MLB Bullets finds Jesus

Is it coming home yet?

• I hate to hit you with the dark side of baseball right off the bat, but the most important piece of the week comes from Jeff Passan, which is something I could write a lot. Passan notes that a convicted child molester in the Dominican Republic was back training young boys, and that’s just the tip of the iceberg on the shady dealings in the world of Latin American baseball. Passan’s solution is a worldwide draft, although he’s smart enough to admit that the owners would likely use one just to cut down on signing bonuses. He talks to Scott Boras (and I know his name is a trigger word for some of you. I probably should have issued a warning.) and Boras has some ideas about instituting a draft that would still allow the players to get paid. But it would, unsurprisingly, cost the owners money that they’d rather not spend.
• Speaking of costing the owners money they’d rather not spend. Bill Brink has a piece on how minor leaguers live on less than the minimum wage, as well as the current state of the lawsuits designed to make minor leaguers get paid what they’re worth.
• The Royals signed 16-year-old Japanese pitcher Kaito Yuki, who becomes the first Japanese amateur to skip high school ball (and NPB, of course) and sign directly with an MLB club.
• Jerry Crasnick has a nice piece in which he talks to three MLB hitters (Daniel Murphy, Kyle Seager and Matt Carpenter) about why it is so difficult to beat the shift.
• Neil Greenberg looks at whether shifting could bring back the bunt to baseball.
• I guess there’s an All-Star Game and in case you missed it, Cubs outfielder Kyle Schwarber will compete in the Home Run Derby, even though he wasn’t selected to the All-Star Team. But maybe he should have been. But Joe Posnanski uses Schwarber and fellow HR Derby contestant Bryce Harper to make a point about reputations and how tough they are to shake. But Posnanski notes that while Schwarber has a terrible defensive reputation based on some high-profile errors early in his career, he’s actually become a solid defensive left fielder. And just the opposite for Harper.
• Athletics infielder Jed Lowrie was named to the All-Star Game as an injury replacement for Gleyber Torres.
• MLB wants you to get excited about the “Final Vote” this week and Whitney McIntosh grades all the various campaign gimmicks that teams are rolling out to get out the vote. As much as I hate to compliment the Brewers, I will say their “I Believe in Jesus (Aguilar)” campaign is pretty darn good.
• Speaking of Jesus Aguilar, Jeff Sullivan writes that it’s time to admit he’s one of the best first basemen in the league.
• In the spirit of the All-Star Game, David Schoenfield asks has the National League finally passed the American League in overall quality? I do like that he adds that if they have, it’s because of the Cubs and the Dodgers.
• Craig Calcaterra asks the question that I’ve been asking for a long time as well: Why should fans still care about the All-Star Game?
• The Rays revealed plans for their new stadium. Of course, they don’t have any funding for it and they don’t want to pay for it themselves, so at the moment, it’s just elaborate fan fiction. But it looks really nice, even if the roof doesn’t retract.
• The trade deadline is still coming and Orioles shortstop Manny Machado admitted that all the trade talks surrounding him have been an unwanted distraction.
• Like this one that says the Red Sox have made contact with the Orioles in regards to a Machado deal.
• David Schoenfield has one player that each team should deal before the trade deadline.
• I’m just going to put the crazy endings to Tuesday night’s ballgames here. The Indians gave up seven runs in the ninth inning in part because of a communications mixup by manager Terry Francona had the wrong reliever warming up in the bullpen. I’m going to say his real issue started months ago when he didn’t realize that it might not be a good idea to refer to two different relievers by the nicknames “O.T” and “O.P.” And is it that much harder to just say “Perez” instead of “O.P.”?
• And then there was this bizarre play that gave the Astros a walk-off win over Athletics.
• On the A’s, Chris Cwik gives three reasons the team has been a surprising playoff contender this year.
• R.J. Anderson notes that the A’s are contending despite having their entire starting rotation on the disabled list. They actually have six starting pitchers on the DL at the moment.
• Rangers outfielder Shin-Soo Choo has extended his on-base streak to 48 games.
• This seems to be another manufactured NY controversy, but Mets manager Mickey Callaway is under fire for saying he meant to announce a pitching change before the Phillies officially announced their pinch hitter.
• Ken Davidoff says maybe he did and maybe he didn’t, but everyone should give Callaway more time to show his true colors before issuing judgement on Callaway.
• In any case, Mark Feinsand offers eight candidates for the vacant Mets general manager job. One of them is Cubs VP Jason McLeod, and he’s going to get mentioned a lot for GM jobs over the next few months. But while the Mets job on it’s surface seems attractive . . .C’mon. It’s the Mets. You still have to deal with the Wilpons every day.
• Earlier I spoke about a call to bring bunting back to baseball, but what about platooning? In this era of 12- and 13-man bullpens, there just aren’t enough position players to properly platoon. (Say that five times fast.) Mark Armour looks at the history and the current state of platooning.
• You may not have noticed, but Mike Trout had been in a slump. Of course, as Rian Watt notes, a Mike Trout slump just looks like normal production to a lot of players. Watt also suggests that Trout had been playing hurt.
• Grant Brisbee looks back at the past week of baseball and among other things, is thrilled that Shohei Ohtani is playing again, even if he’s only hitting.
• Speaking of Ohtani, this Japanese TV show has a pretty creepy puppet of Ohtani. The Angels need to get that puppet for all their promos. He can duel the Rally Monkey.
• Speaking of Angels, Mike Trout and creepy, Mike Trout T-Shirt night was ultra-creepy.
• Here’s six of the best-dressed men in baseball.
• And finally, it’s a baseball classic that never gets old. The Marlins stuck bubblegum and a paper cup on top of the hat of the interpreter for Marlins pitcher Wei-Yin Chen. What’s unusual here is that they got away with it for five innings. It’s just a way of telling you you’re part of the team, Louis Chao.

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