1549

lol, I am not sure what that means. while reading this thread, they read 'take me out to the ball game' and changed the cracker jack part to 'crunch-n-munch' on 95.5. They joked about it on the morning news shows this morning too. I have a friend who is a huge yankee fan, he thought it was some funny s***.

I don't know how I forgot to include that. Slipped my mine. However, Eck's '90 season and Gagne's 2003 season are too similar to declare one the easy winner. Gagne 2003: 55 svs; 1.20 ERA; 82.1 IP; .69 WHIP; 137.

Everyone here in the NY area is making a huge deal about this. I have not seen Cracker Jack at Yankee stadium since 2002. Last year, and so far this year it has been crunch-n-munch. I think crunch-n-munch is just as good, if not better.

This is when my Spanish teacher and my English teacher make appearances.

I am very surprised that Mariano has not recieved more love. These are IMO, the two best seasons ever by a closer, both occurred in 1990. Eck 1990: 48 svs; 0.61 ERA; 73.2 IP; .61 WHIP; 73 K. Thigpen 1990: 57 svs; 1.83 ERA; 88.2 IP; 1.04 WHIP; 70 K. Eck awarded for his dominance, Thigpen for his matching quality with endurance.

Not at all, which is why Ruffcorn will always be worse in my mind, no matter how poorly Diaz performs. Unlike Ruffcorn, Diaz has a chance to turn this thing around. If it makes anyone feel better, Nolan Ryan's ERA was 15.00 after his first two games.

I don't miss the chicago media.

Rollie was definately a solid closer. I excluded him from the list because his career ERA was 2.90, which is good, but the average ERA during his career was only 3.47. So in my mind he did not stand out enough in that regard. Smith also had a high ERA but made the list because of his sick amount of saves, and Eck's ERA was inflated by his years as a starter.

Scott Ruffcorn (1994): 2 G, 6.2 IP; 15 H; 10 BB; 2 K; 12.72 ERA Felix Diaz: 2 G; 8.2 IP; 15 H; 4 BB; 3 K; 11.42 ERA Diaz has better control, but Ruffcorn must have more saavy. Ruffcorn posted a similar ERA despite walking 6 more batters in 2 less innings. I hope his name doesn't give Sox fans horrible flash backs.

That's what they said about Scott Ruffcorn

I would rather see Cotts stay in the pen. I think leaving soft tossers with marginal control in the bullpen helps them settle down, Buehrle spent the second half of 2000 in the Sox pen, why not leave Cotts in there. I think Diaz needs some more time with the Knights. I say call up Mr. Rauch, if he doesn't work out, then we have to explore other options. Our deficiencies in finding a fifth starter has really gotten on my nerves. I think Stewart has actually shown the most potential of all of our fifth starters in the past few years. He seemed to pitch a lot better than that 5.96 ERA indicates.

NOTE ON RIVERA World Series totals: 9 svs; 1.16 ERA Postseason totals: 30 svs; .75 ERA

I would rank them in this order: Rivera Eck Hoffman Wilhelm

One of the most surreal moments I have experienced in baseball was the first time I saw Mariano Rivera come in for the Yankees. The stadium was full of chatter at the end of the 8th inning, followed by silent anticipation as the bullpen door opened in left center...then a silent pause...then the first chord of Enter Sandman blared over the loudspeakers, and the whole stadium erupted...50,000 people standing and going nuts to Enter Sandman, it was a neat experience.

lol, this is the same thing as the more incriminating steroid evidence thread At least a lot of people are noticing this trend.

Wow. :headshake Were you outraged when we caugh Hussein? Were you outraged when the picture of Qusay were released? Were you outraged when we marched victoriously through Iraq? Of course not, the good guys were winning. For that reason they were not outraged on 9/11. Your average 12 year old Iraqi boy views his islamic extremist neighbor as the good guy, not the white man from the other side of the world. You can be angry at the tactics used by the islamic terrorists, and you can be angry when they attack our civilian buildings, but it is stupid to hate those Iraqis who are rooting for the insurgents. If we went on a massive bombing campaign tomorrow and totally leveled cities but killed all the insurgents, you would be smiling, because we will have won the war. So don't blame them for cheering about their victories. You misunderstood my statement. I meant that you rationalized the anger demonstrated by Iraqis when they saw their prisoners molested. Its as simple as this: You hate Iraqi's for what they do to Americans...Iraqi's hate you for what we do to Iraqis. Let me clear something up, that is a general statement. I realize not all Iraqi's hate Americans. Pile them on top of eachother naked. Carry them around on leashes while they are naked. Humiliate them, make them less than human...but please don't physically abuse them There are rules of conduct. No american wants to see American prisoners mistreated. We should not mistreat Iraqis. And people say that if Iraqis don't follow rules of conduct, then we shouldn't. But we are the f***ing United States of America, we should take the higher moral ground and do what is right. That is how you make friends in the world. I have also heard people say we don't need friends in the world. But there are families of the 2,000+ people who died in 9/11 who wish the US had made a few more friends in the middle east. I do realize my capitol punishment statement was too harsh, but I hope these gaurds spend the next 20 years of their life behind bars. We want our prisoners to be safe. By harming Iraqi prisoners, americans who are captured by Iraqis are at a greater risk. You have no idea what my opinion on the Jayson William's trial is, so don't even bring that up. And by assuming these prisoners were murderers and committers of atrocities, you are bypassing a major function of this country, which is fair trial. I don't believe that War prisoners are put on trial, unless they are officers or involved in some sort of war crimes. None of those Iraqi prisoners have been put on trial thus far. Even if they had been found guilty of heinous acts, that does not mean we can strike them down with punishment that is more cruel and more unusual than a lethal injection. Ok I did some chewing... If someone did that to my family, I would hate them, I would want them to die, but better judgement would stop me from dragging them around naked. Regardless of what they did, they are still human, and are therefore entitled to certain rights. these people did not chose to hate america, they have been taught to hate since their birth. They will never be turned away from that evil, but I can not hate someone who never had a chance.

Speaking of Sabermatrics, Kevin "the Greek God of walks" Youkilus played well for the BoSox this weekend. After hitting his first major league home run the other Red Sox players haized him by refusing to get up and congratulate him.

I hope you are right. Big Mac was a likeable guy, and seemed to have his s*** in order. However, I would not be surprised if he did steroids.

Sounds like an incredibly akward dinner table conversation

I am trying to remember if it was a bad back or bad knee that plagued the last year or two of Big-Mac's career.

When I first moved to New Jersey, kids gave me hell about my chicago accent and chicago-isms. I have pretty much fully assimilated now, but I still get irritated when NJ people say they are standing 'on-line' rather than standing 'in-line'

Bad piss experiences are the worst. In 6th grade, I was peeing at a urinal and I was not looking down and the urinal overflowed all over my shorts. My shorts were dark colored mesh basketball shorts so it was hard to notice, but they smelled horrible. Luckily there was only 30 minutes left in the school day, and noone ever told me that they noticed. I had a little phobia about urinals after that, it took about a year or so of practice before I could comfortably piss in a urinal again.

A few little yankee blurbs... Rueben Sierra is one of the Yankees best hitters right now. Derek Jeter is hovering at the mendoza line. the yankees have only lost 24 games since 1998 when leading after 8 innings. Of course, Luis Gonzalez got to the yanks in the ninth other baseball blurbs... Lyle Overbay is looking like the real deal right now. Adam LaRoche is doing a damn good Shawn Abner impression. The Devil Rays are only 10 solid players away from being a contender. Can't wait to see the return of A.J. Burnett, I hope he doesn't throw near pick up trucks during his recovery.

A discussion came up today on New York's WFAN sports radio station about the correlation between steroids and back problems. Jose Canseco said that players waning off of steroids tend to suffer back problems. A doctor who was invited on the air, also said that the back muscles are the first to lose the affect of steroids, and guys who have taken steroids are prone to back injuries. Bonds: out with back spasms. Giambi: Playing time limited because of a sore back, and sore knee. Sosa: Back spasm suffered because of a sneeze. Interesting pattern. Obviously this is not proof that these guys are on steroids, but it is food for thought.

When It comes to the Dew, I prefer live wire. However, I am more of a dark pop guy. Give me, Coke, Pepsi, Pepsi Twist, Root beer, or Saspirilla and I am a happy man.