MLB Bullets is still thankful

I hope everyone had a happy Thanksgiving. It was just my wife and daughter and me at the Thanksgiving table this year. I’m very thankful for my family, but I will say that Thanksgiving is a day that I regret that I’m the one in the family that can cook and not my wife. (She can bake and she made a very good pumpkin pie with fresh pumpkin from scratch. No canned pumpkin in this house. Unless it’s for pumpkin bread. You can’t taste the difference there.)

• Emma Baccellieri gives all 30 MLB teams something to be thankful for.
• Mike Axisa had the same idea: Something for all 30 teams to be thankful for. Even the Orioles.
• I’m thankful that MLB has Shohei Ohtani, and the Angels pitcher/DH gave an interview about his season in America. Ohtani credits Ichiro Suzuki for helping him work through his Spring Training struggles.
• I’m also thankful we had 21 seasons of Adrian Beltre and Levi Weaver shares his personal memories of one of the most entertaining ballplayers ever. And yes, they’re entertaining memories. (The Athletic article, but free to all.)
• David Adler says that theses ten hitters should be thankful for the luckiest ten hits of the 2018 season. (One of them is Matt Carpenter’s third home run at Wrigley on July 20.)
• Liberty Media, owners of the Atlanta Braves, are thankful that the team turned an operating profit over $100 million in 2018.
• Craig Edwards puts that news from the Braves in a greater context.
• After Thanksgiving comes Black Friday. In my house, that means Iowa and Nebraska. But some like to shop and Chad Thornburg has some of the biggest deals that were made over the Thanksgiving weekend in years past.
• The Mets are reportedly “seriously considering” dealing pitcher Noah Syndergaard. That would qualify as a blockbuster.
• Mark Townsend lists five teams that could make a deal for Syndergaard.
• Anthony Castrovince has five potential blockbuster deals that could make sense.
• David Schoenfield has a top offseason priority for all 30 teams.
• Free agent Manny Machado took some heat for his comment that he’s not “going to be Johnny Hustle” during the World Series. Machado talks to Mark Feinsand and he admits that comment came out wrong and tries to clarify what he meant. Machado also says that he looks forward to talking about the comments to any potential team that has any concerns.
• Gabe Lacques thinks that the Brewers could be an interesting landing spot for Bryce Harper. He admits it is also an unlikely one.
• This is an interesting piece. Let’s say you’re the Brewers and can’t afford a top free agent. Or you can afford Harper and Machado they just decide to play elsewhere. Michael Baumann has a list of more affordable alternatives to the top free agents on the market.
• I’ve got to say, nothing in baseball has a higher words published to actual importance ratio than the Rule 5 draft. But if you’re the type that really wants to peruse the catalog, here’s the most interesting prospect from all 30 teams that is available in the Rule 5 draft.
• The Reds signed closer Raisel Iglesias to a new three-year deal, buying out his arbitration years. But Chris Cwik notes that the Reds could still deal Iglesias this winter.
• Jeff Sullivan has a scouting report on left-hander Yusei Kikuchi, who has been posted by the Seibu Lions of NPB.
• Former top Red Sox pitching prospect Casey Kelly, who pitched in 12 games for the Iowa Cubs in 2017, has signed with the Twins—the LG Twins of Korean Baseball Organization.
• The Athletics have acquired pitcher Tanner Anderson from the Pirates for the oft-traveled player-to-be-named-later.
• The Orioles have re-signed Jace Peterson.
• James Fegan has an update on pitcher Danny Farquhar, who has now been cleared to resume baseball activities after suffering a brain aneurysm in April. (The Athletic sub. req.) He is a free agent now and hopes that someone will take a chance on him in 2018.
• There is a controversy over the name of the new minor league team the Amarillo Sod Poodles as the team doesn’t currently own the rights to the name.
• And one final Thanksgiving note. If your Thanksgiving dinner left something to be desired, at least you weren’t at this one. The MLB mascots had their own Thanksgiving dinner and it naturally ended up in a food fight.

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