Back and forth: MLB rejects player plan

MLB rejects players’ plan for a 114-game season
Daryl Van Schouwen, Chicago Sun-Times

If Major League Baseball and its players take the field for a coronanvirus-delayed 2020 season, it will be after acrimonious negotiations that resemble their labor war of a generation ago.

As much as everyone wants to avoid connecting the coronavirus-delay negotiations with the new labor pact negotiations after 2021, the two issues are intertwined. And the notion that MLB will not make a counterproposal in order to preserve their right to a 50-ish game season is ... not promising.

2020 MLB Draft: With only five picks, pressure's on White Sox to get them right
Vinnie Duber, NBC Sports Chicago

It’s no breaking news that the White Sox haven’t always hit on their top draft picks in the last 20 years.

Despite the lede, this is mostly a pro-Sox take on the draft, when such a take is ... pushing it. However, Chuck Garfien’s podcast with Jim Callis regarding the draft is embedded at the end, so check that out.

Andrew Perez's diary: Paciencia y fe
Andrew Perez, South Side Hit Pen at Sports lllustrated

The relationship with my grandma was an extremely important part of my life. Ana Rosa, my mom's mother, lived at home with us. She had a remarkable impact on who I am today.

Throughout the ups and downs of life, she would preach and practice calm and patience. She had a way about her, she lived that philosophy. Whether I was in school, playing baseball, or living life, she would instill that “patience and faith” is such an important way to confront the choices that I make on a daily basis. She was able to teach this within my entire family, and her powerful words influenced my own parents, and trickled down from them to myself and my sisters.

This is a pretty cool take from Andrew on some unexpectedly poignant advice. And wait’ll you get a line on his awful college debut!

Morning Music
How about some beauty, at the end of a pretty ugly week?

There is no greater voice, in rock, folk, whatever — pop music — than Joni Mitchell. And by voice, that’s the literal voice, which is pretty otherworldly, but also the lyric itself.

If you don’t know Joni, please listen, because “All I Want” is sheer beauty. And if you do know her, take a listen/look at the second video, which is just a spontaneous read of the song before it was finished ... an almost completely different song. And absolutely remarkable.