RockRaines

So Im now 10-0 at this bar in the west loop. I cant go anywhere else right?

I heard through the grape vine that Morel is not the upper mgmt favorite to play 3B but the coaching staff likes him on the team. Kind of will be interesting moving forward.

Nice to see Braxton on the cover of SI this week.

QUOTE (Buehrle>Wood @ Feb 28, 2013 -> 08:17 AM) Can't wait to be extra paranoid on my trip to champaign tomorrow. I'm going to be checking my rearview mirror for an f16 gunning me down for going 74. Also, I'm too old for unofficial. Ive gotten tagged by the plane on 55 but not 57. Its shocking when it happens.

YES!!! Lets get it on!!!

QUOTE (ZoomSlowik @ Feb 28, 2013 -> 07:11 PM) Rock, your team sucks. Letting Kale Abrahamson drive to the rim is laughably bad defense. We either play elite defense or horrific lazy defense. Nothing in the middle.

QUOTE (MexSoxFan#1 @ Feb 28, 2013 -> 03:50 PM) I get that the PG position is deeper than ever but prime Tim Hardaway, KJ, Mark Jackson, Penny Hardaway, Gary Payton etc would still be causing major damage in today's NBA (maybe even more so). Mark Jackson would be considered a top 5 post up player nowadays and that's not a slight at Jackson, just goes to show you how much the post up game has sucked in recent years. Magic+Isaiah would still be dominant today.

QUOTE (ZoomSlowik @ Feb 28, 2013 -> 02:10 PM) I think I posted this already, but you'd have to give me 30 to pick NU. They pretty much can't score 45 with this lineup unless they hit a bunch of 3's. AKA, last time they played OSU.

QUOTE (ZoomSlowik @ Feb 28, 2013 -> 01:54 PM) I would say a couple of things... 1) I would guess that 90% of your pro prospects are gone before the start of their junior year. The guys that are left are guys that play their way into a big-time prospect like Evan Turner. Not only do you lose the sure-fire studs, but you lose guys that might have developed into actual studs by their junior year but left because their potential put them in the lottery. Because of this, guys do more development in the pros than in college. 2) Because of that last one, the upside of the elite programs is strongly tied to the caliber of the freshman class. Of course any talent pool is going to be cyclical, so that creates peaks and valleys. There was some very good talent in the 2008 tournament, but of course it was all gone the next year. Some of the recent classes haven't been that strong. 2013 is a great recruiting class, so next year should be better. 3) IMO, zone defenses make it harder for elite athletes to show off their abilities in college. An example I like to use is the 2009 Kentucky team. They had amazing raw talent, but none of them can shoot and their guards didn't know what to do if they couldn't drive to the rim. Because of that, teams would pack the paint and force them to shoot, so they didn't always dominate like they should. In the NBA, you see 98% man-to-man D and the pace is faster so they can get up and down the floor. I think this especially hurts big men because most good ones will get doubled immediately before they have a chance to use a post move (of course most of them don't have post moves, especially early in their college careers, but that's another topic). BUt still, every draft is considered weak for some reason. I just dont get the disconnect.

Oh and the 2013 draft is considered by everyone to be weak.

QUOTE (elrockinMT @ Feb 28, 2013 -> 01:30 PM) I thought that was pickle brine juice? If you mean he drank a s***load of pickle juice before he peed on his hands, then yes.

QUOTE (whitesoxfan99 @ Feb 28, 2013 -> 01:25 PM) The 2010 draft looks f***ing awful by the way. Paul George and Greg Monroe as the best players from a draft? Gross. And while its early, aside from Kyrie Irving, there are no true impact players in the 2011 draft class (although I do love Faried) and this years class isn't setting the world on fire. John Wall isnt awful and Turner is finally contributing. But clearly no talent that is head and shoulders above anything we've seen.

I just want to know where this superior talent is considering I am told repeatedly that college bball has no superstars and not top tier teams. Where the hell is all of this outworldly talent?

QUOTE (IlliniKrush @ Feb 28, 2013 -> 01:24 PM) OSU only -9 or 10 at NW? I know Rock would jump on NW, but that seems low. NW plays OSU tough. Only 3 point spread the last two years at Welsh-Ryan. Plus I'll be there which is grounds for an upset.

QUOTE (Y2JImmy0 @ Feb 28, 2013 -> 12:36 PM) Well I think the topic of AJ being brought back is climbing past Dunn strikes out too much as the dumbest thing on this board. He decided not to come back. There really is no debate. If AJP wanted to play on the White Sox he could have.

QUOTE (LittleHurt05 @ Feb 28, 2013 -> 12:23 PM) He basically said the '94-'02 drafts were ugly & old, while the '03-'12 drafts were ugly & young. I am getting a huge disconnect between people calling college bball watered down and talentless today and there apparently being head and shoulders more talent in the NBA. What is happening between the college season and the draft?

QUOTE (Buehrle>Wood @ Feb 28, 2013 -> 12:16 PM) I meant to state here on this message board. Never said it had any merit. Just find it funny how the opinion on him has changed so quickly. That was the point I was trying to make. And yes, wite, he did well down the stretch to change that opinion, but I think the catcher position has to be far and away the biggest concern going into the season. Gimenez is hitting .455 at the MLB level.

QUOTE (southside_hitman @ Feb 28, 2013 -> 07:09 AM) He had a fine year but he also might be getting better with age. AJ hit 17 home runs in '05 so hitting 9 more last season is not exactly like a PED power explosion. His batting average last season was .278. He hit .300 or above three times in his career, hit fpor a better average in 2011, and is a lifetime .284 hitter. There are a lot of people and primarily Cub fans that dislike AJ, but that is all the more reason for Sox fans to admire his competitiveness and desire to defeat opponents. I would have let Peavy go, signed AJ and traded Flowers. Flowers is a lumbering ox, a big guy that is prone to weight gain and may not prove to be durable over the course of an entire season behind the plate. Just to compare body types, Fisk was also tall, but he was light and like a cat behind the plate. And Phegley seems to be left out in these conversations, but he may prove to be better than Flowers over the long haul. Flowers talks a big game so it is time for him to show us what he can do. I have heard some sportscasters suggest that his defense alone justifies starting him. A .225 batting average with 150+ K's coupled with slightly better than average defense is not going to cut it. And he is a load on the base path. Aj had a chance to come back to the Sox at an affordable price. He chose to go to Texas.

QUOTE (StrangeSox @ Feb 28, 2013 -> 11:55 AM) Obliviousness/ignorance. (not having grown up a hockey fan myself, if I was just a casual watcher going with a group of friends and didn't waste all day at a sports forum, I wouldn't know about this 'rule' either) They actually announce it at the game as well.

QUOTE (farmteam @ Feb 28, 2013 -> 11:46 AM) I know it's hard to get people to stay in their seats during play, but at least some stadiums don't let people walk back into the stands during play. I know they do it at Wolves games and they do it at Target Field, and I'm quite appreciative of it. I'm sure it's done a ton of other places too and I'm just not aware of it. Its just not that hard to wait a few seconds. I dont understand those people.

QUOTE (PlaySumFnJurny @ Feb 28, 2013 -> 09:45 AM) I love the WC/3rd Sweater, but every one I've seen for sale in a store has a heat-transferred "crossed tomahawks through the C" shoulder logo, instead of an embroidered patch. Is that just how they are? I hate that. Yeah I've seen that. Mine is a patch. I think they cut some corners on some of them. Some of the fakes also have different colored patches on the shoulder. There are so many variations of that jersey at every hawks game. IMO nothing is as cool as the standard jersey, I LOVE my white Keith one.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Feb 28, 2013 -> 10:02 AM) Debate never dies on Soxtalk Signed #teamanderson Coffee up my nose on that one, thanks dude.

QUOTE (Y2HH @ Feb 28, 2013 -> 09:12 AM) Well, I run it on OSX, and on OSX, Firefox has been 64 bit for like 4 years now. You can download 64 bit versions on Windows too, but they may not be the default download it is for OSX. +1. Been running it on OSX for awhile.

Wasnt this debate about 4 pages ago?

Driving south on 57 and 55 are speed trap heaven. Need to be careful down there. As for in Chicago? Pedal to metal man.