The Orioles want too much for him in a trade and hes under contract til 2018. Most people believe even though he won GM of the year last year he doesnt want to stay in Baltimore.

The debate is whether the Orioles could keep him from going to Toronto if he were to quit.

The Orioles are already on mlb's shitlist for taking them to court overthe fees for MASN & the Nationals who apparently are pleading poverty over getting very little money from MASN due to the deal the Orioles & MLB agreed to in order to move the Expos to DC.

Baltimore was supposed to be a lock for 2016 all star game but it went to SD even though that's back to back NL host cities with DC supposedly frontrunning for 2017.

see ya Max, say hi to Fister :wavesad: :fu:

Scherzer in the NL East. Well, shit.

<font color=goldenrod>Stephen Strasburg
Max Scherzer
Jordan Zimmermann
Gio Gonzalez
Doug Fister

Fuck.

They may trade one of Zimmermann or Fister since they're both free agents at the end of the year, but then they could just put Tanner Roark into the 5th spot instead.

Again, fuck.</font>

<font color=goldenrod>The Scherzer deal is even more expensive than initially reported. It's 7 years, $210 million however they will "only" pay $105 million over the 7 years he's on the team and $105 million is deferred between 2022-28. They're going to be paying him for a very, very long time.</font>

<font color=goldenrod>By the time Scherzer is done getting paid on his contract I will be about to turn 40. That is terrifying.</font>

Thats nothing. The Mets are still paying Bobby Bonilla $1.2 mil a year for 20 more years and he hasnt played for them since 1999. He'll still be getting checks from the Mets after Scherzers deal is completely over for another 7 years (2035) almost 40 years after he played with the Mets.

<font color=goldenrod>Yes but not nearly the amount Scherzer will be getting. Scherzer's deal has broken the deferment record by a landslide.

Actually would be interested to see if other guys try to do something similar with their contracts.</font>

Bonilla turned a $5 mil total contract into almost $30 million by getting it deferred over 25 years with interest. I'm not sure too many teams are that financially stupid.

<font color=goldenrod>The Madoff scandal had a pretty large part of why they did it in the first place.

http://www.celebritynetworth.com/art...ball-contract/

And now this idiot who fell for a too-good-to-be-true Ponzi scheme is the head of MLB's Finance Committee, meaning he's in good graces with Manfred just like he was with Selig. Was reallllllly hoping Manfred would basically force out the Wilpons just like Selig did with the McCourts.</font>

Cubs acquire Dexter Fowler from the 'Stros for Dan Straily and Luis Valbuena

Looks like the hot stove has already cooked its biggest meal but it's on a pre-bake cycle for another go around.

Rangers get Yovani Gallardo from the Brewers for Luis Sardinas, Corey Knebel, and Marcos Diplan.

MLB considering more time savings rules for games with pitchers only getting 30 seconds and batters 20 seconds to be ready after a commercial break.

On paper, game times could get shortened by around 10-15 minutes on average (1-2 minutes per inning).

Yeah, what if the bathroom break takes longer than usual?

If this is the first act of the new commish, he ain't getting off on the right foot. He'd be better off looking to find ways to cut down on marathon games. Example being Red Sox/Yankees 4+ hour long regulation games.

It wouldn't as long as it also covers commercial time and end of inning replays.

Mangers have been complaining commercial breaks are too long while players have been complaining tv networks need to have quicker end of inning replays or less of them.

IT's very terrifying, given the fact that you are 12.

I'm all for anything and everything that makes baseball games shorter.

I'm not a fan of this trade. I really like Valbuena. But I also understand we have to make roomfor Kris Bryant. I dunno. I like Chris Coglan too.

Can't see them trading Zimmerman.

<font color=goldenrod>Yeah probably not. I certainly think that Scherzer is an upgrade over Zimmermann but the net improvement for the team is marginal if they basically just replace Zimmermann with Scherzer.

So probably Fister gets moved. Or they dump off Roark somewhere. I didn't realize Roark was like 28 already, just assumed he was younger because he's only been in the big leagues for a short while.</font>

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" lang="en"><p>Have heard <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/orioles?src=hash">#orioles</a> pushing for bigger value with compensation from jays in exchange for not filing tampering charges</p>&mdash; Roch Kubatko (@masnRoch) <a href="https://twitter.com/masnRoch/status/558341779247083520">January 22, 2015</a></blockquote>
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Jays might have to give the Os Jeff Hoffman (2014 #9 pick #2 or 3 best prospect in Jays org) and Dalton Pompey (2010 pick OFer) for Dan Duquette if not more if they dont want tampering charges filed. Thats what tge Jays get for fucking around with a team owned by a former lawyer.

In the no-shit news file:

Pedro is going into the Hall of Fame as a Red Sox. He is the best there was and the best there ever will be.

Chatter going around the net is that the Brewers are close to getting Jonathan Papelbon from the Phillies. Only hiccup is that Papelbon wants his $13 mil. coming up for this season guaranteed in order to waive his partial no-trade clause.

Ichiro Suzuki goes to Miami. 1-year, $2 mil.

Orioles got a minor leaguer from the Braves for cash consideration and someone tweeted

http://thefightins.com/wp-content/up...sideration.gif

R.I.P Ernie Banks

I met Ernie Banks 7 years ago. Waited in line. He greeted everyone, including me like they were family. One of the best things I've ever had happen to me.

<font color=goldenrod>In his first official day as Commissioner, Rob Manfred has said that he will give strong consideration to banning defensive shifts.

Why not ban curveballs and sliders while we're at it?</font>

<font color=goldenrod>The idea would be to create more offense. Of course they'd be doing that by basically rewarding all of those lefty hitters who have no fucking clue how to hit the ball to the left side of the infield.</font>

smdh

Blue Jays just ended their attempts to land Dan Duquette. Toronto didn't want to give up Jeff Hoffman and 2 other prospects as compensation.

Nor should they have done so.

Both teams got some fence mending to do.

After all the crap, Blue Jays announce they're keeping CEO/President Paul Beeston around for the 2015 season.

<font color=goldenrod>Cuban shortstop Yoan Moncada has been cleared to sign with any MLB team. It's expected that he'll get a contract of at least $30 million, which would actually cost teams around $60 million because teams need to pay a 100% tax for every dollar they pay over their international signing pool.

In unsurprising news, even though loads of teams are interested in him it's expected to come down to the Yankees, Red Sox, or Dodgers.</font>

2 young and unproven guys up the middle in Gregorius & Moncada could be interesting....

According to Peter Gammons, Dodgers currently interested in getting both Yoan Moncada and Hector Olivera. James Shield as their backup plan if they lose out on Oliveria.


<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" lang="en"><p>Tigers announce DH Victor Martinez suffered a torn meniscus in his left knee and will undergo surgery. » <a href="http://t.co/V2FdzonXRb">http://t.co/V2FdzonXRb</a></p>&mdash; SportsCenter (@SportsCenter) <a href="https://twitter.com/SportsCenter/status/563417203970936833">February 5, 2015</a></blockquote>
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Won't know when his possible return will be until after the results from surgery.

Sounds like it won't be super serious but puts his Opening Day status in obvious jeopardy. Hope it's not 2012 all over again. They'll be stupid if they put him anywhere besides DH this year.

Also, may be going to Yankees' Opening Day... going to be in NY that weekend, trying to convince my (non-baseball-fan) buddy to go to the game. Will be super rad.