Jake

QUOTE (Bruce_Blixton @ Mar 20, 2015 -> 08:26 PM) Hahn has done an amazing job locking in a great core of players so far, Sale, Quintana, Abreu and now Eaton, this has to make a pretty persuasive case for Samardzjia to sign an extension before the end of the year. Also I'd love to see Hahn sign Avi to an extension on the heels of this one. Great time to be a Sox fan right now, I haven't been this optimistic since the offseason before the 2006 season. I would definitely not want to sign Avi to a long-term deal at this point. I like him a lot, but it's really up in the air whether he's going to be a full-time player in the long term

A public university also has a responsibility to foster a safe and effective learning environment for their students. A horde of men shouting about lynching n-words could reasonably interfere with that enough to forfeit whatever free speech rights they might otherwise enjoy. Thinking of what I know about 1st amendment rights in schools, which is superficial, Oklahoma may have solid legs to stand on. Precedent suggests that restrictions on speech are acceptable under certain conditions: 1. Disruption - fairly straightforward. Will the speech act cause significant disruption/distraction that is detrimental to the overall atmosphere? There's certainly a case to be made that this case is highly disruptive, though it is interesting in that it probably would not have been without the distribution of the video. I could see some legal twists and turns over that aspect. 2. Offensiveness - how contrary to generally accepted standards is the speech act? It is currently part of the precedent that schools have some authority and responsibility to teach students moral values in the broad sense. In this sense, speech that is entirely contrary to even the most broadly conceived moral consensus can be restricted. I think this case fits this standard best. 3. Interference with school's goals - does the speech make it more difficult for the school to achieve its mission? A legal precedent involved a school's ability to prevent the display of a banner encouraging drug use, which was deemed too contrary to part of the school's aims (preventing unhealthy and illegal lifestyles). The Oklahoma case is fairly weak on this aspect. The restriction wouldn't have to satisfy all three of those and the SCOTUS could dismantle the existing paradigm as well, potentially. Another circumstantial aspect is the extent to which the speech may be conceived as endorsed by the school. So, for instance, a student having a private phone conversation leaked and getting expelled for what he or she said is different from the student getting expelled for the content of his or her valedictory speech. The Oklahoma incident happened as part of a fraternity event, so you have students acting in their capacities as members of a school-sanctioned organization at a school-sanctioned event. There are definitely some ingredients there for that aspect as well. Alright, time for me to disengage my armchair lawyering.

One odd aspect of this case: the arresting officers are from Virginia's Department of Alcohol Control. Apparently these folks just stand outside bars in college towns like this and try to catch people being turned away at the door. A couple years ago they made headlines for pulling a gun on a girl who had sparkling water that officers thought was beer. http://thinkprogress.org/justice/2015/03/1...artese-johnson/ The victim/suspect is claiming that he was not in possession of a fake ID. He says that he was asked for his home ZIP code by a bar employee, so he provided his mother's current ZIP. This did not match the ZIP on his ID, which does not have the same address as his mother's current address. His ID was an Illinois one, which is where he and mother are from, which is probably what roused suspicion in the first place. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/03/19/m..._n_6906044.html With that said, I don't believe he is 21 and he was standing outside of the bar at 12:30 AM. On the other hand, it is very close to the school. Tough to say exactly what was going on - it always is. What I haven't heard much about is eyewitness testimony. There were certainly people there, you can see all kinds of people walking by in the video. Someone not directly involved must have seen the way things progressed?

Tough to tell what happened, especially at the beginning of the encounter. They were obviously overzealous in the way they were holding him to the ground and such, but I've come to expect that sort of thing and it alone isn't especially newsworthy

If he can get his K rate below 25% in AA this year I'll be tickled s***less

I think you shortchange Sanchez a bit. I would not put him in with Bonifacio and Beckham as you do, calling them "known commodities." This works both for and against Sanchez. If Sanchez is anything like the (younger-than-Johnson) guy he was last year in AAA, which seems to be ruled out as an impossibility by most, he'd be an excellent choice at 2B and would never get pushed off the spot except to (possibly) move to SS. There's intriguing upside with Sanchez and, more importantly, a fair amount of mystery. More nit-picky, I think Johnson having "far more speed" than Sanchez is probably a stretch. Maybe not literally so much as the extent to which it makes for a meaningful difference between these two players. I'm also inclined to believe that Sanchez is such a far superior defender to Johnson that this aspect is not being adequately considered, but I'll admit to seeing very little of Johnson's D. More generally, I'm concerned about Johnson's poor production in AAA and his general up-and-down production that is typically only "up" when his age compares favorably with his competition. I also think that a bad run in MLB is not harmless, but rather that a stretch of really poor play in MLB can really hurt a player's development and confidence. Likewise, even if the bad play doesn't do it, the demotion can do it. Sanchez has nothing to prove in MiLB so I don't see a great reason to protect him from MLB failure at this juncture.

QUOTE (Jose Abreu @ Mar 18, 2015 -> 01:51 PM) This is what I meant, I didn't think we'd need 5 starters until mid to late April. I don't think we normally roll that way, instead using the extra days off to keep guys healthy. Plus, this lets you look at both Penny and Noesi. If Noesi really implodes early, you might have the opportunity to yank him for a known quantity without missing a beat.

Gordon is just pointless. He can play mediocre defense and mediocre offense. I actually think it's up for discussion whether he provides more value than Leury would. Leury wouldn't hit as well, but would play better defense at more positions and be a great pinch runner option.

QUOTE (staxx @ Mar 16, 2015 -> 03:24 PM) If they knew, Im surprised they didn't explore surgery right after the season had ended. I think the idea of getting a guy TJS at first hint of a problem has fallen out of favor. They probably thought it would be smarter to give him rest and rehab over the offseason and see how he looked in ST.

One of these things is not like the others

I don't like the "well the Republicans have the stones to do something like this!" argument. That's why I don't like the Republicans. I don't want the party that most closely aligns with my interests to get caught up in that bulls***. Then nobody would be trying to do things that approximate reasonableness.

I'm relatively optimistic about smartwatches, but it's a very immature market. They have to be priced and marketed like gadgets, not watches. At least, they won't do well to market to the kinds of people that have already purchased watches more expensive than the $300+ typical pricetag on new models of smartwatch. Instead, it's gotta be about the people who aren't afraid to drop that kind of money on a phone or tablet or fitness GPS, etc. They will be most appealing to the people who use their phones the most since their most natural use is mirroring notifications and making quick actions on them. If they are to catch on, it's going to happen when they look a little better, have drastically improved battery life (I think 2 days is a minimum standard for when we can say they are relatively convenient), and are really easy to use. It seems like Apple is indeed interested in getting customers of the non-smart watch market, which is a risky move IMO. In a lot of ways, a smartwatch is simply contrary to the tastes of high-end watch consumers. Things like ruggedness and traditional design mean a lot to them, and those things just don't mesh with smartwatches which are obviously very modern and will be beholden to things like periodic charging. Apple could do well to get the people who have the money and desire for social symbols that high-end watch buyers have, but don't happen to be into watches.

There are a few ways to build a good team in the salary cap NFL. 1. Get a good-to-great QB on his rookie contract and build the team with veterans alongside non-horrible draft classes. The Colts come to mind. 2. Get a good-to-great QB on a market value contract (e.g., huge contract) and build the team with great drafts and selected vet acquisitions. The Packers come to mind. 3. Get a good-to-great QB on his rookie contract, have fabulous drafts, and use your cap space to bring in some vets on short-term deals until you have to pay your young guys. The Seahawks come to mind. The Bears don't have a good-to-great QB, they ARE paying a quarterback like one, and they don't have the young talent that would normally come from strong draft classes that could make up for expensive or ineffective quarterbacking. If you can get rid of the expensive, not-great QB, do it. Then, hopefully, your draft turns into a franchise builder. In the worst case, you can hopefully use your space to load the team with good veterans and get competitive while you look for a good QB (Arizona, kind of).

I have to think if they could do a Cutler deal where they take on no new salary, they'd do it. They might try to hold out for better, but I'd really be surprised if they ultimately walked away from Cutler for anything that isn't some other huge contract.

Marcus Semien hit 20 HR with 20 SB and a .400+ OBP in the high minors as a MIF. He does not have a ceiling of "average." He might be likely to become an average player, but I constantly see people refer to players having ceilings that are really more like "realistic output if things go reasonably well"

I think some of what you see with the reserves is guys executing a really good gameplan. When you have super talented guys, you often will have a harder time getting them to do what you ask of them. To some extent, being a good NBA coach is about having loose enough schemes to keep the free birds happy without them leaving your "cage."

It's like Thibs concedes that E'Twaun deserves more PT, but then that E'Twaun can only play with Kirk on the court so as to nullify the benefit

QUOTE (Jenksismyb**** @ Mar 4, 2015 -> 11:35 AM) Wouldn't it be more logical for her to run her own server like a small business versus grabbing a gmail or hotmail account? That way she can control the security as she sees fit (obviously not good enough)? I'm failing to see the big problem here, at least with respect to having her own email server and address. If she's using the private email for her job, obviously that's the huge problem here, not just the fact that she has it in the first place. I mean, I'm the kind of person who has run an email/cloud server from my house for security purposes so I understand the pros of this kind of setup. Still, it's not at all common and could have easily been farmed out to some more trusted third party. It's not in and of itself damning, but it's awfully suspicious given the other context. I think most people like Hillary and generally like the Clinton brand, but I also think most people don't have a ton of trust in Hillary - even if her husband may be to blame for that. I don't think it will take a ton of stuff to get "swing voters" wary of her.

My self-insured, no-subsidy parents have seen their costs drop around 25% and with much better coverage than before. The other thing that we get with the ACA that is harder to articulate is that the average plan is far better. Even when some people pay more, they're a lot more likely to get their medical costs covered by their insurance. A tremendous portion of the people who have huge medical debts are people who were insured at the time but couldn't get procedures covered due to loopholes/coverage caps/etc.

Haven't the Bulls had some turnover in their training staff in the past ~12 months?

This email thing is starting to look like it has legs. http://bigstory.ap.org/article/b78ba433af3...official-emails Basically, it appears she had a server running in her very own home that hosted her email. This is not very common and most people who do this are those who are very concerned about privacy/government surveillance. That doesn't necessarily make it nefarious to do this, since most people who are doing these things are just techies and DIY types that like to have control. But that's not Hillary, obviously. Just having an email that is @myname.com is not the same as this - that's usually hosted on the server of the website host or alternately a common email provider like Google, Microsoft, etc. Apparently, hosting her own email basically weaves right through a loophole in federal law. She does not have to turn over any of her emails because she owns them. I haven't seen anyone say that this broke the law, but it certainly violated the spirit of it. She could very well turn everything over, but it would be very difficult to verify that she has indeed done so since she has access to all of the hardware and software. Somebody very clever was working for her to set this up. She may have wanted her own email address just because she likes to have her own things for continuity's sake or whatever. She's far from the first politician to conduct state business on a private email account. What's different is the server. The problem here is that whoever did it set her up to look very bad. She may have been approached with this idea and said to go ahead, this gives me cover for whatever I'm doing (this would only make sense if looking like she was hiding something was better than someone knowing what she was really doing). Or, someone on her team did this just assuming it was the best way to do it, and has given her a very guilty appearance in return. With all of this said, if you wanted to be evil, this is not a great way to do it. You would simply encrypt the emails you send, making them inaccessible to anyone who doesn't have the password of either you or your recipient. Even better, she wouldn't have done these kinds of communications over email at all since it is an inherently insecure medium. If you want to evade detection, you use the s*** Ed Snowden was using. Highly encrypted, anonymized, ephemeral messaging. If she has done wrong here, she did it sloppily.

Why would there be any doubt about whetehr the lineup will start with Eaton-Cabrera?

On the bright side, this team is absurdly deep. Unfortunately, we're the thinnest at PG.

QUOTE (Y2HH @ Feb 27, 2015 -> 10:35 AM) The reloading of tabs occurs if the device is out of memory (not storage), but actual RAM. Because Apple cuts corners on only putting 1GB of memory in their phones (2GB exists in the iPad air2), whether it be for their battery power excuse or not, that's why browsers often reload tabs. The entire OS and every background task on iOS devices is running off of 1GB of memory...which while impressive...it's past time they up it to 2gb. Yeah, I don't know why they insist on doing that. Excellent memory management doesn't mean you intentionally put insufficient hardware in the device.

I think baseball has gotten better at understanding the value of SBs. For instance, it is so rarely worth it to steal 3B even if you are going to have a high success rate. Nowadays, guys just aren't trying for that second SB.