Balta1701

QUOTE (lostfan @ May 13, 2009 -> 06:04 PM) Eh, I really wasn't with the premise the blogger was going for but I found it kind of random and creepy myself. Why use their picture, of all pictures? That's sort of the point. It totally doesn't match with the article at all. BS, if you can actually justify why that picture fits with that article, I'd love to hear it. The "They went to school in Chicago" that the Times uses just seems bizarre.

Jose Contreras's career started in the 1990's with the Cuban National Team, where he was their most dominant pitcher. In 1999, Jose pitched an exhibition game for the Cubans against the visiting Baltimore Orioles, where he went 8 shutout innings and struck out 10. In his last season in Cuba, he went 13-4 with a 1.76 ERA and 149 strikeouts. He was named Cuba's athlete of the year 3 times. Jose defected from Cuba in October, 2002. By 2003, he had been signed to a 4 year contract with the Yankees for nearly $30 million without ever having pitched in the big leagues. He had a decent 2003, but spent 2 months on the DL. Jose Contreras was acquired by the White Sox in 2004 in a trade that sent previous year's Cy Young runner up and current all star Esteban Loaiza to the Yankees. In 2005, Jose Contreras was dominant down the stretch, leading the White Sox to their first World Series win in 88 years. Jose Started game 1 of the ALDS, ALCS, and World Series, in addition to the clinching game 5 in the ALCS. He went 3-1 with a 3.09 ERA, 14 strikeouts, and only two walks in the playoffs, and pitched the 4th of 4 consecutive complete games for White Sox starters in the ALCS. Jose signed a 3 year contract extension after 2005, locking him up through the end of 2009. In 2006, Jose continued his run, breaking the White Sox team record by recording 17 consecutive regular season wins without a loss. However, Jose struggled in the 2nd half of the season with a 5.40 ERA after the AS Break. Jose continued being inconsistent through 2007, putting up occasional solid games intersperced with very bad performances, finishing with a 5.57 ERA and being consigned to the bullpen at one point. In 2008, Jose suffered a ruptured Achilles tendon while fielding a ground ball hit towards first base, and missed much of the 2nd half of the season. He returned for training camp, well ahead of schedule and 30 pounds lighter, in 2009, but was a disaster on the mound in his first few starts, and after clearing waivers, was sent back to AAA Charlotte to work things out. Jose's stuff is still there. He can still throw 90+ mph, his ball still moves like crazy. Jose, however, has only really been good when he's throwing strikes. If he's walking people and falling behind people, then batters can sit back and wait on his hittable fastball and drive it. In his first outing in AAA Charlotte, Jose went 6 innings with 5k, 3 hits, 0 runs, but 5 BB's and a HBP. He threw 108 pitches, 57 strikes. He needs to do better on the control if he's ever going to rejoin the rotation in Chicago.

QUOTE (Kalapse @ May 13, 2009 -> 05:55 PM) Alright then I guess he wasn't done after all. 6 IP, 3 H, 0 R, 5 BB, 5 K, 1 HBP | 108 pitches, 57 strikes I'll buy him as ready to come back when he gets the walks down to 2 or lower. With Jose it really has always been that simple from my eyes. His stuff moves so much that if people don't know whether they need to swing or not, they're screwed. If Jose is getting ahead of people, he dominates. If Jose is falling behind people, they wait on the fastball and crush the weakest thing he throws, and the 2 guys he walked score.

QUOTE (lostfan @ May 13, 2009 -> 05:53 PM) Total strawman, find me one person on this board that condoned the unfair treatment of Palin's family. Probably the worst thing I saw anybody say here was the fact that she used her family as a prop, or that it was ironic that Palin is a hardcore abstinence-only education type, and her daughter ends up pregnant. Actually there was one really interesting thing...the right kept saying that all these Democrats were attacking Palin for trying to go for the VP spot instead of caring for her 5 kids or however many she has at home, and then they could never produce an example of anyone actually doing that except for one vaguely related quote a few days afterwards from Carville.

I'd imagine he'd much rather go somewhere where he'd have a chance to play everyday and where they could use a RH bat. San Francisco, NYM, Cincinnati come immediately to mind. Esp. Cinci, he could pad his numbers in their ballpark against NL Pitching and they really need a RH bat between Bruce and Votto.

QUOTE (chw42 @ May 13, 2009 -> 05:37 PM) According to RotoWorld, the Tigers could release Mags. Anybody interested? If only Mags was 25 instead of 35...*sigh. Man, I didn't realize he'd been that bad this year, sporting a .629 OPS currently. Is this the last year of his contract? Would have to be, 5 year deal signed in 05 right?

QUOTE (BearSox @ May 13, 2009 -> 05:36 PM) Well, most of them are socialists, but the problem is, look what Bush did in his final year. Both isles have them, IMO, but one side more than the other. 20% of the GDP being related to the government: wonderful capitalism, like the Reagan years. 22% of the GDP being the government: National Socialism!

QUOTE (BearSox @ May 13, 2009 -> 05:29 PM) Hudson with a decent outing. 5 innings, 2 runs (both earned, 3 BB's, 6 K's. Either the hitters in advanced A are a lot more patient or Hudson didn't have his usual great control today (I'm saying it's the later). Struck out Pedro Alvarez in the first. His 3rd walk of the game in the 5th came around to score. Seems like both those runs came in the 5th?

QUOTE (Kalapse @ May 13, 2009 -> 05:28 PM) I think Chris Getz just fell down a flight of stairs. No, that's just his batting average.

QUOTE (Kalapse @ May 13, 2009 -> 05:25 PM) Brian Anderson just tripled off Casey Fossum. Hard hit ball I hope? Something solid and in the gap, not a screw-up by the defense?

QUOTE (lostfan @ May 13, 2009 -> 05:24 PM) I missed this conversation while it was going on, but I hope it's not another federal judge. That artificially limits the field to a fraction of otherwise qualified people. It's like saying we want people to work in retail, but only if they've been a cashier. This won't be Obama's only nominee, so it won't be his only chance to put someone in who isn't a judge. Know anyone who's hiring a cashier?

QUOTE (Kalapse @ May 13, 2009 -> 05:15 PM) Jose Contreras: 3 IP, 3 H, 0 R, 3 BB, 4 K STOP IT JOSE.

Link I'm not a fan of Napolitano for this position, don't know enough about Granholm to say. Its interesting that the moment the vacancy was announced, the right wing launched in to a smear/whisper campaign against Sotomayor that the press picked up on rapidly and ran with. Demographically, she's both female and would be the first Hispanic justice.

QUOTE (Chisoxfn @ May 13, 2009 -> 05:06 PM) Oh I quietly think the White Sox are really building towards 2010/2011. And even with that, if we can get a little luckier and get Quentin, Alexei, and Floyd out of their current slumps, the only thing that will stop us from making another run this year is someone really taking off. This team is just going to be deadly the next few years...we reloaded on talent like the Pirates or Rays do out of the draft, but we did so with only 1 losing season.

QUOTE (dasox24 @ May 13, 2009 -> 05:04 PM) Excellent point. I would think that we could get a pretty darn good player with that $7.5M considering there are supposed to be so many good free agents that year other than LeBron, Wade, Bosh, and Stoudemire, and then also factor in that the down economy may keep some teams from being able to spend as much. If the cap is a little higher than I expect, that could push up to $9-$10 million also. If we have some idea in the back rooms of where the cap will actually be, that's also money that could be used to hold on to Ben Gordon this year if we were willing to go luxury tax for a little while, or if we could spin Miller off for a draft pick to anyone who has cap space this year.

http://beta.wilcoworld.net/records/thealbum/index.php Offhand, already liking this one more than most of Sky Blue Sky, although that one had its gems.

QUOTE (caulfield12 @ May 13, 2009 -> 04:47 PM) Well, despite the chicanery and tomfoolery today: KW, having the biggest ego of all GM's west of the NESN broadcasting area, WON'T ever admit that the failure of the team has anything to do with the overall talent level of the team or that he believed they wouldn't compete for the AL Central title in 2009. The question is, who will blow up first if this year trends into another 2007, Ozzie or KW? I would rather have Steve Stone as the GM, personally, and I wouldn't mind seeing Ozzie stick around to manage the new generation of Sox players over the next 2-3 years and see how he does with a team that's more suited for his managerial style: players like Nix, Getz, Ramirez, Allen and Beckham, mixing in the power of Flowers/Viciedo and the speed/athleticism of Danks/Shelby. It really amazes me how little credit KW is given for what has transpired with this team over the last 2 years. In 2007, everything that KW had tried to rely on blew up. The bullpen fell apart, the starters struggled, the offense was anemic, the guys we were hoping could fill in, didn't. We were a 70 win team and we looked like we might stay that way for a number of years, esp. since 3 of our key guys were getting up there in age. In 2008, by virtue of a couple trades that seemingly totally depleted our minor leagues, we managed to get back up to where we were in 2006; a nearly 90 win, playoff caliber team, and perhaps the only reason we didn't go farther is that a couple of key guys wound up ravaged by injury. At the same time as KW was totally rebuilding the major league team within 1 year, he was totally rebuilding the minor league team within 1 year as well. At the start of 2008, I don't know if I could name a single guy from the lower or middle minors who I thought might be available in 2010 for the big leagues with any kind of talent. Poreda maybe, but that's about it. Now, with 1 year changed, our AA team appears absolutely loaded, with something like 6-7 guys who could legitimately be on the big league team within 2 years, several of whom could legitimately be all stars. Our single A level doesn't appear bad either...we're really loaded in pitching at that level. We've rebuild the minors to the point that we could be a legit player for anyone on the trade deadline this year, or we can hold them and be able to make some major, cheap strides next year. And on top of that, we're holding 4 picks in the first 2 rounds this year. We rebuilt the major league team from 70 wins to 90 wins in 1 year, while at the same time totally rebuilding the minor leagues...and we did it while simultaneously cutting salary in the middle of a recession. Regardless of how this season turns out...we're getting unlucky with slumps and injuries right now, hopefully that turns around...KW has done an absolutely remarkable job of turning this organization around in the space of less than a year.

QUOTE (Kalapse @ May 13, 2009 -> 03:47 PM) At least Brian had a little pop. I was willing to put up with him there because his defense was saving us as many runs as his bat was costing us. I can't say the same about Lilliputian.

QUOTE (tommy @ May 11, 2009 -> 11:21 PM) I'm here to jinx Ryan Zimmerman. Done. Ended at 30 today.

QUOTE (Kalapse @ May 13, 2009 -> 03:19 PM) Honestly, given the amount of PA's he's already accumulated I'd say yes. In 2006 Anderson had roughly the same number of PA's and had a similar average...the only difference is Anderson had a couple home runs.

There were a number of interesting things today in the Senate's hearing on Bush's torture methods, including Senator Graham berating the man who did the interrogation of Zubaydah before they started the torture and using a previously retracted report to do it, but some of the more interesting stuff that we didn't already know came from Phil Zelikow, who worked under Rice in the 2nd term and who opposed the torture program. First, he says that copies of a memo that he wrote contradicting the OLC torture memos have been found, despite attempts by people at the top of the Bush admin. to make sure that all copies were destroyed, so we may well see some of that later. He also gives a lot of detail regarding exactly how the Democrats in Congress were "Briefed", that random obsession of the righties that somehow is supposed to make the fact that they were breaking the law ok. It's actually an interesting summary of how they maneuvered around the typical procedure...I'll let people who have been following the cases more completely than me give the summary here.

Figured this was the right thread for this article... Former Mexican President Vicente Fox joins a couple of other former South American leaders in calling for an end to the ban on Marijuana. Seems he believes it would give his country a major assist in its current drug war.

QUOTE (greg775 @ May 13, 2009 -> 02:13 PM) Like somebody said, what about the pitching then? The pitching as somebody pointed out has sucked in most all games except for Mark/Danks. Fire Coop as well. Ultimately KW gets the players and Oz makes the on-the-field decisions. If you want a revolving door, then fire Oz and KW and go that route. Even if we don't like the players on the field this season...seeing what KW has managed to do, going through 1 down season and then managing to rapidly turn around and build a team that wins the division and could have gone farther in the postseason with a few less injuries while at the same time loading up on talent moving upwards in our minor leagues and cutting salary to boot...that's pretty darn impressive.

QUOTE (ptatc @ May 13, 2009 -> 02:09 PM) Shoes are very different from pair to pair. Just because it's a professional franchise doesn't mean they don't get a bad batch. Training also varies. May be with all of the bad weather they ran indoors and aggravated the heels. That's only one possiblity. There could be many. Never equate pro sports with good training, medical care or even equipment. Those are very political decisions in oraganizations and (like most things) revolve around money. All that being said, the Sox have one of the best medical staffs in pro sports. However, that does mean things can't happen like the example I gave earlier. DJ and Farmer were talking today that a common mechanism of heel injuries in baseball is stretching out/jumping forwards as you're taking your last step towards 1b and trying to beat a throw. Sounded reasonable to me.

QUOTE (greg775 @ May 13, 2009 -> 02:15 PM) I love how we're all praying for Brian Anderson to come back and save the lineup. Brian freaking Anderson, the definition of mediocrity at best. Lillibridge is like MacDougal. At this point ... please just get rid of him. Make the minor league fans watch him try to hit home runs and fail at it. And Carlos Quentin. And we've lost Dye and Thome for stretches in the past couple weeks. And we're waiting on Alexei Ramirez to wake up. The slumps Fields and Getz are in...those trouble me a bit.