Balta1701

QUOTE (Jenksismyb**** @ Nov 12, 2013 -> 10:22 AM) I fail to see why we should be making these types of coverages mandatory in every policy that is offered. Make it so you can't DENY people that coverage. Regulate it so that insurance companies can't make it unaffordable for everyone and thus not really an option. I have no qualms with that. Do NOT restrict someone's right to buy coverage the think best fits their situation in life, both financially and medically. And that setup is a path to destroying the insurance industry. You can't allow people to not be covered for things and then purchase insurance when they actually have that problem. That's not insurance, that's requiring a private company to pay for treatment, which no private company will do because that's stupid.

QUOTE (KyYlE23 @ Nov 12, 2013 -> 09:53 AM) Could you imagine if all the sudden the Sox were like "Lease is up, We are out, Rosemont here we come!"? You're not expecting this?

QUOTE (NorthSideSox72 @ Nov 12, 2013 -> 10:16 AM) Why are people panicking? What am I missing here? UNDER CONTRACT 2014: Dunn 15 Danks 14.25 Ramirez 9.5 Abreu 7 Keppinger 4 Lindstrom 4 (I believe they took his option, yes?) Sale 3.5 ...TOTAL: 47.25 You're missing that this is incorrect based on your numbers. That comes to $57.25, not 47.25. Thus, the $18 million you projected is actually only $8 million. And if you count Abreu's ~$10 million signing bonus, it becomes -$2 million. Hence the panic.

QUOTE (Dick Allen @ Nov 12, 2013 -> 10:10 AM) Uribe was very underappreciated when he did play here. Remember "snacks and cakes"? Now, 5 years later, the thought of bringing him back is overappreciating him. I always like Juan, and know he is capable of good things, but he always seems to do better when playing for a contract. I think Semien is going to play 3B for the 2014 White Sox unless they bring in an at least close to stud 3B. Uribe was not underappreciated. Uribe was completely unreliable, struggled badly for several years, and contributed mightily to the years when the White Sox underperformed. He provided solid defense on the world series team and a stellar 2004 campaign.

QUOTE (Jenksismyb**** @ Nov 12, 2013 -> 09:35 AM) What doesn't fit with that is telling a young male of sound mind who doesn't use drugs or alcohol that he HAS to get coverage for pregnancy, mental health and substance abuse. He has no choice. He has no option. It's a federal mandate. Because no fine, upstanding young men ever suddenly have mental issues or try drugs/alcohol, and everyone who comes down with depression or starts abusing drugs comes up with a 5 year plan saying "you know what I'm going to do, I'm going to get hooked on crack and become the mayor of Toronto". It's like how everyone who develops cancer comes up with that 5 year plan saying "i'm going to develop cancer and so I should really get insured for it".

QUOTE (flavum @ Nov 12, 2013 -> 09:26 AM) Lists are lists, but #2 for Hawkins is pretty generous. He turns 20 today, btw. Hopefully Hawkins goes back to Winston-Salem with a clean slate and he learns how to hit breaking pitches. Looking at the article, I can't say this is one of those "rankings by guys who didn't take the time to learn our system" so it's clear the guy from Fangraphs still likes him a lot.

By the way...on this subject, it's probably worth pointing out that the big health care upgrade of the Bush years, the Medicare drug benefit/insurance company bailout act, had a ton of difficulty in its rollout too, including website and signup difficulties that lasted for months and impacted a large number of seniors. However, the only people who remember that today are the ones pointing it out as precedent for the healthcare.gov struggles; no one uses it to indict the administration's performance on the whole or describe them as a failure for that reason (of course, that could also be because they did so many things vastly worse than that).

QUOTE (KyYlE23 @ Nov 12, 2013 -> 09:06 AM) Baltimore really doesnt need him now, they have a much better version in Chris Davis They got a .704 OPS out of their DH spot last year. Is Davis moving to DH? That number isn't terrible compared to the rest of the league but it's a place they could find an upgrade if they want to catch the teams ahead of them.

QUOTE (greg775 @ Nov 12, 2013 -> 12:58 AM) I'd give anything to have Uribe replace the Kepp/Gillaspie duo for one year. This should tell everyone how bad of an idea it is.

QUOTE (Chicago White Sox @ Nov 11, 2013 -> 09:54 PM) Why do you keep saying this? You have no idea how much payroll room they have left and what moves they could make to create more. Let's not overreact to some number Merkin through out there on the team's official website. I hope you don't think Hahn would openly communicate his payroll restrictions to agents and opposing GMs in early November. But I think it's exceptionally silly to pretend there are no constraints and just come up with rosters that involve random, unnamed, wonderfully affordable FA's with no explanation of how it's going to happen, who they'll be, or why we shouldn't believe those salary constraints.

QUOTE (Jake @ Nov 12, 2013 -> 07:36 AM) Nothing more certain than Peppers not being on the team next year. Price is too high. We won't be able to afford anyone It costs the Bears something like $7 million to cut him.

QUOTE (GreenSox @ Nov 11, 2013 -> 09:29 PM) C FA 1B -Abreu 2B - Semien SS - Ramirez 3B - Gillespie RF - Garcia CF - FA LF - Viciedo DH - DeAza Bench: Garcia, Keppinger, Flowers, someone who can hit Dealt - Dunn, Beckham How are you coming up with the money for multiple FA signings when we have no room for any right now? Esp. Since you're coming up with a lot of money to get someone to take Dunn?

I said this last week. Maybe they're just this bad?

QUOTE (StrangeSox @ Nov 11, 2013 -> 08:54 PM) "Remember that one judge that was blocked?? Proves both sides are equal always and forever!!" Yeah, remember how they decided an appellate court didn't need a full slate of judges entirely and they were going to block any appointment to that court? I sure don't.

QUOTE (Chilihead90 @ Nov 11, 2013 -> 08:49 PM) I can't imagine Juan Uribe putting up a -1.5 WAR season next year. I watched him put up 0.8 fWAR over 2 years combined during his prime years and a ton of that clue was positional adjustment. I could.

QUOTE (Chilihead90 @ Nov 11, 2013 -> 08:18 PM) As I said a few hours ago in another thread, I would love to bring Uribe in on a 2 year deal, especially at the price that MLBTR suggests, which is 2 yrs/$12M. Uribe was worth 5.1 WAR last season, which is incredible and also unlikely to duplicate next season. However, if he even has HALF the season he did last year, he will easily be worth $6M a year. I'm not saying we get Uribe because I think he is in our future, because at his age he is not, but adding Uribe, a new catcher, and possibly a good CF for next season could allow this team to make a run in our division if we get some 2012 magic again. Because at the very least, we should be able to flip Uribe at the deadline to some team for a couple prospects, and that's a model I can get behind to help rebuild this system. Having had him on my team before...I can't imagine how signing Juan Uribe for 2/$12 would be anything other than a worse contract than Keppinger.

QUOTE (caulfield12 @ Nov 11, 2013 -> 08:12 PM) Viciedo's signing bonus is in the payroll for 2009, and his original contract salary, right? I just never remember either the June draft pool numbers or the signing bonuses for free agents or international signings being in the official MLB payroll. If you look up the Rangers' payroll from a couple of seasons ago, is all of Darvish's posting fee allocated in the first year of his contract and against their total? But we've never spent $10 million on the draft and international period like we will this season.

You must really like that.

QUOTE (fathom @ Nov 11, 2013 -> 06:11 PM) Considering what Hahn said about the catching failure that happened last year, it seems hard to imagine they'd go into the year with the same two mediocre players behind the plate. Considering what Hahn said about the payroll being ~$85 million in reports today, it seems hard to figure out how they could sign anyone to more than a league-minimum deal on the FA market to supplement that positionl.

QUOTE (fathom @ Nov 11, 2013 -> 06:00 PM) I don't think there's a chance in hell they go into next year with Flowers/Phegley as the catcher/back-up If they're not going to sign Salty or McCann, I'd very much consider this. I'd still look to see if I could swap one of them for a LH hitting backup or see if a better option is available via trade, but if this is a true "rebuilding" year, then it makes sense to throw them out there and see if either of them can learn to hit big league pitching. I'd prefer that to a 1-year stopgap like AJ.

QUOTE (Dick Allen @ Nov 11, 2013 -> 05:57 PM) Atlanta isn't a big public transportation town. Do you really think the Braves would spend some of their own money, a bunch of public funds, just to build something that will be harder to get to for the majority of their fans? They really aren't dumb. If a suburb offered to build them a new stadium and mostly pay for that stadium on its own? Yeah, I'd do that too

QUOTE (Dick Allen @ Nov 11, 2013 -> 05:43 PM) I don't think that is true in this case. I know little of the area but NSS did say this:

QUOTE (Eminor3rd @ Nov 11, 2013 -> 05:32 PM) Yeah, I mean I'm not saying Suzuki wouldn't be close to the last possible resort, I'm just trying to illustrate, in general, that I'd favor upside over one-year stopgaps at almost all costs. It's possible that Suzuki, specifically, is too cooked to have a real shot at being a better option than anyone, and is thus a bad example for me to have chosen. Separately, I think AJ's contribution are a bit overrated, in terms of his performance. As far as intangibles, maybe that's worth more (or less), it's hard to tell. The thing I keep coming back to is that signing a guy like AJ who is going to play almost every day actually gets in the way of finding a long-term solution. Right now the only guys we have who might be long-term solutions are Phegley and Flowers. Sign AJ and you release one of them and the other one gets 150 PA's this year while burning a pre-arb year. Yeah based on last year there's a good chance neither of them become starters, but if they get 150 PA's next year I'd say that kills any chance of that happening. From there you either spend the money on another stopgap or you spend the money on a long-term option. You've basically killed our chances of having an in-house option if you sign an AJ. Maybe you do that if your scouts tell you both Phegley and Flowers are backups...but in that case, it sure would make more sense to me to go after the catchers currently on the market who would be multi-year solutions.

QUOTE (Tannerfan @ Nov 11, 2013 -> 05:32 PM) The LA Times is reporting that the Dodgers are willing to trade Matt Kemp, and know that they have to eat some salary to do it. I'm not sure what the Dodgers are looking for in return, but Kemp in center for us would make me very excited. I think Matt Kemp in center field would have made the Dodgers very excited too, they just got used to not seeing it the last 2 years, and this year they saw a guy who was a shell of Matt Kemp from a couple years ago.

QUOTE (Dick Allen @ Nov 11, 2013 -> 04:41 PM) While I couldn't agree more about teachers getting laid off and furloughs days being taken making it impossible to justify a baseball park, especially when the one they are playing in is only 16 or 17 years old now, I saw a chart, and this stadium will actually be closer to a majority of their ticketholders. You can move a stadium closer to your ticketholders and make it harder for them to get there at the same time if the transit options aren't there.