RCL Blog

We have come to the end of this blog’s journey and I just want to thank anyone who has taken the time to read these short form essays and content. I truly enjoy exploring both current events and the political landscape and being able to share my love of baseball with the world.

Today we are going to wrap things up with a little MLB season preview. Most of this will just be my thoughts on the teams, divisions, and players to watch out for this year.

AL East: This is the division to watch out for this year. There are four potential playoff teams in the Yankees, Orioles, Blue Jays, and Rays. The Red Sox could be a decent ball club as well. The Orioles were the kings last year and I wouldn’t doubt that they continue their reign with Jackson Holliday being called up sometime this year. Watch out for Corbin Burnes as the Orioles swung a huge deal to get him and Gunnar Henderson should continue to mash. My pick, however, will be the Yankees. The addition of Juan Soto is disgusting, having that lefty bat in a ballpark with a short right field porch is the recipe for success. I think a lot of their young guys will take steps forward, but it will come down to the pitching.

AL Central: My home division. I expect this division to be pretty weak this year with the White Sox being one of the worst teams in baseball. The Tigers and Royals may surprise some people and become playoff level teams. Most people have been liking the Tigers, but I like the Royals roster more. The Twins will have a shot at keeping their division crown, but don’t count out the Guardians who’s youth and pitching should be competitive and feisty.

AL West: This is a division I expect to take a step back. I don’t think Houston will be as good as years past, as they just don’t have the pitching. The Angels and Athletics will both be brutal teams to watch. The Mariners pitching staff is elite, but I don’t know if they did enough offensively to make a difference. I think the Rangers take the crown once again behind a dominant offense and some sneaky pitching.

NL East: This division has two monster teams: the Braves and the Phillies. Both will be in the playoffs and make runs, but I think the Braves win the division, they have just too much talent and the Phillies don’t have the pitching depth. I think the Mets might be decent, most people wrote them off after last year, but they should hang around. The Nationals will be a fun team to watch, but they are a year away. The Marlins lack a lot of talent and got worse, but have some decent pitching.

NL Central: This division will be fun. These teams might not win the most games in the world, but every team should be competitive. The Brewers offense got much better and they always figure out pitching. The Reds got older after a stellar year last year. The Pirates may have some elite arms coming up from the minors. The Cubs made great free agent signings and the Cardinals still have a lot of talent. I think ultimately the Brewers will have a decent shot, but I think the Cubs might be a sneaky team to capture the division.

NL West: The Dodgers will win the division. They took one of the best teams in baseball and added a generational talent to it in Ohtani. The Diamondbacks got better and should make another deep playoff run. The Giants will be decent, but I think the Padres will be slightly better just with their top level talent. The Rockies will bring up the rear as one of the worst teams in baseball.

Scott Boras is the biggest agent in MLB. He represents all the biggest stars and rightly so, as he gets them huge paydays. He is accustomed to getting his clients 10+ year deals worth typically close to $300 million, but this offseason was a different story.

First, this free agency class was weaker. Outside of Shohei Ohtani, who is not represented by Boras, this class lacked true superstar talent. Still, Boras held the four biggest names of a class in Cody Bellinger, Jordan Montgomery, Blake Snell, and Matt Chapman. The reason I am righting about this today is because of the Cody Bellinger and Matt Chapman signings by the Cubs and Giants respectively. These deals were not the large contracts these players expected, rather they both received “prove it” deals and waited until the last moment to sign. The other two members of the Boras Four have yet to sign but are expected to before the start of the season.

This winter, Boras held MLB fans hostage throughout the free agency process. It was a slow offseason as Boras pitted team against team trying to get the best deals for his clients. They could never get a team to commit as much as they wanted so they settled for short term, large money deals. Many fans are fearing this is the future of baseball, as players become mercenaries for teams rather than committing to one long term without a massive payday. Boras holds the best players, so thus this could be a major problem.

I don’t think short term deals will become the norm. I think this offseason was a warning to Boras about how high clubs are willing to go. Next offseason, the class is loaded and Boras controls basically all the big names. Could Boras hold out for massive deals and then take short term, high value contracts, clearly yes. But I think that the players want security and comfort when they go to the ballpark, they don’t want to be playing for that next contract their whole lives. A couple million dollars a year doesn’t make the largest difference in the world to baseball players, but losing out on the huge contract for their skills by getting injured or slumping during a short term high money deal does. I think this coming offseason will be the first one where players may be pushing against their agent in order to get the deal that sets them up for life.

I think this is much better for the fan. When you buy a jersey of your team’s superstar, you want him to stay and long term deals provide that. Most long term deals in the past end up as an overplay in the back half of players’ careers where they aren’t the talent they once were, but by then they will have become a franchise icon and hopefully captivated the fanbase by taking a little less money to join the club. Also it frees up more teams to be able to sign big free agents. Small market teams can’t compete with the big market teams for free agents, thus causing all the free agents to be packed onto a few teams. With higher years and lower dollar amounts, baseball would become more even throughout the whole season and keep every team competitive.

I’m going to take a different route with this blog and talk about the common thought that the United States is the World’s Police Force and what it means for our country. Ever since I was young, the United States has been involved in some peace keeping situation, whether its conflict or just military presence, and this past year has reminded me of how we truly are the World’s Police after a period of peace.

We grew up in the post 9/11 world where the United States had a large presence in the Middle East and was often in wars or unofficial wars. It was just the way the world was, we thought nothing of it. Warfare became different and vastly easier with the advent of drone technology. Drones became one of the main methods of war in the Middle East, and thus American citizens could come to terms with constant war even after killing Bin Landen.

The United States was fighting for the world during this period. We were protecting the world from the spread of terrorism and kept oil flowing to the rest of the world. I was always taught about how we became the World’s Police in World War II, but I never understood it until actually seeing it in action. Although someone has to be this police force, there is plenty of area for critiquing the actions of the United States.

I want to pause for a second and talk about the killing of Bin Landen and its news announcement. That night was one of the greatest shows of American unity and patriotism ever. Baseball stadiums erupted in USA chants, iconic figures paused performances to give the news, and fireworks were set off all across the country. I just think this was one of the greatest shows of American unity any young individual could have seen

The Middle East operations went on a little too long. After Bin Landen was killed, each one of our proxy governments failed and contributed further to the spiral of the Middle East into a power vacuum which can still be felt today. There truly has not been a stable source of power and peace in the Middle East since the fall of the Ottoman Empire. This has led to the current situation in Gaza. The Middle East had become too reliant on the common enemy of the United States and now in our wake, Israel has taken the blows as our ally. America itself has been caught in a rough situation amongst its citizens. Unlike World War I and World War II, the American citizens don’t have a defined enemy. Not everyone supports who our government supports and thus if it were to come to war, I have no idea how our citizens would react. Thus, we see one of the flaws of being the police force and having to keep peace while keeping allies happy.

The biggest area of this police force is in Ukraine. In 2014, the United States began to take interest in Ukraine during the invasion of Crimea. We acted as a police force during that invasion and we do during this current one. Americans see the value in peace, yet they do not see the value in being the police force and are often upset with what our government does during these periods, yet someone must keep peace on the globe.

One of the largest current issues facing our country is the issue of the boarder crisis. This is a complex issue and one that will most likely never fully be solved. Over the past years and presidencies, there have been many attempts at legislation, but there have been far more periods of accusation of wrongdoings. Thus, we are presented with arguably the most politically charged topic right now: illegal immigration.

Currently, immigrants have been streaming across the boarder illegally and being moved to sanctuary cities around the country. There has been mass busing among other strategies. This is all in the wake of the complete removal of the immigration band from the Southern boarder imposed during the Covid-19 pandemic and kept in place for a period to slow immigration. Upon its removal, the flood gates opened. The boarder is seeing almost 200,000 encounters each month. This mass influx has caused strain on major cities, most of which consider themselves sanctuary cities. The Federal government has taken a new approach to taking care of those who arrive illegally: pawning them off to cities.

There has been fear that cities won’t be able to afford the current year’s budget because of how much they are being required to attribute to the migrants in their cities. The social safety net that we have put in place has failed, but yet it brings us to the seriousness of the question: should our citizens have to pay more and give up benefits to help those in need?

This is one of the hardest questions any society has ever had to face, and one can easily see the answer is not clear. Our citizens are the ones that our government was built to serve. We the people are truly the government and have built the government to better serve us. Taxpayers pay a lot in taxes to the government throughout their lives and see the benefits in the services they use and in their eventual elderly years with Social Security and Medicare. The role of government in society is to provide basic necessities and infrastructure for individuals who supply them with money. Thus, we have come to heavily rely on government and have seen its shortcomings in many areas.

The financial side of things is one area, but the more emotional side is that of the humanitarian. At the end of the day, we are all human. No matter where we are from or what language we speak, we are all human. Thus, we have to serve each other and take care of those less fortunate then us because that could very well be us and for the simple fact that they have the same value and worth as we do. Thus, we are called take care of illegal migrants and supply them with the basic necessities, but this uses taxpayer dollars on non-taxpayers.

It’s a tricky dynamic and one that will not be solved for quite some time. The major issue is that it has become politically charged. Each side of the isle wants to address it their own way and get the credit for doing so, thus we are delaying the issue currently until the Presidential election so it can be debated and the victor can claim his spoils.

In this piece, we will be discussing Donald Trump’s recent comments about China in regards of a potential tariff implemented by his administration. Trump said that he plans to implement a 60 percent tariff.

First, let’s discuss what a tariff is for anyone who might not know. A tariff is a tax or duty on imports from a specific country. Typically, tariffs are kept low and frequent trading partners have treaties that prevent tariffs from being implemented on each other. The idea behind a tariff is to spur economic activity at home. It allows prices to even out and hopefully create a more advantageous price at home rather than overseas. In the current trading climate, East Asia is able to product things from extremely cheap and thus when Trump was first in office he implemented a tariff that ranged from 15 to 25 percent based on the product. This created a trade war in the eyes of the public, but if you take a look at the actual manufacturing side of things, the tariffs were helpful in spurring economic activity and increasing the number of purchases that were with domestic dealers.

A 60 percent tariff would be unheard of, especially when it’s across most products. Thus most people are scared of a trade war, once again, especially given the current economic state of the world. However, taking things from a manufacturing perspective, a tariff would be great, but 60 percent is extremely high. A tariff would help bring prices to a fair level, currently big distributors are able to get materials for extremely cheap from foreign countries, even countries associated with Russia. Home industry would actually benefit fully and there would be an increase in production in the United States. An increase in production, leads to higher wages and more hours of work, which then this money in injected back into the American economy allowing all to benefit.

The other area of benefit would be in the Federal debt. A tariff is a tax, and thus when it is collected the funds are used as money for the government. This high of a tariff on one of our biggest trading partners would allow the Federal government to collect more tax revenue, not to mention all the additional revenue from growth at home. The tariff could also bring China to the bargaining table. China holds a lot of US Treasury Bills, but is massively in debt most to itself and to the United States. The countries could figure out a way to solve the debt crisis and allow for a full utilization of the Chinese economy rather than its current collapse.

This brings me to my final point, China is in a rough economic state. The United States has faired without China in the recent past and allowed for more economic prosperity at home, so why not deal the death blow to their current communist regime. By eliminating a government that wants nothing more than the end of the United States and to be the sole power, hopefully a democratic government could be implemented and China could become a place where freedom is paramount and contributes to the world.

This Friday marked the start of the 2024 College Baseball season. This is an exciting day for all baseball fans, as there is now actual baseball to watch and the MLB season is right around the corner. We will highlight some of the weekend’s series and performances.

Penn State: Starting off at home with Penn State, we were in Cary, North Carolina to play both Monmouth and Army. Cary is where the Division 2 baseball championship occurs and is considered a beautiful sight. The collegian USA baseball team also practices in these facilities. Penn State started the weekend off with two straight wins, before dropping a game to Monmouth on Saturday. Penn State bounced back with a win over Army on Sunday. Cooper Ryan went 5-8 with 11 RBIs to lead the way this weekend. Tayven Kelly went deep twice for Penn State. The pitching staff was shut down all weekend, except for the hiccup against Monmouth. Next weekend, Penn State will travel out to beautiful Stanford, California to take on the juggernaut that is Stanford baseball.

Arkansas: Arkansas is one of the best teams in all of college baseball. They are currently ranked number three and played James Madison in a four game series that will wrap up Monday. Arkansas got a scare in its first game, almost losing to the Dukes. They turned it around Saturday for a run rule victory, but they dropped their game on Sunday which is disappointing. Hudson White had four extra base hits and Kendall Diggs had three doubles. Hagen Smith, the Hogs best pitcher and one of the best pitchers in all of college baseball, got off to a rough start and was pulled after the first inning allowing three runs. We will see if this flamethrower can turn it around in his next start.

Duke: The Blue Devils had an Opening Weekend to remember. They dominated every team they played, as they played Indiana, George Mason, and Coastal Carolina. Indiana is a top Big Ten team while Coastal is one of the best teams in college baseball. Duke hit the lights out of the ball, scoring 34 runs this weekend. Freshman AJ Garcia hit three home runs in one game while Duke hit 14 the whole weekend. Jonathan Santucci had a great start, going 5 shutout innings. Duke will play Liberty in a midweek game and then face Northwestern next weekend.

TCU: The Horn Frogs are the fifth ranked team in college baseball. They played a very good Florida Gulf Coast University in a three game series. On Friday, they walked off the Eagles for their first win. TCU looked better and better in each game with this series being a runs fest. Karson Bowen had six RBIs and Chase Brunson had six hits, two of which were home runs. Zachary Cawyer was a stud out of the bullpen, recording two wins and pitching 4.2 innings and punching out six hitters. TCU will play a midweek game against Texas State which is always a dangerous team, but the bigger test comes this weekend with UCLA coming to town.

Today we will be discussing the recent interview of Russian President Valdimir Putin by independent journalist Tucker Carlson. This is not directly a United States’ foreign policy point, but this interview has massive impact on our foreign policy and the perception of the United States throughout the world, so thus I feel it is important to discuss at least at some length about this interview.

Russia has in effect been cut off from the world since February 24, 2022, if not slightly earlier. On this day, Russia invaded Ukraine in an attempt to take the territory as its own. The Westernized world responded by cutting economic ties with Russia and placing massive tariffs on the country’s main exports, primarily oil. This placed Russia and Putin in a weird spot. Russia has always been viewed as not a truly modern nation and a nation resisting Westernization. This is primary due to the Cold War, the effects of socialism on the country and its population, and the lack of a true democracy. Yet, when Putin decided to invade Ukraine, the western world fully cut off Russia from the economic trading system.

The war has still raged on despite the economic sanctions placed on Russia. Russia has found suitable trading partners in both India and China in order to keep its economy moving and its war efforts churning. Over the past year, neither Russian nor Ukraine have made any advancements on territory, in essence depicting a standstill. Despite this standstill, the United States has still been funding the Ukrainian war effort with billions of dollars. These dollars are not truly being used on the war effort due to the standstill. If one looks at the actual resolutions that have been passed for funding in Ukraine, they find that most of this funding is keeping the Ukrainian economy alive, paying small business owners, and paying for the salaries and protection of Ukrainian leaders. Thus the American people have become upset, they feel like their tax dollars are being spent improperly and that the federal debt is growing for no good reason.

This is where the Tucker Carlson interview comes in. Putin timed the interview perfectly with legislation for more funding in Congress on the table and the perspective of the American public shifting towards a reduction in the funding for Ukraine. I have not yet watched the entire interview, but I have watched a good chunk of it out of curiosity of what a foreign leader of one of the most powerful countries on Earth thinks of the United States. I am not a fan of Putin in any way, especially because of the loss of life in Ukraine in his war efforts both in the mainland and Crimea and Putin’s fake democracy in which he controls every aspect. Yet, I was amazed by his knowledge in the interview, he knows the history of Russia better than any scholar could or honestly better than most American scholars know the history of the United States. Putin also exposed some of the elements that make him a questionable human being when being directly asked about talking to President Biden or about journalist Evan Gershkovich and his unjust imprisonment. But he also displayed elements of a deep understanding of the United States’ problems, he throughly explained the boarder issue, the issue of the federal debt level, and the modern use of the dollar as a weapon in diplomacy by the political leaders of the United States. He also exhibited confidence and a feeling like his country was better suited for the future than the United States.

Overall, I think this interview does little to change anyone’s mind either way about the issue in the United States. I do think, however, that some political leaders will realize the depth of knowledge and excitement that a foreign leader has about our problems here and do something about it. I think that Putin made himself look extremely smart, mentally sharp, and exuded a confidence about his position. This puts the United States in an interesting situation and my primary hope is that something is done to address the primary problems that Putin was so easily able to pick out.

My Civic Issue Blog will be about United States’ foreign policy. I will be looking at both current, present day situations and past examples and perceptions of who the United States is in the world. I grew up loving politics, history, and proud of our country, so these will be values and experiences that I will include in my commentary.

Today, we will be looking at the recent tensions between the United States and Iran. Last weekend, a military group backed by Iran launched a drone strike at a US military outpost. This strike killed three and injured over 40 others. When I first heard this news, it was shocking. It had been a decent bit since I had heard of any number of United States soldiers being killed by an enemy. The United States and the Biden administration planned out a retaliation attack throughout the week, and it was successfully carried out on Friday, 2/2. This attack struck 85 targets with no report yet on causalities. We continued our response Saturday, 2/3, attacking 36 Houthi targets in Yemen with the aid of the United Kingdom. In both these cases, the attacks were done with bombs, missiles, drone strikes.

Due to the Israel Palestine conflict, the United States had brought in some forces to protect its interests in Israel and also to prevent these Islamic groups from joining in the conflict and spurring something bigger. Instead of joining the conflict, these Islamic groups have decided to make attacks directly on US forces and our allies interests. Houthi has attacked various British interests, thus leading the United Kingdom to join in the United States’ retaliation.

I think that we are in a difficult spot in the Middle East. The area itself isn’t controlled by the governments in power, but rather by militias and military groups which the United States would identify as terrorist groups. To be frank, the Middle East hasn’t been at peace since the Ottoman Empire. Legislating in the area is almost impossible due to the rivalry between Sunnis and Shias within the Islamic religion. Due to the vast amount of wealth and natural resources in the area, large countries have to pay attention to and be involved in the area.

We always protect our allies, but when our soldiers get hurt in a conflict we truly don’t have to be in, there is always questioning of decisions. I think that due to the attacks and loss of life, the United States needed to retaliate in some way and prove that it wasn’t just going to stand by and take a slap to the face. But at the same time, there is a grave risk of this conflict spreading, as we have already see it do so just within the Middle East. Luckily, no other powerful foreign adversary has “joined” in support of the various terrorist groups at this moment. If one does, the conflict is sure to change. My personal biggest fear comes from within our own boarders. Our country is divided on who the enemy is in the original conflict between Israel and Palestine, and I think even members of our government are. In all other conflicts, it has been a clear enemy, and thus I am extremely concerned if this conflict escalates which side the United States would end up on and who our citizens would support and thus how committed they would be to the fight and to the United States.

Switching up from our last discussion, the Top 100 MLB Prospect List was released this week. I am going to cover some of the best prospects on this list and discuss what their future may hold.

One additional metric that will be used in today’s discussion are “tools.” These include: hit, power, run, arm, and field. These tools are graded 20-80 with 80 being unbelievable and 50 being an average baseball player. The best way to understand the grading aspect goes as 80 being generational, 70 being superstar level, 60 being all star level, and 50 being major league level. Everything else is subpar.

Another note: The Minor Leagues (where these guys play) are structured as follows: Rookie Ball, Low A, High A, AA, AAA. AAA is the highest level before MLB.

Jackson Holliday, SS, Baltimore Orioles

Holliday was ranked number 1 on this list and for good reason. I agree that he is the best prospect in baseball and will have an extremely bright future. Holliday’s father played in the majors, most notability for the Rockies and the Cardinals. His dad was always known for his bat, but Jackson’s hitting ability might be even better. Holliday swings it smoothly from the left side, with a 70 grade hit tool and a 60 grade power tool. He has a 70 grade overall and slashed .323/.442/.499 for a .941 OPS. All these great tools and I haven’t even mentioned the most absurd part of Holliday: his age. He is merely 20 years old and got drafted out of college. To potentially be playing Major League Baseball just after turning 20 is unheard of.

Wyatt Langford, OF, Texas Rangers

 

We are moving down the list a little bit here, dropping to number 6, but I have to talk about the absurdity that is Wyatt Langford. At only 22, he went from being the best pure hitter in college baseball to dominating the minors. He started midway through the summer of 2023 in Low A and worked all the way up to AAA by the end of the season. There is a very real chance we see him make the Opening Day roster, and it’s all but a guarantee he will play in the majors this year. He has a 70 grade power tool and slashed a ridiculous .360/.480/.667, good for a 1.157 OPS, not to mention 10 HRs in 44 games.

Ethan Salas, C, San Diego Padres

Continuing down the list to the number 8 prospect in all of baseball: Ethan Salas. Could you imagine being a junior in high school and playing AA baseball, well that’s what Salas is doing. He’s not just playing baseball though, he’s utterly dominating it. He plays the most grueling position on the field defensively at catcher while posting a .752 OPS during his 16 year old season. Salas will enter this next season at 17 and don’t be surprised if the Padres consider bringing him up for a short big league stint at the end of the year, but in my opinion its more likely that he is a 2025 guy, just because of his age and the difficult position he plays. It also doesn’t help that he is blocked by another longtime top prospect in the Padres organization with Luis Campusano.

I will be focusing on MLB and college baseball this semester in my Passion Blog. I will most likely be moving this to its own webpage in the near future. I thought there would be no better way to kick off my Passion Blog than addressing the intersection of the two areas I am focusing on: the MLB Draft. My very own Cleveland Guardians hold the number one pick via the draft lottery, so I figured I would look at what players we potentially could select.

Quickly, I am going to address some common terminology for our non-baseball readers. A slash line consists of batting average, on base percentage, and slugging percentage. Batting average is how many hits a player got divided by their at bats (or times hitting for simple terms that a player does not walk, get hit by a pitch, or sacrifice). On base percentage is like batting average but it includes walks (BB) and hit by pitches (HBP) and it’s divided by plate appearances (all times a player comes to the plate). Slugging percentage is the number of extra base hits a player hit over their total hits. OPS is on base plus slugging, anything above .700 is good and 1.000 (or one dotting) is amazing. Besides that it will mostly be counting stats like home runs (HRs) or runs batted in (RBIs). Home runs are self explanatory, but runs batted in are how many times a player who is batting hits his teammate across home plate.

Nick Kurtz, 1B, Wake Forest

Kurtz is a big power bat. He has been on draft radars since he broke out in his Freshman year slashing .338/.471/.637. A 1.108 OPS as a Freshman is unheard of. He hit 15 HRs that year and showed serviceable defense at first base. His Sophomore season was even better slashing .349/.525/.758, good for a 1.283 OPS. Not to mention he hit 22 HRs and had 64 RBIs. He also walked 62 times compared to 49 strikeouts. He was a Golden Spikes semifinalist (the Heisman of college baseball). Kurtz will be leading the number one team in college baseball this year and is the favorite to win the Golden Spikes. He is about the best a true bat can be.

However, keeping in mind my Guardians, I don’t think he is the pick. We have a great first base prospect that should be debuting this year who does essentially the same thing. Will it hurt to pass up on a generational bat at a position we have struggled to find power, one hundred percent yes, but it needs to be done.

 

Travis Bazzana, 2B, Oregon State

Bazzana is an Australian native who grew up playing both baseball and cricket. His swing is majestic. He exhibits great power compared to MLB second basemen. He slashed .374/.500/.622, good for a 1.122 OPS. That batting average is no joke, especially paired with 11 HRs, 55 RBIs, and 59 BBs. He is a class act and his defense is outstanding. He also showcased elite speed with 36 stolen bases. Bazzana will be leading the number seven team in the country and is a true threat for the Golden Spikes Award.

I love the player Bazzana is. He fits perfectly with what the Guardians typically target, I just think he is even better. I may be biased because I love Oregon State baseball, but this kid is the real deal.

I unfortunately am running out of room to write so I will continue this, hopefully, in my next blog post.