lcbf, it reads to me like Iglesias was going, the ball got away, and he tried for two. He'd get credit for the steal, but wouldn't get banged for the CS. Since he was thrown out, there wouldn't be a passed ball or wild pitch.

SoxSail wrote:

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Why is the AFL restricted to so few teams? With the glut of SS and other positions on this year's rosters, it seems like each AFL team could have fewer MLB affiliates. If it's cause of too few pitchers, I can think of a few Sox hurlers who could have joined (Hottovy, Bowden, KJohnson). And fewer affiliates might mean more attendance by a generally Rabid Sox fan base.

You really think that the reason the AFL doesn't get fans is because there are too few players from each organization? Look, nobody's going to travel for the AFL. Think about it - who travels for the minor leagues in general? The fans that go to Spring Training almost entirely go to MLB ST, not the minor league complexes. Not many people plan trips around traveling to see their team's AA affiliate.

It costs money to run a team. It's not like there's any revenue coming in for this. Given the crowd described, it sounds like most of the people in attendance may even get comped - players' families, scouts, etc. don't pay to see games. They're not getting advertisers, and I'm sure concessions barely make a profit, if they even have them.

From a player perspective, the fact is that the regular season is pretty long anyway. Think about the season that you play in high school - 3 months, plus 2 months of summer ball maybe? And even at that, you're playing what, 3 games a week? Playing every day from March to September is grueling. Looking at the pitchers you mentioned, Bowden threw 142 innings and KJ threw 113, although the reason it was that low was because he got his head bashed in in AAA, so many of those were high-stress innings.

The point is to keep the AFL a league for "elite" prospects, for the most part at least. The more teams you add, the more diluted the pool gets, etc. I'd definitely like to head out to Arizona for a week someday for the AFL, but I have no doubt that I'm in the very, very small minority there.

TheGoldenGreek33 wrote:

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Is that a shot of SSS your sipping or did you not follow him after his promotion to Portland? He hasn't missed a beat.

edit: It's also important to note he allowed 3 SB's last night and a PB.

Greek, he was pretty clearly referring to the fact that Expo had been 1 for 11 with 5 strikeouts in the AFL before last night. I don't think it was any kind of actual analysis of the long-term ramifications of last night's game.