Balta1701

QUOTE (Middle Buffalo @ Jan 25, 2012 -> 11:33 AM) The ovations are ridiculous. One side sitting on their hands while the other stands and cheers kind of devalues the whole thing for me. It's like it doesn't even matter what is being said, just who is doing the saying. Personally I'm always a fan of the accidental opposite party applause, when I cared about these we'd get one of them every year or two. Where the pres says something that shouldn't be an applause line but the other party applauds it because it supports something they like.

QUOTE (lostfan @ Jan 25, 2012 -> 10:26 AM) Gingrich talking about stuff like food stamps (which is such an insignificant part of the federal budget as to be irrelevant, and the alternative is to essentially let kids starve to death) isn't going to play in the general election, it's really easy to flip that s*** around. It works in the primaries because he can blame it on the blacks.

QUOTE (lostfan @ Jan 25, 2012 -> 10:29 AM) The actual content of the SOTU speeches isn't empty. Those are real policy ideas... that the presidents know full well will not actually happen. Did anyone take Bush seriously when he talked about going to Mars? It sounded cool though. That Mars line was not SOTU, I believe, and importantly, even if they never put any funding behind it, they forced NASA to pretend it would actually happen until Obama came in and said that it was BS without money.

Ok, I'm going to try this one. Can't hurt right? This is totally going to bust for the Tigers, spending this much money on an NL-only hitter.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Jan 25, 2012 -> 09:31 AM) jaysonst Jayson Stark Did some checking on Prince's HRs. RF in Comerica is 339 feet. Shortest Prince HR to RF in any park last year was 363. #somuchforparkfactor If you check earlier in this thread, there's a calculation at hittrackeronline of which parks different HR balls would leave. He'd probably lose about 5 playing a full season at Comerica from what he hit last year. Of course, he could just get himself into a spot where he hits them farther.

Yawn. Whatever he said will instantly not happen. The fact that he endorsed them means they can't even be considered. I watched an episode of chopped. Thy tried to poison the judges. Three times.

QUOTE (SuperSteve @ Jan 24, 2012 -> 07:54 PM) Euro zone financial ministers, sorry. Think I got that one, but never seen it before.

EZ fin mins?

QUOTE (danman31 @ Jan 24, 2012 -> 07:01 PM) That's likely. I didn't say the Fielder deal was good, but his deal expires at 36. Pujols' at 42. You can't tell me you're going to want to pay Pujols 25 mill a year at 40 years old when he still has 3 years left on that deal. Fielder at 34-36 for 24 mill? Both seem equally crap on the back end and I think Fielder has a better chance of making the middle years look good. I'd say that Pujols is a significantly better player right now, and a significantly better physical specimen right now, and thus, I'd still expect Pujols to age vastly better than Fielder. And to top it off, Fielder has to compete with another guy for the DH spot over the next 5 years.

QUOTE (iamshack @ Jan 24, 2012 -> 06:54 PM) Jesus...$97 billion in cash...and the stock rose $33 today on news of the results. Insane. They could literally buy Citigroup.

QUOTE (Dick Allen @ Jan 24, 2012 -> 06:50 PM) That's interesting. Milwaukee seems like a good place to hit, and when the weather isn't perfect, they can still make the conditions close to it. I wonder if that has anything to do with it. That said I still think the guy is a force, just not a 9 year $214 million force. I don't know if I've ever noticed this one before, but "Hittracker" has a column that calculates how many different parks Fielder's HR's from last year would have departed. There's probably abotu 5-7 of his ones from last year that would have stayed in the park had they been hit in Comerica instead of Miller (or Minute Maid park).

QUOTE (Rowand44 @ Jan 24, 2012 -> 06:51 PM) The insurance guy? And late President.

QUOTE (Milkman delivers @ Jan 24, 2012 -> 06:45 PM) I don't know why, but it bothers the hell out of me every time you say that. You know where that one comes from? Pedro Cerrano.

QUOTE (jphat007 @ Jan 24, 2012 -> 06:39 PM) I wonder what his road splits have been. He's had a career .965 OPS in Milwaukee and .896 on the road. those numbers got a bit more severe last year. 1.096 at home, .869 road.

Apple just came out with some huge earnings numbers, one of the biggest quarters ever for any company, led by a massive surge of iPhone and iPad sales.

QUOTE (Jordan4life @ Jan 24, 2012 -> 06:15 PM) So the case against Detroit at the moment is too wait for their fat guys, even though they've always been fat, to turn into Mo Vaughn, or for Miggy to drink himself out of baseball. Nice. If that happens, then fine. As of right now, it's curtains. They'll be plenty of drama in the other two divisions. Yes, if everything goes right for Detroit and everything continues to go wrong for the other teams in the division, Detroit will win the division. That, of course, happened last season. So there is a solid chance of it.

QUOTE (Princess Dye @ Jan 24, 2012 -> 05:44 PM) True, but value as far as defense is at the highest it's been for him. A team sees that, looks at the team control years, and then pictures his rookie year OBP, and maybe for the right team this is actually the most intriguing he'll be ever again He'll be 26 by late next season--the question has to be asked at some point here... That defense was at 2b, not SS.

QUOTE (Jordan4life @ Jan 24, 2012 -> 05:48 PM) Um, OK? Most of those guys either got hurt or traded. And Carmona doesn't even count, as that's not his real name. Have Verlander, Cabrera or Fielder spent any time on the DL? How many of those guys had spent time on the DL when their teams had their biggest setups?

QUOTE (Jordan4life @ Jan 24, 2012 -> 05:41 PM) Hey, if you want to hold on to the "anything can happen in baseball" card be my guest. This is just ridiculous. You're talking the best pitcher and two of the top, what, 6 offensive forces in baseball in their primes on the same team. This is different than anything the division has had to contend with previously. Yeah, Sizemore, Sabathia, Carmona, and Hafner on the same team doesn't measure up to that. Mauer, Morneau, and Liriano/Santana, with Nathan in the pen, doesn't measure up to that.

QUOTE (Jordan4life @ Jan 24, 2012 -> 05:32 PM) Man, they're not going to leave Miguel over there to embarrass himself all year. Fact is the Central sucks and there's not a case for anybody other than Detroit. And a couple seasons ago, everyone would have said the same thing about Minnesota. And a couple seasons before that, Cleveland.

QUOTE (DirtySox @ Jan 24, 2012 -> 05:33 PM) I wouldn't do it unless blown away. His trade value surely isn't very high right now. If another team wants to give up something for him, that means they think he can turn the bats around. Otherwise, they can just wait until he's DFA'd in a year or two.

QUOTE (DirtySox @ Jan 24, 2012 -> 05:17 PM) Phil Rogers sucks, but he's reiterating a Rosenthal rumor that the Red Sox are interested in Gordon Beckham for their SS vacancy. This in addition to Floyd for the rotation. Trading Gordon Beckham is nuts.

QUOTE (greg775 @ Jan 24, 2012 -> 05:11 PM) Can u imagine if Peavy, Danks, Floyd and Sale were great starters? We'd have a great season unless our always overrated bullpen wrecked it for them every game. Like in 2010 when we were in first place until Bobby Jenks decided to give up the season?

QUOTE (Princess Dye @ Jan 24, 2012 -> 04:10 PM) Hmm... is your meaning that the brass above Hendry at the time called for the Soriano contract specifically, or at least called for a drastic overspend splash w/ minimal focus? I think we saw a similar thing happen to Theo in recent years, where these gigantic moves the Red Sox have been making lately almost become this expected thing and if anything take away from our ability to fairly evaluate the GM. I guess I see that, although Hendry was still a GM that only got his once-in-awhile offseasons to open the checkbook wide... Hendrys job in about 2007 was to maximize revenue by putting together a team that could pack the stadium and make a run at a world series at any cost. The reasoning was simple...maximizing the revenue puts the Tribune co in position to sell the team for the most money it can. If the future owners had to deal with bad contracts, that was not a concern. Hendry did exactly the job he was supposed to do. He probably even knew it would cost him his job eventually, but make no mistake..."win now at any cost" was his goal.

QUOTE (Wanne @ Jan 24, 2012 -> 04:16 PM) What kind of shape...by who's standards?!? I'll believe that when I see it... Spherical. Like ball.