caulfield12

Does Seattle have the right to protect its market from competition in Portland or Vancouver? I guess not. For all these years, the Giants have been able to block an Oakland move to San Jose, and then the Nationals/Orioles have their own long history of disputes as well.

Does Seattle have the right to protect its market from competition in Seattle or Vancouver? I guess not. For all these years, the Giants have been able to block an Oakland move to San Jose, and then the Nationals/Orioles have their own long history of disputes as well.

http://ftw.usatoday.com/2016/02/adam-eaton-tweet-oscars Now the Eaton story has become "mainstream," getting picked up as a headline at USA Today and Yahoo News. SIGH. As far as Gordon's wife goes, it's not totally unexpected. She grew up in the Deep South, just like Scott Fletcher (her father), Greg Walker, Hawk Harrelson, etc. Beckham made a series of comments over time that were perceived to be anti-Obama, but, once again...it is what it is. Democrats in general struggle to get to 25% in some of those rural counties in Georgia and South Carolina. http://www.gammonsdaily.com/gordon-beckham...nvitation-list/ Beckham and his fiance (Tiffany Fletcher) also invited President George W. Bush and Laura Bush to his wedding in 2013. Apparently Scooter was a favorite player of his when he co-owned the Rangers.

Where's the indignation from the "religious right/Moral Majority" on these issues like Planned Parenthood and numerous issues where he's taken liberal positions in the last year or even last decade...even his Christianity has been constantly questioned, but that line of attack from the right seems not to have gotten much traction in recent weeks. It didn't work for Cruz in South Carolina, that's for sure.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Feb 29, 2016 -> 07:29 PM) He asked me what most Asians think...I can't speak for all, obviously, but I've lived/worked in South Korea, China (3 cities), Thailand, the Philippines and Indonesia. A pretty good mixture in terms of skin color and socioeconomic groups. In general, Korean/Chinese/Japanese and Singaporeans feel they are the dominant countries now, and represent the "whitest/purest" in their own minds. As far as racism goes, it's VERY prevalent. China does not have a diverse culture internally, despite the feeling (as a foreigner/visitor) of Shanghai, Beijing and Hong Kong/Guangzhou/Shenzhen being "melting pots" compared to the interior of the country. My wife went to one of the top 5-6 universities in China and she still has lots of incorrect (I'm sure most Americans would call them racist) ideas in her head that mostly come from Chinese culture/stereotyping but also as a result of watching lots of American t.v. shows and movies. One can only imagine those with lesser educations being even more ill-informed. And I did think of one, but only one, movie star who was/is very popular in China...Will Smith. But his popularity more or less peaked here with I Am Legend. The the sci-fi film he did with his son (one of the worst movies that year) actually did pretty good box office here in China before the negative reviews caught up with it. Cloud Atlas did better box office than in the US, and Halle Berry is one of the stars of that film. On the other hand, Creed wasn't shown here and Django Unchained was pulled by the government at the last second. AND NOW, BACK TO ADAM EATON TALK, sponsored by the Score

QUOTE (Y2JImmy0 @ Feb 29, 2016 -> 04:30 PM) This is probably a better question for caulfield but I've heard multiple people bring up the fact that Asians are generally racist. Movie studios make a ton of money overseas and in Asian nations, they don't want to see movies with black people in them. I'm not sure how true this is but Bill Maher brought it up and I've seen it mentioned in a couple of other places as well. First of all, I don't think many white people saw The Artist, Carol, The Room or Brooklyn, either...to respond to an earlier comment. I also doubt many white people saw Beasts of No Nation or the documentary about honor killings in Pakistan. That's not the point. When they constantly make movies and "whitewash" the characters like in Aloha or Gods of Egypt, there's a real issue. As far as Asia goes, what Jimmy said is largely true. Denzel Washington action movies like Man on Fire or the Equalizer don't sell well here at all. Now if you throw Chris Pine and a train into the story, great. Same thing with stories involving interracial romance unless it's mostly white men with Asian women. The only way you can be embraced is as a martial arts crossover star. And, in general, comedies don't translate...so you'll never have a Kevin Hart movie. About the only exception was the Rush Hour series with Tucker and Chan and Zhang Ziyi, but, even then it got banned by the third movie for negative stereotypes about Chinese triads/criminal activity. On the other hand, Kobe Bryant and Stephon Marbury (plays in Chinese league still) are wildly popular, as well as some of the African footballrs in the Euro leagues...but, once again, not in the context of movies and tv shows. In general, I typically hear comments like "black people are dirty/meaning not white or pale skin as well" and the worst one, that lots of black people (students here from Africa mostly) all have disease/s. Most Chinese parents and grandparents won't allow their children to date men of color as well. While I do see quite a few college or university interracial couples...the eventual marriage rate is infinitesimal.

Then some media outlet will take pettie's line at face value and use it to recycle the controversy somehow...and throw all the stereotypes about the White Sox fanbase into the mix. Or they can just dredge up half the yahoo comments on any article dealing with race, like Kanye West and the whole Zuckerberg $1 billion loan twitter controversy. That kind of stuff is 100x scarier, or just any general comments online from detractors of the president thinly-guised as political or states' rights/"freedom and liberty" philosophy. Of course, those with legitimate complaints rightfully bristle at being lumped in as racist...and it goes around and around. I remember a similar controversy when Beckham complained how inconvenienced he was by the president's entourage/detours/security details getting to the ballpark and it came across not unlike the Eaton tweet as being possibly racist or disrespectful. Just better to keep your mouth shut as an athlete in most cases.

From what everyone is saying about Gods of Egypt, far worse than San Andreas...epic failure.

If you're going to take a shot at the White Sox from high in your media tower, this is a pretty ridiculous one. Kenny Williams/Dave Wilder, Kim Ng, Minnie Minoso, Tony LaRussa, Ozzie Guillen as manager...the White Sox have always been at the forefront of minority hiring and outreach.

The irony is that one of the main reasons Donald Trump is doing so well this primary season is for representing the antithesis of this trend...being in a position (billionaire status definitely helps here, since he doesn't have a boss) to say whatever he wants, whenever he wants to say it. Fwiw, this was an area Michael Jordan was a master at...largely managing not to offend anyone, at least during his playing career. The flip side is that he was criticized within the African-American community for not being more outspoken about social and economic issues for someone who was in a position to be so influential as a role model and global marketing icon. Of course the argument was that he merely kept his thoughts to himself in the service of Nike profitability.

I thought we offered Fowler $17 million over two years, no opt-out? Even if it (Sox theoretical offer) was $20 million and two years (and no opt-out again), the Cubs' offer would be more attractive since he's guaranteed to be getting $13 million for the Cubs and is VERY unlikely to end up getting less than $7 million next season, unless he's injured or just has a terrible season as a complementary player within a potentially dynamic offense.

Apologizing then will be perceived as an admission of guilt. No matter what you do as an athlete, you're going to be open to interpretation or those with a political agenda when you have words on a screen and no other context for them. If it was said in the tone of "why can't we all just get along?" it would lend itself to a different frame or reference...not joking exactly, but more irreverent humor. Versus..."white people are always being forced to justify their actions/awards are not considered based solely on merit" way of looking at things.

I guess the "politically correct" interpretation or BLM one would be that years of systemic and endemic Hollywood racism (as well as sexism) have forced this discussion into the public spotlight. Obviously, Chris Rock probably added some fuel to the fire as well, the boycott of the Selma director to focus on issues in Flint, etc. It's also the kind of statement that fits into the narrative of "why don't African-Americans feel welcomed by the sport of baseball...?"

QUOTE (SCCWS @ Feb 28, 2016 -> 08:24 PM) A team that spent the majority of the season w Flowers, Sanchez, Saladino and Avi in your everyday lineup was a good team???? That is half of your lineup in the field. 3 of the 4 will not return to their position from last year and 90% of the fans want the 4th one replaced. Agreed that guys like LaRoche, Alexei and to some extent Melky did not perform but the rest of the lineup were not ML quality starting players. Don't forget Gillaspie as well. He was the original starter at 3rd. Not to mention Olt, Micah Johnson, Beckham, Bonifacio and Davidson...and then one of the few bright spots in terms of younger players, Trayce Thompson, was traded away. Davidson and Avi were supposed to be two key contributors, and their struggles have cost the White Sox quite a bit. Hahn did a good job covering up for those missed evaluations, but will it be enough now that we've run out of resources until at least mid-season?

QUOTE (Dick Allen @ Feb 28, 2016 -> 02:37 PM) Funny how you were against giving up,draft picks and anything more than 3 year contracts earlier this offseason. Of course that is when everyone assumed Gordon to the White Sox was likely. Wanted to wait until June to sign Desmond. Wanted to give Latos $10-12 million, wanted to give Parra $8 million, even though he hasn't shown he can hit in the AL, and wanted no part of Fowler and the draft pick, pointing out without realizing he has spent a season in the AL, that he would be a good candidate not to be able to adjust. Waiting to June for Desmond would have made sense, but obviously he and his agent didn't want to take the risk of sitting out two months. It would have saved the Sox even more money, but, alas, not to be. When I wrote that about Latos, Kennedy had just signed for $70 million, Leake, Happ, etc., and nobody had access to his medical reports. Can you guarantee as of today he's going to provide anything positive (let's say an improvement on Shark's numbers) to the White Sox this season? Nobody knows, same with Rollins. His value might be more from mentoring Anderson than anything else, for all we know. (Of course, that's a pretty darned expensive coach/mentor.) Besides, if the White Sox are in need of financial savings, signing Desmond for $8 million, not signing Latos and Rollins, and not spending $2 million on the draft would have had the same net effect financially ($6 million overall cost). As a reminder, Desmond is the same guy who's in the Top 5 in war for MLB shortstops over the past four seasons. It still would be logical enough (signing him for one year) because of the fact that he's likely to end up with another QO from the Rangers to recoup that lost pick...and with the lack of talent on next year's market, and with his ability to put up huge offensive numbers in Texas, there's a very good chance he can make up at least part of what he lost financially turning down $107 million over 7 years. What it would essentially mean is that he needs to get $90 million for 5 years next off-season. That's not completely unrealistic if he can prove his defensive ability to play in the outfield and also ends up playing extensively at SS or 2B in case of an injury. In the end, we were in a great position to sign at least one of Jackson and Desmond...

Being a fan of Iowa is similar to being a fan of the White Sox... Whenever things are going really well, the bottom seems to fall out. This happened two years ago, although at that time fans probably believed with Aaron White and Marble on the roster that that particular squad was superior to this year's. Uthoff is the only player who has a future NBA career on the roster right now. Oh, well. The runs in football and basketball were nice while they lasted. After starting out 9-3 and losing to Iowa State (granted, we were up 20 in Ames), Dayton and ND (two more pretty good teams), most Iowa fans were expecting to barely eke out a tourney appearance and more likely the NIT. Just goes to show how much momentum, confidence and only having two consistent scorers in Uthoff and Jok can allow opponents to game plan and adjust. Iowa could find their 3 point range and smothering defense again, but it feels like it will be hard to reverse this trend. 2-3 weeks ago, McCaffrey was National Coach of the Year. Now we're in danger of finishing behind Wisconsin and Ohio State. And it's not like we're getting blown out, we had OSU and Wisconsin both down 6 late but couldn't close. There haven't been any terrible losses, other than at Penn State, but the collective psyche of the fanbase is a bit of a mess right now. They've gone from getting #1 votes for the first time since 1986-87 and a Big Ten championship to also-ran status, seems they just couldn't handle the pressure of expectations.

QUOTE (hi8is @ Feb 28, 2016 -> 02:39 PM) Desmond or the 27th pick, Latos, and Rollins... Pretty even but I think I'd side with the route we ended up taking and still have faith that we'll be adding another OF bat vi trade. Who do we realistically have to trade outside our top three that will net an impact bat? Sure, there are obviously many Jay Bruce, Carlos Gonzalez and Ethier types out there...and problem is they all bump the payroll up $12-18 million. About the only real 3-4 war "younger" impact bat on the market was the Marlins' Ozuna...and that acquisition isn't going to come from Tier B/C prospects cobbled together.

QUOTE (venom4789 @ Feb 28, 2016 -> 02:28 PM) So how have the last few players worked out for us that we got from the nationals. Plus its only a one year contract, you lose a pick and are hoping he can adjust to a new league and new position. Appears i am in the minority but i am glad we didnt offer the one year deal to him. We should only trade for DBacks' players because of Eaton and Quentin, by that argument. The other factor is the need for that superutility type of player who can fill in all over the place like a Zobrist. It's hard to say Rollins/Saladino, Garcia and LaRoche are all foolproof plans for the coming season at those three positions, and Lawrie has been injury-prone as well. If the Sox are so tight with finances, sell it to the fans as only a $6 million impact on finances, saving that $2 million and more than likely getting it back again next year. Overall, I'd still take Desmond over the combination of Latos and Rollins because we just don't know how Latos' knee is going to hold up. If someone could guarantee 25+ starts from Latos at a sub 4.75 ERA, then my argument starts to become much more debatable.

QUOTE (ptatc @ Feb 28, 2016 -> 02:18 PM) Yes but spending money on free agents and losing draft picks is one of the primary causes of the poor farm system. If you truly want a good farm system then you don't want them to sign free agents. Except it's a little bit late for that philosophy change after addressing quite a few of the issues on the major league roster...and also not having the position player depth (other than Anderson) to realistically fill those remaining holes over the next two seasons. At that time, we'll have to fill even more holes without buying free agents at the highest prices and/or running into budget limitations.

http://sportsday.dallasnews.com/texas-rang...s-josh-hamilton For what it's worth, Desmond will play LF for the Rangers. That configuration for the Sox probably pushes Cabrera to RF and Garcia off the field. The last paragraph is the key point. Fowler and Desmond will be playing with renewed determination to secure a big payday after missing out this year. How will Avi respond? From another perspective, the real cost of Desmond is only $6 million because they're saving $2 million on the draft pick and are 100% in win now mode with the Angels leaving an opening by whiffing on the offseason.

Ian Desmond > Injured Latos, last legs Rollins We'll find out soon enough who was right. And, yet another AL team has improved their positioning. We have the injury-prone nature of Josh Hamilton to thank for this one. Not too late for Jackson, but since he just turned down $5-6 million and Boras is his agent...

Alex Rios is still available...Brian Anderson or Mackowiak? ErstUd?

QUOTE (LDF @ Feb 28, 2016 -> 08:16 AM) this is a great question. i never in favor of signing any of the top 4 elite fa's. i wanted or hoped that the sox could have use or max the money they would have spent, to fix this team. i believe i have stated this several times before,i also hope that the sox would spend to the limit of 140-150, with the idea of 28+ mil coming off the books at the end of the yr. now the acct part of the owners budget is or will be done by the experts that they hire, accountants. i had a hard time approving the idea of signing fowlers, but if the price was right, go for it. the idea was to improve this team. while at the same time let the farm improve as well. this would have been a steep price b/c of the comp pick and the yrs it would to make him happy. now part of this is hindsight, i thought something like 12-15 yrs for 3 yrs, and opt clause after 2yr. i am also adamant on blowing thru the int'l signing and get as many prospects in the system for future use. the sox needs backup players for players with the idea of "what happen if they do not develop as hope" now i use the reason of the horrible managing by the FO that got the sox in this state, esp in the draft picks. remember the draft picks are prospects and up to several yrs ago, this farm is vacant on elite prospects. back to your question, i really like a jack as the final piece, i also would sign sminon-sp. those are the only 2 left that i would love to be on the team. so far hahn as done a great job of fixing this team, all i am saying is finish the job. They're not going to add both Simon and Latos, but there is definitely an argument for Parra as well as Denard Span and of course Jackson still...none of those three came with draft pick compensation attached.

QUOTE (soxfan2014 @ Feb 28, 2016 -> 08:08 AM) Pods, Contreras and Vizcaino weren't second or third tier free agent signings for what it's worth. Contreras was, in the sense that we felt he was vastly undervalued...received a significant financial subsidy over a multi-year commitment and sold high on Loiaza as well. It worked exactly like a second tier signing for a first-tier talent. Pods was coming off a disappointing sophomore season and they simply wanted to dump Lee's salary and redistribute it over multiple players. Or you could just argue Politte and Contreras came from the scrap heap...since Cashman dumped him largely because of the Red Sox owning him in some key head to head match-ups in 2003 and 2004.

QUOTE (greg775 @ Feb 27, 2016 -> 10:06 PM) The Clintons have it made. As you pointed out they have the black vote. Just like Barack had it, she's got it as much or perhaps even more. Bernie's beaten and once it's Hillary vs. Donald, Donald is gonna get smoked. I wonder if his ego will be able to handle a very very difficult task vs. Hillary. Is Donald in it for when the going gets tough? I know I constantly express my disdain for Hillary. Seriously though, could her advisers tell her to work on her delivery? Screaming into the mic is very annoying to me at least. http://www.salon.com/2016/02/25/im_not_a_s...ina_fundraiser/ You will enjoy this at least...