Harper Called out by Teammate; Dugout brawl!

bravesfanMatt said:
their opening day money committed to the bullpen was 13.5 , >10 mill was to three players.. 5 mill of that to Storen who obviously they had no confidence in because they made a deadline trade for a closer when Storen had blown only 2 saves all year. So basically they went into a season with a 163 million payroll and banked their pen on Storen who they had no confidence in.. Stammen whose injury hurt them (no depth).. and thornton who did well and then some other unproven cheap guys.

you are denying any of this?!?
Click to expand...

The bullpen was:

Storen 5.7
Janssen 3.5 (injured)
Thornton 3.5
Stammen 2.25
Roark .53
Cedeno .52
Barrett .51
Treinen .51 (replacement)

That is 16.5 million, which was 9th in the majors in payroll towards the bullpen. (LAD, KC, SF, Cin, Det, Bal, Bos, Atl, Wash, Hou)

You are clearly wrong. Just stop.
 
wasn't counting Jansen since he wasn't on the opening day roster and was out until almost June. so the Nats STARTED the season with now 13 million committed to 4 players.. 8 million, or half of total BP salary, to two players that either were injured or lacking confidence.. yes you showed me the strong bullpen that Rizzo built. I am sure you had all the confidence in the world in that make up... congrats on the internet victory, may all your Harper fantasies come true..
 
bravesfanMatt said:
wasn't counting Jansen since he wasn't on the opening day roster and was out until almost June. so the Nats STARTED the season with now 13 million committed to 4 players.. 8 million, or half of total BP salary, to two players that either were injured or lacking confidence.. yes you showed me the strong bullpen that Rizzo built. I am sure you had all the confidence in the world in that make up... congrats on the internet victory, may all your Harper fantasies come true..
Click to expand...

Your comment was they didnt spend money....they did. You pay injured players still.
 
I don't like either player, but I dislike Harper more so I'll side with Papelbon on this one.

While in many ways I do think Harper probably should win MVP, but in the most important I think he is a long way off. Sometimes he doesn't come off as a team player, and sometimes he comes off as not respecting the game.
 
Right. They had money committed. But when you have five mill to a player you didn't have confidence in and another 3 plus mill in a player that is hurt then you didn't address the pen. They spent 210 mill on a starter. So you would think they would actively find a closer they wanted for the whole year. Maybe they tried. I don't really know. But my perception is that they choose to go into a season without a bullpen that was reliable. I guess Rizzo thought he would coast into the playoffs and then have the luxury of one of his starters being another good pen guy. So yes they had money committed. But half of that 16 mill was committed to guys that were shaky at best. So again they went cheap on the pen when you look at the big picture.
 
Orphan Black said:
I don't like either player, but I dislike Harper more so I'll side with Papelbon on this one.

While in many ways I do think Harper probably should win MVP, but in the most important I think he is a long way off. Sometimes he doesn't come off as a team player, and sometimes he comes off as not respecting the game.
Click to expand...


That didn't stop Barry Bonds from winning seven times. It's a much more stat-driven award now than it was in an earlier era and that's fine. I can remember when guys like Nellie Fox and Zoilo Versalles won the award or a guy with counting stats got the nod.
 
Orphan Black said:
Sometimes he doesn't come off as a team player, and sometimes he comes off as not respecting the game.
Click to expand...
How players actually are can be easily misread. Papelbon was the biggest jerk this time. Harper's sportsmanship or lack of it is the Nats' problem and shouldn't hurt his MVP chances.

I think Harper is the MVP, though I hate it.
 
Harper is the best player in the NL this year for sure. No debating that. Only challenge to him is Kershaw/Arrieta, but given how great they've both been, but I think they'll divide up the votes for the people who'd consider voting for a pitcher.
 
Fredi said he didn't see it, was reading his baseball prospectus from.......2007.

"What happened? Papelbon is what, the best closer in the game? He's good? What'd he strikeout this Harper guy, who is he to challenge. I don't have a scouting report, is he someone to be concerned about? I'm not really worried about it, more scared, never been so scared of running a pitcher out there like I did tonight, we will run em out there tomorrow and see what they for. Sometimes you got to tip your cap to someone for being so darn competitive to try to get the team fired up. Chris Johnson does that for us, speaking of him, anyone see him lately? I think I'll run him out there tomorrow, he probably needs a few at bats. Tough to find em, really like the upside of our Cubans. You know, I'm like one, right? Yeah, we're good and untouchable. Anything else?"
 
A lot of ex-players coming to Pap's defense including CJ Nitkowski and B. Molina. Shows what the lead singer of Flock of Seagulls cover band is thought of. This was reported on ESPN.
 
VirginiaBrave said:
A lot of ex-players coming to Pap's defense including CJ Nitkowski and B. Molina. Shows what the lead singer of Flock of Seagulls cover band is thought of. This was reported on ESPN.
Click to expand...

I wonder if this reaction is due to this incident or an overall disdain for Harper (and I'm sure he's held in disdain by quite a few players and former players)?
 
bravesfanMatt said:
Rizzo is the biggest issue with this team.. he falls in the Wren model of GMing.. They are like kids who get a credit card for the first time. They spend on the first flashy thing they can find, they spend and spend and never concern themselves with the little things that make a team work. The utter arrogance to not address the BP or bench or the minors will haunt them like it did the Phils. The Gnats have to build an entire new bullpen next year while still addressing some of the pitching depth they are missing. All this with a minor league system that isn't bad but very thin. Their system was under .500 across all levels, where you look at the Braves and their system was under .500 overall, but only under in two leagues..Rome was our anchor because of sub par pitching.
Click to expand...

I actually think Rizzo is one of the better GM's in the league. Sure he has a nice budget the work with, and was handed Harper, but he's also made some very shrewd trades and signings that have worked out well for them.
 
50PoundHead said:
I wonder if this reaction is due to this incident or an overall disdain for Harper (and I'm sure he's held in disdain by quite a few players and former players)?
Click to expand...
I think it's all BS. They've just decided to spin it against Harper because he's the best player and has his reputation. They found a lot more who thought Papelbon was wrong. But nobody cares about Papelbon.

Pap gone.
 
50PoundHead said:
I wonder if this reaction is due to this incident or an overall disdain for Harper (and I'm sure he's held in disdain by quite a few players and former players)?
Click to expand...

I think it's due to the overall disdain for him. Paps was in the wrong for going after Harper with the choke hold. But with that being said I don't think he was in the wrong for calling him out and who knows what Harper said in return that made Paps go after him. I feel Harper is seen as a uber talented player who tends to think he is bigger than the game at times and that rubs some players the wrong way.
 
Papelbon was completely in the wrong.. are you kidding.. He was being passive aggressive by calling Harper out on the top step in front of everyone. He was being childish by trying to get retribution for Harper calling him out in the press for the bean ball against Manny.. Paps was waiting for his opportunity and took it like a little kid seeking revenge. That is bush league at the up most. Harper is a douche and should have run the play out, but Paps should have kept his mouth shut and lead by example, and let someone who has been on the team more than two months handle Harper.
 
Wren made some shrewd trades that worked well for the Braves.. but he was short sighted and would mortgage the future to win now. He couldn't build an organization, he could only build a team.. Sorry, I differ with you in how I measure a GM..
 
Millwood1Hitter said:
Fredi said he didn't see it, was reading his baseball prospectus from.......2007.

"What happened? Papelbon is what, the best closer in the game? He's good? What'd he strikeout this Harper guy, who is he to challenge. I don't have a scouting report, is he someone to be concerned about? I'm not really worried about it, more scared, never been so scared of running a pitcher out there like I did tonight, we will run em out there tomorrow and see what they for. Sometimes you got to tip your cap to someone for being so darn competitive to try to get the team fired up. Chris Johnson does that for us, speaking of him, anyone see him lately? I think I'll run him out there tomorrow, he probably needs a few at bats. Tough to find em, really like the upside of our Cubans. You know, I'm like one, right? Yeah, we're good and untouchable. Anything else?"
Click to expand...

Wow. You hit it all in one post. This is good work.
 
Runnin said:
I think it's all BS. They've just decided to spin it against Harper because he's the best player and has his reputation. They found a lot more who thought Papelbon was wrong. But nobody cares about Papelbon.

Pap gone.
Click to expand...

Baseball has this odd "moral code" and you have veteran players that think they are doing the game a service by enforcing unwritten rules. In general, older players also have a disdain for younger players that are good without putting in the years.

I understand some of it, we hit guys for strutting homers and such. (though, Im more tolerant of it now because pretty much everyone does it) But, there is no one that runs hard on a routine flyball. You may get some guys that run out grounders balls to the wall, but very few that run out routine flyballs. You have vet guys commenting on the issue and they are certainly guys that done run the ball out. Its such a stupid criticism as it is; you might have 1 routine flyball dropped over the course of the season. If its in the playoffs and it costs you; there is going to be backlash. But, anyone really care if its in a meaningless game? Does Joe blow hauling ass to first base on a routine flyball add any value to the team whatsoever or does it just make people feel good about themselves? I'm more interested in guys that consistently take the extra base or go first to third.

Some of the criticism of Harper is simply people not liking him. He's young, brass, and an awesome talent. Not everyone is going to like that. It would be easy to go around a find a few guys that dislike him. (maybe CJ called Hamels, lol) If people really cared about running balls out, you would have fist fights on a nightly basis. Latroy Hawkins came out against Harper; anyone ever hear of him yelling at Bautista or Encarnacion for not running hard? Those guys don't hustle at all and are station to station on the bases.

Players generally hate Papelbon has well (especially when he was younger), but now that he's a vet, he gets a pass. Which is an odd culture to me; like the player that commented that players need to earn the right to jog out flyballs.....just odd. Papelbon just poorly timed his attempt to get on his soapbox. He's been with the team a month, is hated by his teammates, and not considered a team leader. Yelling at the superstar for jogging to first is dumb as it is. If he had an issue with comments from Harper and wanted to be a badass, he should have went at him in the locker room. You pitch 60 innings a year and have the slackest work schedule of any type of player.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top