Cup of Coffee

July 14, 2024: Born Like This

32 Comments

So, I am not made for humidity. Earlier this year I started assisting a volunteer program that works outside. I will be the first to volunteer for January shifts, but as the college kids are out of town, they need me for all these humid days too.

32 thoughts on “July 14, 2024: Born Like This”

  1. Interesting take from Keith Law in the Athletic (q and a on the draft)

    But minor-league contraction has decreased the caliber of competition in the minors, especially at the lower levels, so many guys coming out of the SEC and ACC are unchallenged by high-A pitching or lineups.

    (No link because it was the daily email)

    1. Link. There was another article about the jump from AAA to MLB being harder than ever that I can't find at the moment.

    2. That’s quite a throwaway comment in a mailbag. It’s counterintuitive — has the reduction of roster spots for “organizational filler” guys who are repeating levels driven that decrease? One would think the decrease in roster spots would have concentrated the talent pool a bit, but apparently MLB screwed this up and destabilized its development chain.

      1. Reading the article sean linked to above, cost-cutting seems to be part of the problem:

        Major League Baseball and its owners cut roster sizes in an effort to keep costs relatively flat after they agreed to increase salaries for minor leaguers, guarantee them in-season housing and pay them during spring training and other times they work at team facilities outside of the regular season.

        “Some of the players (who) have gotten squeezed out are the Triple-A veteran or the guy that has two or three years of major-league service but hasn’t really established himself,” Antonetti said. “Maybe some of those spots that had been filled by those veterans who had major-league experience are now filled by prospects.”

        So MLB, which had predicated its player development on a serfdom model, destabilized it by, in part, being too cheap to maintain the competitive integrity of its minor league system once indentured servitude became socially unacceptable.

        I’ll bet the NFL is laughing all the way to the bank since the development of its players has been outsourced to universities that will now be paying their student-athletes entertainment division employees while the NFL waves non-guaranteed contracts at the end of the CTE tunnel.

        1. Save money now to spend more overall with minor leaguers taking longer to establish themselves.

  4. Thanks for the vibes and thoughts, friends. Back to New Orleans this afternoon. Those of you on the mothership, this heat ain’t shit. I’ll be deplaning into someone’s mouth where I’ll live for the next 4 months. Jobu, you wouldn’t enjoy nawlins in the summer.

  5. Ground ac out in aircraft. Check engine light on on dashboard. Dented engine. Deplane. Walk F to C for new plane. Crossed fingers.

  6. Cleveland has already lost to Tampa Bay, 0-2. A win today puts us just 3.5 games back going into the break. We were 9 games behind Cleveland less than three weeks ago.

        2. Few pitches, and nice defense. Going into the All-Star break this could definitely be something...

      1. Bux catches that.

        If he's healthy enough to punch run, why not have him in CF for an inning?

        1. I am a bit surprised Baldelli didn't swap one of the outfielders for Camargo to leave Buxton in center. Something something double switches too hard.

  9. We lost power last night. I bike 20 miles this morning and he to go under 3 downs trees, climb over 2 more, and pedal off the trial to go around several more. Learned that two of my siblings also lost power despite being miles away. Only my sister's power has returned, so it looks like 10 people will be hunkering down at Papa Young's tonight.

    Thankfully, we live in the MAC improvement zone, and all the noise improvements have sealed the house up tight. This, it's only 75 upstairs despite no AC all day.

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