Balta1701

QUOTE(RockRaines @ May 30, 2006 -> 01:39 PM) Its so funny that Javier Vazquez can do no wrong on this board, and is called the next Ace, yet posts a similar career ERA to Garland and gets paid more money. And Vazquez did most of his work in the NL as well. 4.53 for Garland career vs. 4.27 for Vazquez. Interesting way to look at it. And JV is about 3 years older. QUOTE(Felix @ May 30, 2006 -> 01:44 PM) There's a difference between a 4.42 ERA and 1.38 WHIP (Garland), and a 4.28 ERA and 1.27 WHIP (Vazquez). Vazquez has also had numberous successful seasons (2000-2003), and had more above average seasons than average seasons... unlike Garland. (these numbers aren't including this years stats) JV's WHIP was 1.36 when he was 1 year away from hitting Free Agency (the place Garland was at the end of last season.)

QUOTE(kapkomet @ May 30, 2006 -> 01:35 PM) Did he take the tickets, or not? It doesn't matter how he voted. Was it "ethical" to take those tickets? Personally, I could care less that he took them. But it can look bad. The Ethics "problem" if we really want to focus on it would be the "Quid Pro Quo's" in Congress...i.e. a lobbyist offering something to try to convince a person to vote a certain way, and the person voting that way. So yes, given that the tickets seem to have failed to influence him, yeah, it probably was ethical. If I offered you $10,000 and didn't ask you to do anything at all, would it be ethical for you to accept the $? (Assume that it's not laundered money or anything like that.)

QUOTE(kapkomet @ May 30, 2006 -> 01:07 PM) So, it's a "smear" when it happens to a Democrat, but it's corruption all over the place when a Repulican is involved in the same types of things? They are all b****es to the money, power, and lobbyists. Period. No, it's a smear when people allege corruption and wrongdoing when none is present. I'd be more than happy for every single Republican who was given free tickets to skyboxes by Jack Abramoff to get his own article detailing it to jump on, but I don't want to get to 20,000 posts that fast...and most of those congresspeople wound up actually supporting the legislation that the lobbyist wanted, not opposing it. You know as well as I do that I'd be more than happy to end the entire industry of lobbyists. But playing up some sort of false equality by casually leaving key out details from stories or by focusing on things like this story, where a Senator takes something from a lobbyist and then fails to support what the lobbyist wants, when there are dozens of examples of senators taking things from lobbyists and then deciding to support the lobbyist position, just shows that people care more about hurting the other side than they do about real lobbying reform.

Linky.

QUOTE(Felix @ May 30, 2006 -> 12:40 PM) Again, the Yankees, injury prone, and a VERY good pitcher when fully healthy. The Dodgers signed that contract, the Yankees only traded for him.

Origins of a smear. AP publishes article that works as hard as possible to paint Harry Reid in a bad light. Harry Reid took some free Boxing tickets from the Nevada Gaming commission, and then voted against the bill the gaming commission was lobbying on behalf of. The AP cites a couple of unnamed "Ethics experts" who think it's a bad idea. Oh, and this is the same AP Guy who 2 months ago wrote a story on how Reid was lobbied on behalf of an Abramoff client, supporting a bill related to the Marianas Islands, without ever noting that Reid opposed the bill. Next step? CNN and MSNBC run with the exact same story, except they casually forget to include the little note that Reid actually voted against what the NGC was lobbying on behalf of. The Republicans reduce the CNN story, which left out the most important, key detail which proves that Reid didn't do a damn thing wrong, into the slogan "Harry Reid ethics violator." So, Reid gets stuff from lobbyist, votes against what the lobbying party wanted, and turns into an ethics violater. The liberal media at it again. Meanwhile, those same Republicans, so desperate to make Congress clean again make $$$ have taken the incredibly stripped-down lobbying reform package to a conference committee. Who did the Senate appoint to that committee? Was it either of the Senators who backed much stronger reform proposals? Nope, it's Ted Stevens (R - AK). The question now is...will Senator Stevens be able to insert another $300 million Bridge to Nowhere in the lobbying bill, just to make sure that it's a joke to everyone, not just to the folks paying attention.

QUOTE(Felix @ May 30, 2006 -> 12:08 PM) I fail to see how giving an average starter $10 million in 2007 and $12 million in 2008 is lower than market value. AJ Burnett moved to the 60 day DL from the 15 day DL.

Didn't see this posted anywhere, so here we go. Crash returned from the DL saturday night to quite a few standing ovations. At least one person had a sign saying "Chicks dig scars." Rowand is 2/11 (2 doubles, 2 runs scored) since his return.

The Amazin Mets placed Xavier Nady on the 15 day DL and called up...here we go...Lastings Milledge. AJ "Worse career Record than Jon Garland" Burnett has been moved to the 60 day DL. Mark Prior made a rehab start and lasted 2 innigns. Eric Gagne got the save in his final rehab start in Vegas. He'll be driving back to L.A. today. Supposedly his velocity is down somewhat still, but he is throwing fewer fastballs overall. Shawn Estes is 98% sure he'll be having Tommy John surgery. Jon Lieber hit the 15 day DL for the Phils with a Groin strain. David Wells took too big of a bite out of his knee and will miss his next start. Mike Lieberthal was activated off the 15 day DL by the Phils. The Blue Jays added Edgardo Alfonzo, who was released by the Halos earlier this year. Jose Guillen hit the 15 day DL. Jorge Anything you Cantu I cantu Better is ready for a minor league rehab assignment. Chris Carpenter looks to be headed for the 15 day DL.

Hmph...to all of those who said that Soriano's numbers the last few years were all because of Arlington... His numbers at home this year...11 home runs, 1.122 OPS.

George W. Bush, May 25th. White House Press Sec. Tony Snow, today.

QUOTE(kapkomet @ May 30, 2006 -> 11:49 AM) So, the schedule heavily favors Detroit coming down the stretch. Look, these guys aren't going to go away. Teams that get off to this kind of start are definitely hard pressed to not make the playoffs. The thing is, this year, there's 5 teams for three spots (NYY, BOS, CLE, DET, and CWS). Then you have the last spot going to whoever comes out in the West (probably OAK with around a 85 win total or so). I'd love to know why you put Cleveland instead of Toronto.

QUOTE(RibbieRubarb @ May 30, 2006 -> 11:50 AM)

From Yesterday's Your World with Neil Cavuto. X-Men was shown on 3,690 and the Da Vinci Code was shown on 3,754 screens. Al Gore's movie? 4 screens.

QUOTE(WCSox @ May 30, 2006 -> 10:45 AM) Definitely, but I don't think it's necessary. Hell, not even Bonds has 3,000 career hits. If he falls short of 3,000, I think that he still has a good shot of getting in sometime down the road. He's the face of the Houston Astros, a 7-time All-Star, has four Gold Gloves, over 400 career SBs, hits for average, and will be close to 300 career HRs by the time he retires. Definitely a borderline HOF career for a 2B. The fact that you said the word "Borderline" only argues my point better. He's over 2800 hits right now...you get taht 3000th hit on his resume, and he'll have that final, big number that HOF voters can point to.

Keep up the good work Mark. You're 2 guys away from the best ERA in the AL right now. (Of course, problem is, 1 of those 2 guys is Jose Contreras...but anywho...Verlander's up next.)

QUOTE(Heads22 @ May 30, 2006 -> 10:22 AM) What do you guys think about Biggio? Wow, as of right now, he's had exactly 10000 at bats in his career. He gets to 3000 hits and he's in.

It's the Hall of Fame, not the Hall of Very Good.

QUOTE(loltrain @ May 30, 2006 -> 08:48 AM) You're absolutely right, most of us are probably still trying to recover from the barrage of Whitesox "fans" last year informing us of such things as: "DETOILET SUX LOLOLOLOL" "U GUYZ SUX LOLOLOL" "DETROIT IS FULL OF (not a nice word for black people) HAHAHAHAHAHA" "WE WIN AGAIN WHITE SOX FOR WORLD SERIES HAHAH U SUX LOLOLOL" and the like. I hope that we are not quite as annoying to you guys. Every site gets people like that. Please don't interpret them as representative of the entire White Sox fan base. We had some really annoying Cleveland Fans showing up here around the middle of September last year. Strangely, they all vanished during the last week of the season. It happens to everyone.

QUOTE(FlaSoxxJim @ May 30, 2006 -> 09:23 AM) I've heard clarification on that, and it was basically still at the informal level, the NFL seeing if he was interested in the position but not a formal offer of the position. And he supposedly said he wasn't interested.

QUOTE(Tony82087 @ May 29, 2006 -> 02:36 PM) I agree, but they just dont look like the same team. IMO the loss of Coco is hurting them the most(I know how bad there pitching has been) They're the #1 offense in baseball. It's not Coco they're missing.

QUOTE(robinventura23 @ May 29, 2006 -> 08:10 AM) Unfortunately, it was bound to happen. Hopefully, we can stop hearing about his every at bat on ESPN and start focusing on Albert Pujols possibly breaking his single-season HR record. And Jim Thome.

QUOTE(SoxFan1 @ May 29, 2006 -> 02:22 PM) If they haven't noticed by then, their just plain dumb. But...Brian Anderson! you can't win with a guy hitting .165 in May. You can't. No team in history has ever done that! You can't afford that!

And pretty soon on the list...Frank Thomas.