iamshack

So this weekend my wife and I and another couple took a little "staycation" in north las vegas because I won some package in a charity auction. The resort had a golf course across the street so I made an early tee-time for Saturday morning. Ended up partnered up with two guys who played college golf for BYU several years ago. Wow, were they good! I've gotten my handicap down to about a 9, and was starting to think I was getting pretty decent. Umm, no! What a humbling experience to watch these two guys play. Just automatic with their drivers for the most part and very solid iron players. They said they only get out about once a month so they were fairly ordinary with the putter. I think they both shot 73 or something. Was a great learning experience though and the one asked for my number after the round because he is looking for a regular group to join. Looking forward to learning from this guy. Oh, and my 85 looked like about 110 compared to these guys and their 73's

QUOTE (hi8is @ Jul 18, 2014 -> 02:39 PM) I seriously think that the Astros will lose their first pick due to their actions. Hell, you can't talk with the agent and their GM plainly stated "I tried calling his agent three times today." Or am I just completely missing something? Idiots! I think you're missing something. If you're talking about Aiken having an "agent" as opposed to a "family advisor," than that may be problematic for the player in terms of his college eligibility, but I am not certain how closely that is enforced, to be perfectly honest.

QUOTE (Chi Town Sox @ Jul 18, 2014 -> 02:54 PM) I got it, pretty solid week for me, wife and I got a new place and a new position within a 48 hour span. Congratulations! Celebrate good times tonight.

QUOTE (Eminor3rd @ Jul 18, 2014 -> 09:21 AM) I honestly don't think I'd make that deal. Absolutely not, and I'm one of the few that actually entertains the idea of dealing Sale.

I'd do it if I could get them to pick up about $60 million.

Generally, your mortgage should probably not exceed 28% of your household income....not sure if the same general percentage applies to rent or not.

When will he go work for uncle Barry?

I can't wait to hear what the incredible return is.

QUOTE (The Ultimate Champion @ Jul 16, 2014 -> 07:23 PM) The Royals look like they picked up a solid RP in former Sox player (and Chicagoan IIRC) Jason Frasor. I'm not sure what this means for us but I imagine the value of a Belisario or something is probably a lot closer to what the Rangers received for Frasor than what the Pirates got from the Marlins earlier this year (comp balance draft pick). The question is, is there even a market for ANY of our relievers? I would hope so but to me it doesn't look that way. What is the market for Putnam and do we even consider trading him for that price? Do we consider trading Petricka for anything less than a haul given how atrocious our pen is? Could we get anyone with a pulse for Belisario? I think you're looking at this wrong...we need to consider trading anyone for certain types of players except for Sale/Q/Abreu/Eaton/Garcia. We say we'll listen to anything on anyone except for these guys, but this is the type of player we need to get back. I just don't think we have a whole lot that people will call on outside of those guys with the exception of Alexei.

QUOTE (greg775 @ Jul 16, 2014 -> 12:05 PM) Not sure if this belongs here, but to make long story short. My cousin is a 20-something lawyer in chicago who makes good money. He got put on some big cases as far as doing some of the 'grunt' work -- flying out to various cities on the company dime to talk to experts, etc. Staying at nice hotels, living the good life on the road. Sounds perfect -- travel, money, being thought highly of at the law firm and a rising up and comer. However he has to work tons of hours (he's not married or dating anybody anymore) so he decided he hated the profession and quit. The boss talked him into taking a six month leave of absence instead of quitting. The leave of absence will run out soon and he's thinking of returning to school to be some other occupation. My questions to you: -- Do you think this is a generational thing? Kids that are raised to just be praised and receive participation trophies have some unreal expectation of the workplace? I mean it's called 'work' for a reason. Or do you think he has the right to quit and start over, to go from making mega dollars to nothing? Obviously his mom and dad are freaking out. They thought they had a rich son on their hands, now he's preparing to go to school again and be poor. Geez. If you were him would you simply suck it up and use your law degree and rake in all that money the rest of your life? Or would you return to school to be a much lower paid profession? Is this a troubled kid to give up all that money? Give up putting his law degree to good use?? Finally, is the law profession in Chicago horrible? Are 20 somethings not interested in the rat race of chicago law? He has "the right" to do whatever the hell he wants; it's his life. Lawyers have the highest rate of divorce of any profession, I believe. I basically did the same thing as him, except I made this decision coming out of law school, rather than after working an associate for a firm. I make pretty solid money while working reasonable hours and have a skillset not many people have within my industry. That being said, there are certainly times where I wonder what-if.

What about batting averages? And to think in this day and age when the walk is valued more so than it has ever been...

QUOTE (zenryan @ Jul 15, 2014 -> 09:02 PM) played for the first time since Jan 2013 last weekend and shot a 46 on the front 9. then the storms came rolling in and washed the back 9 away which was a good thing because i opened up 2 huge blisters on one of my hands. had to buy a glove for my next outing. could've taken off about 3 strokes if i could putt worth a damn. Dave Pelz's Putting Bible.

QUOTE (Jenksismyb**** @ Jul 15, 2014 -> 06:28 PM) I've been working with some BS sand wedge I bought in a used bin and no lob wedge for years. Finally broke down and decided to buy the Cleveland 588 RTX wedges. 56 and 60 degree. Pretty pumped to start using them once they get here. I've gotten pretty good at using my pitching and gap wedges from 115-15 yards, so it'll be interesting to see how long it'll take me to figure out the best wedge the use from those distances. Pick up a used copy of Dave Pelz's Short Game Bible on amazon....some really good stuff in there. His putting bible has helped me a ton just in the last month or so.

QUOTE (Jenksismyb**** @ Jul 15, 2014 -> 06:19 PM) So we applied. Pretty easy. They actually linked up with the IRS website and obtained our tax return and then I gave them my student pin so they could look up my loans. Pretty seamless. From my calculator guesstimates I think we'll save about $350/month. I'm really pissed at myself that I didn't look into this until it was almost half way through the term of her forgiveness program. They tell you straight away if you're going to be eligible for the program you should immediately change the repayment to an income based plan. We've probably spent $15-16,000 the last 4 years in payments that we did not need to spend. farmteam - i'm in a similar boat. I had 6 figures in loans and have been paying them off the last 6 years on a standard plan. Way, way more than the income plans would require. I've always been terrified of the interest additions after 25-30 years so I never changed the repayment plan. If you get into one of these income based plans your payments are forgiven after 20 or 25 years. I'm nervous about that though. First, the government could always change its mind on that. Second, if my income raises over the next 20-25 years, or say I get an awesome case and make a few hundred thousand off it, i'm out of the program and then im stuck with that interest. And for $90-100k at 4.75-6.5%, that's not exactly pocket change. Edit: you should definitely look into consolidating. Especially since you haven't started paying back yet. I bet you'll save a lot in the long run. If you get an awesome case and make a few hundred thousand off it, you should pay off the loan

QUOTE (Steve9347 @ Jul 15, 2014 -> 08:22 PM) And bed time. Also, in a game that decides home field in the WORLD SERIES, Adam Wainwright just admitted he gave Jeter a cookie that he turned into a double. f*** this. I must say, I was thinking it was all too coincidental that Jeter happened to get the one pitch that he has always been able to handle.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Jul 15, 2014 -> 04:19 PM) Isn't he still under contract/being paid by the Marlins through next season? The article says the marlins and the sox.

QUOTE (pettie4sox @ Jul 15, 2014 -> 03:43 PM) They are going to charge her for the application fees $40 each and 2 days of rent $100/day. Funny considering the place was like $1550/month which on a 30 day average would be $51.67/day. So They are going to refund all but $280 per their recorded conversation today. I told her to go for the jugular because them trying to settle just reeks of them knowing that if they would be taken to court, they would be fleeced. I'd tell them she's willing to pay $80 for the two application fees or else she's going to have her lawyer make it much more expensive for them.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Jul 15, 2014 -> 02:16 PM) What should be the general order of positions of players that Sox should target at the break? SP? C? SS? LF? 3B? RP? I think the catching position would be a priority, but at this point, I honestly think we need to be focusing on the best players available more so than zeroing in on certain positions. It might be different if we had any really valuable assets we were willing to move, but as far as I know, that is not the case.

QUOTE (farmteam @ Jul 15, 2014 -> 12:32 PM) Yeah there's something way too fishy about all this. Hell, even if the law is otherwise on the landlord's side, that's way too much money for little-to-no consideration for a court to actually enforce. The hassle on going through with that, however, is another story. Which is why you should write him a demand letter!

QUOTE (farmteam @ Jul 15, 2014 -> 12:26 PM) One thing confuses me in all this -- why was this only discovered after he was signed? Did they not do the physical beforehand? Was he just signed pending physical, and that's when this was discovered? I just find it unlikely, in this age of hypersensitivity concerning pitchers' health, that a club even makes an offer to such a high-profile pick without having a doctor take a look at him first. My point being, if Aiken signed on the dotted line when Houston already had a chance to conduct a physical, then too bad for Houston. Buyer beware. They didn't sign him. Usually an agreement is reached but the contract is not executed until the physical checks out. I agree though, do they not get physicals just prior to the draft?

QUOTE (witesoxfan @ Jul 15, 2014 -> 12:13 PM) While I think they will care about it, players are not technically part of the MLBPA until they are put onto the 40-man roster, which could take 4 years in this situation. Tony Clark stated they would evaluate all their options in support of the players.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Jul 15, 2014 -> 12:16 PM) I'm not an expert, but that would be pretty tough to do, I believe. Do you list specific injuries? Grades of injuries? What is stop a team from drafted an injured player intentionally with the idea of saving a huge chunk of cap space to give to overslot players down the draft board? Who decides if an injury is severe enough to qualify for this? It would be pretty brutal to draw up the guidelines. I think you'd have to show that a consensus of medical experts has a reasonable concern that the player would sustain a significant injury if he was to begin playing professional ball in the immediate future. As you can see, there are all kinds of subjective terms in there, but I am sure it could be done based on some of the criteria utilized in evaluating major league players and whether they are in a suitable condition to resume playing activities.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Jul 15, 2014 -> 11:40 AM) Only in an injury situation. Otherwise it is 90% of slot has to be offered to insure a comp pick if the player does not sign. Ahh, so then it's the "injury situation" which needs to be defined more clearly.

QUOTE (bmags @ Jul 15, 2014 -> 11:35 AM) The players association should be pushing for at least this to go to an independent arbiter. This is crazy there is no real process for this player right now. Also, flameon, but, does anyone think this would happen to a Boras client? Doesn't the club have the right to just only offer the 40% of slot with no excuses, medicals or otherwise? I think under the rules, they can draft whomever they want and only offer 40% of slot, and at the very worst, receive one pick worse in the next year's draft. Of course, if they do it again and the kid doesn't sign, they lose that pick entirely.

QUOTE (LittleHurt05 @ Jul 15, 2014 -> 11:25 AM) The way this comment is worded is what I question. Maybe it's just the way Will Carroll tweeted it in his words, but the Astros aren't worried about him pitching tomorrow. I think it's safe to infer that that means he is entirely healthy. The whole purpose of their opinions is to ascertain whether he is healthy, not whether he could literally pitch tomorrow.