That's a function of QB. No salary cap would be the same - just those teams would all be in big markets. Forget about Chiefs keeping Mahomes or Indy keeping Manning after their rookie deals.

Awesome more Mike Leake type signings is just what the sport needs.

That's because the variance on an MLB game and even 7-game playoff series is so high. Look at which teams make the playoffs every year and tell me there's parity.

It's extremely easy for inferior teams to get hot and win the WS, once they make the playoffs. But the 162-game regular season is a huge barrier that separates out the contenders.

I went to George Brett's last game. I flew back to KC for Hos, Esky, Cain and Moose's last game. I'll be there for Salvy's last game. Rooting for homegrown stars means a lot to fans. Rooting for homegrown players who stay to make the HOF means a lot. If the Royals had lost Brett in 1979 or whatever I'd have lost a lot of my fandom.

14 of the 15 American League teams have won their division since 2014.

Actually only 2 teams haven't made the playoffs since 2014 - Mariners and Phillies. Padres, Marlins, and Reds are the others but they made it because of the 2020 expanded playoffs.

A large reason for this is because of team's ability to "tank" to get better picks and the ability to hold on to them longer. The MLBPA, from what I have seen, despises both of those.

{shrug}

I'm over pretending to give a shit about the owners pocketbooks. These teams are making money hand over fist.

And it shouldn't impact teams that are already fielding competitive salaries and/or intelligent front offices. If anything it will occasionally save them from themselves. If the Pirates were forced to go spend some damn money, maybe it would've offered Leake enough for the gap between him and someone like Scherzer to be insignificant enough that a team like STL would just go get Scherzer instead.

The fact that teams like the Cardinals can half-ass an off-season because they know that 1/3 of the league isn't going to bother to try and that should get them enough wins to sneak out a winning season even in a down year is a problem. Competitive balance is a good thing for MLB. Teams like the Pirates are not.

If the Royals are in the playoffs then it’s Baseball>Golf>Soccer
If they are not in the playoffs it’s Golf>Soccer>Baseball

I just don't think paying a bunch of turds just to say you spent money is any better. Remember how many bench turds got paid when the NBA salary cap jumped. Didn't really change the competitive balance of the league.

Baseball has to figure out a way in that six year window for team control to pay the guys who deserve to be paid their WAR and not have to rely on bloated contracts in their 30s.

They have that. I've gone over the math on this before, but any player out there can approach their team and exchange top dollar for guaranteed money.

Tatis did it. Franco just did it. We know teams are willing to discuss it. It's an open market and if players would be willing to allow a couple of team option years after the they reach FA eligibility, teams would be willing to pay them more at the front end of those years. It's the guaranteed nature of contracts in MLB that make teams reticent to spend that kind of AAV over those kinds of term. To an extent, the young players are (again) being sacrificed at the alters of the older, more established guys.

And I still maintain that the players position back in 1994 (and since) has been penny wise and pound foolish all along. The owners proposed to allow unrestricted free agency after 4 years back in 1994 in exchange for a salary cap.

The owners have offered a revenue split in exchange for a cap in the past.

Both have been met with hard 'noes' from the MLBPA and it's just a dogmatic refusal at this point. More players will be better off with the creation of a cap and a defined revenue split than they would be under this bizarre-ass model.

The only people that would be truly hurt by it are the uber-stars. And in a league that is so dependent on overall team construction, why shouldn't that be the case? Mike Trout's the best player in a generation and he's never led a single post-season inning. He's made it to October once. Last year's MVPs didn't make the post-season. Once CY winner missed and the other went down with a whimper.

Star players just don't matter as much in baseball. A single great player can't drag a team into contention like in the other major sports. So why should it bother me that the star salaries may be compressed a bit in the name of everyone else getting more? And with a cap and defined revenue split, that's exactly what's happened.

To this day, it’s what I love about the game.

Here's my post from way back when on the subject -- I used Correa as an example and suggested a 12/$250 deal that would've taken him through his arb years plus 8 years of FA.

https://www.chiefsplanet.com/BB/show...&postcount=726

And in the end he bet on himself and he'll probably beat that figure - but ultimately deals similar to those exist on the marketplace for players willing to pursue them. We seem them annually. Oh, and I projected him making $50 million in his pre-FA years - he made $20 million. So he'd need to beat 8/$230 or almost $30 million/yr. Combine that figure with the guaranteed element of it (so the 'stros can expect a discount by guaranteeing money 4 years before he'd otherwise get it) and man, that's REALLY close to what he could've reasonably been expected to seek. I had it damn near on the nose 4 years ago. And this isn't my job, fellas. The players and owners know what's reasonable. Many just choose not to pursue it.

Correa chose this route. As have many other players before him. Just as many others have gone the alternate route.

But it's like people complaining about high interest rates on credit cards. Of course they're high - this is unsecured debt. The risks CC companies take on is enormous many cases. Meanwhile mortgage and/or vehicle debt is often quite reasonable because it's secured.

MLB contracts with their guaranteed money are the sports equivalent of unsecured debt. If it goes bad - you're just boned. You're stuck with it. So yeah, teams are going to factor that in to what they're willing to pay. Especially to players that are less established.

Yeah, I doubt those numbers are taking illegal streaming into consideration. Unfortunately, that's what a lot of fans had to resort to last year due to the terrible Bally deal.

I wouldn’t watch soccer with a gun to my head. **** that sport and the pussies that play it.

Baseball will be fine by season start.

I wish baseball would embrace this aspect of the game. Even in its heyday, regular season games featured fans coming off of work and taking a load off.

Hell, it's how I got my college friends to love baseball. They were skeptical (they didn't enjoy watching it on TV), but in 2013 I took them to games at the K and they loved the atmosphere and how laid back it was. They ended up getting on the Royals train at the perfect time, too.

I pull out my phone and secretly watch hockey.

Yeah maybe they'll find a way to not have their World Series games get eclipsed by NFL preseason games, in terms of total TV viewers/ratings.

Something has to be second to the NFL.

And yes, it’s MLB not NBA or NHL.

MLS in 10 years

I heard this when I was 19 at KU, too, when my friends were driving up to see the newly named KC Sporting.

I am now 29.

Make a thread when it happens so I can neg rep your ass!!!

I was a big baseball fan until that. I was really enjoying that Royals team at the time. After that. I only tuned in for the Royals 14 and 15 runs.

And popularity kills things. Outside of going out of business, no one should want their favorite things to be wildly popular.

It's not high school, keep the **** away from my hockey before that's ruined, too. And stay off my lawn.

In the 70s the top 3 U.S. sports were:

MLB
boxing
Horse racing



Times change

Football already eclipsed baseball in the 1970's.

Maybe 1915.

College football.

Evergreen response.

Soccer was going to be the next big thing in America as far back as 1988 when the '94 cup was awarded to the US.

A) The US is just too wealthy. The appeal of soccer in most other major nations is that it requires a ball and some grass to play. So in the 3rd world, everyone plays it.

B) If you don't play it, you don't get it. You don't appreciate the skill involved. You can have never played football or basketball or hockey or even baseball in your life and recognize how difficult it is. Soccer just looks like guys kicking and chasing a ball around and seemingly without a plan. Offsides doesn't make sense to you, the strategies involved aren't readily apparent, there's seemingly little action apart from repetitive back and forth. Hell, the sheer number of leagues/cups/divisions, etc... involved makes interest in the international game hard to build.

And as big a problem is that the higher the level of play, the less interesting the games become. As the MLS gets better, the scores are likely to actually go down and there's likely to be less action because teams will tighten up a bit.

Soccer's just unlikely to gain a foothold here because there are simply more entertaining things to play if you have the resources to do so. My kids all play soccer because they get to run and kick things but my oldest prefers basketball and gymnastics now. My youngest son wants to play baseball and football and my youngest daughter wants to do dance and gymnastics as well. Soccer is a placeholder for them while they don't have attention spans.

I'll take 'em out there for as long as they keep asking to play because it burns off energy and nobody asks me to coach it, but I don't expect it to be something they're interested in for too much longer.

When people want to have this argument they just can't help but overlook the regional aspect of baseball.

No, baseball's just not a 'national' game in the sense that the NFL is. Few people in NY are watching Atlanta play even when they're good. It's not like football where I'll watch the Cowboys play if they're on.

They watch 'their' team because 'their' team is on 162 times/yr. There's no need to watch anyone else. Baseball is a regional spectator sport played across the nation - it's not a truly national sport. And MLB was smart to recognize that and lean into the regional sports networks as opposed to trying to put together some massive national rights deal.

Baseball has to overcome minimal levels of youth popularity (nobody plays stickball).

Heard that Populous is projecting average MLB attendance to be under 14,000 per game in the coming years..

High level leagues are as popular as ever. Moreover, over the last 10 years or so, baseball has actually widened the gap in youth participation over soccer according to most studies.

yes, at the super-young levels, baseball has flagged a bit (6-12ish) but that speaks to what I talked about above - it's just easier for kids to play soccer at that age. They don't have to stay focused as much.

99% of all kids that play any sort of sport are irrelevant to the health of the big league product - they almost all wash out. And elite traveling teams in baseball are thriving. There's plenty of participation among kids that are likely to actually become good ballplayers.

Now over time could that lack of participation at super-young ages lead to less interest in following it as a fan when they get older? Perhaps - but it doesn't mean that soccer's going to fill that gap.

People have been proclaiming the death of baseball for decades and it just isn't happening. And again, if anything, baseball has been gaining ground over the last 10 years or so.

I suspect at some point the furthest MLB will be third in the big 4 sports leagues.

NHL is too regionally based in popularity to ever be more than 4 and MLS interest will never catch up to MLB.

NBA is the biggest threat to passing MLB.

NHL got a rights deal with ESPN again and that will help, but they've essentially spent 20 years spinning their wheels. If they make up any ground, it's gonna be a long haul.

The NBA kinda keeps shooting itself in the foot. I mean it's already more popular than baseball in urban areas so if it's going to pass baseball, it has to catch up in middle-america and suburban/rural. It can't just lean into its existing fanbase to catch up/pass MLB.

And frankly, I don't see it happening with the league's insistence on championing social causes anytime soon. I'm disinclined to turn this into a politics thread, but the people that the NBA needs to attract to pass baseball just aren't going to become NBA fans in this climate. I am an NBA fan and don't watch the league anymore.

Issue with interest in NHL is that for the youth the entry cost is so high with regards to equipment as well as ice availability. Hockey is a niche sport. I love watching it, but the average American isn’t going to give a shit about Winnipeg playing Dallas.

Basketball has probably the lowest entry cost of any sport and a a majority of the stars are American. Average dude probably has more interest in LeBron than Crosby or McDavid.

To further expand a point you made, NHL being on ESPN helps but you can’t ignore how terrible NBC was broadcasting the games.

My point is since basketball is cheap to play, majority of teams and stars are domestic/American, it has a decent chance at passing MLB that the NHL never will.

The reasons it couldn’t that you brought up are valid, but they aren’t unique to the NBA. Look no further than MLB and Atlanta in the ASG.

The barriers to entry for basketball aren't costs - it's size and speed. It's so driven by physical traits that by the time you're in HS, unless you're playing at some small little rural school, you'd better be 6'2'' or be able to jump out of the gym.

Basketball weeds players out so quickly. Blink and you can't even be a backup wing anymore...

The TV Deal, or lack of one, may become the biggest issue as the parent company of Bally Sports may file for bankruptcy sometime this winter. It would affect 22 of the 30 teams.

https://theathletic.com/2952789/2021...upt-next-year/

BTW, teams like the Yankees, Red Sox, and Dodgers that would NOT be affected (OF COURSE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Bally almost seemed like it was trying to drive into a mountain. I assumed they had some 4D chess plan in place where they were going to drive fans towards a subscription model but as it turns out, they're just going to go dark altogether.

It's really been a disaster and its wholly of their own making. By all accounts the guy that led the charge to buy the regional networks just saw it as a chance to turn and burn for a quick buck and it all blew up on him when providers drew a line in the sand.

He overpaid for the product and they weren't going to subsidize his poor business decision so it all fell to hell.

My son is 16 and plays soccer at the club/competitive level. He has made me truly come to appreciate it. It’s not easy at all. Sure, anyone can get out on a field and kick a ball. But the balls skills, body skills, strategy and conditioning to be able to be truly good is unreal. Most people don’t have a true appreciation for what it takes to play soccer at a high level. They just see guys/girls kicking a ball around.

This is 100% correct.

As I noted, you have to have played it to have any appreciation for it at all. And again, youth participation rates in soccer are at best stagnant over the last 15 years or so. It leveled out and is actually well down from the mid-90s boom that yielded...nothing.

I'm not saying it isn't incredibly difficult. I'm saying that it doesn't translate to the layperson and I don't see any spike in youth participation on the horizon or some massive wave of converts to the sport.

I'm in the same category. I don't watch the NBA anymore as well. NBA took a major shit on main hard core sport watching demographic.

Yea. Your probably right. Honestly very tough for soccer to grab a foothold in the US because we have such a wide variety of sports and extracurriculars.

Soccer has a basketball trap in it.

As I said previously - the higher the level, the less exciting it can get. Look at a soccer player just out and about with a ball. Look at the footwork they can display and the juggling, ball placement, etc...

NONE of that happens in high level matches because it just doesn't work. Kick, chase, pass, setup, defend. Oh sure, you'll see a few little step over moves here and there, but the level of play is so high that those 'tricks' that these guys are capable of just get destroyed.

NBA is the same way. These guys are unbelievable. All of them. Even a big dumb oaf like Dwight Howard can do shit with a basketball that's incredible. And he can sink open 12 footers in a practice gym all day. But in the game, these guys are all so big and so athletic that if you try any of that Jayson Williams white chocolate shit, you'll get picked clean and look like a moron. That's why a lot of people prefer college ball - it's full of far lesser players but the style is typically more enjoyable.

In many ways, the higher the level, the less exciting the play for both soccer and basketball.

That's why it can't catch hold here. If the caliber of player in the MLS improves, the entertainment value of the product will decline for all those that aren't hardcore fans. And unlike basketball with the small courts and constant action, a lot of soccer is played at midfield where you're just kinda waiting for an announcer to raise his voice to alert you to the fact that something might be going on.

My wife played soccer her entire life. Played for one of the best public high schools in Kansas, and placed in state each year.

The issue for her (and her teammates) was that in order to compete at a high level and climb the ladder in the sport, you needed to commit to a traveling league and commit to playing year round - something her parents (and the parents at the public school) were typically unable to do because of geographical and cost barriers -- a problem even more pronounced for rural kids playing the game.

My wife, for fun, participated in an event in high school with other aspiring players who wanted to play in college. She said the gap between her and the students who played in year-long, traveling leagues, felt like the gap between her (a sophomore who played all her life) and a 5th grader. The year-round kids were in an entire other stratosphere. This was a really alienating process for a lot of her teammates and a few of her teammates actually lost interest in the game (when it was supposed to do the opposite) and many students ended up focusing on sports that had more upward mobility through the resources they had available at the high school. For soccer, universities really only had interest in the year-round players - and that barrier was obvious to anyone at that event.

My wife still played in club soccer all of college and her club team did well -- but the gap between club and the University Soccer Team was always that pronounced, and club, unlike the University teams (where students got scholarships), rarely got that support.

I would agree with this. And yes, Americans demand action and offense in their sports.

As a lifelong Angel fan that considers 2014 to be unspeakably painful, right back at ya. Meet me by the adalberto mondesi statue over in left field and we will discuss further.

My little cousin plays D1 soccer. She was on traveling club teams since she was an elementary. Thankfully our family could afford the travel and time. She played all over the US and even went overseas to play.

It's amazing what a golden ticket opportunity that can be. It's amazing to see their effect especially with the right coaches and team dynamic. I have a few students who do that for hockey and it's incredible watching their leaps in talent from 6th-8th grade.

Yeah, I worry about that a lot with gymnastics and baseball. For right now we're only going around Missouri but shit, that started in gymnastics when she was 6.

I played on a few traveling baseball teams as a kid but not enough of them. Part of it was just that I wasn't a great player and didn't really want to go to Texas to be a utility infielder and part-time catcher and maybe get 2 starts and 8-10 ABs over 4 days. I wasn't starting at a super-high level as it was.

But once my teammates started going to 2-3 times as many of those events as I did, they just tore away from me. By my last season I couldn't get on the field at all. And I was at least good enough to play on some traveling squads until my teens. That made me as good/better than 80% of the guys I was typically playing against (especially defensively). In 3 years I went from the no-doubt starting SS to a mopup player.

And that was in the mid 90s. It's orders of magnitude worse now. We weren't looking at traveling until 11-12 yrs old. They have 8-9 yr old traveling squads now. Shit, we were just happy throwing strikes at that age. Worse, many HS coaches have traveling teams they organize and if you're not on that team, it's damn near impossible to get any attention at the HS level unless you're just clearly better than everyone. If you're just a good player, that kid that traveled with your coach all season is gonna get more opportunity than you will.

But hell man, it's no better in basketball or football. All the organized sports have gone haywire in that regard. At least in Hockey you've gotta spend a billion dollars in year 1 so you kinda understand what you're getting into...

Crazy thing about her was on her high school team she was that man among boys or whatever analogy you want to use for girl's sports. But she would just kind of toy with high school play. She let her high school teammates do their thing and she would just take over when needed. Mainly bc she knew that the travel ball was her ticket.

That's a good point, I guess I've seen enough students in the tiny town I teach in get football scholarships in local colleges (non-D1) that it seems a bit more attainable than soccer and baseball -- but it's possible that's an anecdotal take on my end that isn't supported by data.

Well football scholarship is way more attainable because of the sheer roster sizes and physical bodies are of all sizes in football.

Theres even one guy here that bets on baseball so much that he has to file a special form on his taxes. Schedule C.

Are you seriously going to make the argument that football players can be any shape and size but baseball players need size to succeed?

David Eckstein must be a myth to you.

I was constantly undersized for my age playing youth sports. I found myself in a batters box a few times nonetheless. Know where I never found myself? On a D-Line.

I agree on all the points here. Soccer as a major sport overtaking the top 3 isn't happening in our lifetimes. I didn't understand why at the elite level they cant pass the ball to their teammate on the run and hit them in stride. Seems like a basic skill.

Cant play the outfield unless you can make a thrown into a base correctly. Can't play hockey unless you can pass the puck to a streaking teammate. Cant play QB unless you can throw to a spot on the field where your teammate will be eventually. Cant make passes in traffic in BB, your not handling the ball. etc. etc. So even the elite soccer players cant do this, so it must be hard. Still don't understand why its so hard....

Still think the hardest skill to excel at the elite level against is hitting a round ball with a round bat.

Maybe because I grew up playing baseball, but hitting a golf ball straight with a driver feels 10x harder.

Hockey. More specifically, stickhandling.

On skates at high speeds with people trying to hit you and you have to control a tiny little piece of vulcanized rubber while trying to move forward and avoid said people trying to hit you.

And then the guys that can take that same little piece of vulcanized rubber and deke a goalie to create a hole in these giant hockey pads and manage to snake the puck into said hole that's slightly bigger than a coffee cup....good lord.

The fact that these guys can take a cross ice pass at high-speed and just have it stick to their damn sticks somehow is amazing to me. Then to actually do something with it and control it the whole time. It's ridiculous.

At what point in that process was the puck curving in mid-air, looking like its gonna brain you, only for it to land in the strike zone and all your teammates laughing cause you cant hit a curve ball?

Dont even get me started on sliders.

Baseball will always be the premier skill sport and I wont have this hockey talk.

People are endlessly amazed by deflected goals in hockey, because of how much skill it must take to get the stick on the puck in mid-air. Guess what? That's every pitch in baseball.

Most hockey fans aren't all that amazed by deflections. They're just deflections and very few guys have the ability to actually control them (merely getting them on net is good enough).

As you're swinging at this ball, are you on ice-skates while moving at high speeds with large men trying to hit you while also hooking at you with sticks of their own? And again, do you have to keep a frozen hunk of rubber stuck to a stick as though it is on a string while all this is going on?

I mean you're really going to cite the fear factor of a curveball when trying to contrast it to hockey? Where guys actively put themselves in the path of pucks traveling at 100 mph?

Yes, I will cite the fear of a curveball cause I've had it happen when it doesn't curve and maintains its trajectory. One detached retina and a gaggle of wailing mothers later, a hockey player blocking a shot does not impress me.

Memo to MLB: Salary cap or GTFO.

Bryan Berard scoffs at a mere detached retina.

Shit, I can name 3 NHL players just off the top of my head that have had that or worse happen to them. Berard, MacInnis and Okposo.

Chris Pronger got hit in the chest with a puck and his heart stopped. This is a non-starter, man.

Blocking a shot - no worries:

<iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/4S1Dfs8hgR4" title="YouTube video player" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen></iframe>

Just love taps out there trying to gain possession...

<iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/C57NpdhJkUU?start=10" title="YouTube video player" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen></iframe>

I'm well aware of the dangers of skating near the boards. Are you aware of Ray Chapman?

Edited to add: I watched that full Chris Pronger video and that was rough. I'm glad he lived cause it looked dicey there. You made your point. Hockey is for tough guys, baseball is for skilled guys.

I will give you credit for one thing, DJ. You didnt bring up the Todd Bertuzzi incident. You could have, and it would have sent me into a frenzy, but you showed restraint.

Nah - Bertuzzi isn’t hockey anymore than Roger Clemens going roid ragey and throwing a bat at Piazza is baseball. That’s just a shithead being a shithead.

Bertuzzi can eat all the dicks.

And if Cecil Fielder and Tony Gwynn can be great at it while Babe Ruth’s fast ass set the standard for decades, just how skilled can it be?

It's on now. Steve moore shouldn't have thrown an illicit elbow into Markus Naslund's head, concussing him and ushering in paramedics.

But that done, he could have turned around and fought Bertuzzi with gloves off like a man. But he ducked and ran.

Nobody wanted anyone in a wheelchair, Bertuzzi included. But theres a code in the league and Steve Moore flaunted it.

Hey DJ, you follow the sport at all? There's a guy playing for Detroit, first name Tyler, middle name controversy, last name....you guessed it. Bertuzzi.

Moore was your average 4th line pest, no more, no less. He wasn’t even a Tom Wilson level goon. Just a fringe player who was going to bounce up amd down for a few years before vanishing. Leagues had 100s just like him.

Where in ‘the code’ is it okay to grab him from behind and give him a flying rabbit punch to the back of the dome and then drive him face first into the ice.

It was a bitch move by Bertuzzi. Criminal? No - but I couldn’t stand the guy before he did that because he loved toeing that line. But when he drove his forearm into the Moore’s neck into the ice, he very clearly crossed it.

Why dont the owner just stop offering the rediculous money. Set a private cap and stick with it.

I'll tell you exactly the moment Steve Moore went wrong when Todd challenged him to a fight. You gotta fight when that happens man. You cant run away. Moore tried to run away and the bloody aftermath ensued.

It never needed to happen.

They wont let me embed videos here cause they think I'm a Russian. I dont hide it though. This link right here is for you, DJ.

https://youtu.be/cYPnYf4MbQc

Pests don’t fight. That’s part of why guys like Tyson Nash and Mike Danton were so hated in the league. It’s why I hate faux tough guys like Steve Ott. But the league is full of em and always has been.

And yet, you don’t see shit like that happen ever. You catch a guy like that with his head down towards the end of a shift and you go ahead and take the interference penalty by smashing his ass into the boards. And then the whole team makes sure to finish every check he’s a part of.

But you don’t do what Bertuzzi did, turtling bitch or not. I’m not here to praise Steve Moore - I hate guys like him. But that’s not how it’s handled either.

You speak like Todd knew exactly what he was doing. All Todd knew was that its go time. Moore never getting up is the clarity of retrospection.

All Todd knew was that someone knocked out Naslund, and the Canucks never having enforcers, he took it upon himself.

Great hockey debate though. I didnt expect such discourse on a chiefs forum.

Baseball has killed their pipeline of fans by blacking out games to potential young fans. Screw them all, donate your money to local sports programs. Go to the kids games and cheer the athletes playing for sport.

https://dkpittsburghsports.com/2021/...-salary-cap-dk

This article makes a bunch of great points about small market teams and a salary cap.

Here's what I think the master plan is. Expand the playoffs so everyone makes it. Now, why bother spending incremental money for a slight upgrade? Could be the 2 seed but we'll be fine with the 10 seed, or whatever.

But I gotta say Mr Suze. I question the credibility of your source when he casually throws in "Cole would follow Boras off a cliff". That's a bit rich. That's editorializing.

He is one of the best writers from Pittsburgh.

No, the writer is right. He covers the Pirates. Cole does whatever Boras wants. He saw it firsthand.

Being the best writer from Pittsburgh is a bit like being the smartest kid in special ed class, it would seem.