dc.

That was the worst football play I've ever seen. Literally ever. Not even close.

The scenarios for a three way tie for two playoff spots are weird and wild... And O's apparently already made a controversial choice to be the third team, meaning we only get one game to win or be out, but we get it at home... Other option was two games, but both on road. Blue Jays will get two games, if needed, but both at home. Let's just not make it come to that.

At the same time, being tied with the Jays who play Boston, means we also just have to play one game better than them... Makes me feel good.

Tricky thing... I assume that the Tigers are going to make up their rain out on Monday? Leaves a lot open. They either need to beat us by one game this weekend or two... Definitely would prefer two.

If Wade Miley could just start against the diamondbacks every game...

Impressive... But the trend has been that direction for the whole second half, playing sub 500 ball post break right now. And 20+ games over 500 at home to several under on the road. Just keeping my expectations in line...

Unfortunately, I think we are done. We stink on the road and end with 7 straight against teams that have had our number all season - Jays and Yanks. I could be wrong. Hope I'm wrong. But I just don't see enough wins there - only good news is the Tigers have the Indians in the same frame too.

Can I be a semantic pos for a moment and note that Flacco didn't exactly say this teams strategy is to make it close when it didn't have to be, but rather that surviving these games had some advantages for later? It's not my favorite logic or rationale, but it's still wildly different from saying "we keep games close on purpose." He was just trying to shine this turd a bit and look for something worth taking away from the game...

I don't disagree entirely, but it's also a hard call to make in the moment. Wiley has had good years and it's not DD scouting this alone. Gallardo stat-wise was a more than welcome addition to what we were looking at. Second-guessing is easy when the results don't pan out. Just like it's easy to say, "See, I told you we wouldn't win the WS!" ... as if there weren't already a 97% chance of that being true.

You're fine with that... now. When it was a season of maybes, you were less fine? It's not a bad thing. But separate of your own views, you can't claim DD would have walked out of the offseason looking like roses had he not made a move re: pitching. So what's a guy to do, try or not? Either way, fans hate him. Or hey, we could have signed JA Happ and gotten lucky?

On what play in that drive? On several he made great decisions. If Tom Brady pinpoints some of those throws it's not considered a bad decision or lucky...

Is that re: Miley or Gallardo? Either way, you say that now but it's not true... were this team pitching Tyler Wilson, Vance Worley, TJ Macfarland and Mike Wright every 5th start, we know what we get... and we know what you'd be posting. "Thanks, Duquette" ... for not making a move and leaving us with these bums/uncertainty. That's my only point. DD is damned if he does, damned if he doesn't... either he tries and fails and gets crap or he doesn't try and fails and gets crap. We're all armchair GMs/managers. I'm just done being one.

That's why they are pitching a 6 man rotation, even if two of the starts kill us...

I guess I'm still just wondering what you would have preferred. Most fans this past off season were wildly saying resign Davis or else, no matter the price. Most were also saying sign a pitcher, any pitcher, but season start. Gallardo was a pretty popular pick up among the general crowd crying for any kind of arm. Unless you can go back and highlight your distinct opposition to these things, what exactly are you looking for him to have done? What piece do you think this team should have that wouldn't have cost it another piece? Could have David Price at the cost of Davis but no one would have gone for that in January. I said Thanks after the Gausman outing in part because almost annually we here about how we could trade x or y to get z, and why not just do it! Gausmans name has been on that list before, but Dan refused to ever consider it. No credit for that?

Thanks, Duquette!

I'll find a spot for you, Spen. Same problem, the truth elixir isn't good for my work life...

I'd love to see more small ball than we see now, but I don't necessarily prefer that option overall. I want to be able to score runs in as many ways as possible. Small ball sounds great, but it also has huge issues. KCs small ball philosophy isn't doing its job this year all the sudden... What happened? And neither solves pitching issues.

One game out of first, one game up on Detroit. Big series upcoming against Detroit, two against Boston, but some nice spells against rays and diamondbacks.

Just wish someone would tell me what Duquette should have done... Aside from generic "sign better pitchers" Maybe problem is largely coaching them?

You know, despite how bad this teams pitching is... I give us a better than 50/50 shot if having the AL Cy Young at season's end. That would be pretty wild.

Good thing Comcast now owns NBC, universal and more!

Wilson was never supposed to be legit. Period. Tillman-Bundy-Gausman is a fine first three. My problem with the assertions in this thread: how easy is it to find a good starter? Harder than we think. Last year we could have paid an arm and a leg for David Price. Or maybe Greinke. I would have loved to have either, but I am not sure at their prices. It would mean a 1-for-1 trade for Davis, really, which looking back right now may have been the wrong move but at the time - especially with unknowns from Trumbo and Kim among others - that would have had the whole world yelling that we don't care about our guys, etc. Paying for either them may well have also cost us the ability to pay for Machado - which is obviously still less than likely right now. We need to develop better pitching, but I don't see buying it as the best option. Despite all the nay-saying, we're still only 2 games out, more than 10 games over 500, still in the playoffs right now as a WC... and really, our worst moments have consistently come on the west coast. Let's just avoid Seattle and all is good.

Ellicott City isn't as bad as NO in this respect. Much of the problem in Ellicott City was engineering that was limited by the historic nature of the area - lots of development, but insufficient changes in infrastructure to support. That can be changed and likely will be at this point. The problem in that regard is far less intractable than the issues in New Orleans. Really, every region - including Towson - have areas that become more prone to these issues over time. The strategy isn't to abandon but adjust.

Sorry - I just went and (tried to) read the report that is being used as the basis of this interview and it is far from convincing or even especially compelling. The conclusions jumped to at various points also defy basic logic. As a starting point, they continually use names like "large precincts and small precincts" but never get into numbers. So, I went to the link they provide to look up the Louisiana primary results for Clinton and Sanders. I didn't look at every precinct, but I looked at many. East Baton Rouge and Orleans as parishes both have more than 45,000 democrats that voted in March. Most parishes had between 1,000 and 2,000 voters. I found several below 1,000 voters. So when the report says this "violates the law of large numbers" because "each district would have to be so big as to outweigh all of the others" ... well, that actually is the case. Baton Rouge and Orelans combined might just outweigh the rest of the damn state. Cameron Parish had under 400 democrats vote and split almost evenly between Clinton and Sanders - nine votes separated them, yes, 9 - but that on the graph in this report shows up as 3% towards Sanders. In East Baton Rouge, Clinton won by 25,000 votes and that translated to a 78-17% win. But whatever.

Heard Sox want five major prospects. We're not going near that. And add the club house questions from above... Nah.