Daily Thoughts

To any college readers out there, here's to an eventful Thirsty Thursday with $0.50 beer or $1.00 well drinks at the grinding dance bar or the one that has all the cover bands, whichever is your preferred choice.

• A couple quick closer notes: David Robertson is experiencing some elbow soreness. The White Sox don't think it's serious but that's not a good sign. Joe Nathan had a rough day today giving up a homer but apparently had a thumbnail issue. Either way, given his 2014, Joakim Soria has to be targeted as a handcuff. 

• There is a lot of chatter going on these days about specializing in one sport hurting young athletes. The more basketball you play, the better you will likely get, but it's a lot of stress on the same muscles for four seasons. Similarly, the new talk in baseball is about young players, specifically pitchers, throwing for too many seasons consistently without taking time off to casually enjoy some soccer or what have you. With that said, it's interesting to see Mookie Betts crediting basketball for his ability to make adjustments. A lot of it has to do with Mookie's size in basketball and acting accordingly but we might have to rethink how we train our young athletes. Steve Nash and Kobe credit soccer to their basketball game and Mookie Betts is crediting basketball for his baseball game. A more well rounded education regarding sports and athletics might be more valuable in addition to helping with injuries. 

• Andrew McCutchen cut his hair. If McCutchen played in New York he'd probably be on the cover of GQ (with or without his awesome dreadlocks) but in Pittsburgh that hasn't quite happened. Let's hope that changes, he's an awesome player and seemingly an even better human. 

• Sometimes Bill James can sound a bit "get off my lawn"-ish but he has a unique mind and reading his take on a few questions is always worth a read. 

• Spring stats generally don't mean anything in terms of predicting on field performance that season but they could help predict playing time. Joc Pederson is ripping this spring, he may or may not have a productive year in LA but he will start in CF due to his spring. Mookie Betts is crushing, he may or may not play everyday for the entire season but with a crowded OF the Red Sox could have pointed to spring struggles and tweaked the roster. Instead, he will likely be leading off. Dan O'Dowd lists his "five toughest roster dilemmas," many of which could be decided based off of spring performance.