MLB - NEWS & NOTES

Diamondbacks acquire Jon Jay from Royals
The Diamondbacks acquired outfielder Jon Jay from the Royals in exchange for two minor league pitchers on Wednesday evening.

 

^^wow what a life. my company is threatening layoffs due to Transformation. The only co-worker I really talked to was her 12 yrs and her role got axed last week. now her boss didn't like her despite her rave employee reviews, but still. I can't imagine being with a company 6 decades. he play with some of the games greats and saw a ton of classic baseball in his life. sad day for the Cardinals family.

 

Shohei Ohtani placed on DL with a sprained UCL, will miss weeks

 

• BREAKING: Strasburg (shoulder) headed to DL
• Tanaka to DL with mild hamstring strains

 

DOH!

 

Albert Pujols passes Stan Musial for seventh on all-time RBI leaderboard
Angels DH Albert Pujols knocked in three runs on Sunday, taking sole possession of seventh place on baseball's all-time RBI leaderboard.

 

https://www.cbssports.com/mlb/news/...y-need-tommy-john-surgery-after-elbow-injury/

CBS fears Tommy John surgery now...

 

https://www.cbssports.com/mlb/news/...brawl-in-an-independent-league-baseball-game/

Mat Latos sparks ugly brawl in Indy league. The batter didn't charge the mound, his teammate did WWE style.

 

Major League Baseball attendance continues to fall. Gee, I wonder why?

The owners meetings wrapped up today and, while there wasn’t much in the way of actual decisions and high-level news to speak of, Eric Fisher of Sports Business Journal says that, according to Rob Manfred, attendance is down 7% this year compared to last year.

While earlier in the season some of this falloff could be chalked up to bad weather, the weather has improved but the attendance has not. Fisher says Manfred “signals [a] new concern that are other issues [are] at play besides rain/cold.”

There wasn’t much followup on that and I’ve not seen any reporting with expanded comments from Manfred on this score, but I don’t think we should really be surprised.

At present there are ten teams — one third of the league — with double digit deficits in divisional races. For most of them it was pretty obvious this would be the case well before the season began due to tanking or rebuilding or whatever you want to call it. Everyone expected them to be bad and they are bad, so why would people want to go see them? Major league front offices seem hellbent on cutting salaries and fielding quad-A teams, so they should probably expect minor league attendance too.

Meanwhile, ticket prices remain pretty dang high, even for the tanking teams. Indeed, heading into this year, total MLB attendance has fallen in five of the past six years, while ticket prices have held steady or have gone up. You don’t need a Masters in economics to understand that if your product is becoming less attractive and you’re losing customers, keeping your prices steady or even raising them is not going to bring you more customers.

I suspect Major League Baseball has chosen to ignore the realities of the supply-demand curve because, despite fewer customers, revenues have continued to rise. They’ve done so because MLB has worked hard to develop revenue streams that are independent of attendance alone. On one level this is good. Financial diversification is a good thing! But as MLB chases dollars from places other than ticket-purchasing fans — places such as corporate sponsorships and partnerships, which have exploded across the baseball landscape in recent years — they don’t have to be as attentive to the fans as they might otherwise be. And I don’t think they have been, again, based on ticket prices aimed at average fans, as opposed to wealthy fans.

Which, hey, if that’s what MLB wants to focus on, they can focus on it. It’s their business and the money seems to be pretty good these days.

Still, at some point you have to think about the future, do you not? To ask whether or not the kid who might get into a game on a cheap ticket today might not buy 100 tickets a few years down the road. To ask whether, to lure that kid in, more teams ought to try putting a respectable product on the field rather than make promises of better teams years down the line, when that kid may have moved on to other things. To ask whether, in the meantime, those ticket prices couldn’t be a little lower to make up for that inferior product and to deal with all of those other things which compete for would-be fans’ attention. To ask whether the concentration on revenues over getting butts in the seats might not hurt Major League Baseball more down the road than they seem to think it will. (pro hardball talk)

 

Matt Kemp, Robinson Chirinos each suspended for one game

Major League Baseball just announced that Matt Kemp of the Dodgers and Robinson Chirinos of the Rangers have each been suspended for one game as a result of their on-field altercation in the bottom of the third inning of Wednesday evening’s game at Dodger Stadium.

The dustup began when an errant throw brought Chirinos into the base line as Kemp was approaching home plate. Kemp attempted to barrel Chirinos over — he failed to dislodge the ball — and when Chirinos got up he shoved Kemp, Kemp shoved back and the benches cleared. Kemp would’ve been out either way for violating the rule protecting catchers from takeout slides.

Kemp has appealed his suspension and will be eligible to play against the Giants tonight. As of the moment Chirinos has not yet appealed his suspension, but if he does he’ll be able to play against the Rockies.

 

Astros extend winning streak to 11 games

The Astros rallied late to keep their winning streak alive, extending it to 11 games with a 7-4 victory over the Royals on Sunday afternoon. The club is now 48-25, leading the Mariners by a full game in the AL West.

The Royals took a 4-2 lead after three innings, but Brian McCann knocked in a run with a single in the top of the fourth to cut the deficit to one run. Carlos Correa hit a game-tying solo home run in the eighth. The Astros kept their foot on the gas, scoring two more runs on RBI singles from Evan Gattis and Marwin Gonzalez in the top of the eighth and another in the top of the ninth on Correa’s sacrifice fly.

Starter Lance McCullers allowed four runs (two earned) on six hits and two walks with nine strikeouts over six innings. Tony Sipp worked a scoreless seventh. Ken Giles did the same in the eighth. Hector Rondon finished off the win in the ninth, working around a one-out walk with a game-ending double play.

After winning all 10 games on their road trip against the Rangers, Athletics, and Royals, the Astros will head home for a nine-game homestand against the Rays, Royals, and Blue Jays. Each club is below .500. (NBC Sports)

 

Long time NL umpire Dutch Rennert has died

MLB.com reports that long time umpire Dutch Rennert has died at the age of 88.

Rennert retired as a National League umpire after the 1992 season, so a lot of you didn’t get a chance to see him. But believe me, if you got a chance to see him in action, you’d remember him. He had one of the most distinct strikeout calls in history. He’d go turn to the side, go down on one knee, point with purpose and bellow “STRIKE . . . ONNNNNNEEEEE!”

 

Pirates RP Steven Brault sings anthem at PNC Park last night...

 

https://www.cbssports.com/mlb/news/...-cannon-sends-phillies-fan-to-emergency-room/

hot dog from shooting hot dog gun hurts fan and sends her to the hospital. that thing was probably rock hard and she probably got punched in the eye by accident in the melee going for it. only in philly.

 

They will ban hot dogs now!!!

 

they better not. $1 dog nights is a huge hit with the college kids. they have several a season.

 

I was kidding.