I was probably the most intense “trade Teixeira” person around here, and got harangued for it early on but feel like I’ve been proven right, both for the reasons Grant mentions (the Rangers offense has excelled since the trade) and the ridiculous return that JD got looks better every day (thanks Netfali Feliz…).

Frankly, I could’ve cared less about the comments he made but rather worried about his style of hitting. Teixeira was a streaky hitter while here, and while his end-of-year numbers always looked very nice, I couldn’t forget the fact that he would go into funks where he didn’t hit and didn’t look like he cared whether he hit or not. Whether coincident or not, the Rangers winning was very correlated to these waves – when Tex couldn’t hit well, the Rangers didn’t play well. Offensive numbers tend to correlate with the productivity of their #4 hitters…

My impression was that while Teixeira is a great hitter who I’d like to have on any team, he’s not reliable enough to be the linchpin of an offense. And the money that he would cost (~18-20 million/year) would preclude putting in other high quality batters to offset his variability. This was more an intuition rather than a rational perspective, but I’m glad that its worked out to be true…

how comfortable people are to call Adam out, behind the veil of another blog…
As must as I really like Murphy, and what he has done this year… I really have to agree with Adam, that he needs to start sitting more against LHP. I made a comment in a game thread not too long ago, that there needs to be a system in place, something like:
Play Murphy against 1 out of 3 LHP (just to get him some time against them, and to get some practice, and to show he can at the VERY LEAST, do something). Use Boggs to spell Murphy in those 2/3.
Play Boggs against 1out of 4 RHP (same logic, and you’re not losing much with Boggs being a switch hitter). Put him in for Murphy and other guys that need days off!

Hell, even I didn’t start Murphy on my very thin, AL-Only league on Friday.

Hes doing just what Salty did earlier this year. Forcing his way into the big leagues. Thats what you want from all your top prospects. Nothing handed to them. Have them earn it and he is doing just that.

Hey, if he struggles then when blalock comes back youve got a built in reason to send him down without a big “chris shelton is better than you” ego hit and he could get a better idea of what to work on while in AAA.

Shelton/Cat havnt inspired me lately.

There is a much higher percentage of trollish posters over there who never have anything nuanced to say about the front office or coaching staff.

for doing these shroom.

It’s always nice to see shroom’s minor league highlights.