Yeah, Dave Stieb is a good comp.  Felix had a bit better peak, but the trajectory is very similar.

btw, I’m liking my Dale Murphy-Felix Hernandez comparison!

Felix will definitely linger on the ballot for the whole 10 years, and maybe there’s a chance some committee will eventually put him in. If he can pull a Verlander/Sabbathia and reverse course to wring out a few more good years that would help a lot, but I don’t see that happening.

the thing that hurts the most is that he has absolutely no Hall of Fame chance now, even after being on that path for most of his career. Completely derailed. If he had managed to be even slightly above average for the last couple years and then average to slightly below average through age 36ish, I think he’d have…

I’m glad I only have a 110 followers and don’t have to deal with such high-stakes twitter drama. 

-1. read the headline and was excited, but the content didn’t match my expectations.

I agree that vote tampering likely occurred and am shocked that so many states still use these highly insecure voting systems and fail to do a secure audit that is able to detect manipulation, with only Colorado and New Mexico taking steps to do such robust audits.

This is very sad. He was a very good skater and represented Kazakhstan well. And this is pretty shocking, as someone who’s spent time in Kazakhstan, since downtown Almaty is a pretty safe area and violent crimes/murder are fairly uncommon (especially if your not involved in other crimes - drugs, mafia shit, etc.)

She’d be the best grandama sports journalist since Dave’s mom went to Lillehammer.

counterpoint: it’s fun and awesome.

To everyone complaining that this is scamming Costco and that it will screw them over....I actually have a feeling Costco doesn’t mind at all.

I don’t know...from a brand perspective, maybe the racist language will make people think Papa John is a more authentic Italian experience.

The only Fraud left at this World Cup is the 3rd place game, which is a rematch between Belgium and England in another meaningless game.  Cancel the 3rd place game now and forever!

for my next trick, I’ll make you want to gouge your eyes out.

the farewell ceremony for Tim was very emotional

true, but it’s a great genre. The synchronized kid diving while dribbling was a nice bit of flair.

I don’t know...gritty D with strong counter attack and good work my Suarez and Cavani kept me entertained. The ref definitely didn’t have the match under control though and Portugal couldn’t hit the side of a barn when trying to shoot at the goal, but otherwise I thought it was a pretty good game.

I thought Uruguay looked great today. Cavani was magnificent and I hope he’s fine for the next match.  France-Uruguay should be entertaining.

based on this fraud/not fraud list, I’ve decided to commit myself wholeheartedly to CROATIA. *wraps self in red and white checkered tablecloth*

I really like the idea of having the penalty shootout *before* extra time. The winner of the PKs could get 1/2 a goal added to their score to indicate their advantage and it would eliminate the possibility of a tie game numerically.  It would be a much more exciting end of game as the trailing team tried to score.