Balta1701

QUOTE(bmags @ Jan 7, 2007 -> 09:15 PM) would arizona air have any neg. affect on a knuckle ball pitcher?(honestly) Well, yes, but it could have an affect on almost any "touch" pitcher. Floyd's coming in there needing his curve ball and moving fastball to be on for him to have success, so it could bother both of them. It also could be a good thing for the knuckle-thrower to work a little in that sort of environment.

QUOTE(EvilMonkey @ Jan 7, 2007 -> 06:45 PM) Because if Iran becaomes involved to a larger extent and tries to dispupt oil shipping in the gulf and such, it will fall to the Navy, and to a lesser extent the Air Force, to keep the tankers moving. Which is sort of the point I was trying to get across. It at least seems possible that we've prioritized Iran over the 2 wars we're already struggling mightily or failing in. That concerns me.

QUOTE(kyyle23 @ Jan 7, 2007 -> 05:44 PM) I think I am one of the few that really likes both Machina albums. I like how The Corgan Experience™ did something different in each album, and drifted into a more electronic sound. And he really knows how to build an album. The only problem I have with Corgan is his arrogance, but most of it is due to his talent with music. I think the reformation of the Pumpkins will be fun, but I doubt it will last too long. Kind of like when Janes Addiction reformed then broke up after making an album. I'm in the group that liked the Machina albus also. Hell, I fully enjoyed the Zwan album as well.

QUOTE(WhiteSoxfan1986 @ Jan 7, 2007 -> 06:37 PM) I'm not sure about this move with the recent track record of college coaches in the NFL. There's probably good reason to be skeptical for just that reason, but on the other hand, someone, somewhere is going to have to figure out a way to make Vick into a success. There's just so much unfulfilled talent there, but so far, every single scheme has seemed to make him look worse. Stop with the freaking 7 step drops and roll him out of the pocket more!!!

QUOTE(Damen @ Jan 7, 2007 -> 07:12 PM) I believe the Sox could eventually be the organization that Floyd thrives in, but I can't see this miraculously happening by the start of the season. Like biggruss said, it seems from the interviews management has given that Floyd has been all but penciled into our starting rotation. Hopefully they at least give Haeger a legit shot, is all I'll say about that.

QUOTE(Damen @ Jan 7, 2007 -> 06:49 PM) Where'd you find Spring Training numbers? thebaseballcube.com. Hell of a resource for stats.

QUOTE(CaliSoxFanViaSWside @ Jan 7, 2007 -> 06:03 PM) Ok Balta u convinced me I was being a little bit stingy there. Lets upgrade it from a needle to a 16 penny nail in a haystack. Thats quite a bit larger but still damn hard to find. Personally, I think it's a lot higher than that too...but hey, that's why they play the games.

QUOTE(CaliSoxFanViaSWside @ Jan 7, 2007 -> 05:51 PM) He had approx. the same number of AB's before and after the AS break. Judging by theses stats ( and I know things don't always go the way we want) I'd have to say BA is capable of hitting .250-.260 over the course of a season. That's not unrealistic expectations. And I know the numbers don't translate exactly, but in 3 seasons in the minors with us, Anderson hit .306, and he hit .295 in his last full season at Charlotte. The kid has the talent to be a really good hitter, he just needs to learn how to be one in the big leagues.

QUOTE(Texsox @ Jan 7, 2007 -> 05:49 PM) 18. A couple of the questions sucked. For example the Which will do more to reduce crime? Prisons help after a crime is committed, not before. But, at least in California for example, the prisons out here are so overcrowded that its impossible to keep anyone except the worst offenders in jail for the duration of their terms, and the overcrowding itself tends to harden people (like 6 people to a cell or something like that, you can imagine how effective that is for rehabilitation). So you have a system where people get put into conditions bad enough to promoke riots, and then get back onto the street well before their terms are over.

QUOTE(kyyle23 @ Jan 7, 2007 -> 05:38 PM) If Eli Mannings name was Eli Floyd, would Philip Rivers be the quarterback of the Giants right now? And Shawne Merriman might be in their linebacking corps.

QUOTE(CaliSoxFanViaSWside @ Jan 7, 2007 -> 05:31 PM) I'll suggest you'd be out of your mind to think BMac is good for 15 wins in his 1st full year as a starter, but i will say his chances of doing it are better than Floyds. One has a snowballs chance in hell and the other one finding a needle in a haystack. Considering the offenses that both of them could have behind them, I wouldn't rule out either of them having 15 wins. May not happen, but it's a lot higher than the needle in a haystack.

QUOTE(Brian @ Jan 7, 2007 -> 05:10 PM) He had his TD catch in the 1st drive, than was non existent until the 4th quarter. Too bad the overrated Giants defense lays an egg down the stretch. They didn't belong in the playoffs anyway. If Eli Manning's name was Eli Floyd, would the Giants be considering hitting the FA market for a backup QB this offseason? Or thinking about using a draft pick on a QB?

QUOTE(NorthSideSox72 @ Jan 7, 2007 -> 04:04 PM) And that is an excellent comparison. Israel has a history of preemptive military action, they have the military hardware to do it, and they would likely have U.S. support (tacit). Somehow, I don't think Myanmar can say the same. I think my point may have eluded you. My point is that it shouldn't be a story at all that a country has potential plans to attack Iran. The U.S. probably has 87 versions of that plan. Israel probably has just about as many. That's what general staffs do, they come up with contingency plans so that in the event the politicians make that decision, they aren't starting from scratch. The thing that would be worth reporting would be something beyond the plan being drawn up. If, for example, a leader went around for 6 months saying how they needed to invade some country, that makes the plans that much more newsworthy. Or if there was some additional level of preparation, like training on mock targets or a call-up of reserve forces or something like that. I just don't see how its does anything to report 5 times in 2 years that "Israel has plans to attack Iran". Especially when nothing happened the other 4 times the same thing was reported.

QUOTE(TLAK @ Jan 7, 2007 -> 03:59 PM) I think Anderson should be made to earn his keep this year or be sent down. If he plays in spring training like he did early last year, he shouldn't make the team, even if he breaks camp with them, if he has a month in the Majors like his last September he should get a ticket to Charlotte. If needed, the White Sox should go through every player in the system, Sweeney, Torero, Owens - even Nanita, before accepting another season like last year. That said, he has so much talent that if he were to click he could be on the all star team. He is a tantalizing young player and I hope he makes it but you can't lose another year waiting for him. Interestingly, if people recall, I believe Anderson actually put together a pretty good spring training last year. 21/68, home run, .845 OPS in the spring. And he's hit over .300 in ST both years where he was in camp with the big boys. So ST might very well be the least of his concerns. Or so we hope. He should have a month or two in the big leagues to get going, and by get going, I basically mean hitting in the .230's or so. That's all I want from him to start the season, he doesn't have to be good with the bat, just not bloody awful. With his defense, he should just give us more than an NL team gets out of its 9 hole. And anyway, in terms of the general topic of this thread...trading Brian Anderson now is a terrible idea. Why? Because right now, Anderson's value is basically as low as it could possibly get unless he hits .160 the next 3 years. Right now, anyone who wants to acquire him will be trying to do so with the hope that they can "Turn him around" and get more out of him than we could because he does have a lot of talent. But teams would do the same thing at the end of next season, and probably the season after that if he's still struggling then. On the other hand, if he can learn a few things somewhere along the line, and put together a good season, then suddenly his value goes right back up. Think about this...how much would the Sox have cost themselves if they decided to trade Crede in the middle of the 05 season, when he was still struggling before he finally worked the kinks out of his swing (and there was sure a lot of talk about replacing him with Eric Chavez, for example). By holding onto Crede, the Sox saved talent, they suddenly found themselves holding a much more valuable trading chip in Crede, and they've saved themselves over $15 million in the last 2 seasons alone.

QUOTE(NorthSideSox72 @ Jan 7, 2007 -> 01:51 PM) I don't find the nuclear aspect likely, but I do think that the general idea of them having a plan of this type is not at all far-fetched. Hell, I wouldn't be surprised if the general staff in Myanmar had some sort of plan for an airstrike on Iran. Doesn't mean that it's actually going to happen.

I'm going to step back from actually discussing the report and go after the source here. And More from the right-wing Pajamas Media. This is just a Rupert Murdoch owned paper either trying to sell papers or rattle the sabre on its own, I'd say.

QUOTE(NorthSideSox72 @ Jan 7, 2007 -> 01:07 PM) There is also of course the fundamental problem of having a city in New Orleans at all. its a sub-sea level flood plain (part of it anyway). I sure as heck hope we take this opportunity to NOT rebuild residences and businesses in those lower areas, and instead, make those open spaces, parks, gathering spots, etc. that can flood to no great damage. Otherwise, we're just asking for it to happen again. The problem with that argument though is that you can make it about a significant number of cities within the U.S. Yes, New Orleans faces a major storm hitting it on average every 50 years or so, with minor storms more often. The Los Angeles and San Francisco areas will each face a major earthquake every 100-150 years or so on average (major being 1906 scale), with minor, Northridge/Loma Prieta scale events every decade. Every 300 years or so (plus or minus about 300, and the last one was about 300 years ago), the Pacific Northwest will face a Sumatra-scale earthquake which will absolutely destroy that area. Every 100 or 200 years or so, the regions around Mt. Hood and Mt. Rainier will be put in major jeopardy due to eruptions of those volcanoes. Every 50 years or so, we can probably expect New York City to wind up under water from a Hurricane. I think the reality of the situation is there's just no way that we can start abandoning cities that are at risk, because if we go down that road, there's no where to put people. Everyone looks at what happened to New Orleans, and now it seems like a logical suggestion to pull out of there because of the things you cite, and clearly it's been shown to be the most at-risk city in the coutnry right? Well, I'd disagree with that. In fact, I'd say it's probably a lot easier to make New Orleans relatively safe from the waters around it than it is to make Los Angeles safe from the multitude of fault lines that run right through it, or San Fran safe from the 2 fault lines that run right through it. This is a classic problem in Geology actually...people have a habit of living right where they are at the most risk, because it is geologic risk that actually creates nice environments. The LA Basin is a great environment because of the rapidly rising mountain ranges next to it. Louisiana is a great place to put a port because of the Mississippi river. Tehran sits right on a fault line that could destroy it at any day, but it's there because the faulting has provided that area with mountains which give the area water resources that otherwise wouldn't be there. And so on. There is no easy solution. But I will say this...if it seems like a good idea to just end the lifetime of New Orleans because we don't want to spend the money to build a decent levee system, then it's time to start evacuating LA and SF, because sometime in the next few hundred years, and probably a lot sooner, it's going to cost a hell of a lot more to fix these cities than it would to build those levees.

So, a question...why do you put a Navy Admiral in charge of an entire theater of operation where you're fighting 2 ground wars?

QUOTE(southsider2k5 @ Jan 6, 2007 -> 09:00 PM) Exactly how should we have been prepared for the biggest natural disaster to hit the US in 99 years? How many people should we have standing by for an event like this? Where should they be stationed? How much equiptment should be sitting and waiting? How much in foot and temporary shelter should sit waiting for a natural disatster? What budgets should be taken from to make sure this never happens again, or should we just raise taxes for this just in case event? I think another worthy point to raise in response to this is that the biggest natural disaster to hit the US in 99 years was not due to the biggest storm or most catastrophic event to hit the U.S. in that time, but was in fact due to a storm hitting a spot that had been totally neglected in preparation for the exact event that happened. There was still no reason that those Levees should have failed other than the fact that the people who built them did a sh*tty job, and once they were built, the agencies that oversaw them never funded the upkeep.

I was surprised that Paulie's HR numbers were down a little last year, because he had a great year with the bat. Very, very consistent, and I think he'll avoid any prolongued slumps and do that again, and get a little luckier with the power #'s. .314, 40 HR's, 121 RBI.

9

So, another little bit of good news, at least for now, Pelosi has decided to keep one of the actually positive Republican rules...a term limit for committee chairmen...something that was not in place for the Democrats before 94, which almost certainly contributed to the corruption that developed in that group. Link. So...if anyone reads anything about them trying to get rid of that rule in the future, make sure to point it out. If there's never less attention focused on it, then they can't get rid of a good rule, right?

QUOTE(Dick Allen @ Jan 6, 2007 -> 10:33 AM) Whether Danks is as good as McCarthy is anyone's guess. The Rangers apparently didn't think so. That's not necessarily true. The Rangers may well have thought that Danks will actually be better than McCarthy, but if you look at things from the Rangers perspective, their "Window" closes in 2008. I know for a fact that Mark Teixeira hits Free Agency after 2008, and as he's a Boras client, he won't be signing any extensions before hitting the open market. On top of that, Michael Young hits Free Agency at the end of 2008 as well, and Hank Blalock hits at the end of 2009. With this roster, their window basically closes at the end of 2008, maybe at the end of 07 if they want to get something by trading Tex and Young. They need pitchers for 2007. Danks probably shouldn't see the big leagues until mid-07 at the very earliest, maybe 08 even better, and who knows how long it would take him to adapt to that level given that it has taken him a little while to adapt at each level he's stopped at. The Rangers wanted someone who could pitch for them right now, and they got that.

QUOTE(winninguglyin83 @ Jan 6, 2007 -> 10:29 AM) We're going young. get ready for it. I'm plenty ready for it, I just don't like the idea of going young by losing Mark Buehrle for draft pick compensation alone when he should be worth significantly more than that in a trade.

QUOTE(greasywheels121 @ Jan 6, 2007 -> 10:10 AM) What do you consider reasonable, with the current going prices of pitchers on the market? Honestly, I don't know, but I want to know if it would take Zito-money for him to sign. Hell, I'd consider the yearly cost of Zito if the contract was quite a bit shorter than 7 years.