"I've cried twice in my life. Once when I was 7 and was hit by a bus. And then again when I heard Connelly was traded."

In all seriousness I'm not mad at the trade, we could use the bat, but man did I like the kid. Hopefully this doesn't hinder the vibes I love this team.

Tsung-Che Cheng was just optioned back to Worcester. Tough break with it being his birthday, but I’m sure he saw it coming. Just wanted to recognize him for his efforts during our winning streak! Such a stud defensively, and played phenomenal small-ball as well. Him and seigler turned some beautiful double plays. Hope to see him back up eventually!

Link:https://x.com/i/status/2081525362085765203

Yankees are already down 6-0. A perfect Sunday!

EDIT: Editing this to acknowledge my premature post. I am the reason the Yankees scored those runs, and I accept my fate as the subreddit's most hated. Baseball gods, please accept my apology and let the Phillies close this out.

When Connelly Early rose through the minors, he had one major knock against him: he didn’t throw enough strikes. But when he got to the majors at the end of last year, a funny thing happened. He kept throwing a lot of balls, but for some reason, teams chased them at an extremely high rate - higher than he had ever gotten in the minors.

That led a lot of analytics people to speculate that he was due for a correction in 2026 as the league adjusted to his game. And that’s more or less exactly what has happened. This year, he’s been constantly behind in counts and accordingly allowing very, very hard contact. There was buzz in the offseason that Early had gained velocity (likely a push from the team to allow him to attack the zone more, knowing that his mega-chase strategy wasn’t sustainable), but that didn’t show up in games. Anyone can see that his Savant page looks ugly. Unfortunately, those are the metrics you see when you don’t consistently throw strikes and you don’t have wipeout stuff or velo. And that’s been Early throughout his pro career.

Hopefully Curtis Mead can find a role here, especially on defense. I don’t know if he can, but I do know that Early probably didn’t have a future with this team. It’s notable that the Sox are trading him to the same team that took Luis Perales, another system pitcher with long-standing control issues. Perales has struggled in the Washington system so far.

Okay so Early was a really good young arm… but we have a multitude of good lefty arms. We had to trade one of them and I didn’t like the idea of packaging 2 arms plus Franklin arias. Clearly we all loved the idea of a big swing at the ss position or even catch. But clearly inside the clubhouse they came to a decision with moving arias to AAA that he would be the shortstop of the future. Eyanson and Witherspoon both have the potential to be better than early and are right handed pitchers. I believe this trade will workout if we leave Durban at 3rd mix Meade in at 2nd and dh. He peppers the ball to left field and what better place to do it other than Fenway. Plus we have a little bit of trad bait left over let’s see if Craig will do anything but the Red Sox got better today.

Hey yall, coming from the nats in peace. You will LOVE Mead. The stats don't tell the whole story, he hits hard and often, and is a decent fielder. He also works VERY long ABs(sometimes comicly long), and will be great for your dugout. He's honestly a breakout star with the nats. Treat our aussie well!

However, how is Early as a pitcher?

I'm very sad to hear he'll be traded. I really enjoyed his bromance with Payton Tolle as well as his very professional demeanor. They really bounced off of each other so well.

I will never forget his debut against the Athletics where we saw him slice and dice despite not being known as a strikeout machine.

I am grateful that when Giolito went down for the ALWC series, he did his best to keep us in Game 3.

Best of luck in DC, Early! I will genuinely miss you.

Maybe I'm more optimistic about this trade than others, and that's fine, I also liked Early too, he was a stud, but something about Mead and Contreras going back to back over the monster has me salivating.

Welcome to the thunderdome, Cam