Balta1701

QUOTE (NorthSideSox72 @ Oct 26, 2011 -> 04:08 PM) Ah HA! Its YOUR FAULT they haven't gone back! You'd better put that hat on starting on opening day in 2012, mister. I will break that hat out again when they are in the Series. Not before.

QUOTE (ZoomSlowik @ Oct 26, 2011 -> 04:05 PM) With that qualifier, I guess it depends on how you define "top player". A lot of teams would love to have Rajon Rondo, Amare Stoudemire, Zach Randolph, Danny Granger, Rudy Gay, Joe Johnson, David West, Tony Parker, Andrew Bynum or Joakim Noah, though none of them are going to carry the franchise single-handedly. You can build a playoff team around 2 of those kind of guys, which is a hell of a lot better than pissing away money on proven mediocrity. Take a look at your own list of players now. How many of them are getting stupid money? The names you just wrote are some of the worst contracts in the league. Amare is getting paid what., >$20 mil a year? Rudy Gay signed a near max deal last year. Joe Johnson signed the biggest contract of the Lebron offseason. Andrew Bynum's contract and injuries would be hampering any team other than the Lakers. Zach Randolph looked like he was stealing money from 3 franchises before he finally got things ironed out for 1 season in Memphis, and turned that into another big extension.

QUOTE (ZoomSlowik @ Oct 26, 2011 -> 03:47 PM) That's a gross exaggeration, otherwise the Clippers would have been gone 20 years ago. The Clippers have a major market to feed off of, and they're really helped by the existence of the Lakers. The Pacers, Kings, Bobcats, don't. This is actually one of the worse things the NBA has done recently...in pursuit of new owners willing to put up with losing money, they've wound up moving a lot of franchises to places that were smaller cities than previous. Memphis is a small market. New Orleans was a small market even before a storm. OKC is a much smaller market than Seattle.

QUOTE (ZoomSlowik @ Oct 26, 2011 -> 03:40 PM) So if the fastest way to be good is to stink for a few years and draft well, why do teams insist on spending extra money to be mediocre? Spending that extra $10 million to get someone like Mike Dunleavy just isn't a smart business decision. If you draft well and don't overspend, you can build from a 20 win team to a 40 win team and look for that finaly piece, which will get you there a lot faster than tacking on a mediocre vet or to in some desperate hopes to improve. You also don't necessarily have to pick in the top-3 to get a really solid player. Plenty of solid players have gone a bit later in the draft, and you can still sign/trade for guys before they peak. Winning 40 games and getting bounced in the first round of the playoffs just isn't going to drastically improve your "revenue streams". Several of the franchises that are struggling the most right now are teams that are/have been consistent playoff contenders in the Hornets, Bobcats and Pacers. You have to spend your money intelligently just like in any other business. You can only sign and trade for a guy if he's willing to sign with your franchise...which means you need to offer him stupider money than the next owner, and you still don't have a shot at a top 5 player. And name for me a top player in the league drafted in the last 10 years who was taken outside of the top 5 picks. yeah, I'm excluding Kobe and Nowitzki with that date...but if the NBA has gotten any better at scouting over the last decade...I can't think of many 2nd round league-changers any more.

So, I'm betting Carp starts if there's a game 7, whaddya think?

QUOTE (ZoomSlowik @ Oct 26, 2011 -> 03:31 PM) And obviously winning 35-40 games a year hasn't done anything to improve their financial situation. In the NBA you're way better off being a cheap, bad team with a shot at the top of the lottery as OKC recently proved. Strategically you're right...but that's also a path to contraction or being forced to move the franchise if you don't have a firm fanbase already built up. 3 years of 20 win seasons will effectively end probably 1/3 of the teams in the league.

QUOTE (sunofgold @ Oct 26, 2011 -> 03:31 PM) Did anybody else have any rituals they used before the playoff games. I remember always going to the same place for lunch. And then in the ALCS I starting changing into the same t-shirt, jeans, and baseball cap before the game. And after each win I would reward myself with some candy (candy gets even better when you get closer to Halloween...the candy companies bring out their best stuff). ...Guess it worked. Oh yeah I prayed also during the games (''please please strike him out") and I never did this before or after..lol. Same hat every day. Hat was probably 15 years old at the time, my oldest Sox hat, probably got it the year they put the new uniforms on. Have not worn that hat since.

QUOTE (flavum @ Oct 26, 2011 -> 03:24 PM) Postponed. Game 6 tomorrow.

QUOTE (ZoomSlowik @ Oct 26, 2011 -> 03:24 PM) Clearly spending that 30 million I mentioned on complete crap has kept the Bobcats out of the cellar and put them in good financial shape for the forseeable future. They won 34 games and were in competition for the 8th spot last year. This is effectively a new franchise, it doesn't have a strong fanbase, I'd be shocked if it has a high TV/Radio revenue...they're not going to build that franchise into anything of value by winning 20 games a year and being judged out of it by December 1. They made a legit playoff run the year before, they had a chance to build up good will if they could continue some measure of winning. This is the catch 22 in the league. The only way to truly win is to get the #1 pick or a true star, but that requires destroying your revenue streams several years in a row in order to actually get a chance at that...then managing to win during the 7 year window you have that player.

QUOTE (GoSox05 @ Oct 26, 2011 -> 01:34 PM) Who really cares about Louis Farrakhan? I'd say he probably has a bigger following than the Westboro church, at least.

FWIW, if it does wind up postponed...Friday night, Carp and Wilson would be on 3 days rest.

The Midwest as viewed by Chicagoans. Link

QUOTE (ZoomSlowik @ Oct 26, 2011 -> 12:45 PM) I also love that Paul Allen is on the list of small market owners griping about unacceptable annual losses when he's worth more than the rest of the list put together. Seriously, he could probably cover the losses from money he finds in his couch. How many years worth of losses would it take to equal what he spent on that massive yacht of his? The biggest problem is not that the players are paid too much, the biggest problem is that the money is handed out in an extremely stupid manner. Instead of Lebron or Wade getting $25 mil, you have players that make no real impact on the team's success making $7 million-plus. Just look at the Bobcats; Corey Maggette, Boris Diaw, Tyrus Thomas and Desagana Diop will make a combined $33 million for a team that might not win 20 games. You can maybe handle one deal like that, but not four, and someone like Antawn Jamison getting $15 mil is just as painful. THAT is your main problem. The middle class of players (for these purposes that will be defined as everyone between $7 mil in salary and the top-20 players) are consistently getting about $4 mil more than they should. I love the idea that Mark Cuban may/may not have suggested: get rid of the salary cap but have a super-high tax at certain levels. That way the respective teams can spend what they want to spend, player movement will be a bit more fluid, and a fair amount of money will get funneled to the bottom tier teams. It seems to work reasonably well in baseball: the awful contracts are mostly grouped on major market teams that can absorb them more easily. Of course it would work even better if they simply contracted a few of the teams that can't turn a profit anyways, but the NBA will never admit defeat like that. You're right, That is part of the main problem...but I would contend that the other half of it is that the teams which don't have a superstar are overpaying for regular players because the economics of the game leave them with zero choice...either they lose 60 games a season and have a completely empty arena, or they spend that kind of stupid money to try to make a run at the 8th spot.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Oct 26, 2011 -> 03:02 PM) Sounds like Rush, not Bears awesome.

A big pile of additional data showing once again that there has been no surge in executive branch regulations in this President's term.

QUOTE (JPN366 @ Oct 26, 2011 -> 11:58 AM) I wouldn't project an innings eater like Terry as a middle reliever. In this day and age, "Middle reliever" means "Doesn't have the stuff to start and doesn't have the stuff to close". If his redeeming quality is eating innings but he doesn't have the stuff to get MLB hitters out, that's simply not a path to the bigs.

QUOTE (NorthSideSox72 @ Oct 26, 2011 -> 11:50 AM) Rick Perry seems to be indicating, due to his poor performances, that he may not participate in any further debates. Says his mistake was being in them at all. One school of thought is that this will help him stay away from an area of weakness. Problem is, he already showed he's weak, and now if he does elect to not go to any more, I don't think that helps the image. If he had chosen not to from the beginning, that would be different. Besides, if he were to win the nomination, he'd have to do some debates with Obama anyway. Thoughts? The Prism I'd continue to look at this through is "Rick Perry must win Iowa." If he loses Iowa badly and then Romney stomps in NH, he has no conceivable path to the nomination I can see. So...he already blew badly in a couple debates and his standing suffered from it...now he's got to jump both Cain and Romney in Iowa. He might well be able to rely on Herman Cain having a couple more bad performances, especially in debates, and hurting himself, and just being the other guy there by default...but that's a serious gamble. Mittens is going to pull ~25% there in the first ballot, he's hung at that for a while, but he's also probably not a lot of people's 2nd choice. Maybe, just maybe Perry can pull off being a lot of people's 2nd choice by not participating and not saying anything really embarrassing. Risky strategy...only way it's a good strategy is if you're convinced that the candidate will have an even worse performance in a future debate.

QUOTE (Steve9347 @ Oct 26, 2011 -> 11:25 AM) I feel bad for KC. He's exceptional at his job. They should just have him covering this awesome Derrick Rose World Tour. Following D-Rose on Facebook has been incredibly fun. Except 2k5 posted this morning that Rose pulled out?

QUOTE (Steve9347 @ Oct 26, 2011 -> 11:27 AM) The MLB is looking at pre-emptively postponing tonight's game. That'd be crazy from that forecast, unless they have something that says the chance of rain is actually 100% throughout the game.

QUOTE (smalls2598 @ Oct 26, 2011 -> 11:18 AM) The only game on Christmas Sunday is the Bears/Packers night game. The rest of the games for that week are on Saturday, except for the Thursday and Monday night games. Ok, then I'd probably miss the NBA early games...some...but I could find other things to do.

Yeesh, Cliff Lee money for him? I was guessing there might be a chance the Tigers would be in on him...but at $25 a season...well, I'd almost hope the Tigers would be in on him so that they'd be stuck paying him in 2-3 years.

QUOTE (The Critic @ Oct 26, 2011 -> 11:07 AM) The Christmas games seem to be the breaking point for the entire season, right? I've read that the "smart money" says if the Christmas games are cancelled, the entire season might follow soon after. I dunno, they lost the Christmas games but saved the season in 99 right?

QUOTE (Steve9347 @ Oct 26, 2011 -> 10:57 AM) WHAT HER PARENTZ SED SHE DIED OF ALCOHOL WITHDRAWAL AND SHE WAS TRYN TO GET CLEAN!???????????????!!?!?!?! I DON'T BELIEVE IT. AMY WINEHOUSE IS A VICTIM. Depending on how much she weighed exactly and whether she'd eaten beforehand...a .5 BAC is something in the range of 15+ drinks over the span of a few hours.

QUOTE (mmmmmbeeer @ Oct 22, 2011 -> 01:00 PM) If Peavy pitches reasonably well this season and manages to stay reasonably healthy, I wouldn't be surprised to see him come back on a ridiculously cheap 1 or 2 yr deal. He's a competitor and seems to be a pretty stand-up guy. My guess is that he feels as embarrassed about getting paid what he's been paid by the Sox as we are angry. Kind of like folks think Dunn would retire if he can't earn his keep, I think Jake will try to make his lack of performance up to the Sox. I was just thinking about this...we've heard this a lot...and I was wondering...how do people think Peavy gets along with Cooper? Peavy had some serious mechanical overhaul issues right before his injury, and I wouldn't be surprised if Peavy feels like Cooper isn't the best match for what he likes to do. With all the "in and out of new mechanics" stuff that happened before Peavy's injury, might he not decide that a different pitching coach/philosophy might work out better for him?

QUOTE (Buehrle>Wood @ Oct 26, 2011 -> 10:54 AM) Finally a couple of my movies come up. Surprised to see each was only on one other person's list (Coach Carter and The Big Lebowski). As much talk as there was about the Big Lebowski when this list idea first was proposed, I'm surprised that only made 2 lists.