"official" Team X threads

[pahoard]

Not a question but a comment. I've notice a sudden increase of "Official Team X offseason thread". It is alarming because the last thing I want to do is read through 1200 "Yankee" threads to see if there is anything interesting about Wilson Betemit.

I am writing to encourage you to do something to curtail this practice. If I want to read about a team as a whole I'll go to MLB.com or some other source. If I want to talk/read about fantasy I want to come to BaseballHQ and this practice makes it a chore, not the pleasure it once was.

[Michael@HQ]

I agree that more bite-size threads would be better but I don't know what BBHQ can do about it. If posters want to talk about the Yankees in the clubhouse forum in a thread clearly titled about the Yankees (or A-Rod opting out etc.), then I don't think it should be curtailed.

[GoldenEagle]

I see this trend as primarly an off-season phenomenon. Most of the hot stove activities need a team context to be relevant. To just say, "how will x player do next year" won't be as relevant until AFTER the free agents have taken their seats in the game of musical chairs. These team threads won't be much use for draft prep anyway, they're mostly speculation and include a lot of "fans preferences" that become obsolete in early 2008 from a roto-team prep standpoint.

Once we get the Forecaster in December, the focus will be back on the player-specific stuff.

Plus, you can always do a search using "Betemit".

[jbluestone]

Yeah, we are talking about team specific decisions, not everything on these boards has to be or is supposed to be about fantasy content. But once the forecaster comes out there will be tons of player specific threads I am sure... usually we start a player of the day thread sometime during the winter.

[NICK@HQ]

And here I thought this was a helpful practice. Usually people complain that the Yankee talk creeps into every thread, but now we have a place just for that.

Furthermore it's kinda cool to see these other threads. I may not care about, say, the Minnesota thread, but if a player of mine is on the Twins' roster, or if a trade offer comes my way involving a Twin, I now know exactly where to look instead of doing a site-wide search.

[Michael@HQ]

I like how the Rockies thread is correctly titled as "unofficial" too.

[Markus_ls]

Yeah, I thought (like Nick) that is was helpful - I know where to go to post about particularly teams. (See the proliferation of ARod threads a few weeks ago where we don't know which of the 6 we should be posting in.)

And everything in those threads is voluntarily posted by the users.....if they want to post there that is their prerogative.

[RAY@HQ]

I have (and will continue to) encourage that actual transaction news be posted in their own threads as warranted, for just this reason. I think I broke that rule in discussing the Villarreal-Anderson deal in the Braves ongoing thread. I'll try to keep this in mind going forward, it's a very fair point.

I do like the idea of keeping the Yankee fans in their own "cage", with occasional breakouts (ARod opts out) as needed.

[GoldenEagle]

I do like the idea of keeping the Yankee fans in their own "cage", with occasional breakouts (ARod opts out) as needed.

And Red Sox fans, in their own "cage", as well!

[RAY@HQ]

And Red Sox fans, in their own "cage", as well!

Yeah, if you want to compare "our" 4-page thread to their 1500-post monstrosity. (And that doesn't even include "A-Rod opts out".)

[jbluestone]

Yeah, if you want to compare "our" 4-page thread to their 1500-post monstrosity. (And that doesn't even include "A-Rod opts out".)

There you go again ray... praising the redsox and bashing the yankees... so predictable!

[willemaze]

I do like the idea of keeping the Yankee fans in their own "cage", with occasional breakouts (ARod opts out) as needed.

The quote marks around "cage" are duly noted, but that does sound a little harsh, perhaps implying sub-human behavior.

I prefer to think of it as a "quarantine" to prevent infection of other non-Yankee threads.

[circle360]

Not a question but a comment. I've notice a sudden increase of "Official Team X offseason thread". It is alarming because the last thing I want to do is read through 1200 "Yankee" threads to see if there is anything interesting about Wilson Betemit.

I am writing to encourage you to do something to curtail this practice. If I want to read about a team as a whole I'll go to MLB.com or some other source. If I want to talk/read about fantasy I want to come to BaseballHQ and this practice makes it a chore, not the pleasure it once was.

News flash. There is nothing interesting about Wilson Betemit. He will be the backup 3b.

I know im someone that posts numerous times on those threads. As well as other threads. People complained when yankee fans were on numerous threads. Now its pretty contained to 3 threads.

But what kind of fantasy info do you really expect to read in november. There are no games etc. If a player has been traded or signd with another team. That usually has a seperate thread.

[pahoard]

News flash. There is nothing interesting about Wilson Betemit. He will be the backup 3b.

Actually I've heard that they might move AROD to 2nd base to get him some more time. I think you get my point.

Anyway, maybe I'm in the minority or maybe I'm part of the silent majority. I don't know. But believe it or not I think that on occasion a Yankee fan(or other teams fan) might have an insight into a player I'd like to consider. But I don't have time to sift through all the chest bumping and bravado to find that nugget.

I'm just saying please throw those nuggets out on it's own thread and please keep the rest of it neatly tucked away in the team threads.

The Baseball forecaster can't come out soon enough!

[GoldenEagle]

Anyway, maybe I'm in the minority or maybe I'm part of the silent majority. I don't know. But believe it or not I think that on occasion a Yankee fan(or other teams fan) might have an insight into a player I'd like to consider. But I don't have time to sift through all the chest bumping and bravado to find that nugget.

I'm just saying please throw those nuggets out on it's own thread and please keep the rest of it neatly tucked away in the team threads.

My observation is that it's fairly unrealistic to expect a separate player breakout thread whenever it comes up in the stream of consciousness going on a Team Thread. Not intentionally trying to make anything difficult, just the way message boards tend to operate.

In the heat of the battle, people start discussing whether a package of X prospects+ Y players exchange for Z free agent would be a good idea. And then people throw in player analysis and opinions and preferences...nobody is going to say, "hold on, somebody mentioned Phil Hughes, we must start a Phil Hughes thread, so the non-Yankee fans can get all this insight without sifting through 1,500 posts!".

Nice idea, very unlikely to be implemented. I'm not defending the current practice, just accepting it for what it is.