Around the League - 2021 Szn

Southcack77 said:
I googled how MLB continually did Montreal dirty and came up empty.
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A lot of the problems stemmed from an ongoing inability to improve the stadium situation, which was not entirely an MLB problem (more of a problem of a community not willing to be held up by the team).

But, in a nutshell, a powerhouse team got stripped for parts after the ‘94 strike. Fan interest and attendance cratered. MLB tried to eliminate the franchise and lost in court, so it allowed the owner to **** off to the Marlins, looting the Expos on the way out.. MLB then took ownership of the club, played a really cynical game with the team—letting English-language broadcast rights lapse, playing games in Puerto Rico, while it waited for the opportunity to move it to DC.

So MLB certainly screwed the community and the club for a solid decade.
 
Julio3000 said:
A lot of the problems stemmed from an ongoing inability to improve the stadium situation, which was not entirely an MLB problem (more of a problem of a community not willing to be held up by the team).

But, in a nutshell, a powerhouse team got stripped for parts after the ‘94 strike. Fan interest and attendance cratered. MLB tried to eliminate the franchise and lost in court, so it allowed the owner to **** off to the Marlins, looting the Expos on the way out.. MLB then took ownership of the club, played a really cynical game with the team—letting English-language broadcast rights lapse, playing games in Puerto Rico, while it waited for the opportunity to move it to DC.

So MLB certainly screwed the community and the club for a solid decade.
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I remember this episode very well because the Twins were the other team on the chopping block. The contraction threat got the new stadium built up here, but it had everyone in a tizzy. Twins' had fallen off in the mid-to-late '90's and were playing in the god-awful Metrodome (built in 1982 as a basically a football stadium into which baseball was shoehorned).

Link to the details: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2001_...6, 2001, the,Expos, cast the dissenting votes.

I remember one particular trade after MLB took over ownership of the Expos and sent Cliff Lee, Brandon Phillips, and Grady Sizemore (all highly-regarded prospects) and decent veteran bat whose career was winding down Lee Stevens to the Indians for Bartolo Colon and Tim Drew (less successful brother of J.D. Drew). On paper, it didn't look like a terrible deal for a team that had a shot at the wild card (the finished 2nd in the NL East, 19 games behind the Braves), and Colon pitched very well for them. But after the season, MLB trades Colon to the White Sox along with a minor leaguer for an injured Orlando Hernandez (yes, El Duque), Rocky Biddle, and Jeff Leifer. El Duque never threw a pitch for the Expos as he became a free agent after the season and went on to a resume his career back with the Yankees.

They still had a solid ballclub for their first two seasons under MLB ownership, thanks, of course, to the fact they had Vlad Guerrero, Jose Vidro, Brad Wilkerson, Javier Vazquez, Livian Hernandez and a few other really good players (and Frank Robinson was a pretty good manager), but things fell apart in 2004 with the departure of Guerrero to free agency and the trade of Vazquez to the Yankees.

All in all, it was a sad demise for a team that played some really great stretches of baseball with tight budget constraints. Really had a solid player development system and had great luck with a lot of players from Latin America.
 
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I remember they had a bad owner and MLB took them over for a bit, but I'm not sure that was MLB continually screwing them and the attendance lag began before any of that happened.
 
50PoundHead said:
They still had a solid ballclub for their first two seasons under MLB ownership, thanks, of course, to the fact they had Vlad Guerrero, Jose Vidro, Brad Wilkerson, Javier Vazquez,
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Grew up watching and taking baseball camps from these guys. Shane Andrews was there too. Their A ball affiliate was here.
 
Tapate50 said:
Grew up watching and taking baseball camps from these guys. Shane Andrews was there too. Their A ball affiliate was here.
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Expos were kind of a test case for draft compensation for free agent departures. In the 1990 draft, the had ten picks in the first two rounds (2 first round picks, 4 supplemental picks between rounds 1 and 2, and 4 second round picks). Of the ten, only Shane Andrews and Rondell White really developed into a multi-year regulars, with White far outpacing Andrews in terms of performance. A couple of decent pitchers (Gabe White and Chris Haney), but the rest of the haul underperformed and, somewhat as a result, the question of whether to trade impending free agents or taking the draft picks remains a relevant debate.
 
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Have a feeling players in general don't like Manfred and it could be a long offseason
 
Those of us who were posters on the old Fanhome boards back in the early part of the millennium might remember that the Expos board on Fanhome was the most popular and, frankly, rather insane boards on the site. Those fans were intense. I distinctly remember them celebrating when Tomo Ohka hit Andruw Jones in the head after Andruw homered off him twice.
 
thewupk said:
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Have a feeling players in general don't like Manfred and it could be a long offseason
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Assuming things get taken care of (and in time), I was looking ahead on a quiet Sunday morning. Let's assume Freeman's extension gets worked out in some form. If the Mariners choose not to pick up Seager's option year (or he can be had for something reasonable) I still think he could be a perfect fit in 2022. Ozuna slides to DH with Riley replacing him in LF and Seager takes over at 3B for one season while we wait to see how Waters and Harris develop. The first thing this helps is balancing the lineup...

RF- Acuna
1B- Freeman
DH- Ozuna
2B- Ozzie
LF- Riley
3B- Seager
SS- Dansby
C- Contreras
CF- Pache/Waters

If you could get Seager on a 1 year/$15 million deal you not only ONLY "spend" Morton's money on him, but you buy yourself more time for Pache/Waters/Harris/Shewmake/Grissom while paying Acuna's raise with Smyly's money. That leaves Ender and Martin's money to pay for arb raises.

This requires you to count on an eventual healthy return of Soroka (and the continued development of Wright/Wilson/Davidson/Muller/etc.), but would fit AA's MO of trying to fill holes with one year deals - and allows you to shift Riley back to 3B in 2023 while using Seager's money for other things. You start converting some of the SP prospects to pen pieces (most notably Touki replacing Martin) to save a little money and you DON'T waste money on bringing back guys like Jackson, Dayton, and Camargo.
 
CrimsonCowboy said:
So the possible relocation of the A's got me to thinking about what we may see in the next few years. The alignment of MLB could very well look a whole lot different than it is today. I'd even suggest it's likely. In trying to come up with the "most likely scenario", this is something I could see happen. This may not be ideal for the Braves and I'm not totally on board with this, but it's a very plausible thing. Here's my thoughts:

*It's not official by any means, but I think the A's are gone from Oakland. MLB telling them to start looking at other markets makes me believe as such. Cities are being thrown around, but from what I've seen today, the leader seems to be Las Vegas. That makes a ton of sense to me. Not sure MLB wants to make a difficult realignment by moving them east of the Mississippi.

*The Rays are talking to officials in the Tampa Bay area, but I have similar pessimism with them as I do with the A's and Oakland. They've been talking about as long as the A's and Oakland have. The Rays owner has thrown around the dumb idea of splitting a season in Tampa Bay and Montreal. I think this is setting the stage for a relocation of the Rays and the return of the Montreal Expos.

*After a CBA is agreed to and clarity with the A's and Rays, then comes expansion to 32 teams. Manfred wants it. So who gets the expansion teams? I look at two cities that already have organizations looking to bring MLB to their areas. One is Portland. I haven't looked at it in a while, but the Portland Diamond Project has been working to get MLB there. I don't know if he still is, but Seahawks QB Russel Wilson was (is?) a part of it. The other is, and I know this will cause some groans, Nashville. It will cut into the Braves fan base, but Nashville has also made a great effort to get MLB there and their work so far has been impressive. What Nashville brings as a city is also a plus.

So with all the above factors, there will be realignment. A scenario to me is four divisions in both leagues of four teams each. Now, as much as I would love to say the postseason structure would be easy, all division winners, Manfred will not want to decrease the number of playoff eligible teams. Last season's format will likely be a similar structure to the postseason in the future. Four division winners, four wild cards, best of three Wild Card Round, best of five Division Series, and best of seven in the LCS and World Series.

The above factors would result in a possible alignment like this, including two teams changing leagues:
NL East: Expos (after Rays relocate to Montreal), Mets, Phillies, Pirates
NL North: Brewers, Cardinals, Cubs, Reds
NL South: Braves, Marlins, Nationals, Nashville Franchise
NL West: Dodgers, Giants, Rockies, Padres

AL East: Blue Jays, Orioles, Red Sox, Yankees
AL North: Indians (or whatever they'll be called in the future), Tigers, Twins, White Sox
AL South: Astros, Diamondbacks, Rangers, Royals
AL West: A's (after relocation to Las Vegas), Angels, Mariners, Portland Franchise

This is just an idea of mine and far from a guarantee of all the above happening. Another thing such as another city being picked for expansion or the Rays staying and everything above is blown up.
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Excellent post and I agree 100%. Pretty obvious what’s going to happen to the athletics and rays.
 
Maybe. Seems to be on quite a little roll after a horrendous start.

Think there is a bunch left in the tank but I can’t ignore that last year was a disaster.
 
thethe said:
Maybe. Seems to be on quite a little roll after a horrendous start.

Think there is a bunch left in the tank but I can’t ignore that last year was a disaster.
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Even in another record setting strikeout year from hitters I don't expect Bumgarner to keep up a career high in K/9

He likely will settle in with a high 3 FIP
 
msstate7 said:
Just thought the dodgers liked bench players with versatility. Just seemed odd to me
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Well when your SS goes down it can put a wrench in things. Pretty sure Pujols was brought in to platoon agaisnt lefties. And Muncy will go to 2nd when that happens.
 
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