Balta1701

QUOTE (pittshoganerkoff @ Aug 24, 2010 -> 02:11 PM) That series sucked. Three extra inning games in a row, a double header that ended at 1:15 AM, Joe West, and a bullpen that imploded. I would like to say nothing like that will happen again, and I hope I'm right. Because of the lackluster performance of late, a sweep of the O's is almost a necessity. How about a win tonight, then news that Manny has been acquired, then two more wins. A nice bonus will be a few losses by the Twins. Go Sox! Even if he was put on waivers today and then immediately claimed by the Sox, there'd be 49 hours before you knew whether or not he'd actually been acquired.

Blog headlines I find it impossible to dislike. "Since 1906, White Sox have dominated Cubs."

QUOTE (LittleHurt05 @ Aug 24, 2010 -> 01:37 PM) I've haven't had time to look at them, but I thought I heard that the Marlins made like $50 million one year. How ridiculous is that? How much did they lose during the previous couple years after that series run though?

QUOTE (justBLAZE @ Aug 24, 2010 -> 01:38 PM) Before his stop on the DL , Manny's 186 ABs produced 39 RBI, 8HR and .317. That works out to around 2 Kotsays. Just saying. whitesoxski from twitter. The good news is that's excellent production, the bad news is he's managed fewer at bats this season than Thome. I won't like having a known juicer on the team and I'll feel compelled to make that opinion known annoyingly and repeatedly, but I'll find a way to deal with it.

QUOTE (buckweaver @ Aug 24, 2010 -> 01:36 PM) Stellar retort; it's like participating in a battle of wit with an unarmed man. Y'all want to watch it on the personal insults in this thread? Let's keep civil so that we don't have harsher policing.

QUOTE (Jenksismyb**** @ Aug 24, 2010 -> 01:25 PM) So, nothing can create jobs, but we should spend, spend, spend our limitless cash tree? At the end of the day businesses are going to bring the economy back, not the government paying people to be unemployed or paying people to do odd jobs. That's not long term sustainable growth. The government needs to create meaningful incentives so that businesses get back to risking a little bit of money (investing) into growth, either of existing businesses or new businesses. Edit: as to the tax cut as spending, I agree it technically is, but I view it as the reduction in tax revenue is less than the unemployment the government would be spending on that otherwise unemployed worker. The problem with pretending that tax credits aren't spending is that it allows for huge market distortions that otherwise would get much more attention. I can give a stellar example...the mortgage interest tax credit. It's a subsidy on the scale of $100 billion per year...that's on the scale of the first Bush Tax cut or the Iraq war. It is a subsidy that isn't indexed to cost or anything like that. It literally means that up to a certain level, the federal government pays a slightly larger share of your mortgage as you buy a bigger house. It hurts renters and anyone who doesn't purchase a $700k house, while it rewards people who go deeper in to debt to buy a larger house. It's a massive market distortion that doesn't get any attention because it's a credit and that doesn't count as actual spending. If you, right now, proposed a policy that would take $100 billion a year in taxpayer money and use it to finance the mortgages of people who have bought houses, and then made it so that the bigger your house was, the more you got...I think a lot more anger at paying one's neighbors' mortgage would be inspired, but no one cares because it's a credit. On the other matter...yes, it's going to be business that eventually resumes investment, but businesses aren't going to risk money right now, it's simply bad business. The average business right now has seen its customer base erode significantly over the last 2 years while its cash positions have improved massively through cutbacks. If that business had any reason to think that by investing the cash it was sitting on it would increase profits, it would. Instead, that business is seeing an environment where inflation is at 0.5% and plummeting, and the returns on holding cash or treasury bills are slightly greater than that amount. There is more money to be made right now by not investing cash holdings than there is by creating jobs. The only thing way to change that is to either find a way to generate more customers (aka hire people) or to push inflation the other way, to disadvantage sitting on piles of cash. Both of those happen when the federal government pushes stimulus. Neither of them will happen if the government pulls back.

Somehow, I'm still less than confident at our ability to say that Gulf seafood is safe.

QUOTE (Jenksismyb**** @ Aug 24, 2010 -> 11:28 AM) I'd be fine with SPENDING nothing. Give out some tax breaks/credits/incentives to companies that hire workers, to companies in emerging industries ("green" energy, for example), etc. Let the market adjust to itself. The country needs to go through a cleansing process, just like the housing market needs to go through one. Clear out the bad, allow it to recover, and in the long run we'll all be better off. The way Obama wants to fix things is to continue to artificially prop everything up , which isn't working in the short term, and definitely isn't helping in the long term. So, basically your opinion is that the recession was not deep enough and more people need to lose their jobs. I think you're wrong, and I think your path is at best a Japan style lost decade path. There's nothing right now that can push any sort of job creation. Companies aren't going to hire for tax credits right now; they're sitting on enormous piles of cash already. They're only going to hire when they have customers to buy their products, and right now there is no customer base left capable of expansion. Oh, and I vehemently, 100% disagree with the concept that tax cuts and tax credits aren't spending. Thank you for giving an opinion though. It's something we can legitimately discuss.

QUOTE (Cali @ Aug 24, 2010 -> 11:16 AM) Its crazy how he could pitch like that all throughout HS, College, and a little bit of minor's, but a few months in the big leagues and we'd on the DL twice already? Either it's all catching up to him at the worst time, or it's just such a super mental and stressful thing he's doing now pitching in the bigs and he blows it out... Maybe it's both Sad either way. Maybe kids will be less and less likely to rock the inverted W (which I still think should just be called the M) as they play ball through their youth... Innings pitched: 2007: 37 2008: 108 (with a couple month gap between college and fall ball) 2009: 128 (with a couple month gap between college and fall ball) 2010: 123, between AA, AAA, and a good number in the majors.

QUOTE (iamshack @ Aug 24, 2010 -> 11:36 AM) I think he's getting to the point in his career where it won't be so much about money anymore, but about having fun, cementing his legacy, and perhaps trying to win another World Series or two. I think we match up pretty well for him if those are his concerns. Manny Ramirez cemented his legacy in 2009 when he got caught.

QUOTE (pittshoganerkoff @ Aug 24, 2010 -> 10:26 AM) I agree. He's not going to command a huge amount of money anymore, and he could be a good DH candidate. Why not give him a test run? Because...what are the odds that a guy like ManRam is going to stay motivated if he's not playing for a huge amount of money?

QUOTE (Steve9347 @ Aug 24, 2010 -> 10:28 AM) We need as much Frank visibility as we can get, and I'm glad the organization/CSN are utilizing this. And you know Frank doesn't need the money, he just loves baseball. Um, I'm a Thomas fan too...but are you quite certain about that? There has been talk basically his entire time with the Sox that despite big contracts Frank has managed to keep having money issues. Almost everyone seemed to think that the JR/Thomas money issues played a role in the public blowups that finally happened when Frank actually left.

QUOTE (Cknolls @ Aug 24, 2010 -> 10:11 AM) Another "unexpected" record month to month drop in existing home sales. 3.83mln vs. 4.72 mln. Just missed. More stimulus more stimulus. So...a serious question...although I think it's fair to blame this number in part on the stimulus (this is the hangover from the housing tax credit which I never really liked)...you appear to be ridiculing the idea that more stimulus is necessary. Fine. What do you think can be done to pull the economy out of its doldrums? If the answer is nothing, that's fine, but I want to hear you say it. What can be done by anyone to generate economic growth?

So, hypothetically, let's say the Cubs go on the traditional post-manager-change late season it's september and we have a few young guys who want to play spoiler run. What are the odds that the Cubs decide to retain Mike Quade, and what are the odds the Cubs decide they're close enough that they can run with nearly waht they have next year, and it's only because of things like Ramirez's injury that they are down this year?

QUOTE (NorthSideSox72 @ Aug 24, 2010 -> 09:25 AM) Don't make me come over there! Its really not even SoxTalk's crush, its mostly just me. I think. It's hard to begrudge you a crush on a guy with a .391 career OBP in the minors (.424 at AAA).

Why the f*** can't I bike more than 2 days in a row here without blowing a f***ing tire?

QUOTE (kapkomet @ Aug 23, 2010 -> 09:51 PM) Let's see... about 30 pages ago I said this is an attention whore story - and gee, I think it's not changed. Except you still seem to think that the attention whores are the Muslims.

QUOTE (bigruss22 @ Aug 23, 2010 -> 06:17 PM) Not to mention the # of years of team control. If we had some confidence that Jackson would come out next year as a type A free agent, that does help balance it somewhat in my mind...but I still want a couple playoff wins before I say it's worth it

QUOTE (danman31 @ Aug 23, 2010 -> 06:00 PM) Which is fine. I'm not threatened by that. Look what Garland is doing at age 30 with somewhat poor peripherals. Jackson seems to be capable of putting up a sub 4 ERA for us. To me, a sub 4 ERA in the AL is roughly equivalent in performance to a somewhat-above-3 ERA in the NL, give or take a reasonable error.

QUOTE (kitekrazy @ Aug 23, 2010 -> 04:53 PM) If the NFL does away with the salary cap to resemble MLB, I'm done with that sport. Not a chance in Hell.

QUOTE (kitekrazy @ Aug 23, 2010 -> 05:08 PM) Is this another "Coop can fix" guy? Yes. I don't think this deal gets off the drawing board if it wasn't a guy that Cooper had already told KW he could work with. He had a set of instant changes ready for the guy to start working on in throwing sessions, and so far they've been productive.

QUOTE (justBLAZE @ Aug 23, 2010 -> 03:42 PM) Buster Olney Jayson Stark reports that Manny Ramirez is NOT on today's waiver wire -- the first chance the Dodgers have had to place him this month. Yeah, they're going to at least wait a few days so that he can have a couple games to hit and prove he can stay healthy for more than 1 game.

QUOTE (JoeCoolMan24 @ Aug 23, 2010 -> 04:20 PM) I would find that hard to believe. Any Harder than believing that Laroche wasn't claimed at all?

Things you may never see in this thread again: long excerpts from Ron Paul, with no sarcasm or ridicule involved.

QUOTE (Jenksismyb**** @ Aug 23, 2010 -> 02:35 PM) Hell, add the pension in and I bet teachers do pretty damn well over their lifetime. And that's precisely the point...no one would go into teaching without the benefits, one of which is job security after a certain point, another of which is family health care, and another of which is a reliable retirement plan.