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Post by alexcorahomevideo on Jun 19, 2020 21:40:53 GMT -5
No chance of this happening now. Players are starting to test positive. This is a potentially deadly pandemic. Stay the Fuck Home. Just my opinion though. Which of course was inevitable, and the thing I STILL haven't seen addressed is how you get around this problem; everyone's just talking about the negotiations over moneybucks while hand-waving about the "health issues that need to be worked out." But when one player in the NBA got infected they shut down the whole league. One possible solution is just to say, "look, players are gonna get the coronavirus, as will clubhouse attendants and other team employees, etc., and we're just gonna barrel through. If half the Phillies get it then they just have to go on with half their players while the rest quarantine. And if anyone gets hospitalized, or god forbid, dies, then that's the price we'll have to pay. If, as a nation, we're doing it for bars and restaurants and movie theaters, then we may as well do it for major league baseball." Maybe that's defensible. But I haven't actually heard anyone say that. So what is the plan, exactly? I agree. However in my opinion everyone needs to stay home until this is over unless its a life or death situation that you're fighting for.
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Post by swingingbunt on Jun 19, 2020 22:44:21 GMT -5
I agree with Chris. I love the idea of ties after 10-12 innings during the regular season.
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Post by philsbosoxfan on Jun 19, 2020 22:58:33 GMT -5
Jon Heyman @jonheyman · 1h MLB will be closing down Spring Training facilities in Florida and Arizona temporarily due to recent events and will be conducting a deep cleaning and disinfecting of all facilities. Upon re-opening, a negative test will be required for entry. @bnightengale 1st
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Post by costpet on Jun 20, 2020 8:09:23 GMT -5
The Phillies shut down their training facility in Clearwater, FL. If you can't practice, how can you play? You can't. I wouldn't count on a baseball season this year.
The NFL owners want every dollar they can get their hands on. So, there will be some kind of season. But, it will be difficult. Every player will have to be tested prior to the game and those testing positive will not be able to play. If both their quarterbacks are infected, then what? They might need to allow all their practice squad players to be eligible on game day, just to have enough players to field a team. Very few fans allowed to attend, so forget the cheerleaders. The people who get the stadium ready will be tested, as well. There's a lot of them. Then there's the danger of a player or two who shows no symptoms spreading it to the other players on both teams. In other words, it will be a real mess and might shut down the season within a couple of weeks. I have no clear view how it will all work. Maybe we'll know during the preseason.
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Post by incandenza on Jun 20, 2020 10:27:39 GMT -5
Jon Heyman @jonheyman · 1h MLB will be closing down Spring Training facilities in Florida and Arizona temporarily due to recent events and will be conducting a deep cleaning and disinfecting of all facilities. Upon re-opening, a negative test will be required for entry. @bnightengale 1st It doesn't help that Florida and Arizona are the two states with the most alarming trendlines in the country right now. Not only are they both setting records for new cases on most days recently, their positive test rates are spiking - Arizona was above 20% yesterday, which is very ominous.
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Post by Oregon Norm on Jun 20, 2020 10:57:42 GMT -5
What I do find encouraging is the discovery that a cheap and widely available steroid has been found to significantly increase the chances of recovery for seriously ill victims of the virus. It was discovered purely by accident, as a last ditch effort to find something that would help someone who was going downhill fast. It worked. One of the business people in our town had his brother come down with COVID-19 and he got better quickly when he received the treatment. So there's hope, but as you say the rise in the number of infections is really disconcerting.
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Post by sdiaz1 on Jun 20, 2020 11:46:40 GMT -5
What I do find encouraging is the discovery that a cheap and widely available steroid has been found to significantly increase the chances of recovery for seriously ill victims of the virus. It was discovered purely by accident, as a last ditch effort to find something that would help someone who was going downhill fast. It worked. One of the business people in our town had his brother come down with COVID-19 and he got better quickly when he received the treatment. So there's hope, but as you say the rise in the number of infections is really disconcerting. This. Despite the fact that we as a society really have not done our part to minimize transmission we all owe a major debt of gratitude to the hospitals and medical workers that have done a fantastic job in finding treatments and improving on care for patients. Even though cases really stopped decreasing since mid-May (until the current explosive increase) the number of Covid Related deaths have been continuously falling.
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Post by James Dunne on Jun 20, 2020 11:51:14 GMT -5
As a fan those weird 18 inning games every couple years are fun, but they seem really just awful for the teams involved. If teams really hate playing them that much then it's something I can give up as a fan - it's a quirky thing I like but not one of the reasons I like baseball. In the minors they should probably just stop after the 10th inning.
Nobody likes the man on second base thing, why do they keep trying to make that a thing, literally nobody likes it, everyone hates it, it's awful, never do this. Why do we need cockamamie rules that change the game around significantly before they call the game a tie?
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Post by umassgrad2005 on Jun 20, 2020 13:48:35 GMT -5
I hate the 2nd base idea, but hate ties even more. If given the choice, I'll gladly take the 2B idea. You play games to determine a winner, ties are just horrible.
As far as Covid and the season, it's on the players and their families. If they want a season they have to be careful and take the needed steps.
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Post by incandenza on Jun 20, 2020 14:39:36 GMT -5
So there's hope, but as you say the rise in the number of infections is really disconcerting. What data are you looking at that indicates a rise? Not trying to start a thing, it's just that I look at WHO and CDC data fairly regularly and the number of reported cases per day in the US has been fairly consistent since mid April. Just trying to figure out what I'm missing. The 7-day rolling average is the highest its been since May 10th. Yesterday was the first day with 30k+ cases since May 1st. The increase is concentrated in the south and southwest. See here or here.
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Post by Chris Hatfield on Jun 20, 2020 15:34:05 GMT -5
Why are ties horrible?
You're watching a game on a work night. It's tied in the 13th inning. How many people are left in the park? At some point, you're turning it off to go to bed and so is the rest of the viewership that has a job. Honestly, what's the difference between "I was at a game that wound up going 16 innings but we left in the 12th" and "I was at a game that wound up being a tie after 12." Does the fact that there was eventually a result later in the game change anything?
Also, if you've got a hard stop at 12, teams will play to win rather than playing not to lose. More aggressive substitutions (you know when your slow-ass DH isn't coming up again, so yeah, get him out for a pinch runner if he walks), different use of pitching, etc. Plus you don't wind up with Johnny Triple-A out there the next day going five no matter what because there's nobody left to pitch.
It's a 162-game season. I don't find a team having like, 5 ties on its record to be offensive. The 2019 Red Sox would've been 82-76-4 instead of 84-78 (ignoring the fact that the teams may have played the ties differently, and therefore wound up with a winner). Is that really so horrible? If so, why? There are rational arguments for ties. What's the rational argument against them? I'm not sure I buy "if you've played for four hours, you need a winner." So you're going to force the teams to keep playing? Nobody wants to be there anymore!
And that goes double for the minors. I have no idea why they don't have ties in the minors yet. After 12 there's almost nobody in the park and nobody who's still there wants to be.
The issue is how would you then count them - you couldn't just use winning percentage anymore. Do they count as half a win?
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Post by sarasoxer on Jun 20, 2020 15:38:19 GMT -5
To incandenza...Yep. Worldometers had the U.S. at 33,000+ cases yesterday. We are 31,000+ today with 3 hours of compilation to go. We may hit a record that was 'achieved' before shutdown. A month ago Florida was averaging 6-800/day. Cases have risen steadily to 4,049 yesterday. This is a disaster zone in the making. New York is thinking of banning Floridians from entry.
A number of Tampa hockey players have the virus as well some Philly baseball players and pro golfers. It's hard to see mlb in Florida this year w/o stringent protocalls...play, eat, go home...no bar hopping. And Arizona is seeing big case increases as well. Where to play? the upper Midwest? Maine?
One good thing is that the death rate seems to be declining as hospitals are better equipped, people seek diagnosis and treatment earlier and the average age of infection drops.
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orion09
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Post by orion09 on Jun 20, 2020 16:44:59 GMT -5
Why? Why do we need 15 inning games? What's romantic about that? I have no issues with ties after 12 (or so) innings and felt that way before the present situation. The thing that’s romantic about 15 inning games is the idea that you play until there’s a winner. It becomes a battle of will in a way that mirrors the tests all of us face in life, which in an underlying sense is what draws many of us to sport in the first place.
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Post by sarasoxer on Jun 20, 2020 16:57:55 GMT -5
Why? Why do we need 15 inning games? What's romantic about that? I have no issues with ties after 12 (or so) innings and felt that way before the present situation. The thing that’s romantic about 15 inning games is the idea that you play until there’s a winner. It becomes a battle of will in a way that mirrors the tests all of us face in life, which in an underlying sense is what draws many of us to sport in the first place. You are so right IMO! You nailed it! The tension and reward/loss is so enhanced. It may be done away with especially this year if any games are played, but it's something intrinsic to baseball that I treasure.
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redsox04071318champs
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Post by redsox04071318champs on Jun 20, 2020 17:23:06 GMT -5
The thing that’s romantic about 15 inning games is the idea that you play until there’s a winner. It becomes a battle of will in a way that mirrors the tests all of us face in life, which in an underlying sense is what draws many of us to sport in the first place. You are so right IMO! You nailed it! The tension and reward/loss is so enhanced. It may be done away with especially this year if any games are played, but it's something intrinsic to baseball that I treasure. Exactly. For me personally, like most others, I have a job to do the next morning, but you know...priorities....if the Red Sox are playing meaningful baseball so what if miss a little extra sleep to do a job that feels like autopilot somedays anyways? If I'm really into the season and the game it's not like I'm going to be able to sleep without wondering what happened. And anyways, what do you do with a World Series game or playoff game that goes beyond 12? I mean, that 14 inning game the Sox played against NY in 2004 for Game 5 was something else. Declaring them ties does it no justice. I personally hate ties - might as well not have played. I remember the ruckus it kicked up when it occurred during an exhibition game - the all-star game. The only thing I hate more than ties is that idiotic notion of starting the inning with a runner on 2b. Loving or hating ties...it's just an opinion. Nobody is really right or wrong about it.
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Post by sarasoxer on Jun 20, 2020 17:52:30 GMT -5
How many summer nights did I lose sleep as a kid laying on the radio, inning after inning with the signal fading in and out, in hope for extra inning triumph. Did I care with sleep loss? Extra inning games magnified the intensity. Can any true Sox fan of that era say that those games were not special?
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redsox04071318champs
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Post by redsox04071318champs on Jun 20, 2020 18:03:26 GMT -5
How many summer nights did I lose sleep as a kid laying on the radio, inning after inning with the signal fading in and out, in hope for extra inning triumph. Did I care with sleep loss? Extra inning games magnified the intensity. Can any true Sox fan of that era say that those games were not special? Exactly. I used to have my transistor radio underneath my pillow when I was supposed to be sleeping, particularly for those West coast games. Didn't have cable TV back then - even when it was the 1980s. I look at it this way. There aren't a ton of games that go beyond 12 innings, so we're talking a handful of games. To me it's like the intentional walk rule change. Now they pass the batter automatically without throwing the pitches. I honestly don't know how much time they really think they're saving given that the intentional walk doesn't happen often and that there is the possibility of an intentional walk resulting in passed ball/wild pitch or that the runner can take off from 2b or the pitch can be hit by the batter or even the possibility that it's a bluff - I think that happened with Johnny Bench catching once. It's a rule change where they think they're taking a rare occurence and saving us all time by tweaking it. I'd rather see them take away all of the stepoffs that the pitcher takes and the stepouts that the batter takes. That's what slows the game down. That and the long commercials and yeah, all the pitching changes. But they're going to do what they're going to do and we'll have playoff systems where more takes make it than don't, which kind of takes away from the long season - I would anticipate that's the plan/hope that owners have even beyond 2021.
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Post by incandenza on Jun 20, 2020 20:04:46 GMT -5
To incandenza...Yep. Worldometers had the U.S. at 33,000+ cases yesterday. We are 31,000+ today with 3 hours of compilation to go. We may hit a record that was 'achieved' before shutdown. A month ago Florida was averaging 6-800/day. Cases have risen steadily to 4,049 yesterday. This is a disaster zone in the making. New York is thinking of banning Floridians from entry. A number of Tampa hockey players have the virus as well some Philly baseball players and pro golfers. It's hard to see mlb in Florida this year w/o stringent protocalls...play, eat, go home...no bar hopping. And Arizona is seeing big case increases as well. Where to play? the upper Midwest? Maine? One good thing is that the death rate seems to be declining as hospitals are better equipped, people seek diagnosis and treatment earlier and the average age of infection drops. I hope you're right that treatment has improved as the medical folks learn more about the disease, etc. But I fear the only reason the deaths haven't started going up again yet is just the usual lag we see between increasing cases and increasing deaths. If the usual pattern plays out we will see deaths start to increase maybe 1-2 weeks from now. I also think this really changes prospects for professional sports. It's one thing to try to start things up when the pandemic is slowly ebbing; and frankly even that stretches feasibility and prudence. But it's a whole other matter if things are getting worse day after day. What if Orlando starts looking like Detroit or Boston did in April? Is the NBA really going to go ahead with their plan? And it would seem even more challenging for MLB teams to be flying all over the country.
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Post by foreverred9 on Jun 20, 2020 20:13:51 GMT -5
Why? Why do we need 15 inning games? What's romantic about that? I have no issues with ties after 12 (or so) innings and felt that way before the present situation. The thing that’s romantic about 15 inning games is the idea that you play until there’s a winner. It becomes a battle of will in a way that mirrors the tests all of us face in life, which in an underlying sense is what draws many of us to sport in the first place. I get it for playoffs, but for the random game number 76 in the season, is it really that important to declare a winner and a loser?
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Post by Chris Hatfield on Jun 20, 2020 20:51:33 GMT -5
Nobody's talking about ties in the playoffs. So that's off the table.
I guess I get the romanticism piece of it, but again, this is a 162-game season. There is a point in an extra-inning game where a team might be better off with a loss now than with a win that's going to take even more out of their bullpen for the coming days. I guess that's the part I don't find romantic. Yes, let's give everything we have to win this game in 17 innings... and then get pasted the next two nights because our bullpen is toast if our starter doesn't go deep into the game? I dunno. I just don't find any mirror of life in that.
The fact that we're not talking about a lot of games is part of the point, for me. For the Red Sox, 4 last year, 3 in 2018, 6 in 2017. It's not like it's a soccer game where there's a very good chance you're leaving with a tie. And as I said, with a set endpoint, teams are going to play extra innings differently, so I bet you wind up with even fewer games that would end in ties than you otherwise would have.
For me, in the playoffs, you're staying up. You're staying at the park. You're invested. You get things like the Eovaldi outing in 2018. Magical. I hear that! For game 56? Yeah, there's 100 more of these. I'm going to bed, man.
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Post by James Dunne on Jun 20, 2020 22:41:34 GMT -5
Why? Why do we need 15 inning games? What's romantic about that? I have no issues with ties after 12 (or so) innings and felt that way before the present situation. The thing that’s romantic about 15 inning games is the idea that you play until there’s a winner. It becomes a battle of will in a way that mirrors the tests all of us face in life, which in an underlying sense is what draws many of us to sport in the first place. The problem with romanticizing it in this way is that's not what actually happens. Teams are annoyed and trying to not get hurt and reaching the point that they're using backup second basemen to pitch in order to lose faster.
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Post by incandenza on Jun 20, 2020 23:31:01 GMT -5
Nobody's talking about ties in the playoffs. So that's off the table. I guess I get the romanticism piece of it, but again, this is a 162-game season. There is a point in an extra-inning game where a team might be better off with a loss now than with a win that's going to take even more out of their bullpen for the coming days. I guess that's the part I don't find romantic. Yes, let's give everything we have to win this game in 17 innings... and then get pasted the next two nights because our bullpen is toast if our starter doesn't go deep into the game? I dunno. I just don't find any mirror of life in that. Man, that sounds exactly like life.
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redsox04071318champs
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Post by redsox04071318champs on Jun 21, 2020 7:54:01 GMT -5
Nobody's talking about ties in the playoffs. So that's off the table. I guess I get the romanticism piece of it, but again, this is a 162-game season. There is a point in an extra-inning game where a team might be better off with a loss now than with a win that's going to take even more out of their bullpen for the coming days. I guess that's the part I don't find romantic. Yes, let's give everything we have to win this game in 17 innings... and then get pasted the next two nights because our bullpen is toast if our starter doesn't go deep into the game? I dunno. I just don't find any mirror of life in that. The fact that we're not talking about a lot of games is part of the point, for me. For the Red Sox, 4 last year, 3 in 2018, 6 in 2017. It's not like it's a soccer game where there's a very good chance you're leaving with a tie. And as I said, with a set endpoint, teams are going to play extra innings differently, so I bet you wind up with even fewer games that would end in ties than you otherwise would have. For me, in the playoffs, you're staying up. You're staying at the park. You're invested. You get things like the Eovaldi outing in 2018. Magical. I hear that! For game 56? Yeah, there's 100 more of these. I'm going to bed, man. I totally get your point of view. I do. But for me, I'm a salaried employee. There are days that are absolutely hellacious (sure you have them quite often) when I'm putting in a lot more than the "standard" 8 hours, sometimes double of that. It really doesn't bother me too much if these very well compensated employees need to work "overtime", even excessive overtime on rare occasions to get their job done, which is to play a game to its conclusion. If their starter can't go deep into a game the next day whose fault is it? What's to stop their offense from rolling up runs as well the next night? I get that these kinds of games can impact a team the next day or two, but I don't think it's a huge minimal impact given that there aren't a lot of games like these. I think adding that 26th man (extra pitcher) to the roster or making that LOOGY go more than 1/3 of an inning will help that situation.
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Post by umassgrad2005 on Jun 21, 2020 8:02:33 GMT -5
I don't buy the wear out your bullpen theory, that's what makes great teams great they have very good pitching depth.
Now crazy long games is an issue, yet ties fells like a stop gap measure that doesn't actually fix the problem. Speed up the games, so extra innings doesn't mean five hour games. Heck place a guy at third if you need to after say 12 innings. Just determine a winner. Trying to find values for ties is a joke.
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Post by Chris Hatfield on Jun 21, 2020 10:08:29 GMT -5
I don't buy the wear out your bullpen theory, that's what makes great teams great they have very good pitching depth. Now crazy long games is an issue, yet ties fells like a stop gap measure that doesn't actually fix the problem. Speed up the games, so extra innings doesn't mean five hour games. Heck place a guy at third if you need to after say 12 innings. Just determine a winner. Trying to find values for ties is a joke. See I think starting innings with runners on base is far more of a joke than ending a game in a tie. You're saying you'd rather a game be decided by luck (start inning with runner on second, BS broken-bat flare can end the game, for example) than end in a tie? We'll probably have to agree to disagree there.
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