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MLB News & Notes (other than Cubs or Sox)
Quote:I thought I read somewhere that MLB players can elect to be taxed based on place of residence, which would be Nevada in this case, so this wouldnt be an issue. Not sure if thats true though.
That's not accurate. MLB players are taxed where they play, so every road game triggers a state tax liability. MLB players must file taxes in all the states in which they play a game. So an LAD player would have more than half his salary (LAD, SD, SF, OAK, LAA) taxed at CA rates.
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That makes sense, but as I understand it domicile also matters. This is the piece I read a while back, but not certain if the TCJA of 2017 changed anything since it was written. You know WAY more about taxes than I do, so I'll stop now.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/kurtbadenha...-tax-code/
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https://twitter.com/Ken_Rosenthal/status...3291987976
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This seems like a very bad deal for Colorado.  Arenado was already under contract for 2019.  This buys them a 2-year extension at the cost of a 5-year player option after 2021.  If Arenado plays how he has and the market for FAs improves over the next few years, he can opt out and cash in.  If he declines or the market doesn't improve, he doesn't opt out and they're paying him a contract with a AAV of $32.5M.

This is not some silly theory that's unsupported and deserves being mocked by photos of Xena.  [Image: ITgoyeg.png]
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To put a Cubs spin on this, there was speculation that the FO was looking past the Harper/Machado sweepstakes and were actually more interested in Arenado one year from now (KB would then move to a corner OF spot). Wonder if other teams had similar designs and might now re-engage with Harper's camp. Doubt it will change the outcome of this offseason, but just another interesting spin on things.
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The timing of this could only help Harper's camp.

One dick can poke an eye out. A hundred dicks can move mountains.
--Veryzer

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Was going to say, so much for the Cubs going after a preferred Arenado theory.

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I don't understand how shorter inning breaks is superior to a pitch clock. That does nothing to improve pace of play and actually costs the league advertising revenue. Not a huge fan of any of these "reforms" except maybe expanding rosters to 26 and reducing September rosters to 28.

https://twitter.com/JeffPassan/status/11...1467602949
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All of this tinkering is kind of stupid. MLB constantly highlighting what is wrong with their product is the most idiotic thing they could do with their brand, but they do it constantly.

 

How about they do something to shorten the time it takes to get a replay call completed? That might help some. But honestly none of this stuff around the perimeter of the game is going to suddenly get all the young'ns watching the game again.

 

I can only say this from my own experience which is a fraction or a fraction of a fraction of the entire country, but Little League has absolutely exploded in popularity around me. I imagine it coincided with the Cubs being more competitive for a longer time than ever before, but I've talked with several people who run leagues around me and there are more kids playing baseball around me than there has in decades. Part of the problem with MLB is that it's hyper-regional. MLB stars aren't popular the way NBA stars are popular. MLB's marketing is generally pretty bad, IMO.

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Agreed with all of that. And how about nuking blackout restrictions so that dwindling pool of fans that you do have can actually watch your precious product in any format available?
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100% this. The blackout restrictions are so idiotic.
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Devil's advocate: Do the blackout restrictions still provide a positive economic benefit for either those selling tickets to games, or those paying for broadcast rights?

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Little league around me has been decimated by travel teams and soccer. The better half of baseball players are nearly all playing on travel teams and after the age of 10 are no longer playing recreation little league. So you have 120 players in the 9-10 age group and 50-60 in the 11-12 age group in my son's league. Soccer is also exploding around here and taking from all of the major sports. 

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Quote:Devil's advocate: Do the blackout restrictions still provide a positive economic benefit for either those selling tickets to games, or those paying for broadcast rights?
 

It depends on where you are.  I think there is a positive economic benefit, for example, for NBC Sports Chicago that the games are blacked out on MLB.TV in the Chicagoland area (at least unless you can authenticate a cable subscription to stream NBCS).  They want people to keep their cable subscriptions which include a fee for NBCS (especially since Comcast owns them and Comcast wants people to keep cable subscriptions).

 

But MLB's blackout zones are ridiculous.  The entire state of Iowa is blacked out for both Chicago teams, Milwaukee, Minnesota, St. Louis, and Kansas City.  Las Vegas is blacked out for both L.A. teams, Oakland, San Francisco, San Diego, and Arizona.  These are people that are hundreds of miles away from a ballpark and probably have access to no more than 1 or 2 of those teams through their local cable system.  They can't get the games they're blacked out for on standard cable, and they're blacked out of watching them on MLB.TV or Extra Innings.

This is not some silly theory that's unsupported and deserves being mocked by photos of Xena.  [Image: ITgoyeg.png]
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Quote:Little league around me has been decimated by travel teams and soccer. The better half of baseball players are nearly all playing on travel teams and after the age of 10 are no longer playing recreation little league. So you have 120 players in the 9-10 age group and 50-60 in the 11-12 age group in my son's league. Soccer is also exploding around here and taking from all of the major sports. 
 

Soccer is massive by me, too. And everywhere, I think. It has definitely taken a huge bite out of baseball/basketball/football. When I mentioned little league, I was lumping travel teams in there as well. Our community does a rec league and a more competitive league; but there are also a lot of pay-to-play organizations who definitely pick off a lot of good players from the community leagues.

 

What's really interesting is how much football has suffered around me. One of the local high school's football teams (which was once insanely competitive) is now no-cut because so few kids are trying out now. I guess parents aren't digging the concussion stuff all that much...
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