MLB Bullets says nothing compares 2 Yu

Good morning, Cubs fans. Some of you are winners. Some of you are the other thing. It depends on whom you talk to.

• The trade deadline has passed. David Schoenfield has some winners and losers.
• Grant Brisbee has winners and losers.
• Michael Baumann has winners and losers.
• The baseball staff at Yahoo Sports has winners and losers.
• Bill Baer has some winners and losers.
• Jay Jaffe has winners and losers.
• Matt Snyder has winners and losers.
• Paul Lebowitz just picks the winners at the deadline.
• That’s because he has Ryan Davis picking the losers for him.
• Mike Lupica doesn’t say “winners,” but it’s clear he thinks the Dodgers and Yankees are just that.
• Cliff Corcoran simply lists the six trades that will make the biggest difference this season.
• Rob Arthur just says that the MLB rich got a lot richer.
• Ken Rosenthal, still on Facebook, blasted teams that hung onto their prospects rather than risk making a deal.
• Moving away from premature grades, Jeff Passan has a fascinating inside look at how the trade of Yu Darvish to the Dodgers got done in just 12 minutes.
• Tim Brown praises the Dodgers for landing Darvish without sacrificing their future.
• Dave Cameron notes that despite the Dodgers not giving up either of their top two prospects for Darvish, the Rangers came away with a pretty good prospect in Willie Calhoun anyway.
• Bradford Doolittle says that with Yu Darvish, the Dodgers look almost invincible. He does point out how the playoffs, while not quite a crapshoot, are pretty unpredictable.
• Jeff Sullivan looks at the hidden strengths behind the Dodgers run-prevention efforts.
• Ryan Davis asks if any team in the National League can stop the Dodgers this season?
• Christopher Crawford breaks down the prospects that the Yankees sent to Oakland for Sonny Gray.
• Mike Axisa claims that in one year, the Yankees have gone from sellers at the deadline to a powerhouse.
• Andrew Marchand proclaims that the Yankees are the Yankees again.
• Red Sox team president Dave Dombrowski compared the Yankees to the Golden State Warriors, which I just assume is ‘teens slang for “evil empire.”
• On the flip side, Jon Tayler notes that the Athletics dealing of Gray means yet another arduous rebuild in Oakland.
• Astros ace Dallas Keuchel is disappointed his team didn’t make a big move at the deadline.
• Elsewhere in Texas, Rangers third baseman Adrian Beltre has made it clear he isn’t interested in sticking around for a long rebuild.
• Zach Kram believes that moves made at the deadline are a sign of the increasing importance of bullpens in today’s game.
• Will Leitch lists the teams under the most pressure after the trade deadline. Remember, never let the pressure exceed to pleasure.
• Things are not going so well in St. Louis, and I know you are all choked up about that. It’s a bad sign when a team’s manager (in this case Mike Matheny) complains that the fans (in this case, “The Best Fans In Baseball®”) are “just so bitter.”
• On top of that, catcher Yadier Molina has been taking thinly-veiled shots at Matheny on social media.
• Benjamin Hochman understands that Molina is frustrated, but thinks this isn’t the time nor the way of expressing that frustration.
• Marlins pitcher Edinson Volquez will undergo Tommy John surgery.
• I always say that when a major leaguer does a rehab assignment, the results of his performance are meaningless. (Yet I still report the numbers, because . . .) There is only one question: does the player feel good when the game was over? On that front, the Giants got terrible news as pitcher Johnny Cueto left his rehab start with “forearm tightness.” Yeah, that’s about as bad as news can get after a pitcher has a rehab appearance, especially since Cueto went on the DL with blisters. On the bright side, Giants fans, Cueto probably won’t opt out of his contract now. If that’s actually a bright side.
• Andre Mayer has a long piece on what happened with the Blue Jays fan who threw a beer can at Orioles outfielder Hyun Soo Kim in the Wild Card playoff last year. Basically, one moment of stupidity has forever changed his life for the worse and he feels terrible about what he did.
• Here’s a story about a promising program at the University of Connecticut about how talking about baseball can help elderly patients with dementia. I lost my own father to dementia and I can vouch that it’s terrible, since you really lose them years before they actually die. (h/t Hardball Talk)
• Anthony Castrovince notes how 16-year-old pitcher Mo’ne Davis continues to be an inspiration for many as she plays in the RBI World Series.
• Frank Jackson writes about the dying art of scorekeeping. I know I occasionally get puzzled questions at the game about what I’m doing when I’m keeping score.
• This was all over the internets last night, but Indians outfielder Austin Jackson made a spectacular catch over the outfield wall, robbing Red Sox DH Hanley Ramirez of a home run.
• Rays third baseman Evan Longoria hit for the cycle, after a video review reversed an umpire’s call.
• Rays starter Chris Archer has declared a prank war on Astros mascot Orbit. How about Archer and Noah Syndergaard do a tag-team against Orbit and Mr. Met?
• And finally, three members of the Milwaukee Brewers made their own beer and declared it “ so good.” So now they are Brewers and brewers.

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