0 comments by Joe Lucia on 2/18/2013
Baltimore Orioles pitcher Kevin Gausman, the fourth overall pick in the 2012 draft, has a bizarre ritual during games – he eats powdered donuts. Specifically, Gausman eats one donut before taking the mound, and four between each inning. Gausman's preferred brand of powdered donut was Hostess, and he was distraught when the company shut down […]
0 comments by Joe Lucia
Before fracturing his ankle in game one of the ALCS against the Tigers last October, Yankees shortstop Derek Jeter was told he had a stress fracture in his foot. Yankees GM Brian Cashman said that the team only knew about a bone bruise, and manager Joe Girardi agreed with that statement. But during a media […]
0 comments by Joe Lucia
Continuing from our season preview of the Miami Marlins earlier today… What should you expect from a very young Marlins rotation? Aside from Ricky Nolasco, this is a very inexperienced batch of pitchers. You've got Henderson Alvarez (251 career innings), Wade LeBlanc (362 career innings), Nate Eovaldi (154 career innings), and Jacob Turner (67 2/3 […]
0 comments by Joe Lucia
What else can baseball fans do in January but dream of October? In You May Say I'm a Dreamer, the Outside Corner staff will imagine the route to a World Series in 2013 title for all 30 teams. Jeffrey Loria's master plan has worked: the Miami Marlins are World Champions for the third time in […]
0 comments by Joe Lucia
Boston Red Sox reliever Alfredo Aceves is at it again. This time, Aceves starting lobbing pitches to the plate during batting practice instead of pitching the ball normally. Red Sox manager John Farrell wasn't pleased when talking about the situation afterwards. "The one thing I'll say about that is that he didn't go through the […]
0 comments by Joe Lucia
What do you get when your team goes hog wild in the free agent market, loses 93 games, and then proceeds to sell off all of those awesome free agents they spent a ton of money on the prior offseason? The 2013 Miami Marlins, of course. It's essentially Giancarlo Stanton and a bunch of others […]
0 comments by Joe Lucia
Our first week of previews is in the books, and we're moving on to week number two today. This week's featured division is the NL East, and we're going to kick things off today with the Miami Marlins. We'll be rolling out the usual schedule today with the Marlins, and I hope you all enjoy […]
0 comments by Joe Lucia on 2/17/2013
The 2012 rookie class across MLB was perhaps one of the best ever, highlighted by the Rookie of the Year winners in each league: Bryce Harper and Mike Trout. But past Harper and Trout, there were a lot of rookies who had great years. Seven rookies put together three win seasons, and an additional 15 […]
0 comments by Joe Lucia on 2/15/2013
The 2012 A's were filled with players that were x-factors. Did anyone think that Brandon Moss would stake a claim to the first base job and become one of the best sluggers in the league? Did anyone think that Josh Reddick, a guy who was a part-time player in Boston in 2011, would become one […]
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In the This Is My Nightmare series, we'll take a look at what the absolute worst case scenario for each team would be in 2013. Think of it as the negative complement to our You May Say I'm A Dreamer series that we'll be running during our preview series. After a miraculous 2012 season, lots […]
0 comments by Joe Lucia
Continuing from our season preview of the Athletics earlier today… Will the A's pitching staff be able to replicate their awesome 2012? In 2012, the A's pitching staff had a 3.50 ERA, the sixth best mark in baseball and second best mark in the American League. Four of their five starting pitchers (with Brandon McCarthy […]
0 comments by Joe Lucia
What else can baseball fans do in January but dream of October? In You May Say I'm a Dreamer, the Outside Corner staff will imagine the route to a World Series in 2013 title for all 30 teams. The knock on Billy Beane and his Oakland Athletics has always been "his crap doesn't work in […]
0 comments by Joe Lucia
The A's weren't expected to contend in 2012. After all, they had lost 88 games in 2011, and the team traded both of their 200 inning men (Gio Gonzalez and Trevor Cahill) and their closer (Andrew Bailey), while also seeing 2/3 of their starting outfield depart as free agents (Josh Willingham, David DeJesus). But then, […]
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We've reached the end of week one of our first week of season previews, and today is Athletics day here on TOC. Yesterday, we celebrated Rangers day, and here's a recap in case you missed it. Rangers on TOC End of Season Postmortem 2013 Season Preview You May Say I’m a Dreamer 2013 Burning Question […]
0 comments by Joe Lucia on 2/14/2013
The Rangers have their share of star players. Guys like Berkman, Kinsler, Beltre, Andrus, Cruz, and Darvish may not be household names on the level of Pujols and Verlander, but they're pretty close. Obviously, none of these guys can really be an x-factor, since everyone is focusing on them. What an x-factor is for a […]
