2011 MLB Regular Season Thread

[mwo925]

Today I went out to the game and had one of my best days getting autographs out there. Here is a list of everyone that I got and photos are below.

Mark Ellis
Grant Balfour
Cliff Pennington
Trystan Magnuson
Conor Jackson
Josh Outman
Ryan Sweeney
Bob Melvin
Guillermo Moscoso
Gio Gonzalez
Trevor Cahill
Coco Crisp
Hideki Matsui (ROMLB)



And below is the Hideki Matsui baseball

[coolmoors]

Craig Kimbrel is going to replace Matt Cain in the ASG, and rightly so.

[-46-]

Who do you think will win the Cy Young awards? I say Jair Jurjens or Roy Halladay for the NL, and I'll be a homer and say Justin Verlander for the AL.

[dfreely]

A whole lot of players skipping the ASG.. as if it wasn't a joke already.

[coolmoors]

A whole lot of players skipping the ASG.. as if it wasn't a joke already.

People are calling it the All-Scar Game. .

[coolmoors]

NL wins 2nd All-Star game in a row because of Prince Fielder and awesome pitching (except for the A-Gon homer off Cliff Lee.) Hopefully they can keep on winning.

[dfreely]

Mets traded K-Rod to the Brewers for cash and two PTBNL, almost immediately after the ASG ended. Who they end up getting is probably irrelevant since the Brewers don't really have a good minor league system (supposedly the worst in the MLB), but good trade for the Mets simply for getting rid of K-Rod's contract.

Though, I'm surprised he ended up going to the Brewers. I don't think they were ever rumored to be one of teams he would be traded to, and they already have a closer.

[dfreely]

With the trade deadline coming up, I've been reminiscing a bit about how bad the Mets' previous GM Omar Minaya was since he made all sorts of nonsense transactions. And as bad as he was with the Mets, someone reminded me of how bad he was with the Expos before he managed the Mets - he once traded Brandon Phillips, Grady Sizemore and Cliff Lee for Bartolo Colon. Yes, that actually happened. The same year he also traded Jason Bay (to the Mets, strangely enough) for a utility player. Sure am glad he isn't managing the Mets anymore.

[coolmoors]

Jonny Gomes went to the Nats for two prospects and cash. Any thoughts on where Beltran or Bell might end up going? Jon Heyman on MLB Network said that Beltran goes to the Giants or Braves.

[dfreely]

Not sure what the Nats are thinking with the Gomes trade.

Yeah, I'd put the Giants and Braves as the frontrunners for Beltran, with Texas, Boston and Philly coming up behind. For a while, the biggest rumors were that Beltran goes to Philly for Dominic Brown, or to the Braves for Mike Minor, though both seems a bit farfetched. Hunter Pence could also be on the market, which may make things interesting for the Beltran rumors.

Also, a pretty interesting 19-inning game between the Braves and Pirates last night. Prado went 0-for-9 and makes me wonder why I ever drafted him in my fantasy league. And the Braves win it on one of the worst calls I've ever seen - the runner was called safe at home even though it was painfully obvious he was tagged out like 10 feet away from the plate. Imagine if the Pirates miss the postseason by one game.