Balta1701

QUOTE (Jenksismyb**** @ Mar 13, 2012 -> 01:38 PM) Can the Commish veto a FA signing? Wouldn't that just call into question the entire lockout we just had? Wouldn't that do some serious PR damage and result in a ton of lost ratings? I can't imagine the league would ever allow that to happen. It would be theoretically impossible for the Heat to sign howard as a free agent. They could possibly pull off a sign and trade for him built around everyone on their roster who isn't the big 3. That basically means the Magic would have to accept Miller, Chalmers, Haslam, Battier, and Anthony in exchange for him. I don't know why the Magic would do that.

QUOTE (Heads22 @ Mar 13, 2012 -> 12:58 PM) The problem with the last part is that when recruiting, looking for a new coach, etc., you can't just ignore the last few years. Recruits may not remember 2005 for you guys. If Indiana can come back from their black hole, Illinois can come back, you just need to both make sure you have quality facilties and have coaches who understand the position they're starting at.

QUOTE (Chisoxfn @ Mar 13, 2012 -> 11:50 AM) Let me ask you this. What does losing Gortat/Reddick do for the Magic? It isn't like if they didn't, they'd have had all kinds of cap room. None of those deals really put them in a financial mess. They were already in a financial mess. But they had no play to get out of it. If "Keeping Dwight Howard" wasn't the only goal, then after they made that finals trip but then lost Hedo and had Lewis get old/suspended the next year, the right play might very well have been to try to clear cap space and hit with a couple draft picks...but they couldn't afford to burn 2 seasons on a rebuilding/cap space clearing project, because that's 2 seasons of making Dwight Angry.

QUOTE (KyYlE23 @ Mar 13, 2012 -> 11:30 AM) trading him for Big Baby Yeah, just another one on the list.

QUOTE (Chisoxfn @ Mar 13, 2012 -> 11:12 AM) Otis Smith is supposedly a pretty well thought of gm. They haven't made any horrendous trades (that I remember). Rashard Lewis didn't dominate when he left. They did acquire Arenas in an odd move, but the reality is, they just haven't had a ton of talent. I think Dwight has lobbied to add players and how much he's made decisions, I don't know, but they haven't gotten the right guy yet. I feel like there's a lot of "we have to do something" moves they've made. Keeping Gortat and Reddick despite big cap numbers on both of them, dealing for Turkoglu back after letting him walk, the Arenas deal, trading for Vince Carter, signing Brandon Bass, signing Quentin Richardson etc. They've been scraping and clawing to "avoid falling back" and then trying to hit a home run by going for guys like Carter and Arenas who have had down times.

QUOTE (Chisoxfn @ Mar 13, 2012 -> 11:06 AM) That team is pretty bad. Jameer Nelson, etc. They really haven't had very good parts around Dwight. Dwight is a beast and can win titles in this league if you put him around a good wing player. That hasn't really happened yet in his career. I will admit when they had Rasheed and Turk playing well they were decent but that team was never full of elite talent and he's never had another top 20 player on his team. Part of the problem in all these spots is why they wind up not having good parts around him...and it seems to me, the answer invariably is that they keep trading for guys that Howard wants. The Cavs did the same thing...they didn't make moves (i.e. trading Szczerbiak's expiring deal for a better player) because Lebron didn't want them to, then they made other deals (Shaq) because Lebron wanted them to, and it kept them from really growing the team they needed. No one has made more aggressive and borderline insane trades the last few years than the Magic, and I'll bet those trades haven't happened over Howard's objections.

QUOTE (Steve9347 @ Mar 13, 2012 -> 10:51 AM) Sorry, I'd say keeping some integrity within your organization is better than having a player s*** all over it. The cynical part of me says that Jas is right, and the part of me that wants to like the NBA wants to believe that Steve is right.

QUOTE (BigSqwert @ Mar 13, 2012 -> 10:07 AM) I don't know. A 20 year study of 110,000 adults seems pretty convincing (referring to the article Steve posted). Those 2 studies aren't necessarily mutually exclusive. The lower cholesterol one was looking at a very specific case...a certain, controlled amount of red meat intake while on a certain diet including whole grains and exercise and looking only at cholesterol numbers compared with a larger study of mortality in general while not on that diet.

QUOTE (GoSox05 @ Mar 13, 2012 -> 09:32 AM) The OL isn't that bad? Tell that to Jay Cutler. I think we've said before...there's a lot of things that went wrong there, from Martz's system to two first round picks getting hurt to Frank Omiyale being allowed into the stadium to Cutler himself having a freak injury. Some of those things will correct themselves over the offseason...it's just hard to determine how much fixing those issues will improve the line. There still clearly needs to be a backup/swing tackle added to replace Omiyale so that the backup tackle can actually be played, but a larger upgrade than that is still uncertain...and is probably the single decision that is going to determine whether Smith and Tice keep their jobs beyond this year.

Just in case anyone isn't sick of the IU alums relishing this return...

QUOTE (kapkomet @ Mar 12, 2012 -> 10:28 PM) Which means Boama gets re-elected in a landslide because there's not going to be any Rmoney left. You're not thinking in a SuperPAC world Kap. If all rMoney is able to do is preserve a couple of these loopholes like the one that gets him a 15% tax rate, that's worth somewhere around hundreds of billions of dollars to wall street over a 10 year period. A billion dollars given to a SuperPAC to try to protect that tax cut is a tiny investment, almost a rounding error for these incomes, and could produce returns of 100 on a $1 investment.

DR1 rips refs.

QUOTE (thxfrthmmrs @ Mar 12, 2012 -> 11:47 PM) If I were the Bulls, I would trade the Charlotte pick while it has some value. Charlotte will finish with the worst record this year, they will almost certain to land either Davis, Barnes, or Drummond, and perhaps another top 5 selection in 2013. They will be a force in the East by 2015. A core of Biyombo, Anthony Davis, Henderson, Kemba Walker (and bless not Shabazz Muhammad) is and excellent core to build on. The Charlotte Pick is almost certain to increase in value with time rather than decreasing. Not just because Charlotte could get better...but because the pick is likely so far away. Take the Magic right now, for example...the Magic don't want to commit themselves to rebuilding through the 2016 draft. If they lose Howard, yeah, they could go through a rebuilding process, but they'd probably love to have themselves in a solid position by 2014, and even at that point that pick could be a few years away. It's an asset, but it's an asset that is so far away that even teams who could use it wouldn't think it has much use to them.

No one wants Louis to be a starting tackle. He was only in that job because their backup tackle, Omiyale, would have made them look solid.

QUOTE (Jenksismyb**** @ Mar 12, 2012 -> 09:38 PM) Do people still think Lin is a flash in the pan? Alls I know is the Knicks are 2-7 since Melo returned coming into tonight.

QUOTE (GoodAsGould @ Mar 12, 2012 -> 08:41 PM) There is a good chance they don't make a move towards the OL at all, it depends how much faith Tice has in Webb. The rest of the OL is solid, I think people just get caught up in it being the popular thing to say but there are bigger issues than the OL on the Bears and the only spot even questionable is LT. They still absolutely need to replace Omiyale with someone who actually can play more than a down without getting Cutler killed.

Only if the Bears also can pick up some WR's somewhere will I be excited by that.

Yawn. Not going to happen. Sox aren't breaking up their rotation in spring training unless some rookie steps up and dominates, and none of the candidates have done anything close to doing so. Talk to us again in June.

QUOTE (Rex Kicka** @ Mar 12, 2012 -> 03:12 PM) Rick Santorum is probably only going to get 33 delegates out of the 40, the remaining seven going to Mittens. With Romney winning all the delegates in Guam and Mariana Islands, plus splitting the difference in Virgin Islands, and winning Wyoming as well. What does that mean? Rick Santorum's crushing defeat of Mittens in one state ended up cutting into Mittens' delegate lead by less than 10 delegates. If Gingrich and Mittens split victory in Alabama and Mississippi Tuesday - which is a very real possibility - Rmoney sorta wraps this thing up. At this point, "Wraps up" is a relative thing. Unless rMoney's margin of victory starts going up, it's going to take him to June to really get enough delegates in hand to actually call the thing "Wrapped up". It's almost impossible for him to lose, but this is delegates, and if he stops campaigning in the primary/stops spending millions of superpac dollars trashing his primary opponents in every state, then his opponents can go right back to narrowing the gap. He has to keep competing.

QUOTE (Chicago White Sox @ Mar 12, 2012 -> 03:10 PM) But if it's between him and A.J., I'll take a chance on the guy who might be able to fill the role well rather than the guy we already know can't. The problem with Beckahm is screwing up his brain again. It really is that simple.

QUOTE (Chicago White Sox @ Mar 12, 2012 -> 02:16 PM) Having the top of the lineup take a lot of pitches also helps wear the opposing starting pitcher out. Honestly, there is no good reason to have A.J. in the two hole. There may not be a clear cut choice at this point, but clearly A.J. has none of the traits you'd like in a #2 hitter. I'd probably just start the season with Beckham as the #2 hitter. Beckham in particular...needs to hit his way there, after his last 2 seasons.

QUOTE (Quinarvy @ Mar 12, 2012 -> 01:48 PM) It just doesn't make sense why Dwight really doesn't want to extend here, other than he wants to team with his buddies. But I don't want to here "I want to win" from him. Or "The shoe company paying me $200 million over the next 10 years doesn't want me playing on the same team as the guy they're paying $300 million over the next 10 years".

QUOTE (Thad Bosley @ Mar 12, 2012 -> 11:01 AM) The number one characteristic or ability of the number two batter is to take pitches. This enables the lead-off hitter to see a pitch or two and get a read on the pitcher before deciding to steal a base, as well as give the number three hitter on the on-deck circle and the clean-up guy in the hole a chance to observe a few pitches before coming to the plate. With that said, you could arguably make the case that AJ is the last person on this team who ought to be hitting in that slot. He swings at the first pitch about as often as anyone in the league, and while he does make a lot of contact, often times it's weak, resulting in easy grounders to the right side. So if DeAza continues to be the get-on-base type of player he was last season, you'd hate to waste those efforts with a guy who could erase things in the blink of an eye with a 4-6-3 double play. Just my opinion, but for me, it's 'no way, AJ!' as the number two hitter. That might be true back in the era when leadoff hitters were stealing all the time, but the Sox haven't had a leadoff hitter who could steal 50+ bases since August of 2005, and they're exceedignly rare around MLB. If nothing else, you put a guy with decent speed on first, even if he's not stealing, a slow ground ball to the right side is a "productive out". AJ obviously isn't the ideal candidate there...but it's more because he's slow himself and he doesn't walk much so he's never on base. But the problem is...someoen else needs to earn that job. It can't just be given away to another guy who will wind up spending a month hitting .210.

QUOTE (smalls2598 @ Mar 12, 2012 -> 12:46 PM) Noah is playing tonight; Deng and Watson are out. We need Deng back Wednesday.

QUOTE (Quinarvy @ Mar 12, 2012 -> 01:39 PM) Wow. Asik + Deng + Boozer + Charlotte pick and Dwight doesn't want to be here. THAT deal I do. Noah + Deng is a little different, but that one, just, wow. I love Deng as much as the next guy, but Noah-Dwight-Gibson is an insane defensive front court. You could start Korver and Brewer/Butler. But the manchild doesn't want to be here, so f*** him. And the Bulls clear Boozer's contract? Of course I'd do that if he'd extend. But first, I don't believe that the Magic would seriously take Boozer's deal, and second it's pretty clear DH doesn't want to extend here.