caulfield12

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Jan 10, 2015 -> 09:44 AM) A lot of people who know the history of the man actually didn't quite like how they portrayed him, they supposedly went overboard on the "awkward genius" level with Turing but most people seem to suggest that he was a much more sociable person than portrayed. http://www.slate.com/blogs/browbeat/2014/1...lan_turing.html More Sherlock than Turing.

Crusades? Inquisition? The Catholic Church's passive approach to Hitler? Haven't millions more in the world died in the name of Christian causes? Is every American responsible for stopping McVeigh, Koresh, militia groups, the KKK etc.? These entities were all fighting "terroristic" wars in the name of religion and anti-government beliefs, yes? What about Fred Phelps' church or Rev. Terry Jones?

QUOTE (Douglas Rome @ Jan 10, 2015 -> 04:06 AM) we're not forgetting that Rios sucked couldn't hit his way out of a paper bag? How many guys has the Sox gave lots of money to and they were total slugs? Rios, Kipling, Manny, Dunn, the list goes on. I can't get it out of my mind that the big dummy is sitting in Texas on 54 million bucks. thanks, douglas Rudyard? Rios was a waiver claim. The Blue Jays were the ones to give him that money. He performed well in 2010 and 2012.

QUOTE (LDF @ Jan 9, 2015 -> 04:45 PM) i just saw Imitation Game. i really like it. it is a docu type of a movie. the problem i am having with it, i can't think if the main male actor was over acting or not. i can't think b/c i like the move that much. the female main lead was great in this movie. for me it is a 5 out of 5 type of movie. Benedict Cumberbatch. Kiera Knightley. Brilliant actor. Right now, I'd say it's going to come down to the pr spin war between MLK/Selma and this film for the Oscar. The Imitation Game glosses over Alan Turing's homosexuality and shameful demise which was just recently rectified sixty years too late by the British government. MLK does the same with his indiscretions to focus primarily on the historical achievements. Dr. Turing should be accorded a position as one of the five most important figures of the 20th century but he's barely a footnote in some textbooks. Toss-up. I'll go Selma Better overall film.

Last hour of American Sniper was much better. Would put it at #9-10. On to Still Alice, for which Julianne Moore is getting a lot of attention leading to next Thursday's Academy Award nomination announcements.

Inherent Vice is worth checking out...its a mix of aa Franco/Rogen stoner flick with the time period perfectly evoked. I ca say it made my yearly top 10 but it was darned close. Waterston is a revelation (a cross between a young Helen Hunt and Jennifer Lawrence). Phoenix continues to be one of the underrated acors of his generation when paired with the right director. Definitely the type of flick you need to watch again to fully appreciate. American Sniper is good so far....but there is so much controversy over the type of person Chris Pyle really was that I can't quite reconcile it with Bradley Cooper's portrayal. It shouldn't be used as recruiting propaganda. Movies like Lone Survivor or Black Hawk Down (even the hurt locker or zero dark 30) are much more realistic and nuanced. Pyle as a person is too one-dimensional...while that's what is needed for battlefield survival it doesn't necessarily make for compelling narrative.

QUOTE (Heads22 @ Jan 8, 2015 -> 11:23 PM) Why doesn't Olaseni play more? He's played his two best career games in a row. The North Florida coach that questioned the team's toughness said "he's a beast" and gave him the highest amount of props of any player on Iowa. And he makes almost all of his foul shots, which is unusual for a big man. McCaffrey said they didn't do a good job feeding him in the post in the 2nd half...so it always goes back to guard play, and the lack of a consistent 3 point threat now. (And the fact that Trice was like 8/9 from 3, unguarded or poorly guarded half the time and they just shot the lights out, better than most teams would in pre-game warm-ups with no defenders). That and the fact that they keep waiting for Woodbury to put it altogether. It reminds of the same situation with Jared Reiner a decade earlier, highly-touted and heavily recruited big men that haven't developed as expected at Iowa after showing early promise. Melsahn Basabe peaked his freshman year. Olaseni, to the coaching staff's credit, has come a long way and has an outside shot at making an NBA roster as the final man off the bench if he finds the right team. So now 1-14 in their last 15 against MSU. SIGH. Iowa has probably blown 12-15 big games in the last 2 1/2 seasons when they held double-digit halftime leads. Now they get Minnesota on the road, OSU and at Wisconsin. Lucky to get one win in three out of that schedule, which is why starting 3-0 would have been so huge. Oh, well. Getting thoroughly used to disappointment with football and basketball these days.

QUOTE (raBBit @ Jan 8, 2015 -> 12:27 PM) Birmingham and the White Sox have the longest marriage of any MLB team and an affiliate IIRC. Charlotte is a remarkable minor league team and stadium. Beautiful park, great hitters environment and a great city. I am not going to jump on the "MLB team to Charlotte bandwagon" but the city is flourishing. Charlotte is a serious stronghold for the healthcare industry and as you can see by the pictures above, their skyline is surprisingly impressive. Both Charlotte and Raleigh have some of the fastest population growths in the country. Really great to have an affiliate there even if the Sox don't have any tangible stake in the business. I know I have heard both Jordan Danks and Axelrod refer to it as "the best place in the minors to play." Don't forget the banking/financial services sector, Bank of America, etc. I always felt like Atlanta, Charlotte and Nashville were the best, most progressive and cosmopolitan cities for a transplanted Yankee, not counting FL and TX as the South.

Speaking of time travel, has anyone see Predestination (the movie)? Looks like it might be worth checking out. Have watched the first two episodes of Agent Carter. The 40's/50's feel is cool (especially the fact that she's perceived as a glorified secretary by the men whereas the audience knows the truth) but I'm not really into it yet. Maybe it's because that Chad Michael Murray seems like he belongs more on a 90210 or The Hills spinoff. At least we're getting the Jarvis origin story, but we need more Stark and less apartment shopping/roommate banter.

QUOTE (Brian @ Jan 8, 2015 -> 07:23 PM) Yup. UNBREAKABLE was good, every thing else blah. And Signs until the last 15 or 20 minutes. Some of his later efforts such as The Lady in the Water and especially The Last Airbender were brutal.

QUOTE (pittshoganerkoff @ Jan 7, 2015 -> 04:40 PM) http://tvline.com/2015/01/07/person-of-int...hahi-interview/ The whole behind-the-scenes story of this week's Person of Interest/Edge of Tomorrow-ish episode.

QUOTE (Brian @ Jan 8, 2015 -> 04:35 AM) My Top Ten Movies of 2014: 10. Locke 9. Foxcatcher 8. Nightcrawler 7. Birdman 6. Chef 5. Life Itself 4. Captain America 2: Winter Soldier 3. Gone Girl 2. Snowpiercer 1. Whiplash Haven't seen Selma, Inherent Vice, American Sniper, Big Eyes, some others. Am going to watch American Sniper later tonight. Wild, Two Days/One Night, Obvious Child and A Most Violent Year are also on the list, as well as the last Hobbit movie. It sucks here in China because we JUST got Night at the Museum 3 (sigh) and Hunger Games won't come out until February. There's quite a bit of interest in 50 Shades of Grey but that movie will never make it past the censors in the mainland. No BOYHOOD? Finally, "Frank Jodorowsky's DUNE" is way out there but a must-see for anyone who loves film. 1. Selma 2. Boyhood 3. Snowpiercer 4. Whiplash 5. Captain America 6. Chef 7. Birdman 8. Gone Girl 9. Foxcatcher 10. The Taking of Tiger Mountain (Chinese movie, Tsui Hark) I haven't seen The Imitation Game yet either, that would PROBABLY go into the Top 10 from everything I've read. Also, Love is Strange is a nice little indie dramedy with John Lithgow and Alfred Molina as a couple who get separated by circumstances after waiting 20 years to get married. Marisa Tomei cameo.

QUOTE (ptatc @ Jan 7, 2015 -> 10:28 PM) I'm not a fan of people using this as a reason for the HOF. It's the hall of fame for the best players not the best left fielders or best leadoff men or best third baseman. I happen to agree that he belongs in based on being a great player not necessarily ranked by position. For the first half of his career, he was the second best leadoff hitter and one of the most impactful players of his time. If you grew up in the 80's and 90's, Rickey Henderson AND Raines (Vince Coleman and Willie Wilson to a much lesser extent) defined the "speed" game. It's a shame by the time he played for the White Sox he wasn't the same as in his peak years, when he could change a game's complexion single-handedly.

QUOTE (NorthSideSox72 @ Jan 7, 2015 -> 08:00 AM) There is a very in-depth 2014 MiLB attendance report available out there now, which is like 150 pages long. But some highlights for Sox clubs... --Charlotte Knights led all of minor league baseball in attendance, both total and per game --Birmingham Barons led the Southern League in attendance. Even more amazing, their attendance actually went up in the 2nd year of their new stadium, and they had the 6th largest per-game jump in baseball --Winston-Salem Dash continue to draw well, they were 2nd in the Carolina League --Kannapolis Intimidators continue to be middle-ground in the SAL attendance-wise, which is actually pretty good considering their stadium is not very new and they compete with nearby Charlotte --Great Falls is on the lower end of the Pioneer League, in fact they had their lowest attendace since the 60's. Another older stadium. --AZL Sox are non-rev and do not track attendance Here is the full report. Some cool historical info too. Overall, that's a pretty darn good performance, with the three highest level teams all drawing quite well, and another managing to be average-ish in an older stadium and a tough market. New stadiums help. Kanny is just kind of a "blah" mid 90's cookie-cutter minor league stadium. I was there once and have not one single memory sticking out in my mind about the facility. Hickory was THE team in the SAL that did really well in attendance (and they with the Sox then) in that era...along with Charleston (SC) after they built a new park. Most would argue 65-75% of minor league attendance is related to promotions and the niceties of the stadium/s (especially in the lower minors). Obviously the horrendous records of the Charlotte team recently didn't have much of an impact...3-5 years down the line, of course, the presence of top prospects and competitiveness of the team will return to being more of a factor.

Congrats to the Illini. With the Rice injury, it definitely looked like they were joining Minnesota in the unenviable 0-3 position and buried early. MD probably was a bit overconfident they could just walk in and ILL would roll over. No easy wins in the Big 10 on the road, except for maybe Penn State. Now, let's go Hawkeyes and finally win a HUGE home game against MSU. Aaron White is 0-7 on his career (against the Spartans), and unless they win tonight, they don't play again unless it's the B10 Tourney in March. And imagine the Badgers with Uthoff, too? Of course, Iowa would be even better with Tyler Ulis in their backcourt, too. Finally, STEVE ALFORD still sucks.

QUOTE (Douglas Rome @ Jan 8, 2015 -> 02:07 AM) 20 homers, are you saying a 20 homer guy is a home run hitter? I say no way, a 40 homer guy is home run hitter, but not 20. thanks, douglas Ten years ago, no way. Now....20-25, pretty close. Although in today's environment, I think 27.5 or even 30+ is the magic number to be considered a "home run hitter."

Bring back Beckham. Thanks, Caulfield Actually, the major problem's going to be if Eaton is injured...which would pull Bonifacio off 3B and the Gillaspie split. Of course, one would assume if it's a major injury they would have another OF in Charlotte to bring up, along the lines of Danks, Shuck or Campana. But are any of those three a better option than Bonifacio? Perhaps they would prefer Saladino splitting time with Conor and playing Emilio in CF in that situation.

Whiplash was simply excellent (albeit uncomfortable at times) with a Supporting Actor nomination due for JK Simmons and possibly one for Miles Teller (will believe it when I see it). Selma, as mentioned above, happens to have the advantage of being incredibly timely to revisit and one of the best "historical" films in ages...right there above Spielberg's Lincoln. The recent trend of taking one slice of history to encapsulate a person instead of doing a 3+ hour biopic seems to be catching on with screenwriters/producers. Will be incredibly shocked if Oweleyo doesn't win the Oscar for portraying MLK so well. About the only criticism I've seen of this film so far has been the historical accuracy of ANYONE really standing up in a confrontational manner to LBJ in that way. Supposedly, the FBI tapes say it never happened. But it definitely makes for a better, more dramatic script. But back to MLK and Whiplash's "Tiger Mentor/Conductor" Terrence Fletcher...the actors absolutely inhabit those roles to the point where they become someone else and you almost forget you're watching a performance. With Foxcatcher, you can never quite separate yourself from Carell, Tatum and Ruffalo, as a counterexample.

QUOTE (Jake @ Jan 3, 2015 -> 08:36 AM) I've known several guys throughout my time in baseball who learned to ID offspeed pitches, but for whatever reason still had little ability to be disciplined on them. They'd be tickled s***less that they recognized the curveball, so they would swing without even realizing it was an unhittable location. I do wonder what level he'll start at in 2015. A+ would still seem appropriate, but it's hard to imagine any team having a player of his caliber repeat that level a third time. That's especially true when considering how small the SAL is. Carolina League?

Iowa with the nice road win over Ohio State. They've already lost to Texas, Syracuse, Iowa State (massacre) and flopped against UNI at a neutral site. On the other hand, they've already gotten two big victories at North Carolina and OSU. IF IF IF Uthoff can keep building his confidence and they could take down Nebraska and Michigan State at home...a 3-0 start would go a long ways towards an NCAA berth. With the way they played against ISU and UNI, that didn't seem possible a week ago.

QUOTE (greg775 @ Dec 28, 2014 -> 09:06 PM) I think his bullpen management was great. He would pick a closer and go with them until it was obvious they had to be replaced. Not crazy of all the situational lefty/righty crap, but it's not Robin. All managers do it way too early in games. I was incensed that game he ran out of pitchers. Hope that never happens again. But Robin's bullpen management was fine. He had one of the worst collection of pitchers to work with, expecially the few lefty hacks he was provided. Were you equally incensed with Ozzie Guillen when Pablo Ozuna would have had to relieve Mark Buehrle in the World Series had the game gone on any longer? Sometimes situations like that can happen...especially when the relievers who come in early simply fail to get the job done.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Dec 28, 2014 -> 09:00 PM) Way to miss the forest for the trees. I am equating taking the same "profession" and asking them to do two completely different things within that profession. Tex is a middle school teacher. Asking him to teach K on a moments notice is akin to asking your middle reliever to close. Having taught high school and university my entire life, I actually did go into this exact situation in South Korea in a KG/hagwon just to see if I could do it. It wouldn't have been very easily without a South Korean assistant teacher to help manage the kids. Having your own classroom in a situation where they don't understand you well in their 2nd language would be darned-near impossible. In hindsight, it was challenging because there is that assumption that "teachers can teach anything/anyone" and that's simply not true. There are teachers with great content knowledge who fail to communicate or instruct, and great classroom managers and motivators who are lacking in knowledge. In the end, to go back to the middle reliever changing to a closer role comparison...it takes a LOT more energy. 20-30 minutes with those kids is like 2-3 hours with high school or univ students. The amount of preparation and the need to vary your instruction (or you will completely lose the students' attention) is something an "adult" teacher would never be ready for. Most good middle relievers can't close. Most high school or uni teachers can't teach KG effectively.

QUOTE (Brian @ Dec 28, 2014 -> 06:49 AM) Want to see Selma, Inherent Vice, American Sniper, Big Eyes, and a Most Violent Year before i make my top 10 list. Doubt anything replaces my current #1. Big Eyes is coming out of the gate as a bit of a disappointment. Am really looking forward to American Sniper, though. Selma seems to be on nearly every single Top 5 list out so far. Whiplash hopefully will get Simmons or Teller some acting nods.

Some funny moments but I'm not sure it's worth $6. Interestingly more information is coming out that the leak didn't originate in S.Korea. Maybe Sony can collect an insurance payment for a movie that was going to seriously underperform if they can blame it on foreign espionage.

They're not going to replace Ventura now. That's the kind of thing that Daniel Snyder or Donald Sterling would do. If the White Sox are a huge disappointment in 2015, he will be held accountable (presumably) unless there are major injuries.