Balta1701

QUOTE (AWhiteSoxinNJ @ Jan 14, 2009 -> 04:17 PM) I'd rather go with a young arm then Colon, it worked out with Danks and Floyd. "A" young arm, I have no problem with. My worry is that right now we're requiring 2 young arms. We have 3 potential candidates (Marquez, Richard, Poreda) but frankly, at the end of last year it looked like all 3 could use some time either in the bullpen (Richard) or in AAA to start the next year. We might get lucky and have someone like JVB or Broadway suddenly step up in ST also, but this was insurance we needed to do. Even if all Colon gives us is a couple poor months, that's a couple poor months while the kids get extra work in.

QUOTE (Milkman delivers @ Jan 14, 2009 -> 03:12 PM) I'm guessing that's from Star Trek, but I googled it and it only came up with Moby Dick. Khan's last words, quoting that book.

Over at Obama's transition website, Change.gov, there's a function where you can vote up or vote down specific policy ideas. The top vote getter right now is SUPERTRAINS! #2 and #4 have some relevance to this thread.

QUOTE (mr_genius @ Jan 14, 2009 -> 02:12 PM) Actually there was a ton of outrage for Bush doing it. I saw tons of stories on deficits and spending. I myself did much complaining. The Democrats and their followers all cried "Reckless spending!!!" Now Obama is going to run deficits that will absolutely destroy deficit spending records under GW Bush but it's "Good" now. Actually, there's some legit economics that would say that running deficits at a time of economic growth is a bad thing, because the growth always stops at some point, and when that happens, you actually need the government to go in to deficit. The ideal time to balance the budget and pay down some portion of the debt would have been the period from say 2003-2006. Instead we were $200-$400 billion in the hole every one of those years.

"From Hell's heart I stab at thee. For hate's sake, I spit my last breath at thee."

QUOTE (Big Daddy Kool @ Jan 14, 2009 -> 12:53 PM) Dunn in CF? You're smoking something right? 3 year old Cheerios.

QUOTE (Cknolls @ Jan 14, 2009 -> 12:47 PM) You guys seem to be forgetting the biggest reason, and that is the man himself, the President -Elect. BO had very little to do with the retaking of both houses of Congress in 2006. He likely had an impact in 2008, but at the same time...he wasn't the one out there setting up or running local campaigns, training and recruiting candidates in unexpected places pre-08, getting set up with all the local things beforehand...etc. The Obama campaign was smart in that they really took advantage in a lot of areas of the work Dean's DNC did in the previous 3 years. Building up voter lists, having people actually in place who were trained and who were familiar with local districts, etc.

QUOTE (kyyle23 @ Jan 14, 2009 -> 12:48 PM) Dye, Quentin, BA and Dunn? Dunn would play CF.

QUOTE (Kalapse @ Jan 14, 2009 -> 12:44 PM) Using the loss of an injury prone player like Crede as some sort of excuse is just silly, his trip to the disabled list last season should not have been seen as a surprise, rather an inevitability. You can't bank on players like him to stay healthy and besides, I'd argue that the Sox were just as well if not better off with Uribe as their starting 3B last season than they were with a perpetually banged up Crede. Then if you're not counting Crede as a surprising injury, Crede's injury replacement spending the whole year banged up (Fields) has to count.

QUOTE (Dick Allen @ Jan 14, 2009 -> 12:24 PM) I love Quentin, but his health has to always be a question mark. He's been injured a lot during his brief career, and the one thing that always concerns me is he gets hit at such a high clip, he may be out for a while at any time. Can the White Sox be certain Linebrink is over his physical issues? When he came back he was batting practice. On Liney...I have no idea. On Quentin...I agree. But you're missing my point here. I think it's pretty simple...yes, the team still has 1 or 2 holes, CF and #4 starter being the obvious ones. And there are a number of other positions we're rolling the dice on. If a few positions crap out, then we might be in trouble. But if a couple others step up, this horrific, terrible, awful, we're going to be bad forever offseason will look an awful lot like the "We're going to be bad forever" offseason we had last year. Seemed like everyone was down on this team in January last year, and they stepped up big time and won an admittedly weak division, but did so with major losses to injury. If this is our roster in April...I'll worry about the 2 kids we have as our 4 & 5 starters. But we may well be better than you think. And if we are, then we're in real good shape a year or two down the road.

QUOTE (DukeNukeEm @ Jan 14, 2009 -> 12:21 PM) 1943? I'd say our ties with the Aussies were pretty good then. Coral Sea was '42.

QUOTE (Dick Allen @ Jan 14, 2009 -> 12:14 PM) Probably because of the results of the previous season. The bottom line is while the White Sox won the division in 2008 they weren't good enough to win what they were ultimately shooting for. Detroit, Cleveland and KC were woeful in 2008. Minnesota surprised and the Sox won but had to go to OT. Will Gavin Floyd be able to repeat? Can Danks repeat? Will the other teams perhaps being a little stronger hurt the Sox? One thing is for sure, I don't think anyone on this board thinks they are good enough to win it all. I still hold out hope KW is bluffing and will bring in some talent. I've stated before, no one will be more shocked than me if he doesn't bring in a real lead off hitter. If its Jerry Owens, I'll want to stab myself in the eye with a fork. But every day that goes by heightens the odds that KW really is going with what he has for the most part. I guess he wants to ensure walk up sales will be the nill the team aparently is anticipating for 2009. True. They weren't good enough to win it all...after September 1. You take away the best player from any team in the playoffs, and they're probably lucky to still make that round. On top of that, we lost what, our #3-#4 starting pitcher, and our #1 setup guy never really recovered from his injury? I can't say with any certainty we'd have beaten the Rays or anything like that if we'd had a healthy Q, Linebrink, and Contreras. But I have trouble thinking of another team that made the playoffs that was as banged up as we were. The Red Sox perhaps, they struggled with a Beckett injury and Ortiz having troubles throughout the season.

QUOTE (StrangeSox @ Jan 14, 2009 -> 12:10 PM) I don't get why he didn't mention his AIDS initiatives in Africa. edit: bmags beat me to it. The AIDS aid has its own problems, though; 1/3 of the funds are for abstinence-only education. And most of the money for those programs came out of funding for anti-malaria programs and other diseases.

QUOTE (shipps @ Jan 14, 2009 -> 12:03 PM) Why is that? So you can ensure that you will wet the bed and wonder how the hell that could happen the next morning? Alcohol dehydrates your body in a number of ways, through stimulating your kidneys to overproduce urine and the reaction in the liver that consumes alcohol. That dehydration is a main cause of the headaches you get in a hangover. If there's enough water in your system, you won't cross that threshold. Powerade or something similar can also be useful because it supplies salts at the same time, something that is removed through a lot of urination.

QUOTE (Dick Allen @ Jan 14, 2009 -> 12:02 PM) You might want to check your baseball encyclopedia before telling people you are the only one who remembers correctly. Aardsma, Erstad, Sisco, Prinz were all brought in for the 2007 season with KW saying a lot of the same things he is now saying about these other players he brought in. What ensued was a disaster. BTW Brett Prinz transaction:February 22, 2007: Signed as a Free Agent with the Chicago White Sox. Ok, you win this round, I apologize on that. But that still doesn't mean that my point is incorrect. An awful lot of people thought we were in better shape going in to 2007 than going in to 2008.

QUOTE (StrangeSox @ Jan 14, 2009 -> 11:58 AM) Keep in mind its from the Weekly Standard. The head honcho over there has been pretty much universally wrong every time he's opened his mouth for at least the last 6 years. Which is of course...why he's a major Fox News contributor, why the NYT picked him to run an op-ed column for a while, and why he dined with the President Elect last night. There's no better way to advance your career in politics than by being constantly wrong, as long as you're constantly wrong in advocating for more wars.

QUOTE (Dick Allen @ Jan 14, 2009 -> 11:52 AM) No. More like the offseason between 2006 and 2007. Guys like Erstad, Prinz, Sisco, Aardsma. In a word, crap. Why am I the only one who ever remembers all the people who said that Quentin guy wasn't going to amount to anything last offseason? Or that we were screwed for looking at Uribe at 2nd base. Or that Danks and Floyd would never cut it in the rotation. Or that Fields ought to be playing over Crede at 3rd base. Or that our 2006 bullpen could be historically good because of how hard they threw. Hell, you don't even have your years right. Erstad was 2007. Aardsma and Sisco were 2006. Prinz was 2007...but wasn't an offseason addition - he's a guy we grabbed off the scrap heap mid season.

Rice and Henderson deliver the top 10 list on Letterman.

QUOTE (TheBigHurt @ Jan 14, 2009 -> 11:49 AM) Agreed. If nothing else was done, this offseason would clearly be a giant failure. Just like last year's was.

QUOTE (RockRaines @ Jan 14, 2009 -> 10:44 AM) Pods was a pretty decent name back then, he was a fairly prominent lead off man. We arent even targeting THOSE guys. But...he was also coming off a season where he hit a whopping .240. There were a lot of questions about whether he'd be a decent leadoff man for any team if that's the way he was going to hit in what was basically his 2nd full season.

QUOTE (ptatc @ Jan 14, 2009 -> 09:57 AM) Picking up good players who fit their roles is the way the Sox will win. And by developing cheap guys to fill available holes. That's how we won in 2005. We had a few cheap development guys coming up (Jenks, McCarthy, Crede, Rowand to some extent), and we found a group of other guys who weren't huge names but who were undervalued in the current market for various reasons (AJ - attitude, Iguchi - blow up in NY of Matsui at the same position, Dye - Injuries, Contreras - struggles in NY). Part of the reason why we were able to rebuild this thing so fast is that KW pulled off a couple of similarly shrewd moves last year, finding value where other people didn't think there was any. He stole Q for a minor leaguer because Q was injured the year before. He grabbed Alexei from a market that was undervalued. He picked up Danks and Floyd on the cheap for various reasons and gave them time to develop. Occasionally those moves blow up, especially if they're obviously wrong (example 2007 and Erstad). But we keep having success with that method.

QUOTE (StrangeSox @ Jan 14, 2009 -> 09:56 AM) The restisting cities are falling one by one. They will fall A LOT more rapidly if the federal government comes in and says "We're paying for this chunk".

QUOTE (RockRaines @ Jan 14, 2009 -> 09:40 AM) The Sox have been pursuing players quietly, and the reason it remains quiet is because they are players that nobody gives two s***s about. You sound like you're outraged by that. I think that's how most teams seem to build title contenders lately.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Jan 14, 2009 -> 05:37 AM) non-Economist writer? I would at least like to see someone who understands what the lack of liquidity does to a marketplace. If you want a really good example, look at the credit market. So, for a counter-example, the UK has had a similar tax for years. Has that tax crippled the UK any more than any other financial market?

Biggest House and Senate majorities in decades, vastly bigger than the 1994 Republican majority, the White House, and a complete 4 year change in which party is viewed to be in disarray. He had some help (W), but give the man his due.