This Bar is closed. You don’t have to go home, but you can’t stay here.
We have 2 choices:
- Turn off all comments on posts other than “The Bar” and keep “The Bar” as an active thread for a few days then open another one.
- Allow all posts to have comments and open up a Game thread for every game.
I’ll keep comments open here, but people need to understand that the “way it was” wasn’t an option any longer. It was an antiquated system 15 years behind the times that wasn’t going to work with any upgrade…and we needed to upgrade.
Speak up if you want a say in the new system. I’ll do what the majority wants.
Test
I have difficulty accessing the bar. In fact, since the reboot, it’s been challenging accessing Braves Journal.
Thankfully I can read the recaps when they appear in my email. I miss the comments but survive.
If those are the only two options, I would choose #2. Things just get lost “in the wash” with a catch all. As I mentioned in the bar thread, I appreciate the new content but what we really want to discuss are the games and after in the recap threads. News like call ups, DFAs, injury reports, etc. have always made it into those threads because we pay attention. From experience (here and elsewhere), threads will live or die by interest. I’m sure we all understand that it is no easy thing to rebuild from the ground up, but I guess I’d say understand the audience. We’re just here to talk about the Braves, how much we hate the LolMets and Philthies, how great is it that we are 3 runs up right now (and Murphy just got his first hit for us!) and drinking Keystone Lite…something about Metallica…oh, hell, others help me with that and there is no search function. 😉
I’ll reiterate, I get what you are trying to accomplish, Ryan. Awesome vision but don’t forget what DOES work.
As a lurker and extremely rare commenter, I like the comments in the posts and the game thread. However, I am good with the bar – but like coop said, I’ve had difficulty accessing the bar during this experiment.
Option one for me as long as the tech issues are resolved for the others (everything is good on my end).
How about this Dodd guy? Looks like he’s not a dud.
Like all new things, it can take some getting used to. From the two options above, I’d choose #2, but I can get used to the first option if the Bar threads update regularly.
I’m open. Ryan’s put a ton of work into the new site so I appreciate all the efforts into keeping this place running. It ain’t easy.
Austin sometimes makes it look like it is, though. And good for Dodd – the Cards don’t just have hateable faces, they have a sneaky good lineup. And Jordan Walker went to Decatur High School! Anyone here watch him play?
I’d pick option 2.
From my brief glance at Shuster and Dodd, Dodd appears to have better stuff. Shuster kind of was Kolby Allard 2.0.
The problem with option 1 has totally been me. I was manually going back to turn off comments for all threads when I found out there was a way to turn them all off automatically and only turn the few on for the bar.
If people are ok with that, the system will work correctly very soon. It was just a learning curve.
To me, this is your core statement, and you should do whatever is proving to move Braves Journal to where you want it to be.
‘It’s my opinion that people revisit blogs for 2 reasons:
1. Because the writing and information is good.
2. To create online bonds with people through a common interest.”
I felt like we had those 2 things covered already.
What I don’t know anything about is website analytics. I assume you have some kind of analytic approach to whatever metrics you think are important, and after a fair chance for us to adjust to the changes and for you and your team to refine them, see if they’re moving in the right direction.
It’s not unusual to take a step backwards on the change curve before going forward. What to be nervous about is sometimes you take a step backwards and never recover.
Anyway, I guess what I’m trying to say is we’re all pulling for you.
I really appreciate that Rusty.
Arcia has been smooth as silk at short.
He has validated their trust in him. I was worried about him defensively, but he looks great.
As usual, Rusty has said what I wanted to say, but more clearly than I would have. We appreciate you, Ryan.
As to the options, I’m a dinosaur, and this is the only board I participate in, so take what I say with a grain of salt. I do think having just one place for comments (the Bar) can work once we get used to it.
ACUNAAAAAA
What a throw by Ronald!
I was gone, what happened with Pillar?
They made a pitching change and we pinch hit Rosario to get the platoon advantage.
And Eddie obliged with a couple of hits
They say if you ever want a ton of unsolicited advice about running a bar, you should try opening a bar. In that spirit, first off, I really appreciate all that y’all are doing here in terms of keeping this place going & also trying to find a way to keep it fresh & sustainable. I know it’s a ton of work, and the writing has been great.
I have heard similar things from other folks over the years, but this site is the one and only part of the internet where I actually look forward to reading the comments. If we end up moving away from the Bar, and this higher level of regular content sustains, I wonder if it’d be possible to pin the latest recap & the latest gamethread to the top of the homepage; I would figure those would (maybe?) be the most heavily commented-upon articles on a daily basis, and that would make sure the most active conversations are easily accessible upon visiting the site, which is the biggest thing for me. (I get my breaking-Braves-news either from the comments here or elsewhere on the internet; I come here for the writing and the conversation.)
For me, also, while I’ve been enjoying all the new writing, I wouldn’t necessarily need the news about, for example, selecting Dodd’s contract & DFA’ing Luplow, to exist as its own post… for the sake of conversational continuity, I wonder if content like that, especially shorter posts of that kind, might could perhaps be consolidated together into something like a regular news & notes post that could also serve as a gamethread?
Regardless, though, appreciate all that y’all are doing, and whatever happens, I’m good with. Cardinals (and Chip) delenda est.
I like the idea about the smaller news, roster moves, transactions, etc. I would be curious to hear more ideas batted around about this. I see other sites post regular articles regarding these things and I generally click on them but I understand your view of it not warranting a post on its own. We’re just trying to get content to you guys and boost engagement across the board.
If Rosario could be a better than league average LF, between offense and defense, this year, that would be really really awesome.
Honestly either option works if all the quality-of-life glitches are ironed out. I just think the home page needs some more thought. It’s hard to find the game thread. It’s been hard to find the bar – and the title of the bar thread is ever-changing. There’s a bunch of wasted space at the top, and at the bottom left there’s links to BJ posts from 2007. You want it to look like the site is active and there’s a vibrant community. It’s not there yet. A bunch of articles with “0 comments” is a bad look, in my humble opinion.
This might could be a pretty good team.
By the way, I just saw Algiers tonight. Really good band.
Besides the quality of content, the thing that distinguishes this site from others is the quality of the conversation. Whatever the flaws of the old format, it was relatively easy to follow the conversation. I think either the bar concept or allowing comments in all posts can work if you also make it easy to find comments added since last visit. My suggestion is to make the latest comments section on the home page scrollable with a larger number of entries, AND that if you click on an entry it takes you to that comment within the relevant post (which it does not seem to do from my experience; it takes you to the top of the post where the comment resides). As a regular reader, this is WAY more important to me than having boxes showing “most popular” or “most highly rated” posts.
The latest posts links should also be scrollable rather than having a relatively small number of posts displayed. If you’ve been away for a while, there is no good way to quickly find what you might have missed.
Anyone notice what Soroka did tonight at Gwinnett. He’s coming back. And Dodd was fantastic; he looks like the second coming of Ian Anderson, though. It took Anderson two years to implode. I do agree that Dodd looked better than Shuster. I am currently loving the depth, though. Elder may be the second coming of Bryse Wilson. I hope better.
As long as our guys keep hitting, the pitchers will have more room to figure things out. I am so excited about this season. Tonight’s team looked every bit the part of a championship team.
Oh, and I’ll take Nick Anderson over Joe Jimenez, too. I hope Jimenez figures things out and becomes what we bought.
I’m here whatever path we take
I too had trouble accessing the new site to start with (“old” site in favourites wouldn’t work, Google didn’t work, all very strange) but now it’s all good
And I’m always happy to go to the bar…
From fangraphs overnight?
Ryan, appreciate the job you’ve been doing and your vision for the best place on the web. I enjoy the new format especially on the mobile phone. The new navigation and look takes some time getting used to but I very much like that it looks modern now.
As others mentioned before, people come here to read the posts and to read the comments. That’s what I do and no matter what format works for the majority, there will be always the brilliant content. I enjoy the bar comment-only idea but whatever is decided, it will work for me. Thank you for everything you do, Ryan.
No question. The bar’s lease is not being renewed.
Please.
What if the game threads were the Bar? That is the place we always spent the most time discussing all the stories and the current game.
Soroka had a solid first start last night. 3.2 IP, 0 BB, 3 K, and 1 run on a solo homer.
Oh my God, Sandy Alcantara threw a 100-pitch complete game in under two hours.
That’s it – I’m calling it here. Baseball in 2023 is good.
Yeah I ran into the “old bookmark” issue as well. “bravesjournal.us” no longer works … that might be blocking at least some of the old regulars here.
Yeah, I felt like I wandered through a maze to get here. Keep striving . . . .