Balta1701

QUOTE (RockRaines @ Aug 10, 2010 -> 10:07 AM) You mean he took out Viciedo who hadnt come even close to a pitch the last two at bats and put in one of our best clutch hitters this season? It was actually a very good move IMO. And the bunts were good as well considering our offense this series, all it takes it a hit by the middle of the order, and they didnt come through. Keep second guessing the team when they lose, it makes it funnier when you guys cheer on these moves when they win. Taking out Viciedo was the right move. Alexei bunting with Pierre on 1b late in the game with Weiters behind the plate is a terrible move. Even poorly planned plays will have some probability of still working, bragging when they do is the same as thinking "hey, i won on this slot machine, I'm going to triple my bet next game!"

Of course, her nomination will die with a filibuster like every nomination should, but this is at least a fight worth having.

One of those things that was just bound to happen that will wind up eventually costing taxpayers a fortune in cleanup costs:

An arbitrator has sided with the NHL in voiding Kovalchuk's deal with the Devils, and he is now a free agent again. The first time I typed this post, I accidentally wrote "Nets". Man I've got a long way to go before I'm good on this sport.

QUOTE (BigSqwert @ Aug 10, 2010 -> 09:50 AM) Meh. He was effective enough to not give up a bunch of key hits to break the game open for Baltimore. He's been night and day with us vs Arizona and I think he'll only get better. That's certainly entirely possible. I think his mechanics got a bit lost later in the game yesterday and that's why he started elevating pitches.

QUOTE (BigSqwert @ Aug 10, 2010 -> 09:51 AM) We'll be asking our pitchers to throw shutouts against the cream of the crop. But I'm not allowed to be hard on Edwin Jackson's performance last night? Part of the reason why our guys have terrible home/road splits is that our home ballpark is the best HR hitting ballpark in baseball. Our home/road splits should be excessive.

QUOTE (BigSqwert @ Aug 10, 2010 -> 09:49 AM) We just better pray that we play the wild card in round 1 (if we make it to the post season) and get home field advantage. We suck on the road. We're 30-29 on the road on the season.

QUOTE (BigSqwert @ Aug 10, 2010 -> 09:45 AM) Wow. You're really being a tough critic. The guy gave up 1 earned run and showed good control by walking only one. At least if it were Hudson we would have lost the game by the 3rd inning after he walked 5 and gave up 4 or 5 runs. And that 1 that he walked was the old unintentional-intentional walk too. Jackson deserved the win last night and the loss was on the offense, but Jackson wasn't a dominant pitcher for the middle 3 innings. I could be a real jerk and say "Yeah but Hudson wouldn't have given up as many hits, look at his last game line!" but that's just as silly as your point.

QUOTE (LittleHurt05 @ Aug 10, 2010 -> 09:24 AM) He gave up a solo homer and his defense cost him a second run. I guess he should have shut them out, but I thought he did pretty damn well. My problem was, from watching him...for the first 3 innings he was dominant. For the 2nd 3 innings, he was getting the ball up a whole lot more and was in "pitch out of trouble" mode. Yea, the defense screwed him out of 1 of those runs, but he also grooved a few balls that inning that Pie and Scott hit hard as singles to help with that inning. A better hitting team does more damage than the O's last night.

I'm a fan of my game writeup today.

QUOTE (Quinarvy @ Aug 9, 2010 -> 10:56 PM) At least Jackson did his part. True, but with the way the Orioles were hitting he could have been better as well.

QUOTE (Quinarvy @ Aug 10, 2010 -> 08:49 AM) I place the odds at 70/30 that Kotsay is the one Kenny dumps because of how much Kenny has been hunting for a bat. After his last couple outings I wouldn't be surprised at all to see Viciedo back in AAA, and I'm not sure I can be that angry about the decision. The scouting report is now out on him.

QUOTE (BigSqwert @ Aug 9, 2010 -> 05:46 PM) If we make the playoffs he won't be facing the like of Sabathia and Lee. I bet we'll find a way to get him into the lineup then.

QUOTE (witesoxfan @ Aug 9, 2010 -> 05:14 PM) Greg Walker is pretty much an average hitting coach. He's seen some guys do incredible things, and he's seen some guys fail on his watch. Not everything is to his credit or to his fault. Not to defend Walk here but out of curiosity...what do we consider a great hitting coach these days?

QUOTE (RockRaines @ Aug 9, 2010 -> 05:04 PM) Aka, "leaked" info about how close the Sox actually were to getting Dunn. Driving up the price saying there was a 3-way deal possible or that the Sox were shopping Gordo. I dont think we were close at all for Dunn. I don't think we were either, and I think part of the reason KW is pissed at Rizzo is that he felt like Rizzo was being totally unreasonable.

QUOTE (RockRaines @ Aug 9, 2010 -> 04:53 PM) Didnt get that at all. All I saw was EJax was never discussed and KW wanted to keep him instead of trying to get Dunn. Rizzo has said multiple times that the Sox were in a distant 3rd place and were never close. Kenny was also quite angry at an unnamed GM that he felt was just asking for the moon from Kenny to try to drive up the asking price on that player for other teams. And referred to this trading deadine as particularly frustrating because of it.

QUOTE (bucket-of-suck @ Aug 9, 2010 -> 03:56 PM) Apparently AJ is gonna be Jackson's guy, but I'd rather see Castro in there to supply some kind of punch. AJ has been just pathetic this season. This "injury" would have been a wonderful reason to give him a few days off to work on his bats.

QUOTE (NorthSideSox72 @ Aug 9, 2010 -> 03:22 PM) Also, your bolded line is sort of hilarious, since what you say I am ignoring, I SPECIFICALLY SAID earlier as a benefit. I know you cited that earlier, but at least to me, it seems to be in conflict with the idea that a government shouldn't be running any system that turns a profit.

Let me supply a counter-example NSS...let's say that I'm running a municipality, and I discover that there is an inverse correlation between how much people pay for a service...I'm going to use garbage collecting in this example...and the cost for that service. In other words, it costs more to throw out more trash. Therefore, if I set the price at the exact amount that it costs to pay for the collection, processing, and disposal of the trash, or if I subsidize it somewhat through other tax dollars, I wind up collecting more trash. However, if I raise the rates significantly, it turns out i turn a significant profit, but the amount of trash I collect decreases massively as people recycle more and use other means of disposal like mulching, etc. Your argument seems to me to imply that all cases where a government entity turns a profit should be viewed as a bad thing and a potential spinoff opportunity...but you're ignoring the potential societal benefits that can come from things costing more to use than they do to run. Parking meters/congestion pricing could certainly fit that description.

QUOTE (Soxy @ Aug 9, 2010 -> 01:49 PM) If the school is s*** quality more time in it won't help. Can you offer a citation on this?

QUOTE (BigSqwert @ Aug 9, 2010 -> 01:40 PM) *cough*

QUOTE (bmags @ Aug 9, 2010 -> 01:35 PM) well, we could make school longer. And the money to pay for that is going to come from...?

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Aug 9, 2010 -> 01:33 PM) They also will need a lot small budgets in the future, because they won't be supporting formerly money losing operations on bloated bureaucratic budgets. Do you really actually believe that will happen? That because they've spun off some things that used to generate small amounts of revenue...their budgets will shrink?

QUOTE (LittleHurt05 @ Aug 9, 2010 -> 12:51 PM) You are throwing a rookie into the rotation who will probably have several short outings, so that extra person in the bullpen would be even more necessary. On the other hand...if the other 5 guys in your rotation are significantly better on extra rest, then they might last longer and actually cut the innings the bullpen needs to take over on their starts.

QUOTE (NorthSideSox72 @ Aug 9, 2010 -> 12:56 PM) What you will get when its done selling off what it reasonably can, is a smaller, less costly, more transparent, more effcient government... more private industry jobs in the area where there is growth potential with those companies, not dead end jobs alone... and less debt to saddle future generations with. Those alone are a lot of good. That's not even getting into smaller things. What exactly can you cite from recent history that suggests that government contracting with the private sector, and in particular contracting with banks, produces lower costs, increased transparency, or more efficiency?