MLB Bullets Goes On Too Long

Good morning Friday. Happy St. Patrick’s Day those of you who claim Irish heritage. I’m not Irish (at least not that I know of), but my wife and daughter are. The little girl is petrified someone is going to pinch her today, even though she’s wearing green. Cut that out, people.

• Grant Brisbee looks at what is wrong with the World Baseball Classic and how to fix it. (Hint: It’s Brisbee, so don’t expect a straightforward piece.)
• Billy Witz thinks that MLB could learn a lot from the WBC about how to make the game more fun and exciting without forcing things.
• Ken Davidoff thinks the WBC needs an underdog to root for to become truly important.
• Bob Nightengale notes that even Team USA is getting into the spirit of things with showing emotion on the field.
• It seems that many of you are finally catching WBC fever this time around and the tournament’s attendance and TV ratings are up by double-digits this time around.
• Mark Willis likes the WBC, but he thinks he can do a better job designing the caps. Take a look and see what you think of his designs. (h/t SB Nation)
• Jesse Sanchez talks to the managers of the WBC teams and talks about the demands they have other than just “win the game.”
• Team USA’s Marcus Stroman thinks that pitching in the WBC is much better preparation for the regular season than Spring Training is.
• Team Mexico’s Adrian Gonzalez is still angry about the way that Mexico was eliminated from the tournament, and I can’t blame him.
• Dodgers closer Kenley Jansen will join Team Netherlands for their semifinal game in Los Angeles.
• They may have been eliminated, but Team Israel won lots of hearts and fans and as Charlotte Wilder notes, so has their mascot, the Mensch on the Bench.
• Transitioning away from the WBC, the Brewers Ryan Braun thinks Spring Training is too long. He’s pretty whiny about it, but he’s right.
• Jack Dickey notes the irony around former Team USA captain David Wright. Now that the Mets are finally good, he’s breaking down. (And by the way, now that Wright can’t carry the title of “Captain America,” the shield rightfully belongs to Adam Jones.)
• Florida investigators have determined that Jose Fernandez was likely the driver of the boat when the crash claimed his life and that of two others.
• Dodgers manager Dave Roberts is concerned about Scott Kazmir’s poor velocity this spring.
• Diamondbacks slugger Yasmany Tomas has a strained oblique.
• Richard Justice thinks the Yankees have good reason to be optimistic about their future. You’re welcome, Yankees fans. It’s just too bad about your title drought.
• Stephanie Apstein has a nice profile of Braves manager Brian Snitker, the career minor league manager who got a shot to manage simply because he was there and made the most of it.
• Ben Lindbergh looks at the data on whether pitchers who take less time between pitches get better results. The conclusions are nuanced. Right now, it’s a big “it depends.”
• Michael Baumann asks the “Who is the second-best pitcher in baseball?” question and comes up with Max Scherzer.
• Jon Heyman reports on the lack of progress on a contract extension between the Giants and Madison Bumgarner.
• Scott Boras is upset about the way that the Blue Jays renewed Aaron Sanchez’s contract for the minimum.
• Doc Gooden says he’s never speaking to Darryl Strawberry again.
• Yasiel Puig got ejected for slamming his bat on the ground. #PuigYourFriend
• Jorge L. Ortiz looks at Trevor Rosenthal as he tries to go from being a reliever to starting. Well, first you’ve got learn to do an impression of Will Ferrell doing an impression of Harry Caray . . .
• Jeff Sullivan found something Mike Trout is bad at. In baseball, even.
• Anthony Castrovince lists six teams that need to get off to a strong start in April.
• If you’re following the NCAA Men’s Basketball Tournament, you are probably sitting at home thinking “How can I tie this in with baseball?” Or at least you are if you’re Cliff Corcoran and are paid to do stuff like that. But he actually has a clever article in which he lists the all-time greatest baseball player from each school in the bracket.
• Marlins manager Don Mattingly had a cinderblock broken on his chest as part of a motivational exercise. Why that is supposed to motivate grown men (or anyone else) is beyond me. Maybe he could just say “I played 14 years for the Yankees and never once got to play in the World Series. Then I sat out the season and the Yankees won it all. Don’t be like me.” OK, that’s harsh. And not motivational at all. But if you want to hire me as a motivational speaker for your group or workplace, I can send you some price quotes.
• The Rockies celebrated “Pi Day” with a little help from the team’s photoshop department. And man, are those uniforms purple.
• Former Angels and Rangers pitcher C.J. Wilson is about to make his pro auto racing debut this weekend.
• The Mariners have always been one of the teams with some of the more creative advertising. Here are the Mariners players trying to find an alternative to the bat flip.
• As well as “Late Night With Robinson Cano.”
• And finally, a trip back to the WBC for a home run in the Tokyo Dome that hit a fan in a sensitive area. I can hear Homer Simpson right now going “Baseball. Groin. It works on so many levels!”

And tomorrow will be a better day than today, Buster.