Balta1701

How this doesn't immediately unify the entire Dem Caucus I have no idea. (FWIW, the WHO already ranks Costa Rica's health care system ahead of ours. And it's a Public, universal, socialized system.)

QUOTE (Benchwarmerjim @ Mar 9, 2010 -> 01:41 PM) a few of the names I've seen bandied about on Twins Blogs and message boards is Liriano or Perkins. if they can't make teh 5th starting spot, move them to the closer spot...or the bullpen and let Rauch close because it would leave them multiple LHP options in the pen I can totally see it being our luck that Liriano steps into that role and finds it easier on his arm than starting and suddenly dominates

QUOTE (fathom @ Mar 9, 2010 -> 01:28 PM) First, especially with Bartlett looking like a star at SS for Tampa. Really? Ahead of Posey, Smoak, Alvarez, Matusz, the other Beckham? I think you can make a case for any of them. Probably others too.

This is behind something of a subscription wall but another blog i read is hosting the text.

QUOTE (Kalapse @ Mar 9, 2010 -> 01:01 PM) Hamilton, without a doubt. His body is incredibly f***ed up from years of hardcore drug use, he has virtually no immune system left and he takes longer to heal than your average ballplayer. That was a rhetorical question.

Anyone else ever found the New Belgium 1554? Dark beer they're putting out now. I tried it 2 weeks ago and found it very good.

QUOTE (Rex Kicka** @ Mar 9, 2010 -> 12:24 PM) I was wondering if you could show an example of when Democrats opposed the idea of using reconciliation as a legislative tool available to the Senate to modify existing legislation that already was passed through Cloture? Although they may have opposed the bill and voted against it, I don't recall hearing Democrats yell and scream about using reconciliation in a general sense. But maybe I'm wrong. You can find plenty of stuff on the Democrats defending the filibuster's existence from 2005-2006, but if there was commentary on reconciliation specifically, it never made it to the point where anyone reported on it.

QUOTE (Cknolls @ Mar 9, 2010 -> 12:03 PM) An honest question here. Does anyone here actually think this bill will lower the deficit? If we can cut the 80-100 billion in Medicare waste now, why haven't we already started? How will we pay for the SEPARATE doc fix? And on a completely different subject can someone explain why, if FNM and SLM are in conservatorship, their 1.4 trillion in debt is not counted in the Federal debt numbers? Carry on. Genuinely, yes, I believe it will lower the deficit. We can't cut $500 billion from Medicare without this bill because: 1. We haven't set up any system to put any downward pressure on prices, only upwards. This bill starts to turn that around. 2. Medicare as set up is taking on the highest-cost individuals who often need more treatment or are uninsured beforehand, because lower-cost individuals can get private insurance while high-cost individuals can't 3. Preventative care remains cheaper than responsive care, and people who aren't getting preventative care coming into Medicare will have it more often with this bill 4. Medicare has been barred by the 2003 drug and insurance company bailout bill from negotiating drug prices by a Congress/Senate/White House that really likes their campaign contributions. Doing that would save even more than what we're talking about so far, but it's not in this bill because the White House felt like they couldn't take on 2 enemies at once so they made a deal with the drug companies for $75 billion in savings in exchange for no drug price negotiations. That's a full 1/4 or so of the tallied savings. 5. This bill establishes a number of other cost-savings options, which could be done on their own but which will never get through this Congress, like end-of-life planning (DEATH PANELS!) which provides significant savings but which is seemingly easy to demagogue, comparative effectiveness research (actually asking whether or not the more expensive drug/surgery works better than the cheaper version, which is the equivalent of putting a bureaucrat between you and your doctor), it strips pricing power away from Congress (Which can be easily bought in exchange for higher reimbursement rates) and gives it to an independent panel, which is where it should lie anyway. Especially over the long term this does cut the deficit. It could be better with a public plan, it could be significantly better on deficit reduction just by opening up "Medicare for everyone", but it absolutely takes a chunk out of it.

QUOTE (2nd_city_saint787 @ Mar 9, 2010 -> 11:55 AM) I obviously know hes gonna be good but ive never known how good, I read something about him having light tower power so to the guys that follow him more than i do when hes ready what do you expect from him? 20+HR? .275+BA? .350obp? middle of the lineup? Expect or hope? Right now, I'm not expecting anything from him, and I'm worried he'll bust, like I am with any prospect. If he reaches his full potential...we're talking Mike Piazza numbers except with a lower batting average. He takes a good number of walks, so we're talking about an upper .300's OBP guy, maybe topping .400. And we're talking 30+ HR.

QUOTE (Thunderbolt @ Mar 9, 2010 -> 11:13 AM) You move TCQ to DH. Start Hamilton in RF. I like Hamilton a lot, but I’d be very concerned for a guy going to Chicago with his type of problems. The nightlife is famous for getting to people who are lot less easily swayed then Josh Hamilton. Who is more likely to be an injury issue, Hamilton or Quentin?

Neyer with another note...this could impact their bullpen and rotation setup if they wind up needing to use their only lefty in the pen in the closer's role even on occasion.

QUOTE (BigSqwert @ Mar 9, 2010 -> 10:15 AM) They always seem to be able to plug in some no-namer into a hole and it works out for them. But there have been 1 or 2 guys that they haven't been able to replace at all. Santana leads that list.

QUOTE (ChiSox_Sonix @ Mar 9, 2010 -> 10:22 AM) Someone found it a while back. We control him through his arb years still. I'm positive about it. The fact that he was signed to a major league contract is irrelevant. This is correct from the mouth of Rick Hahn himself. See Viciedo's AAP page for exact words.

QUOTE (Steve9347 @ Mar 9, 2010 -> 10:04 AM) Yeah, D-Rose has really developed a deadly mid-ranger. I agree completely that he should wind up more than capable of hitting 3 pointers. I'll bet it's on his offseason to-do list somewhere near the top. Coming into this year, a mid-range scoring game was clearly at the top, so that he wouldn't have to go to the hole to get points every time, and he came out with exactly that.

QUOTE (StrangeSox @ Mar 9, 2010 -> 07:38 AM) kap is just trolling. There was a moment in 2002 on Crossfire that this makes me reminisce about. GWB had just released his first budget, after 9/11, and the budget as released was wrapped in an American Flag cover. James Carville got the chance to comment on it, and he somehow just kinda froze, seemed to spout out gibberish for a few seconds, and wound up being able to get out 2 words of actual commentary. It went something like this. "Well I, um, (unintelligible)...flag desecration!"

QUOTE (Steve9347 @ Mar 9, 2010 -> 09:47 AM) Didn't Wilson Betemit rake last ST? Didn't Brian Anderson rake every ST?

Apparently, Lindsay Lohan's legal team feels she has a copyright on the name "Lindsay".

QUOTE (Leonard Zelig @ Mar 9, 2010 -> 01:39 AM) It was good, I voted for it over the American Lager. I don't remember it well enough to describe it, it was a great trip and we drank a ton of great beer. Wow, a beer in this thread I can comment on. I thought it was ok, but I probably wouldn't order it again. Despite trying, I wasn't able to catch any of the stuff discussed in the last post on it. Maybe I'm just a weak palate.

The hope that following the Jackman format from last year and adding more well-known pictures to the best-picture list would help boost Oscar Ratings seems to have worked. Up 14% from a year ago in the early reports.

Tyler Flowers has a big face.

Has there ever been real, legit work that can qualify the number of wins that having an exemplary closer adds to your team? I can see this being the difference between a 92 and an 87 win team easily, especially if they move one of their middle relief guys to closer, get an average performance out of that guy, but then have weaker middle relief.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Mar 9, 2010 -> 08:28 AM) You have to watch the irrational excitement early in spring training. For one thing many guys are still working more with their fastballs to try to build arm strength. They are also not able to throw nearly as sharp of breaking stuff as they will feature when they move north. That doesn't mean that Mitchell isn't doing well, but he could be getting a little help. Viciedo had a solid spring last year IIRC.

If I look at our OF construction, I ask...who is Hamilton going to be better than with 100% certainty? I come up with the name of Pierre, but he's not going to the bench because he's a unique type of hitter in our lineup. Do we want him replacing Q? Not unless he's hurt. Do we want him replacing Rios? Well, we already are gambling on recovery from Rios, and frankly, given the age and injury history, I wouldn't be surprised if Hamilton is a defensive downgrade. Anyway, the last thing we want is Rios regularly benched, because that's a sure-fire way to guarantee he'll struggle more. That leaves us with our rotating DH. If you could get Hamilton for a reasonable price and put him in Kotsay's place as the rotating DH, would you do it? Of course, that's a freaking no-brainer. But the question you have to ask yourself is...how much is he worth to you compared to other teams? Filling a rotating DH/OF spot is going to be easier than finding a full time, offense-generating CF (which we hopefully already have). If KW could pull it off without giving up Hudson or D2, that'd be great, but I don't know why Texas would do a deal like that. Hudson would have to be the key part, and I wouldn't give up that pitcher for him after his injury history. They have no need of Viciedo. I'd probably do Mitchell straight up for him. But I can probably name about a dozen teams with greater OF weakness than us who could use him more and should be willing to give up more than we would.

Crediting BWJ in the catch-all for this. Link.

I am not going to celebrate. However, that's likely the difference between a 92 win Twins team and what, an 87-86 win Twins team? They're going to have to make a move for a closer. For once, I'm going to say this deserves its own threadage. I'll give you credit.