Balta1701

QUOTE (K-Rock @ Apr 9, 2012 -> 08:52 PM) Even when he struggled last year, Morel was still pretty good at making contact When he was having success last year, he was making a lot less contact.

You do not want to be hit by that. OUCH.

QUOTE (iamshack @ Apr 9, 2012 -> 08:28 PM) I want to see Brent just rip one into left a few times though...he's a better hitter when he's aggressive. Love seeing Alexei hitting the ball to right there. Last year all he could do was ground the ball to the left side, he never sprayed anything around and 1/2 of them wound up being tailor-made double plays. And Viciedo works the same hole. Everyone's pushing it to right since I've tuned in.

Aliens wearing hoodies?

Darvish looking very much like a rookie pitcher in his first inning. 3 walks, Mariners bat around, given up 4 so far, only 1 out, 40 pitches so far. He's got a solid fastball and a good running fastball but he doesn't seem like he knows how to attack these hitters just yet. That wouldn't be surprising for a rookie pitcher and you wouldn't be annoyed if you hadn't just spend $120 million on him.

QUOTE (iamshack @ Apr 9, 2012 -> 08:21 PM) Line drive oppo off the infielder's glove and into right. Hit it solidly. Morel was really working that opposite field line drive swing the other day, and I noticed that Alexei was really working it too in his last at bat. Wonder if that's something Manto is pushing with these guys right now. Darvish getting battered around.

QUOTE (LittleHurt05 @ Apr 9, 2012 -> 07:05 PM) Since the trade, Brandon Allen has produced -0.2 WAR, while Pena provided the Sox with 0.8 WAR. KW = winning Except the Sox also paid Tony Pena $3 million over that time.

QUOTE (Dick Allen @ Apr 9, 2012 -> 07:47 PM) They have the best place to hang if they get ejected at home than any other team in the league.Rogers had one of the better columns about the situation. http://www.chicagotribune.com/sports/baseb...0,6047893.story What I don't understand is the apology. Was Ozzie only kidding when he said he loved, then said he respected Castro? He doesn't now because a lot of people have a different view and he's in trouble or is he sorry people don't agree with him? I thought Ozzie didn't care what people think, he tells you how he feels. Phony and dumb, that's Ozzie. The apology was the usual phony apology if you were offended statement.

QUOTE (Reddy @ Apr 9, 2012 -> 07:08 PM) http://sports.yahoo.com/news/guillen-retur...P2Fb5DKw.0RvLYF Guillen LEAVING the team to go back to Miami to apologize. Public officials calling for him to lose his job. This is amazing! This isn't really surprising. It's an easy way to score political points with the Cuban voting community in Miami without pissing off any important constituency.

Darvish down 2-0 in his ifrst inning and getting a pitching coach visit. What did Morel do?

QUOTE (KyYlE23 @ Apr 9, 2012 -> 04:10 PM) that whole game is IFs. If Rose hits free throws. If Deng hits free throws. If Noah hit a free throw. If Melo misses two deep contested three pointers. The bulls lost, it is what it is. If it were happening that JR Smith were hitting hit shots, the Bulls would have refocused effort on making sure he didn't get as many open shots. That would probably have meant more open looks elsewhere, but JR Smith only got those looks because the Bulls saw he was missing them.

Ben Stiller, Vince Vaughan, and Jonah Hill summer movie titled "Neighborhood watch" now in serious jeopardy.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Apr 9, 2012 -> 01:23 PM) Its either that or everyone else should stop taking Ozzie so seriously. Ozzie is at the least one of the highest paid managers in MLB.

Grand jury panel called off.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Apr 9, 2012 -> 01:13 PM) Cue the Cowley attack job on a member of the White Sox in 3...2... Joe Cowley just became a communist.

QUOTE (Tex @ Apr 9, 2012 -> 11:09 AM) Balta, how does selective breeding factor into this? Aren't we breeding dogs that thrive in an artificial environment? Wouldn't that speed up the evolution? It depends on what traits we are breeding for. You can accelerate things but only so much. Is "ability to digest grain based foods easily" a trait we're breeding for or is that just something impacting evolution on the outskirts? I don't think of breeders pushing dogs based on what they eat very often. There might well be some species who can process grains and processed foods better than others...but you can say that about humans too. It could certainly happen but you need to be directly selecting for that trait. I feel like they are selecting for things like "Quality of coat" "Behavior" "appearance" more than diet.

QUOTE (Tex @ Apr 9, 2012 -> 11:03 AM) I believe we are looking at dozens and dozens of generations. (Although I'm not certain the number of generations makes that big of a difference) Plus we would also have to examine the evolution of processed dog foods as a suitable food for dogs. I suspect that we will find that a wild diet is better, I'm just not certain by how much. Looking at a wild dog who has a wild diet and a wild environment. We assume we can improve the dog's life by switching it to a domestic environment. On the surface it makes sense and based on my belief that a dog does not have a very complex psyche, one I believe could be true. The dog grows up in an environment and does not have the capacity to understand the concept of wild or any other life. As far as quality of life, I am looking at what is "natural" for a wild animal. Shack is preaching a "wild" diet while keeping the dog in a distinctly non wild environment. I find that a very interesting contrast. This whole concepts of humans keeping pets is fascinating to me and I am looking into what research has been done to understand why we do that. Of course there are all the symbiotic reasons that are usually mentioned, and the various psychological reasons. I think there's a pretty clear setup for a symbiotic relationship between humans and dogs. Put the 2 together in a "Hunter/gatherer" relationship, and they're going to make each other more efficient. A dog on its own can't bring down large prey, but a human with a tool can do so. A human on its own is very weak in smell compared to a dog, so a dog can flush out prey that a human would walk right past without knowing it was there. Wild dogs and primordial humans almost certainly started interacting for some reason along those levels...they made themselves better hunters. Then, over the course of thousands of years, the canis familiaris breeds evolved from more wolf-like breeds, probably lost some of the aggression, because hunters wouldn't want to deal with dogfights, attacks, etc. Some canine fossils show evidence that they were clearly killed and often eaten by man with tools, so the behavioral changes could definitely be reflected by changes in survival rates over tens of thousands of years.

QUOTE (Jenksismyb**** @ Apr 9, 2012 -> 12:47 PM) He also had 2-3 lead passes that were way off. That stuff comes back though once you get acclimated to the speed of the game. I thought the first and second half were night and day in terms of his play. Not to dwell on that game Sunday, but I am a little concerned that the last week or so the Bulls have played pretty terribly on the defensive end. Hopefully it's not fatigue, because the "real" season hasn't even begun yet. They're able to mount comebacks because their 2nd unit almost always dominates the other teams' second unit, but that becomes less of an advantage in the playoffs, and specifically with the Heat since 99% of the time either Lebron or Wade are on the floor. The only worry the Bulls have in terms of winning games before the end of the season is the Heat/Thunder catching them in record. Until then, they need to stay healthy and re-learn to play together.

QUOTE (Jake @ Apr 9, 2012 -> 11:18 AM) I assumed that he had reached his minutes limit. It's clear that Derrick had overreached his conditioning as well, he just might still have been better than an aching CJ Watson/healthy JL3 Derrick was clearly better than CJ/JL3 already in the 2nd half last night. There were just plays/mistakes that he usually makes that he couldn't make last night. He got pickpocketed while driving the lane about half a dozen times it seemed like, and there were several times when he was close to the rim, put up a floater, and missed it, where I'm so used to seeing him make that shot that it was hard to believe he missed it.

If nothing else, he's going to get the playing timie.

QUOTE (Harry Chappas @ Apr 9, 2012 -> 10:46 AM) At what point does he pull a Sammy Sosa and forget how to speak english. The comparison to Schott is interesting, he may get suspended. Good riddance asshat. I can't see how you could suspend him for that. You could have management fire him for hurting their specific business, but I don't see that it's the league's business to regulate this type of speech. If some team hires a coach and then he comes out as a communist, is that a suspension-worthy offense?

Mavs to make Odom permanently inactive the rest of the year.

QUOTE (Tex @ Apr 9, 2012 -> 10:33 AM) Will this domestication lead them to kibbles and bits, or primal cuts of animal? We are at the stage where dozens and dozens of generations have been raised on kibbles and bits, seems like that part of their evolution is complete. Of course if we start comparing the very worst of the human processed foods compared to the best our conclusions will be vastly different. Are they domesticated enough that we need to regulate their food intake or are they wild enough where we can leave them a bounty of food and allow them to eat what they will? Bottom line, compared to living in the wild, our domesticated dogs have a far easier life. I'm not certain if it is better. It is easier and longer. But we've taken a wild animal and locked them up in crates and houses (basically a bigger crate). We take them to the doctor and dentist, clip their nails and cut their hair. Is it better for them? I'm not certain it is. Think about how evolution works though Tex. It's selection based on die-off rates. half a dozen generations may have been raised on Kibbles and Bits, but the question then is whether there's a big enough difference in die-off rates between groups eating processed food and groups eating the kind of meal Shack is advising. For it to happen in 6 generations would require a huge selective advantage towards eating processed grain based food and an appropriate mutation already existing within the population. They can't just "Get used to it" if it isn't in the gene pool already. The extra food availability may be a big advantage...but it's not like dog owners are killing off dogs who don't eat that sort of diet, or deliberately attempting to breed it out.

QUOTE (bucket-of-suck @ Apr 9, 2012 -> 09:43 AM) Impressed with Manto thus far. Hitters are more selective and thier approach is better. Obviously he's helped Rios and Dunn look better specifically. Manto literally called Rios' shot on Sat in a radio interview on The Score 670. Of course...we also only scored 6 runs over the first 3 games...but then again, the Texas pitching staff isn't weak, and they were at home, and the Sox are playing a lot of kids who might well get better as the season goes along. The numbers weren't there this weekend. So I guess I'm left hoping that all these excuses are actually sorta accurate. Except for Gavin "never very good in April", Texas's bats didn't really light us up either, considering how their lineup stacks up compared to ours.

The Post had a good, well done piece yesterday on other instances of Florida's "Stand your ground" law and how it has been used.