Willie McGee is part of the 2018 St Louis Cardinals

not sure what other teams were covered under fox sports midwest, but it's now sinclair_gambling.jpg(tm)

...

Fox Sports Midwest (along with most other RSNs acquired by Sinclair) will be renamed some permutation of Bally Sports, thanks to a deal with gaming and casino giant Bally’s Corporation.

Sinclair President and CEO Chris Ripley promised more integration of sports betting into the broadcasts, in an effort to “gamify sports.” That may involve some new technology for viewers to place bets via the TV or app they are watching on. But even without some new technology, if betters are watching the game and placing bets on their mobile apps - and they are - if Bally’s can drive those fans to bet via their book rather than DraftKings or William Hill or someone else, that’s a money-maker.

The silver lining for Cardinals fans is that this deal aims to provide more options for you to watch the games. Ripley also announced a plan to offer a standalone subscription for RSNs in their given territories. In other words, you will be able to subscribe to just Bally Sports Midwest (or whatever it’s called). Ripley promised this was being developed aggressively and would launch next year, though it is not clear if that will happen before Opening Day.

My guess is this will come in the form of a Bally Sports Midwest App, likely available on all your mobile devices, AppleTV and Roku, etc. And yes, I would expect that while you are streaming the game on your Bally’s Sports Midwest App, you can get some action on the Jack Flaherty strikeout prop.

https://www.vivaelbirdos.com/2020/11/25/21718960/the-deal-between-ballys-and-sinclair-will-provide-more-ways-to-watch-cardinals-baseball
(stupid URL)

missed this, 6 years ago, but it's great:

https://www.sbnation.com/2014/5/15/5717272/sb-nation-reviews-willie-mcgee

...When he got to the plate, he looked like he had just been beaten by angry people with truncheons, a crouched, stiff figure who didn't swing a bat so much as he threw it at the ball hoping for something to happen. It was a half-swing, really, the kind you'd take if an old war injury had left you with half a shoulder joint and shards of depleted uranium in your knees. He leaned backward waiting for pitches like a 75 mile an hour gale was blowing in his face. He looked, in the words of his teammate John Morris, like he "was in a lot of pain, and having a miserable time."

That sounds bad, but it got worse. At one point, provided McGee threw the bat and it made contact with the ball, there was a point where Willie McGee, all pained face and salvage-grade joints, had to begin moving like a human. Once he turned and got over the shock of hitting the ball-- and no matter the situation, McGee always looked shocked he'd made contact -- McGee would lurch forward and begin running on the balls of his feet, always at a ridiculously pitched angle like he had an invisible drag chute bolted directly to his shoulder blades.

It looked fast in motion, but let's specify what kind of fast. There is the fast of a Usain Bolt, the kind of effortless, long-striding speed, and there is the bull-strong intimidation of a Lamborghini you get when someone with giant traps can also run a 4.4 second 40 yard dash. (Think Bo Jackson in his prime.) Then there is the kind of fast that terrifies you for all the wrong reasons, like when a toddler in a grocery cart gets loose and begins rolling downhill in a busy parking lot. That is the kind of speed Willie McGee had: something that once in motion begs for a merciful stop, and the immediate intervention of safety authorities.

You may like an athlete because they happen to be very good at what they do. You won't love them for this, though, or at least not without combining it with other variables that make them unique. There were players as good as Willie McGee, but none were as entertaining to watch based strictly on quirk and the apparent misery that every step caused him. That misery was only part of it, though. McGee chose the odd set of options in life in every facet of the game, a switch hitter who looked equally strange from either side of the plate, a superb center fielder prone to rare but grandiose mistakes in the field, and a man who could not take a baseball card portrait without looking like you had just:

a.) bought him the most adorable rabbit in all the world

b.) made it his only and best friend

c.) slaughtered this rabbit in front of his horrified eyes

d.) put a bat in his hand, and pointed him toward the DonRuss artist while tapping at your watch

It's easy to explain why you love a conventionally excellent player, but way, way more fun to try and explain the appeal of a top-flight athlete whose every step and twitch appeared to be bringing him dangerously close to death itself. You had this guy, St. Louis, and he was awesome and everything, but every time he hit a triple he'd pop up and have the saddest look on his face like everything he loved had died, and left him with the soul of an ancient, sad, and immortal Golem. It was like watching Buster Keaton play centerfield, and he was like that every time he played.

That’s great.

i've come to the conclusion that he is my third-favorite ballplayer of all time

the two ahead of him either shared my surname or gave me a childhood lesson in decency, and both played for my home team.

willie mcgee is just a guy who was really good at baseball, and completely took over game four of the 1982 world series, and fucking look at him. <3

Mookie Wilson and ???

lol

dave parker & willie stargell

I was close!

Wild guess:

Parker = surname
Stargell = decency

Obviously, Mookieproof’s real name is Cobra.

willie mcgee is 63 today <3

https://greatestondirt.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/07/willie-mcgee-1983-smiling.jpg

From Goldschmidt's Baseball Reference page:

Nicknames: Goldy or America's First Baseman

Really? Someone somewhere has actually called him "America's First Baseman"?

i called him that, but the full quote is "america's first basemen in being a moran"

Hes America's first basemen because he isn't allowed anywhere else

yadi is (allegedly) skipping 2 games to watch the puerto rican basketball team he owns play in the championship

yes, but during that time his knees will heal

lol

Goldschmidt just isn't letting up. His OPS+ after yesterday is 202; the only players this century to finish with an OPS+ over 200 are Bonds (4 times), Soto, and Sosa. I can't see a first baseman who did it since Bagwell (213) and Thomas (212) in '94. I expect he'll fall back, but what a season. (Judge is at 194 right now.)

also has a legit shot at the old-school triple crown; he's three homers behind schwarber and two RBI behind alonso

i haven't looked it up, but i suspect he might be having an all-time platoon split season, too. vs lefties this year, in 111 PAs he's .435/.527/.848, wrC+ is 276

Leading in the slash TC right now, too. Huge lead in slugging, comfortable lead in batting average; Soto will probably overtake him in OBP.

Should also mention Freddie Goldschmidt out on the coast: second in BA, third in OBP, sixth in SP.

Willie >>>>> pic.twitter.com/nqCIv6KHvV

— St. Louis Cardinals (@Cardinals) August 25, 2022

wainwright, whose best case scenario is making a heroic relief pitching appearance in the playoffs and then retiring. carlos martinez continues to be the best thing about the team.

i was so otm in 2018

Whoah--definitely making a run at the Triple Crown.

Goldman and Freeschmidt came up again on James' site yesterday, and one reader pointed out how similar Goldschmidt and Bagwell are (per 162 games):

PG: .296/.392/.529, 145 OPS+, 32 HR, 105 RBI, 5.9 bWAR, MVP pending?
JB: .297/.408/.540, 149 OPS+, 34 HR, 115 RBI, 6.0 bWAR, 1 MVP

But neither is on the other's Similarity Score list.

Arenado is going to wind up with his best bWAR this season. I’d say he and Goldschmidt are both locking down their HOF chances, though I guess Nolan could always do an Andruw Jones and nosedive before he clears the bar. I’m guessing that’s highly unlikely though.

yeah, he is a very competitive guy. i was reading a little blurb about the birth of his child the other day, and he was basically like "i'm just glad it went smooth and calm so i could get back to the team for the next game". he seems genuinely driven to win a WS (goldschmidt as well) and he seems pumped to get a decent chance to do it

He did win one back in 2006!

weather permitting, i'm going to tonight's game! i was originally planning on going tomorrow, figuring a sunday day game against the Cubs would be ideal. but then i noticed that Wainwright is pitching tonight, which means Yadi will be playing, and the Cubs are starting a LHP, Drew Smyley, which means Pujols will almost certainly start as well. might be my last chance to see any of those guys play again (unless I splurge for playoff tickets, if they get that far).

it's kind of an odd situation because i'm not sure if i'll be standing room only or have a seat somewhere. i was able to get tickets, just $11 for a pair, this morning through the First Pitch Program. Not sure if there's a similar deal at other parks, but basically you get a voucher, and then when you show up at game time they tell you where your seats are (or more likely for this game, standing room since it'll probably sell out).

$11 gets you a hot dog at the Rogers Centre.

That’s a great deal for last minute seats!
The jays are probably too popular to do something like that, but my gf would be all over it if they did.

That’s a great deal for last minute seats!

totally agree

i chatted with a few different people in the line about their experience with the program. one guy told me that he used to have season tickets and gave them up because so many of the voucher seats end up being so good. they come from unsold/unused tickets that were set aside for workers and players etc to give to their families - so they're a mix of the worst seats and also some really nice seats. because i'm an unforgivable weirdo, i asked him to give me a rough probability distribution. he told me that about ...he paused for a long time here to calculate...three out of ten were 100-level, meaning field level. another 3-4 out of ten in the mid-tier levels, and only 2-3 out of ten were nosebleed/standing room only.

for a game like tonight, with the cubs and the oldsters (who are my age) playing, the chances are very high that i'll get standing room only. but for an early season game against teams that are not the Cubs, Brewers, Yankees, or Red Sox, apparently the chances of getting a great seat are very good. For $5.50 a seat! the only catch is you have to live near Missouri, which is fucking terrible

it's extremely cheesy and i don't think i would participate irl, but i think it would be kind of neat if the fans started chanting MVP as goldschmidt bats, and then continue with no interruption to chant it with Arenado hitting after him

(i don't think Arenado has a chance of winning, and will probably end up more like 3rd or 4th or 5th. for those that don't get to see them play every day, amazing, superlative defense is hard to demonstrate with numbers in the same way that a triple crown level season does)

because i live in the world of regression to the mean, i never expected to see a mvp-like year from goldschmidt or arenado. it is very cool to see them do it in the same year, and to be equally as wrong about pujols

also, in the continued mea culpa that is my life, i was extremely wrong about wainwright. i wanted him to retire circa 2019. what a doof

I saw the play he made on that incredibly high chopper--amazing.

wait, hold that.

peninsula. penin.

hmm

sorry, wrong thread

If Goldschmidt doesn't get the Triple Crown, I hope it's because Freeman overtakes him in BA, rather than Schwarber winning HR--he's such a one-dimensional player.

dang, wish i would have gotten cheap-ass tickets for today's game, too! this is probably low on the list of notable career records, but wainwright and molina are tying the record for most starts as a battery. which is pretty cool. but also, alec burleson is making his debut in RF. probably not a household name, possibly DH bound, but he's a good hitter and will probably (hopefully) stick around for a while.

Not related to the Rooster, I'm sorry to say.

dang. i should gone. Burleson, it is clear to me from watching him track down (1) ball on the right-field line, is just too slow to be even an average fielder. he is a DH. bummer.

however, he took an easy 4-pitch walk in his first PA and then got to score on a Yadier Molina HR to Big Mac Land, which is what the upperdeck area is called on the LF line where McGwire once sent home runs with startling regularity. it is owned by mcdonalds

by bWAR, the cardinals have the top 3 position players in the NL

the outfield has been weird and catcher has been a black hole, but the infield production has been pretty phenomenal this year

Goldschmidt, arenado, and the best of them all albert pujols

https://i.imgur.com/nLexRNR.png

I was not expecting Wainwright to sing the national anthem

So wait the Cardinals have players named Hudson, Hicks, and Gorman

Not something I normally observe, but it turned up on my FB wall: 41 years ago today, the debut of a certain fleet-footed outfielder.

https://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/SLN/SLN198205100.shtml

getting ugly for waino : /