Balta1701

QUOTE(3E8 @ Nov 28, 2005 -> 01:44 PM) I'm talking about the breakdown of salary each year. Maybe it is back-loaded and he will be traded in the future. That would make sense if it was something like Oakland or Washington signing a guy who's been pitching at the Cell or at Coors field...but Loaiza was pitching in Washington last year. How logical is it to expect that his performance in another ballpark is going to improve over pitching in that ballpark in DC? If it were to be backloaded, that would mean that for a trade to make sense, Loaiza would have to improve over the numbers he had last year - it seems very few of us think he's worth $7 million a season, and next year there will be more pitchers available on the FA market, so just trying to trade him doesn't necessarily make sense.

QUOTE(Greg The Bull Luzinski @ Nov 28, 2005 -> 01:28 PM) As long as it is not 2003 Loaiza, I could care less. He had one good year. Thank God it was with the White Sox. And thank God the Yankees wanted him so badly.

QUOTE(Punch and Judy Garland @ Nov 28, 2005 -> 01:22 PM) THat is a lot of money but if I was goign to give that money to a closer in baseball, Wagner would be among my first three choices. Also, given BJ Ryan's deal, this isn't as bad as it would have seemed a week ago. I respect the Mets for going for it all, even if it blows up in their faces( I will likely pick them to win the East though if they add a good catcher and a set-up man) I don't know if that would have seemed like that bad of a deal a week ago either...the numbers "4 and $40 mil" kept floating around Wagner, and this is still pretty close to that.

Seems like a lot more than he's worth, given how we saw him perform in 2004. Then again, if the 2003 Loaiza could suddenly resurface again...eek. Next year...when there are actual quality FA's on the market...there is going to be a ton of money spent.

QUOTE(WinninUgly @ Nov 28, 2005 -> 01:05 PM) That is all we need, a player with some sort of political agenda. What next PETA and baseball mits? I have 2 words for you: Carl Everett. I don't think anyone on the team would have a problem with a political agenda if the guy was a good person about it and didn't force it upon others. On the other hand...according to the Trib... KW struck a deal for Delgado in 2004 at the trading deadline, and Delgado nixed it, so KW basically wanted no part of Delgado. That seems to deal far more with baseball matters.

JT Called PK over the weekend...didn't talk yet...expects that they'll "Connect" within a day or two. Drag #14 back with you Jim, Please.

"From all the reports I've been getting, I'll be ready to rock in Spring Training"

QUOTE(greasywheels121 @ Nov 28, 2005 -> 12:23 PM) It won't affect me if he's there or not, I'm a Colts fan. However, I feel Millen's the problem, not Harrington or Mariucci. They spent a first round pick on a wide receiver 3 years in a row. That just has to say something.

QUOTE(Heads22 @ Nov 28, 2005 -> 07:47 AM) Not trying to take anything away from him. Just saying the Texans suck. Suck it hard. At least their new coach seems on pace to get himself a heck of a player on draft day.

Is this Legit? Do we really have to misspell Aaron's name in order to send the email?

QUOTE(timotime @ Nov 28, 2005 -> 12:13 PM) it has already been firmly established that we will not be acquiring furcal. if anyone, the flubs may, for a rediculous amount. for some reason, i think the cubs have already, or someone correct me if im wrong. No the Cubs have not already acquired him...and there are sources saying their $100 million offer to him never happened.

QUOTE(kapkomet @ Nov 28, 2005 -> 11:54 AM) And where, exactly, did I "list" my standard? ASS*U*ME I don't recall ever putting down my standard... but that search function is a neat little thing. Ok, then allow me to clarify... We have no idea the extent to which this sort of behavior has taken place. We have 1 video which is documented evidence of it, and there are widespread other reports. Your response is to say, to paraphrase "It's still better than Saddam" without any real summary of what scale the problem actually has. Therefore, given your lack of any statement to prove that this is not a wide-scale problem, it is safe to assume that you would judge any action which is not as bad as something done by Saddam to be justifiable, given that there is no evidence here that it is not a wide spread phenomenon. We've been allowing these contractors to run rampant through Iraq, especially the "Private security forces", without ever really paying attention to them or investigating what they might be doing with that authority. They've been quite literally above the law. I want their actions to be monitored and curtailed, and this video is just hte latest reason why. However, if the knee-jerk reaction from the other side is "Oh you just think we're worse than Saddam", you've basically just attempted to justify any and every action they've taken without knowing what actions they've actually taken aside from this limited evidence of clearly depraved behavior. This reasoning would naturally lead to avoiding any additional monitoring, regulation, and prosecution of those security forces, and would allow them to continue whatever sadistic actions they've chosen to undertake, no matter how illegal.

QUOTE(YASNY @ Nov 28, 2005 -> 10:40 AM) I can't blame Konerko one iota for testing the waters to see what his value is. And let's say the Angels do offer him $15M per for 5 years and the Sox offer $13 per for 4 with an option on the 5th year, I don't think Paulie's a bad guy for taking the Angels offer. The difference in guaranteed money is $23M. Does anyone really expect a guy to leave that much money on the table for the sake of loyalty? It's a business, too. Just like when Kenny Williams couldn't consider the 'loyalty' issue when he traded Rowand. Yes, I wouldn't expect Konerko to leave that much on the table either. But let's say that the Angels and Chisox come up like $4 million apart? What would you say then? Like we offer $12 million over 4 and the Angels offer $13 million over 4? I think that Konerko would actually be better off taking the Chicago deal - he'd have far better options for endorsements in the city where he won a ring than he would in Anaheim, where Scoscia and Guerrero have already dug in their nails. Especially without a Sosa on the north side any more.

QUOTE(daa84 @ Nov 28, 2005 -> 10:53 AM) haha no arguement from me...i just think 05 sox w/jones > 05 sox w/rowand...but thats a moot point....what iwas tryin to say is 06 sox w/jones > 06 sox w/Thome I believe Jones is being paid something like $13 million a season.

QUOTE(jackie hayes @ Nov 28, 2005 -> 10:36 AM) Yeah, but that's a lot different than not counting long term unemployed. The statements were wrong. If the person's looking for work, they're counted as unemployed, and that's that. Look, I understand that the unemployment rate is not the end-all, be-all statistic of economic health. But the BLS does collect data on discouraged and marginally attached workers. If you want to say, Indicator X is better, I'll listen. But this scorched earth idea that unemployment numbers are worthless is just silly. Ceteris paribus, a lower unemployment rate is better. Other things matter, but if you want to make a case around them, cite those numbers, don't just inveigh against the unemp rate. Here you go: an indicator which would be better is "The percentage of the total work-aged population currently employed". For that you need 2 numbers; the number of people in the workforce, and the number of them that are working. This metric is out there...and it includes all of the other problems - you can't escape being counted by being put on disability, you aren't just missed if you don't look for work, etc. Why do I like this statistic? Because it's possible to look at how it varies and actually evaluate why the changes are happening. We've heard at least a dozen times in teh past few years that the unemployment percentage has dropped a tenth of a point because fewer people were looking for work. That would not happen with this metric. It would measure exactly 1 thing...the change in the number of jobs relative to the population. Therefore, if the population went up but there weren't enough jobs tso keep pace, it this metric would show a bad number, and if jobs were plentiful, this metric would show a good number. It would not be possible for it to be divorced from the actual situation like the numbers are now. Unfortunately, I can't cite those data, because no one place collects them all. The BLS reports a couple of items, but they don't report the disability numbers I mention above, and I don't know where to get them. Also, I don't know what else might be excluded, because I'm just not enough of an expert on the topic. And yes, all things being equal I would agree that lower unemployment is better. However, things are not equal. A lower unemployment rate right now can mean a higher rate of disability, it can mean that the economy is so bad that fewer people were looking for work, etc. (Think about this last point...if the economy is so bad that fewer people look for work, the unemployment percentage would go down...hence it could very well decrease in the event of a worsening economy and a worsening job market. How useful of a metric can that be when it can go both up or down with a worsening job market?)

QUOTE(kapkomet @ Nov 28, 2005 -> 10:03 AM) Good God. It's our fault. AmeriKKKa's made everything worse then Saddam. Yes, because there's absolutely no difference between America doing things that America shouldn't do and America making things worse than Saddam. By your standard, America could torture 100,000 prisoners to death, and as long as Saddam had tortured 120,000 to death, you'd have a clean conscience, because fewer people were being tortured to death.

QUOTE(jackie hayes @ Nov 28, 2005 -> 10:13 AM) I think you're wrong. If someone has been out of work for a long time, but is still looking for work, I'm pretty sure they're counted as unemployed. Documentation? Edit: Numbers for October (in thousands) -- 2695 unemp less than 5 weeks, 2040 unemp 5-14 weeks, 960 unemp 15-26 weeks, 1386 unemp 27 or more weeks. Which add up exactly to the total, 6964 unemp (all the numbers are in thousands). So the long term unemployed are included. The US Government classifies people who have not looked for work within a month in a different category...they're known as "Discouraged" and do not get included in that number...from the BLS's own October numbers; I'll also give a block of detail on another point...the "Disabled" issue...this comes from the LA Times in December of 2003 (Use Lexis to find the article if you have it available to yourself and want the full text - its behind a subscription wall)

QUOTE(spiderman @ Nov 28, 2005 -> 10:07 AM) Those unemployment numbers are the same ones that many, don't know about you, pointed to during the Clinton years, and now point away from during the Bush years. It is just as impossible to compare the unemployment numbers between the Clinton and Reagan economies as it is impossible to compare the unemployment numbers between the Bush and Clinton economies. It is completely ignorant of the numbers to say things like "the unemployment was at a historic low during the Clinton years", because the unemployment number was not actually measuring total unemployment. I know other people use those numbers to support Clinton's economy, and I fire off as many LTE's to them as I do LTE's to people who parrot the unemployment number to try to argue that Bush's economy hasn't hurt people that badly.

QUOTE(southsider2k5 @ Nov 28, 2005 -> 09:42 AM) I just want to speak to this part of the post. There is one better, but obviously not perfect, way of measuring underemployment IMO, and that is to use the average hourly wage numbers that get put out. Interestingly enough those have been steadily increasing over the years, and I can't figure out why. We always read about layoffs from high paying jobs, but this number never really goes down, and I have not been able to figure out why. I don't know if it is just we always hear about the layoffs and assume that all high paying jobs are gone, or if there really is high wage job creation going on, but just in different fields from where people are getting laid off of, and we never hear about that either. Then again it could be all statistical manipulation as well, and we would never really hear about that either. However, it is worth specifically noting that the average hourly wage has been, in particular in recent months, increasing at or below the rate of inflation in this country. Therefore, in terms of net purchasing power, it actually is going down relative to the costs of goods.

QUOTE(southsider2k5 @ Nov 28, 2005 -> 05:10 AM) I knew something like this was going to happen sooner or later. With all of the kidnapping, torture, and murder of the contractors, it was only a matter of time. Chicken and the egg problem. Which came first, the murder of the contractors by the Iraqis, or the torture and murder of the Iraqis by the contractors? There have been reports of torture and murder by those "above the law" private security forces and contractors in Iraq almost since the beginning...we know, for example, that they were heavily involved in the Abu Ghraib mess...and there were reports of quite a few actions against the people in Fallujah by the private contractors before the infamous 4 bodies were strung up from the bridge? None of these of course have been confirmed by reliable sources, but that's in large part because the military doesn't report on or monitor the actions of most of those contractors - we don't even know how many of them are killed, despite the fact that by numbers, they make up something like 20% of hte U.S. forces in Iraq.

QUOTE(southsider2k5 @ Nov 28, 2005 -> 09:38 AM) Its done here everyday. I just found an irony in blowing off that particular statement for that exact reason. Well, the reason I would do it specifically with that statement by Allawi is actually slightly more complicated than just the ol' "He's a politician". He's a politician campaigning for an election only a few weeks away trying to reach out to a specific constituency. Allawi is a Shiite, but he's not part of SCIRI, the main ruling party among the Shiites which currently has Jafaari as the PM. SCIRI has a power base among the Shia. Allawi is a Shiite, but he's from a party less openly religious than Jafaari. However, most of the Shia voted for SCIRI last time, and they're likely to do so again even with Allawi's party being better organized. This means that if Allawi wants to expand his power base, he needs to look elsewhere. Where is another untapped source of votes in Iraq? The Sunni population. They basically didn't vote in the first parliamentary campaign, so their strength is basically unknown. However, we know for a fact that the Sunni strength isn't enough to break the Shia majority in the electorate. So, we have both Allawi and the Sunnis not having enough strength to overturn SCIRI. However, if Allawi could convince the Sunni population that he's not their enemy, and they'd stand a better chance with him than they would with SCIRI...then he might have a shot, if he were to combine votes from the less-religious and less Pro Iran Shia with a large number of Sunni votes. How would he go about reaching out to the Sunni population? Well, that's a population that's been repeatedly driven from its cities, that's probably had a member or two of every single family detained or disappeared by the government, and that's suffered significant torture at the hands of the ruling party. Furthermore, the Sunnis were largely spared the direct torture, gassings, etc. that Saddam gave to the Shia. Therefore, by saying things like this, Allawi is playing up their situation in an effort to secure some of their support. He has a motive to exaggerate and the opportunity. Therefore, in this particular case, I judge his words to be those of a politician campaigning, and not necessarily an honest assessment of the conditions in Iraq (although they may very well be one). As with almost anything, it's hard to find a firm rule, and each statement should be evaluated on a case-by-case basis. In this case, I would judge Allawi to be speaking as a candidate reaching out to a constituency, such as Bush when he made his "Guest worker proposal" in January of 04.

There are still basically zero rumors out here on the west coast about Anaheim having offered Konerko anything substantial other than some brief talk about a 4 year, $40 million offer a few weeks ago. So if the Angels have made a big push...no one out here knows anything about it...and I find it really odd that the Chicago people would know more about offers from Anaheim to PK than the media in LA. If KW was serious when he said he wanted this to be over by the end of the winter meetings...it's officially crunch time now though. Oh, and I believe that the Chipper Jones restructuring was good for both Chipper and the team...Chipper would take less money per year, but in exchange he'd get an option year turned into a guaranteed year at a lower price, and since Atlanta almost certainly would not have picked up the option...he gets extra money that way.

QUOTE(Steve Bartman's my idol @ Nov 28, 2005 -> 07:09 AM) With re. Steinbrenner...you have to give the guy credit. He spends to give his team it's best chance of winning. Obviously the results haven't been so great over the past few years, but, as an owner, I can't see how you could find anyone better. He wants to win, and backs up his desire with $$$! On the other hand...while Big Stein is willing to spend money...he's also willing to spend money on wildly insane deals, and he's also willing to go around his own management. The best example in recent years would be the fact that the Yankees Execs wanted to make a hard run at Vlad Guerrero, but big stein had his heart set on Sheffield. They grabbed Sheff. While in the short term that deal may have been a wash...Sheff is still a lot older, and will be gone from NY fairly soon. There's also the issue that maybe his willingness to spend money actually can wind up hurting the team - it gives them room to just go and grab anyone no matter their cost, such as Randy Johnson or Kevin Brown - guys with big deals who are on the back sides of their careers. They end up depleting their minor leagues to do it, and then all of a sudden, their team is old, creaky, breaking down, and limps into the playoffs every year. Money in baseball can be a blessing and a curse.

QUOTE(YASNY @ Nov 28, 2005 -> 01:45 AM) I don't see where Gload fits on this team. Hell, he didn't fit last year when we didn't have Thome. Edit to add: This is assuming we retain Konerko. Your edit is the real key part. Sans Paulie...we may not have a better option.

QUOTE(southsider2k5 @ Nov 28, 2005 -> 05:39 AM) That's kinda my point. You can't just dismiss one politician's words off hand as politicing, but then invest in the words of another one. Its kinda silly. Can we apply that same standard to all of Bush's rosy assessments of Iraq?