ZoomSlowik

I don't have enough people on this site for another one, so anyone still interested in joining a league can play in this one: League ID: 145728 password: dabulls Draft is set for Saturday night at 9:30.

QUOTE(Chisoxfn @ Oct 25, 2006 -> 11:43 AM) It would be on different than any fantasy team you've ever had where you take a bunch of young players with potential and go on to finish in the cellar (or apparently kind of how you run your DPPL team or whatever its called). Heads wishes he had Milledge. It's not a case of him having young players, it's him having a lack of talent. Anyways, on to the original thing. Heilman is probably a better fit for what we'd want, even though Milledge is a sexier name. If we can't find a more dependable option in LF though I'd consider it, the kid is quite talented.

QUOTE(Wedge @ Oct 24, 2006 -> 10:14 PM) Notre Dame has done just as much as Florida and Tennessee that they are a top 10 team. You're kidding yourself if you think otherwise. Texas with the impressive win against Nebraska. Florida with the impressive win versus... nobody. Oh please, take off the homer-glasses. ND has defeated one team with less than 3 losses so far, and that's from some mediocre conferences. Plus 3 of those wins were less than impressive. Florida had a convincing win against a 6-2 LSU team that would have one or no losses in any other conference and beat a 6-1 Tennessee team on the road. Tennessee absolutely destroyed a 7-1 Cal team that just might win the Pac-10 and had a convincing win at Georgia, who is 6-2. Auburn has wins against LSU and Florida. Even Texas at least beat Oklahoma and Nebraska. The best Notre Dame can claim is a win over 5-2 Georgia Tech, and all they really have is a win over an equally overrated Virginia Tech team. If Charlie Weis didn't have a four-leaf clover up his fat ass they could easily be 3-4 against a rather mediocre schedule. You could make a decent case that a few more teams should be ahead of them...

I figured he'd get 10 games, and quite possibly a 1st semester suspension like Marcus Williams last year. That definitely makes life easier for the team, though they still need a couple of guys to step up and be more dependable than they have been in the past...

QUOTE(CanOfCorn @ Oct 23, 2006 -> 03:16 PM) Take LaMarcus Aldridge out of that, he was hurt a good chunk of his freshman season and didn't really help the 'Horns all that much. I don't consider an injury as a reason someone stays for their sophomore season...in other words, if he was healthy, he was gone. Well, I was just saying you never know what can happen. Even before he got hurt he wasn't playing THAT well, and was probably a borderline lottery pick instead of the top-5 he expected. Yes, Rose and Gordon both appear to be one-and-done's, but strange things have happened before.

QUOTE(whitesoxfan101 @ Oct 22, 2006 -> 01:13 PM) I'd agree 99 percent of the time, but these 2 are 2 of the best guards to come along in a decade, and are top 5 locks. And I'd be saying this even if both went to Illinois btw. While that might be true, Charlie Villanueva, LaMarcus Aldridge, Darius Washington and Malik Hairston all probably thought they'd be one and done as well just to name a few. Those guys were rated just as high. You never know.

QUOTE(CanOfCorn @ Oct 20, 2006 -> 12:49 PM) Just a question: With Gordon now an IU commit, do the Illini go hard after Mayo? That's highly unlikely. Mayo has shown little to no interest in Illinois.

Alright, here's what I did. I put together this roster with the following rule for myself: no starting position players or starting pitchers could still be on pre-arbitration/extension deals. Therefore: Position players: C- Victor Martinez- 800k 1B- Albert Pujols- $15 mil 2B- Tadahito Iguchi- $2.4 mil SS- Michael Young- $3 mil 3B- Joe Crede- $2.65 mil LF- Carl Crawford- $2.5 mil CF- Grady Sizemore- 500k RF- Vladimir Guerrero- $12.5 mil DH- Travis Hafner- $2.6 mil bench Brian McCann- $333k Chone Figgins- $2.25 mil Matt Holliday- $500k Vernon Wells- $4.3 mil Orlando Hudson- $2.3 mil Pitchers #1 starter- John Santana- $9 mil #2- Carlos Zambrano- 6.5 mil #3- Jake Peavy- $2.5 mil #4- John Lackey- $3.76 mil #5- Brandon Webb- $2.5 mil closer- Joe Nathan- $3.75 mil lefty setup- Matt Thorton- $355k righty setup- Bobby Jenks- $340k middle reliever- Joel Zumaya- $327k middle reliver- Juan Rincon- $900k long reliever- Erik Bedard- $1.4 mil total= $82.965 mil I could tweak it a little more, but I've done enough.

Mine will definitely be forth-coming, I already have a ton of ideas... Edit- I think I might do 2: one without rookie and one with them. The second one is kind of easy...

Draft is in 20 minutes!

Yeah, I love this so far, the bastard I'm playing has 11 goals and 11 assists in 2 days.

QUOTE(beautox @ Oct 17, 2006 -> 01:25 PM) Fair enough he will be making 1/2 of his starts in the (Bronx#27), but he will have to pitch at the Rogers Centre(#7), Tropicana Field(#11), Fenway(#13), Camden Yards(#17) while facing a DH in a superior league. His ERA will go up .5-1.5 brining his ERA to 4-5.5, and i imagine his BB rate would stay the same while his SO rate would drop down a significant amount. Park Factor Link But do you really put Zambrano on the same level as Johan? On pure talent I think he is on the same level as Johan, but he is a head case that walks too many guys. I think in the AL he'd post an ERA somewhere between about 3.75 and 4.25, with a WHIP in the high 1.2's and a similar strikeout total. That's roughly what C.C. Sabathia gives you, which is still pretty solid. I have a hard time seeing him post low-3 ERA's in the AL with that many walks though. I can't put too much stock in his AL numbers because not only is that a rather limited sample size, it's against a lot of good hitting teams in some hitting-heavy parks. There's not a single Tampa Bay or Kansas City in there. His numbers will suffer a bit going from the NL to the AL, but he's definitely better than guys like Beckett and Burnett, and he doesn't have anywhere near their injury history.

QUOTE(sox4lifeinPA @ Oct 17, 2006 -> 10:43 AM) can someone PM me if there's a spot open for a league? I'll do it, but no open spots right now.

QUOTE(Buehrle>Wood @ Oct 16, 2006 -> 08:31 PM) I just don't see why they are in such bad shape. They have arguably the best defensive team in the country with Frazier, Randle, Pruitt, and McBride on the floor. With the little scoring they'll need, they should be able to get from Jamar Smith, McBride and Pruitt. Their major problems are will be foul problems and the lack of a star player. Illinois is extremly deep, but they simply don't have anyone who has shown the ability to take over a game. One major problem with that is McBride is suspended indefinitely. I don't see how they're that deep. They have exactly 4 players that have gotten significant playing time on the college level, and one of them is McBride. They'll still need to score about 70 a game to win consistently (basically what they did last year), and I'm not sure where they are going to get all those points. Even assuming that Smith averages 15, Randle and Pruitt averages 12, and McBride comes back and averages 12 a game, they'd need 19 from everyone else, and they don't exactly have a whole lot of firepower off the bench this year. IMO those are pretty optomistic projections for those guys too. I expect them to end up as like a 6 or 7 seed, which means they will run into a pretty solid team in the 2nd round. I gotta admit, I didn't realize that they don't play at OSU or Wisconsin. That will help. Still, they could easily end up as a 5 seed, which doesn't make the draw that much easier.

QUOTE(Buehrle>Wood @ Oct 16, 2006 -> 08:21 PM) Quoted for emphasis later. And if Illinois is in as much trouble as you think, well, then the Big ten conference is in MAJOR trouble. They are going to need a really sweet draw and some guys stepping up. ESPN had them at 33, and that's with McBride on the roster. I think that's a pretty fair assessment. They need at least 3 guys to step up and be double digit scorers, and the only guy they still have that did it last year got suspended. One of two things will have to happen to change my mind: Randle becoming a star or someone like Carter, Brock or Carlwell stepping up and being a key piece to the team. They'll do okay in the Big Ten and should still be tough at home, but the tourney is another story. Not really. They have two potential top-10 teams in Wisconsin and Ohio State, that's more than most conferences can say. Plus Michigan and Penn State also have some talent, and Illinois isn't a total dog.

QUOTE(TaylorStSox @ Oct 16, 2006 -> 08:10 PM) I dig what you're saying but recruits don't make you elite. Results make you elite. It wasn't like Smith was an unknown. He committed early to Bruce Weber. There's not enough sex appeal for the "guru's" to raise him in the rankings. Rankings are subjective bulls*** that, outside of the top 20, are rarely accurate. IMO, the Illini have the potential to be a S16, or better, team right now. That's all I care about. Fifteen years ago, none of this bulls*** would have been said. Computer nerds weren't obsessing about player rankings. They were watching games, and Bruce Weber wins the majority of them. Recruits and results are usually linked, that's part of the point. I don't see how they are going to make the Sweet 16 this year. They didn't make it last year and they lost by far their best two players. They lack depth and have issues at point guard. They simply have very few proven players, which is generally a big problem. Plus McBride might not even be there, who knows what happens with that. Smith and Pruitt should be good and Randle is decent, but they're going to need more than that.

QUOTE(TaylorStSox @ Oct 16, 2006 -> 07:44 PM) Here's the thing though, Williams and Cook were not Self's recruits. Mcbride and Randle were Self's recruits. Dee is the exception. Deron wasn't too far off from McCamey. Wasn't Brock a 4 star on Scout? I thought he was. Those two players are still better than anything Weber has signed. Augustine was also a better recruit, he was somewhere in the 60's. Regardless of that, Weber has exactly 2 4-stars that he signed on this team which is still less than Self. Plus those 2 4-stars he signed were 78 and 77 (and McCamey pending), which isn't that close to what Self did, and he's already been at Illinois just as long. Even ignoring stars, the best Weber has come up with so far is a 8-point per game SG and a 6.2 point 5.1 rebound PF. Not exactly stellar results there. Weber has a good record, but how well do you think he'd have done if Self didn't leave him Brown, Williams, and Augustine? That'd be a totally different team if he were following a coach that couldn't recruit. Plus Smith isn't really a factor of the system, he's an obvious miss by the recruiting community. He's obviously a good athlete and a great shooter, he'd do well in a lot of places. I'm not arguing that Weber is a bad coach, he's clearly pretty solid. However, he needs someone to help him with his recruiting if they want to keep their recent success going.

QUOTE(TaylorStSox @ Oct 16, 2006 -> 07:21 PM) Recruits that were subpar when measured by your "elite" standards. Let's not act like Self was the be all/end all of recruiting. Most of his recruits were 4 star guys. Weber's recruiting hasn't been as good, but it certainly isn't off by much. I respect Weber's ability to evaluate talent. He took a chance on Jamar Smith who has proved that some "gurus" are absolutely clueless. Semrau and Carlwell weren't chumps in the rankings and from all reports seem to be pretty good players with alot of upside. Frazier can run a team, plays great defense and is tough as nails. Ironically, the one rated higher than the rest (aside from Carlwell) has been a disappointment (Brock). Cole and Tisdale might not be big names, but they seem to fit Weber's system well-bigs that see the floor well, shoot and block shots. On a side note, recruting reminds me prospect evaluating. The guys that seem to really be into recruiting/prospect evaluating always seem to think that the minor league guy is better than his major league counterpart. I prefer winners over those guys that look sexy on a stat sheet. Frank Williams, Cook, and Brown were McDonald's All-Americans, and Deron Williams was a top-50 recruit. How is that not elite talent? Those are your 4 most important players from the last 5 years. Brock was a 3-star, that's not higher than the rest of them. McBride and Randle were by far the best recruits during Weber's tenure, and Self actually did most of the work with that class. Smith was a good find, but you're not going to get too many 3-stars that play like that early in their career. Pruitt is the only other Weber recruit that has shown anything so far.

QUOTE(Soxbadger @ Oct 16, 2006 -> 06:40 PM) doctor, A lot of times I think 5 star recruits actually set a program back. They come in for 1-2 years and then leave. The coach has no time to adopt to their playing style and really get the team going. That is why many times these "vet" teams take out the diaper dandies. Im not an Illini fan, but honestly I just cant understand why so many people are down on Weber. He may not be the greatest recruiter, but so far his teams have done well. Isnt that all that matters? Self has recruited like a champ but has bombed in the tourney. Which would you prefer? Well, so far Illinois has been winning with Weber's coaching but Self's recruits. His own signees have been much less impressive. On the other hand, Self has had a team that suffered from some lackluster recruiting towards the end of Williams' tenure, and his best players were underclassmen that he recruited. We shall see what he does over the next couple of years with the talent that he has accumulated.

QUOTE(Soxbadger @ Oct 16, 2006 -> 03:30 PM) Zoom I agree that Wisconsin is not a top 5 program, or even a top 10 program yet. What I disagree with is that you have to have the best recruits to make the final four. The person said that without top recruits they would never get anywhere near the final 4. That is far different from saying that without elite recruits you will never have an elite program, which I agree with. I just disagree that you have to have great recruits to make the final 4, and I think the last 8 years of final fours affirms my statement. I don't think you absolutely need top recruits to make the Final Four, but they definitely help a lot, and I think to be a consistent Final Four threat you do need the elite recruits (or at least a good number of good recruits). You can only do so much by finding hidden gems and coaching well. As I said before, I think without those elite recruits you need to have at least a few things go your way to make it that deep. Without looking at all the brackets, I'd say that your average Final Four has at least one recruiting powerhouse, one solid but not stellar program in recruiting (ie Louisville/Illinois), another team from one of those two groups, and another smaller/mediocre recruiting school (Wisconsin, George Mason, Marquette). For a while there it looked like Illinois might be gaining ground toward becoming an elite program, but life should get a little more difficult. The lowest seed they've had the last few years is a 5, and that'll change. I expect them to get a few more 6-9 seeds the next few years, which will make it harder to make a deep run in the tourney. They should still get a few good years when they have veteran teams and/or when they have some success with individual players, but I don't expect them to consistently be 5 seeds or higher anymore.

QUOTE(Soxbadger @ Oct 16, 2006 -> 03:06 PM) Before I start researching, what would you call a "other programs" that I would need to compare how deep they went with. If you are referring to UNC and Duke, then you are probably correct. But most programs would like the following: Wisconsin has been sweet 16 or higher: 2005 (elite 8) 2003 (Sweet 16) 2000 (Final 4) To count: MSU 4 appearances Florida 2 appearances UNC 2 appearances Uconn 2 appearances Most teams would take your 1 FF every 4 years. I would say those teams (minus Florida, not that consistent), and notice each of those other ones has a national championship during that stretch. That earns them some extra points in my book. Plus UNC's resume would be better if not for Doherty (though he did recruit those stars). I would also include Kentucky, although they are in a bit of a down-slide. However, it wasn't that long ago that they made three consecutive title game appearances and won two titles. Kansas fit in too pre-Self, though they've had some clunkers in the tourney. We'll see what happens this year. Arizona also has had some solid runs with a title, a finals appearance, and another Elite 8 appearance I believe. Yeah, everyone has a few bad years here and there, but I'd say those schools have a better tournament resume in the last 10 years or so than Wisconsin. If you go deep 3 years in a row and then miss it for 5 years, that still averages out to almost a 50% hit rate, they don't necessarily all have to come in a row. Plus I would argue that over the next few years UCLA and OSU have a major chance to join this list. If Florida lives up to expectations this year they could also join that group. I never said Wisconsin was a bad program. They've done pretty well, but they're not quite what I would call an elite program. They're not exactly a perrenial top-3 seed, though they do have a good tournament record. Illinois has been an elite program over the last 5 years or so with a finals appearance, an Elite 8, and a Sweet 16, but I have doubts that they'll keep it up. Also, I said that they'll probably have A CHANCE at the Final Four every 4 years or so on average, not that they would make it.

QUOTE(Soxbadger @ Oct 16, 2006 -> 01:55 PM) Your right a team like Wisconsin who never gets the big name recruits never has been in the Final Four in the last 10 years. Oh wait... Bruce Weber just needs to look at how Bo Ryan wins at Wisconsin for his blueprint. He may not get the best recruits, but he makes the most out of what he gets. I would rather have a guy who is a general on the floor, than a salesman in the living room. Wisconsin is the one major exception I can think of. Obviously they have had good coaching, and IMO their system helps them a lot because they can get solid production from a lot of "tweener" players offensively like Alando Tucker and Mike Wilkinson. Those guys typically aren't recruited that heavily. However, you also can't quite call Wisconsin a national power. They are a successful program, but they don't go as deep in the tournament quite as frequently as those other programs, and IIRC their two major runs also came as lower seeds (I think a 9 and a 6?). Even they've started recruiting fairly well, Butch was a McD's All-American and Krabbenhoft, Stiemsma, Gavinski and Hughes were all fairly highly rated at one point or another (plus Leuer and Nankivil for next year). A lot of teams can make one good run when they have a veteran team, but the question is whether or not they can consistently make Sweet 16 or better appearances. Coming off their recent stretch Illinois probably should have been better positioned to do that than they currently are. They're going to need underclassmen to start stepping up in the near future, and that's hard to do when you don't recruit as well. I think Illinois can still be a successful program, but they're going to need to recruit better to join the elite. With the way their recent recruiting has gone I'd say they'll have a shot at the Final Four roughly once evey 4 years unless things pick up.

The moral of this story is that verbal commitments mean basically nothing. They simply aren't binding, so you shouldn't get too excited if a stud verbals to your school, especially early in the recruiting phase. There's no guarantee that they will be there until they sign the LOI. Gordon is the 4th big time recruit I know of this year that has changed his commitment (Bayliss from Texas to Arizona, Beasley from Charlotte to K-State, Pope decommit from Pitt). These things are so informal that I don't know how you could really be pissed at Sampson at this point. All Gordon has to say is that he's going to Illinois and it's the end of the story. If a coach wants to waste his time recruiting a committed player that's his own problem, and for guys as good as the ones I mentioned it might be worth the risk. Until the NCAA makes a rule preventing such a practice, I don't see a problem with it. On another note, FWIW there was a blurb in The Sporting News like a month ago saying that Gordon had decommitted from Illinois. However, since there is no official paperwork or anything, who knows or cares. It's been pretty obvious for some time that he wasn't a lock to go to Illinois anymore...

I set mine up with 2 QB's too. I thought it balanced things out a little more, with a heavier reliance on QB's and a slightly lower emphasis on RB's. However, it just doesn't work too well. If you're one of the 4 teams that gets stuck with only two starting quarterbacks, you're in trouble, especially if injuries hit. You can get away with it with RB's because there are platoons and backups still get touches, but not so with quarterbacks. No more of that in the future.

QUOTE(Buehrle>Wood @ Oct 15, 2006 -> 09:58 PM) Illinois' roster: Richard McBride- 4 Star propect, top 100 recruit Brian Randle- 4 star prospect, top 100 recruit Warren Carter- 4 star prospect, top 100 recruit Calvin Brock- 4 star prospect, top 100 rectcruit Shaun Pruitt- 4 star prospect, top 100 recruit Brian Carwell- 4 star prospect, top 100 recruit Richard Semrau(preinjury)- 5 star prospect, top 20 recruit Of the other 3 players on their roster since day one who are not top 100 recruits, two of them are expected to start this year with one of them being arguably the team's best player. The third was a top 100 football player coming out of high school. The moral here, obviously, is that Illinois has done a horrible job of bringing players into the program, and are deeply screwed. And two of those guys don't see the floor a whole lot, McBride is strictly a jumpshooter (though he does play decent defense), Randle isn't much more than an athlete, and Semrau's contributions are a bit more dubious since the injury. (Rivals has/had Brock as a 3-star by the way) Plus only McBride was a top-50 recruit, with Randle being the only other one higher than 75 (53). There's a big difference between top 50 and top 100, just about any big and/or athletic player can sneak into the last 20 or so of the top 100. Saying they are screwed is a bit of a stretch, but I'll be very surprised if they make the 2nd weekend of the tournament. I like Pruitt and Smith, and Randle is decent, but that's a long way from being a real threat to make some noise.