Balta1701

QUOTE (HickoryHuskers @ Mar 6, 2016 -> 10:13 AM) Rubio is finished. He won't drop out until after Florida but he's finished. Kasich is about 50/50 to win Ohio right now. If he doesn't, then he'll drop out and it will be Trump v Cruz to the end. My guess is Cruz would win. If Kasich wins Ohio, then we probably get to the convention with nobody having a majority of delegates. Kasich tries to use the fact that he polls way better vs Hillary than either of the other two to try to get a brokered deal, but I can't see either of the other two going for that. I think Rubio will stay in, in the hopes of being the "brokered convention" candidate". However, I've been wrong before this year.

QUOTE (whitesoxfan99 @ Mar 5, 2016 -> 12:31 PM) Million dollar buyout for Bill Cubit and $360,000 for Ryan Cubit to not coach for Illinois this year after getting jobs they never should have had in the first place. I don't feel bad for those two at all. Sucks a bit for the players but they will get over it, players almost always do. The good news is that Illinois's university budget is in solid shape these days.

QUOTE (KyYlE23 @ Mar 5, 2016 -> 09:34 AM) Your team base running is good if your players are good base runners. Coaches aren't going to magically make them better or faster Honestly, I really disagree with this. Baserunning can't possibly be entirely instinctual, that's a skill unless you're Paul Konerko. "Do I go first to third under these circumstances" is a set of decisions that you can practice for. How many times do we see some guy who isn't the fastest but who is an effective baserunner because they recognize situations like that? Furthermore, it's clearly not always the fastest guy first to second who is the best base stealer. Take our own decade ago example - Scott Podsednik was a great base stealer for a few years because he was fast enough and had extremely good tecnhique - he wasn't even the fastest guy on that team IIRC (Ozuna was probably faster in a foot race on sand). Pods knew how to read a pitcher, to get the appropriate first step, and then to nail the run and the slide and that overcame his footspeed limitations. We see the same thing with guys who are great base stealers in the minors based on pure speed, but when they get to the big leagues and see better moves and better throwing catchers their numbers drop a lot. A coach can't turn Paul Konerko into a base stealer, but the game of baseball as I've watched it strongly suggests that baserunning is a place where coaching can make a solid contribution.

Initial investigation; not a weapon. Still will presumably test for blood.

QUOTE (Buehrle>Wood @ Mar 4, 2016 -> 12:47 PM) So today's scandal is that Hillary paid herself 250,000 in campaign funds. No other candidate did so. Does anyone care? I can't say I know the law on this at all.

QUOTE (greg775 @ Mar 3, 2016 -> 11:38 PM) Bernie was in my neck of the woods today. If you listen to this man, you will realize he SHOULD be the Democratic candidate. Bernie Sanders is a great man and a helluva candidate! He's the polar opposite of Hillary. I happen to think Hillary is a liar and a fairly rotten person. My opinion. Bernie appears to be a truth teller and a good person. Please just leave this thread. There's another thread where you can go praise people who are arguing over the sizes of their penises. Literally zero people in this thread want to hear you talk about how our likely candidate's voice is shrill but comparing penis size is honorable and presidential.

QUOTE (RockRaines @ Mar 3, 2016 -> 09:54 AM) He did a good job this year, however I do believe that the conference in total isnt as elite as it has been during his tenure so part of it was great timing. While the conference may not have had an elite team with Valentine being hurt for a while, there are what, 5 ranked teams, any of which you could say has a shot to get hot and make a final 4 run? You don't get the "obvious loss" of Wisconsin last year unless you have to play at Assembly Hall, but that's still a grueling schedule.

To be fair, Trump doesn't just call for torture, he calls for things worse than torture. Some of which he won't define, but he does specifically call for murdering the families of anyone who opposes the US.

On the original thread subject

Link

QUOTE (Buehrle>Wood @ Mar 2, 2016 -> 07:48 PM) And now you see some of the appeal of Trump. He's throwing in big money himself but at least it's his own and not 10 different mega corporations telling candidates exactly what to do and say. You also see why the gop and media hate him so much. Can't control what you're not paying. Actually he hasn't spent all that much. The media loves him and gives him an ungodly amount of free airtime - more than basically every other candidate combined. He's making news networks and news shows money, but he's not buying ads. His total spending is so low that the smaller networks that were hoping for an ad revenue bonanza from this election are suddenly sending out official worried statements about their expected 2016 profitability.

QUOTE (bmags @ Mar 2, 2016 -> 06:34 PM) I think probably more than if he were a different candidate, but about $120 million of republican donor money was lit on fire by the Jeb Bush campaign. A lot of those guys are probably tapped out. Estimates last year generally came down suggesting the full Presidential campaign alone will run in the range of $4-$5 billion (half per candidate), with another $5 billion down the ballot, for a $10 billion election season. I don't think you're quite getting how much money is available for these guys.

QUOTE (shysocks @ Mar 2, 2016 -> 05:55 PM) That's a poor standard. I would not say he takes walks, nor would I say anybody who walked at a lower rate than him last year took walks, but whatever. Also worth noting that Avi was 119th out of 141 qualified hitters in terms of "fraction of pitches thrown to him in the strike zone". He's down there with legit sluggers who the pitchers are scared of, and in fact saw even fewer strikes than Abreu - in other words, pitchers were also not throwing him strikes. He should have walked a lot when he's getting very few strikes, but he also had the highest %age of swings and misses per total pitches thrown in baseball among qualified hitters.

Ted Cruz has won Texas

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Mar 1, 2016 -> 08:27 PM) So far the only state that has closed polls but not been called for Donald Trump is Virginia. With 60% reporting, its Trump 37, Rubio 30, Cruz 17 - close enough that it hasn't been called yet but that margin is tough to beat with more than 1/2 the precincts in. Edit: actually Vermont is still uncalled with Kasich and Trump tight. Virginia called for Trump. Rubio will win zero states today.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Mar 1, 2016 -> 08:31 PM) Apparently Barack Obama, Bill Clinton, and George W Bush did something right to by that standard. I don't believe there was such a thing as a SuperPAC until 2009.

So far the only state that has closed polls but not been called for Donald Trump is Virginia. With 60% reporting, its Trump 37, Rubio 30, Cruz 17 - close enough that it hasn't been called yet but that margin is tough to beat with more than 1/2 the precincts in. Edit: actually Vermont is still uncalled with Kasich and Trump tight.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Mar 1, 2016 -> 08:10 PM) Welcome to the 21st century where every anonymous yahoo is waiting in the wings to make someone else look bad, to make themselves look good. Social media has changed the face of everything. I shutter to think of how people like MLK, Ashe, Owens, Robinson and other barrier breakers would have been treated in the twitter era. I think we have an idea from Henry Aaron's pre-record mail.

QUOTE (GreenSox @ Mar 1, 2016 -> 07:05 PM) You may be right, but I hear that about every young player the Sox have when they don't produce big as rookies (and sometimes even when they do - Trayce "fourth outfielder" Thompson, e.g.). That's because when the Sox do give a guy a rare chance, they bet the entire season on him becoming an all star right away. When that doesn't happen he takes a large share of the blame for failing - because we don't blame the people who made the bad bet on him being ready.

QUOTE (GreenSox @ Mar 1, 2016 -> 06:51 PM) Lawrie was a .6 WAR player; I think there's a reasonable chance Sanchez could well exceed that. But of course that's the crux of my disagreement with the philosophy of people on this board and the Sox FO. I'll take the chance with the young player over the proven veteran mediocrity. I had no objection to Lawrie though -the price was modest. Hopefully he'll do better. But Brett Lawrie has also been a 2.6, 2.3, 1.4, and 1.8 win player...so I think there's a reasonable chance Brett Lawrie could exceed that also. If you really want to make the "young player over the proven veteran mediocrity" case, I think you've got a better chance at doing so 1 position to the left.

QUOTE (Quinarvy @ Mar 1, 2016 -> 01:10 PM) Oh, I'm not banking on it. Austin Jackson still makes the most sense, because I feel like Eaton would excel in RF as he does have a strong arm. I'm also not sure at all how much I count on Eaton's arm strength right now since he's literally coming off throwing shoulder surgery and still taking it easy early in ST as a consequence.

QUOTE (Quinarvy @ Mar 1, 2016 -> 12:35 PM) Wasn't Eaton a Gold Glove finalist a few years ago? You are correct, in 2014 he was a gold glove finalist. UZR had him as a top 10 in the league defensive CF. In 2015 he was quite bad. Not terrible, but bad is an appropriate description - UZR had him as the 3rd worst qualifying CF in the big leagues. It certainly remains possible for him to return to his 2014 form. However, counting on that to rescue a defense that is generally terrible around him seems dicey, especially when he's already dealing with injury rehab. But we'll see. Maybe there's a coaching issue there somewhere? He was benched for a day last year while not listening to the coaches regarding positioning.

QUOTE (LDF @ Mar 1, 2016 -> 11:46 AM) no matter what, he can't be worst than MJ last yr, defensively however, Micah only played there for ~2 months. He can absolutely be a lot worse than Sanchez, and frankly he should be expected to be a defensive downgrade from Sanchez because Sanchez was really good.

Andrean, the private school none of us liked.

QUOTE (Eminor3rd @ Mar 1, 2016 -> 10:21 AM) ZiPS came out yesterday, and August f**erstrom used it to point out how incredibly bad our OF defense looks, which reminded me that we didn't address it at all. Overall, we project to be 29th out of 30. http://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/previewing-...-team-defenses/ LF - Melky; BAD CF - Eaton; Below average RF - Garcia; EXTRA BAD 1B - Abreu; BAD 2B - Lawrie; BAD SS - Saladino; Good! 3B - Frazier; Good! C - Avila/Navarro; Solid and improved. With Austin Jackson somehow still out there, and this team hurt so much by lacking what he does best, I just... I just can't believe this is what the lineup looks like. I want to believe that they're going to get this done. I mean, it's not like giving Jackson a two or three year deal is going to block ANYTHING coming up in the system, and what a difference it could make! The defense could instead look like (by the way, those assessments are my own; the projections actually make it look worse): LF - Melky; BAD CF - Jackson; Good! RF - Eaton; Probably average or above 1B - Abreu; BAD 2B - Lawrie; BAD SS - Saladino; Good! 3B - Frazier; Good! C - Avila/Navarro; Solid and improved. Crazy how much better that looks. Defense would still be the weakness of the team, but that group above is merely "below average." That feels like a state that may not sink the team. I really apologize for being a downer lately. You guys know it's not usually how I am. But I just don't GET this. The only explanation is that ownership is being cheap, and I just keep glancing to the corner of my room and seeing my pitchfork there, gleaming dangerously in the wan sunlight that filters through my half-drawn curtains. And just... why is this happening? I know it already looks bad...but it's actually worse. Note that Saladino is one of our only 3 good defensive positions and in the other thread, most people guessed that Jimmy Rollins had an 80% chance of emerging as the starter and probably would slot in for 100 games. That takes that position from good to bad even if Saladino is a defensive replacement.