The Changeup: January 10th, 2019
EVERY TEAM CAN AFFORD YOUR FAVOURITE PLAYERS
Remember last off season and all the talking heads said, "Oh, it's the over 30 players having issues- the teams don't want to pay old men. The peak age for a player in mid to late 20s. Advanced stats have proved that and baseball just needs to adjust."?
I rolled my eyes then and I’m rolling them now.
It's a couple of star 26-year-olds in 2019. Like, “best of generation” players that are just chilling out on the market. Soon the mid -twenties MLB players will join up with the even younger minor leaguers and it will be no one making any money.
Let’s all get this into our heads:
These teams don’t want to pay anyone at all and they will use anything as an excuse. They will talk about anxiety over luxury taxes and lot’s of talk about value for money, and try to downplay just how much money is pouring in.
And money is pouring in. Forbes just posted a story this week saying that the revenue for the MLB in 2018 was $10.3 billion. Attendance was down, but people are still consuming. It’s just the way people are consuming that’s changed.
Deadspin said it best: any one of these teams can afford Bryce Harper and Manny Machado.
Eno Sarris, for The Athletic, argues that the Blue Jays are one of the teams in the position to spend some money.
VACATED PRESS BOX BECOMES CASH COW
For a team that isn’t really spending any extra money and is in an unofficial rebuild mode (with the best prospect in baseball manning 3rd base some time in late April because it would be horrible to start his clock any earlier than absolutely necessary), the optics of this are hilarious.
I’ve sat in that press box. I sat in “row 1”. The view is fine. But what are they going to be watching? Unless you get to high five Vlad jr. every time he hits a homer, what is the value for your money?
TREVOR BAUER REMAINS A TURD
Trevor Bauer harassed some girl on Twitter for hours this week. And made a trans joke.
Deadspin had the recap.
NBC Sports suggests that Cleveland should take it seriously.
So, to sum up, Nikki’s offense was to tweet Bauer, telling him he was her least favourite person in sports and his response was to do things that would perfectly illustrate why Nikki was completely justified in feeling this way.
Is his skin that paper thin?
PROFUNDOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
Williams Astudillo became a cult hero with his epic home run pimpage in Dominican winter ball.
Really, this kid should already be a legend with this post-game interview from last September.
Chubby people also run.
Hidden ball trick!
BO
Bo Bichette had a busy week. Hitting bombs in the Bahamas and talking about it on MLB Network.
THE SCRUM
This is going to be a semi-regular feature. I’ll put the call out on Twitter and answer your questions. Here’s the first one.