Follow the money. It's not everything but it's most of it. Players see the revenue produced by the game growing annually pre pandemic. They want the annual player salary to reflect that. Owners want to protect their growing portion of the pie, and point to the mega deals the best players continue to get. Players seem determined to try to find a structure better suited for every player, one that can only really happen if more money goes toward salaries. Owners would prefer to shift the amount of money that goes toward salaries around, but not grow it. Add into the mix that players, I think, feel they signed a bad collective bargaining agreement last time around and want to make up the ground they lost in this round. They seem more unified and more focused. They seem more like the owners.
Bullpen improvement is going to be at or near the top of the Cardinals' list once the business of baseball opens back up again. Mozeliak pointed to it after the Matz deal, even suggesting some type of swing man could still be on the shopping list. Expect relief moves. Names? Not sure.
I hear you. There seems to be this rush to disqualify Trevor Story as someone the Cardinals could and should be interested in on the right terms. If he goes to the Yankees on a long-term deal, sure. If he's open to taking shorter term or the market gets weird on him, that's a different story. I think he's a pretty good player.
Wait, I thought Mizzou's basketball season was already over? Kidding. Very good win for the Tigers, and a reminder that making sky-is-falling assumptions about a new-look team before January even arrives is usually risky business. I thought the Tigers looked more engaged and invested in defense, which they have to be if they are going to have a chance. They are not a good 3-point shooting team but they got some to fall, and you have to have that to have a chance, too. Kobe Brown seems to have realized he can be That Guy every night, and now he has to do it. Coleman has to keep shooting through this early-season slump. He made a high percentage of threes at Ball State. The distance to the basket and rim are the same in SEC. I just can't believe he will be this bad of a shooter all season. Most important, there is some promise showing in the youngest guys, like Kaleb Brown and the coming-on-strong Trevon Brazile, who I really like and Cuonzo can't play enough at this point. That's what you have to see from this down year. Some hard proof things are getting better and will be better next year.
Saban was smiling for a reason after the L, and I don't think it was retirement on his mind. That Alabama team was very young, and two of its most important playmakers were out. Tide will roll again, but now Georgia is officially an equal. Alabama of the East.
Of course. Three different SEC champs in the past three seasons. It just means more? Greg Sankey is happy, I imagine.
I agree with your point on Saban's process, but I don't connect the dots to the 12-team playoff being something that will work against that model. Saban's teams would have been just fine in the 12-team format. Expanding the bracket gives more team a chance. It raises the stakes for a bigger group. It works against the watering-down of the bowl games via opt-outs, because guys want to play for a championship. It would absolutely capture our interest, just like the NFL expanded playoff already has, and the NCAA basketball tournament does. What it doesn't do is stop the fact of cream rising to the top. It just gives more teams a chance to derail the powers, which is good and should make winning even sweeter for the teams that do. Just my two cents.
He didn't tell them to stop shooting threes, though. They attempted 24 and made nine in the win against Alabama. You can't not shoot threes in college basketball today and have a chance of winning. He's told certain players to stop leaning on threes and start getting to the basket, after seeing too many not be able to shoot them well enough. Coleman (four-of-11 on Saturday) specifically has to keep shooting them because it's why he's out there, and they desperately need him to make some to compete.
Fair concern. He did say that about the rotation, yep. But he did also mention the possibility of pursuing a swing-man type, too. That was back before the lockout. The Cardinals haven't said anything since it started. They made a very big deal about shuttering and not commenting on anything during this time. Matz will help the depth as long as he stays healthy. Last season the rotation looked strong until spring training started and the Cardinals did nothing to respond to injuries to Mikolas and Kim, and then were slow to react after Flaherty went down once games began. One way to avoid that happening again is of course better luck. Another would be to add more depth entering spring. Another would be to hope for the best entering spring but reacting sooner if something goes wrong there, and it usually does.
Indeed. Physical team and well-coached, whether you like Pitino or not. The Billikens just needed to play, and wound up getting a W against a team ranked higher than them in the NET. Good game. The A-10 is pretty much wide open.
Baseball is indeed trending toward becoming a more regional sport, but it's about as strong anywhere in the nation right here in STL. I don't think the Cardinals are going to be struggling for fans or STL area kids who want to grow up to be Cardinals.
The Rams won that one. They can buy the facility for $1 if they choose to in 2024. Or unless another deal gets worked out. There seems to be productive stuff going on there now through Lou Fusz Athletics, so hopefully a compromise can be made. Hard to bet on it knowing one side a little bit.
Check out how well that old conference is holding up. It just lost Texas and Oklahoma to the SEC. Have you ever watched Fixer Upper? It's better to have the cheap house in the nice neighborhood than the nice one in the block everyone is feeling. Tigers are in the rich neighborhood. Time for a lot of hard work and investment. It will be money better spent than paying an exit fee -- one that just went up recently -- to go to a less stable conference in what seems to be the most volatile era of college sports we have witnessed in a long time.
Andrew Knizner would be starting for a decent chunk of MLB teams. Not starting like Molina has for the Cardinals over the years, meaning every day no matter what usually, but that's not how the position works in most places these days. It's often a timeshare, and Knizner would be in that mix for a lot of teams. I think the Cardinals are OK handing him starts if something happens to Molina.
I like Travis, but he has to beat a ranked team or make a tournament run before that becomes a realistic threat. SLU is taking care of him in terms of contract and salary. Billikens are competitive. My take on his situation always has been he should stick around and make the program better and benefit as a result, and that's what he's done so far.
Transfers have been happening forever. Reminder: Travis Ford, subject of last answer, once transferred from Mizzou to Kentucky. I think Mizzou has been hurt much more by recruits it did not nab (EJ Liddell) than by transfers it lost. Depending on how next season plays out at quarterback, Connor Bazelak to Indiana could hurt the most. The QB played hurt this season, took his lumps and certainly looked like he needed to lose his job at times. But if he gets heathy and balls out for the Hoosiers, and the Tigers don't know who to take snaps, that would sting. The Wingo one hurts because he's exactly the kind of player you should not lose. He was a Drinkwitz recruit. He had a great season and made the SEC all-freshman team. He was set up to be a leader of the team moving forward. Those ones hurt. But, if he does indeed going to LSU, where his old high school coach Rob Steeples is now an assistant, and if that was the main reason it happened, I'm not sure what you are supposed to do to combat that, really. Gotta see if that is indeed the outcome. QB is the most important position on the field, though. Always. And Tigers lost a guy who started a bunch of games without a clear answer on who will be better there next season.
My biggest concern for football is Macon will see he can't beat cook out and transfer after spring ball. I did a lot of research on Horn and his baseball , he has a 93 mph fastball with a great off speed pitch. He plays for the number 1 traveling baseball team in Georgia.also listen to an interview he did on Nov. 4 2021 he said he likes football but his dream is to play pro baseball. So if he opts for baseball were does that leave us. I trust drink he knows a lot more than me. But with the receiving core we will have we must have a decent QB YOUR THOUGHTS