[blogguy]

Thanks to everyone who's posted since the last time I popped in! I'll be back in a bit with a few more comments and ideas on how people can contribute within the frameworks of their own time constraints and what they're already doing.

For now...

*Yes Spraguer I'd LOVE to hear your thoughts about pitching and any ideas you have for stats we could monitor in this kind of format.

*Sooner, I agree completely that watching a lot is best. That's not always workable, as you mentioned yourself within your own schedule. We may be able to find a way to pool the ideas and knowledge here in a way that gives each of us 20 eyes or 40 eyes instead of just two. Think we're all on the same page about that.

*IK, good to hear from you again too. Maybe we can come up with ways to numerically define some of the things you like to watch for in a way that fits the format (control, toughness, pitch counts).

I'm also thinking of starting a non-pitching thread to get people's thoughts on team "directions." I've heard a lot of people I respect say things along the lines of "Baltimore may have given up...Atlanta isn't what they used to be...Florida is better than people realize..."etc over the course of the seaosn. I'd have to estimate that about 12 of the 15 or so were correct in advance. The teams that people watching the games "sensed" had lost some fire did in fact have losing skids right afterward....and teams about to ignite did in fact have winning surges. Not 100% of the time...but enough of the time that it mattered. And...with surges, you're talking about multiple winners for an upside...and stop-losses helping to tame the downside. So...12 of these that go something like 8-3 really add up when copmared to 3 errors that go 0-3 at worst (doing something until a team loses three in a row for example).

No...I'm not saying we'll all go 96-45 playing hunches...but I wouldn't be shocked if the record reallly was something like that going back and taking stock of what everyone said before things happened (Arizona's bad month was a big boost to that record, and may be an abnormal thing that won't be replicated any time soon.).

If we find that several different people here are feeling the same way about Baltimore, or Philadelphia, or somebody else fading away...while we have agreement from people on possible surges (I always look for Houston and Oakland to have strong second halves...doesn't mean it's going to happen again. Anaheim has had some good second halves too if I recall).

THIS WAS GOING TO BE A SHORT POST, lol.

Back later with more thoughts....looking forward to hearing more from everyone else too...blg