By Josh:

Saturday night I went to a minor league baseball game. It was a great night for baseball as the weather was great, the two teams were full of young talented professionals and there was even special guest Don Larsen (threw the only perfect game in World Series history) at the game. Yet the stadium felt empty.

This got me thinking about the same discussion that keeps coming up as to whether or not something is wrong with baseball and what needs to be done to fix it.  Sports writers question if the game is too long, if the season is too long, whether or not there is enough ‘star’ power, and a wide variety of other issues believed to be plaguing baseball.

Read the rest of Is Something Wrong With Baseball via 9 Inning Know It All

The Los Angeles Dodgers are one of Major League Baseball’s flagship franchises, going all the way back to when the team called Brooklyn, New York its home. For years, relying on flashy players and sometimes even flashier managers, they have traditionally been in the national spotlight. In particular, the 1977-78 teams were among the most entertaining and talented, and yet unfulfilled. Author Michael Fallon has dived in with a deep examination with Dodgerland: Decadent Los Angeles and the 1977-78 Dodgers (University of Nebraska Press, 2016).

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When the Arizona Diamondbacks signed Yasmany Tomas to a $60 Million dollar deal, many thought the Cuban “third-baseman” would be an instant star. Little is known about Cuban players when they come over; their skills are often exaggerated and their numbers on the Cuban National Series inflated. While some players, such as Yoenis Cespedes and Jose Abreu, do come over and become instant stars, others, such as Hector Olivera, simply don’t have what it takes to make it in the majors. For the better part of last year, Tomas seemed a lot closer to the bust category than major league stardom. That assessment seems destined to change soon.

Too quick and binary is our collective assessment of players. They’re either good or bad and we know within the first weeks of April. We care little about their story, or struggles to adapt. It’s the Twitter era; context and nuance is dead.

That is the story of Yasmany Tomas. The Diamondbacks miscast Tomas as a third baseman and the metrics hated him there. They probably knew he was not a third baseman, but there he was. Unable to help the team defensively, and struggling a bit in his first offensive season at the Major League level, Tomas got a label. He was a bust, just another of the missteps in a reign of terror  for a Diamondbacks front office that doesn’t even know the rules.

But that label loses all context.

To continue reading about the context that shows Yasmany Tomas may be on his way to stardom, please check out the full article at Off The Bench.