Jake

The Sox are all professionals, and they know that these series 90 games into the season don't mean s***. You want to win every game against the Tigers and you'd like to always be in first place, but there's a lot of baseball ahead of us. "Biggest series of the season" is a tremendous overstatement with all of the games left to play. The guys on the team are just trying to win because wins are good, not because their fans get too worked up over every divisional game. They also know that there a few guys on offense not clicking, we're short two starters, and our bullpen is full of unfamiliar names. Some of that will change and the sky won't be falling anymore.

QUOTE (Reddy @ Jul 20, 2012 -> 07:36 AM) i don't really care what you think man. My intent wasn't to really criticize, just wanted to hear the best of your side of the argument

It's not worth my trouble. If a business had something I loved yet promoted beliefs that are against me (they wouldn't like me as an atheist, for instance) I'm going to continue to shop there especially when the product is as unique as Chick-Fil-A. Seriously, there is no fried chicken that tastes like that. God has blessed them with holy Manna in their chicken breast. I will not abstain from it especially when they are willing to serve me despite my beliefs. I also take my business elsewhere on Sundays. What will affect my buying decision is the quality of product and quality of service. I like that my local grocer buys from local farmers, but the food is s***ty and expensive so I don't buy it. Sorry I'm not sorry.

Taking Q out was definitely the right move. He'd been skating on thin ice for a couple innings and he just isn't used to that many pitches. The mistake was who they brought in. QUOTE (northside sawx @ Jul 20, 2012 -> 10:10 AM) Your point is well taken fathom, and since thats the case, maybe A.J. is to blame? He is the one calling the pitches afterall. I dont care to look back at whether Reed missed his spot or not on that pitch (too depressing) but that ball was RIGHT in Ross' wheelhouse. Seems like Thornton is rubbing off on Addison in "throw it as hard as you can everytime, consequences be damned." AJ does NOT call pitches for the vast majority of our pitchers this year. It's Mark Parent. This, IMO, has led to some abhorrent pitch calling this season.

Peavy hit Quentin Berry and then gave up some singles. It sucks but it happened. We didn't hit well and Verlander is good. Our best hitter has been slumping for over a month. Dayan isn't exactly en fuego. Tomorrow we have Sale vs Rick Porcello and then we have Humber vs Jacob Turner...two very winnable matchups. Let's go boys! If we don't win this series, there's a ton of season left, nothing to freak out about. Very interested in KW's next move, if there is one.

QUOTE (caulfield12 @ Jul 20, 2012 -> 08:42 AM) A San Diego woman who was contacted by ABC News told reporters she was Holmes’ mother. She said had awoken unaware of the shooting and had not yet been contacted by authorities, but immediately expressed concern to ABC that her son may have been involved. “You have the right person,” she said. “I need to call the police . . . I need to fly out to Colorado.” I thought this seemed odd as well, he may have given some indication it may happen. Obviously as a parent even if your son said something like this, it'd be hard to believe he meant it so I won't start pointing fingers...but just a very crazy event

I feel very weird guys. I've been living out here in Denver with my brother for the summer and we priced tickets at that movie theatre last night, decided not to go because of work in the morning and long lines. Just crazy. The day after we bought a Glock too, makes me want my concealed carry (no good in Illinois is why I've never bothered with it). Just....weird

I'm always reading....

QUOTE (Y2HH @ Jul 19, 2012 -> 07:25 AM) The question is how much of this is FUD and how much of it is factual? I've not done much research on GMO's, other than some basic reading, and while I don't like the tampering we're doing with GMO's that produce natural pesticides (like you mentioned), I have no issues with GMO's that produce massively bigger crop yields. If we only grew organic foods (truly organic), the amount of edible food we produce in the world would fall by a massive amount...and the world is only getting more populated, not less...so we sort of need to find methods as GMO's produce...but hopefully do it in a safe way. The latter point is very important. QUOTE (Y2HH @ Jul 19, 2012 -> 08:18 AM) Much of the problem with the "natural" or "organic" movement is it's been hijacked and bastardized to the point that the word organic has lost it's luster. To begin, natural and organic are not the same. USDA Organic, which is an actual label, must meet strict standards set by the USDA about farming/growing/etc., which then allows you to use their stamp on your packaging and avoid possible lawsuits and fines. Natural means...well...it means exactly nothing. There are no standards in which you can or cannot use the natural label, and this is how they [corporations] hijacked the industry. Rather than saying it's organic, because it's not...they instead label it natural. They realized that to most people, the two words are interchangeable...even though they aren't. When producers found that you could charge hefty premiums on anything labeled organic, or in this case "natural", they set out to do exactly that. There is also a difference in labeling your food "Organic", vs "USDA Organic". The label of organic, without the USDA in front of it means the food must be 95% organic. Well...that 5% can make all the difference in the world when it comes to "cheating the process". That said...even though they only used 5% pesticide, or some other biological means to cheat, they can still use the word...and it's vastly cheaper for them to produce it that way. The other issue is, as with anything, there is a lot of misinformation that's been passed off as fact over the years, to the point that people often repeat things they've heard about organic vs inorganic without bothering to do any actual research for themselves. A bit of ideology has crept into the discussion, so because people feel so strongly about the subject, they tend to not care what the science actually says...all they know is it makes them feel better inside. Is organic more nutritious? They don't really know. They've been studying this for over 40 years and the results are often inconclusive...one study will show the organic foods yielded higher levels of vitamin C, but another study will show the inorganic counterpart did the same. Overall, actual research/science have concluded that (thus far) there is no nutritional difference, no matter how badly people wish their was. Some information from the Mayo Clinic: http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/organic-food/NU00255/ More misinformation people accept as fact: Cooking vegetables destroys nutrients. I've heard this repeated a number of times, and it's a half truth at best. This is more complicated than a simple true or false answer, because while cooking can destroy small amounts of unstable water soluble vitamins, primarily Vitamin-B and Vitamin-C (ascorbic acid), it doesn't do much to other types of vitamins, and it also doesn't completely kill them as some people like to believe. An uncooked Vitamin C filled veggie will only retain about 10-20% more vitamin C content than it's cooked counterpart, but the trade off is they've found people tend to eat way more of a vegetable if it's cooked...so you easily make up the difference in any lost vitamin content. Now, to take this further, cooking can do the opposite when it comes to vitamin A. For example, cooking carrots actually increases the amount of beta-carotene in them. Also, microwaving those same vegetables seems to preserve the Vitamin B/C...because it's direct heat that seems to hurt them. Whenever a subject becomes something of an ideology to a group of people...such as health and nutrition...be sure to research what you hear, which will be backed by actual scientific studies. People tend to have a causal (NOT casual) mentality when it comes to diet and it's affect on their bodies...to highlight a quick example, when people come down with food poisoning, they will tend to look for a cause in the last 24 hours. Almost every time, they will look for the worst thing they ate nutritionally (in their opinion), or the thing they disliked they most in that time span, and that's what they will blame. They won't just blame it, but they will *know* it was the cause. Reality, however, tends to disagree almost always...because more often than not, it takes more than 24 hours for food poisoning to set in...and goes back as far as anything you ate in the previous 72 hours. I'm enjoying your posts very much. QUOTE (Reddy @ Jul 19, 2012 -> 08:21 AM) so then why won't Monsanto perform the tests if there's nothing to hide? I don't know all the facts here, but your tone sounds very "conspiracy-ish" and its undermining your arguments

Who do you have on the bench instead???

Escobar doesn't need to be cut, for f***'s sake he had a bad 9th inning let it rest. I'm very interested in the decision to use Thornton because it makes me think that Reed may have a sore arm going or something. Couldn't have thrown Q out there, he had been skating on thin ice for two innings. Anyone hear the post game interviews yet? I'm out of market and I don't get that stuff. More run scoring would have been nice. The thing with this team this year hasn't been that we haven't had bad losses, bad series -- it's that they've been isolated incidents. We may not dominate this weekend, but I can't expect this team to play bad ball. Let's go boys!

That managing boggles the mind

QUOTE (Marty34 @ Jul 19, 2012 -> 04:16 PM) The way Jones has pitched for the last month or so you have to wonder why he wasn't sent down instead of Martinez. I think it's because he's one of the guys they're looking to deal. You've gotta be trollin' me.

QUOTE (PorkChopExpress @ Jul 19, 2012 -> 02:31 PM) He's like Sampson, only instead of his strength being in his hair, it was in his fat. lmfao

QUOTE (nitetrain8601 @ Jul 19, 2012 -> 03:53 PM) Nope, even without Asik. Bulls need to fill out the roster. And if we trade Rip for a draft pick/low salaried player?

At this point, we have a chance to stay UNDER the tax, yes?

In for s***storm

Christ, another AAA reliever with great numbers. I still think Leyson can cut it, but Donnie may actually give us another chance to find that LOOGY

QUOTE (flippedoutpunk @ Jul 19, 2012 -> 11:19 AM) Lebron learnt that from this man when he did this after winning his 5th championship against the jazz. Remember? He counted up to 8 championships on his fingers! So arrogant i tell ya. MJ was arrogant. Moreso, however, he was competitive and that's what drew people to him. They asked LeBron before the Finals, "what if you lose again?" LeBron's response was along the lines of, "as long as we gave it our all I'll be okay." This is a reasonable response since LeBron is a millionaire and basketball is just a game...but can you imagine Michael Jordan saying that? Michael Jordan refused to lose a f***ing practice! While he was a resilient character as you must be to stick around that long in the league, before the fact there was no acceptance of losing. This is the kind of killer instinct that some people see in Kobe...makes me think of the "passing the torch" stuff from Kobe to Derrick early this season. Kobe's response? "I'm not passing s***" As to this specific situation...when LeBron gets to his 3rd, 4th, 5th championship...he can start making some more outlandish claims about how many he'll win. People are imagining how a super team in LA could overthrow them this year or how a couple years down the line Wade will be too old or this or that scenario could stop them from winning....this is why 6 championships is amazing. People get old, get hurt, players rearrange, new talent arrives, all that and STILL you win? That's pretty f***in' cool. If the Heat can do all that, that will be pretty impressive. Until they've done something more than what a team like the 2011 Dallas Mavericks did, they should probably just focus on next season (a season in which they seem to be the favorite)

It's too good not to eat.

Hector should have started the season as a starter in AAA. It really boggles the mind that they did this to him -- the effect of going to the bullpen is that he's lost his offspeed pitches and very well may have lost his confidence as well. Unforunately, at this point he's nearly essential as one of the few "experienced" arms in the bullpen. You can't trade Thornton right now. We've paid him most of that salary now anyway. You could "upgrade" the backup catcher, but you likely won't see the backup catcher at all in a playoff setting. You won't see much of the bench either, basically just Escobar and Danks. I know everyone hates Hudson, but I still like him on the bench and I'm interested to see how he does at the plate now that he isn't learning a new defensive position. Flowers in 27 PA against LHP: .269 Flowers in 45 PA against RHP: .077 Something to think about. Of course with those PA numbers, he's a 3 for 3 game away from mucking everything up

QUOTE (Reddy @ Jul 18, 2012 -> 04:49 PM) here's the crazy thing. while yes, genetics are hard to avoid, just by eating right (and i mean ACTUALLY right, not what typical americans think of as "healthy") you can avoid all SORTS of diseases - even diseases you're genetically predisposed to. I'm talking antioxidants, pre and probiotics, vitamin K, fermented foods, organic veggies, free-range chicken, grass-fed beef, non-farmed fish, non-enriched flour, no processed foods etc etc. Why do you think people in aboriginal societies have such a LOW rate of cancer and other mega-diseases? Because they eat REAL FOOD. That's it. That's the difference. Yes you can't bring the risk to zero, but you can come pretty damn close. I feel like you're taking some leaps here, but your heart is in the right place. Just remember that the organic, non-GMO movement is FILLED with misinformation and has big money behind it (often from the same pockets as those that are profiting from the inorganic, GMO). QUOTE (Y2HH @ Jul 18, 2012 -> 06:46 PM) You don't explain it...exercising and strengthening muscles can help with things like this...but sometimes it does nothing at all. I guarantee there are far more stories where eating properly and exercising did nothing to trump genetics than it did to help it. You simply don't hear about them...but go to any local hospital to check the facts. While 1 patent may have destroyed cancer and credited it to eating properly and exercising...most every patient facing a life or death disease does the same...only a majority of them lose the war. They simply don't make very good stories...so you rarely hear about them. Like I said...I ate right...and a lot of what you recommended really has no scientific proof behind it...for example, probiotics...may or may not do anything. While I happen to believe they do something...I just happen to have a bottle of them here with me...notice the FDA won't recommend them...because for every person it seems to help, there is a person it does nothing for in their testing. The fine print is pretty clear: * This statement has not been evaluated by the FDA. This product is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure or prevent any diseases. When various products actually do the things they claim to do...the FDA says so. And no, I don't believe everything the FDA says...but you shouldn't believe everything product X says, either. A lot of life is luck. Be thankful you've had it so far...because if the day comes you ever are stricken with something like I've been in my past...or Rock has been, for another example...all the eating right and exercising isn't going to help...because you're already eating right and exercising. You will NOT beat genetics the majority of the time...sadly. I suppose if you're genetically pre-disposed to something horrible, it is liable to happen. I think "healthy living" is usually more geared towards preventing lifestyle-induced disease and health issues, extending one's longevity, etc. The expectation that eating well/exercise/what have you will save you from a genetic predisposal to cancer, arthritis, a battery of other things of varying degrees...is probably an unreasonable expectation. Perhaps one could delay or lessen the blow of some of these things. QUOTE (Y2HH @ Jul 18, 2012 -> 07:46 PM) 1) You can *possibly* lessen your chances of said diseases by eating right. That's as far as science backs you up on this. No farther. 2) Some of this is true, some if it unproven, and some of it is false. Antioxidants have been studied and shown mixed results at best in actual studies: (http://health.howstuffworks.com/wellness/food-nutrition/facts/antioxidant4.htm). Organic foods are not proven to be any better for you than their inorganic counterparts...and at times can even be worse, as organic foods still contain pesticides...only they must contain organic pesticides...which can be worse for you than their synthetic counterparts. That said, other variations of organic foods, if they are actually organic foods, can be a healthier choice. Unfortunately, since the organic craze started, the corporations have joined this bandwagon and have bastardized the meaning of the word, so most of the organic foods you see today don't meet actual criteria to be called that...but they're called that anyway. Yes, grass fed beef is better for you. Non-farmed fish is still an iffy proposition, because how do you know the mercury content or where the wild fish has been, or what waters it was exposed too? Free range chickens and their eggs are also proven worse for you than their caged counterparts, as free range chickens are exposed to fecies/manure-borne diseases...but they're a great marketing ploy that get people to pay 2x+ for eggs or meat that are no cleaner/safer or nutritionally better. We agree on enriched flour and heavily processed foods, however... 3) They also have lower life expectancies regardless. I'd need to show citations on this...but last I looked via the Australian census, aboriginals tend to live 8-10 years less than their western counterparts. I can't speak for Eskimos, however...I do not know their life expectancy...and I doubt they eat much processed food. Whatever it is, however, I doubt it's more than the average American...and we live in one of the top 2 most obese societies in the world. The longer we live, the longer we are exposed to coming down with one of these mega-diseases. That's just the law of averages. 4) No, you can't. You can possibly decrease it by some percentage points...but to zero? If you want to make statements like this...where is/are the scientific studies backing it? I enjoy your perspective here. QUOTE (Y2HH @ Jul 18, 2012 -> 08:04 PM) You are absolutely right in that I shouldn't be making judgements. I apologize for doing so. And you have my sympthies for going through what you've gone through. But you again lean on organic. Inorganic foods have the SAME vitamin quality as their organic counterparts. I'm not sure where you've hear they don't. Yes, throughout my 20's, I ate properly, steamed veggies, brown rice, boneless skinless chicken, egg whites, salmon, fish oil, etc...all of it. That's unfortunate for me and anecdotal at best, but that's what happened. I'd like to hear more about your take on "natural" foods and the like. QUOTE (Reddy @ Jul 18, 2012 -> 08:09 PM) yeah we need to stop using the word organic because you're right, it has been bastardized. i'll definitely agree with you on that. it's just a fast way for me to express "non genetically modified". How bout that? GMO-free. I'll use that instead. GMO's are f***ing awful. I need to see some evidence for GMOs being bad. It makes no sense to me that it is bad. @FDA talk To receive FDA "approval" you'll need multiple supporting human clinical trials, typically double-blind with n=32 or better. This always costs a bundle of money and in some cases can get astronomical depending on the amount of controls necessary. For your every day supplement company (say the one selling you a probiotic) these multi-million dollar studies are just not going to happen.

Alexei dogging it

QUOTE (Baron @ Jul 18, 2012 -> 07:03 PM) Jose Quintana will more than likely unravel very soon. I saw him in the Padres organization. This guy is nothing that we dont already have in the minors. Both pitchers can make it, but neither can make a bad pitch to power hitters with 2 men on base. One of them has done it twice in 4 innings, the other has hardly done it.

The guy's stuff is damn near indistinguishable from Quintana's, Pedro having a better change and Q having a better cutter. They pitch exactly the same, strategy wise. Pedro got rushed up a year too early. s*** happens, he got roughed up by a very good hitting offensive club in a hitter's park. Wonder if they'll have him get another inning, that's big developmental time for a young guy and I don't think we will want to cook any more bullpen arms.