A year ago, on his way to becoming the Dodgers Minor League Pitcher of the Year, Gavin Stone went from Great Lakes – A Ball, to Tulsa – AA Ball, to OKC – AAA Ball.. all in one season and put up a 1.48 ERA and a 1.10 WHIP. He struck out 168 batters in 121 innings. He was on his way to the Show… or so it seemed. Meanwhile,…
8 W; 4 L; 2.95 ERA; 1.09 WHIP; 70 IP; 93 K’s – Not bad for an old man. Enjoy his last season as a Dodger – I hear he is seething, and it is his right! Has it ever occurred to anyone that maybe Clayton has figured out his back problem? I GUARANTEE that Andrew Friedman will not pay Ohtani anything close to $500 Million! Whoever gets him will…
Pitching changes, lineups, and strategy decisions are subjective… VERY subjective. Additionally, second guessers are seldom wrong. I rarely question tactical decisions because I know that there are frequently underlying reasons. I think I was dead on in what I said about Caleb Ferguson, and I think you will find out about it soon enough. The beat writers report what the team gives them; sometimes, they are told not to publish…
Of course, I knew that everyone inclined would blame Dave Roberts for the loss last night. Right or wrong – everyone has an opinion of him, just like everyone has or is an… well, never mind! I sat four rows in back of the Dodgers dugout and had hundreds of Dodger faithful in all their gear around me. In the first inning, after scoring three runs in the top of…
Predictably, the Dodger fandom is restless. By the time Spring Training started, many fans had pronounced the Dodger’s Off-Season as a colossal failure, and some even said that the Dodgers would not even make the playoffs. When that was proven false, the same fans are now clamoring for the Dodgers to make some epic, “gut-the-farm” trades. Trayce Thompson is on the IL, and his return is far from certain. He…
The greatest of all time. That question gets asked in sports so many times. And you ask any 10 fans who is the greatest, you will get 10 different answers. Younger fans usually base their answer on players they have seen. Older fans tend to stick to who was the best in the era they associate with. The stat geeks go to the stats, and then dissect everything and re-evaluate,…
The bad news is that the Dodgers lost to the Yankees, setting up today as the rubber match. The Good News is that last night was a “breakout” game for Michael Grove. In his best-pitched game so far in his young career, he was dominant… except for two bad pitches to the same hitter. Sometimes certain hitters just have a pitcher’s number. Groves’ mechanics were in sync and his release…
On June 15, 2016, Yordan Alvarez signed with the Los Angeles Dodgers as a scrawny, wide-eyed International Free Agent out of Cuba. He received a $2 Million Dollar Signing Bonus back in the days when guys like Hector Olivera (who was an adept hitter… of women) got $62.5 Million Dollar Deals. In his initial scouting report, it described him as “an athletic contact hitter who has shown some power.” What…
This is something new that I am going to try to stimulate conversation, but that only takes me a few minutes. Subject: Noah Syndergaard Ever since Noah (THOR) burst on the scene, he was a manacing physical specimen. He threw 200 MPH and was built like the Hulk. After he blew out his arm and need TJ, he can only throw about 93 MPH now. In his latest interview, which…
Tim Busch has been a practicing attorney in Orange County for the past 35 years and is the founder of The Busch Firm, which specializes in high net-worth estate planning, real estate and business transactions, tax, and Religious Organization representation. Tim is also founder and CEO of Pacific Hospitality Group, LLC a hotel development and management company that owns and manages eight hotels, including the Doubletree Hotel at Irvine Spectrum,…