mets GM, the A’s are now less interested in retaining a 4.8 bWAR second baseman? Rosenthal is not saying some new agent will be less inclined to recommend that Lowrie stay in Oakland. he is specifically saying that Oakland is now less inclined to keep him. How does that work, exactly?.............

We are now in the QO accept/reject window. Making that decision can be a tricky proposition for the players involved..........

Hows this for a twisty ending? Marco Gonzalez wrangled a pre-arb pay raise out of the Mariners after his stellar 2018, and he did it apparently by ‘selling’ his service time grievance against the Cardinals. Gonzalez agreed to drop his grievance, and magically got himself an early pay day.........

The future of baseball belongs to the little guys. Jose Altuve is featured, but David Eckstein is honored............

Read this essay by Jeff Passan on Baseball’s apparent inability to create star power anymore, and think long and hard about a Commissioner at the helm who can do more than shrug at the failure to market Mike Trout while on his watch..........

Think also of how aggressive the NBA is to lock in new joint venture deals as sports gambling opens up nationwide and revenue streams and marketing opportunities follow suit. All while MLB is still scrambling in a losing cause to send out lobbyists so try and finagle revenue off the top out of State coffers............

The Baseball Hall of Fame Committee for Today’s Game Era have published this year’s ballot. For the record, the Today’s Game Era is defined as 1988 to present. This makes the candidacy of George Steinbrenner somewhat odd. Steinbrenner was banned by MLB from having any further management power over the Yankees. All he could do was pay the bills until he was re-instated in 1993. But by then he was de-fanged. The George of legend was all pre-1988..........

One of the risks that is taken by aligning with any former pro is that sometimes the strongest personality trait that drove that person to be a top-level, world-class, athlete is the same trait that drives them into disastrous inter-personal conflicts out of the arena. Latest potential casualty: Ray Knight..........

Let’s follow this NFL Sunday Ticket project a little closer as it plods along. Because the NFL’s research into the option of flipping to streaming might inform us as to the current momentum of cord-cutting..........

The Duffle Bag

Big Sexy. almost old enough to be my baby brother, and still wants to play.............BVW, the agent turned Mets GM. made his first bold move. He fired the hitting coach. While the hitting coach was with his family on vacation. How a west coast based players agent knew that the hitting coach is why a Kevin Plawecki is not hitting like Johnny Bench eludes me.........